Thwumphed, skwizz, and floapes. You're welcome.
- Justin Matheson
- 21 hours ago
- 5 min read
Most people treat vocabulary the same way.
More words in = More words remembered = More words used
But the real bottleneck is not exposure, it is attention and repetition.
A 2026 open-access paper in ITL, International Journal of Applied Linguistics (John Benjamins) caught my eye, it looks at whether incidental vocabulary learning can happen through gaming in an extramural (out-of-class) context, and which learner factors predict who benefits most.
Suprapas tested this with 23 intermediate English learners who played a modified version of Skyrim with embedded nonwords in the written game text, then assessed vocabulary at form-recall and meaning-recognition, immediately after play and again one week later. (John Benjamins, 2026)
Did y’all know there is an actual list of nonwords? As if that’s not cool enough on its own, the list is called the ARC Nonword Database! It contains glorious nonwords like “wofts” and “fuched” which will forever be in my vocabulary. If that’s all you get from this article, you’re welcome.
Right away, that is a more honest design than a lot of “games improve vocabulary” claims, because it tries to measure learning that came from the gameplay environment, not from a teacher, or a worksheet, or a massive pre-existing word list and it focused specifically on the impact of gameplay from extramural situations.
Research summary
The study sits in the “extramural input matters” tradition in SLA, meaning language growth happens when learners get meaningful exposure outside class, not just during formal instruction. (John Benjamins, 2026)
The basic structure is:
Participants: 23 intermediate English learners
Intervention: play a modified version of Skyrim with embedded nonwords (yelb) in written game text
Outcomes: vocabulary knowledge measured at two levels
form-recall
meaning-recognition
Timing: immediately after treatment, and again after one week
Predictors examined: vocabulary size, gaming habits, engagement
Findings:
Vocabulary knowledge increased at both measurement levels immediately after gameplay
There was “considerable retention” after one week
Gaming habits and engagement significantly predicted gains
All of that is promising, but it also immediately raises the right implementation question.
If habits and engagement predict gains, then “use games” is not the correct intervention.
The intervention is, “create conditions that sustain engagement long enough for repeated exposure to matter.”
What immediately struck me
I love that they used nonwords (crork).
It is a clever way to isolate incidental learning, because participants cannot have learned those words somewhere else last month, and they cannot quietly Google Translate a familiar term.
But it is also a reminder.
Nonwords (shice) are not the same as real vocabulary. Real words come with messy prior knowledge, false friends, partial meanings, pronunciation guesses, and social context.
So I read this as proof-of-mechanism that gaming can generate measurable word-form and meaning knowledge, and some of it sticks.
It is not the final word on “games teach language,” but it supports the idea that games can create viable vocabulary exposure loops.
Where this research hits home for Rift
Rift is not primarily about language learning.
But this paper maps cleanly onto a broader thing we care about, people learn what they repeatedly do in meaningful contexts.
Workplaces are full of “incidental vocabulary” too.
acronyms
product names
process terms
role labels
the weird internal verbs teams invent (“triage it,” “hotfix it,” “ship it”)
Traditional onboarding treats that language as something you read and memorize whereas games, and game-like practice loops, treat it as something you learn because you need it to act.
What this means for game-based skill development
Here are three practical translations for L&D teams and educators.
1. If you want vocabulary, design for repeated, legible text exposure
Research insight: Learners gained vocabulary knowledge from written in-game exposure, with retention after a week. (John Benjamins, 2026)
L&D application: Choose environments where key terms are visible, repeated, and tied to actions.
Implementation detail: Prioritize games and tasks that surface the same concepts again and again (items, objectives, roles, resources), not just one-off story text.
Success indicator: Learners start using the target terms unprompted during decision-making.
2. Treat “engagement” as a variable you can design, not a learner personality trait
Research insight: Engagement and gaming habits predicted vocabulary gains. (John Benjamins, 2026)
L&D application: Assume gains will vary unless you scaffold engagement.
Implementation detail: Make the loop easy to enter, and easy to repeat.
short sessions
clear goals
quick wins
visible progress
a debrief that helps learners notice what they are picking up
Success indicator: More learners complete multiple “runs,” rather than dropping after the first exposure. See the article about Roguelike games for more information.
3. Build the transfer bridge on purpose
Research insight: Incidental learning can happen, but the paper does not claim, by itself, that learners will automatically transfer that knowledge into new contexts.
L&D application: If needed, debrief vocabulary like a skill.
Implementation detail: Ask:
“Which words did you see repeatedly?”
“Which words mattered for success?”
“Where do these show up in your real tasks?”
Then run a short application exercise outside the game.
Success indicator: Learners can correctly recognize and use the terms in a new context within 24–48 hours.
What the researchers did not study
Again, Rift does not primarily focus on vocabulary development or word acquisition.
However, I think that this opens another path for research into how we can manipulate games to teach more specific learning objectives. This was a version of Skyrim, that was tailored to a specific purpose. What if we could do the same for history? Math? Science?
Here are some other questions I would chase (if anyone is interested in conducting some legitimate research, let me know!):
Does co-op play increase vocabulary gains because learners negotiate meaning socially?
Which matters more for retention, time-on-task, or number of separate sessions?
What happens after four weeks, not one?
That is basically the roguelike model of language learning, lots of runs, lots of feedback, and the learner getting better at noticing what matters.
Bottom line
This paper supports a claim I have seen play out in classrooms and workshops, when the environment makes language meaningful, repeated, and worth paying attention to, vocabulary growth follows.
The work is not “add a game” because that, on its own, isn’t enough. The work is designing the loop so learners come back, and then building the bridge so what they learn in the game shows up in the world.
(John Benjamins, 2026)
Honourable mentions: scwooged, fleep, and flephths
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