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if i knew how words worked i’d make an entire post about how helpful video games are with my depression and adhd and how they’re able to make me engage with the world instead of disassociating but unfortunately i’m dumb

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Seriously curiously: as a person who has suffered from depression (I have with chronic d. for the last 5 years) what are some of your coping mechanisms for when you feel like things are spiralling out of control? I know five years is a long time, but I'm still in the experimental phase of figuring out what helps distract me. I assume part of your coping is making videos, but is there anything else?

I take long baths and play video games when horribly depressed. When I’m the worst level possible, I just sleep.

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i never thought that my last year of high school would be so similar to the first one

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i know my boyfriend doesn’t understand my depression because he didn’t even like my funny tweet about it

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you know, i love the idea of “depression doesn’t make you unworthy” that a bunch of people got from thor’s, uh, “arc” in endgame. I love that, I do. It’s a great message. However. I don’t in any capacity think that that’s what the creators were going for. and frankly I think we’re giving m&m and the russo’s far too much credit for that. analyzing the film and getting that from it is valid. and i don’t mean to say that you shouldn’t get that from the movie. but, i’ve seen a large number of people praising the creators for pushing this message, and that’s giving them way too much credit.

because the russo’s have openly admitted that they didn’t know what to do with Thor. and that fat, depressed, video game-obsessed was the default. they didn’t write him as a hopeful metaphor about depression and personal worthiness. they wrote him as the most shocking thing they could think of. they wanted the audience to gasp or laugh at him, not be inspired by him.

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video games save my life

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being ADHD with depression is like

me: playing video games while browsing tumblr while watching tv.

tv: episode ends, is silent

me: doesn’t notice, keeps playing games and browsing tumblr

me: gets sad

me: why am i sad?

me: Oh NO! tv stopped. not enough stimulation to keep brain distracted from sad thoughts.

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I felt this in my soul

Source:

https://mobile.twitter.com/jackiefiles/status/1257404934095433728?s=19

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“Why am I so alone?”

*Plays video games constantly. Ignores messages and texts out of anxiety. Takes depression naps all day and stays awake all night.*

“Ah the mysterious human condition...”

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Me a week after March 20th

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Avoid video games that use extrinsic motivation. A video game should at least mostly rely on intrinsic motivation, meaning that the playing of the game itself is the fun part, not the reward you get for playing the game. If you don’t enjoy the gameplay, but you want to earn lootboxes, you’ve fallen into the intentionally exploitative system operating within so many games nowadays, and you need to find another game, because you’re not having fun.

It doesn’t sound serious, but this kind of thing can make depression way worse if you’ve already got depression.

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Matchmaking is the worst thing to happen to online games, and has made gaming more toxic

Matchmaking Encourages players to:

Care only about their rank, instead of the fun of everyone playing it

Creates temporary bonds at best

Because of the ephemeral nature of matchmaking, players have no incentive to be respectful towards one another

Become an addiction, instead of hanging out in a CSS or Quake server with their friends, they now feel compelled to “grind” a ranked or unranked queue for rank points or some cosmetic skinnerbox.

To balance the rankings, keep queuetimes short, and foster esports, games have to use smaller team sizes, meaning larger groups are unable to play coherent games together, while conversely making it harder for solo players to meet new people to play with.

Matchmaking often incurs a penalty on players who leave games in progress, making players less likely to leave a game instance filled with assholes or just people they don’t connect with

Clan servers encourage players to:

Care about the social interactions of the people they play with instead of an arbitrary rank system

Helps create more permanent bonds in having a club/bar like atmosphere, with many regulars attending

Due to the server system requiring it having a fun atmosphere to be in to stay alive, players are encouraged to be more friendly or respectful towards one another.  I personally have heard far more racism in any matchmaking game than I ever have playing community servers in TF2 or CSS, and this was before social justice became more widespread.

Is more of a social activity, most games that have or had servers tend to have little in the way of locked content for players to grind for, instead the social interactions they have with a group of people over time is what keeps players invested in playing the game

To be successful, a server based game usually needs to be able to handle a large enough amount of players in any game instance to allow for a community to form around any server instance, facilitating larger groups of people (aka a clan) as well as making it easier for solo players to find new people to play with.

