History SanitySlippage / VideoGames

* In ''VideoGame/HotlineMiami'', Jacket begins the game as a (relatively) sane person, but as the game continues, [[FromBadToWorse his mass-murdering sprees begin to take a serious toll on his mental wellbeing.]]

** Actually {{Exaggerated|Trope}} in ''VideoGame/Persona5Strikers''. While the public still goes insane thanks to supernatural influences with the final one being the worst, the public are rendered insane all at once, with a few being shown on screen and in other cases, the whole city or prefecture has been driven insane before the events of the game occur.
* Goro Akechi in ''VideoGame/Persona5'' is eerily calm when you [[spoiler:confront him in Shido's Palace. However, once beat his first phase, he enters a VillainousBreakdown, transforms into the Black Mask and attacks you while screaming obscenities.]] Interestingly, [[spoiler:he ''really'' fights like that as the Black Mask and even if in that confrontation he did use the berserk ability on himself, it didn't make much of a difference.]]
* ''VideoGame/PersonaQ2NewCinemaLabyrinth'':
** Yosukesaurus in the second movie is generally friendly, but he felt powerless about not being able to lead the Herbivores into resisting the Carnivores. When he led the other Herbivores into a "paradise" which was revealed to be a dead end clearing that just makes them Carnivore fodder, all of the Herbivores voted to ostracize him and kick him out. He doesn't want to and they force him to attack the party because humans wrote the book depicting "paradise." He gets mindbroken piece by piece, finally turning into a carnivorous dinosaur himself to mercilessly attack the party.
** While Hikari was nothing more than a depressed wreck at the start of the game, [[spoiler:she used to be quite sane when she was young; Even when she was wrongly blamed for poisoning the class rabbit by her primary school teacher or ostracized by her secondary school friends for having a different opinion on how Miyuki should be treated, she can still talk to her father with a straight face. However, after her relatives denied her worth, all hell breaks loose; She just collapsed in a fit of depression and self-loathing and closed herself off in her room so she would be "normal" under the emotional premise that everyone hated her for being different. Her father then accidentally triggered her TraumaButton by asking her a question in the exact phrasing as everyone said before they flip out as a concern for her mental health. Needless to say, he was her only beacon of hope, so she ''snapped'' and became the NervousWreck encountered in the theater.]]

* Dutch van der Linde goes mad throughout the course of ''VideoGame/RedDeadRedemption2''. He starts the game as a charismatic leader but goes off the deep end as his gang gets into worse and worse straights, compounded by his own bad decision making. Some characters note that he’d been acting differently since before the game started, like outright murdering a woman. However, whether or not he truly went mad or if he was always that way and just didn’t have the facilities to hide it anymore is left open to interpretation. Even in game, characters have different theories about what exactly happened to him.

* Kefka in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVI''. He was once a general, but he starts disobeying orders and has lost his rank by the time the game's narrative begins. And he just keeps getting worse from there, culminating in the development of a [[AGodAmI massive god complex]] and [[OmnicidalManiac an urge to destroy everything]].
* Edda in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'' starts out as a simple, if timid, healer in a group of adventurers looking to make money and a name for themselves. Her boyfriend, who is the party's tank, constantly belittles her subpar healing skills and the others make fun of her for having to rely on potions to heal. When Edda's boyfriend [[LeeroyJenkins runs ahead of the group]] in a dungeon, his act of recklessness gets him killed, but the others blame Edda for his death (for not keeping up to heal him). One would show sympathy towards the poor girl, but then her former party reveals that she's been carrying her boyfriend's severed head around. From there, she goes completely nuts by using dark magic to revive her boyfriend as a monster and invites the player character to her "wedding" in order to use their body as a vessel for her revived lover.
** The tooltip for the debuff caused by the Dark Knight's Scourge in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'' is "Sanity is slipping, causing DamageOverTime."

** Actually {{Exaggerated}} in ''VideoGame/Persona5ScrambleThePhantomStrikers''. While the public still goes insane thanks to supernatural influences with the final one being the worst, the public are rendered insane all at once, with a few being shown on screen and in other cases, the whole city or prefecture has been drive insane before the events of the game occur.

* ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublicII'': This is the entire plot arc for Atris. Before the events of the game she tried a gambit to try and lure the Sith out of hiding. It backfired horribly, killing nearly all the remaining Jedi in the galaxy. As a result the ex Jedi Council member is cooped up on a remote planet with her handmaidens desperately trying to convince herself she was in the right, and that she can till save the Jedi. Furthermore she is ''convinced'' you are the real villain no matter what you say, or do.\\

** ''"Can you hear the whispers, Jeremiah?"''

* (Some of) The characters in ''VideoGame/{{Psychonauts}}'' whose minds you enter, but especially the ones in the asylum levels.
** [[spoiler: Fred]] is a particularly striking case, starting out as an asylum staff member and becoming one of the very patients they treat.
** One of the nice things about this game is that you invert the process for a few characters. By helping them confront deep-buried issues and work through problems they get some of their lives back.
* This is a major gameplay element in ''VideoGame/CallOfCthulhuDarkCornersOfTheEarth.'' The "hero" is slowly going insane due to all the {{Eldritch Abomination}}s running around. This results in hallucinations, talking to himself, and hearing voices. The player can reduce the rate at which he goes insane by keeping him from being exposed to disturbing situations (this being a horror story based on the works of H.P. Lovecraft, that's easier said than done). If it gets too bad, the hero may attempt suicide and prompt a NonstandardGameOver.
* ''VideoGame/EternalDarkness'' has this as one of its main gameplay mechanics with a "sanity gauge" that drops whenever enemies are encountered. Once it gets low, the ''[[NightmareFuel really]]'' [[MindScrew weird shit]] kicks in.
-->"This...isn't...really happening!"
* ''VideoGame/SidMeiersAlphaCentauri'': If you're really kicking the crap out of another faction and refuse to accept their surrender, they send you increasingly-crazy messages until you kill them or otherwise stop the war.
* In the Creator/ParadoxInteractive RealTimeStrategy game ''VideoGame/CrusaderKings'', characters can occasionally become Stressed. In itself, this only causes a slight stat hit, but if left unchecked, Stress can further worsen into Depression, Schizophrenia, or outright Insanity, and once one of those hits, that character is locked in a vicious spiral of stat decay, personality instability, and possibly even murderous sociopathy until he or she finally dies or gets "Locked Up for Good!" (which is effectively the same thing).

** Tiny Tina, world's deadliest 13 year old. The reason behind her total loss of sanity? [[spoiler:Flesh Stick (yes, that's his name), sold her and her parents to Handsome Jack, for his Slag experimentation. Her mother gave her a grenade and taught her how to use. What next? Handsome Jack used them as guinea pigs. Seeing her parents mutate due to slag, Tiny Tina ran away after putting the grenade to a good use.]] Ever since, she went a bit nuts... BURN ALL THE BABIES!!!! DummiedOut audio files show Tiny Tina's descent into madness, but it was likely cut out for being a bit too disturbing since she's a pre teenager.

* ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublicII'': This is the entire plot arc for Atris. Before the events of the game she tried a gambit to try and lure the Sith out of hiding. It backfired horribly, killing nearly all the remaining Jedi in the galaxy. As a result the ex Jedi Council member is cooped up on a remote planet with her handmaidens desperately trying to convince herself she was in the right, and that she can till save the Jedi. Furthermore she is ''convinced'' you are the real villain no matter what you say, or do.\\
\\
Over the game's length she starts to crack even more, no thanks to Kreia's influence and the Sith artefacts she has gathered, but surprisingly if you are restrained in your final meeting with her she shows signs of recovery and there's a RayOfHopeEnding for her
* ''Videogame/StarWarsTheOldRepublic'':
** In a somewhat stranger example, [[spoiler:Revan]] [[spoiler:After three hundred years of being [[FateWorseThanDeath trapped in stasis]] and {{mind rape}}d by the Sith Emperor, (all the while subtly influencing him NOT to attack the Republic)]] he's broken out by a strike team..... Only to [[spoiler:immediately go to one of the remaining Star Forges in the galaxy (you know, the EldritchLocation]] he spent the better part of the first game trying to destroy?) and [[spoiler:attempts to build a robotic army that will wipe out all those in the galaxy that contain even a trace of the Sith gene in them-incidentally 97.8% of the Imperial population.]] Not that, given his situation, this isn't ''slightly'' justified.
** After the [[MookMaker Foundry]] is seized by an imperial strike team and Revan pulls a [[VillainExitStageLeft villain exit stage left]]. He returns in Shadow of Revan [[OffscreenVillainDarkMatter (pulling an army out of his ass in the process)]] after deciding "Screw it; lets kill everyone" promptly declares war on both the Empire (reasonable) and the Republic (less so). It's not like he was trying to save the galaxy before... oh wait.
* This plays out in reverse in ''VideoGame/TimeFcuk''. The protagonist is a HeroicMime, but due to the unusual nature of time and space in the game, he often gets radio messages from his past and future self. In the beginning, you're getting messages from what seem to be several future selves, ranging from a PerkyGoth to a ConspiracyTheorist to someone who's flat-out hallucinating. Towards the end, you can hear his early messages, when he was TheEveryman-- making it scarier, now that you know exactly how he'll be broken.

