“Do you remember playing hide and seek as a kid? Can you remember the comfort and relief you felt when you made it safely back to ‘base’ without being caught? Video game designers try to recreate that feeling by placing ‘safe spaces’ throughout a game’s world. It’s your base in Minecraft, villages in the Zelda games, and the many safe places in the Lego games where you can catch your breath because you’re fortified and protected from dangers outside. In a world filled with bullies, abuse scandals, and snarky online trolls, I have to believe that game designers aren’t only using ‘safe spaces’ to appeal to players’ childhood memories. They’re making the in-game emotional experience into a shelter from out-of-game troubles. Perhaps they know, at least intuitively, that feeling safe amid danger is one of the deep longings of the human heart” (Jared Kennedy, “Find Safety with the Holy Spirit,” The Gospel Coalition, September 18, 2022, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/safety-holy-spirit/).
