Tackling the Challenges of Clinical Depression Through Gaming

I’ve just been made aware that May is Mental Health Awareness Month here in the United States. That is the primary reason why I have elected to stand before you upon my soapbox today. I wish to speak to you about many of the challenges I face as a result of my diagnosed mental illnesses. I do so almost entirely in the hopes that detailing my personal trials, tribulations, and triumphs when facing these mental disorders may ultimately (in some way) help those of you who find yourselves fighting similar battles.

Of course, this piece would have no right to call itself a true Phenixx Gaming article if it didn’t relate to gaming or entertainment in some way. Beyond that, I don’t want to simply bore you with the technical details of the ways in which my various diagnosed conditions manifest. To that end, I’m going to structure today’s discussion in such a way that it focuses on how video games have helped me get through many of my worst times, and even helped create some of the best times.

You might recall that this past February, I wrote at some length about my three diagnosed anxiety-related disorders and discussed a few games that help me cope with those specific aspects of my mental health. Today’s monologue will instead be about how gaming has helped me tolerate my nearly-lifelong clinical depression and everything that has come with it. Before we get to that, though, I’d like to give you a bit of backstory about myself to help “set the scene,” if you will.

I say “nearly-lifelong” because as far as I can remember, I’ve had several of the classic symptoms of clinical depression. This has gone on since I was about nine years old. The primary issue was that back then, my family and I had no idea that what I was dealing with. We also had no idea that the way I was feeling had an official name, much less that there were ways I could’ve potentially gotten help dealing with my symptoms.

Granted, I don’t know what sorts of treatment I could’ve received back then, nor do I know how well those methods would have actually worked when it came to relieving certain aspects of my depression. I don’t personally know of any doctors who would genuinely consider putting a nine-year-old on antidepressant medication, after all. All I knew with certainty at that point was that I felt particularly down all the time and couldn’t really articulate why.

Then, one fateful day when I was seventeen, I was finally set on what I believe to be the right path for me. That day, I was at an appointment with my neurologist; a doctor whose specialty, as far as I’m aware, isn’t usually very deeply affiliated with mental health. At this appointment, I was asked completely out of the blue if I thought I was depressed.

I told my doctor I wasn’t sure, so he rattled off about ten or twelve of the most common symptoms. The knowledge that my depression manifested itself in every single way he had just listed hit me right then, forcefully and suddenly. A week or two later, I was able to set up an appointment with my first therapist and to make a long and tumultuous story quite short, I eventually managed to become the man who figuratively stands before you today.

All of that was several years ago, and the road to getting where I am today has by no means been completely smooth or pleasant. However, I still unquestionably have gaming to thank for getting me through the harder points of that journey. Having said all that, let us finally get into the details of how gaming managed to help me with that, shall we?

First though, I’m afraid there’s something I have to warn you about folks. As you might know, coping mechanisms like video games can vary wildly in terms of effectiveness from person to person based on things like one’s personality and the severity of one’s symptoms. In my case, while the vast majority of games work to help lessen my depression to some degree, certain games are more effective at that based on exactly what I’m feeling at any given time.

Due to that, there will most certainly be some games discussed in this article that are much too violent or otherwise graphic for some portion of our audience. As I said, the games in question just happen to work better for me at times based on my current mental state. So, to use an exceptionally hackneyed line from television, “viewer discretion is advised.” Now that the disclaimer is out of the way, let us dally no longer.

It seems to me that as I’ve gotten older, my depression has changed in such a way that it typically manifests in one of two major forms. I’ve found that my situation is often close to a perfect fifty/fifty split between these two conditions. The first of these is arguably the more commonplace image of major depressive disorder in that I have no energy, and I feel completely worthless. During these times it’s a herculean effort just to get out of bed, much less do anything I would actually consider productive.

If not that, the other primary manifestation of my depression is typically constituted by me suddenly and completely inexplicably becoming so irritable and outright furious, that it takes only the slightest external stimulus to really set me off. Neither of these situations is ideal, obviously, as they both cause me to withdraw from what little social interaction in which I typically engage on an average day.