* ''VideoGame/VampireTheMasqueradeBloodlines'' featured a quest in which one has to "cleanse" a haunted hotel (much akin to ''Literature/TheShining''). Upon finding the diary of a woman whose ghost now lives in the house, one can read her tale of how her husband experienced one of these inspired by [[LoveMakesYouEvil romantic jealousy]], culminating in him [[spoiler: murdering her and her two children and killing himself]].

* Fentible of ''VideoGame/StarshipTitanic'' suffers for these occasional, usually in mid conversation. The end result is mostly rudeness and forgetfulness. Thankfully he can be reset.
* In ''Schizophrenzy'', you play Private Investigator John K. Facey - a severe schizophrenic. Your sanity is represented by a sort of "health meter" and is constantly decreasing, with only your medication keeping you from going completely over the edge. Of course, even fully medicated you perceive yourself as walking on walls and hallucinate bizarre creatures.
* In ''VideoGame/TheSims 2'', if a Sim's aspiration meter is very low, they'll start doing crazy stuff related to their Aspiration:
** A Romance Sim will [[Creator/GeneKelly try to dance with a mop]]...
** A Popularity Sim will start talking to [[CompanionCube a puppet made out of a plastic cup]]...
** A Family Sim will [[BabyDollBaby cuddle a flour sack with a face drawn on it like it was a real baby]]...
** A Knowledge Sim will [[ConsultingMisterPuppet start talking to]] [[Film/CastAway a volleyball with a face painted on it]] wearing a mortarboard...
** A Pleasure Sim will [[LampshadeWearing put a lampshade on their head]] and dance around like an idiot...
** And a Fortune Sim will go out on the street and beg for money.
** If a Sims' Aspiration Meter bottoms out completely, they will collapse on the ground babbling. Then a therapist (who is only visible when that sim is selected) will appear and talk to them for a while, moving their aspiration meter back up one level.
* ''[[VideoGame/AssassinsCreedI Assassin's Creed]]'' had mentions of Subject 16, who committed suicide after excessively prolonged Animus sessions caused mental breakdown due to the "Bleeding Effect," where the Animus subject may gain their ancestor's abilities but end up being unable to mentally distinguish themselves from the ancestor, though Desmond only ends up gaining his ancestor Altaïr's Eagle Vision ability. In ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedII'' this is deliberately invoked in an attempt to quickly train Desmond to become an Assassin, but along the way Desmond suffers visual hallucinations and experience (in his sleep) one of Altaïr's memories without being in the Animus. By ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedBrotherhood'' he's become an Animus-trained Assassin but the hallucinations have gotten more frequent, are now both visual and auditory (sight and sound) and may not even be from his ancestor Ezio's memories. On at least two occasions Desmond inadvertently refers to himself in the first-person when describing Ezio's actions, and later in the game an e-mail reveals that the other modern-day Assassins have heard Desmond screaming in his sleep.
** Just to [[FromBadToWorse make it worse]], Desmond is self-conscious of his own growing mental instability, at one point in ''Brotherhood'' wondering how long it'll be before he "[[RoomFullOfCrazy starts painting symbols on the walls]]" (referencing Subject 16).
* The ''VideoGame/ShadowHearts'' games, along with the usual HP and MP gauges, also feature a Sanity Gauge, as the characters are constantly fighting horrific and twisted abominations. If the Sanity of any character slips below zero, the background music changes and the character goes berserk, attacking everything around them.

