Mindbloom, a Seattle startup founded by veterans of Amazon.com and the Monolith Productions games company, has reached a deal with the health and wellness center at California State University, Sacramento, to make the company's "Life Game" online service available to its 28,000 students, faculty and staff.

It's the first big institutional deal for the company, which also offers a free version of the Life Game online, in addition to a subscription-based professional version for personal coaches and others looking to customize the experience. The game lets people set goals for health, relationships, finances and other areas of their lives, using the metaphors of trees and leaves to illustrate how well they're doing over time.

"You don’t want your tree to look bad," said Brent Poole, the CEO and co-founder of the company (formerly of Amazon) explaining the simple but effective psychology behind the game.

Monolith veteran Chris Hewett, Mindbloom's other co-founder and executive producer, created the underlying mechanics of the Life Game by applying many of the same approaches that game companies would use to keep people engaged with more traditional video games. The game also incorporates elements of social networking to allow users to interact and encourage each other. (See video below.)

"What we’ve really built here is an online platform that we’re trying to optimize to support people making lasting change," Poole said, explaining that the idea is to create a habit and reward users in small ways to make it more likely that they will accomplish their goals.

Sacramento State will roll out the Life Game in conjunction with the debut this September of a new 151,000-square-foot campus facility known as the WELL (which stands for Wellness, Education, Leisure, Lifestyle). The school will be able to customize the online application to suit its "7 Dimensions of Wellness Program" and its own look and feel.

Mindbloom, founded in 2008, is based in Seattle's Pioneer Square, with 12 employees currently. The company is self-financed, with the help of friends and family, Poole said. It's currently working on its first mobile phone app, as well.