Gaming for Good

Our society prides itself on tolerance, but people with mental disorders are rarely accepted – and seldom understood. Ella Luna Pleasance knows this first hand.  A third year computer science student at Sapir Academic College, Ella suffers from Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, trying to cope on a daily basis with often debilitating fears and insecurities. Getting others to accept her is another, never ending struggle.  So together with fellow student and animator Tamir Zehavi, Ella took to one of the world’s most powerful and rapidly expanding platforms – computer gaming.  A 150 billion dollar industry and growing, gaming reaches young people and adults in every corner of the globe.  The pair’s new RPG video game, Out of Mind, helps gamers understand people who struggle with mental disorders. It was recently featured at a major gaming festival in the City of Rehovot.  Out of Mind’s protagonist is a young girl who wakes up in a strange world and must “get back to where she once belonged,” solving the mysteries of her own past.  Players come to understand mental illness for what it really is – a daily struggle with no guarantee of a happy end.  Pleasance and Zehavi developed the game at HIE Sapir, the widely acclaimed Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Sapir Academic College.  At HIE Sapir, technology meets social activism and students devise out-of-the-box solutions to help make the world a better place. Pleasance and Zahavi have now made it just a little bit better.