The Psychology of Video Games

With my choice to now go all the way for my PhD, the possibility of teaching opens up. In thinking about what sort of classes I might want to teach, I tried to come up with new and interesting options for video game focused classes. My favorite one I've come up with is what I should have done my psychology through literature term project on. I think the main goal of this idea is to torment my psychology teacher, since I'd want him to co-teach it with me. But, forget psychology through literature and take my new class: Psychology Through Video Games. What follows is an example of a discussion we might have in such a class.

Before we begin, we need to understand The Shadow. The quick description of The Shadow is that it is the part of your psyche that you don't like. We all have the capacity to be thieves, murders, and rapists, but we hide that part of ourselves away. We refuse to acknowledge that it is part of us. This, is The Shadow. The best example of this is the story of Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde.

The game we are going to look at now is Kingdom Hearts RE: Chain of Memories. The character we follow here has a constant battle within himself of light versus dark. He can call his darkness to aid him in battle. The other important item of note is what a "nobody" is. In the first game in this series, it is established that a person who gives into the darkness in their heart (arguably their Shadow) becomes a heartless. The main goal of that game is to defeat Ansem, leader of the heartless. In this game however, you quickly discover that you fought only half the battle. When a heartless is made, so too is a nobody. Nobody's are beings of complete darkness, pure evil. They are Shadows themselves. This is important to note as Ansem makes an appearnce here, and the main villian we see is a nobody.

It is also worth mentioning that there are many Disney elements in this series, so Mickey will make an appearence.

Now watch this movie in its entirety:




Now that we've watched that, here are some things to think about. First, what are the benefits of the Shadow? Riku's darkness/Shadow actually physically saves him from being killed by Lexaeus. Many say that the Shadow is needed to make assertive choices. Like how Dr. Jekyl is a total wimp without Mr. Hyde. Now, at the same time, what are the dangers of the Shadow? It clearly threathens to consume Riku. If he completely gives in, he will become like Lexaeus. Then, finally, Lexaeus says something very interesting, "You're also capable of controlling the darkness." The ideal relationship between a person and their Shadow is to acknowledge it, work with it, but keep it under control. When a person suppresses their Shadow too hard too long, when they cast it into the darkness, then it consumes them, because shadow thrives in the darkness. Serial killers whose neighbors describe them as "they were the nicest people, very quiet, and kept to themselves" have been consumed by their Shadows. But Lexaeus suggests it can be both controlled and that it shouldn't be feared.

From later in the game we have an example of when Riku finds this balance. Embedding it is disabled so here's the link instead:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7bhBoJo3vM

So what do you think now? Discuss.

Maybe Final Fantasy and Disney were two different things for a reason....