蕾菲亞： 爸爸？！
塔卡： 蕾菲亞！ 你還好吧！ 太好了… 真的太好了！
蕾菲亞： 真是…. 不要哭嘛。 大家都在看呢！
塔卡： 我一直都很擔心你… 不提了， 我們回家吧！
蕾菲亞： 等， 等一下， 爸爸….

詛咒被解除之後， 村子又恢復了生力。  商店也可以從新開張啦！
你知道帕美尼山脈嗎？ 從外界通往那座山的尼爾福山谷被大地震時崩落的岩石堵住了。這樣的話就無法前往迦南了。 我奶奶住在迦南…. 要是能快點想想辦法就好了….
太好了， 太好了…. 這樣一來， 秘銀礦山又能派上用場啦！
秘銀經過專業人士的鍛造， 更會產生出特別的力量！
這樣又可以開張了！ 謝謝！
謝謝！ 我差一點深信就都要變成幽靈了。
你知道這個鎮上的秘銀礦山嗎？ 在那邊有著通向更身的秘銀入口。
應該在盡頭的牆壁周圍…. 不過我覺得害怕不敢去啊….
哇， 快看！ 解除詛咒后我的身體又恢復了活力！
我終於變得和原來一樣漂亮啦！ 哦阿啊！

um. kinda liked the way he looked as a ghost better...

西德： 幹得好！ 我就知道我不會看錯人。由於你們來使用飛空艇最合適不過了。說說我逮到迦南去吧， 我妻子還在那裡等著我呢。 拜託了！
西德加入了隊伍！

歡迎來到莫古網絡！ 在這裡可以讀到與你們4人又密切關係的人們寫來的信庫啵！你們關照的人和關心你們的人會利用莫古網絡寫信給你們， 所以遇到莫古的時候別忘了問問庫啵！

塔卡： 喲， 西德， 你也變回原來的樣子了， 真是太好了！
西德： 為了回到迦南， 我想用飛空艇撞碎堵在尼爾福山谷的岩石…你能給飛空艇裝上秘銀的船頭嗎？
塔卡： 秘銀船頭嗎…. 好！ 等我一下！  我現在就做！蕾菲亞，妳也來幫忙！

塔卡： 好了， 完成了！飛空艇就停在了小鎮的附近。
西德： 不愧是塔卡啊！ 動作總時那麼麻利。接下來用飛空艇撞碎岩石吧！

yeah! let's go crash that airship!

西德： 裝上秘銀的船頭之後， 飛空艇變得更堅固了啊！ 這樣就可以撞擊岩石了！！

Guess who decides to tag along.  I was honestly hoping for some more touching scene, but fine, let’s have Refia run away again from home without any resolution to the conflict with her and her father…

蕾菲亞： 你們好慢！
魯內斯： 蕾菲亞？！ 妳怎麼在這裡。。。 沒問題嗎？
蕾菲亞：  和水晶的約定很重要啊！ 還有我可不想就這樣成為鍛造師！ 雖然父親一直這樣培育著身為孤兒的我， 但這和約定是兩碼事。。。
魯內斯： 啊？！ 妳也是孤兒嗎？
蕾菲亞： 啊？！ 。。。 你也是嗎？
阿爾克： 我也是孤兒啊！
因克斯： 等等！ 我也是。。。
魯內斯： 水晶所召喚的我們4個人都是孤兒嗎？
西德： 噢噢。。。看樣子這是一場充滿艱險德旅程了。  我們用飛空艇去撞擊岩石吧。

So there are two terms I’m still unclear about: 不愧 and 身為.   I’m guessing the former is more of a compliment, sort of like, “You are so capable and have proven yourself whatever thing you just did”? Like, I once saw the sentence: “安美果然不愧是班長啊” or something to that effect, and I think I understand it there.  But here it’s all, “不愧是塔卡”.  So… “You have proven yourself/deserve to be to be Takka”…?

As for 身為, I just don’t understand how it’s being used in the sentence at all.  Unless, it’s supposed to be separate words?  But that doesn’t really make much sense to me either.

But you know, has it ever happened that one day, you totally don’t understand something in Chinese even though you comprehend the individual meaning of every word in the sentence, and then when you come back to it a week or month later, it suddenly makes sense?  It’s kind of like learning math; you’ll learn the all axioms and theorems and understand them, but you get to a problem, you’ll have no idea how to apply anything.  Then, and month later, after grappling with the material and feeling as if you’re still as confused as before, you can go back to a problem you remember having issues with.  Suddenly, the intuition that just wasn’t there kind of just comes to you so easily, as if it was there all along.

Not to ramble about this too long, but something my brother once told me when I was complaining about time-management or some trivial issue like that still sticks with me till now: “You feel like you have no idea how to solve the problem, and maybe that’s true, but that doesn’t mean you can’t make progress.  Just by being aware of whatever it is, your mind will constantly be aware of things to look out for, new ideas to try out, little details to improve upon,  even though you may not feel like anything’s changing.  You’ll find the solution that works for you, eventually.”  And though I have issues with being patient about these things, I do believe it’s true.   As long as I’m aware of what my questions are, eventually I’ll find out where the problem lies.  Eventually, I’ll figure it out.

Anyway…

Let’s end with my most favourite screenshot so far from this game:

egads! get it away from me!

]]> http://superlawnchair.wordpress.com/2011/10/22/saying-goodbye-part-two-%e5%8d%a1%e8%8c%b2%e6%96%af/feed/ 4 superlawnchairgirl IMG_0276 IMG_0297 IMG_0282 IMG_0312 IMG_0313 IMG_0404 http://superlawnchair.wordpress.com/2011/10/19/saying-goodbye-part-one-%e8%96%a9%e6%96%af%e5%97%af%e5%9f%8e/ http://superlawnchair.wordpress.com/2011/10/19/saying-goodbye-part-one-%e8%96%a9%e6%96%af%e5%97%af%e5%9f%8e/#comments Wed, 19 Oct 2011 02:41:01 +0000 superlawnchairgirl http://superlawnchair.wordpress.com/?p=279 ]]>
So the NPC’s here don’t really say anything too interesting, but some are still fun to see anyway.  Like the above dejected soldier.  Some give small tutorials, another hints that you should make Ingus a red mage (yeahno), and the best is probably the guy who seems to be having a midlife crisis and is thinking about switching careers.  

