Grand Text Auto

Years ago we created a board game, POX: Save the People, a gane tgat helped players understand infections diseases, as well as ZOMBIEPOX and POX: Save the Puppies, about vaccinating pets. Watch a video about the project, read an interview, and read one paper about an empirical study, looking at the basic question of whether transferring a public health game from an analog to a digital format would impact players’ perceptions of the game and the efficacy of the game for stimulating changes to beliefs and cognitions; or read paper two which looked at the design process and how we modeled “herd immunity.” We love public health, with or without the undead.

New research at the Tiltfactor Game Research Laboratory at Dartmouth College indicates that people’s thinking about public health policies and spending priorities can be shifted through a novel new game genre–role playing sports.

A key challenge in public health in the United States is lowering costs by focusing on health priorities. Often, these priorities are discovered by complex visualizations and in-depth workshops such as those sponsored by Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Aligning Forces for Quality initiative. Research groups across the country have taken a variety of approaches to rethinking health spending, for example. ReThink Health, an initiative from The Rippel Foundation, offers a robust dynamic modeling system for testing and visualizing scenarios and changes to the whole US health system.

Earlier this month Tiltfactor game designer Max Seidman represented the lab at the annual Games for Health conference in Boston. The conference is exactly what it sounds like: a place where game experts, health professionals, and health stakeholders come together to share innovations in improving health and health care through games, as well as to be inspired to make further breakthroughs!

For Immediate Release
Contact: contact@tiltfactor.org

July 17, 2013 (Hanover, NH) – Tiltfactor Laboratory is proud to present a new digital game, POX: Save the Puppies! POX: Save the Puppies is a game developed for our collaborator in Australia, Dr. Mark Kelman BSc BVMS CMAVA (http://www.virbac.com.au). POX: Save the Puppies serves as a reminder that achieving herd immunity is not just important for humans, it’s also extremely valuable for animal populations. Our recent experimental research shows that playing the game gives players food for thought while also promoting an understanding of systems thinking concepts.

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contact [at] tiltfactor[.]org
(603) 646-1007

November 3, 2012 (Hanover, NH) — Meaningful Play 2012 has awarded Tiltfactor Best Digital Game for POX: Save the People™ for iPad, Best Non-Digital Game for the party card game Awkward Moment™, and runner-up for Best Non-Digital Game for another Tiltfactor party card game, buffalo™. Each game went through a competitive peer review process for inclusion in Meaningful Play, with awards decided by conference attendees.

Ideally, medical solutions would be straightforward. If a patient had an illness, they could go in to see a doctor, who would then have a diagnosis and an effective treatment option that aligned with the patient’s preferences and desires. In reality, it isn’t so simple, and there often isn’t a “best” option. Pioneered at Dartmouth, shared decision making involves increased communication between health care providers and their patients, in order to find solutions that best fit patients’ interests. The results seem to be overwhelming, with almost 70% of patients surveyed preferred taking part in making decisions with their doctors (The Guardian, 3/10/12). At tiltfactor, we’ve been working on our shared decision making game prototype. In our most recent game iteration I worked on coming up with potential treatments—such as surgery, topical treatments, or electing to undergo screening, and other actable qualities of a patient—working as a TV presenter, paranoid of needles, or having the responsibility of taking care of two young children.

Modeling health system dynamics with a game of tag about zombies? Sounds impossible, but the Tiltfactor team experimented with just such a wacky game on the Dartmouth Green! The human team runs away from the zombies, because if they get tagged then they have to change teams. Meanwhile, the humans can choose to call in one type of specialist per round: either the soldiers to stun the zombies (you can’t kill them, duh), the medics to heal tagged humans, or the scientists to turn the zombies back into humans.

