It’s a cold November morning. My mother wakes me. I know it’s early as it is still dark outside. I’ve not been stirred from my slumber to get ready for school though. No, I know the news that is coming is far worse. I can’t recall exactly how the conversation went but I’ll never forget its subject. My grandfather had died. He had been battling lung cancer for some time and it had finally got the better of him. My mother left me in her bed where I had been sleeping whilst she went to attend to other relatives that had arrived at our house. I crawled to the edge of her bed, switched on the bright blue tube television and fired up the Sega Mega Drive. With my eyes full of tears and my heart full of pain I began guiding Sonic through his intrepid journey. I was only 6 years old.

Why I chose to pick up the controller on that dreadful morning I’ll never know, but what I do know is that in that very moment I had made a friend for life. No, not Sonic. God forbid. No, my newfound friendship was with video games. For the first time, and by no means the last, video games were there for me. To support me. To provide me an escape from the real world into a fantastical one. A fantastical world where my only concern was that super-sonic hedgehog and maintaining his bank of golden rings. For the briefest of moments, Sonic allowed me to forget my grief. Since that day video games became the constant throughout my life, the sole thing I could rely on when life tried to trip me up.

As a child I was extremely anxious. I was terrified of social situations and being involved with anything that would put me in the spotlight. I was much more inclined to just fade into the background than put myself forward. I was, and still am in some ways, a prime example of ‘the introvert’. It will come as no surprise then that I was not a massive fan of school. The concentrated combination of all those situations I would rather avoid was piled into one damp, dismal building and it horrified me. I dreaded having to go to school, often wishing sickness upon myself and occasionally fooling my mother into believing I actually was. Turns out diarrhoea is surprisingly easy to fake.

My only salvation from having to sit in cold classrooms and coping with the math teacher’s menopause was knowing that by 4pm I would be home, safe and playing the latest of Playstation releases. I knew that Crash Bandicoot or Driver or Brave Fencer Musashi would be waiting to comfort me. They took me away from my chronic fear of school into their world, where I was the hero, where I was the most important aspect of the game and where I could find happiness. A momentary happiness that I would come to depend on.

When I was a little older, around 13, my mother developed a debilitating illness that rendered her disabled. At the time she could do very little for herself and relied upon family to assist her with day-to-day tasks. She was the pillar of our family, supporting and caring for all of us but now those tables had turned. The pillar had all but crumbled. My father didn’t take it well and my sister was far too young to comprehend the enormity of the situation. It was then when I felt the need to step up, to forgo my childhood and jump straight into adult responsibilities; caring not only for my mother but for the rest of my family.

Those times were extremely trying for me. Not only was I dealing with pubescent struggles of ‘finding that hair down there’ and trying to fit in at school, but now I had to learn how to face some new challenges at home. Once again though, I knew I was able to fall back upon my old friend – video games.

By this time it was the era of the PlayStation 2 and Sony’s wonderful black box was there to remind me that I was allowed to exist outside of my care-giving responsibilities in the real world. It taught me that sometimes, my input was needed just as much in other worlds. I was needed to assist Dante on Mallet Island, to defeat the evil Mundus. I was needed to help Tommy Vercetti become the kingpin of Vice City. It was comforting to be needed outside of the real world, as it was the real world that made me powerless. Everything was out of my control and the tragic situations that tore through my life seemed unstoppable. Video games provided a gateway to a digital world where I was in complete control, where the will of the world was in my hands. It turned that sense of the powerless into the powerful. It was a therapy of sorts that only gaming could provide and it got me through some very tempestuous times.

As I continued to trudge through adolescence my virtual support network only grew larger. The Playstation 2 became the Playstation 3, the Xbox became the Xbox 360 and the games these platforms provided only got better. The medium and I were maturing. Fast. We were both growing and learning our limitations, yet we certainly did not grow apart. My dependence on such gaming did not waiver, it only deepened.

It got me through the clichéd teenage heartbreak, where Drake and Elena’s relationship became the focus over my own romantic failings. It gave me the much-needed break, and sometimes unwanted distraction, from my university deadlines. Hell, it even got me through a more adult and significantly life altering break up, where I became engrossed by the antics of Trevor Philips – a man whose broken sanity came to save my own.

Now, as I creep upon the age of 25 and come to terms with the fact that I’m nearly a quarter of a century through my life, I rely on gaming more than ever. To say video games are my life is a severe understatement. They have been, and always will be, more than that. They are my saviour. These fictitious and reality bending worlds allowed me the mental fortitude to survive the struggles that could have quite easily ruined my life.

Even now, gaming remains the constant – the backbone to my existence. I know that if things were to go south right now, and life were to throw another curve ball at me, Big Boss would be waiting in enemy territory for me. Makoto will be ready to uncover the mystery at High Peaks Academy with me. Geralt of Rivia will be eager to carry on our journey. I know that they will always be there, awaiting my return to their world and willingly offering that brief escape. A brief escape that, once again, may come save my life.