赤魔法師可以操縱劍和兩種魔法， 是薩斯嗯士兵所向往的職業。
因克斯！！ 我們會保護薩拉公主的！ 你就放心旅行吧！
改變角色的戰隊順序時可以通過點擊要換位的兩個角色或長按角色之後拖到對應的位置來改變。
在選項書面中還可以切換角色站在前排還是後排。只要雙擊角色或直接左右拖動就可以了。 很簡單吧。
因克斯！ 大王把你送走后一直很擔心啊！
因克斯，從小我就不是你的對手…
戰士們， 謝謝你們！ 多虧了你們我們才能獲救！
製作秘銀戒指的， 好像是卡茲斯的一對父子匠人， 我要不要也拜師呢…
傳說魔人是一千多年前被四名戰士封印的。
城左變的塔里有屠屍劍， 是對不死系的怪物很有效的聖劍。
謝謝你們！ 戰士們！ 我們都回到原先的樣子了！
居然有在空中飛行的船， 西德到底是怎麼樣的一個人啊…
魔人的封印被解除是不是和最近的大地震有甚麼關係呢…

Anyway, a maid hints that you should go see Princess Sara (“右邊的塔的最上層是公主殿下的房間。 她是哭著回來的， 去敲她的房間也沒有回應…不過要是因克斯大人的話… 您能去看看公主殿下嗎？”) and from there, you get the first goodbye: Sara and Ingus. 

對話1：
因克斯： 啓程之前， 我來向您告別。
莎拉： 如果你無論如何都要去的話， 就應該不讓我知道悄悄地離開啊。。。竟然故意來惹我落淚。。。 太過分了！ 我必須要留在父親的身邊。 其實我真的很想跟隨你一起去。。。 可是， 那樣會給你添麻煩的。。。。
因克斯： 莎拉公主殿下。。。

Screw that. I’d take Princess Awesomepants over Arc and Luneth any day.  Just saying.

對話2：
莎拉： 各位！
阿爾克： 啊， 莎拉公主殿下！
莎拉： 要保重啊！  完成旅行后一定要回來啊！
因克斯： 莎拉公主殿下！ 我一定會回到這裡！！

look at that cute smile

生詞6.2：

I should probably make a separate post and put all those technical terms (“button”, “to click”, “double-click”) together. Well… one day.

So I’ve actually already played Eternal Legacy  in English on my iTouch (I still somehow passed that stats class too…) and it’s so ridiculous that  I’d recommend it anyway even without the Chinese language option.  Well, that is, if you’re like me and enjoy playing games just to laugh at the wooden dialogue and so-bad-it-can’t-possibly-be-true voice acting.   To be fair, the game is rather pretty, considering the platform, and it’s basically FFXIII with bad character designs.  As for the Chinese… well… er… it’s in simplified. So I can’t read it for crap.   Well, okay, I can recognize half of the words, but then there are so many proper nouns that it’s really hard for me to distinguish a possibly familiar word or just some really long-winded transliteration for Algoad  (阿尔戈德).  But, if you are studying simplified, who knows, this might be a fantastic choice.  I wouldn’t know, in any case.

look at that hair and brooding expression. how could you resist a main character like that?

On the other hand, Inotia 3 (I have no idea what the first two games are about, btw) has traditional characters! Yippee!!  But I’ve only played through the first stage, so I can’t really comment so much as to how good it might be.   I will say this though; not only is the vocabulary more advanced (I think?), this will be a game that requires you to read the dialogue and actually comprehend most of it.  Which okay, if you’re playing video games to learn Chinese with, then you probably already can do it for the most part.  So you won’t have much trouble if someone’s being all, “Omagosh, the townspeople are being kept captive on the north side of town!”  But then if the game is telling you, “Don’t come back to town until you’ve collected the antlers of eight deer.  And by the way, tonight is your coming of age ceremony, don’t be late.”, there’s really no way to button mash and explore your way out of it.  And while FFIII has a nice balance of die-monster-die! and let’s-talk-townspeople-though-you-don’t-really-need-to, this game is definitely more of the lets-talk-to-townspeople.  And with far more long-winded dialogues. (Or maybe I’m just used to Luneth’s vocabulary? “你幹嘛？“ ”說甚麼呀？“ and the like.)   I mean, you could still skim I suppose, but I feel like for this game this wordy and philosophical about how all humans are truly evil at heart, you would definitely be missing out on a lot.  

On the bright side, the vocabulary is so similar to FFIII. It’s like a mini-review! I saw 泉水，恢復， 體力，狀態， 噁心， so I felt awesome being all, “I know that word! And that one too! I’m so fly!”    Anyway, if you want to check a brief look at a bit of the game’s vocabulary, I’ve typed up the character creation page for some reason or another. 

and the game's namesake looks pretty, at the very least.

So yeah, if you’re looking for other games, you could check those out.   Not sure if they’re still on sale for $1.99, but even if they’re not, they definitely won’t be FFIII’s $17.

Anyway!  Back to FFIII! Recap: evil Djinni defeated and then our heroes are suddenly transported back to… the Crystal’s Cave!

因克斯：出了甚麼事了！？
魯內斯： 哦。。。 這裡是！ 這不是水晶的洞窟嗎！

是我呼喚你們來的
你們只傳遞希望的人
被選為了光之戰士
請叫下我體內殘留的光
收下最後的希望
如果你們不接受， 這東西將會消失
所有的平衡將被破壞
而一旦你們接受了光之祝福
就能夠從其他水晶之中
獲得巨大的力量

4個人站在光芒中
感受到被賦予自己的強大使命
決心踏上徵程
去吧， 揮去黑暗
在一次讓光明降臨於世界
將水晶的光芒化為希望

去吧， 從里面的魔法陣走向外面的世界吧
光明戰士們啊！
起程吧！

Have I mentioned I love the Crystal’s epic monologues?

And now for the second Final Fantasy continuity: the moogle!    Can’t wait to see how Chocobos look in this game…

庫啵啵！
可以轉換職業了。
恭喜啦庫啵！
轉換職業之後， 就可以使用那個職業的專用能力了庫啵！
只不過， 轉換職業之後， 最開始無法在戰鬥中使出全力庫啵。
多戰鬥幾次， 熟悉了這個職業之後才能發揮出真正的能力庫啵！
請繼續努力地冒險吧， 庫啵！

Returning to Sasune Castle….

