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Best Social Media Crowdsourcing Game

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Life As A

Organization:

National University of Singapore

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Life As A is a serious game developed in Unity that transforms real-life scenarios into validated cognitive training experiences. Inspired by the Multi-Attribute Task Battery (MATB), originally used to train pilots, Life As A is modelled on MATB’s four core tasks: Tracking, Resource Management, System Monitoring, and Communications. Each is reimagined as an interactive mini-game that challenges players’ divided attention, executive control, memory, and decision-making under time pressure.

The game is designed with familiar, emotionally resonant themes such as gardening and driving, promoting accessibility for older adults, individuals in cognitive rehabilitation, and even younger users seeking cognitive enhancement. To enable personalized training, Life As A incorporates CURATE.AI, an adaptive AI platform that adjusts task difficulty in real time based on individual performance. This makes the game not only a tool for cognitive improvement but also a potential digital biomarker for monitoring cognitive changes over time.

A coin-based reward system further boosts engagement by incentivizing focus and sustained participation. The game has undergone seven rounds of iterative, user-centered playtesting to refine its mechanics and narrative design, ensuring it remains intuitive, motivating, and age-inclusive. By combining the scientific rigor of MATB with CURATE.AI’s real-time personalization, Life As A offers a scalable, engaging platform for cognitive training that is both clinically relevant and widely accessible.

Game Overview

The game introduces players to four challenges inspired by the four core tasks of MATB through a tutorial: Fish Drag, Fill the Jug, Planting and Harvesting, and Communications. Once familiarized, players must perform all tasks simultaneously within a set time limit during gameplay. The Drag Fish Drag (Tracking task) develops visual-motor coordination and sustained attention. Fill the Jug(Resource Management task) builds planning and control skills, with strong performance indicating the ability to function effectively under cognitive load. The Planting and Harvesting (System Monitoring task) sharpens attention, reaction speed, and decision-making. Lastly, the Communications task trains auditory memory and discrimination.

The core goal of the game is to optimize task performance to achieve the highest possible score in each level, with cumulative scores determining leaderboard placement. Players are challenged to manage multiple simultaneous tasks under time pressure, requiring sustained attention, multitasking efficiency, and cognitive flexibility. As performance thresholds are met, players unlock new hobby-based scenarios that present analogous but increasingly complex task demands, reinforcing learned cognitive strategies while introducing novel contextual challenges.

Older adults aged 65 and above, who are prone to cognitive decline.

Each of the four mini-tasks was mapped to a corresponding MATB task and equally weighted (25 points), creating a standardized 100-point score per difficulty level for consistent and fair performance comparison. Task 1: Drag Fish [Accuracy in dragging fish to the target spot.] – Tracking Task, Task 2: Fill the Jug [Filling jugs when they’re empty or there are leaks until they’re full. Patching cracks in the jug to stop leaks.] – Resource Management, Task 3: Planting and Harvesting [Timely harvesting within time limit in each level. Detecting plant readiness for harvest and collection.] – System Monitoring, Task 4: Communication Task [Correct response to audio cues (responding to true/distractor cues)] – Auditory Communication.

Players will be assessed based on the percentage scored out of the total maximum possible score attained in each difficulty level.

Game Specs

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Game Video

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