Features

How video games helped me cope with depression

And made it worse?

Published

March 2, 2019

Leez

Video games have been a vital part of my life. My first game was JumpStart. Frogger quickly followed. From Frogger, I played Sonic the Hedgehog, Super Mario Bros., and Suikoden II. Playing video games was pretty much how my siblings and I spent time together when we weren’t studying and pretending to do our homework.

I once borrowed a girl’s Nintendo DS and played Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town and obsessed over farming and flirting. No, seriously… This was the game that weirdly taught me how to flirt. I know I’m not the only one (I think). I honestly hope not, but that’s for a different article for another time.

Playing games was a large part of my childhood. But, it cemented itself into my life in a different way when I suffered from depression.

I think I was thirteen when depression and I had met but didn’t quite know each other’s names. I honestly thought it was a phase. “Thirteen and depressed,” sounded too silly to have been an actual thing. It was strange. I don’t quite know what was going on with myself. I just knew I had absolutely no motivation to not only be thirteen but to also, just be.

I remember staying up one night playing Ori and the Blind Forest on my laptop and feeling like I needed to just play it. I zoned out and played until the end. By then, it was morning. I had to wash up and head to class completely unprepared. As much as the day that followed that night was pretty much set to be horrible, I felt less anxious about having a bad day.

I realize now, in retrospect, that much of playing games growing up has taught me to be fine with failure. Well, I suppose that was the case because I was completely terrible at games, but had the stubbornness of a completionist.

Night in the Woods was one of the notable games that helped me through tough times.

I played games to escape the daunting reality of existence. From mulling over the purpose of life to the significance of one’s self in the grander scheme of society, I was not going to have it. No, sir. No, ma’am. No, thank you. I was going to play to have fun and if it meant watching my character die over the dumbest of things, I was going to laugh it off and start over.

I grew up failing a lot at games, but it’s not to say I failed at every single thing. Much of my first games were educational ones which set me up to know out-of-left-field facts. The ones that followed were pretty much where I learned to get better by failing.

Games like Suikoden II and Harvest Moon were where I learned to play once for the fun and a second time to meet all the stars of destiny to save Nanami from dying and to make every single non-playable character (NPC) fall in love with me. I’m not obsessive; I just have a fear of missing out.

Games may have played a vital role in my escapism, but sometimes that sense of detachment from reality is necessary to come back functioning better than before. In cases like mine, it taught me a healthy way to cope with my depression.

You see, when I was depressed, how I saw myself was pretty much distorted from reality. It still is sometimes. In many ways, video games can be a great avenue to strip yourself of the haunting noises in your head. This may not follow for some games with inevitably toxic chats but remember: They’re as much sad saps as you are — just kidding. Be nice, play nice, and have fun.

Playing games gives you the opportunity to shift perspective and alter your sense of reality. You get to decide whether to take it seriously or to take a step back and consider it as just a game. Also, there’s more to video games than having fun. Sometimes, dabbling into the deep technicalities make the game all the more fun.

How you immerse yourself can change how the game changes you and how willing you are to have it change you. As for me, it’s sometimes what keeps my sanity in check.

Hands-On

Apple iPhone 18 Pro Series Hands-on

And everything announced during Apple’s September 2026 Event

Published

September 13, 2026

GadgetMatch and Michael Josh Villanueva

The latest Apple event isn’t just about the shiny new Apple Duo. There’s a lot to talk about!

In this video, we break down everything Apple has announced during their September 2026 keynote.

First, there’s the updated iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max. That’s alongside their design and color changes, battery and performance improvements. Even that massive camera upgrade.

There’s even the ANC-infused AirPods 5 alongside the newer Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4. Plus, the latest software updates coming to both these wearables.

So, are these worth the upgrade?

Explainers

Spotlight: Hisense UR8 + RGB MiniLED Explained

The Biggest TV Upgrade in Years?

Published

September 13, 2026

GadgetMatch

TV technology is changing in a way you can’t see. And it starts with how color itself is made.

Hisense’s new RGB MiniLED technology could change the way we see TVs.

Here’s our spotlight on their latest Hisense UR8 offering.

Check out the Hisense UR8 TV: https://bit.ly/4cxo6xl

Features

How did new CEO John Ternus do for his first Apple event?

Is a new golden age coming for Apple?

Published

September 10, 2026

Luigi Leonardo

For a brief moment, I thought Tim Cook was refusing to step down as Apple’s CEO.

Apple’s “Surprise and shine” event, which heralded the coming of the foldable iPhone Duo, started bombastically with a montage of cinematic moments spanning different genres. The main point was: “what’s the best way to start an opening scene?”

