Brain Strainers

• Title — Brain Strainers • Developer — Carousel Software • Publisher — Carousel Software Coleco • Modes — Single-player, Multiplayer • Released — Atari, C64 1983 ColecoVision 1 June 1984 • Genre — Music • Platforms — Atari 8-bit, Commodore 64, ColecoVision, Coleco Adam

Brain Strainers consists of two musically themed sub-games: "Follow The Leader," and "Clef Climber." The intention of the game was to provide an educational video game experience. Skills that were targeted were eidetic musical memory and tonal accuracy.

• Illustration — Follow the Leader section gameplay (Atari 8-bit) "Follow The Leader" is an eidetic music game designed to test the player's memory. Here, a pattern of musical notes are played and four colored panels light up correspondingly. The player then has a few seconds to repeat the sequence back to the computer. If the sequence is repeated correctly then the computer generates a longer string of notes to perform. As the game progresses, the speeds at which the tune is performed and at which the response by the player must be given are increased. Further enhancing the difficulty of the game, the four colored panels cease to light up in higher levels.

"Clef Climber" is a pitch-based video game where the player is given a reference note and then a tone corresponding to a different musical note that must be matched shortly after being played. As the game progresses, the reference note ceases to be played and the player must rely on his or her intuitive sense of pitch. The player can choose whether or not to view the notes on the musical staff, however even if musical notes are selected for display, they disappear at higher levels of the game.