Tier Gameshow Olympics™
Cognitive-Wellness Game System: Mental Freedom Through Play in Restricted Housing
Project Type: Self-initiated Social-Impact Design (Cognitive-Wellness Game System + Brand & Print Experience)
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Project overview
Tier Gameshow Olympics (TGO)™ is a game-based cognitive-wellness system built for people living in restrictive housing environments, including segregation units, where access to stimulation, human connection, and meaningful activity is severely limited.
Role: UX Designer, Systems Architect, & Experience Strategist
Deliverables: Logo suite, brand & tone system, series playbooks & volume structure (rules, brackets & scoring sheets)
Tools: Word, InDesign, Photoshop, Canva
Industry: Social Impact, Corrections & Rehabilitation
Duration: 10/31/2025 - present (ongoing development)
Jump to the Updates section for recent milestones and success highlights.
Objectives
Design a game system that protects cognitive health, builds connection, and strengthens emotional resilience in restrictive housing — using structured competition, humor, and low-resource play as tools for dignity and mental freedom.
Each game in the series is built to be:
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Paper-based and voice-play friendly
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Secure and ultra-low-material
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Joy-building and socially engaging
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Centered on dignity, humor, and mental strength
Instead of relying on screens or supplies, TGO reimagines classic game mechanics for environments where movement is limited and connection is scarce — offering challenge, moments of choice, and pride through nothing more than voice, paper, imagination, and community.
The first two volumes are:
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Tier Trivia Throwdown
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Cell Block Phrase Breaker
This system enables players — especially those in segregation — to stay mentally sharp, maintain identity, laugh, and compete fairly, even in highly isolating conditions.
Design approach
Designing Dignity Through Play
To create a game system that could thrive in the most restrictive environments, I embraced constraint as a design asset, not a limitation. Every element—mechanics, tone, and format—was shaped around real-world DOC restrictions and the lived experience of isolation.
The goal wasn’t just to entertain, but to build routine, pride, connection, and cognitive resilience. Paper-first layouts, clean hierarchy, and voice-play mechanics keep games clear, fair, and accessible, while humor and cultural relevance protect dignity and spark joy. In a space where freedom is scarce, the design gives mental movement and a sense of human agency back to players.
Guiding Principles
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Human dignity first
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Cognitive resilience + emotional support
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Ultra-low resource access
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Trauma-aware tone + language
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Inclusive play mechanics
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Fairness + transparent scoring
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Hope, humor, and intelligence at the center
Tone & Language Direction
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Encouraging, playful, and emotionally safe
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Non-patronizing — adults deserve real competition
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“We see you, we respect you, you're still human here.”
Visual System
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Earth-tone psychology palette: resilience, hope, calm, warmth
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Institutional-friendly typography + accessible hierarchy
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Clear, instructional structure for self-run gameplay
Tier Gameshow Olympics Series — Tier Trivia Throwdown™
Methods & development
This project combined structured writing and information architecture to organize complex ideas into clear, accessible systems. Through a systems-thinking lens, each element—content, layout, tone, and interaction—was designed to reinforce cognitive flow and emotional safety. UX research informed how users inside restrictive environments interpret instructions, engage with printed materials, and sustain motivation. The low-resource design framework ensured that every component could function without technology, relying instead on paper, voice, and human connection as tools for participation and learning.
Constraint Analysis
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No screens, boards, props, or tech
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Limited writing materials
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Verbal play through doors and walls
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Must be secure, simple, and self-organized
Human Insight
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Isolation and monotony harm cognitive health
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Competition creates purpose and connection
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Humor is emotional survival
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Routine builds mental stability
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Fairness and agency matter deeply
System Design
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Tournament brackets
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Fixed, transparent scoring rules
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Tier-culture themed content
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Fair turn-based voice mechanics
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Encouragement-focused writing and pacing
Tier Gameshow Olympics Series — Cell Block Phrase Breaker™
Visual design development
The visual language for TGO was designed to feel human, grounded, and stabilizing — the opposite of the cold, institutional environments it will live in. The palette builds from restorative greens, warm neutrals, and earned gold accents, symbolizing resilience, dignity, hope, and quiet triumph.
Color palette
Deep Tier Green and Shadow Spruce provide structure and psychological grounding, while Sage Meadow and Paper Cream soften the experience, creating a sense of breath, calm, and humanity on every page. Old Gold introduces a feeling of achievement without flash or ego — a subtle nod to progress and pride. Together, these tones form a visual system that feels safe, steady, and empowering, echoing the emotional goals of the project.
Typography
Choices follow the same philosophy: clarity, dignity, and accessibility first. Arial and Calibri deliver a polished, modern presentation. Headings use strong, confident weight for structure and authority, while body text remains approachable and clean for long-form reading and instruction.
Hierarchy, spacing, and subtle tonal cues guide players through content without overwhelming them, preserving a calm and encouraging tone. The final system bridges professional playbook polish with emotional sensitivity, creating a design language that supports focus, learning, pride, and mental presence — even in isolation.
Logo suite
The Tier Gameshow Olympics™ logo suite was designed in Canva as a symbol of dignity, confidence, and friendly competition within confined environments. The golden crown represents earned pride and mental resilience — a nod to the “championship” spirit of the series — while the clean sans-serif typography grounds the design in clarity and accessibility.
