Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Brainball!

Posted by emmett on from the geeksports dept.

hasse writes "The Swedish Interactive Institute has developed an interesting new game called Brainball. The rules are simple; a steel ball on the playing field is controlled by biosensors on the players' heads, and the player with the least brain activity wins. A slackers game if I ever saw one. Kinda reminds me of the Amiga guru meditation game. The text about Brainball is only in Swedish but they've got an English section here."

23 of 118 comments (clear)

  1. Ooops, I lose. by mortonda · · Score: 2

    I guess it took to much brain power to post.

  2. They watch DS9! by jd · · Score: 2
    Must do. This is very similar to the game Dax showed Dr Bashir in the Holodeck, except that was a solitaire variant.

    Actually, this looks like a cool idea! I'm sure there are plenty of ways to expand on it, that would increase the challange.

    Where can I get this?

    --
    It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
  3. Pro-Brainball by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

    I guess I'm going to state the obvious.

    Why the least brain power, and not the most?

    Simple. If they ever want this to become a professional sport, they're going to need jocks to play. Watching a game where jocks are competing for the MOST brain power would be like watching two old ladies boxing.

    1. Re:Pro-Brainball by Wellspring · · Score: 2

      Simple, take at an idiot and a genius (for the sake of the argument, we'll name the idiot Dave and the genius Brian-- from KODT, no real people impugned). Dave and Brian will have to sort the phone book into alphabetical order. For their convenience, the book is available in HTML format (!) The winner get's Dave's Hackmaster+12.

      Ready? GO!

      Dave's sweating bullets, playing with the file, pacing, playing with his mouse, nibbling on his fingernails. To no avail! He's struggling to cut and paste it in Word, but Word didn't convert the HTML right, so it looks like a Jon Katz article.

      Brian is sitting back and sipping lightly on his mint julep, content as a cow chewing hay and prozac. He knew that the phone book is already in alphabetical order.

      Software is smart, hardware is fast. By the same token, intelligence represents efficiency, effort is measured by brain activity.

      That's why my dream team would be some of the slackest people on earth, such as me. Surfers, hippies, UNIX gurus and top physicists-- the first two don't even try, and the second two use minimal brain power to accomplish the most. Ideally, these are SubGenius types who don't get into idea fugues.

  4. Fantasy Brainball League by 348 · · Score: 2

    OK, for the Fantasy Brainball League (FBL), Would Uri Gellar be a good pic or a bad pic?

    --

    More race stuff in one place,
    than any one place on the net.

  5. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by clgoh · · Score: 2

    Isn't there a similar game mentionned in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in wich Ford "usually played to lose" ?

    1. Re:Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by __aawsxp7741 · · Score: 2

      Ford stared at Arthur, and Arthur was astonished to find that his will was
      beginning to weaken. He didn't realise that this was because of an old drinking
      game that Ford learned to play in the hyperspace ports that served the Madranite
      mining belts in the star system of Orion Beta.

      The game was not unlike the Earth game called Indian Wrestling, and was played
      like this:

      Two contestants would sit either side of a table, with a glass in front of each
      of them.

      Between them would be placed a bottle of Janx Spirit (as immortalised in that
      ancient Orion mining song "Oh don't give me none more of that Old Janx Spirit/
      No, don't you give me none more of that Old Janx Spirit/ For my head will fly,
      my tongue will lie, my eyes will fry and I may die/ Won't you pour me one more
      of that sinful Old Janx Spirit").

      Each of the two contestants would then concentrate their will on the bottle and
      attempt to tip it and pour spirit into the glass of his opponent - who would
      then have to drink it.
      The bottle would then be refilled. The game would be played again. And again.

      Once you started to lose you would probably keep losing, because one of the
      effects of Janx spirit is to depress telepsychic power.

      As soon as a predetermined quantity had been consumed, the final loser would
      have to perform a forfeit, which was usually obscenely biological.

      Ford Prefect usually played to lose.

    2. Re:Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Pfhreakaz0id · · Score: 2

      Or you could just drink a few Pan-Galactic Gargle Blasters.....

      ... like hitting yourself in the head with a slick of lemon wrapped around a very large gold brick. And -- dark I say it -- a drink almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.

      Seriously, if there any geeks here who have NOT read the HHGTTG series, you need to. funny stuff.
      ---

      --
      DO NOT DISTURB THE SE
  6. controlling thoughts by pOrATa+paTima · · Score: 2

    It is not easy to control your thoughts as everyone thinks. It is definitely not achievable by a slacker. Try to keep your mind thoughtless for a minute and realize how difficult it is.

    1. Re:controlling thoughts by Pascal+Q.+Porcupine · · Score: 2

      Yeah, even in meditation, brain activity is quite high. In fact, while I'm meditating and clearing my conscious mind is when my subconscious seems to be the most active, coming up with cool shit...
      ---
      "'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.

      --
      "'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.
      Quine "quine?
    2. Re:controlling thoughts by Industrial+Disease · · Score: 2

      In orther word, there is a significant difference between low brain activity and useless brain activity.

      --
      Weblogging Considered Harmful:
  7. Brainball's Stability by bjb · · Score: 2
    So if the Brainball program is being run under Windows, does a Blue Screen of Death cause an epileptic seizure or just a brain fart? Maybe this is the way for all you kids who want Attention Deficit Disorder to get on Ritalin. Cool.

    I wonder how the player reacts when nude photos of (ok, ok) a naked petrified Natalie Portman appear in their peripheral vision? Someone want to control an experiement here? I mean, it IS for science..