沙啦： 大家都平安回來了啊！ 因克斯！
因克斯： 莎拉公主殿下。。。您沒事就好了。
莎拉： 接下來只要去聖泉把這個指環洗淨的話， 就應該能夠解開詛咒了。。。聖泉在城的地下， 快走吧！
莎拉公主將指環扔進了聖泉。
莎拉： 這樣一來， 詛咒應該就解開了。 我們去父王那裡吧！

薩斯嗯王： 年輕人們， 謝謝！ 多虧你們拯救了大家。
魯內斯： 那我們就此告辭了。。。 為了履行光之戰士 的使命， 我們也該啓程了。
薩斯嗯王： 光之戰士？！ 因克斯啊， 你也要去嗎。。。
因克斯： 是的。。。
薩斯嗯王： 原來如此。。。 好吧。 只要你們團結來的話， 一定能夠克服各種困難吧。
魯內斯： 是， 那我們就出發了！
薩斯嗯王： 對了！ 拿上這個。  說不定會幫上你們的忙。
從薩斯嗯王那裡得到了折疊獨木舟！

生詞6.1：
呼喚; hūhuàn; to call out
殘留;cánliú; to remain, left over
一旦; yīdàn; in case/once (sth happens)
光芒; guāngmáng; rays of light
賦予; fùyú; to entrust (a task)
強大; qiángdà; large, formidable
使命; shĭmìng; mission
決心; juéxīn; determination
降臨; jiànglín; to descend to
戰士; zhànshì; fighter
轉換; zhuănhuàn; to transform
恭喜; gōngxĭ; congratulations
洗淨; xĭjìng; to wash clean
扔進; rĕngjìn; to throw into
多虧; duōkuī; thanks to, luckily
就此; jiùcĭ; and thus
告辭; gàocí; to say goodbye
履行; lǚxíng; to fulfill, to carry out
克服; kèfú; to overcome, to conquer
折疊; zhédié; to fold
獨木舟;  dúmùzhōu; canoe

with your powers combined, I am... CAPTAIN PLANET

Not a lot of new words, honestly, so just consider this more reading practice.

莎拉： 因克斯！ 你沒事吧！
因克斯：  公主殿下！  之后請交給我們。  請您會城吧！
蕾菲亞： 回去之前將秘銀指環借給我們吧！
莎拉： 不， 我也要和你們一起去！ 我也是為了幫助大家， 為了封印魔人來到這裡的！
魯內斯： 真是個不聽話的公主殿下啊。。。 怎麼辦？
蕾菲亞： 因克斯好好的保護好公主就行了吧！
因克斯：  那是當然了。
莎拉： 謝謝大家了！ 請多關照！ 啊， 對了， 想和我說話的時候點擊右上的圖標就可以了哦。不要忘記了啊， 我們出發吧！

莎拉： 雖然我只身一人來到了這裡， 其實我很害怕的。。。謝謝你， 因克斯。。。
因克斯： 哪裡。。。 我一個人甚麼也沒作成。

莎拉：  哦對了， 我來給你們講解存儲和中斷吧。存貯就是保存冒險了的進程。 我們可以隨時從存儲好的記綠中斷續遊戲， 不過只能在世界地圖面中進行存儲。 “中斷” 有自動中斷和手動中斷兩種方式。 自動中斷時不進行任何操作也會自動保存進度。手動中斷可以自己選擇中斷的時機。手動中斷在洞窟和村鎮中也能夠進行保存。 但是， 從中斷的記綠開始遊戲的話， 之前被紀律的存檔就會被消去。 一定要注意啊。

莎拉： 我叫莎拉， 你呢？
魯內斯： 我叫魯內斯！
莎拉： 請多照顧， 魯內斯！

莎拉： 在那裡！ 魔人， 你覺悟吧！ 我要用這個指環把你封印！。。。唉， 怎麼回事！ 怎麼甚麼都沒有發生！！
魔人： 哈哈哈哈哈哈！  我已經重新得到了黑暗力量！ 那種東西已經起不了作用啦！

莎拉： 看我的！ 這次你給我覺悟吧！
魔人： 噢噢噢噢噢噢噢！

魯內斯： 怎麼覺得有點不對勁。
因克斯：公主殿下！ 您回城去吧， 我們不會有事的！
莎拉： 大家是怎麼回事！？ 因克斯！！ 不要消失啊！

生詞5.1：
交給; jiāogěi; to hand over
請多關照; qǐngduōguānzhào; please treat my kindly
存貯; cúnzhù; to keep in storage
保存; bǎocún; to preserve
冒險;  màoxiǎn; to take risks, adventure
進程;  jìnchéng; process
隨時; suíshí; at any time
自動; zìdòng; automatic
手動; shǒudòng; manual
操作; cāozuò; to operate
進度; jìndù;  degree of progress
存檔; cúndàng; to save a file
消去; xiāoqù; to eliminate
覺悟; juéwù; awareness
重新;  chóngxīn; once again
不對勁;  bùduìjìn; fishy
消失; xiāoshī; to disappear

Ahhh! I’m experiencing that whole, “haven’t studied Chinese for a while, having trouble getting back into the swing of things” feeling.  Because now it feels more like a game of catch-up then actually moving forward.

I just have issues with learning vocabulary, really.   Not in that I have a bad memory, but there’s a thirteen-year old, SparkNote-addled girl in me that believes there’s some magically quick way to retaining bunches on vocabulary that I just haven’t discovered yet.  (I mean, I did once learn 200+ Chinese words in two hours for my final, but those were special special circumstances where I don’t even remember half the words I forced into my head anymore).   Which is fine and all, optimism and ambition are wonderful things, but the problem is that idea sometime actually prevents myself from actually starting, because I’m so determined to figure out that perfect method so I can the most uber-fantastic-sparkling-perfection-of-efficiency when I do begin.

But if there’s anything I’ve learned, it’s that you just you honestly won’t know what study methods will work for you until you actually just start studying.   From there, you refine and tweak; from there, you’ll start thinking, “oh, maybe I can organize my thoughts this way”, from there, you can start being creative.  But until you’re actually in the midst of doing it, how will you be able to figure out what works?  Even if I have to fall back on the boring, write the characters several times over until muscle memory kicks in method, it’s still progress, isn’t it?

