I spent an hour playing the new time-management “life-sim” My Life Story today (available for Mac and PC). It puts you in the shoes of a recent high school graduate living in his/her parents’ basement. You are ready to go out and start your life. But your dream better involve getting a degree, because you won’t get far without one. This game follows a very stereotypical -- and somewhat cynical -- formula for living a “successful” life. But its addicting gameplay and great humour make it worth a look.

You have four happiness meters -- hunger, energy, health, and fun -- that go up and down as you engage in various activities, in addition to an education and an experience level. Your education level can increase by spending a set amount of time at Dreams University, while experience increases from time spent at work. Both require more time at each successive level. And experience can only get one level ahead of education, which means a job soon stops being useful for anything beyond earning money. There are a finite number of hours in a week in which you may engage in any of the 50-or-so activities, most of which cost money, and all of which have both a positive and negative impact on aspects of your happiness -- exercise improves your health but drains energy and makes you hungry, for instance.

Each activity (and job) is confined to a building on the map, which you must either walk or drive to (walking takes longer). There are 15 buildings in the first town, and I presume the same number in the other 14 towns. Random events keep things from getting too predictable, aided in this regard by the use of Life Cards, which can each be used once for some special purpose -- such as increasing bonuses from activities, maxing out all the happiness meters, or giving you a free revival for your next trip to the hospital (they call this one “health insurance”).

All of this is presented with a great sense of humour. My first job was as a street beggar, sitting in a box in the park for $4 an hour. A clearance sale at the electronics store is described as perfect for consumers to “find something barely usable.” You can watch free TV at the hospital, “despite continued warnings from the hospital staff.” I moved out of home to live at a place called Shady Apartments. A new recreational facility at the university resulted in students vowing “to start socialising with each other.” And each weekend there is a random event or “highlight” that affects one of your happiness meters. One such Weekend Highlight saw me play hide-and-seek with some kids at the park. But they never looked for me.

This job description is clearly inaccurate. The energy loss should have one extra bar, and your fun meter should go down rapidly -- not up slowly.

To win, you must max out your education and experience levels -- apparently happiness is only incidental. Your life -- according to My Life Story -- is only meaningful and successful if you have several years of tertiary education and a job at the top of your profession -- in any of eight career paths. It’s not all about money and fame, though, as the game stresses the importance of balancing the four happiness attributes. If happiness drops below a certain point, you cannot further your education. If energy, health, or hunger run out, you get rushed to hospital and incur a hefty penalty of half your current money plus half a week in game-time. I never found out what happens if the fun meter drops to zero. Given the humour displayed in the rest of the game, I’d say it could be one of three possibilities. Your character could commit suicide, ending the game (highly unlikely). Or they might attempt suicide or sink into depression, with various penalties such as fines or reduced benefits from activities harming your progress (possible). Or they could simply get rushed to hospital for the same penalty (likely).

I didn’t get a chance to find out what happens if multiple meters run out at the same time, or if any one meter is allowed to run down several times. But as far as I could tell, the game has no failure state. You just keep plugging away until you get to the end. I hope I’m wrong, and fail states are included, because this game is about life. Not everyone gets to go to university. Not everyone gets a big house and fancy car. And not everyone gets a well paying job after years of climbing the ladder. Some people get stuck in the same crappy low-paying job for their whole lives, or burnout before they reach the top. It would be wrong to pretend that can’t happen, even if it is just for a simple time-management game.

Perhaps that would be asking too much, with the target audience for this game looking for a fun and consuming experience that can eat a few hours here and there. As it is, My Life Story is perfect for that very purpose. It's hard to gauge precisely how much depth is present for those willing to give it a go, and I doubt it is an experience that will be memorable (even days later). Nevertheless, the game seems charming enough to warrant an afternoon's play.