Sze-to Hiu Yuet explored incidental vocabulary learning from a single-player video game, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Her Capstone project addresses a timely issue, i.e., technology-mediated and autonomous second language learning. She asked her participants to play a particular route of the game and examined how the frequency, the modality (image vs video), and learners’ prior knowledge affected incidental learning of vocabulary items that appeared in the game. Her analysis was conducted in a systematic and methodical manner using the Vocabulary Knowledge Scale Test. In addition, her interpretation of the results is based on a robust understanding of relevant theories such as the Involvement Load Hypothesis (Hulstijn & Laufer, 2001), the Trade-off Hypothesis (Skahen, 2009), and the Dual-coding Theory (Paivio, 1971). This study provides meaningful insights on the pedagogical use of video games for promoting second language vocabulary learning, and it has full potential to evolve into a larger-scale study in the future. That said, I would pleasantly nominate this project for the Exemplary Capstone Project Award 2021-22 Term 1.

With the rise of technology, vocabulary learning not only can be conducted in classrooms, but also can be assimilated into our daily lives. In conjunction with the pandemic COVID-19, online learning and gaming have become a new trend as more people stay at home and use their electronic devices more frequently. The chance of learning vocabulary incidentally increases. Many scholars have tried to study whether incidental vocabulary learning occurs in digital gameplay. Yet, most of the studies are based on multiplayer online games. There is a lack of attention paid to incidental vocabulary learning from single-player video games which do not require communication as much as the games above. The relationship between single-player games and incidental vocabulary learning is still in its infancy, so it is worthwhile to investigate so and hence fill in this research gap.

This paper explores how single-player video games influence one’s incidental vocabulary learning through the case study of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (BOTW). Eight local undergraduates were split into experimental and control groups, where the experimental group played the game for four hours and the video gameplays were recorded. Participants were asked to complete a pre-test and a post-test in both groups. 26 target words were picked from the game and the tests were conducted in the form of Vocabulary Knowledge Scale (VKS). It was found that single-player video games improved one’s receptive vocabulary knowledge to a marginal extent. Word frequency and context in video games did not have an impact on vocabulary acquisition due to its high cognitive demand. “Need” and “search” of Involvement Load Hypothesis had the most prominent effect on so, and pictures facilitated players to form the pathway between the semantic meanings and pictorial information.

As a(n) (introverted) gamer and an English major, I thought it would be impossible to combine my two favourite things into a formal research project at first. However, this capstone project has fulfilled my wishes miraculously. Not only have I known more about the relationship between language acquisition and our daily entertainment, but also have discovered how single-player games can be adjusted so that we can achieve learning through playing, especially by ourselves only. This capstone project undoubtedly is one of my greatest achievements I made in my 4-year undergraduate study, and it certainly encourages me to pursue further studies on L2 acquisition and applied linguistics in general.

I would like to take this precious opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor, Professor Jung Jookyoung. I am very grateful that she was always there for me to provide invaluable feedback and comments whenever I had any problems or questions. And of course, I would like to thank all my friends who have participated in this study. Without their support, I would not have been able to complete this project.