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Tag Archives: Russ Pitts

Polygamer #35: Susan Arendt of Take This

Posted on December 9, 2015 by Ken Gagne

Take This is a non-profit charity that promotes awareness and education of mental health issues through outreach to gamers. Its “AFK Rooms” have become a staple of PAX East, West, South, and Australia, and its holiday stream gives gamers a community to help them through a challenging time of year. Soon, the organization will offer a scholarship to help those gamers who need financial assistance toward mental health counseling.

It’s been a year since Take This co-founders Susan Arendt and Russ Pitts were on Polygamer podcast episode #7, and much has happened in that time! In this follow-up, Susan and Ken discuss how the AFK Rooms have since expanded to every PAX; how mental health has been represented in some of 2015’s biggest titles, such as Rise of the Tomb Raider and Life Is Strange; the difference between anxiety as an emotion and as a clinical condition; Take This’s new 24-minute documentary; the intersection of horror video games and mental health; and how to balance helping your friends and protecting yourself.

Stream the audio edition of this interview below or from Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Overcast, Pandora, Pocket Casts, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, RadioPublic, or the Internet Archive. Click past the jump for links to resources mentioned in this episode.

Continue reading →

https://media.blubrry.com/polygamer/www.polygamer.net/wp-content/uploads/podcast/pg35-susan_arendt.mp3

Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:02:42 — 29.6MB) | Embed

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Posted in Podcast | Tags: AFK Room, anxiety, charity, depression, documentary, fundraiser, Life Is Strange, Mark Kline, mental health, non-profit, PAX, PAX East, PTSD, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Russ Pitts, stream, suicide, Susan Arendt, Take This, Take This Project, Tomb Raider, Twitch |

Stage of Development: The human side of gaming

Posted on August 17, 2015 by Ken Gagne

When the Polygamer podcast was still in the conceptual stage, I thought it was going to be called Polygame. As I better defined the show, I realized the focus wouldn’t be on games, but on gamers: telling the stories of the people who make up this industry and community. Only a single letter in the show’s title made a big difference in what it’d be about. Sure enough, in the year since Polygamer launched, I’ve been honored by dozens of gamers sharing their stories with me and with listeners. It’s been wonderful to get out from behind the screen and connect with the people and passions that make this pastime so powerful.

One of the first guests was Russ Pitts, co-founder of Take This, a non-profit that helps members of the gaming community address mental health issues. For longer than Polygamer has been around, Russ has been helping other gamers tell their own stories, as in the “Human Angle” series of features on Polygon, a website he co-founded; or in the e-book How Video Games Are Made, which details the development of Defense Grid 2.

Now Russ has taken to Kickstarter to crowdfund a video series that tells the human side of gaming. Stage of Development “is a documentary series featuring human stories about real people. Some of them make games. Some of them play games. Some of them just happen to be caught in the crossfire. All of them are helping make the video game community one of the most vibrant and exciting collections of humans on Earth.”

The campaign is seeking $192,105 by September 16, on which day the first episode of the show will debut, funded by Russ’s own company, Flying Saucer Media. Early episodes will feature big names like John and Brenda Romero, or the team at Spry Fox. I’m hopeful future episodes will tell us stories of people we’ve not heard of before, companies and studios less well-funded, and those representing marginalized voices.

I’ve backed this project at the $45 level because Stage of Development is an important way to remind us that there are people behind the products and screens we spend so much time engaged with. When developers get harassed, they leave the industry; when gamers get harassed, they leave the community. Each departure leaves us with fewer games and gamers to enjoy our favorite pastime with. Acknowledging our shared humanity is a defense against that attrition.

Stage of Development isn’t about publicity; it’s about empathy. Anything that helps gamers recognize and appreciate the human element of gaming has my vote.

UPDATE (Aug 4, 2016): The original Kickstarter for this project was canceled in August 2015 and relaunched August 2016.

Posted in Crowdfunding | Tags: Flying Saucer Media, Kickstarter, Russ Pitts, Stage of Development |

Polygamer #07: Susan Arendt & Russ Pitts of Take This

Posted on October 8, 2014 by Ken Gagne

Take This is a non-profit charity founded in 2012 in response to the tragic suicide of a gaming journalist. The organization promotes awareness and education of mental health issues through outreach to gamers both online, through a variety of Twitter campaigns and initiatives, and offline, by hosting "AFK Rooms" at events such as PAX.

In this interview, Ken Gagne speaks with Take This co-founders Susan Arendt and Russ Pitts about the organization’s founding, the social stigma of mental health and gaming, the resources available to gamers, and the challenges the group faces as they grow to better serve the gaming community.

Download the audio edition below or from Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Overcast, Pandora, Pocket Casts, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, RadioPublic, or the Internet Archive. Click past the jump for links to resources mentioned in this episode.

Continue reading →

https://media.blubrry.com/polygamer/www.polygamer.net/wp-content/uploads/podcast/pg07-take_this.mp3

Podcast: Download (Duration: 59:38 — 31.4MB) | Embed

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Posted in Podcast | Tags: AFK Room, charity, depression, Mark Kline, mental health, non-profit, PAX, PAX East, Russ Pitts, suicide, Susan Arendt, Take This, Take This Project |

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