That’s entirely either because I just want to sleep all day, or because I’m afraid of my irritability reaching a boiling point and unjustifiably targeting one of my friends in the resulting metaphorical meltdown. However, if I were somehow required to choose which of these mental states I prefer, I’d have to pick the latter despite the risk of me snapping at anyone who doesn’t deserve it.

I say that because when my depression manifests primarily as irritability and anger, at least I’m able to get out of bed, do what I need to do to compose myself by doing things like showering, and ultimately being at least somewhat productive. It is for that reason that I think it would be best for me to start by discussing some of the games that help me turn my anger into fuel so that I may at least be productive in the context of whatever game I’m playing, if not in the real world as well.

Most recently, one of the most prominent games to which I’ve been turning in the event that I need to vent is Rebellion’s 2017 release, Sniper Elite 4. You might recall that I reviewed one of this title’s predecessors, namely Sniper Elite V2, here on Phenixx Gaming quite a while ago. In many ways these two games are quite similar, as you might expect given that they’re both integral parts of the same series.

To name a few examples of similarities, you assume the role of battle-hardened American sniper Karl Fairburne within the context of one of the many battlegrounds of World War II; you’re still required to use your wits and your environment to your advantage as you efficiently neutralize your enemies, the gloriously-gory “bullet cam” remains ubiquitous, and most importantly, there are still copious amounts of Nazis to kill.

The last three aspects I just listed off are the primary reasons I’ve been enthralled by Sniper Elite 4 lately. My often seemingly-endless reserves of anger are (as I alluded to) used as fuel to keep me going as I progress through each in-game mission. It also helps that the game includes challenges to encourage me to improve my skills as a sniper. These challenges include such things as landing a fatal shot from increasing distances away from my target, or other considerably more difficult trials than that.

Plus, for a bit of extra fun, I often like to imagine how Sniper Elite 4’s gameplay would be different, if not drastically improved, if Karl Fairburne were replaced with the sniper from Team Fortress 2. I know that’s probably only fun to me specifically, but I just find something quite enjoyable about an exceptionally-efficient Australian wilderness expert enjoying his line of work a bit too much, as he fells a Nazi or two with each shot he fires.

Remaining on the topic of particularly violent stealth games which bring me great joy, there’s always the venerable Hitman franchise. As for which game in the series is the one I turn to most often when my depression and irritability flare up; there is honestly no single, consistent answer. That primarily depends on what I’m specifically in the mood for, as obvious as I suspect that sounds. Allow me to elaborate.

If I find myself wanting to challenge myself to improve my skills while in the shoes of the world’s baldest contract assassin; I’ll play either the 2016 reboot of the franchise which from here on will be referred to as “Hitman 2016”, or its 2018 sequel, Hitman 2. These games both contain more than their fair share of gameplay challenges, bonus objectives, and achievements that are both related and unrelated to these mechanics.

These challenges and bonus objectives serve to encourage players to complete each in-game mission much, much more often than just once. That’s just one of the things I love so dearly about these titles in particular, however, going into much more detail than that would quadruple the length of this article. Suffice it to say that I’m a long-standing Hitman fan, and I’m starting to doubt that I’ll ever 100% complete either Hitman 2016 or Hitman 2.

Alternatively, if I just want some old, familiar comfort, I’ve consistently found that 2006’s classic Hitman: Blood Money is always ready and willing to welcome me back whenever necessary. Many Hitman veterans, including my esteemed colleague Keiran, would assert that Blood Money is the best game in the entire franchise. That is in no small part because quite a large portion of those players dislike the new direction the series began to take in the forms of 2012’s Hitman: Absolution and the aforementioned two newest titles.

I can most assuredly see the reasoning behind that argument, despite how thoroughly I enjoy the trio of Absolution, Hitman 2016, and Hitman 2. Even all these years since Blood Money’s release, I still know the layouts and objectives of each and every one of the game’s missions like the back of my hand. However, that is due in very large part to the fact that the game is readily available on the technological miracle that is Steam. Blood Money, to me, is like an astoundingly warm and comfortable blanket… a blanket that’s heavily bloodstained and has a bar code woven into it for some reason, but that’s beside the point.

