Instant Immersion German

Rating:
Summary: Useless, and rather [sad].
Review: For starters, all the content offered would have easily fit on a single CD-ROM, so their offering so many disks reminds of bogus language courses from the past which had 30 or so cassettes or videocassetes, each with about 10 minutes or so of playback. Each area of the course is essentially worthless. To just describe one disk, the vocabulary disk has about 2,000 or so words almost randomly chosen. Very few of the essential words of the language appear, and instead hundreds of terms deal with country names and things you don't need to know your first days, such as cufflinks and redcurrant.

It is true that pictures and videos help remember words, but the images are thoroughly depressing and [sad] on many ocassions. For example, the woman in the "kiss" term looks like she is doing so forcibly, and in general any picture or video (one in about 30 definitions has a 2 or 3 second video) in which people of any age appear seem to either have a great dislike for the photographer, or for life in general. It is rather disturbing to see such suffering when one is trying to learn a new language.

The other disks are even more worthless, and everything has a depressing quality to it. Needless to say, I sent it back, and will instead try another product. I recommend staying far away from this one!

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Beginner and Refresher Course
Review: For the low price, you definitely get your money's worth! The program covers numbers, telling time, basic words, sentences, colors, nations, foods, names of body parts, and more! I especially like that each word is pronounced, not just by one person, but by a man and a woman, so you get a little bit of variation on acceptable pronunciation. And it even has a feature where a word is first said by the software, then you say the word (you need to have a mic) and then you get to hear how your pronunciation sounds compared to how the software says it. There are tests, both easy and hard, which I personally enjoyed. And there's a game show type test option that is kind of cute and fun too. And all this is just on the FIRST of the five disks! The other disks cover such things as pronunciation tests (the software critiques how well you pronounce the words), an interactive picture Dictionary (Kind of like the Rosetta Stone Explorer series), and a cool game called "Who is Oscar Lake?" where based on how well you do will determine if you win the day or end up in prison.
While you'll not become fluent in German with just this software, you'll certainly be able to make your way around Germany just fine after using this software.
That's My Opinion, ut You're Welcome To It.

Rating:
Summary: not for a serious self education
Review: I am a college student who was looking for software to help me learn german. I bought this because it was the first thing i came across. I can already speak french in addition to my native language english. The first cd will introduce you to a series of basic nouns, food, body parts, time, useful inanimate objects and colors. The second cd throws you into a sort of game, however even the instructions for the game are in solid german. The questions are not only german but very hard to understand, even after mastering the first cd. The speaker is too fast on the third cd (talk to me 3.0), and the interactive picture dictionary fails to have a decent selection of anything but nouns. I never played the last cd "who is oscar lake". All in all its an ok set of cds to help one memorize nouns. There are lots of games to play and fun ways to help one memorize. However there is absolutely no aid in german grammar. I actually had to look up, on my own, the very basics in sentence structure, such as object pronouns, definite and indefinite articles, verb conjugations and even simple prepositions necessary to give even the most banal of sentences cohesion. This software may be satisfactory as a supplement to help with nouns, but that is all, i would look to other companies for a self education.

Rating:
Summary: Super!
Review: Super software for the price

Covers all the elements to learn German

Very fun and engaging activities

I will highly recommend it, you definitely get a great value for a low price

Rating:
Summary: For the price, this has alot to offer
Review: There is alot missing from this program (and most German programs out there, in my opinion), but it has some nice features. The games are just flashcard practice, but fun nonetheless. The speech recognition on CD 3 is not as good as German Now! 9, but still helpful. The picture dictionary isn't terribly helpful.

The game on CD 5, Who is Oscar Lake, was what really made me want to get this. The concept is great, and after learning the interface and giving it time, it grew on me.

Having fun and maintaining your interest in the language is the best way to learn it. That is a strength of this program, in my opinion. I would recommend using this program as a supplement to a class, textbook, or mabye a better program, because it is not comprehensive enough to stand alone. But for a good price, why not go for it?