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I got this example sentence online:

人生の最後は、ゲームをプレイして死にたいよね

What function does て-form have in this sentence to have it mean this way?

The chronological sequence, "and" function does not make sense in this case.

Deciemator
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1 Answers1

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This te-form describes a situation that coexists with the following verb. A representative example is 歩いて学校に行く, which means "to go to school on foot" rather than "to walk and then go to school".

In your case, you can translate this using English "while":

人生の最後は、ゲームをプレイして死にたいよね。
At the end of my life, I want to die while playing a game.

See also:

naruto
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  • Thank you for the response. So can I take it that depending on the context of the given sentence, て can mean "while" or "by"? In addition, I saw one of your previous answers for a question of a similar nature, do you think I could drop a comment over there to clarify on one of your examples? – Deciemator Mar 04 '20 at 02:37
  • @Deciemator Yes, the te-form has a lot of functions and you may need time to digest. And which question did you find? I might link to it from this question if it's related to this. – naruto Mar 04 '20 at 02:42
  • https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/57523/how-to-differentiate-between-separate-meanings-of-%e3%81%a6-form This is the post I found, I was wondering if the example you give "急いで顔を洗う。(situation)" was referring to the case where "て = V2 while V1" – Deciemator Mar 04 '20 at 02:45
  • @Deciemator Ah, yes, I've forgotten that answer, but it essentially says the same thing :) – naruto Mar 04 '20 at 02:58
  • Sorry if I am dragging this out, would like to confirm one more thing. You said that this te-form function has two example, situation and a verb that need to coexist with the former, how do I identify those in my example "ゲームをプレイして死にたいよね". Thanks again. – Deciemator Mar 04 '20 at 03:05
  • @Deciemator Context. ゲームをプレイして死ぬ **can** mean "play the game before I die" in a different context. In **this** context, the sentence clearly says "at the last moment of (my) life", and I would assume he is referring to [this](https://www.thegamer.com/15-people-who-have-died-playing-video-games/). – naruto Mar 05 '20 at 04:44