Rating: 
Summary: not for everyone but i thought it was great
Review: I have used several LanguageNow courses and I like them. However, reviews for these courses seem to be all over the place, so I thought it might be helpful to describe what they are and what they aren't.The CD always has at least four parts. 1)The first section teaches common words in sample sentences and dialogues. 2)The second section teaches survival phrases. 3) Other sections are monologues on travel and culture, or are stories full of dialogues. These sections are more difficult than the first two. Everything you hear is written on the screen. You can stop and start anyplace and at any time. You can listen to one sentence a hundred times if you want. You can listen to a slowed down version. You can click on a word at any time for a translation into English. When ready, you can go to the games section and practice what you have learned. I really like the games section, as it really reinforces what I am learning without wearing me out. Beware! The courses don't teach grammar, but they still work well if you buy a simple grammar reference. The courses do teach vocabulary, and how to speak and listen. I know several languages and find that I learn more quickly if I focus on communication and just check on a grammar point now and then. This company also has "add-on-titles" which are good if you want to become near fluent even without much real life practice. If you are a complete beginner, you might find these courses frustrating. If you have some background or know a related language, these courses really work well.
Rating: 
Summary: Best Italian Software
Review: I found Italian Now to be quite good for learning the Italian language. It gives you the ability to start almost anywhere making it ideal for beginners through experts. Being a beginner when I bought this program I started with the alphabet reference and a grammar tutorial. These were both very good features and after some practice they helped to lay a good foundation for further learning. From here there are endless things to do. This program does an excellent job of teaching vocabulary and useful phrases. Perhaps one of the best things this program does is working on your pronunciation. In several different activities I had to speak Italian into a microphone and it was compared to a native speaker's pronunciation which helps you to drastically improve your own pronunciation. I am more than satisfied with this program and I highly recomend it.
Rating: 
Summary: Waste of Money and Time!
Review: The worse thing about this is that it doesn't teach grammar...you cannot learn a language without knowing the grammar! This program has long conversation dialogues that are absolutely useless, especially if you don't know the grammar. Oh and the speech practice meter is a joke! If you just blow or humm into the microphone it'll still say you did a good job! I threw this crap out and got a real Chinese tutor which is really the only true way to learn a language.
Rating:
Summary: WOW
Review: I bought this program to learn Dutch because my ancestors were from the Netherlands so I had a general intrest in learing the language. To my surprise this program exceeded my expectations ten fold and has helped me on my way to learning the Dutch Language. Dutch Now teaches all the necessary skills to learning a language - Listening, Speaking, Reading & Writing, Vocabulary & Grammar. It does each of these in multiple ways which all seem to be effective. I really appreciated the conversation practices which are available for many different situations making this feature very useful for travel at the least. Technology wise this program makes good use of it with Advanced Speech Analysis and full motion video. Dutch Now most definitely deserves the 5 star rating.
Rating:
Summary: Good Product
Review: This product by Transparent Language excels in teaching Polish. I would recomend this program for many reasons.
First of all they use many methods to teach such as games, conversation practices, and reading/speaking in Polish, ect. Secondly, they give you the tools to learn the basics of Polish such as a Grammar tutorial, alphabet reference, word dictation, ect. Another thing about Polish Now that I really appreciated was the vast amount of content(meaning language) that was in the final product. There were practice conversations for many situations and you could hear every Polish word said in the program. Finally, the depth of the program's features are truely amazing. It goes as far as allowing you to compare your pronunciation of words to the pronunciation of a native speaker's words.
Transparent Language did an excellent job with this product and I highly recomend it to anyone looking to learn Polish.
Rating:
Summary: Terrible, terrible software!
Review: I really have a hard time understanding how this line of language software has a 4 star rating on Amazon! I found the program to be far too complicated and intimidating for beginners like myself, and there was no section on the fundamentals of the language, and that's a pretty important section to have. When I tried to find out what certain characters meant, or even how they were pronounced, I found only a poorly made jpeg with the name of some 20 random characters. The dialogue sequences themselves were well written, but a good language program needs more than poorly recorded dialogue sequences to successfully teach any language, and the voices were very poor, as they sounded as if they were recorded using a prepackaged cheap-o microphone (I wouldn't be surprised if that was true). I'd have a hard time recommending this to anyone; even those who wish to brush up on their mandarin! Shame on these people for peddling such a faulty product!
Rating: 
Summary: Not terrible, but definitely not good.
Review: Not terribly expensive, but still not worth it. The Rosetta Stone software is far superior, albeit costly. If you're on a budget and MUST have software and are willing to put up with a klunky interface and poor quality, buy this. Otherwise, save your money.
Rating:
Summary: Worthless junk not even fit for the garbage.
Review: The program "Learn Spanish Now" turned out to be total junk and a complete waste of money. The only lesson I learned was to not to buy computer software without trying it first. Don't waste your money on this senseless mess.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Spanish Tutor!
Review: While it doesn't have the photos or pictures as some other programs do, the process of learning the language and the interface are the best! The speach recognition is better than Rosetta Stone. And that is saying a lot because Rosetta Stone is another great program. The age on the package reads 12 to adult but my 9yo loves it. Some kids don't require pictures or "fuff" to learn. I'm looking forward to buying other languages from this company! You can actually participate in conversions. I do have to say, though, it does take a little time to figure out where to start in the program. BUT you must read the help section! It really... helps. :) Once you understand how to work the program... it's great!
Rating:
Summary: Worthless. Absolutely worthless.
Review: Save your money. The interface is god-awful, buggy as hell, and the program clearly was rushed out for production. Little thought has been put into this program. The games are cheesy, stupid and boring. However, one cool feature was a section with extremely short video segments with the corresponding Japanese (in romaji) scrolling on the left side. I would pay good money for a program that did just that in more extensive amounts. Hope this helps prevent people from wasting their $39.99 on this program. -sev
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