It’s an obvious lesson that many many others have already talked about, as seen here and here,  but it’s also one I tend to forget a lot.

生詞4.1
秘銀頭盔；mìyín tóukuī; mythril helmet
治療；zhìliáo; to cure (i.e. Cure)
催眠； cuīmián; hypnosis (i.e. Sleep)
青銅拳套；qīngtóngquántào; bronze fist sheath (Original Eng: Bronze Knuckes)
不死鳥之尾 ；bùsǐniǎozhīwěi; undying bird’s tail (Original Eng: Phoenix Down)

Anyway, it’s time to meet the pretty boy of the game.  I mean, look at the Bieber hair.

為薩斯嗯王所效忠的士兵
因為當時不在城中
而幸運地躲過了魔人的詛咒
對於下落不明的莎拉公主
他感到非常擔心

對話1:
因克斯：城里的人因為魔人的詛咒都變成了幽靈的樣子。雖然用秘銀指環就可以解開詛咒但是卡茲斯期的鎮上似乎也是同樣的情況。。。 我雖然為因外出而躲過一劫， 可是到底應該怎麼樣才好呢
蕾菲亞： 我是卡茲斯的鐵匠的女兒。 我父親所做的指環應該在國王陛下手裡。
阿爾克： 我們是來向國王陛下借指環的。 拜託， 請讓我們和國王大人見上一面！
因克斯： 原來是這麼回事。。。 我帶你們去見國王。  你們跟著我就好了。

生詞4.2
效忠; xiàozhōng; to swear fealty to
士兵; shìbīng; solder
幸運; xìngyùn; fortunate
躲; duǒ; to hide, to dodge
對於; duìyú; regarding
下落不明; xiàluòbùmíng; unaccounted for, missing
情況; qíngkuàng; circumstances
劫;  jié; calamity
到底; dàodǐ; finally, in the end
陛下; bìxià; your majesty

The NPC’s always give some good reading review. 

“寶想發現了屠尸劍！ 怪物突然出現了！”
“有沒有解除魔人詛咒的方法呢？”
“我很擔心大王莎拉公主， 但這副樣子也甚麼都不做了”
“啊。。。 這個國家的人是怎麼回事。。。”
“如果不是這樣子， 我就可以打敗魔人了的說。。”
“城佐的塔里有屠屍劍， 是對不死系的怪物很有效的聖劍。”
“封印的洞窟內的怪物是被暗之力操縱的不死系。 用治療魔法能對其造成傷害。”
“右邊的塔的最上層是公主殿下的房間。  為了能隨時迎接 公主的歸來， 我每天都在打掃。如果是因克斯大人的話， 可以隨便進來呢。”

對話2:
薩斯嗯王：由於魔人的詛咒， 大家都變成了這副樣子
因克斯： 莎拉公主殿下她！ 不會是被魔人給搶走了吧？！
薩斯嗯王： 啊， 我的莎拉啊。。。 魔人應該在從這里向北的封印的洞窟里。。。
因克斯：陛下， 我也和它們一起去， 我要去救莎拉公主殿下！
薩斯嗯王： 所得好， 因克斯！ 你們也沒問題吧？
蕾菲亞： 當然了！ 倒不如說和他們兩個一起感覺更不可靠。。。＊
魯內斯： 說甚麼呢！ 不過確實又城裡得士兵和我們一起救更又把握 了。。
因克斯加入了隊伍！
薩斯嗯王： 封印得洞窟里還有密道， 我記得， 骨頭時打開密道的關鍵。。。拜託了， 因克斯。 也拜託你們這些年輕人， 封印魔人， 拯救大家吧！

*Refia’s original line: “Of course not! His sword is worth twice that of these two.”  And oh, it’s so true.

生詞4.3
打敗; dǎbài; to defeat
屠屍劍; túshījiàn; slaughter corpse sword (Original Eng: Wightslayer. I like ‘slaughter corpse sword’ better.)
有效; yǒuxiào; effective
聖; shèng; holy
操縱; cāozòng; to operate, to control
殿下;  diànxià; your majesty
歸;  guī; to return, to go back to
打掃;  dǎsǎo; to clean
搶走; qiǎngzǒu; to snatch
不可靠; bùkěkào; unreliable
骨頭; gǔtou; bone
拯救; zhěngjiù; to rescue

So wow. I got the whole place down with just one post. That never happens.

It’s gonna all go down next dungeon, isn’t it.

Anyway, I’ve added a Script page, which is basically a collection of all the dialogue I’ve bothered to type up.   If you feel up to the challenge of full-on immersion without my random commentary, or just need a quick refresher, check it out.  And if you’ve been studying along with me up until now (Anyone? Anyone at all?), then you’ll actually to be able to read and comprehend it all!  Whoohoo!

Nope, it’s…

Cid!  Now known as 西德。

對話二:
西德： 我叫西德， 是從迦南來到這裡的。 不過尼爾福山谷被巨大的岩石堵住了去路， 沒辦法回去了。。。所以來這個鎮上求宿一晚， 真是落魄啊， 阿阿！
阿爾克： 魯內斯！ 想想辦法幫助這個鎮上的人們吧？
西德：對了， 我可以把我的飛空艇借給你們。 應該能派上用場吧？據說擁有秘銀指環的話， 就能解開詛咒。 不過這個鎮子上似乎沒有。。。塔卡雖然能夠製作這個指環但是塔卻變成了幽靈。。。 他的女兒也不直到去了哪裡。。。飛空艇藏在西邊的沙漠里。拜託了， 幫我們想想辦法吧。 直接點擊飛空艇就可以進行乘降了。這一點其他的交通工具也一樣， 別忘了哦！

Luneth never gets any choice, does he.

Reference3.1
西德; xīdé; Cid
迦南;  jiānán;  Canan
尼爾福山谷; ní’ěrfúshāngǔ; Nelve Valley
塔卡; tǎkǎ; Takka

生詞3.4
去路; qùlù; that path one is following
落魄; luòpò; in dire straights
艇;  tǐng; vessel, small ship
派; pài; to dispatch… ?
據說; jùshuō; allegedly, it is said that
擁有; yōngyǒu; to have, to posses
指環; zhǐhuán; ring
解開; jiěkāi; to untie, to undo
製作; zhìzuò; to make
幽靈; yōulíng; ghost
沙漠; shāmò; desert

The blacksmith in question, Takka, basically tells you the same information.  Except angrier.

