Hey all,

I'm wondering if anyone knows of any existing (and hopefully easy to obtain) games that deal with social anxiety (or any sort of anxiety).  I'm going to be part of a social anxiety workshop / support group, and the facilitator wondered about using an RPG as an activity for one of these days.  As you may or may not know, social anxiety, or social phobia, is an intense fear of social situations which severely limits a person's social performance and ability to lead a normal life.  I'm certain a great many gamers have some experience with this, which is why I'm wondering if a game like this has been tackled before.

I'm hoping to find something with high player involvement, which has a mechanic for an anxiety level that rises and falls over time (depending on the situation), and some sort of social performance / effectiveness mechanic that ties in with anxiety.  Also, the game has to be learned and played in the course of a single hour and a half to two hour session, so it needs to be fairly simple.

I'll most likely modify a game to fit our specific requirements, if I can find one to use as a starting point.  If I can't find one, I'll make something from scratch, but time is a factor (the first workshop session is October 19th, although the actual RPG session will probably be a few weeks after that), so anything at all would be helpful.

I brainstormed a quick outline for a "from scratch" design, but I'll wait to post those notes until a conversation is going, so as not to confuse things.

Heh, define a 'normal life'. If anything a desperate desire to be 'normal' triggers the very thing which supposedly stops you from being 'normal'. My flip side is that there are people who firmly believe that there is a structure to the universe and wow, just by luck they have a place in it, and there are other people who are closer to the truth of the matter and thus suffer more anxiety simply out of being more in touch with that truth.

That said, perhaps look at "My life with master", with the master perhaps being a social throng/mob more than an individual?

I agree with 'My Life with Master'. It has a mechanics focused feeling integrated that could help.

I would propose Smallville too. It has no 'anxiety' attribute, but it focuses in facing conflicts and developing social networks around the character. If you throw away all the 'superpower' stuff and use to play daily life in any city in the world, facing everyday problems and relations, it could be interesting.

Hmm.  Good point, Callan.  There really is no such thing as "normal."  I think "Normal Life" in this case just means, roughly, able to approach people and make new friends, able to speak up for oneself, able to date if so desired, able to leave the house, and that sort of thing.  I think you're right though, in that socially anxious people tend to worry more about being normal, and that's really the source of much of their anxiety.

I'll take a look at My Life With Master.  I've been meaning to get my hands on a copy anyway, actually, and IIRC from what I've read about it, it has a sort of domination & submission/fear mechanic going on that might work really well. 

Moganhio: It's funny you mention Smallville--I just got my copy last week, but I haven't had a chance to read it very far.  I'll keep reading, though.  I think I'd have to strip it down pretty heavily to get it simple enough to learn and play in a single 2 hour session, but it might be well worth it.

Thanks for the suggestions guys!

I did write a game about social anxiety once. It's on the forum Knife Fight and, since it's not a public post, I can't link to it.

Thinking about games that aren't about social anxiety, but play with vaguely related themes, I agree My Life With Master is a good choice. Also try Nicotine Girls (talks about fear, which can be socially related), Misery Bubblegum (has a big thing about social humilation) and Kagematsu (has a Love and Pity mechanic).

Thanks for the suggestions Graham; I'll check out those games. 

If you don't mind my asking, what was the general structure of the game you designed?

Did you have character traits to reflect the person's anxiety or anxious thoughts?  If so, how did they work?  Also, was the focus of your game on social performance, or more on dealing with anxiety itself?

These are questions I've been mulling over for a simple scratch-built system, but I haven't had time to work on it much so far.