Multiple color variations were created to adapt across print and digital formats: deep tier green for authority and calm, paper cream for warmth and inclusivity, and matte black for contrast and power. Together, these choices form a visual identity that feels both institutional-safe and aspirational — professional yet deeply human.
Cover Art Iteration Process
The Tier Gameshow Olympics™ series cover art evolved through a process of refinement — from an early concept focused on contrast and framing, to a final design that fully embodies the brand’s dignity, clarity, and emotional warmth.
The draft cover (shown first) introduced the foundational palette of Deep Tier Green, Paper Cream, and Old Gold, but leaned heavily on geometric framing and centered type. While visually striking, the composition felt slightly rigid and didn’t yet convey the sense of human warmth or structured freedom at the heart of the series.
Through iteration, the design shifted toward simplified hierarchy and spatial balance. The final cover (shown second) adopts cleaner alignment, refined spacing, and a stronger typographic rhythm. The addition of a muted Paper Cream field grounds the layout in warmth, while Deep Tier Green and Old Gold create a confident sense of contrast and legacy.
Typography was rebalanced for clarity and hierarchy: “TIER GAMESHOW OLYMPICS™” anchors the center in bold, grounded authority, while the supporting tagline — “Games for the confined. Freedom for the mind.” — reinforces purpose in a softer, more compassionate tone.
This evolution reflects the brand’s guiding principle: structure and soul in harmony. The final composition feels both official and human — a dignified invitation into a world of hope, intellect, and play.
Before
After
Challenges & solutions
Challenge: Preventing stress spikes and emotional withdrawal during competition in a high-tension environment.
Solution: Designed supportive gameplay flow, gentle scoring language, positive reinforcement cues, and humor-driven relief moments to keep competition motivating, not triggering.
Challenge: Maintaining dignity and avoiding trivialization of incarceration.
Solution: Trauma-informed tone, thoughtful humor, humanity-first framing.
Challenge: Designing for isolation and no tech, contact, or game materials.
Solution: Multiplayer tournament brackets + verbal gameplay + paper/pencil tracking.
Challenge: Keeping rules fair and simple.
Solution: Consistent series-wide rules framework, scoring sheets, scripted host prompts.
Deliverables
Brand Assets
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Full emotional-psychology color palette rooted in calm + resilience
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Typeface hierarchy for DOC-safe print environments
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Tone + voice system, encouragement lines
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Logo suite
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Series binder layout: cover art, section dividers
Tier Trivia Throwdown Playbook
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Intro hype copy and game rules
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4-game season structure (Opening games → Semifinal → Championship structure)
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Fixed point ladder with double-points rounds
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Poll-based questions and answer keys
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Scoreboards
Cell Block Phrase Breaker Playbook
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Intro hype copy and game rules
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3-game season structure (Opening games → Semifinal → Championship structure)
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Fixed point ladder with tier toss-up bonus points (correct consonants, vowel purchases, solving correctly, wrong guesses)
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Themed categories and puzzle bank (inside life)
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Puzzle bank word-count rules
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Scoreboards
Outcome & reflection
The TGO series demonstrates how thoughtful design can create mental freedom, routine, and belonging in places designed to take those away. These games nurture connection, laughter, self-worth, strategy, and cognitive strength — without tech or tools.
These game systems help:
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Reduce isolation symptoms
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Foster connection & community inside
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Support emotional resilience
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Keep cognitive skills sharp
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Provide laughter & pride in hard places
This project deepened my practice in constraint-based design, social-impact storytelling, trauma-aware UX, and human-centered systems building. It reinforced that design isn’t just visual — it’s emotional architecture. Even where freedom is limited, creativity can open doors.
Final thoughts
This work honors those who are often forgotten. It shows that joy, intellect, and community deserve space everywhere — including behind the wall.
The Tier Gameshow Olympics™ series is proof that joy, intelligence, and community deserve space everywhere — even behind the wall. What started as a simple idea is quickly becoming a system for preserving dignity, sparking connection, and keeping minds active in places built to silence them.
This isn’t just entertainment — it’s mental wellness infrastructure disguised as play. Designing for confinement environments reminded me that:
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creativity can survive anywhere,
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connection can flow through steel and concrete, and
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sometimes one new habit, one laugh, or one challenge can give someone something to look forward to tomorrow.
This series will continue to grow — into additional volumes, into reentry-focused versions, and eventually into supplemental tools that bridge inside-to-outside support. My long-term vision is to see these playbooks live inside correctional education programs, community reentry networks, and rehabilitation spaces where belonging and self-worth are being rebuilt every day.
Hope belongs everywhere — even here.
A confined body is not a confined mind.
Walls can restrain a person — never their imagination.
Even in confinement, people deserve to feel human — challenged, connected, and alive.
And if design can give someone even a small piece of that humanity back, then it’s doing what it was always meant to do.
Updates
Tier Trivia Throwdown just had its first big win!
On 11/14, word came back that Levels 1–2 absolutely crushed it. Eight players jumped in, and the whole thing turned into a full-on after-dinner event that kept them entertained for most of the night. The energy was high, everyone was laughing, and the feedback was nothing but love.
The best part? They’re already asking for more.
Requests are rolling in for new levels, team play, and even a weekly drop of fresh rounds because they’re ready to run it back as soon as possible. The gratitude was real, too — they made sure the shout-outs got back to me.
Tier Trivia Throwdown isn’t just a game anymore… it’s becoming a whole movement!
