Part A:

For this discussion, you will select a mobile application (real or fictitious) and assume you have to develop that app from scratch. You will identify whether you would use a native development environment (e.g., Android Studio/Java for Android) or a cross-platform tool set. Share your app selection and your tool selection. Defend your development selection.

Part B: Demonstrate more depth and thought than saying things like “I agree” or “You are wrong.” Ask questions or ideas about their app selection.

Post 1: The app that I chose for this discussion is called MindShiftCBT. This app uses scientifically proven strategies based on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to help it’s user learn how to relax, become more mindful, and develop more effective ways of thinking, and they give you active steps to take in order to manage their anxiety (Anxiety Canada, 2020).
With the current events, I am sure it has caused a lot of anxiety and people with anxiety before this, have probably experienced anxiety on a whole new level. It is estimated that 40 million adults in the US age 18 and older suffer from an anxiety disorder (ADAA, 2020). So of course there is an app for that!
If I made an application similar it would be simplest to make it in Android Studios using Java. Working with it for these past few weeks gives me a good idea of just how versatile it is. It is also supported by almost 100% of mobile devices. Also, there is a ton of support if you do run into a development problem. That is why I would choose this method for this application.

Post 2: As an avid board game player, I am always looking for ways to enhance my games. Many of the titles I play are in depth and require several hours to play. One such game is called Middara. This is a four player modern fantasy dungeon crawl game released in three acts. Act one is the only one available right now and has a variety of ways to play. The core narrative is hundreds of pages long including story and branching paths. Due to the overwhelming amount of text, the company, Succubus Publishing, released a companion app that has many different voice actors reading the text of the story so the players don’t have to. The app is available on both Google Play and the Apple store as well as in mp3 format. This gave me the idea for companion apps to other games as well. A game we have to set aside an entire day for is called Eldritch Horror, a Cthulhu mythos based game. My friends and I love this game but set up alone is an hour or more due to the massive amount of tokens and cards. I’d like to streamline it a bit and create an app for the cards as well as player information such as health, sanity, and equipment.
Naturally for apps like this, you’d want it to be available to as many players as possible. There is no need to use any of the onboard devices such the microphone or camera. I also wouldn’t want to charge for it, so store placement is insignificant. With this in mind, I would use a cross-platform tool set. The shared code would be a time and money saver, which are important since I would develop it as a free app.