“如果是向我要秘銀指環的話就回去吧， 每個傢伙都只會問這個。。。我知道你們想解開詛咒， 但我這副幽靈的身體怎麼能鍛造秘銀啊。。。比起這個我更擔心我離家出去走的女兒， 也許我為了把她培養成出色的鍛造師有些過於嚴厲了。。。”

生詞3.4
鍛造; duànzào; to forge
出色; chūsè; remarkable
過於; guòyú; too much, execessively
嚴厲; yánlì; severe, strict

So when you go to the airship Cid is talking about, turns out, there’s someone already there!

Hmm. Couldn’t be…

Well, ain’t that convenient.

卡茲斯的鐵匠
塔卡爺爺撫養大的少女
因為厭倦了塔卡爺爺
所佈置的嚴格的修行
最近經常離家出去

生詞3.5
 鐵匠; tiějiang; blacksmith
厭倦;  yànjuàn; to be fed up with
佈置; bùzhì; to put in order… ?

對話三:
蕾菲亞：哇， 你們是誰啊！
魯內斯： 這話我還要問你呢！ 這個飛空艇是西德借給我們的！
蕾菲亞： 我是蕾菲亞。  作為卡茲斯的鐵匠為這艘船做過不少零件呢！
魯內斯： 你難道是鐵匠老板的女兒吧？ 那你給我做一個秘銀指環吧！
阿爾克： 為了解除卡茲斯的詛咒， 秘銀指環是必不可少的！
蕾菲亞： 我。。。 對不起， 我没有認真地修行。。。 所以做不出來。。。
魯內斯： 西德聽到的話一定會失望的。 修行中怎麼可以跑出來呢！
蕾菲阿： 我想起來了！父親以前做的指環在薩斯嗯王那裡。你們也帶上我吧。 雖然我不會做秘銀指環。。。 但是我也想幫助父親和卡茲斯的人們！
阿爾克： 讓她和我們一起去吧。 魯內斯！
魯內斯： 也好， 幸虧你出來了， 所以沒被施下詛咒也不錯嘛。*
蕾菲亞： 討厭！
蕾菲亞加入了隊伍!

*Luneth’s original English line, which is loads better, is, “I agree (that Refia should join). Slacking off saved her from the curse, so maybe that “luck” might rub off on us!”  Maan. Douche.  

生詞3.6
艘; sōu; MW for ships
零件; língjiàn; component, part
解除;  jiěchū; to remove, to get rid of, to relieve sb of
失望; shīwàng; disappointed
幸虧;  xìngkuī; fortunately

Aishh, all the vocabulary is finally getting to me.   There’s… so much.  I mean, I can understand the game relatively decent enough without looking up everything to play through it, but Final Fantasy is such a button-mashing, visual novel that to not understand the storyline kind of defeats the purpose of playing it.  (Unless there is someone out there who honestly plays Final Fantasy games for the actual gameplay.  Which is a really scary thought.)

I mean, basically, I’m trying to stuff a whole lot of words in my head in a short time period and so that’s bound to be trouble. Maybe I’m getting burned out. There’s a voice in my head telling me that it’s never a good idea to learn a whole bunch of words only passably well, and that instead I should be focusing on fewer vocab and focus on getting those words down solid. But the problem with that (for me, anyway) is:

 1) I have no patience.  I’d take me at least a year to finish the game at that rate and I don’t care how holistic and solid learning it is, I’d rather just pick up a (-shudder-) textbook with its bite-sized vocab lists and dialogues.
2) Small goals are really easy for me to overlook.  If I tell myself I’ll just try to learn ten words a day, I’ll suddenly make it a lower priority, because I know it won’t take as much time or effort as 30 words. Then before I know it, the day’s over and I completely forgot.  Plus, if I’m going to learn ten words, why not take the extra half-hour to learn 30? (I’m one of those horribly ambitious, time-management challenged, self-discipline lacking overachievers.)
3) What does it even mean to learn a word solidly?  Mine Google for example sentences and memorize them? That’s just dull.

Here’s my tentative philosophy.  Even if there are some words that slip through the cracks, that’s fine.   If they’re important and very useful words, they’ll come up again and I’ll learn them quicker the second time around because of the initial exposure.   If not, then no need to worry about them, right?

I think at this point, the only thing I should be worried about is burnout.  Which is probably what’s happening at the moment.   But I know I’ll get over it;  there’s no way the perfectionist fangirl in me could let myself not finish this game.    And on the bright side, doing all this hyper-cramming forces me to try different methods of memorization and experimenting to see what works best.  Here’s what I got so far:

1) Reading the game out loud.  Just hearing my voice act out the dialogue helps me not only remember tones but context as well.   This is, by far, the most helpful. And the most fun. Luneth is the best I swear, and Refia only makes things better.
2) Flipping back and forth between Pleco and the game to look up words.  Because when I flip to Pleco, I don’t have to the word in front of me as I draw it on the tablet, which means I have to find some good shot-term mnemonic  device to help me remember the character  enough to look it up (sight-memorizing, that is, looking at it and feeling like you know how to write it from memory, never works).  So I have to rely on radicals, similar characters, etc.
3) Having post-its of the vocabulary in front of my desk.  I can give myself a quick review just by reading one of the stickies in seconds.

Wow, I didn’t realize how long that rant was going to be. My.

Anyway, I’m definitely curious as to how other people are using the game to learn or if anyone has any thoughts about learning vocabulary in general.  Let me know.

“我倒是沒有看到啊爾克， 他去哪了呢？ 我以為你這個好朋友會知道呢.”
“啊爾克又被欺負了吧？ 你和他像兄弟一樣， 可要照顧他啊.”

But actually, you can’t go just yet.  See, there’s this stupendous old man standing in the back of the town with a surprise: free stuff!

“前面的倉庫里放又道具. 我已經不需要了， 你拿去吧. 不過要小心中途會遇到怪獸.”

