@~And now for something completely different but very handy!

               Total Recall - Sharp Software
     A Computer Memory Trainer, part of SynTax Disk 838
             Reviewed by James Judge on a 486sx

Do you remember the time...?

Probably not. How about when...? Still no bells ringing? Well,
with the aid of this course of memory exercises, you too can
perform feats that will astound your friends - just how DID you
memorise 40 items in such a short space of time?

To be honest this program could go far beyond providing the odd
party trick - it really could be useful. Not just in every day
life (ie the old shopping list etc.) but in adventuring too! Just
imagine no longer having the need for sheets and sheets of notes,
pages and pages of maps and still no idea of who said what and
where a vital artifact is! Pure bliss.

To blow my own trumpet for the moment, I've got a pretty good
memory when it comes to adventuring, places, people, events and
the like. It is only languages and mathematical formulae that I
have real trouble retaining. Due to this I rarely make notes with
games and use my 'adventuring notebook' to doodle in. In fact I've
only ever once made a map for a game (Crusaders Of The Dark
Savant) but even then, it was only to give this mapping lark a
go...

So, I didn't really feel that this program would be of much use to
me. I retained enough of day to day conversation and happenings to
astound many friends and I only need to look at a telephone number
twice to memorise it. I also knew of a 'technique' that I had read
about in the barest detail that worked well for the example given,
but I wasn't able to put it into practice.

Imagine my joy when I found this program doing something extra for
my memory and me being able to put it into every day use!


The actual package isn't anything snazzy - just a set of ASCII
files lumped together under a shell (much like SynTax), accessed
via DOS. There are, though, a few 'interactive' pieces where you
are asked to enter the next item in a list and so forth.

The whole course looks at a range of memory techniques. The
program is split into a number of sections and sub-sections and
goes into quite bit of detail about what you should do with each
technique and how to put it into practice in the real world.

It starts off introducing two basic techniques - the Linking idea
and the Substitution idea. To give a brief synopsis here is what
each technique entails:

LINKING

You use this to remember a list of items that can be linked in one
way or another - no matter how bizarrely. To link them you must
imagine a scene in your head that incorporates two of the objects.
Then you think of a different scene that incorporates the second
of the two objects and a third object.  An example would be this:
To remember a list of three objects (chicken, melon scouring pad)
you think of these three scenes:

(1) A dead and plucked chicken walking around a supermarket.
(2) The said chicken trying to hatch a melon.
(3) Someone trying to use the said melon to scour out a saucepan.

By remembering the first item (the chicken) you then remember the
second and by remembering the second scene you remember the third
and so on and so forth. The more zany the scene the easier it will
be to remember and link.

SUBSTITUTION

This is used, again, for lists, but with lists that have items
that can't be easily pictured and linked. Just how do you remember
the three largest counties in England by their names alone?
(North Yorkshire, Cumbria and Devon). What you do is substitute
an item or scene that sounds like the item, or is in some way
linked to it. So, to remember North Yorkshire you may think of a
huge Yorkshire Pudding. To remember Cumbria you can imagine that
giant Yorkshire Pudding coming nearer (come-near sounds like
Cumbria on a very bad day...). Then to remember Devon you think of
heaven coming nearer, or something similar.

This way you still use the LINK method, but can utilise it with a
wider range of things.

This forms the basis of the first two chapters and the rest of the
series (apart from another technique that it is introduced further
along the road).

It all sounds strange and 'far out' as well as being unlikely to
work, but I promise it isn't. I haven't spent very long with the
package - an hour at most - but now I have got the 15 largest
counties lodged in my head (in order of size, no less) as well as
this entirely irrelevant 20 item shopping list. If I can remember
35 items in a particular order in about 15 minutes (and I can

recount them backwards, if you want...) then most other people
shouldn't have THAT many problems with the system.

As the program says, all it takes is practice and some of us will
need more practice than others.

The rest of the program goes into looking at practical uses for
the techniques - from remembering jokes and stories to faces,
names, dates, places, anecdotes, appointments and how to overcome
absent-mindedness. Something there for everyone.

The whole course is pretty in-depth and you will need to spend
some time reading through all the text (and there is quite a bit)
but a lot more time practising the techniques it teaches you -
this is no 'instant memory' recipe.

On the whole the text is easy to read and with few spelling and
grammatical errors (for the amount of text). If you feel that you
need just that extra bit of 'oomph' in the memory department, this
program may be just for you. It's a complete package and a œ11.75
registration fee will bring you the latest version along with
extra reading material.

I won't end this review with a tacky "now, I can't remember what I
was going to do next..." line, as I feel that is beneath me.

Now, I can't remember what I was going to do next... (oops,
forgot!)











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