What is Alter Ego?

We've all heard of flight simulators, sports simulators, and even financial simulators. Now, we can experience a complete life simulator, a highly unusual entertainment program called Alter Ego. This program gives players the chance to try out different life options without having to suffer the possible consequences. The results can be surprising.

The first screen that appears asks players to answer a number of true/false questions about their own personalities (an option lets the computer randomly generate a character). This establishes the character in whose shoes you'll be walking.

After creating the character, the user can play through any phase of life, from infancy through the school years, then on to early, middle and late adulthood. In each phase, life events are displayed as icons, which are clicked on to bring the "experience" up on-screen. Other icons line the sides of the screen, representing age-related experiences such as school events or work activities. Players just click once on the icon they want to live through to bring up that event on-screen. For each experience, the screen displays two or more options, with radio buttons used to select them.

Each event poses a particular quandary. For example, in the infant stage, one scenario revolves around the baby's first experience with Grandma, When she picks you up, you have the option to cry or smile, and whichever is chosen affects the character s permanent status.

Because After Ego simulates a person s complete life experiences, the program contains a few explicit sexual references that may not be suitable for young piayers. It's nothing pornographic, mind you—but there does come a time in every young adult s life when sexual experimentation is, pardon the pun, a fact of life.

The object of each experience is to build a well-rounded character who leads a healthy, happy and long life. The player’s current status is represented by an icon on the upper left side of the screen, which reveals the character's age assets and status bars when it's clicked. Status bars, which represent health, intelligence and other facets of a personality, change from white to black as the character acquires more skills.

There are two editions of the program, one male and one female, and each was designed to simulate the different life experiences of each gender. For example, adolescent boys ask girls for dates; girls can show interest in a particular boy. but he still does the actual "asking out." Still, the female version avoids being overly cloying, cutesy or sexist.

The first time you pick up Alter Ego, you'll be amazed at the depth and humor of the program. The second time around, you'll notice many similar situations, and might even remember which choice resulted in the best outcome. The third time through, you could just find yourself experiencing deja vu. That's the program's only major problem, but it is ultimately its downfail: there just isn't enough information here for 10 or 12 "lifetimes," which is about the least someone should expect after laying out sixty dollars or so.

Despite its limitations, everyone should piay After Ego at least once. Written by a psychologist, this package offers some interesting—and surprisingly true to life—insights into how our behavior affects ourselves and those around us. It's a lesson in human nature.

Forman Hines, Tracie. (August 1986). Alter Ego. MacUser. (pg. 36).

Download Alter Ego for Mac

Architecture

Motorola 68K

System Requirements

From Mac OS 1.0 up to Mac OS 5.0

Compatibility notes

Emulating this? It could probably run under: Mini vMac