iPhone Game Tackles Short Term Memory Improvement

Renowned illustrator Kyle T. Webster took a detour in 2009 from illustrating for clients like The New Yorker, Time and The Wall Street Journal. He spent ten months designing and developing an iPhone game with the hopes that it would not only be a fun diversion for those who play it, but that it would also help them improve their powers of short term memory.

The new game, 'White Lines,' ($0.99) is designed for all ages, and asks players to redraw lines that travel across the screen in the same order and direction in which they originally appeared. In an effort to make the game stand out from the arcade-style games that are currently on the market, Webster designed the game in black and white with sparse graphical elements, thereby allowing players to concentrate fully on the gameplay.

The game begins with randomly generated sequences of two lines, and as players successfully complete 15 sequences, they advance to the next level, in which an additional line is added to each sequence. Overall, the game consists of nine levels and the ninth and final level contains sequences of 10 lines.


Webster, the creator of the game, theorizes that the later stages of the game (four lines and up) will stimulate the parts of the brain that are used for short term recall because the core game model makes use of the four basic elements required for such stimulation: concentration, repetition, pattern building, and information absorption.

Webster is currently reaching out to Wake Forest University Psychology Department professors to conduct further experiments with the game to see if it might be used as a fun, alternative tool in measuring test subjects' ability to recall visual patterns.

Pricing and Availability:
White Lines 1.0 is only $0.99 (USD) and available exclusively through the App Store in the Games category.


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