In my experience, finding time to write is one of the hardest things for anyone to do and this is doubly true for college students. On top of writing papers for class and discussion board posts, who can find time to keep a record of their life or start tracking creative ideas? In comes 750 Words to save the day.

The premise of 750 Words is to make journaling a game. Every day your goal is to write 750 words about anything—whether it’s two pages from your novel, the start of your research paper, or what your cat ate for dinner. Once you’ve hit your goal you gain some points for that day and it gives you an emotional analysis of what you wrote about.

Instant feedback when you write? Who would’ve thought? Photo Courtesy of Colin McGann

To track the subconscious feelings behind your writing, 750 Words uses the nifty computing services called the Regressive Imagery Dictionary and the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count Library. These technologies give you detailed charts and graphs about the feeling you wrote about most (happiness, self-Importance, etc) and the issues that concerned you in your writing (success, religion, etc). There is also a general mindset indicator depending on your word choice and the syntax of your words. On top of that, there is also an indicator of how efficient you are while writing, your time orientation, and even the weather. For a person who has been journaling on paper most of their life, this amount of feedback is incredible.

For me, the incentive to keep coming back every day were the game elements. A simple scoring system that is reminiscent of bowling has been implemented. If you can reach your 750-word goal every day, the previous day’s score gets added to your current one creating a growing combo score. Every month your score resets and if you can write your name, it is added to the “Wall of Awesomeness.” If you fail, your name is added to the “Wall of Shame,” a public board showing your failure—and nobody wants that. Finally, you can earn the social media staples of badges and achievements for completing goals. If you write for 200 days in a row, you can earn a pterodactyl badge—this is now my life goal.

Photo illustration by Colin McGann.

In the first Best of the Web (BOTW get it?) segment we’re going to take a look at some Flash games that don’t require a Facebook game.

Robot Unicorn Attack is an Adult Swim game where you take the role of a robot unicorn on a mission to make it through a land of fairies, dolphins, and rainbows.  You could classify this game in the “Running Sidescroller” subgenre that was popularized by one of the other BOTW game, Canabalt. You play on a two-dimensional plane, where you jump from cliff to cliff and break through giant stars with a rush attack. If you’re on the fence about this game, listen to the song Always by Erasure. If you can make it through without stabbing yourself in the eye, go ahead and give Robot Unicorn Attack a chance.

P.S. This game also has a Facebook version with leaderboards, weekly tournaments, and a heavy metal nightmare mode.

Live another life in One Chance. Photo by Colin McGann.

Categories: Blogs Geekin It SPM

Read the full post »