Key Benefits
Free Installation Support. Free Training. Free Upgrades.
Operating neurofeedback and biofeedback systems are complicated. We’ve designed Zukor’s Air (and our other feedback products) to be feature-rich, but also simple and intuitive. Our goal provide clinicians the best feedback games and to make sure the experience of using them is as easy as possible.
To support these goals, we offer free installation support, free training and free upgrades. This support not only covers how to use Zukor’s Air, but also how to use it with your specific neurofeedback or biofeedback system.
"We pride ourselves on offering the best customer support in the industry and we are relentless in helping clinicians solve any problems that might arise. Simply put, we will never let you down and we will make sure Zukor’s Air works right for you.”
Broad Appeal
Zukor’s Air is designed to strongly appeal to a very broad range of people, including all ages of men, women, boys, girls and children. Zukor’s Air has 40 flying objects in three categories: Aircraft (25), Animals (5) and Fantasy (10). Whether you are training a 13-year-old boy, a 29-year-old woman, a 50-year-old man or a 9-year-old girl, Zukor’s Air has something for everyone.
The broad range of aircraft include historic (Wright Flyer, Spruce Goose, Red Barron), WWII era (P-51 Mustang, Spitfire, Zero), modern military (A10 Warthog, F-22 Raptor, B-2 Stealth Bomber), commercial (747, MD-11 “Hot Pink”), experimental (X-29), small private (Beechcraft Bonanza, Great Lakes Bi-Plane), fun fictional (Wooden Toy Airplane, “WTF” Wingless Titanium Flyer) and two helicopters.
The animals include a Flying Squirrel, a Monarch Butterfly and a Ruby Macaw Parrot.
The fantasy creatures include four dragons, a griffin, a dinosaur, a pink flying pig and an alien on a jet-powered chrome surfboard.
There are also three unique 1st person options where “you” are flying.
- AIRCRAFT
- A-10 Thunderbolt II “Warthog"
- Beechcraft Bonanza
- Boeing 747-400
- Boeing AH-64 Apache
- Eurofighter Typhoon
- Fokker Dr.I “Red Baron"
- General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon
- Great Lakes Bi-Plane
- Grumman X-29
- Hughes H-4 Hercules “Spruce Goose"
- Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk
- Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor
- Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird
- McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle
- McDonnell Douglas MD-11 “Hot Pink"
- MD Helicopters MH-6 Little Bird
- North American P-51 Mustang
- Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit
- Supermarine Spitfire
- Mitsubishi A6M Zero
- Wooden Toy Airplane
- Wright Bros. Flyer 1
- WTF (Wingless Titanium Flyer)
- Zselyi 2
- ANIMALS
- Bald Eagle
- Bat
- Flying Squirrel
- Monarch Butterfly
- Ruby Macaw Parrot
- FANTASY
- Dragon Bat
- Griffin
- KornEv
- Mountain Dragon
- Pink Dragon
- Pteranodon
- Wild Eyed Watcher
- Winged Pink Pig “Penelope Pigs-Fly"
- Wyvern Dragon
- Zoot Jet Pack
- Zoot Jet-Powered Chrome Surfer
- FIRST PERSON
- Airplane cockpit
- Alien arms out (Superman style)
- Solo (nothing)
Highly Customizable & Options Galore
Zukor’s Air offers an unprecedented amount of features, options and customizability to fit the needs of the individual clinician’s feedback training style, as well as the unique needs of each patient. Clinicians frustrated by current feedback games’ lack of options will be amazed to see that Zukor’s Air has 9 separate areas of options, each of which have up to 55 individual choices.
Clinicians use varied neurofeedback and biofeedback protocols, so feedback games should be flexible as well. Zukor’s Air does just that and allows the clinician to adjust the game to fit their individual needs. This extensive level of choice and control provide myriad benefits for both clinicians and patients, including those discussed below.
Interesting, but not over stimulating
Clinicians in the field of neurofeedback have varying opinions and preferences about the level of visual and auditory complexity and stimulation needed for patient feedback options. Some clinicians and patients prefer a simple environment, keeping the stimulation level at a minimum. Others prefer some complexity to the feedback, as found in games, but do not want anything too stimulating.
Zukor's Air in unique in that the clinician can tailor the complexity and involvement of the game to meet the clinical needs of each patient. Zukor’s Air effectively allows the clinician to “dial up or dial down” the stimulation level to suit their neurofeedback training beliefs and/or the needs of individual patients.
The clinician can achieve this through the abundant options built into the game, such as increasingly sophisticated levels, standard and fantasy characters, night or day mode, plus dozens of additional game variables the clinician can easily control.
Clinician experience enhanced
One of the main complaints we have heard from clinicians is that the currently available feedback games quickly become an irritant to the clinicians themselves. The reasons are numerous, but ultimately are caused by the inability to change things within the game. This and hearing patients complain about the lame games can significantly impact clinician fatigue during back-to-back neurofeedback sessions.
Zukor’s Air and our other feedback games solve this problem by giving the clinician control over all variables, clinical and visual, within the feedback game. Clinicians will find flexibility, variety and even enjoyment while working with patients all day using Zukor’s Air. Flying through a beautiful and ever changing environment is both interesting and relaxing, not just for the patients, but for the clinicians themselves.