* ''[[VideoGame/DevilSurvivor Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor]]'' has an odd example of an ''[[AIIsACrapshoot AI]]'' apparently undergoing this. [[MadOracle The Laplace Mail]] starts out giving news from the future, but as the game wears on (and the protagonists [[ScrewDestiny repeatedly prevent its predictions from coming true]]), it starts to get glitchier and glitchier, first capitalizing random letters and eventually adding in weird symbols in place of them, changing its "Have a nice day" ending to "Have a nice ''death''", and finally spitting out an error message and discontinuing all together.
* ''VideoGame/MiddleEarthShadowOfWar'' lets you do this to Uruks by "[[MindRape Shaming]]" them: there is a chance while Shaming that the Uruk will become "Deranged" and have their mind snap in two, permanently altering their personality. It is also likely that the Uruk may become a "Maniac" and, even with their mind melted, [[CameBackStrong Come Back Strong]].
* [[spoiler:Pit]] of all people starts to go crazy in ''VideoGame/KidIcarusUprising''. [[spoiler:In chapter 23, he gets eaten by Hades after the 3 Sacred Treasures are destroyed in front of him. When he's eaten, [[GoMadFromtheIsolation he's isolated from the outside world]] and can't get into contact with Palutena. Only Hades can talk to him from the inside and constantly [[MindRape taunts him]] the whole dungeon.]] It gets to the point where [[spoiler:Pit starts talking to himself and acting like he's going crazy.]] Then there's [[spoiler:[[BreakTheCutie chapters 18-21]].]]
* Martin Walker, the main character of ''VideoGame/SpecOpsTheLine'' spends most of the game slowly going crazy trying to justify what he did during the [[spoiler:white phosphorous incident]] to the point of [[spoiler:imagining entire conversations with the dead villain]] to somehow make it so that he was forced into his actions. The language he uses also gradually devolves from professional military expressions, to loud, insane {{Battle Cr|y}}ies consisting mostly of angry rambling and cursing of his enemies.