At this point, I think it would be best to move on to a selection of different and notably less violent games I turn to when my depression manifests in its other primary form: that which drastically reduces my productivity and sense of self-worth. The games I’m about to discuss are in large part what both I and PC Gamer would classify as “podcast games.” That is to say, these are titles with which I’m so intimately familiar that I can just throw on some music in the background and “go with the flow.”

Personally, as soon as I hear the term “podcast game” or anything that gets that same gist across, the first title that instantaneously springs to my mind is none other than my beloved Civilization VI. Considering I’ve played Civ VI for about 486 hours at the time of writing and have no plans to stop anytime soon, I’m sure you can imagine why I don’t even need to play with the game audio prominently playing in the background.

I’ve heard narrator Sean Bean’s adorable mispronunciations of words like “Roosevelt” and, more recently, “Simón Bolívar” so many times at this point that I can recite the vast majority of such mispronunciations in full context from memory. Granted, there are still so many playable Civs, victory conditions, and other combinations of variables with which I’ve yet to experiment despite having spent such a copious amount of time with Civilization VI. I’d say that’s a good thing, though, as that ensures I won’t get bored of one of my most-beloved games anytime soon.

In fact, there’s now virtually zero chance that I’ll become bored of Civ VI anytime before approximately this time next year. You might recall that I recently reported upon the news that the game has just received the first of many portions of an ongoing season pass that’s chock-full of DLC. That DLC is the reason why I mentioned the name “Simón Bolívar” a moment ago; the famed “Liberator” leads the Gran Colombia Civilization in the first installment of the DLC present in the New Frontier Pass.

Thanks to my close friend and esteemed colleague, Alexx, I was able to get my hands on the New Frontier Pass much sooner than I thought possible, in order to experience what it has added to the game thus far. If you’re planning to hold off on buying it just yet, whether that’s because of its rather steep price tag or because you’re waiting to see what else it may include, I want to assure you that I’ll publish my detailed thoughts on the currently-playable DLC here on Phenixx Gaming as soon as I can. Hopefully my in-depth reporting will be of use to you.

On a final note concerning Civilization VI, I suspect you’ve more than likely heard by now that it’s free on the Epic Games Store for the next couple of days. If you decide to take advantage of that promotion, or even if you’ve owned the game on Steam for a while, and you find yourself unsure of how to really dive into it; I think it may interest you to know that I’ve been uploading an entire beginner’s guide to its gameplay over on our YouTube channel.

That guide covers the base game and both of its expansions in their own dedicated sections, in as much detail as I could think to muster when I recorded it. Unless something changes in the near future (which admittedly, may happen), new episodes of the guide will be uploaded to our channel every other Tuesday at precisely 1pm Pacific time. You can check out the entire playlist right here if you’re interested!

Moving on to the final game I want to mention today, this spot deservedly goes to none other than the game I’ve easily played for the longest amount of time of any game; not just on this list, or any other list I’ve published here, but since I started taking gaming as seriously as I currently do, many years ago. This probably won’t come as a surprise to very many of you, but the game in question is none other than World of Warcraft.

I’ve played WoW off and on since I was in seventh grade, and I certainly don’t plan to quit for good anytime soon. Sure, I burn out on it fairly frequently and go find other games to play to occupy my time, but I always return eventually because no other game has come close to filling the spot that World of Warcraft has irreversibly made for itself among the most positive aspects of my life. If not for this particular game, I wouldn’t have any of the lasting friendships I’ve made since I initially began playing.

Heck, if I had never gotten invested in World of Warcraft, I likely wouldn’t have any common ground with the man I’ve considered not just my best friend, but my brother for nearly a dozen years now. I wouldn’t have had any desire to learn to build computers because I wouldn’t have needed a better machine upon which to play. That, in turn, would have led me down a very different path than the one upon which I currently find myself.

So, just in case I haven’t clarified it thoroughly enough, I wish to end with this note. World of Warcraft is on this list because even when my depression is at its absolute worst, even when I think I’ve hit rock bottom, all I have to do is think about all the good the game has done for me. World of Warcraft has indirectly ensured that I’m enjoying the best possible life for me by giving me both something to do and a means to socialize with my favorite people. I don’t care how weird that may sound; it’s ultimately one hundred percent true.