    --

    --
    Never hit your grandmother with a shovel, for it leaves a bad impression on her mind...
    1. Re:Brainball's Stability by Industrial+Disease · · Score: 2

      Just don't let a Field Service Engineer monkey with the machine while you're playing.

      --
      Weblogging Considered Harmful:
  8. Re:ummmmm...... by Emil+Brink · · Score: 5

    Well, you play it like this: you and your opponent sit, facing eachother, with a big table-thingie between you. The table is about the size of a tabletop hockey game, or something. The table is matte black, and somewhere on it there's a steel ball. You score by getting the ball to move to the opponent's end of the table. To move the ball, you need to relax. Relaxing is made harder by the fact that when the game is played, there is a hysterical light & sound show going on, and curves showing each player's brain activity are projected on the wall behind the players. Of course, an audience also helps stressing the players out.
    Hmmm, I guess I really should dare take the plunge and actually try Brainball next time they demo it (yes, I work at the Interactive Institute)... ;^)

    --
    main(O){10<putchar(4^--O?77-(15&5128 >>4*O):10)&&main(2+O);}
  9. ... by casret · · Score: 2

    ...
    ...
    ...
    ...
    ...
    (Did I win?)
    DAMN.

  10. Re:ummmmm...... by Emil+Brink · · Score: 2

    The game has been demoed when we've had various party-like occasions here, but I don't know much about how alcohol affects people's results. Sorry. ;^)

    --
    main(O){10<putchar(4^--O?77-(15&5128 >>4*O):10)&&main(2+O);}
  11. Here's my team: by grappler · · Score: 2

    Dan Quayle
    Polly Shore
    Cathy Ireland
    Kato Kailan (sp?)
    Lou from Littleton (a local radio personality, don't ask)
    Norm MacDonald
    Joe Bob (interrupts some cable movies to annoy people)
    hmm, that's about all I can think of at the moment...

    --
    grappler

    --
    Vidi, Vici, Veni
  12. Translation by SuViking · · Score: 2

    Swedish tax money at its best...

    "Brainball is a new game which has been developed
    by Swedish cross-science research elite.
    The rules are simple; the player with the least
    brain activity wins over the stressed out and
    thinking opponent. Bio sensors attached to
    the brains of the players reads alpha and theta
    waves which controls a steel ball over a
    playing field towards the opponents goal.
    Brian ball was created out of a joint project
    between artists, technicians and designers at the
    Interactive Institute."

  13. If you wonder what da heck is a joyboard... by Eg0r · · Score: 2
    guru meditation n.

    Amiga equivalent of `panic' in Unix (sometimes just called a `guru' or `guru event'). When the system crashes, a cryptic message of the form "GURU MEDITATION #XXXXXXXX.YYYYYYYY" may appear, indicating what the problem was. An Amiga guru can figure things out from the numbers. Sometimes a guru event must be followed by a Vulcan nerve pinch.

    This term is (no surprise) an in-joke from the earliest days of the Amiga. An earlier product of the Amiga corporation was a device called a `Joyboard' which was basically a plastic board built onto a joystick-like device; it was sold with a skiing game cartridge for the Atari game machine. It is said that whenever the prototype OS crashed, the system programmer responsible would calm down by concentrating on a solution while sitting cross-legged on a Joyboard trying to keep the board in balance. This position resembled that of a meditating guru. Sadly, the joke was removed fairly early on (but there's a well-known patch to restore it in more recent versions).

    Pictures and stuff here and here.

    To me guru meditation always looked like blinking BSOD (a.k.a black screen of death :)

    ---

    --
    "Hasta la victoria siempre!" El Comandante
  14. I can see the headlines now... by Dman33 · · Score: 4

    Reigning BrainBall Champion Wins Yet Another to Continue an Amazing 37 Game Unbeaten Streak!

    The MPAA beat a group of AOL hAx0r5 last Friday night in front of a capacity crowd to mark a new record for consecutive wins, 37. The previous record of 36 was held by a dead corpse early in the season last year, and was ironically ended by the very same MPAA team!

    When asked about this amazing accomplishment, MPAA team captain and leading goal scorer Jack Valenti stated, "Wow... I am really happy that we could come together and do this. Heck, I have not felt so good about us since we submitted the source code of DeCSS on public record back in the 1999-2000 season." The AOL hAx0r5 claim that the contest was unfairly judged, however when asked to explain all they could say was "HEY, 7h|5 IZ n0t K3w1.."

    I had to do it... ;)

  15. Startrek TNG by snack · · Score: 2

    Does this remind anyone of the game that took controll of the crews mind?

    Every one was under the controll of some alien species, and only 3 people knew about it?

    Maybe it's just me.

    1. Re:Startrek TNG by Wonko42 · · Score: 2
      Urgh. Wesley Crusher must die.

      --

  16. Re:Swedes have it all wrong by grappler · · Score: 2

    Brainball should involve the greater amount of brain activity allowing the ball to move. This would make the game come out something along the lines of the Star Trek mental wrestling match on the planet of the greek telepaths (telekinetics for the purists.)

    But your brain might just be working "smarter", not "harder". Recall the article about increased brain activity resulting from sleep deprivation. That might be a way to cheat actually...

    "Sorry, we'll have to take back your medal - tests indicate you've deprived yourself of sleep leading up to the game. It's an unfair advantage, and it's bad for your health..."

    --
    grappler

    --
    Vidi, Vici, Veni