5 games to help you understand depression and mental health
Video games can help us better understand mental health issues like depression. We present you the games that best deal with this topic.
Mental illnesses are often a burden for those affected, which can affect many areas of their lives, whether work, relationships or private life. For outsiders, these difficulties can be difficult to understand.
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| 5 games to help you understand depression and mental health |
Many video games also address mental health in one way or another. This doesn't always happen in the best way, clichés and stigmata are often replicated, especially in horror titles. However, some games have also made it their goal not only to address mental illnesses in a differentiated manner, but also to illustrate them for people who are not affected themselves.
Of course, these are artistic interpretations and no game can ever cover the entire spectrum of an illness, but the following titles manage to make the difficulties of depression, anxiety and other illnesses tangible.
Games about depression, anxiety and mental health
Celeste
- Genre: Platformer
- Mental Health Topics: Depression, Anxiety
That's what it's about: In Celeste, the protagonist Madeline tries to climb the eponymous Mount Celeste, but has to face her self-doubts on the way. The crisp jump & run passages require a lot of skill from us, but thanks to the assist mode they are also suitable for platformer newcomers.
How the game deals with mental health: Madeline suffers from anxiety and self-doubt, which is portrayed in the game by a dark mirror version of herself. She doesn't just have to conquer her inner demons, but rather learn to make peace with them. Moments like Madeline's panic attacks, in which we have to balance a feather so that she can calm down, make her experiences tangible.
Night in the Woods
Genre: Adventure
Mental Health Topics: Depression, Anxiety, Bipolar Disorder, Abuse
This is what it's about: As 20-year-old Mae, we return to our hometown after dropping out of college. Here she not only has to try to reconnect with her old life and old friendships, but also to fathom the mysteries of the city.
How the game deals with mental health: Night in the Woods addresses the difficulties of growing up. Mae feels aimless and alienated from her old friends, who are all struggling with their own problems. Only gradually do the characters come closer to each other and learn to trust each other. Night in the Woods doesn't use the power of friendship to heal anyone, but it does show that not being alone with your problems can help.
Psychonauts 2
Genre: Platformer
Mental Health Topics: Depression, Anxiety, Psychosis, Addiction
That's what it's about: In the platformer Psychonauts 2 we slip into the role of the supernaturally gifted Raz, who was able to fulfill his dream of joining the Psychonauts. The secret organization can enter people's minds to look for information or solve mental problems. In order to find a mole with the Psychonauts, Raz has to jump back into different mental worlds and solve puzzles and platform passages here.
How the game deals with mental health: Psychonauts 2 visualizes the condition of the characters through their mental worlds. In the mind of a character suffering from anxiety, for example, we have to complete a game show under time pressure or defeat a panic attack monster by slowing it down.
Fractured Minds
- Genre: Puzzle Adventure
- Mental health issues: anxiety, depression, paranoia
That's what it's about: Fractured Minds is a short puzzle game in which we have to complete seemingly simple tasks in order to progress. But even simple activities like opening a door can become a struggle if we just can't find the right key. The game aims to show what it can feel like to live with mental illness and how it can distort one's perception of the world.
How the game deals with mental health: Fractured Minds was created by the then 17-year-old developer Emily Mitchell, who suffers from severe anxiety herself and wanted to convey this feeling in a game. Fractured Minds takes us through six short chapters, each exploring an aspect of mental illness such as paranoia or anxiety by distorting everyday places and actions into disturbing images.
Child of Light
- Genre: RPG
- Mental health issues: depression, grief
That's what it's about: The 2D RPG tells the story of the young princess Aurora in fairytale verses, who ends up in a kind of dream world after the loss of her mother and has to save a kingdom. On the way she meets new companions, fights turn-based battles against monsters and grows with her tasks.
How the game deals with Mental Health: Child of Light deals with grief and depression, which is represented by a deep sleep typical of fairy tales, which the princess falls into after the death of her mother. In a kind of dream world, the girl has to learn to believe in herself and to cope with her grief.