After what felt like an age, the all-too-familiar voice of Tim Cook came on, perhaps for the very last time. But rather than overstaying his exit as the former CEO, he describes that the perfect opener should be classic, as a car that is, quite symbolically, riding off into the sunset. He then explains that he’s not the main character anymore.

Last shot of Tim Cook at the Surprise and Shine event

“That’s your guy,” he said, before pointing to John Ternus, who steps into frame without an introduction or even a name card. It’s hard to image that this guy is the new face of Apple.

It’s the perfect end to Tim Cook’s tenure and as perfect a start for John Ternus’s.

Moving from an age of crisis to a golden age

After a decade and a half of being the face of the brand, Tim Cook stepped down from his tenure as CEO. He leaves the company in a much better state than when he took over. Thanks to him, the iPhone is now a household item. It’s a ubiquitous phone that draws millions of fans every time a new one comes out every year.

But his tenure didn’t start on a bed of roses. When he took over in 2011, it was in response to Steve Jobs’s failing health, who passed away soon after. He inherited a company constantly threatened by competitors trying to eat into Apple’s slice of the pie.

Indeed, Cook’s tenure was peppered with crises. He had to navigate Trump’s first reign, destructive as it was towards relationships in China. He had to figure out survival during the tempestuous pandemic years. Finally, he had to carefully build a strategy for the dawn of AI.

Cook is, first and foremost, a businessman. While the Jobs era was typified by innovation after innovation, Cook built upwards, turning Apple into a trillion-dollar company. Although we didn’t see a lot of new exciting segments introduced, the company built on what it was already good at, delivering a premium and refined experience.

John Ternus comes at an opportune time. Though the brand will always have a healthy share of diehard fans, Apple must now find the next big thing and rediscover the spice of years past.

A time for AI?

After his nonchalant introduction, Ternus immediately goes on the offensive and describes his vision for Apple Intelligence. Rather than dwell on NPUs, TOPS, and other metrics that a regular user can’t make heads or tails of, he described Apple Intelligence and Siri AI as a personal assistant. Usage versus performance, in other words.

If you’re an AI enthusiast, the renewed push towards Apple Intelligence should give you hope that the iPhone won’t just be a receptacle for other AI software. Rather, it’s building its own. Wherever the AI industry is going, Apple looks like it can keep up.

Now, if you don’t like AI at all, that’s fine, too. Ternus isn’t there just for the AI.

Unlike Jobs or Cook, Ternus comes from a strictly engineering background. In today’s world, hardware complements AI. The software must use NPUs after all. But, when the AI bubble finally pops, Ternus isn’t out of a job. In fact, if his track record is any indication, it’s just getting started.

Or a time for new hardware?

This year is absolutely monumental for Apple. Earlier this year, the company launched the MacBook Neo, its first budget-friendly notebook built for everyone. If you were looking to get into the MacBook lifestyle, now is the perfect time to buy in. A lot of users felt a subtle changing of the guard.

From there, you can feel Ternus’s influence already seeping in. And if it wasn’t obvious back then, it’s more than apparent now.

In his first ever “One More Thing,” Ternus started his tenure strong with the introduction of the iPhone Duo. Almost twelve hours since the phone’s announcement, I’ve never seen a more visceral reaction to the launch of a new iPhone.

Whereas most of their annual releases reveled in more incremental improvements that primarily tickled already dedicated fan, the iPhone Duo is something new. Everyone’s talking about it. It’s gotten so crazy that even Samsung, often more nonchalant with its prodding, openly attacked the foldable after teasing the brand to go foldable last year.

Though it’s technically not a new segment, the iPhone Duo is patching up the mistakes of past foldables. Rather than just pasting two screens together, Apple’s take feels like a unified whole, emphasized by an interface that seamlessly changes from folded to unfolded.

Where Tim Cook failed to illicit more than a modest ripple with the Vision Pro, Ternus flew to new heights with the iPhone Duo’s announcement. And the phone isn’t even out yet.

Now, there’s still a chance that the Duo won’t be a hit with sales, especially because of the price. But this is still a strong opener for Ternus.

Who is the main character?

“That’s your guy,” Tim Cook pointed.

I don’t think he was pointing in the right direction. Though the camera cut to Ternus himself, his first outing clearly states that the main character is no longer whoever is handling the reins. His decision to skip an official introduction feels intentional. The main character, after all, is the hardware itself: the iPhone 18 Pro, the iPhone Duo.

The entire event started with a bold declaration that everything was shot with an iPhone. It ended, in fact, with the same declaration. Channeling their inner Marshall McLuhan, Ternus’s Apple wants you to believe in the iPhone again.

Even as someone who doesn’t use Apple products mainly, I’m stoked to see what the new era will bring to the table. This is an exciting time for Apple. We might be in the first year of a new golden age.