I played Depression Quest, which is an interactive “choose-your-path” game about what it’s like to live with depression. The game was created by Zoe Quinn in 2013, who later was at the forefront of GamerGate where they were subject to rape threats, death threats, and cyberbullying. The game is intended for all audiences to help foster a better understanding of depression through crossed out paths. You can play the game for free online, but there is an opt in option to donate to the creators, and part of the proceeds go to the National Suicide Prevenition Lifeline. There was a lot of praise and backlash for the game, but also some false accusations about the success of Depression Quest are what triggered the start of GamerGate.
Playing a game as a feminist means reframing the game design and game play by thinking of games not just as entertainment, but as chances to reflect and challenge social structures. Because Depression Quest is a game that goes against typical gamer culture by talking about “feminine things” like feelings and acceptance of mental illness, and has a diverse set of creators, Depression Quest allows players to focus on marginalized experiences and gives voices to the silenced.
The game mechanics were very simple. Some pages you just click next, some you click from an answer choice. It is a select your path game, but has a constrained set of answer choices. You could see the answer, but it would be red and crossed out. As the story proceeded, more options would get crossed out. It came to a point where all but one choice was crossed out, which symbolized the impact that depression can make in one’s life. It’s like you’re living an illusion of life. I felt this small mechanical choice really helped to deepen the impact that the Depression Quest has.
At the end when I was in therapy and taking antidepressants all the answers became available to select! This symbolizes the kind of burden that can be released. The game really forces the player to inhibit perspective. At the end you also feel what it’s like to finally have all the options back!
While I think the game definitely demonstrates feminist resistance by disrupting expections, centering marginalized identity, and demonstrating that games can be sites of political and personal storytelling, I think the game itself severely simplifies what depression is like. At the bottom of the page, there is a list of prompts that describes how you the players are feeling and are doing with the depression. There are only three points and they change so slightly throughout the game. I felt this simplifies the portrayal of depression to just 1) how you’re feeling 2) therapy 3) meds. This feels like a very stereotypical portrayal of depression and completely oversimplifies what depression can be like and what can help with depression.
While I think the game uses a lot of feminist perspectives to help drive the idea of the game, I feel like the execution is a bit limited. The answer choices are very like either “Im going to accept i have depression” or “I’m going to deny my problems” and it forces you to choose extreme high or extreme low. It doesn’t really seem like the choices you make impact where you end up, and I felt like I felt pressure to pick the “correct” answer. I think we can use more feminist perspectives to talk deepen the narrative inclusivity, emotional frameworks, and player engagement strategies perhaps by linking in intersectional feminism, access to resources, and also portraying different manifestations of depression. I think depression quest did a good job of using feminist theory to use game design to tell a story and educate its players, but I think it can do an even better representation of what depression is actually like. Perhaps the creators could use more user interviews to get many perspectives on depression, and be able to make the answer choices, and the “depression state” details with more nuance and less stereotypical. That being said, I’m not really sure if a game of this type is able to fully encompass all of the details of living with depression.
