How frustrating video games help tackle depression.
Depending on where your challenges lie, the fix might look like progressive successes through a series of failures.
For all their punishing systems, horrifying foes and shattered vistas, souls-likes are about sizing up a, seemingly, insurmountable problem, and biting it into manageable chunks. Cross this section? Victory. Solve this puzzle? Victory. Chip the boss a little closer to defeat before dying? Another victory. The game never handheld you; and therefore there is no one to attribute that success to but yourself. True, these aren’t ‘real’ victories, but players who’ve claimed mental-health benefits from souls-like games say that these in-game achievements have kindled positive changes in their outlook in more tangible areas of their lives.
In the end, this is the power of media as medicine: a wide range of experiences to meet a broad set of needs.
Find your medicinal media… ♥ï¸ðŸ”¥
Source: https://universityobserver.ie/saving-souls-how-difficult-video-games-can-help-combat-depression
