Connected Worlds: Locating Play Between Video Games and the Imagination

This article argues that the virtual worlds created by video games can function as Winnicottian “potential spaces”: intermediate zones between inner and outer reality where play enables identity exploration and the development of the true self. While much psychoanalytic literature pathologizes engagement with video games, this article utilizes clinical and personal case material to show how virtual worlds and their imaginative extensions can support comparatively safe psychic exploration, particularly for transgender and gender-nonconforming individuals. By actively engaging with and reflecting on the space between virtual worlds and the imagination, a clinician can facilitate the integration of fragmented aspects of identity when such work may not otherwise be tolerated.