#1 Welcome to Free Will!

Have you ever wondered what it might be like if you were playing a game like the Sims with real people? It'd be pretty interesting. That sort of the idea with this blog. You, dear reader, get to decide what I should do with my day. Just like a video game character, I have stats, attributes, skills and equipment. In order to gain favour, you have to suggest good courses of action. Regular players who suggest beneficial things like 'eat a healthy breakfast' or 'get some exercise' will be given more attention than players suggesting things like 'jump off a bridge' or 'stay up pask 4am playing video games'.

The ultimate goal of the game is to turn a 20something male nerd into a successful human being who goes to church, pays taxes and is a general asset to society. The game is complete when I, your character, have completed a series of objectives, such as 'hold down a steady job with good pay and prospects' and ' get married and start a family'.

As various challenges are faced, relevant abilities will become available such as social skills, technical skills, fashion sense and the all important confidence stat. It's up to you though to decide what I should do in a given situation.

On the right, we can see the free will chart. There are limits to free will of course, because without them, we wouldn't know it existed. As you can see, Laws (of man and the universe like treason and physics) restrict free will, as do relationships, common sense and religion. These restrictions are subject to change as I grow and learn.

You'll also notice that free will is encircled. This represents my comfort zone. Even though it doesn't touch any boundaries, there are many things I would not be comfortable doing such as tattoos, piercings, sky diving, eating spiders etc. Players who can make the circle bigger earn points for expanding the comfort zone, even though this objective is perhaps the most difficult to attain.

Since the game has just begun, Confidence is 0/100 and at level 2. This means I can just about order lunch in subway without getting too embarrassed and can even ask for directions when lost.

Computer skills on the other hand are reasonably good, since I have a qualification in the field. Right now, they're 22/100, level 8 and rising, since I'm learning how to use this blogging software. In particular, my computer networking skills rose recently thanks to a bit of tinkering with some RJ11 cable.

Your first task is to decide what my stats and stats should be. You can come up with as many different stat types as you like for me and I'll assign various numbers which you can then argue up or down. Do I need a bladder control stat? Should I have a yoyo skill? Should I apply for a job at the zoo as a wolverine herder? You decide!

My free will - It's in your hands!