What Computers Can Teach Us About Mental Health

"Problems with computers are often described as being hardware problems, operating system problems, and software problems.  If you have a hardware problem, you will often see symptoms at the operating system and software levels as well as with hardware.  If you have an operating system problem, you'll see symptoms at the software level as well as the operating system.  Software problems pretty much just show up at the software level.  Granted, if the problem at a higher level is severe enough, it can damage the lower levels as well.

I noticed a correlation with mental health the other day.  If you have a hardware problem, you go see a neurologist.  This fellow pays attention to nerves, brain tissues, blood vessels in the brain, that sort of thing.  When you get a CT scan after a concussion, they're looking for hardware problems.  If you have an operating system problem, you go see a psychiatrist.  The psychiatrist is looking for issues involving brain chemical imbalances and misbehaviors.  Based on information from reported symptoms, they will apply medication that is designed to counter malfunctions within the chemical system.  If you have a bi-polar disorder you treat with medication, that's an operating system problem.  If you have a software problem, you go see a psychologist.  Psychological problems exist in the thought-level of the brain.  Issues around self-esteem, self-worth, some forms of paranoia, etc all hang out as software glitches.  When you need to talk out a problem or alter your understanding of your world view, it's a software problem."

Full story

https://sites.google.com/site/socraticstudios/deep-thoughts/what-computers-can-teach-us-about-mental-health

I'm Running for President (Not really)

I've started jotting down thoughts on where I stand on various political issues that come up.  Check out how I've solved the problems of the Healthcare and Marriage debates!

https://sites.google.com/site/socraticstudios/self-for-president

Levels in RPGs

The idea of "character levels" in RPGs has always irritated me somewhat.

 Levels are a very artificial way differentiate relative power, though they are very easy to work with.  I forgive their usage in pen and paper games on the grounds that you don't want people to have to use an advanced graphing calculator to determine the results of an action.  I also understand that they're a very easy way to supply a feeling of progression to the player.  I'll even allow that they're okay to use in a scripted closed-ended (that's the correct term, I looked it up) single player game.  If you look at a lot of the Final Fantasy games for example, they use levels and have a cap at 99, but you often reach the end of the game in the 40s and the game basically forces you to reach the needed levels for any given piece of content as you work to reach it.

The real area where they bother me is in the MMORPG genre.  It's especially irritating that you basically play two different games.  You've got the leveling process where you're working your way to the cap in which you generally play through story-driven quests often by yourself until you reach a cap, with the option of doing small group dungeons if you wish.  Then at the cap the game switches to doing a handful of dungeons to gear up so you can do a handful of raids until you cap out on that.

If you prefer the story-driven quest game, the first phase is great...but then it ends.  If you're lucky, you get repetitive daily quests you can do at the cap, but for most who prefer this phase, doing the same quest over and over doesn't come near the level of the actual enjoyment had when doing "new stuff".

For those that prefer the "end game", that first phase is just a dull grind you're forced into before you actually get to have fun.

My aim is to design a system where there is no magic line where the type of available content completely changes.  The player should be able to continue improving their character so long as a challenge can be found, and varying types of content should be able to be found at all skill levels.

The Old "I'm Gonna Start a Game" Post

So I've been tinkering with the idea of starting a game for years.  I've noticed a few different mindsets when a person decides to embark on this endeavor.  For fun, lets use one of those "X Steps of Y" lists you find in psychology.

1)  Naive Enthusiasm
You start out with a great idea and all the enthusiasm in the world, with grandiose ideas and no real idea of what it would take to accomplish them.  If you're a programmer, you pop open your tools and start a project called "Game"...and then realize you have no clue what to do next.

2)  Overwhelmed
The last step for the majority of people, this is where you realize that creating a Magic Robot Ninja Space Opera MMO Shooter actually requires a wide variety of skills and a massive investment of time and/or money.  Most will decide to give up at this point, but the few budding indie developers will realize it's time to aim a little lower for their first product.  (Or, you could do like my friend over at http://lspiroengine.com/ and just do the big idea anyways)

3)  Cut Back
Okay, so maybe the next-gen 3D engine isn't really required, it doesn't have to run on all the consoles and phones and the PC, for that matter we don't really need magic, or robots, or ninjas, or spacecraft, or multiplayer, or...for that matter, if you just make the objective to fling birds at pigs, you could draw all the art yourself and call it good.

At this point you've hopefully settled on an idea you can produce yourself, perhaps with some help from that artsy friend from school that you added on Facebook recently.  Not that any of these thoughts come from experience of success.  We'll see how my own endeavor goes.

Hello Blog

So I find myself attempting to start a blog.  Be warned, you might not want to peer inside my head.