"The biggest thing is seeing games as more than 'yes, games are fun and entertaining,' but they're also educational," Poole said.

Students during this event also got the opportunity to get hands-on experience with certain language games. During this game demonstration, students got to test-run language games Wagotabi, Wisp, rhythm games and a few more. 

One of the video game designers of Wagotabi (和語旅), a role-playing game geared towards Japanese language learners, was one of three panelists who presented their insight on the role games play in improving language learning. The game, meaning Japanese language journey, attempts to combine efficiency, fun, immersion and story to induce interest within the player.

They use a unique way of educating their players, with prioritizing useful vocabulary and alphabets first. There is also a focus on providing information within the game in a manageable manner, while still having opportunities for additional practice if the player desires as much. 

Another panelist, James York, professor in Meiji University on Ludic Language Pedagogy, presented his game Kei-Go, a card game to practice Japanese honorific language. York discussed the process of how to teach language with games: learn, play, analyze, report and with methods, materials and mediation. By analyzing the process of which students learn language, games can be created to tailor to how students can learn most effectively and efficiently, he said.

Department of Media and Information masters student Jesse Sanderson developed a board game called We Speak Kiingereza (Kiingereza meaning English in Swahili) to Mitigate dropout rates and help educational careers in Tanzania. Sanderson and his team, partnering with Form 1 curriculum, developed 200 sentences for players to be able to translate in various difficulty levels. He hoped to support young students’ education in Tanzania combating difficulties of linguistic transition and financial struggles. 

The inspiration of this event came from professors in linguistics Shannon Donnally Quinn and Mariko Kawaguchi. Quinn mentioned that a group of language teachers get together to play board games, and the conversation of utilizing gaming within language classes was discussed within their group. This led to Kawaguchi putting their discussion and inspiration into action. 

Kawaguchi expressed how this event was a nice way for various departments of language education to get together in a more casual manner to discuss language education and its connection to video games.  

Video games can come into play for specific languages in certain classes, but the professors did mention the challenge of games' incorporation into the curriculum. Poole mentioned how he had board games consistently in his curriculum, and Quinn mentioned how she has use of VR in some of her classes as well. Kawaguchi said that there is difficulty in incorporating games, as it occasionally can not fit into the course schedule, but she did say that there are various opportunities for students to get involved with media outside of class to enhance their language understanding. 

Professor Michael Toole showed enthusiasm for students who use media to expand their horizons of language learning.

"I think students work really hard in the classroom, but as a lot of people know, you can only do so much in the classroom," Toole said. "So if they do more stuff outside of the classroom, like do lots of reading of Manga, watching Anime, getting exposure and input is really valuable for language acquisition." 

Jonah Magar, video game collection coordinator, advocated for the use of games as fun and rewarding educational tools.

"There are so many more things that we can do to use games as teaching tools to use them in our research and our study, and that's what we're here for," Magar said.

The event gained positive traction from students. Audience members who came primarily for the linguistic elements left the event with a new outlook on their language learning and the future of games in relation to their education.

"I think that it's kind of helping me realize that (games) can merge a lot of like ideas into one," games and interactive media freshman Liv English-Saunders said. "The fact that you can still be playing a game and learning a language, at the same time, that's just really cool to me."