Creating Mind Over Meal: Conquering Food Disorders as a digital game has been an incredible journey. This digital game was born out of a desire to tackle an issue that is often misunderstood and stigmatized: eating disorders. With 20 different scenarios, 10 exploring the experiences people occasionally deal with bulimia and 10 focusing on anorexia, we aimed to provide players with an impactful experience.

Each scenario places players in the shoes of someone going through an eating disorder, allowing them to make choices and witness the impact of these choices. These scenarios are carefully designed not only to challenge stereotypes but also to emphasize the complexity of these disorders. Each decision leads to a lesson, whether about recognizing triggers, understanding the societal pressures that fuel disordered eating, or realizing the importance of support systems and professional help.

The inspiration of this topic stems from my personal experiences with an eating disorder. I went through an eating disorder when I was 15 years old during COVID-19. I started to gain weight rapidly due to the lack of movement and I ended up becoming overweight. After some of my family members decided to comment on my weight I decided to do something about it and thus, ended up choosing to starve myself throughout the day to give me a good head start and lose weight fast. At first, this strategy worked and I lost around 10kg in 3 months which I was deeply proud of but I also started noticing that my hair started shedding more and more and my mental health wasn’t in the best place ever. I also developed cystic acne all over my body due to my poor diet and started hanging out with my friends less because of the fear I had of eating unhealthy when I was with them. All those things managed to make me lose weight yes, but my life couldn’t have been worse so I started to think that losing weight by starving myself made me lose more of myself than gain anything except losing a few pounds. My parents then took me to a nutritionist where I learned to lose weight healthily and love and accept myself as I am.

The process of creating Mind Over Meal required extensive research and we had to make sure we had a full understanding of the differences between Bulimia and Anorexia so that each game we created was different and unique than the other. We also used ChatGpt to help build the scenarios that we used in the game and make sure we used them accurately and respectfully. The project deemed our understanding in addressing sensitive topics and it taught us to use our lived experiences and use creative tools to amplify those voices and create a game that might potentially help others to seek out help if they are going through the same thing we did.

If we had more time, I would work on enhancing the narrative depth of the game. By doing so, I would have perhaps enriched the narrative with more nuanced character development and maybe I would have broadened the scope to include other eating disorders in the game. Finally, I would have tried to develop the game’s visuals to match the theme of the game more. However, my peers’ feedback was extremely helpful as I used their feedback and created a conclusion at the end of the game so it could be the game’s learning lesson and I also tried to enhance the backstory and add distinctive scenarios.

In conclusion, by stepping into these scenarios and playing our game, people are expected to gain insight into the complex realities of those who have dealt with eating disorders and feel inspired to seek or offer help for those in need and for those who relate to these scenarios we have offered. We hope this game helped in increasing awareness, empathy, and knowledge.

Link to the game:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1N1kkVsRz6DoxJp1VV4wToQPYtWzNLuyaO4hzgMjUtfU/edit?usp=sharing