Depression Quest

I played through this little point and click story game a couple of times now. For starters, it's a bit of an RPG-type game where depending on the choices you make, the story and outcome will change. I got two horrible endings at first, thinking that the game's writing and choice design is weak, inflexible, and not very intricate. As it turns out, it's a bit deeper than that, though i imagine most people will get bad endings on the first go. It's worth playing through at least twice to see how different choices affect different outcomes. As far as tackling depression, it does a decent job. The game isn't preachy or encouraging you to go down a certain path. It's not a guide on beating depression, nor does it judge you for your choices. Its best qualities are the atmosphere and scenarios which I'm sure many players have been though. I've been through near 1:1 situations presented in the game, such as parents not being the most understanding or feeling too defeated to be productive. An interesting design choice is presenting us with choices that we know we SHOULD make, but are simply denied making by the game. If you make certain choices, future choices seem to be either crossed out completely as you spiral towards whatever ending you're headed to. On the other hand, the game's presentation and mechanics are extremely minimal, as is the length. You'll be done with it anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour after starting. This should be expected with a free indie game from over 10 years ago. You will find much more detailed, artistically rich, and fulfilling games exploring this same topic. But for what it is, it's worth trying. 7/10 P.S: My nose began profusely bleeding after this review. It appears all my brain power went into writing it and I will now sink into bed and cease productivity for a week.