Keep your brain active Simon Brew puts his brain through boot camp
Simon Brew’s tired brain almost kicks the bucket after tackling some of the trickiest games around
Much of what I’ve blathered on about in this column these past few months has concerned brain-training tools and games that actively target the more frugal user: free and cheap games trying to rob you of 10 minutes or so of your time.
That has meant overlooking the brain-training tools with more serious intentions. A company called Posit Science has recently been granted patents in America for “exercises focused on elemental people skills”. These exercises were originally part of research into treating people with conditions such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
Its suite of tools, called Brainhq, costs £9 a month, although there are free exercises to try at www.brainhq.com. It feels pricey, but it gives your brain a thorough workout with games that are demanding, if not especially original.
In Hawk Eye you have to identify the odd bird out from those flashing before your eyes (see screenshot above). It turns the screw by showing the birds for mere fractions of seconds. The game Divided Attention works on the same principle involving a simple task (in this case saying whether the colours of a shape match). By the end, objects flash on screen for just milliseconds.
It’s recommended that you spend 30 minutes a day, three days a week, on the activities. If you have the time (and cash) to invest, perhaps the monthly subscription (cheaper on an annual basis) is worth it.
Cognifit ( www.cognifit.com), a similarly serious service, also wants you to subscribe – or at least register an account – before you get going. Once you’ve given it a few details, you can try the initial 10-minute brain tests for free. I really enjoyed Cognifit’s exercises, which feel different to the bulk of brain-training games that offer the same colourmatching, shape-sorting challenges.
The games are almost as hard to play as they are to describe. In one you follow a ball around a screen with your mouse, while tapping the space bar if the colour of the ball matches the colour displayed at the bottom. Another exercise plays a snippet of audio, then replays a longer version, challenging you – from memory – to stop it at the point the first snippet ended. Does the originality of the games justify the £13.15 a month (or £118.80 a year) subscription? Depends on how much faith you have in them slowing the onset of dementia (read our Cover Feature on page 50 for more on this).
At the end you’re given scores out of 800 across several categories. This is visually represented by what looks like water filling up a head. My pathetic score of 289 didn’t even reach lip level.
These enjoyably tough games felt like the mental equivalent of the army assault course on The Krypton Factor (always my favourite bit on that much-missed show). I needed something less strenuous next, so installed Drop Flip Seasons ( http://dropflipgame.com, see screenshot left), a brilliantly designed physics-based game for iphones and ipads where all you need to do is drop a ball in a bucket (its predecessor is available for Android also).
It sounds like the kind of simple game you might encounter at a village fete, next to the welly wanging. But the obstacles make it hard. You need to move them to create a path for the ball to follow. To excel, you’ll need a better sense of logic and coordination than I possess. I’d struggle to drop a ball in a bucket three miles wide. If you get hooked, I’d suggest paying three quid to remove the ads might not be a bad investment.
These enjoyably tough games felt like the mental equivalent of the army assault course on The krypton Factor (always my favourite bit)