Not an adapted video game
Zukor’s Air is not a video game adapted for use as a feedback game. Rather, it is a sophisticated audiovisual feedback tool which incorporates only appropriate and productive video game techniques. To some extent, it’s not what’s in Zukor’s Air that’s important, it’s what is excluded, since most concepts employed in mainstream video games are counter-productive for neurofeedback training.
For Zukor’s Air, we evaluated mainstream video game features one-by-one and incorporated only those that fit the unique requirements for an effective neurofeedback game. Then, we made as many of these elements as possible customizable so the clinician could adjust the game to their needs.
Intuitive and highly responsive gameplay logic
Zukor’s Air offers extremely intuitive gameplay logic which is critical to a patient’s ability to focus during their neurofeedback training sessions. An effective feedback gameplay dynamic should not have to be explained to the patient, because this requires them to think rather than relax and focus. Rather, the gameplay should be obvious and mirror the real world, as well as be logically consistent within the game. In all these areas, Zukor’s Air excels.
Reinforcing intuitive gameplay is the need for the feedback game to be instantaneously responsive to changes in input variables (EEG or biometric). Zukor’s Air is able to accept and process input at the same rate as the neurofeedback or biofeedback system software, so changes in the gameplay are directly reflective of the state of the patient at any given moment.
Zukor’s Air offers traditional and innovative new styles of threshold meters from which the clinician can choose. However, if a feedback game contains meaningful, interesting and intuitive gameplay, then traditional threshold meters, as part of patient feedback, become unnecessary or even counter-productive. In general, threshold meters are non-intuitive as they have to be explained to the patient, often repeatedly. Indeed, in our clinical testing, we found this to be the case and for most patients the threshold meters were turned off so the patient could instead rely on the gameplay itself for feedback.
With Zukor’s Air the gameplay is interesting, intuitive, instantaneous and meaningful. This allows patients to remain focused on attaining the desired state rather than trying to figure out the gameplay or understand multiple cryptic meters moving up and down.
Patient Engagement
Many clinicians report that some of the biggest challenges they face in working with patients, especially with kids, are:
1. Getting the patient to focus during a feedback session.
2. Getting the patient to come back for their next appointment.
Zukor’s Grind helps resolve both issues in several ways.
Increase patient focus during feedback session
Effective neurofeedback requires the patient to maintain a relaxed-focused state for extended periods of time during each neurofeedback session. Many clinicians report patients falling asleep during neurofeedback sessions. A sleeping patient is not receiving effective neurofeedback. Likewise, even among patients who are awake, many lose focus, or become agitated, which also reduces the effectiveness of the neurofeedback session. The problem is universal, but it is particularly acute in children, adolescents and teenagers, especially boys.
Zukor’s Air’s multiple truly unique game levels and many customizable game settings, including aircraft and fantasy characters, time of day lighting choices, and many more easy-to-change options, add variety to the feedback experience which thus reduces patient boredom and increases patient focus during the neurofeedback training.
Incresed patient retention
One of the chief problems many clinicians face is keeping patients returning for their next neurofeedback session, i.e. patient retention. As one clinician bluntly put it, “What good is neurofeedback if the patient doesn’t return for their next appointment?” Zukor’s Air helps the clinician get the patient return for their next neurofeedback session in several ways.
In addition to multiple unique levels and many customizable game settings, Zukor’s Air’s multi-faceted, built-in incentive system helps keep patients focused during their neurofeedback session and also highly motivated to return. Zukor’s Air’s incentive system includes patient selectable “nicknames,” period and session scores calculated in multiple ways displayed on a separate Scores screen, a “Top Scores” feature from which patients can compare their scores to other patients (via their nickname only) and a printable Scores screen which patients can take home.
Through these features and options, Zukor’s Air will help get patients, especially the kids, to come back for their next session. This also essentially extends the practical usefulness of the feedback game for each patient. “I used to have to literally bribe the kids with toys and even money to get them to return for each session,” notes that same clinician. “Now, they want to come back to play Zukor’s Air again.”
Feedback game protocols possible for research or clinical use
Zukor’s Air allows the possibility for clinicians and researchers to develop feedback game protocols when training various clinical presentations of neurological dysregulation (i.e. under-activation, over-activation, or instability).
Since Zukor’s Air provides clinicians virtually complete control of the game feedback features, clinicians can now "tailor" the feedback the same way they "tailor" the frequencies, time and placement sites trained during a neurofeedback session.
These "tailored" changes to Zukor’s Air feedback settings may be discovered over time by clinicians to be effective when training a particular type of dysregulation or client issue, thereby resulting in a type of "feedback game protocol" to follow when setting up Zukor’s Air. Examples of these types of protocols or "tailored" changes, include using the daytime mode or multiple levels with under-activation issues and using night time mode or a single level with over-activation or instability issues. Another example is turning all objects off with over-activation or instability issues and conversely leaving all objects on with under-activation issues.
Using the vast array of options available in Zukor’s Air thus offers clinicians the flexibility to change the game feedback enough to develop an actual "feedback protocol" for each type of dysregulation.