My iPhone has 16GB. I don’t have the Facebook, Twitter, or Youtube apps. I read the “Storage Almost Full” pop-up message probably once a day, and I delete pictures off my phone at least once a week. The only non-social media apps I have are Clue (my trusty period tracker) and the best game ever created, the app that saved my life this summer: Two Dots.
This is not a How-To Guide; you can Google those yourself. (Fine, I’ll do it for you: this is the best Two Dots guide article, by far.) But for clarity’s sake, let me explain. No; there is too much. Let me sum up. (Princess Bride reference, anyone? No? Okay.)
The game’s objective is simple: connect dots. Typically by way of connecting four dots in a square. Each level has different tasks and obstacles to navigate, which vary wildly in difficulty level. (Fire dots, I’m looking at you.) Two Dots currently has upwards of 800 levels, so there is plenty of variety.
Two Dots is fun, but that’s not what I like about it. For me, fun isn’t a scarce resource—I experience roughly the same amount of fun talking to friends, staring at my phone, eating, playing board games, and lying on my bed and dozing off to sleep. Rather than its entertainment value, what I love is Two Dots’s uncanny ability to de-escalate my anxiety.
Two friends encouraged me to download Two Dots at the beginning of the summer. At first, I was frustrated when I couldn’t beat a level immediately. One of my friends, a psych major, told me about some fancy motivational theory called the Yerkes-Dodson Law, which measures optimal level of arousal: basically, games have to be challenging enough to avoid players’ boredom, but easy enough to avoid players’ discouragement. I thought Two Dots was too hard for me—without the instant gratification of beating a level every time on my first try, I got annoyed at myself. Why couldn’t I figure it out? What was I doing wrong? Newly medicated, I knew this line of thinking was genuinely poisonous to my well-being, so I considered deleting the app. Then I found myself on a five-hour plane trip without WiFi and played for hours straight.
Once I got past the initial hurdle of accepting I wasn’t going to succeed every time, Two Dots provided me an unexpected path to thoughtless meditation. The game is so visually and mentally stimulating that the only thought on my mind is my next move—not my upcoming job interview, not my fear of parking the next day in Hollywood Hills, not my senior year looming before me, not the murky prospects of the unknown future. Two Dots taught me how to concentrate on the moment immediately in front of me.
Everything about Two Dots works in tandem to soothe my loud, scared, exhausted brain. Whimsical aesthetics, an upbeat yet relaxing soundtrack, simplistic gameplay, sequential thematic “worlds,” rewards for both strategy and luck, easily-acquired fun boosters… when I say everything, I mean everything.
I would rather delete my damn Messages app than give up Two Dots. I’m not sure if my SSRI prescription or my nightly Two Dots therapy helps my neurotransmitters more. My brain is rarely ever at peace. But at night, brightness on my phone turned down low and Two Dots music twinkling quietly, I lay curled in bed drawing casual but effective squares through the pastel-hued dots… That’s pretty close to peace.
Or as close as I can imagine right now, anyway.
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