JLfest 2024 | The 17th Annual Japanese Language Festival
JLfest 2023
Sugoroku Language Game Design Competition
Objective
The competition aims at developing interesting language board games to motivate learners to learn Japanese and develop good sportsmanship during the game.
It also incorporates IT skills such as programming and stimulates the creativity of Japanese language learners.
Theme：「語彙学習」
Design a digital Board Game using the application 'Scratch' to enhance learning and building Japanese Vocabulary among learners.
RESULT ANNOUNCEMENT
Although all competing teams have put in tremendous effort in designing the board game within a limited duration, the language content was not given adequate attention. Hence, the judges decided that only the 3rd Prize be awarded and a Merit Prize be created in appreciation for the creativity of the game.
3rd Prize
TEAM: MEYFA
SM SAINS KUBANG PASU
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Nur Izzati Koo Bt Lokman Koo Wai Keong
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Nur Aleeya Maisara Bt Romzi
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Aimi Nasuha bt Badri
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Aufa Adani Bt Azaman
Objective:
Enhance the learning of new vocabulary used in daily life conversation within the KSSM Syllabus.
Theme:
McDOC Game - Let's Eat!
Proposal Paper
'I was enticed by the game. The music and sound effects liven the game. The dice in the form of an ice cube in the glass of coke was mind-blowing! The board was free of clutters and the tile path design reminded me of the 'Aeroplane Chess' I used to play when I was a child. What I liked most was that every tile came with a random question and each question was accompanied by an answer with an explanation. This maximizes and enhances learning! Reading out each question and its answer by the gamemaster is a great idea to help weaker students. There was a good balance of penalties and bonuses in the game.
However, I wonder why there were questions on grammatical items (such as particles) which has nothing to do with vocabulary building. The judges were also not given a vocabulary list used by this game to assess the range and type of vocabulary used in the game. Halfway through the game, I lost track of the movement of tokens. Each of the 4 tokens is given a home base at one of the 4 corners of the board. Each token starts from its respective home base. Once it has moved a full circle, the token moves toward the centre of the board. However, as the game proceeded and the tokens got close to each other, we lost track of which token had taken a full round. It would be better if the token is of the same color as its home base.'
EDWARD LEE
「デザインは一番面白そうでしたがちょっと複雑で進め方が大変だったかなと思います。 日本語の語彙のレベルとバランスが良く（「おにぎり、はし、いらっしゃいませ」など）、 初級学習者のレベルにちょうど良い質問が多かったと思います。 ただし文法を問う質問もいくつか含まれていたようで、これは不要だったかと思います。」
SUMITANI KEN'ICHI
'Although the students' presentation is a bit unorganized, the questions provided are accompanied by explanations in English, making this game suitable for learning.'
ZEETY KARTINI ABDUL HAMID
'The board design was interesting and hugely different from the other teams. Thus, making them stand head and shoulders above the rest. They used the ice inside a cup of coke to represent their dice is kind of unique. Their code was all right, except that they used a quite complicated way to present it. They showed the 'question-and-answer' pop-ups with the game board as a backdrop to achieve a nicer look. However, they failed to hide the sprites, which caused some unnecessary distractions.
During the game session, perhaps due to the poor Wi-Fi condition, regrettably the team was not able to interact with the players. Poor moderating of the game also led to some confusion among the players on whose turn is it.'
OOI WEI LING
'The sound might be too loud until cannot hear the voice, the marks and token still there when the questions are popped out.'
CHAN CHUN XIANG
'The players' tokens remained on the screen although during the question pop-up screen.'
WONG PUI CHING
Merit Prize
TEAM: SUPER
SMJK KATHOLIK PETALING JAYA
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Tan Khai Wei
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Kan Caleb
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Chim Hui Shaynne
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Ho Zi Xuan
Objective:
Improve reading and listening skills in addition to vocabulary expansion related with food.
Theme:
FOOD AROUND THE WORLD
Proposal Paper
The idea of using the word-association vocabulary-building technique to associate food with its name, taste, and country of origin is indeed very commendable. Pictures and English vocabulary in the question cards served as useful hints to the players. The colourful board, animated background objects, and the pilot's welcome announcement before the game starts hyped up the game!
However, I wonder what a player can learn from this game. How does knowing the specific name of a cuisine (e.g. sushi, pasta), and its origin and taste (sweet bitter) enhance communication skills such as listening and reading? Besides taste is very subjective and unless you taste it, you would never know. Hence, rather than associating food with its taste and country of origin, associating food with its ingredients, texture, methods of cooking/preparation, or even how is it being eaten, would enable learners to read recipes and describe a certain food in Japanese!
EDWARD LEE
The code is interesting, including lots of interesting elements in the game, for example, the game starting page, the game setting, the storyline, the fill-in of players' names, the dictionaries, the nice looking backdrops, and the background music which makes it more attractive just like a real console game. Also, they make the operation of the game super easy yet can have good effects, this is amazing! The team put many effort into making everything good and kept on modifying it to be better.
