When the World Feels Messy, I Turn to PowerWash Simulator

This is key. Sometimes, I can find the idea of an open world, where I can do anything, overwhelming. But when my anxiety is incredibly high, playing a game that doesn’t have set goals is very rewarding and cathartic. When I’m overwhelmed, I often revisit older games as well.

If a player gets time-sucked by the game, there’s certainly less time to actually put feet to pavement, look someone in the eye, feel the endless heatwave. Wilson wrote that we are “terribly confused by the mere fact of our existence,” and god games appear to mitigate that. But we do play against ourselves during that “private time” of reverie, rez... See more

The greatest power of games is that you can explore this landscape of different agencies. The greatest danger of games is that you can get sucked into this experience of just craving and wanting to be in a clear, crisp and gentle universe where you know exactly what to do and exactly how well it’s measured.

C. THI NGUYEN: I n games, for once in your life, you know exactly what you’re doing and you know exactly that you can do it. And then you have just the right amount of ability to do it. It’s a feeling of concentrated, crystallized action. For me, solving puzzles, or balancing over in a rock climb, or seeing a trap ahead in chess, this is ecstasy. A... See more

Likewise, players lose hours inside god games. They are sometimes referred to as “time-sweep” games and noted for their addictiveness. Crucially, time moves faster in the god games. Years pass with one turn of Civilization or SimCity. One Sims day is equal to 24 minutes in our world. There is also a particular kind of time-abolishing focus required... See more

In this human-made apocalyptic context, it seemed to me that interactive participation by the viewer made the more sense, by putting them in a situation of urgency rather than passively absorbing content. The game forces you to make choices and decisions. That's how the world works. This need for real, urgent action is just as true in reality as it... See more

Mindless activities in front of screens are what I like to call “being dead while conscious.” These are the most readily available tools that allow us to leave ourselves, which can feel pretty good, or at the very least, pretty necessary. I am not against being dead while conscious. It’s hard to be a human living in a body. Sometimes it helps to be... See more