WHAT’S PSYCHOTIC BATHTUB?
Sit in your bathtub and experience your very own psychotic episode. Interact with the environment and find a way out of the really scary parts of your mind.
50% OF PSYCHOTIC’S FINAL PROFIT WILL BE DONATED
Psychotic Bathtub shows a fictional disorder that follows psychotic symptoms. Psychotic is intended to destigmatize mental health disorders and to make them accessible. 50% of it’s final profit will be donated to mental health related projects.
Gupscore: 
Category: Psychologic Horror, Point and Click
Psychotic Bathtub, while it sounds like a metal band, is a point and click game where basically you sit in the bathtub with a rubber duck and contemplate intrusive thoughts that teeter around mental health issues and ultimately, psychosis.
This game is best played with headphones on. The eerie music coupled with the quirky chalk-like graphics really sets an atmosphere of uneasiness. The music quality is 100%. Natsha Sebben, the artist behind this game has such a distinct art-style (and yes, I have been to her IG). I’m not really a pro at describing art styles but her portfolio looked like aesthetic and professionally made adult version of children’s drawings, typically depicting eccentric yet nightmare-ish characters. Peak.
I liked the graphics, clicking through the storylines and checking how many endings I could get. However, and I’m going on a tangent here, but the entire experience just felt rather otherworldly. I’m using that adjective because as a person who have dealt with trauma in the past and have had someone close self-exit, I’m not sure how to feel about this game and how psychosis is portrayed for the shock value. I’d rather not go there, if you know what I mean. But if you’re someone who wants to play a game and actually have fun, this might not be for you.
I do appreciate including a disclaimer in the game:
Psychotic Bathtub shows a fictional mental health disorder and addresses themes like death, suicide, self-destruction, intrusive thoughts, guilt and escapism.
Your well-being is important to us. If these themes may trigger you or make you feel unwell: skip Psychotic Bathtub for today. Take care and stay sane.
Onto the downsides. There’s an itch.io feel to it and don’t get me wrong, I get that this is an indie game, and it’s a debut game from natsha but it’s like a short game that Jay from Kubz Scouts might play for 3 random games, and then forget about. Yes I know it’s a demo. It is supposed to be short, but I could imagine getting the similar experience just stretched out in more chapters so I am at the very least curious, but I’m not sure the full game is going to be enjoyable for me.
And it goes downhill from there. I think there’s a language barrier when they wrote the description about this game and said this game is ‘intended to destigmatize mental health disorders and to make them accessible‘ lol I don’t think we need any more accessibility to mental health disorders but what we do need are more accessibility to therapies, psychiatric research and spaces for conversations around mental health disorders.
Furthermore, I’m not sure how mental health disorders is destigmatized in this game where I see it actually put on display like a freakshow for people to prod around and be all “ooh look at all the creative ways I could die in this game” and “ooh this might be how crazy people think ohlala”. Just imagine PT Barnum trying to spread “awareness” about physical deformities but in entertainment form, and profitting from it. Right? The fact that there’s no concrete plan for the actual proceeds smells a bit sus. Like it’s giving mental health baiting. It’s seriously cheap to target people who may be dealing with mental health issues and market the game with ‘50% donation to mental health projects’ and to ‘spread awareness’, without an actual plan to back it up. Totally gives off hippie leftist vibes and was just a major turn off for me.
Like what specific projects?
I stalked their website and there is literally no information on where or what type of mental health projects they’re starting or supporting, not even stories of how this game came to be about psychosis–just more marketing and merch. Like they just pulled it out of a hat and thought hmm genZ will definitely eat this up. The art and passion for the game creation in itself should have been fine and I would definitely purchase this game for the descent-into-madness-with-a-duck experience but this just made it sound a bit too desperate and ethically questionable.
A lot of the players liked the game though and they got international game awards.
Final verdict: Maybe play it and not take it too seriously. It’s still a well made game.
