Is 看上去(他们找到了新的游戏场所) an impersonal sentence (a proposition without a subject)?

Question

I’m trying to do the analysis of the sentence 看上去他们找到了新的游戏场所. I thought that 看上去 was the verb of the impersonal sentence, and that the object was the subordinate 他们找到了新的游戏场所, but I can’t find anything about impersonal verbs in Chinese.

Answer 1

看上去 is a guess/estimate of what you are seeing - it appears, it seems, or it looks like.

• 看上去[It appears]他们[they]找到了[(have)found]新的游戏场所[a new gaming place].

The verb here is "找到" (to find), with 了 (an aspect particle) helping to indicate the "completion of the action" and "tense".