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Sea Hero Quest Essay

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Have you ever wanted to take to the seas on a global adventure? A new game available on smartphones worldwide from today does just that -- and could help dementia patients in the process.

The game, called Sea Hero Quest, asks players to set sail in search of precious artifacts -- in the form of memories -- which can be collected at different locations around the world.
As you progress through the game, scientists can use the data you generate to gain insight into your spatial navigation abilities -- one of the first skills lost at the onset of dementia.
The aim is to get hundreds of thousands of people playing from around the world, to identify what the normal range of navigation skills are among people in general.
Once that is established, …show more content…

Next step: Brain imaging
In the next stages of the project, Spiers would like to have volunteers play the game while having their brain scanned in order to see which parts of are active, and link this to patterns seen in the population worldwide.
"I hope to collect neuroimaging data from people playing this game to really understand how the circuits are activated as people play the game," says Spiers.
This is not the first use of mobile games to crowdsource data for scientists. Cancer Research UK have launched five games to date, including Play to Cure: Genes in Space in 2014, which obtained data as people traveled through space and helped identify codes and patterns along their way -- unwittingly.
This time, as players travel the seas instead of space, their navigation choices and strategies will be the data of use as they're set new and changing challenges to test their true abilities.
Sea hero quest, available on iOS and Android from May 4, was created in a collaboration between Deutsche Telecom, Alzheimer's Research UK, Scientists from University College London and the University of East Anglia and game designers

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