Iremía

Inspiration WEHack2023

Millions of people (especially teenagers) across the world struggle with mental health, and most of them feel alone. We wanted to create a game that would allow people to alleviate some of the stress caused by mental health problems. We also strived to increase inclusivity regarding mental health by providing both positive words of encouragement for people that are struggling and means of letting people know that they aren't alone with their struggles. All four of us have gone through our own mental health journeys, and we know how difficult and mentally draining the process can be, so we wanted to create something that would help with that.

What it does WEHack2023

Iremía (which means "calmness" in Greek) is a game that is meant to help relax and ground people that are stressed out or struggling with mental health issues. There are several levels throughout the game with simple tasks that the user can complete to advance levels. However, for those who just want a mindless task to relieve stress, there is a freeplay version where the user wanders through the game's map. The game also has a mood tracker to keep track of the user's mood that day and send positive reinforcement messages based on how they are feeling that day. We created a nature theme for the game because nature is a very calming presence for most people and we wanted that to come across.

How we built it WEHack2023

We used HTML and CSS to create the front-end part of the website we're using to show off all the different elements of our game. We used Java to create the back-end part and to provide functionality to the website. We used flow lab to create a working prototype of the game and demonstrate what it would eventually look like. Finally, we hand-drew the images that are displayed in our game (the home screen and the avatar).

Challenges we ran into WEHack2023

Since we are all first-year students, we don't have the experience that many older students have yet. For some of us, this was our first hackathon. We also had minimal experience with the languages and platforms we were using (particularly HTML, CSS, and flow lab), so we had to rely heavily on video tutorials, guidance from mentors, and HTML/CSS templates in order to create a functioning product.

Accomplishments that we're proud of WEHack2023

Our biggest accomplishment was being able to create the game and the website to showcase it in spite of our lack of knowledge with several of the languages and platforms we used. Despite several instances where we had to debug code or fix some of the visuals, we were able to create a functioning product. Another extremely notable accomplishment is that all of the images we used were hand-drawn.

What we learned WEHack2023

We were able to expand our technical skills as we now have experience in CSS, HTML, and flow lab. Since we learned the logistics of HTML and CSS through using templates of both languages, we essentially have the skills to create our own websites from scratch if we choose to. Finally, since this was some of our group members' first 24 hour hackathon, we also learned about the logistics of hackathons and what it takes to code for long periods of time throughout an entire day.

What's next

In the future, we would like to implement several levels to the game and create it in a way that's it's playable and user-friendly. Another thing we would like to do is add ambience noises in the background of our game and a feature to select whatever ambience noise the user would like (or an option to have no ambient sounds playing in the background). In terms of the mood tracker, we want to add inspirational messages based on the answers to the user's mood that day as well as a database so the user can keep track of how they've been feeling for a year.