This is probably a long shot, but I was wondering if anyone would be interested in helping me make a gamified Spanish vocabulary web application.
For context I’m working on this Chinese vocab app Repository: https://github.com/GreenAnts/HSK-3.0-Study-Game Website: https://greenants.github.io/HSK-3.0-Study-Game/
I was hoping to either: a. expand it to multiple languages and beef up the actual “gameplay” to feel more gamified and less like a flashcard app - while still keeping the high vocab repetition. (someone on Lemmy recommended making it like the game “minutequest” which I was not previously familiar with, but might be a good direction) b. create a separate application all together, focused purely on Spanish.
The primary goal for the app is:
- Libre: Free and open source, easily accessible via browser, now sign-in, etc.
- Vocab focused: Not trying to “teach” the language or create yet another “duolingo” clone. I want it to feel more like an Anki deck to get high repetition of vocabulary in.
- Gamified: Too many “gamified” apps are not actually fun or even interesting in my opinion. I always have a hard time sticking with things, and I want to create something that is easy to open up and get addicted to the repetition enough to actually want to use it and start memorizing vocabulary.
Disclaimer: I have some programming experience, but I am pretty much a beginner without much work experience in the programming/IT field, and have been relying on “vibe coding” mostly to get work on these projects. While I know that is a huge turn-off, my main goal is to get the app actually created and usable - and if other experienced devs are willing to contribute, then obviously we would be able to have more maintainable infrastructure non-reliant on “ai-slop”.
Like I said, I know this is a long shot, but I figured I would reach out and try regardless. Right now I was just starting to go through and create a rough draft of vocab words (https://github.com/GreenAnts/Spanish-Vocabulary) and will try to build up a foundational JSON before kicking off the web app. If anyone is interested in contributing I would love some help :)
Also, (mostly) shameless plug for my other long term project that I am hoping to get collaborators on [https://github.com/GreenAnts/Amalgam_Webgame] - an abstract 2 player strategy board game.
Anyways, regardless - I hope everyone out there is having a good day, and staying safe in these crazy times. ✊
Hey, I am a native Spanish speaker and have been recently playing a bit with html css js but I am pretty much a noob too, I can’t promise anything but I’ll try and see if I can help. This gives me some Clozemaster vibes, I think it could be used as a reference to improve some aspects because it also focuses on vocabulary and it has that ‘gamified’ look.
(Weird - I sent a reply but now its not showing up.) I hadn’t heard of “clozemaster” but tried it out and it seems like a nice resource! The fact that it has the vocab in the context of sentences, while still only focusing on one word seems quite useful as to not learn the word in isolation.
And great, yeah as both being beginners we can stumble through it together if you like - feel free to pull request whenever you like, or however else you want to work on it. As for being a native Spanish speaker - that helps out a ton :) - I did forget to mention in the main post that I was wanting to focus on Mexican Spanish rather than Spanish from Spain, but I don’t think should matter too much because the actual vocab should be super easy to just swap in or out with new JSON data.
But yeah, if you decide to contribute (of course no pressure), I look forward to seeing some of what you come up with.
yeah, that’s really good from clozemaster because you can “guess” the meaning and context is essential (specially in sinitic languages where one character can have multiple meanings).
i’m from argentina actually so i know how mexicans speak more than a spaniard would, feel free to dm me if you have any doubts regarding spanish. i’ll try and take a look at the code this or next week.
Pretty cool projects. I played around with the Mandarin one a little. What plans do you have for these going forward?
More languages, custom vocab lists seem like they’d be good additions, but mainly I’m interested in how you plan to improve the game aspects?
I think it depends on the language, but specifically for the Spanish version I was initially brainstorming the following idea(s):
- Separating parts of speech (verbs, nouns, adverbs, etc) into different “word decks” and for each deck you play as a different character (warrior, miner, etc.). This would create some variation to keep the player interested.
- The words you are trying to guess will be above the various things that character is trying to accomplish (enemies for warrior getting killed - ore that the miner gathers - etc.) 2a. For Spanish, Verbs have multiple conjugations - so there might for example be one Large enemy you kill for the infinitive version (eg: “ser”) - and there is a bunch of his minions you must kill in succession afterwards which are the conjugations (eg: "soy). 2b. You have a health bar, and getting answers wrong takes away health. The large enemies (infinitive verbs) for example could do more damage than the conjugations.
- occasionally, other things that are not spanish words will be sprinkled in that might be little power ups or something that you can use (maybe they can be used for hints or something)
- You go through levels, gain character experience, etc. - which of course is all superfulous, but might make it feel more like the player is actually making progress - trying to get a high score.
- As you gain experience, you could upgrade the visual look of the character or unlock things.
–These are just some ideas I was brainstorming, and if I am doing this myself, it will take me a while so it would be a slow and incremental process - but I think this might be one of many possible ways to keep it vocabulary focused, while still making it feel more like a game than learning. I’d of course be open to any ideas though.
The mandarin version already made feels more like a flashcard app, with minimal gamified aspects, but I think if I was to start over on the Spanish one, I would lean more into the game feel - with more visuals and such. I think it would also be nice to add a toggle option to either type out the answer or select it with the mouse. Of course, depending on the time and effort, there are a lot of avenues to take, it just is a matter of actual implementation. Getting artists on board would be nice as well, since we wouldn’t have to rely on the Creative Commons sprites and could get a more unified theme. Probably wishful thinking, but I am thinking of best case scenario.
Sorry for the long answer, I realized I ended up rambling on a bit. :D
EDIT: I threw together a super quick mockup to kind of see how it would work out - and I’m not actually 100% sure how it would work out. . . it definitely brings to light the fact that it will need some more brainstorming. The fact that there are so many conjurations (present and past tense) complicates it a bit. I hate to have a new word for every single tense, and prefer to have them grouped so that it is easier to process, but it might be information overload with how many there are?