And when you arrive at the warehouse, yet another old man awaits you with wise words:

“鎮上和洞窟中有隱藏的道具和開關。走近並仔細觀察的話， 就能找到它們。比如那邊的蠟燭。 在一般的視點上是看不到的， 不過走近后 仔細觀察的話…”

 生詞2.7
欺負; qīfu; to bully
照顧;  zhàogu; to look after 
倉庫; cāngkù; storehouse
隱藏;  yǐngcáng; to conceal
開關;  kāiguān ; power switch
觀察; guānchá ; to observe, examination
蠟燭; làzhú ; candle
視點; shìdiǎn; perspective viewpoint

As for what he is talking about, here is a screenshot of the wonderful, sparkly things!

Also, for people who rely on dictionaries as much as I do (though I probably should try to go monolingual at some point or another), if there are two characters that seem to make up a compound word but your dictionary doesn’t recognize it, before you call it some odd, idiomatic twist of phrase to memorize (for Chinese already has too much of those), check another dictionary.

For example, in this passage alone, there were two words I had issue with.  I couldn’t find 觀察 on Pleco and instead had to check MDBG.  Vice versa, I couldn’t find 視點 on MDBG but found it on Pleco.

And sometimes those two dictionaries aren’t enough. In another ‘fun’ self-project I had (I challenged myself to get through a 小說. I gave up after the fourth chapter of prose and prose and prose and…), I came across the phrase “在這天與地都不存在的黑暗中”.   I kept trying awkward translation after awkward translation until I finally put the part that was messing me up into Google translate; turns out, 天與地 means ‘in Heaven and Earth’.  So the sentence translated into, “in this darkness that existed in neither Heaven nor Earth”, which made far more sense than my guess of “In this day and the darkness that didn’t exist”.

Worst case scenario, google the phrase that you don’t understand and see how blogs and news articles use the phrase. Admittedly, this tactic has only worked once for me out of the many times I’ve used it for the phrase “你是哪裡跟哪裡”, which is a pretty specific question to look up.  (In the context I was looking it up for, it turns out that when people ask a 混血兒 this,  it means ‘what mix are you’)   So yeah, I wouldn’t resort to this often.

Well. Or. You know.  You can just ask some Chinese friend for help.  But that makes it faar too easy.

Anyway, now we’re off to the ghost town to find Arc!

Wait, you mean, he didn’t even enter the town? After all that?  Screw you, Arc. That’s some way to be anticlimatic.  At least get kidnapped by pirates or something.

對話1：
魯內斯：冷靜點， 阿爾克。是我， 魯內斯。 你這傢伙， 鍛煉膽魄倒是沒有問題， 也不要一個人隨便跑出去吧！
阿爾克： 魯內斯， 也帶我去吧。我要讓大家對我刮目相看！ 既然我都來到這裡了… 我不會給你添麻煩的！
魯內斯： 好吧.
阿爾克加入了隊伍！

生詞3.1 
鍛煉; duànliàn; to toughen, to temper
膽魄;  dǎnpò ; courage, bravery
既然; jìrán; since, this being the cause
添;  tiān; to add, to increase

But anyway, here we are in the ghost town.  And what exactly do we mean by ‘ghosts’?

Egads!  People-outlines!  Ah well, not as cute as Boo from Mario Bros, but still kinda endearing, I suppose… Save for their all their freaking out:

“受到了魔人的詛咒變成了這副樣子… 難道我們直到死去為止都會是這副德性嗎？ 還是說我們已經死了？！”
“在魔人的詛咒下， 竟變成這幅模樣了… ”
“被下了詛咒， 也没法做生意了… ”
“被關在封印的洞窟里的魔人借大地震的機會又甦醒了過來。 明明和詛咒之力一同被封印住了… ”
“為了封印魔人， 秘銀之力是心不可少的。因為在鎮上的確山里可以取得秘銀， 所以魔人給人們都設下了詛咒， 現在這副身體就沒有辦法獲取秘銀了…”

生詞3.2
*直到…為止; zhídào… wéizhǐ ；not until…
副; fù ；MW for facial expressions
德性; déxing ；revolting behaviour…?
幅; fú ；MW for pictures
模樣; múyàng； appearance
生意; shēngyi ；business
關; guān；mountain pass
封印;  féngyìn； seal
甦醒; sūxǐng  ；to gain consciousness
秘銀; mìyín； secret silver (original Eng: Mythril)
必不可少; bìbùkěshǎo； indispensable
礦山; kuàngshān；mine
取得; qǔdé ； to acquire
設; shè；to set up, to arrange
獲取; huòqǔ；to gain, to acquire

*It’s a grammar pattern!  This is exciting! I didn’t think I’d be able to recognize grammar patterns, but I suspected it when I saw it, and then googled and it turns out, this is one of those grammar patterns that textbooks put in their dialogues and stuff! See, video games can be educational.  For a concise ‘explanation’ on it, check out 英语句型not until的用法：直到…为止

Anyway, we’ll stop there for today.  Before go off running into caves to defeat evil magicians, I’ll tell you right now those monsters will you kill in one hit.  But it’s so fun to try.  Not even kidding here.   By now, there are at least three places freely available on the world map where you can go KO yourself. 

Also, I’d just like to mention that I’ve added a master list of all the vocabulary learned so far; the link is located between Arc and Refia’s head.  Check it out as a reference or an ego-boost.    

What is this man asking for?

Anyway, back to where we left off: the village elder is looking for Luneth!    Here, Luneth’s epic past is revealed…

對話一：
托帕帕：首先一定要知道這並不是偶然。
魯內斯： 雖然您這麼說， 但是甚麼光明黑暗的我完全不明白啊！
托帕帕：從前， 有一位旅行者帶著一個嬰兒來到了我這裡… 他的黑臉上全是煤灰， 衣服也被燒得不成樣子。  而他懷裡得那個嬰兒， 就是你。 仔細想想的話， 那時，你就已經被水晶選中了吧…  所以， 好好使用你的力量和你心中的光明， 踏上征程吧!

