Psychonauts 2 Director Took A More “Thoughtful Approach” To Sequel’s Mental Health Issues

Highlights

Psychonauts 2 focuses on healing through gameplay, deviating from traditional action games to address mental health.
Double Fine’s thorough development of the sequel led to a 32-episode documentary series, providing insight into the game’s journey.
The team behind Psychonauts 2 aimed to approach mental health with sensitivity, learning from the first game to keep things lighthearted.

The platform game Psychonauts 2 was designed to be a paradox in some respects, erupting as an action game but carrying a gentler theme of healing at its core as protagonist Raz battles through the hostel creatures manifested by the characters the acrobat encounters. Addressing mental health issues, the platformer’s sequel wanted to learn from the approach of the game’s predecessor to match today’s cultural awareness of the matter.

As with any videogame, the development behind the sequel was thorough, so much so that it warranted the 32-episode documentary series, PsychOdyssey, released by Double Fine and in partnership with 2 Player Productions to document the entire journey. Recently, the title’s communications director provided more insight into the thought process.

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Psychonauts 2 Team Progressed With The Cultural Shift Toward Mental Health In Mind

During Develop: Brighton 2024 (Thanks GamesRadar), Double Fine marketing and communications director, James Spafford, spoke about studio co-founder and Psychonauts 2 director Tim Schafer’s approach to mental health issues in the sequel, touching on the game’s ability to design levels in a “complete opposite” way to shooters and other action games.

Spafford recollected Schafer’s sentiment that “Raz should always leave minds in a better shape and a better condition than when he entered them,” which is the exact opposite of what an action game does. “When you’re playing an FPS or an action game, guns are blazing, bullets are flying, there are explosions everywhere, and by the time the round is over the whole level has been decimated, there’s rubble and dust, everything’s been destroyed,” Spafford recalled Schafer stating.

Speaking on Raz’s plight in the game, Spafford said “You’re helping clear other people’s emotional baggage, getting rid of unwanted thoughts. You’re healing people, and the game is about healing, but Raz isn’t fixing people.” The communications director thought the original Psychonauts game could have been more sensitive toward mental health, particularly referring to the characters kept behind asylum tape, and this reflection greatly influenced the sequel’s approach to the subject.

“Cultural awareness of mental health issues had progressed significantly since the last game, and we knew that we’d end up exploring these relations again, but at least this time we could go into the project thinking about this stuff ahead of time,” Spafford said. The development team believed “it was important to take a more thoughtful approach” to mental health with “the aim to keep things lighthearted without making light of very real issues”.

Double Fine would go on to “take stock” and learn from the first Psychonauts game to improve these sensitive areas in the sequel. “In Psychonauts 1 we’d established that everyone was redeemable, they just might be dealing with things.” Spafford continued, “Having mental health issues doesn’t make you a bad person, and so we were very careful not to fall into that trap in Psychonauts 2.”