Real life might be the best role-playing video game (RPG) you’ve ever played. Increasing amounts of research have gone into the use of games as learning tools in the classroom, and the findings seem to indicate a positive trend for students.
However, the gamification craze doesn’t stop there — many grown individuals have taken on a gamer mindset when tackling the pitfalls of personal and professional life. People are turning their mindset to goal-setting and specific quantitative goals and quests to complete in the day-to-day.
Here are a few ways you can add some excitement to your daily life — both working and otherwise.
1. Set Quests
First and foremost, it’s important to understand what kind of gamer you are. Some people are excessively creative daydreamers, players who get taken by a great story and daydream constantly. Others are highly analytical, and enjoy puzzle solving and figuring out systems. There are many variations on this theme, and it’s likely you already have some idea of the games or hobbies you enjoy.
With this in mind, setting goals or quests may or may not work well for you. Anybody who’s played an RPG will be familiar with quests. The quest missions are what progress the storyline, introduce new characters and require your hard work and dedication to complete. These often take a long time and cover extended journeys through the world of the RPG.
Your quests should be the more significant accomplishments you hope to complete in the future. Think of something that takes a while and consists of smaller requirements before you can complete it — for example, carving a canoe or finishing a long-term project at work.
Burnout can be a problem in these projects, as they often seem too large to complete from the beginning. However, if you figure out a checklist of exactly what you need to finish this quest and the reward upon completion, you’ll be surprised how quickly you start working on the requirements.
2. Sharpen Your Tech
Tech — or technique — is a fighting game term used widely throughout the community. While quests usually consist of large, unique missions, tech covers the exact opposite: the grind. When you are practicing at Street Fighter or Melee, you spend hours sharpening your skills, reaction time and other small factors that give you a leg up on the competition.
Tech is a surprisingly universal concept that applies to personal and professional life. When going through the drudgery of your day, examine all the small interactions and performances you must undertake. In your mind, begin to figure out what you can do to improve your efficiency and skill at these tasks. Then, set measures of how you can test your improvement.
Just make sure not to get too intense about it – you might get funny looks.
3. Consider Multiplayer Options
While multiplayer has had a bit of a falling off in the past years, nothing replaces the memories of gaming on your couch with your brothers or friends, working hard to complete the next mission.
Gaming can be an incredibly potent teamwork machine. It’s also an excellent means for attacking a problem as a group. If you are working on a work project with a group, figure out what everybody is best at doing, and assign tasks accordingly. However, you should also set a level of competition — similar to a kill count — to get your members stoked when they perform well. Scoring also cuts down the chances of free-riding on others’ hard work.
4. Keep the Casual Gamers in Mind
It’s a simple fact that not everyone is a big gamer. For some, casual daily gaming takes the form of mobile games or fun, non-competitive board games. Within these games, personal improvement is important but does not have the same brutal disappointment at losing a fighting game.
For many of these casual gamers, using mobile apps can be extremely beneficial. They are accustomed to the repetitive and calming setup of mobile games already.
Some apps have taken this to heart, and offer a helpful service that keeps the user interested and having fun. Many of these apps also include some sort of reward upon completion of a game or quest. For instance, Sweatcoin tracks how long you walk outside and gives you virtual currency as a result. So you get healthy and get a reward at the same time!
We can all use a little more gaming in our lives. Games light up the imagination, turn repetitive tasks fulfilling and fun and get us motivated to face the challenges, whatever form they take. Gamifying your life can do exactly that!
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