* Matthew Baker from VideoGame/BrothersInArms follows this trope as the stress from losing squadmates and friends begins to pile up.
* All over ''Franchise/DeadSpace''. Alongside the [[ZombieApocalypse Necromorphs]], [[ArtifactOfDoom The Markers]] cause [[MindRape hallucinations, homicidal and suicidal ideation, paranoia, and a whole host of other pleasant symptoms]]. Most characters in the series are affect at least to some degree. [[spoiler: Including protagonist Isaac Clarke, whose deteriorating mental state was TheReveal in the original game and a major plot element in ''VideoGame/DeadSpace2'', where he had to find a way to stop his insanity before it made him kill himself.]]
* In ''VideoGame/BioShock1'' anyone who is hooked on ADAM will slowly loses their sanity, as it destroys and rebuilds their physical and mental state. The best example is Dr. Steinman, in his audio diaries he becomes increasingly delusional, beleving he's talking to the Greek goddess Aphrodite, and spends most of his time doing surgery on other splicers to create his version of what is beautiful.
-->'''Steinman:''' An intruder?! He's ugly! Ugly! Ugly! UGLYYYYYYYY!
* In ''VideoGame/DontStarve'', your character has a SanityMeter that slowly goes down if you neglect it. If it gets low enough, you start seeing flickering visions of shadowy monsters. Let it drop even lower, and various crazy things happen: the wild rabbits roaming the land become replaced with monsters made of hair called Beardlings, shadowy hands might reach out to snuff out your campfire at night as an OminousMusicBoxTune plays, and the shadowy monsters you see become more and more real until they ''[[YourMindMakesItReal come to life and try to kill you]]''.
* ''VideoGame/DragonAgeII:'' [[spoiler: Anders]] slowly gets driven mad by Justice over the course of the game, slipping from [[WellIntentionedExtremist strong supporter of the mages to crazy extremist,]] becoming completely consumed with his cause. His views become so extreme that you're either [[WithUsOrAgainstUs with his cause or an enemy to it.]] His madness culminates when he [[spoiler: blows up the Chantry to force a confrontation between the mages and Templars.]]
* Salvatore Leone from ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAuto'' comes off as a friendly, if ruthless man in ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIII'', only to [[spoiler:try and have Claude killed because he suddenly becomes convinced Claude's a spy]]. ''Liberty City Stories'' shows that he had fits of extreme paranoia before this, one time nearly blowing [[TheLancer Tony's]] head off while accusing him of scheming behind his back. [[spoiler:''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoSanAndreas'' reveals that this extreme paranoia was caused by CJ playing him (and pretty much every other faction that was involved) for a fool in the game's bank heist arc.]]
* Dutch van der Linde goes mad throughout the course of ''VideoGame/RedDeadRedemption2''. He starts the game as a charismatic leader but goes off the deep end as his gang gets into worse and worse straights, compounded by his own bad decision making. Some characters note that he’d been acting differently since before the game started, like outright murdering a woman. However, whether or not he truly went mad or if he was always that way and just didn’t have the facilities to hide it anymore is left open to interpretation. Even in game, characters have different theories about what exactly happened to him.
** Played for laughs with the Stranger, Nigel, who can be found around the game constantly asking for his friend Gavin. Years later in the Epilogue when [[spoiler:John]] finds him, he's a shaggy, unkempt mess who's still been looking for him all these years to the point he's forgotten what he even looks like, but can't stop.
* Happens to Eddie in ''VideoGame/SilentHill2''. He starts off as a scared yet lazy kid, but later on [[spoiler: he kills a couple of men and threatens to kill James]]. In truth, he's been [[spoiler: crazy all along]], just like [[spoiler: James]].
* All three of the main characters in ''VideoGame/{{Ib}}'' can experience this. While Ib is on the outside the calmest of the trio, she doesn't really handle the gallery well. [[spoiler:She hallucinates constantly, seeing bunnies when she looks at dolls, seeing images of herself hanged, etc.]] Mary displays a bit of neediness from the get-go. It turns out [[spoiler:she is already unhinged, and can become even more so depending on how her companions interact with her and the gallery in general.]] Garry [[OnlySaneMan is probably the sanest of the three]] and only starts slipping mentally [[KarmaMeter if the player lets him]]. [[spoiler:If Garry fails the doll room event, he gets brainwashed by the dolls. Generally a good slap on the face is all it takes to bring him back, but if he's been kicking over a lot of artworks before that point, the damage to his mind is permanent.]]
* The protagonist of ''VideoGame/TheConsumingShadow'' is already doubting from the beginning of the game if anything he experiences is real. It only gets worse from there as he sets out to fight {{Eldritch Abomination}}s and other horrors.
* ''VideoGame/CliveBarkersUndying'': Journal entries show that this was inevitable for the Covenant siblings.
** ''"Can you hear the whispers, Jeremiah?"''

