THE LESION: CHARCOT’S TOURNAMENT

Localize in the central nervous system and name diseases after yourself

Paris, 1893

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You have been summoned to the deathbed of Jean-Martin Charcot, the self-proclaimed
godfather of neurology.  At first, you assume he wants to apologize for plagiarizing your paper about the taxonomy of eyelid tremors, but his intentions are much more grandiose and devious.

Charcot has hand-picked you to face off against Europe’s most illustrious scientific minds in a battle of medical dexterity. Your opponents are as powerful as they are socially awkward, master diagnosticians who wield reflex hammers as if they were extensions of their very limbs.  You have always done well on standardized tests, but this will be the greatest challenge of your distinguished career.

With the eyes of world upon you, you will take turns examining patients with symptoms like weakness, numbness, and eye movement abnormalities. Find the source of these problems, and you will emerge triumphant from this Colosseum of neurological ailments. 

Will you be the first to master the nervous system, find the most lesions, and become Charcot’s heir-apparent? Only then will you earn the greatest honor in the history of medicine: to have all future neurologic diseases bear your name.

The Lesion: Charcot’s Tournament is a strategy game based on real human neuroanatomy. Players map neurologic electrical pathways that sense the environment and tell our bodies what to do. Earn points by finding lesions where two or more pathways overlap. Earn even more points by finding a lesion in every part of a pathway.

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Game Design: Zach London and Jim Burke
Art and Illustration: Nina Schwartz