Details are scarce, but series regular Max is joined by a handful of childlike doppelgangers and a motherly-looking pink avian pal who will no doubt guide Japanese children through the dangerous waters of English sentence structure. Despite the lingual horror, Talkman for Kids gets a safe A rating from CERO. Cruel really. Michael McWhertor

Talkman Shiki: Shabe Lingual Eikaiwa for Kids [PlayStation.jp]

London game blogger Guy Cocker over on Gamespot has posted a video of his hapless attempts to use Talkman, the new PSP travel phrasebook. If this video is true to form, the thing is worse than useless:

I've reviewed the game for the site, but I thought I should also put his original design brief to the test. Luckily, I work in a big tourist area of London, and finding a Spanish girl isn't that difficult. Watch my hapless attempts to remain a gentleman as 'how are you today?' is turned into 'do you want to come to my apartment?' by the randy blue bird.

Guy laughs it off, but propositioning strangers is a good way to get your ass kicked. I should know, I live right next to the gay neighborhood, and seeing as all the heterosexual men in Seattle look like the bastard lovechildren of John Romero and Bill Gates (which in a way, they are), I am sometimes forced to disguise myself as a drag queen and go cruising with Florian.

Whether I'm shoving my PSP into their hands or not, it always ends in runny mascara, hurt feelings, and a spike heel embedded in someone's back.

Thanks for the tip, Carrie! Eliza Gauger

See Guy's video here [Gamespot]

Imagine you are in a bar in Hamburg. You're watching your team in the World Cup. The guy next to you is spouting off something in a language you don't understand. You're feeling xenophobic worldly and want to cuss him out chat. What do you do?

Bust out your PSP with TalkMan software and expand your horizons. The software was released in Japan last year, but a new version dropped in Europe last week. It has been updated to include German, French, Italian and Spanish as well as English and Japanese. A cartoon bird character named Max wants folks through the basic expressions. Something tells me that Max will not be covering words football fans are dying to use. Brian Ashcraft

More Here [Cool Hunting]
Previously: Eavesdrop on Crecente's Wife [Kotaku]

You see, my wife mostly grew up in Australia, but was born in Italy and her mother is Swiss, so the two of them have a lot of conversations in French and other languages. While this doesn't typically bother me, I sometimes feel like the family dog. I'll be minding my own business, my wife talking away to her mom on the phone in French, when suddenly I hear "Brian" and then more French. It's most disconcerting when my name is followed by lots of laughter and the word "Oui" repeated like a dozen times.

Talkman Coming to Europe [Gamebrink]

PSP411 has a hands-on review up of Talkman for the Playstation Portable. The program can speak or translate Chinese, Japanese and Korean to English or the other way around. The title comes with two modes, one is just a basic program that lets you choose phrases which it translates. The other is a game designed to teach you some basic conversation world in the chosen language.

Talkman sounds intriguing, especially it's ability to hear a sentence and translate on the fly. Very cool. I have no use for this tool, but I'd love to check it out.

Talkman is a Pretty Good Tool [PSP411]

If each of these women represent their native language and culture, isn't it odd that the Japanese lady is wearing a flight attendant uniform? Nah.

Find Picture Here [Watch Impress]

PSP Vault folks hit the Sony Building in Tokyo to find out a bit more about the upcoming language translator for the Playstation Portable. The Talkman will have a library of about 3,000 sentences in four languages (English, Korean, Chinese and Japanese). It will have two modes Talk and Game. The Talk Mode will be used to translate sentences in a selected language and then say them out loud so you can "make friends with foreigners." The Game Mode will be more of a language tutor with the system grading how well you repeat phrases.

Sounds pretty cool. I hope they release a version in the U.S. I think this will be the first "non-game" to hit the PSP. I wonder if they will continue to expand in that area.

Sony PSP Talkman [PSP Vault]