Games for Health was awesome! Two weeks ago I gave a talk and demo at Ludica Medica II: Medical Modeling, Simulation, Learning & Training with Videogames & Videogame Technologies, an all-day event as part of the Games for Health Conference week in Boston. The day was filled with combination of larger discussions and game-specific talks, including my talk on the development and subsequent studies on POX: SAVE THE PEOPLE (available both as a board game and for iPad). Concurrently with the Ludica Medica session, the Out & About III: Mobile Serious Games Day was running as was Enabled Play: The Fourth Annual Games Accessibility Day. With all of these events happening at the same time, I jumped in and out of many great presentations and discussions covering such topics as exergaming apps, a program that helped families of military veterans with PSTD, and subversive game design. Below are some of my observations and quotes heard from the day:

(PDF version here)

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Contact:
cont…@tiltfactor.org
603.646.1007

Tiltfactor Laboratory is pleased to announce that ZOMBIEPOX™ has been selected for the IndieCade showcase at the 2012 annual Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) trade show at the Los Angeles Convention Center from June 5th to June 7th. E3 is presented by the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) and is the world’s premier trade show for video game and related industries, with last year’s attendance peaking at 46,800.
http://www.e3expo.com/

Happy Halloween everyone! We’ve been keeping this a secret for sometime now and we’re happy to announce that POX: Save the People® is now available for the iPad!

All of us here at the Tiltfactor Lab are very excited about the release!

Based on our board game, POX: Save the People® is a 1-4 player game in which players fight the spread of a disease that threatens to take over a community. The game is based on the way a typical disease spreads, and players must work together to contain the spread of infection by either vaccinating or curing citizens.

¡Algo nuevo! ¡Tenemos las instrucciones para POX: Salve la gente, en español! Descargue las aquí.

Thanks to everyone for the tremendous response we received at Gen Con!

Because there was so much interest in POX, we’ve decided to start shipping the second edition early! No need to wait until September. In fact, if you order before September 1st you’ll still get the discounted pre-order price of $21.95 USD!

The Tiltfatory is cranking on the 2nd Edition of POX. 2nd Edition includes minor tweaks to the game board, cards, and the game instructions. If all goes well, we hope to have POX 2nd Edition game sets available by late August. What’s so awesome is that we are already getting pre-orders for the 2nd Edition. MUCHO THANKS!

Pre-Order now at a discounted price, now through 7/25!

Pre-Order POX 2nd Edition set

Wow! In less than two months, we are SOLD OUT of the 1st edition of our Pox Game! But do not fret! The Tiltfactor team is publishing a 2nd edition. Pre-Order Edition 2 now! Expected ship date 9/1/2011. We’ll have some at GENCON in Indiana this August as well at our BOOTH!

Thanks to everyone who bought a set and helped -ahem- spread the word about POX.

The POX game was in the NH Union Leader this past Friday, complete with interviews of Mary Flanagan and Martin Downs of the Mascoma Valley Health Initiative.
Here are some excerpts:
Flanagan is quick to point out the game takes no stance on whether vaccinations are good or bad, it simply explains how diseases are transmitted and allows the players to fight them. She may be quick to make that point given all the controversy over vaccines and the, turns out erroneous, link between the vaccines for measles, mumps and rubella and autism. A recent British Medical Journal article uncovered fraudulent data was the to blame for this belief and pretty much debunked the idea. “The game let’s you come to your own conclusion,” she said. “People can make their own choices, but you end up seeing how the system works.”

Social communications expert Clifford Nass, with researchers Eyal Ophir and Anthony Wagner, Stanford University, just completed a study of multitasking and productivity among college students. The resulting paper, “Cognitive control in media multitaskers,” was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The results of “digital overload” were similar to past research: multitasking does not make one more productive. See the CNN article here. Do you self identify as a ‘chronic media multitasker’?

Does Bejeweled calm the savage beast? In a recent study funded by the game makers Popcap Games reported in the Washington Post, researchers found improved moods and heart rhythms in players– coherent, equally spaced rhythms. The researchers note that mental health benefits for many could lie in the zone between stressful arousal and boredom.