生詞2.3
偶然; ǒurán; by chance, randomly
嬰兒;  yīng’ér; infant
煤灰;  méihuī; soot
不成樣子; bùchéngyàngzi; beyond recognition
 仔細;  zǐxì ; careful, cautious
 踏上 tàshàng; to set foot on
征程;  zhēngchéng; journey

But wait! There seems to be trouble in the village:

“呀， 魯內斯！ 剛才我看到大家都聚在村子的角落裡， 出什麼事了嗎？”
”孩子們倒是很悠閒， 在村子角落吵鬧的那幫傢伙到底是甚麼人啊… ”
”在村子的角落裡吵鬧的是你的伙伴吧。 真煩人，快讓他們別吵了！”

生詞2.4
聚; jù; to congregate
角落; jiǎoluò ; corner, nook
倒是; dàoshi; contrary to what one may expect
悠閒;  yōuxián; lesuirely
吵鬧;  chǎonào; noisy
幫;  bāng; group, clique
傢伙;  jiāhuo; guy
伙伴;  huǒbàn; parter, companion

Hmm…

對話二：
傢伙一： 你怎麼就能斷言根本沒有幽靈呢！ 你要是不相信的話， 過來看看啊！
傢伙二： 哼… 明明沒有那個膽子…  真的丟人啊， 膽小鬼！
魯內斯： 喂, 阿爾克， 你在做甚麼啊？
傢伙三： 糟糕… 是魯內斯… 快跑！
魯內斯： 阿爾克， 等一下！ 別一生不吭就跑掉啊！

And that is how we meet Luneth’s best friend, Arc.  

生詞2.5 
斷言; duànyán; to affirm, to assert
根本 ; gēnběn ; simply, absolutely
膽子 ; dǎnzi; courage, guts
丟人;  diūrén; to lost face
膽小鬼 ; dǎnxiǎoguǐ; coward
吭 ; kēng; to utter
跑掉 ; pǎodiào; to run away

(Also, is it just me or does Luneth seem to end every sentence with ‘啊’? It’s like he’s the girl from a Taiwanese drama that is obligated to end her every sentence with a whine.  Or at least that’s how I hear his voice is my head. )

這個少年
是魯內斯從小一起長大的朋友
同樣由托帕帕長老撫養
性格有些內向
比起去外面玩， 更喜歡自己看書
無論是誰學得他很博學

生詞2.6
性格; xìnggé; temperament
內向; nèixiàng; introverted
比起; bǐqǐ ; compared with
博學; bóxué; erudite

So let’s end this town with a 成語！

刮目相看; guāmùxiāngkàn; to esteem someone’s progress

As for why we are looking at this idiom, well, right before Arc leaves town, he gives a little monologue:

“我才不是膽小鬼… 我也知道這樣不去不行… 但是我不會借用魯內斯的力量的… 我要讓大家對我刮目相看！”

Which doesn’t sound ominous at all…

By the way, did you give the old man a potion for the pop quiz?  If you did:

Moon Crystal Power~

Reference2.1
魯內斯; lǔnèisī; Luneth
托帕帕;  tuōpàpà; Tuopapa
妮哪;  nīna; Nina
鳥爾;  niǎo’ǔr; Ur
帕美尼; pàměiní; Parmeni
薩斯嗯;  sàsīen; Sasune
卡茲斯 ;  kǎzīsī; Kazus

Also, if you decide to go shopping, here is what the shops are selling at this point.

VocabList2.1 （“想買點什麼嗎？”）
武器店； wǔqì diàn；weapon shop
短劍; duǎnjiàn； short sword
長劍; chángjiàn；long sword
短弓;  duǎngōng；short bow
手杖;  shǒuzhàng ；cane
木箭; mùjiàn；wooden arrow
防具店; fángjùdiàn; armour shop
皮鎧； píkǎi ; leather armour
皮帽；pímào; leather cap
銅手鐲；  tóng shǒuzhuó; copper bracelet
解毒； jiědú; to detoxify

Man, imagine having a Chinese class about shopping  with this vocabulary. I could just imagine how the homework would be to create some skit about bargaining… 

“Excuse me!  I have need of some quality weapons for I am off to fight a DRAGON! Sell me your finest blade!”
請問，我快要去找一條龍， 為跟它戰鬥！ 我需要師傅最尖的刀！

“How about this short sword?”
那，看看這把短劍。 您覺得怎麼樣？

“You think I’m off to fight a dog?  I need a real sword!”
短劍？！ 難道你以為我敵人是一只狗嗎？  這不行啦！

“Then how about a longsword?”
這長劍呢？

“…It’ll do.  How much?”
… 還可以。 多少錢？

“10,000 元.”
一萬元.

“10,000? That’s more than two times the price of a short sword! How can it be that expensive?!”
一萬元？！ 價格比短劍的大了兩倍多！ 怎麼那麼貴？

“It’s not expensive at all! See this? It’s real gold.  You can’t get this in other stores.”
“不是啦！ 你看一下，這是道地黃金。 另外的武器店肯定沒有這樣的， 他們都只賣的是銅或鐵的.”

“With 10,000元, I could probably buy a sword and a shield at another store. How about 3,000?”
一萬元太過分了！  有這麼多錢的話，在另外個店不但會買一把劍而且會加一個皮盾.   便宜一點, 我給三千元，好吧？”

“No way. 8,000.”
不行。 八千元。

“Fine. I’m leaving.”
那，我走了。

Haha, so I got a bit carried away there.   And I’m pretty most of it is awkward and horribly incorrect Chinese, as it’s been a bit since I’ve been in a proper Chinese class.  But hey, that’s an idea!  If you’re looking to practice these vocabulary, write a bargaining skit!   And for even more fun, include lines from Russell Peters’ skit about bargaining.   

Anyway, it’s time to talk to the townspeople!  And they sure do have a lot to say:

“該死的大地震！ 鳥爾福山谷的人口被岩石堵住了，不能回迦南了.”

“我來給你講解一下你的職業。 自由人可以使用底等級魔法！ 但是因為能力值很底要特別小心.”

“接受了水晶之光的人可以依靠泉水恢復體力和無法戰斗的狀態.”

“被帕美尼山脈環繞的這片地區都在薩斯嗯王的統治之下， 她的城堡做落在西邊.”

“卡茲斯的鎮上好像被詛咒了… 很可怕的， 可不要去那裡啊.”

“在戰鬥中，不但可以通過點擊敵人的名字來決定攻擊目標， 還可以通過直接點擊書面上的敵人來進行攻擊。 另外， 在書面中沒有顯示出來的指令， 可以通過點擊三角標記來上下移動指令欄顯示出來.”

That last one was especially quite fun to figure out. (No. Not really. Not at all.)    But here’s the vocabulary list for all that to help you out.

