Stuck in a Dark Place
Stuck in a Dark Place explores consent and the many ways we are affected when it is ignored.
This narrative-based game covers many different aspects of consent through eight chapters.
Educators: Stuck in a Dark Place includes a Lesson Mode for educational use so that individual chapters can be selected for classroom discussion. Note: the full game should be played through in its entirety before focusing on individual chapters in order to have a better understanding of the context for those individual chapters.
Stuck in a Dark Place includes discussions of non-consensual sexual activity including assaults. You can use the CONTENT WARNING setting in the game options menu to bypass some of the more potentially troubling content.
Stuck in a Dark Place is a prosocial game from the Gaming Against Violence program produced by Jennifer Ann's Group, a non profit charity, as part of the Consent Game Series.
Since 2008, Jennifer Ann's Group has been producing prosocial games to help students, educators, and parents. Video games are an ideal approach to engaging, educating, and empowering young people and Gaming Against Violence is an evidence-based program shown to change unhealthy attitudes and beliefs.
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Gaming Against Violence recognized as Top-50 Innovator
The nonprofit program that produced this game has been recognized for its innovative approach to violence prevention through video games. Learn more about Gaming Against Violence.
Stuck in a Dark Place
A game about consent.
Created by Another Kind.
Produced by Jennifer Ann's Group.
Published by Life Love Publishing.
About Stuck in a Dark Place
Stuck in a Dark Place was developed by Another Kind and is a winning video game from the 2017 Life.Love. Game Design Challenge. Stuck in a Dark Place is published by Life Love Publishing and produced by Jennifer Ann's Group.
Stuck in a Dark Place includes scenarios of non-consensual assaults and is not appropriate for all ages.
Development |
Another Kind |
@_Another_Kind_ |
Produced by |
Jennifer Ann's Group |
@stopTDV (Mastodon) |
Published by |
Life Love Publishing |
|
ESRB Rating |
T for Teen |
Word puzzles are interspersed throughout Stuck in a Dark Place's narrative.
Game options allow players to skip some sections of gameplay and customize their character.
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About Jennifer Ann's Group
Jennifer Ann's Group is a nonprofit charity. Through their Gaming Against Violence program they have produced more than seventy prosocial video games since 2008. Many games focus on consent, healthy relationships, and teen dating violence prevention. We also have games designed to foster attributes supporting protective factors like critical thinking and resilience.
This award-winning approach to violence prevention is evidence-based and the games are available for use in university studies. Please contact Jennifer Ann's Group to discuss possible grant collaborations, dissertation ideas, and research opportunities.
Jennifer Ann's Group was created in 2006. More information and additional free resources for teen dating violence prevention are available at JenniferAnn.org.
Jennifer Ann's Group® is a registered trademark of
The Jennifer Ann Crecente Memorial Group, Inc.
Also available on
Development log
- Full Screen AddedApr 02, 2019
Comments
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I'm not entirely sure how to feel about this game for multiple reasons, but I greatly appreciate the intentions of it.
It's difficult to find peace and forgive and think positive when you find yourself in situations.
People will often tell you that the only real option is to be at peace with the fact that the only real thing you can control is your own mindset.
It's so, so difficult...
A part of me wishes that there were more ways to encourage people to be kinder and more honest instead of joking about things all the time, but it often resembles a terrifying, unrewarding endeavor where people say and do bad things all of the time and get away with it and you have no choice but to accept their right to choose to do bad because 'they're stubborn and you should stop thinking/complaining about it.'
Anyone can use wit as their excuse, so I gravitate towards people who understand the real value of honesty.
There are parts of this story that don't inspire me, but there are also parts that do.
that third chapter hit me really hard because i too had my first kiss stolen from me. it happened in high school with a guy i had been dating at the time. funnily enough, i was going to break up with him before he shut me up with that kiss. thank you for adding that particular bit in the game, since not a lot of people consider "just kissing" as assault. i know that i completely disregarded it and downplayed that trauma because i wasn't "really" an assault survivor.
We're sorry to hear that happened to you but really appreciate you taking the time to share your experience with us. We agree that this is behavior that is not acceptable -- and is too often treated in our culture as "okay" or worse.
Like you, were this to happen to us in high school we would likely have dismissed it as not being an "assault." We would think that because that is how we've been raised to think of these issues: our movies, books, and songs have given us those messages for years - and we were never taught otherwise ... so how would we know differently?
Our hope is that young people who play this game will see issues like this in a new light and, as a result, be less likely to be engage in this behavior. We want very much to change the "norms" around what is considered acceptable behavior when it comes to non-consensual activities.
We know that Stuck in a Dark Place has some very dark moments but believe it is an opportunity to shine light on issues that aren't discussed as often as they should be. We have tried very hard to find the right tone here in order to inform players without traumatizing them; we hope that you found the game's use of these trauma-based scenes to be appropriate. This is an ongoing issue for us and we are constantly considering how we might need to make some changes to this game.We hope that Stuck in a Dark Place is effective at finding the right balance between informing players while not traumatizing them -- and that at least in some small way is helping to change some of the unhealthy social norms we've grown up with in our culture.
Thank you again for sharing your experience and thoughts.
wow. just... wow. i played through it all without skipping through scenes and it was a bit harder than i thought. i'm surprised there isn't more comments on this.
We'd love to see more conversations about this game also!
We know that the game covers many difficult topics and that might discourage much conversation. We are happy to hear any thoughts you, or anybody else, has about the game.
Thank you for taking the time to write something and to share your thoughts. We appreciate that.