Play two games and call me in the morning: Newsworthy

Newsworthy is an interview show that aims to talk about the intersection of news and games with newsmakers and thought leaders both inside and outside the game industry.

Today we sit down with Erin Reynolds to discuss using video games as therapy.

In 2014, Reynolds turned her master's thesis project at USC's Interactive Media Program into a video game made up of the stuff of nightmares, literally. Nevermind was designed to virtually drop people into the terrors of a trauma patient's psyche. A player's real heart rate is monitored in the game to tweak the difficulty and adjust Nevermind's ability to rattle the player.

New, two years later, Reynolds and her team at Flying Mollusk are adding support for emotion tracking, eye tracking and the Apple Watch. They're also bringing the game over to virtual reality. I chatted with Reynolds recently to discuss the impact of her game so far, the power of Games for Change and the possibility of prescribed gaming.

Please take a moment today to subscribe to Polygon Newsworthy using the links above. And if you're feeling particularly giving, review it.

There are several ways to follow Polygon Newsworthy. You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes with one click, or add it to your podcast player of choice using its RSS feed. It also lives online at Polygon Newsworthy's SoundCloud page — and in the SoundCloud app. For those of you who'd rather control your files, you can always download each story as an MP3.

And if you're a fan of talk radio, news or podcasts in general please look into Polygon's other podcasts. Newsworthy joins our growing list of programs, including our game reviews show Quality Control, our award winning daily news show, Minimap, our entertainment show, Cutscene, and our video game-themed comedy podcast, CoolGames, Inc. Check out our podcast hub to see them all.