Coping with Crisis: Gaming and Self-Care

Last week was a trying week for a lot of people and some are still feeling the effects today. South Texas began to feel the effects of a winter storm from the Polar Vortex, and due to a myriad of factors including incompetence by elected officials, we were not prepared. Lisa and I are in Texas, along with our family, so last week was largely spent coordinating with PG staff in other places to make sure things ran smoothly without us.

We were lucky, as we had plenty of ways to stay warm, and yet there were other challenges. Lisa has medical equipment that requires electricity, and there were a few periods of uncertainty as to whether or not we would be able to (literally and figuratively) weather the storm. One thing that helped though, was gaming.

Now I know you’re wondering: “If you had no power, how did gaming help?” Well, we weren’t playing games, but during periods of time checking Twitter and social media for updates by our power company and ERCOT, we got to see that a Nintendo Direct was coming. Aaron covered it last week, but that topic of conversation kept Lisa and I occupied for hours in the dark.

We talked about what we expected from the Direct. Things like a possible Wind Waker port, Skyward Sword (which came true), and even my hopes that at some point before I turn 40 (I’m 27, I’m joking here) we might see Bayonetta 3 as more than a teaser trailer. I’m looking at you Kamiya, you teasing sausage you.

It was a morale booster in a period of time that had us feeling a myriad of emotions. Anger, anxiety, apprehension, and overall a feeling of boredom permeated the days we had no power or sporadic power due to blackouts. I want to reiterate that we were lucky. There were many others that had things worse than we did, and in the coming weeks and months, I am certain that we are going to see a rising death toll from people freezing alone in their homes.

I’ve also seen people compare this to Hurricane Harvey, and I would say the comparison is accurate. Many people have property damage from frozen pipes, and there were large numbers of people without the things they needed. Just like Harvey lawmakers and officials were caught unprepared, and the weak spots in our infrastructure were glaringly obvious.

What this brought to mind for me though, was how when Lisa and I were living in our van with our family during Harvey, we spent a lot of time with the Nintendo 3DS and mobile games to pass the time. We’d hooked up to a friend’s house that still had power away from the flooding, so we could charge things and not run out of battery.

I remember playing through Fire Emblem: Shadows of Valentia, and spent a lot of time with things like Angry Birds and other things just to pass time. It was a brief reprieve from not knowing if our home would still be there when we got back. It was something for us to talk about and bond over, not knowing if the flooding was going to decimate my grandparent’s house, or if they’d be able to rebuild.

It is times like this that I think about gaming as something more than just entertainment. People want to say that gaming causes violence and that all these shootings and other tragedies are laid at the feet of gamers. In truth, I think the world would be a lot worse without gaming to allow us to open ourselves up to new worlds and new stories.

For me, gaming is a form of self-care. I’m lucky too that my career is so entwined with something I love so much. People can say what they want about gaming and the people involved, but at the end of the day, we’re all folks who just want to be immersed in something. An escape from the dark realities of the world, whether we are in crisis due to a natural disaster, or just need a break after a long workday.