Server based systems are predicated on anyone being able to hop in or out of the game at will, letting people who join a shitty server to make the decision to bail and find a better group of people to play with

A lot of these same observations can be made when one compares forums to social media, where people care less about discussion and more about accruing followers/notes.

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Gaming Spotlight: Gamers vs COVID-19

Gamers vs COVID-19 is a community of virus-killing, society-supporting, game-loving heroes, founded to raise awareness about the importance of social distancing, good hygiene, and positivity in combating the spread of COVID-19. They were founded by a group of anonymous gamers and medical professionals, most of whom work in or adjacent to the esports industry. You can join them by signing the pledge at www.gamersvscovid19.com!

Lots of parts of the internet thrive on misinformation—how does this initiative strive to combat that?

Our resources are heavily researched, and we rely on citations from institutions such as the US FDA, US CDC, and the WHO. Each of these is referenced on our page, so you don’t need to take our word for it. We also have contributing medical professionals who help to fact check our distributions, but that doesn’t mean we’re giving medical advice. 

Of course, when it comes to questions about viruses and disease, we always encourage anybody to go directly to a vetted source of information like those we’ve already mentioned.

Besides gaming, what are other ways to practice social distancing?

Social distancing is just the act of removing yourself from public spaces as often as possible. For many of us, that means replacing public activities with online gaming, but for you, it might mean reading, playing music, baking, painting, coding, or whatever you love to do from the comfort of your home. We started this movement in part to remind everybody that social distancing doesn’t mean social isolation: we’re all in this together, even when we’re apart.

What are other ways we can contribute if we still have to go to work?

You can still live by our pledge and help save the world if you go to work! Not everybody has the luxury of being able to totally isolate themselves. Some people have to go to jobs, while others may need to care for relatives or go out for other necessities. Social distancing is the active decision to restrict your time in public spaces to the minimum required amount, which is going to vary from person to person. 

What’s important is that you spend every minute you can at home and that you stay home if you’ve felt sick or been in close contact with somebody who has a confirmed case of coronavirus. Even if you feel healthy, give others a gap of at least six feet whenever possible and don’t touch other people physically. Wash your hands thoroughly with soap and water frequently (especially when exiting or entering a public space), and never touch your face, eyes or mouth with unwashed hands. You can also help amplify the message by not meeting friends in public, sharing the pledge, and shifting in-person meetups to online activities instead.

How do you build a community through gaming? 

Contrary to old stereotypes, gamers are inherently social. Building a community around an important issue like COVID-19 is just a matter of reaching out and getting help from big amplifiers. Once this message is in front of people, we’ve found gamers eager to join and help. It’s been truly uplifting in a challenging time.

The gaming space is supremely lucky to have so many amazing influencers who care deeply about their fans and broader communities. This is an international epidemic, and it’s going to take international cooperation and acts of courage to overcome it. We will do whatever it takes for as long as it takes, and every gamer from the biggest pro to the average joe is making an impact by consciously deciding to sign the pledge and change their lifestyles until COVID-19 is controlled.

Take the pledge over on the website! In the first few hours, over 10,000 gamers signed up, including the likes of Castro1021, FallenNCS, Sjokz, Nickeh30, Voyboy, JKap415, HungryBox, Goldenboy, Ocelot, G2Pengu, Slasher, SirActionSlacks, Sheever, and too many other gamers to name. We’re excited about every person who comes on and decides this is a movement worth supporting. Social distancing only works if everyone chooses to make a sacrifice for the greater good.

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Statistics on Collaboration in Video Games - Are thye geared towards certain demographics over others?

Reference: https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2015/08/06/chapter-3-video-games-are-key-elements-in-friendships-for-many-boys/

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are there any popular games you just can't get into?

I bought Breath of the Wild, but I cannot bring myself to play it now that I have games like Animal Crossing and Borderlands 3. I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that I play video games with friends. Breath of the Wild is a single player game and the story line does not draw me in as much as Borderlands to be able to play it by myself. Maybe if there was a multiplayer option I would play it more.

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True friendship