* The Harran virus in ''VideoGame/DyingLight'' first causes seizures, then increasingly vivid hallucinations that rapidly take on a terrifying tone if the uninfected are unable to get their supply of Antizin on time. If it's allowed to progress past that, zombification is the inevitable (and irreversible) result.
* The tooltip for the debuff caused by the Dark Knight's Scourge in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'' is "Sanity is slipping, causing DamageOverTime."
* ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamSeries'':
** Over the course of the Batman: Arkham games, the Riddler gets hit with this pretty hard. With every game he tries harder to defeat you, and with every game he fails, cracking his fragile ego further and further until, by Arkham Knight, he's more ranting and aggressive than ever before.
** In ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamAsylum'', Scarecrow is insane, but not much moreso than any other of Batman's rogues. After getting mauled and nearly killed by Killer Croc, he completely loses it and in ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamKnight'' becomes arguably the biggest threat that Batman faces in the entire series.
** The "Spirit of Arkham" audio file collectables found throughout ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamAsylum'' detail Amadeus Arkham's slow devolution into insanity following the murder of his wife and daughter at the hands of one of his patients.
* ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIIMorrowind'':
** The Sleepers, otherwise normal people who've been influenced by [[BigBad Dagoth]] [[PhysicalGod Ur's]] [[PsychicDreamsForEveryone Psychic Dreams]] start out babbling about [[KingInTheMountain Dagoth's return]] and the rise of the [[ReligionOfEvil Sixth House]]. After a certain point in the main quest, they will turn hostile and start attacking the player.
** Dagoth Ur and the [[PhysicalGod Tribunal]] all suffer from sanity slippage to varying degrees as a side-effect of [[DeityOfHumanOrigin becoming Gods]] through the power of the [[CosmicKeystone Heart of Lorkhan]]. Dagoth Ur has it the worst, since he was far less restrained in his consumption of the heart's power. Of the Tribunal, only Almalexia exhibits any [[GoMadFromTheRevelation obvious signs of insanity]], though it is implied that Vivec and Sotha Sil would have eventually suffered the same fate.
* The entirety of ''VideoGame/SonicForces'' is caused because of this: [[spoiler:The creature who would become Infinite flipped his lid after Shadow effortlessly defeated him, called him weak and to never show his face to him again before disappearing. He did ''not'' take it well, leading him to be used by Eggman as his weapon]].

** At the Janurary of ''VideoGame/Persona3'', people in Tatsumi Port Island [[spoiler:began saying insane things, a few were in catatonic depression, and Strega leaflets and graffiti can be seen all over the city with nobody to pick on them.]]

** Deliberately microdosing himself with the Filth in order to build up an immunity to the nastier effects, [[MadScientist Dr Klein]] ended up with a far more subdued case of this. Among other things, he believed that he was able to catch his shadow from pouncing on him by turning his head fast enough, ranted wildly about parasite-infected snails and degenerated into psychopathic megalomania... but other than that, he was almost perfectly lucid. In fact, he actually ends up being the second-most coherent of the Dreamers' minions - the first being the Black Signal.