VocabList2.2
岩石; yánshí; rock
堵住; dǔzhù; to block up
講解; jiǎngjiě; to explain
自由人; zìyóurén; freelancer
等級; děngjí; level, status
依靠;  yīkào ; to rely on
體力; tílì ; physical strength
山脈; shānmài; mountain range
環繞; huánrào; to surround
統治;  tǒngzhì; to govern
城堡; chéngbǎo; castle
鎮上;  zhènshàng; town
詛咒; zǔzhòu; to curse
戰鬥; zhàndòu; to fight
點擊;  diǎnjī ; to click (a button)
敵人; dìrén; enemy
攻擊目標;  gōngjīmùbiāo; attack
直接; zhíjiē ; directly…?
顯示; xiǎnshì; to show, to illustrate
指令; zhǐlìng ; order, command
三角; sānjiǎo; triangle
標記;  biāojì ; sign, symbol
欄; lán; column/row of text

Whew.  Can’t believe I just typed all that up.   I guess I really don’t want to do that homework…

Anyway, I’ve been seeing the phrases “可要” and “可不要” used a fair bit so far in the game.   I’m not really sure what the phrases mean exactly, but I’m guessing it’s something similar to “had better/better not do sth”.     So maybe it’s usage is similar to “最好”?  Like, maybe   could I say, “我今天可要幫她的忙，要不然她肯定熬夜睡覺了”?

Note to self: be on the lookout for sentences with 可要/可不要 and see how it’s used.

So, I think that’s enough vocabulary for one day!  I’ve gotta say, it’s kind of fun creating fake assignments for this blog.   Makes me wonder kind of writing assignment would be helpful for learning list2.2.    Hmm…

But anyway, to end with a pretty screenshot, here’s a preview for next time!   Luneth hears the truth about his past, Harry Potter style (well, sorta)!

 Anyway… So while you’re wandering around, you start to come across these treasure chests, full of mostly useless things (game-wise and vocabulary-wise, haha…).  

VocabList1.4 (“寶箱中發現了…” )
皮盾; pídùn; leather shield
恢復藥; huīfùyào; restorative medicine
長劍; chángjiàn; long double-edged sword
南極之風; nánjízhīfēng; wind of the south pole (original Eng: Antarctic Wind)

Next there is a suspiciously sparkly boulder that the game tells you to pay close attention to.  

“用兩雙手指接觸屏幕， 擴大手指間的距離試試看…”  

Similarly, when you come across some sparkling water, Luneth gives you a hint that it might be something special by saying:

“泉水… 顏色有些奇特啊…”

VocabList1.5 (for special, sparkling things)
接觸; jiēchù; to touch, to contact
屏幕; píngmù; screen (TV, movie)
擴大; kuòdà;  to expand
泉水; quánshuǐ; spring water
奇特; qítè; peculiar, unusual

But wait!

 不明邪惡生物襲擊了魯內斯！

VocabList1.6 (aka nearly every word from the above sentence)

不明; bùmíng; unknown
邪惡; xié’è ; sinister
生物; shēngwù; creatures
襲擊; xíjī; surprise attack, raid

Which leads you an epic boss battle.  Okay, not really, it’s just a giant turtle.  It’s the part after that is my favourite: the giant, talking crystal and its very ominous monologue.  I just had to type up the whole thing.  Behold!

The Crystal Monologue!

你被選中了
來自暗之大地的來訪者啊
你已被選為傳遞希望之人
如今， 世界正在逐漸被黑暗所包圍
這樣下去世界將失去光明所有的平衡將被破壞
世界上有其它和你命運相同的同伴， 首先你要先找到他們
那時， 我將給予你們最後的明與希望的啓示
啓程吧！

I think it’s just me, but while I was reading (and furiously looking up every other word in the dictionary), I found myself speaking the whole thing dramatically  and it’s so much better outloud.  Like, it’s ridiculous, hilarious, and beautiful at the same time.  The only thing that could maybe make it better is hearing Don LaFontaine read a translation of it.

I mean, this poor kid, falls into a random cave, gets attacked by random monsters, and then there’s this giant creepy object telling him that if he doesn’t save the world, then darkness will take over:  ”The burden of the world is on your shoulders (along with three other people that you must find without any clue as to who and where they are).  And you can’t fail.  Otherwise the word ends.  Yeah. Sucks to be you.”  Whoo, gotta love those RPG plotlines…

Ahem.

Anyway.

VocabList1.7
水晶; shuǐjīng; crystal
選中;  xuǎnzhòng; to settle upon, to decide a candidate
來訪者; láifǎngzhě; visitor
傳遞希望之人; chuándì xīwàng zhī rén; person who passes along hope (original Eng: Bringer of Hope!)
如今; rújīn; nowadays
逐漸;  zhújiàn; gradually
包圍;  bāowéi; to encircle, to surround
平衡;  pínghéng; equilibrium
破壞; pòhuài; to destroy; to wreak
命運; mìngyùn; destiny
啓示; qíshì; enlightenment, revelation
啓程吧; qǐchéng; Go forth! (young grashoppah!)

Okay, to be honest, there’s a bit in the monologue I don’t really get.  (See below image)

For example, “來自暗之大地的”?  Is that supposed to mean… people who came from a dark earth? And then there’s the last sentence, “我將給予你們最後的明與希望的啓示”.  I’m guessing something like “I’ll give you the last revelation of luminance and hope”, but that just sounds odd .  But I forgot what it said when I replayed the scene in English, and I’m too lazy to go through the boss battle again so… Yeah. Queer translations.  I’ll work with that.

*9/1/11 – Okay,  so I replayed the beginning in English.  Here are what those two sentences were originally: “Warrior from the land of darkness” and “I will bestow upon you our last light, our last hope.”

And there we go!  We are done with the first dungeon!  Later on, the game actually becomes an SRS for some words, because the townspeople start to give little tutorials about 職業, or the descriptions for healing potions talk about 狀態, so that’s kind of fun.  Plus, not to mention after endless battles, if you’re not button-mashing too much, you’ll probably be able to memorize the characters like 攻擊 and 防禦 without any studying.

Also, Luneth’s actual dialogue is all pretty simple, which is always an wonderful confidence boost after lines and lines about 命運 and 希望.     Well, his dialogue has mostly been “這是甚麼東西啊” and the like, but it’s still nice to know I know basic, conversational Chinese at the very least.   Whoo!

So, to celebrate getting through the first dungeon, let’s end with my favourite line from it all~