Throw at enemy to release a purple, soporific haze.

[Visolaris]

Hello,
I know this is a weird question but when I am watching several native English people playing a game over the internet
and in this game there is an item description that contain the word "soporific"

item description is :
Throw at enemy to release a purple, soporific haze.

and it is kind of hard to read for them and after reading it they say :
"I do not understand this word"

So they do not understand what the item does!!

I also asked my wife (she is Japanese) about this word (she have a high level of English understanding and she didn't know either)

But in my language (french) there is a very similar word with the same pronunciation with the same meaning (soporifique) and everyone I know know what it means

so my question is :
what word do English people use to mean soporific in daily use? (could be a drug or a lecture)
Is it normal that people do not understand it?

 

[probus]

You mean English-speaking people, not only English people.

Most of us probably know that soporific means "sleep-inducing" but few would ordinarily use that term to describe something. We'd be much more likely to call it boring.

 

[Tdol]

Plenty know it, but plenty don't. Is the gaming community known for its wide vocab? You will also find that people who use it to mean boring may not know the more specialised medicine/drug usage.

 

[Rover_KE]

I can't help feeling that the percentage of native English-speakers who understand soporific is almost exactly the same as native French-speakers who understand soporifique.

Why do you think it should be any different?

 

[jutfrank]

I can't help feeling that the percentage of native English-speakers who understand soporific is almost exactly the same as native French-speakers who understand soporifique.

Why do you think it should be any different?

It's much commonly used in French.

In English, I'd guess that among the population at large, much fewer don't know it than do. I think it's mostly used by the medical community.

 

[SoothingDave]

I think the chances of a random American knowing the meaning of this word are very slim. It's not a word I am familiar with.

 

[Tarheel]

Well, I know the word, but I don't know if I have ever used it. If I had to guess I'd say that only about half of native speakers know it. However, in the proper context most people will be able to figure it out.

 

[emsr2d2]

I use it but not to mean "boring". I would use it, for example, to describe relaxing, quiet music that you can play when you go to bed in order to induce sleep.

 

[Glizdka]

It would help a lot if you said what game it's from.

Some games would surprise you with the vocabulary they use. It all depends on what the game's about. Plague Inc., for example, uses precise medical terms because the goal is to genetically engineer a disease that will wipe out humanity.

 

[probus]

the goal is to genetically engineer a disease that will wipe out humanity.

Good grief. I think I'll stick to chess.

 

[Skrej]

It might just be a translation issue. Video games are notorious for their poor English translations (all your base are belong to us). Sometimes they do get the grammar correct, but seem to rely on translation dictionaries for vocab, which sometimes offer uncommon English words as the equivalent term from the native language.

I see students do this all the time - they use a dictionary to translate a term from their native language and end up using uncommon or otherwise inappropriate (for the context) English words. For example, I had a student turn in a short paragraph in which she talked about the lack of furniture in her house. The only other item in the bedroom other than a mattress on the floor was an "armoire", which turned out to really be something like a plastic clothes box.

While of course not entirely unfeasible, I suspected it might not be an armoire based on the spartan living conditions she described, so we brought up some images on the internet and confirmed hers wasn't quite as fancy. 'Armoire' was just what the bilingual dictionary suggested for whatever term she looked up in her native language.

 

[Skrej]

Good grief. I think I'll stick to chess.

Chess may less stressful - once Madagascar shuts down its port, it's impossible to win the game. It doesn't have an airport and being an island, ship transmission is your only vector. I've killed off 99.9% of the world, only to have a few thousand survivors left on that danged island with no way to infect them.

Quit vexing, actually, when all you want is to just end humanity. Not unlike some Mondays.

 

[Tdol]

By the way, doesn't purple haze have a Jimi Hendrix reference to acid blindness?