Games are a fun way to practice reading and get interesting Chinese input. With games, you can go at your own pace, get feedback through your in-game actions, and gather context via what’s on-screen. I recommend starting with visual novels or simple RPG games you have played previously in English. To play a game in Chinese, you either need to go into the game settings and change the language or go to your game launcher, such as Steam, and change the language from there. If you’re unsure how to change the language for a particular game, you can Google it. Some games default to your system language and require you to play through the intro before you can change the language.

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Translate Games as You Play

You’ll inevitably come across some words you don’t know, and in order to continue with the gameplay you’ll need to be able to decipher what to do. With the OCR capabilities of Google Translate, you can easily take a picture of a word or sentence you don’t understand and quickly get the translation and pronunciation. Start by opening Google Translate on your phone and press the camera button in the bottom right corner.

Next, take a picture of what you want to translate, then at the top of your screen, make sure you have it set to “original.” Showing the original text is very important, especially for Chinese, because it will allow you to copy words and select just the sections you want to translate. It is also more accurate this way.

Next, highlight the word or sentence you want to translate, and it will automatically show you a translation. If you would like to make a flashcard out of a word or sentence, you can copy it into Anki or Pleco.

Stardew Valley – $15

Stardew Valley is a cute, relaxing RPG, and it’s great reading practice for intermediate learners. It has a lot of dialogue, and you will learn the names of many everyday objects. It is $15, but it has a lot to offer, and I highly recommend it for someone who is just starting to play games in another language.

Steam Visual Novels – Freemium

Steam offers a variety of Chinese visual novels and games at different price points. Some are free to play, while others are pretty pricey. However, you should be able to find something that fits your interest and language level with how many games are available.

You can see if a game can be played in Chinese by scrolling down and looking at languages. The game in the image below has support for twelve different languages, including Chinese.

Epic Games – Freemium

The Epic Games store routinely offers free games, and you can often find interesting games for free with multilanguage support.

To see if a game can be played in Chinese, go to that game’s store page and scroll down to the specs. It will say which languages are supported all the way at the bottom.

Genshin Impact and the HoYoverse

Genshin Impact is a free RPG with thousands of hours of content. It has many interesting storylines with Chinese audio, so you can read and listen at the same time. However, it can be very difficult to understand at times due to the complex language used, so I wouldn’t recommend playing it if your Chinese is below the advanced level. MiHoYo, the studio behind Genshin Impact, also has many other games available, all originally in Chinese and free-to-play.

Multiplayer Games

Multiplayer games are very popular among language learners as they let you interact with native speakers in a natural environment. Two of the most popular multiplayer games for language learners are VR Chat and Minecraft because you can easily find servers from other countries and talk to people. For Minecraft, I highly recommend finding a group to play with over Discord, so you can have a voice call going at the same time. Other popular multiplayer games include Fortnight, Among Us, Overwatch, World of Warcraft, and League of Legends. If you already play any of these games, it’s just as simple as switching servers and possibly creating a new account, however, for some games that require fast server connections, you may have issues if you are located far away from the country of origin.

Mobile

There are many fantastic free mobile games for practicing Chinese, but they can sometimes be difficult to follow because you can’t translate the in-game text. Don’t worry, there are some great apps to help with this problem. Instant Translate for Android and iTranscreen for IOS are two great options for on-screen translation when playing mobile games.

To access more mobile games, you can also change the country in which your app store is located. Changing the country of your app store will allow you to access region-locked streaming services, games, and more.

Paper Bride Series

The Paper Bride is a series of puzzle horror games with beautiful art and phenomenal stories based on Chinese mythology. These games are great for learners new to playing games in Chinese as they provide a lot of feedback through actions, and it’s easy to go at your own pace through the dialogue.

Meridian 157

Meridian 157 is another puzzle horror series where you uncover the mystery of the lost island on the 157th Meridian. It is a fun and engaging game great for learning the names of everyday objects and following directions.

Nameless Rivers and Lakes

无名江湖 is a fun martial arts story game with lots of side quests and mini-games to keep you learning and having fun!

Wuthering Waves

Wuthering Waves is a Genshin Impact-like gacha RPG with lots of areas to explore, stories to complete, and characters to collect.

Tencent App Store

If you’re interested in discovering even more Chinese games, you can download the Tencent App Store and get Chinese games directly from there! Check out the article linked below on how to access and download Chinese apps from Tencent.