Mental
Without even knowing it, Patrick Lindsey made me accept a harsh reality. That reality is that, most horror games and villian’s in games have a mental illness. This is an issue because it portrays a negative image of people with a mental illness. If we were able to create a new culture of accepting mental illness people would be more conscious of the real issues at hand; as well as understand what these people are going through. This culture can simply be improved by removing this negative stigma towards people with mental illnesses in games.
Lindsey’s article mentions that society approaches the situation of mental illness, “at arm’s length”. I strongly agree with this statement, there are so many negative inklings that tell us not to approve those who aren’t “normal”. We are also tough how to treat each other equally, but there are so many signs given to us that we are not equal. A gaming platform is not the place for discrimination. All ages are playing these games, its setting a standard for kid on what is acceptable. People with mental illness’ need support, not to have a sigma held over their head that they are “insane”.
Our class was able to play a game; the game was decision based. The game would give you a situation and a few different responses; after you select a response your storyline would keep unraveling. After playing this game, my classmates were wondering, how do you win? The thing about the game was that no matter what decision/response that you selected you would end up with a mental illness. After a classmate asked the question, we found out that the point of the game wasn’t to win, there is no way to win because you have a mental illness. After reading this article, that game really sticks in my head. There was no reason for that game, period. There was just no purpose in my eyes; best case scenario, someone walks away from playing that game and develops sympathy for those who have a mental illness. All things considered I just don’t imagine that happening too often.
I would like to see a change in the industry because the characters with mental illnesses are too most of the time, too aggressive. These characters are equivalent to defective products that you want to return of throw away. The amount of neglect toward the actual issue at hand is unheard of. If these sort of games where no longer created it would change the look on mental illness. The only thing is that, these games cannot just be removed; there needs to be a way to incorporate awareness to mental health in a positive way. “Approximately 10 percent of Americans are living with some form of diagnosable mental illness” (Lindsey). Lindsey suggest that games get a first-hand opinion from someone with a mental illness or a doctor, so that people are truly aware of how the disease really is.
