First, play the game.
Then, read the rest of this entry.
I think I probably got the worst possible ending. Given more time, I would have sat down and analysed the precise verbiage of the game. It says, on the one hand, "In six days all living cells on Earth will be dead", but it also says "You have one chance". At first glance these two statements are directly contradictory with one another. If you have one chance to save the Earth, then the first statement is an outright lie or at best a possible outcome. But it's presented as fact. So, I reasoned, I must have one chance to accomplish some other task. But what other task could be referred to? This point of confusion became my doom.
I accidentally went up the stairs to the roof on day two or three or so and witnessed a guy jumping off to his death. Stupidly, my character then evidently spent the rest of the day moping about and then went home! There was time for a full day's work in there!
That was the only mistake I made. I spent every single one of the other days in the laboratory trying to find a cure. By the final day, everybody on Earth was dead except my character and my character's daughter. On the final day, that is to say the day after all life on Earth except me and my daughter had been extinguished, I found the cure. There was big green tick on the computer screen. I injected her, and then we went to the park. It was entirely unclear whether the brown-coloured trees in the park had been killed by this virulent cell-destroying phage, or whether it was simply autumn. We sat there, the only two living creatures on a completely dead planet, and then, presumably years later, died ourselves. Pleasant!
So what was the point of the game? It had poor animation and not-terribly-good writing, although it succeeded in conveying feelings and atmosphere, so, as a work of art, I must give it a certain amount of credit.
The point, as I take it, was to find out who you are by seeing what your decisions were. The question is a very old and very well-known one, albeit not officially canonised in any widely known work of fiction as yet: "The world is going to end in a very small space of time. For the duration of that period, you are free to act entirely without consequence. What do you do?"
This is a question I first considered a very long time ago, long before One Chance was created. If you remember the Ed Stories, then you will have seen my (or rather, Ed's) response there. (I have long lamented that the Ed MacPherson of the Ed Stories is basically an idealised version of myself and this is certainly true here.) In this case, the specific means by which the world is about to end is an asteroid impact from deep space. And Ed's response (as mine would be in reality) is stop that asteroid and save the Earth.
The correct answer is save the world. It always has been. So a seemingly unstoppable threat is descending on humanity? Well, are we all dead yet? No? Then it's not over. So you have cancer? Then cure cancer. Awareness nothing, cancer research charities nothing. Get that biochemistry degree and throw your two million cents into the all-consuming maw of that grand machine we call science. Be experimental! Be worth it! This is my attitude. Right now, anyway. Admittedly, I don't have any serious illnesses yet.
The second thing that this game revealed about me is that I'm hesitant. I'm hesitant to commit myself to a course of action without having thought it over for a while. I got to day three or so before deciding "You know what? I'm going to save the world." I took every day as if it was an entirely new and independent decision, instead of approaching the whole seven-day/one-week storyline with a single specific goal in mind. In the latter case, I'm sure I'd have found the cure a day earlier and successfully saved the world.
The lesson here is know yourself. Figuring out your priorities from now until the end of your lifetime is not a trivial matter and takes time to get right. So take that time now, and get it right. What is valuable? What is important? Then, when the end of all creation or some other comparably gigantic life event comes knocking on your door, you won't die from sheer paralysed indecision. Smart people know what to do in every eventuality. Smart people see something happen, and act.
Given the choice, always save the world.
Discussion (34)
2010-12-12 23:28:37 by Sherp:
2010-12-12 23:54:19 by Sherp:
2010-12-13 00:30:03 by Col:
2010-12-13 00:45:00 by bbot:
2010-12-13 00:45:30 by Tanya:
2010-12-13 02:35:55 by EthZee:
2010-12-13 02:58:49 by Matt:
2010-12-13 03:26:03 by Tobias:
2010-12-13 11:30:21 by Naleh:
2010-12-13 15:22:24 by Kyle:
2010-12-13 22:57:06 by Matthew:
2010-12-13 23:07:10 by qntm:
2010-12-13 23:38:30 by Sean:
2010-12-14 00:10:20 by Ross:
2010-12-14 00:33:10 by Ross:
2010-12-14 06:54:58 by Turgid:
2010-12-14 10:26:21 by Naleh:
2010-12-14 14:45:39 by pascal:
2010-12-14 15:56:43 by Treblemaker:
2010-12-14 21:24:45 by Typhon:
2010-12-16 02:22:58 by atomicthumbs:
2010-12-16 13:29:26 by Snowyowl:
2010-12-16 21:47:18 by SkyTheMadboy:
2010-12-17 00:56:13 by Thrack:
2010-12-18 11:21:36 by Hodou:
2010-12-19 15:06:11 by Thrack:
2010-12-23 08:51:28 by Gruntbuggly:
2010-12-23 09:38:57 by Crane:
2010-12-23 12:42:36 by nosesquid:
2010-12-28 04:14:17 by Jeremy:
2011-01-02 06:13:03 by Moarti:
2011-01-18 04:03:58 by Lee:
2011-01-31 03:58:39 by Erik:
2011-08-20 06:19:19 by JTKirk: