I can’t help but notice that my last entry prior to this one is dated November 12th. On November 13th, two things happened: Wrath of the Lich King released, and all my projects went into crunch mode. So what better way to get back into things than with that most academic of game types, the educational title?

My Chinese Coach sounds like a great idea: learn a difficult complex language in small, simple lessons through fun games! If only the practice held up as well as the theory. I can say “hello”, “goodbye”, and “thank you” now, but learning a little vocabulary is a far cry from fluency, and there’s a long uphill climb towards that. One thousand lessons, to be exact, apparently in one long linear string.

My first problem with the game is that I don’t have a good sense of what I’m learning, and as an academic myself I’d like to know where I’m going.  But rather than question whether this game teaches well or is worthwhile for students (the general consensus seems to be that the My Language Coach games are better as refresher courses, and not for from-scratch beginners), I’d like to know why we build these games at all? What I get on the DS are the small advantages of convenience:  portability, the ability to learn at any time (but not at my own pace) without a class or teacher, and affordability (i.e., it set me back thirty bucks). What I’m missing? Any understanding of the hows and whys, and the ability to ask questions. I’m already worried about my pronunciation. I don’t know if I’m learning Mandarin, Cantonese, or Chinese itself. I don’t know if the game addresses the tonal nature of Chinese. And I don’t have anybody I can ask.

Of the two fun games I’ve unlocked, it also bears mentioning that one is a multiple-choice test, and the other is a “hit-the-gopher” word game that does more for my hand-eye coordination than my understanding of the language. Yes, sometimes it’s about repetition, so maybe I’m learning more than I think I am (all you educational research guys, let me know, please?). But it doesn’t feel like I’m getting anywhere. And I keep wondering: with all the fascinating innovations in gaming in the last decades, the best we can do is digitize our multiple choice tests? Where are the real, immersive learning games? Or is learning a foreign language – of which I’ve always heard that immersion in the culture is the best way to go about it – simply too much for current technology? Do we need AI teachers to go any farther?

As for My Chinese Coach, it was a fun thirty or forty minutes, and I can say “thank you” to my Chinese colleagues now. But like Wii Fit, I’m not sure that these first forays into the digital realm for self improvement are as helpful without a real person. And as I’m not prepared to wait for AI, I should probably sign up for a Chinese course instead.