** On Solomon Island, anyone who visits Atlantic Island Park begins to experience this: workers experienced disturbing impulses and stimuli while building the place, and as ''VideoGame/ThePark'' explains, one was so distorted by his time there that he refused to let his girlfriend see him until he'd recovered from whatever he'd experienced there - [[spoiler: and it may have even resulted in him having committed suicide.]] Meanwhile, a park worker playing the part of Chad the Chipmunk began to degenerate from alcoholism to utter obsession with his mascot suit, taking it home with him, declining to clean it, and even refusing to take it off; he also developed a taste for ice-carving - and finished up his time at the park by carving a teenager's eyeball out. Most notably of all, Lorraine begins to experience this herself as she delves deeper into the abandoned park, her love for Callum being gradually twisted out of shape into a demented, possessive obsession that arcs wildly between unhealthily doting on him and despising him with all her heart. [[spoiler: It so happens that the reason for this is because the park's creator Nathaniel Winter was actually [[EmotionEater harvesting the emotions]] of the visitors - specifically their joy and happiness.]]
* This trope is ''EVERYWHERE'' in ''VideoGame/CultistSimulator'', and nigh anybody is at risk: your cultists as they're promoted, your pawns as they're over-promoted, occult authors when you get to their later volumes, Hunters you've shown powerful mysteries to... and of course the player character themselves, inevitably. But whether your descent into madness is careful and controlled or rapid and catastrophic is up to you.
** Unusually for most CosmicHorror games, sanity is not a single stat in and of itself. Instead, you've got Dread and Fascination, representing being consumed by despair or being so overwhelmed with rapturous visions you can't tell what's real. One can even be used to cancel the other out. Additionally, Dread and Fascination only kill you if you get three of them at once at the wrong time.
* ''VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}}'' has this happen to, well, basically everyone, but the most notable is Father Gascoigne, whose daughter mentions that they play a music box to get him to remember that he has a family. By the time you find him, he's become little more than a rabid animal hellbent on murdering everything in his path, [[AmbiguousSituation quite possibly including his wife]], even ''before'' he turns into a werewolf monster.
* ''VideoGame/ConfessMyLove'': Willie goes through one after enough endings had passed and the player gains access to the "Mutated Room". In this special ending, [[spoiler:Liza turns into a demon and attempts to kill Willie]]. Back in the real world, Willie then gets flashbacks about the event, freaks out, and [[spoiler:stabs Liza.]]
* ''VideoGame/DarkestDungeon'' has this as a fundamental mechanic. Heroes can be stressed by their experiences in the dungeons, including encountering disturbing objects, being hit by traps, and especially the horrifying and nightmarish attacks many monsters unleash on them. If their stress grows too high, their Resolve will be tested. If they fail, they will gain an Affliction, in which they start becoming mentally unstable and begin lashing out at their allies, wailing in terror or hopelessness, or babbling irrationally. If they succeed at the test, however, [[HeroicWillpower they will become Virtuous]], becoming tougher and stronger and supporting their allies.
* Edda in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'' starts out as a simple, if timid, healer in a group of adventurers looking to make money and a name for themselves. Her boyfriend, who is the party's tank, constantly belittles her subpart healing skills and the others make fun of her for having to rely on potions to heal. When Edda's boyfriend [[LeeroyJenkins runs ahead of the group]] in a dungeon, his act of recklessness gets himself killed, but the others blame Edda for his death (for not keeping up to heal him). One would show sympathy towards the poor girl, but then her former party reveals that she's been carrying her boyfriend's severed head around. From there, she completely goes nuts later on by using dark magic to revive her boyfriend as a monster and invites the player character to her "wedding" in order to use their body as a vessel for her revived lover.
* In ''VideoGame/FallenLondon'' you can start suffering from nightmares. As nightmares increase your character starts being unable to tell the difference between their dreams and reality, eventually driving you completely insane and resulting in you being taken to the Royal Bethlehem Hotel. Fortunately this is reversible.
** There is also a certain storylet called Seeking Mr Eaten's Name. [[spoiler: At first this simply manifests as a minor HorrorHunger, but as time and the story go on your character becomes increasingly insane and self-destructive. This includes doing things like baking your own face into a pie, or eating your own teeth, or rendering a candle out of your own body fat. Even compared to the general insanity of the Neath, Seekers are bad.]]
* ''VideoGame/BatmanTheTelltaleSeries''. While in most Batman stories, Harvey Dent immediately goes insane after becoming disfigured, in this game, he is initially unaffected by the experience, but slowly becomes paranoid and unstable as the new mayor of Gotham. What truly pushes him into becoming Two-Face is being affected by Lady Arkham's drug and discovering Bruce having an affair with his girlfriend, Selina Kyle. In fact, Dent loses his mind even without becoming disfigured if the player saves him.
* In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemThreeHouses'', Dimitri starts off as kindhearted and chivalrous, but underneath he's dealing with a lot of issues due to his SurvivorsGuilt over the Tragedy of Duscur. Over the course of Part I, his self-control erodes as he faces "those who slither in the dark" and the Flame Emperor, and the revelation that said Flame Emperor is [[spoiler:his stepsister and childhood friend Edelgard]] causes him to have a full-blown psychotic breakdown. When he returns in Part II on all routes save Crimson Flower, he's become a madman completely obsessed with revenge and uncaring about the kingdom he is supposed to be protecting. On the Silver Snow and Verdant Wind routes, [[spoiler:he gets himself pointlessly killed at Gronder]]; on the Azure Moon route, [[spoiler:it takes a lot of guidance from Byleth, but he eventually recovers]]; on the Crimson Flower route, [[spoiler:Rhea keeps him in check and he doesn't fall as far as he does on the other routes]].
* ''VideoGame/InjusticeGodsAmongUs'': In an alternate version of the DC Universe, after being tricked into killing his wife Lois Lane and nuking Metropolis by ComicBook/TheJoker, Superman establishes a dictatorship on Earth. He CantTakeCriticism by responding with outright violence at times, ranting about how [[UngratefulBastard "ungrateful"]] people are towards his rule, and [[NeverMyFault blaming]] others for his misfortunes. [[spoiler:He even kills two of his own allies when they realize how far he's fallen, and threatens to destroy Metropolis and Gotham when people began revolting. Regime Superman even [[{{Yandere}} develops]] an obsession on Multiverse Lois [[LovingAShadow when told]] about it, planning to forcefully [[AndNowYouMustMarryMe take her]] as his bride even if she won't like it and [[MurderingTheHypotenuse kill]] Multiverse Superman]]. By the end of the game, he's much [[VillainousBreakdown worse]] than the insane clown he killed earlier.
* ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong64'': King K. Rool shows this. After being defeated three games in a row he goes as far as to attempt to destroy DK Island with his "Blast-O-Matic", [[AxCrazy even going so far as to put his and his own minions' lives in danger just to fire it.]]

