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Sony's language software Talkman may not be selling on par with Nintendo's English Training for the DS, now in the bazillions sold, but it does okay for itself. Now, in an effort to get 'em while they're young, SCEI is releaseing Talkman Shiki: Shabe Lingual Eikaiwa for Kids for the PlayStation Portable, giving children a chance to hone their conversational English and expand their vocabulary with a series of exercises and voice controlled mini-games. It's what we call in the States "edutainment" and it usually sucks. More »
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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: More »
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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? More »
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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. More »
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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. More »
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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. More »
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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. More »
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