During the competition day, the team also showed good teamwork among the members in interacting with their players and ensuring the flow of their game was smooth. Everything is well-played on the competition day. From the technical side, I have nothing to comment on because it is nearly perfect.
OOI WEI LING
デザインが見やすく、進行もスムーズでした。テーマも面白いものでした。 ただし、日本語の語彙としてみると、国の名前（カタカナ）や料理の名前（日本の食べ物ではなく世界の料理、これも主にカタカナ） の知識やカタカナ類推の設問が多く、あえて「日本語すごろく」にする必要性をあまり感じない印象でした。 たとえば、日本料理周辺語彙に特化するなどすれば日本語学習にももっと役立つかなと思いました。
SUMITANI KEN'ICHI
Almost perfect. However, it was a pity that the audio files could not be played, perhaps due to time constraints. Listening was listed as one of the objectives of the game. Hence, allowing players to listen is vital.
ZEETY KARTINI ABDUL HAMID
The time taken does not start counting for the first player, the token is a bit large which might make you confused.
CHAN CHUN XIANG
The questions for each "question mark" are repeating each time the tiles are being landed on.
WONG PUI CHING
PANEL OF JUDGES
Edward Lee
President
THE JAPANESE LANGUAGE SOCIETY OF MALAYSIA
SUMITANI Ken'ichi
Principal
PUSAT BAHASA TEIKYO
MALAYSIA
Zeety Kartini Abdul Hamid
Japanese Language Lecturer
UNIVERSITI UTARA MALAYSIA
Ooi Wei Ling
Postgraduate Student
UNIVERSITI TEKNOLOGI MALAYSIA
Chan Chun Xiang
Product Application Engineer
SINGAPORE
Wong Pui Ching
Postgraduate Student
UNIVERSITI TEKNOLOGI MALAYSIA
COMMENTS FROM JUDGES
"First and foremost, congratulations to all participating teams. You made it! It was indeed a long but, with no doubt, fruitful journey. You crafted the game proposal, designed and developed the game prototype, met with the programmer twice to fine-tune your game and coding, and lastly tested your game with your schoolmates. Never has a language competition so engaging as this. This competition tested not only your language learning and computer coding but also teamwork, communication skills, and time management. Throughout the whole journey, I watched you grow from strengths to strengths. Bravos!
While it is understandable that most teams put a lot of effort into the technicality and creativity of the game, you should not lose focus on the primary objective of the game, i.e. language learning. 'What can a student learn from the game' and 'How the game can enhance learning effectively' should be your important checklists when developing the game. Care must be exercised to ensure that there is no mistake in the Japanese text, be it spelling, grammar, or word choice. These are the reasons why the first and second prizes were not awarded for this year.
Having said that, this year, the level of creativity was much higher than last year, primarily due to the 2 meetings with the programmer as well as your willingness to test run the game. You have done remarkably well and there is no shame for your achievement. Keep it up!"
EDWARD LEE
「初めて審査させていただきました。いろいろ工夫があって楽しめました。 日本語の質問を考えるのは大変だったと思いますが、頑張って作った様子がうかがえました。」
SUMITANI KEN'ICHI
"Although this is my first participation as a judge, I feel that this program is very good because these language games were created by the students. Judging from the games, the students' level was also very good. I hope this program can be opened at the university level as well as for the production of Japanese language learning games."
ZEETY KATRINA ABDUL HAMID
"It is not easy work to join this competition as it needs a long-term commitment, the students not only polished up their Japanese skills and boosted their programming skills but also their communication skills in developing the game and moderating it during playing session at the competition. Their determination spring on me.
Compared to the previous years, all teams did very well on the technical side. I am impressed with the board game designs, the codes, and the creative ideas. Hope this has been a precious experience for all of you. Bring us more surprises next year!"
OOI WEI LING
"Congratulations to all the contestants who put a lot of effort into making this competition come to a success. Some of them had participated in this competition last year and I was happy to see them again in this year's competition. Of course what surprised me the most was how much they've grown, and how much more interesting and better this year's entries were compared to the previous ones.
I believe that competitions, like this, not only enable students to learn Japanese in a fun way but also develop their interest in programming to a certain extent."
CHAN CHUN XIANG
"It was a great experience for me to be the technical judge as I learned a lot from this competition and the contestants' game board design. I think that it is a nice platform for students to be able to learn about programming at a young age with such an interesting and user-friendly approach. At the same time, they have the chance to strengthen their Japanese language abilities. From the game design, I could see that they had put in a lot of effort in designing their board, programming the game flow, and gradually improving their game by adding various elements and improvisations. During the competition, they also did their best in managing the game session by interacting with the players and trying to make the session as interesting as possible. Hence, congratulations to all the contestants for successfully completing your game board. Give yourself a round of applause for your efforts! お疲れ様でした！"
WONG PUI CHING