* ''VideoGame/Donkey Kong 64'': King K. Rool shows this. After being defeated three games in a row he goes as far as to attempt to destroy DK Island with his "Blast-O-Matic", [[AxCrazy even going so far as to put his and his own minions' lives in danger just to fire it.]]

** Tiny Tina, world's deadliest 13 year old. The reason behind her total loss of sanity? [[spoiler:Flesh Stick (yes, that's is his name), sold her and her parents to Handsome Jack, for his Slag experimentation. Her mother gave her a grenade and taught her how to use. What next? Handsome Jack used them as guinea pigs. Seeing her parents mutate due to slag, Tiny Tina ran away after putting the grenade to a good use.]] Ever since, she went a bit nuts... BURN ALL THE BABIES!!!! DummiedOut audio files show Tiny Tina's descent into madness, but it was likely cut out for being a bit too disturbing since she's a pre teenager.

* In the ''Franchise/ShinMegamiTenseiPersona'' series, this happens to the public especially in the endgame. The changes are often highly noticable and outright terrifying.

** Actually {{Subverted}} in ''VideoGame/Persona5ScrambleThePhantomStrikers''. While the public still goes insane thanks to supernatural influences with the final one being the worst, the public are rendered insane all at once, with a few being shown on screen and in other cases, the whole city or prefecture has been drive insane before the events of the game occur.

** Actually {{Subverted}} in ''VideoGame/Persona5ScrambleThePhantomStrikers''. While the public still go insane thanks to supernatural influences with the final one being the worst, the public are rendered insane all at once, with a few being shown on screen and in other cases, the whole city or prefecture has been drive insane before the events of the game occur.

* Goro Akechi in ''VideoGame/Persona5'' is eerily calm when you [[spoiler:confront him in Shido's Palace. However, once beat his first phase, he enters a VillainousBreakdown, shuts down his thinking and drives himself berserk with the same power that he uses to cause mental shutdowns, then attacks you while screaming obscenities.]]

* ''Videogame/DarkestDungeon'' has this as a fundamental mechanic. Heroes can be stressed by their experiences in the dungeons, including encountering disturbing objects, being hit by traps, and especially the horrifying and nightmarish attacks many monsters unleash on them. If their stress grows too high, their Resolve will be tested. If they fail, they will gain an Affliction, in which they start becoming mentally unstable and begin lashing out at their allies, wailing in terror or hopelessness, or babbling irrationally. If they succeed at the test, however, [[HeroicWillpower they will become Virtuous]], becoming tougher and stronger and supporting their allies.

* In VideoGame/FallenLondon you can start suffering from nightmares. As nightmares increase your character starts being unable to tell the difference between their dreams and reality, eventually driving you completely insane and resulting in you being taken to the Royal Bethlehem Hotel. Fortunately this is reversible.

* The entirety of ''VideoGame/SonicForces'' is caused because of this: [[spoiler:The creature who would become Infinite flipped his lid after Shadow effortlessly defeated him, called him weak and to never show his face to him again before disappearing. He did ''not'' take it well, leading him to be used by Eggman as his weapon.]]

* Happens to Eddie in VideoGame/SilentHill2. He starts off as a scared yet lazy kid, but later on [[spoiler: he kills a couple of men and threatens to kill James]]. In truth, he's been [[spoiler: crazy all along]], just like [[spoiler: James]].