This article, originally posted on October 31, 2019, has been republished to amplify black voices in GameSpot's support of Black Lives Matter. Donate to the effort to fight systemic racism here.
Death is such a major part of video games, but rarely in a way that's constructive--it's most commonly a failure mechanic for you or the ever-present goal for you to enact on others, regardless of whether you're facing other players or NPCs. A story-driven game's most dramatic moment may use the death of a beloved character to create a severe emotional response and plenty of horror games rely on surprising character deaths to produce jump scares. But that's usually the extent to what games do with death. So in the few cases when games actually do deal with death and grief as a reality, it's almost always surprising.
Video games should talk about death more. And I don't mean just show it; more games should really talk about it and explore how normal it is. Video games too often gloss over or demonize death but that's not an accurate reflection of real life. We're all going to die someday, as are the people we know. And as frightening as that may be, those deaths will probably be boringly normal. So too, in turn, are the emotions associated with coming to terms with that, whether it's depression, grief, anger, or acceptance.
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