The hardest part of this post is to 'news' it. Or as Kosta and I like to refer to them: "newsie". Ultimately it still feels selfish and self-indulgent. But, in reality, I need it and needed to do it. This is a story about how the recent remaster of both Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 and 2 guided me out of a mental funk, because each session is just two-minutes long.

For amplification, I wrote the linked article below fighting against invisible demons; it took my all to get through it. I was shaking and on-tracked in my goal, but invisible walls just kept emerging from the invisible ground. You know those dreams where when you're trying to run away from a danger, but you feel like you're running in concrete shoes? That was me, all day yesterday. Only awake, and not dreaming.

Here's a snippet:

I fell readily into the camp of “games can’t fix me”, largely because games is my job. But, really, they’re designed as an escape in a fictional narrative sense, or as a reason to beat up on someone else with the outcome meaning, maybe, nothing. In essence, games are a distraction. I put almost 1000 hours into The Witcher 3, and that other zero is not a typo, I just lost myself in it, but could I use such a game to self-medicate my PTSD? Nah.

How Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2 helped me this morning is that it’s an ever-rewarding experience and you gain from it. That gain and time limit to gain is unique in modern gaming, and stood out. It gave me immediate purpose and helped me realise goals and the effort to achieve them. I mean, at the end of the day, I wrote this. But wouldn’t have been able to without the game.

Click here for the full hand up post.

Thanks for posting this Steve

Thanks Steve, life sucks sometimes and it’s great if you can find something or someone to brighten your day.

I’m locked down in Melbourne, 11 weeks and counting, and buying Tony Hawk a couple of weeks ago made things feel fun again. Having something to look forward to doing helps so much.

Just booting the game up and hearing Goldfinger play on the title screen is just awesome.

Thanks dudes, wasn't easy to write both physically and emotionally. But man, has this game helped me a lot

Thanks Steve, mental health is tough to write about. Hang in there Tim Dan will let you out soon mate.