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Gaming charity Safe in Our World announced its inaugural Mental Health Game Devs Champions event at today’s Wired Direct. This event invites developers to make games within a period of five months that are focused on personal experiences. The registration window for the event begins now and ends on May 31, and the event itself begins on June 1, with the development window lasting through October 31, judgement ending on November 30, and the winners announced in a special December livestream.
According to Safe in Our World’s charity director, Sarah Sorrell, each Champions event will follow a theme. In 2024, that theme is COVID, as Safe in Our World was founded in the same time period as the pandemic. Sorrell said in a statement, “If there is one legacy that Covid-19 has left, it’s that perhaps people are now talking more about their mental health. That is the theme of this competition; to continue this vital conversation and encourage people to express what they went through and share their experience by making a game that means something to them.”
Several partners sponsored the event, including Xbox, Unity, Intel, Outright Games, Devolver Digital, Sharkmob, FutureLab, PressEngine and Wired Productions. The winners receive several prizes, including a Unity Pro license, mental health training courses and other resources.
Mental health and gaming
Leo Zullo, managing director of Wired Productions and co-founder of Safe in Our World, spoke with GamesBeat about the role video games can play in mental health: “Games connect with people in deeper ways that films for example, and can sometimes be great at gently opening a topic of discussion and showing people that they are not alone. Games can be cathartic, can offer closure, can teach, or in some cases be more direct and can show symptoms of mental health that people can relate to.”
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Safe in Our World has worked with several games companies to improve gamers mental health. Most recently, it announced a collaboration with Ubisoft to create the Good Game Playbook, to help players identify and shield themselves from in-game toxicity. Zullo added that awareness is critical. “For now it is important we keep the dialogue open with the gaming community, to make sure people are aware of any helpful resources they may need, to make sure people can identify if they or others are suffering, and to generally keep the topic of conversation of mental health active, so people aren’t afraid to talk or reach out. This event is complimentary to aiding this.”
Zullo said that the judges are open to any kind of game, as long as it adheres to the theme: “As a charity we believe that the conversation about the real effects of the pandemic have been swept under the carpet, and this will be an opportunity for people to voice their experience, past and potentially present. I would expect a wide variety of entries, from visual novels, to puzzle games, to maybe more advanced action type games, but the beauty of this event is that it will not be pressured, there is time, and gamers/developers/people in general are amazing and creative and I fully expect to be amazed at what will be delivered. Whatever size of game, which will be PC based, the only thing I would say is that the gameplay loop is complete, or the micro story is complete.”
