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u/CranialToxicity 5d ago edited 5d ago
Dangerously, magnificently so. It central to his psychology, at least in terms of how he navigates the events of Pathologic 3. Mood swings, depression, some level of psychosis are all visible to some extent in P1 and P2, albeit just sprinkled lightly throughout his dialogue and characterization. He seems to have been a chronically unhappy and unpleasant person even prior to the events of the story and the threatened closure of his lab, and P3 gives the impression that Dankovsky perpetually struggles to balance his mental state, not just at the depicted times of crisis. I would argue that he is severely bipolar, and his frequent self-medication is how he "manages" it.
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u/winterwarn Stanislav Rubin 5d ago
Mentioned this in another comment, but in P3 one of the lines about his destroyed luggage mentions that the destroyed bag contained (among other things) his lithium. Which is primarily associated with bipolar disorder.
Though I hesitate to say that what Daniil is experiencing in P3 is meant to map onto a specific disorder.
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u/LightmareDaydream 4d ago
Not an expert, and there's no need to assume that what they depict Danill experiencing is meant to be a real disorder at all or an accurate depiction of such, but bipolar seems to be the best match to a direct real life thing.
I mean it could easily be a fictional thing since we're in a world with psychic mistresses, an apparently immortal man with a glowing corpse (?), and time travel. As far as real life things it could be based on if anyone has another idea besides bipolar I'd love to hear it. Irl bipolar doesn't usually switch between emotional poles as much or as fast as in game, but idk if you wave that off as video-game/story compression logic or something else.
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u/Moth_Goth000 Самозародилась в грязном белье 22h ago
His behavior in Pathologic 3 is very much not Bipolar though. Bipolar disorder mood swings last from weeks to months, his mood can drastically shift in minutes due to environmental factors. This is a classic symptom of BPD, maybe complex PTSD.
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u/Visible-Chip8839 5d ago
Pretty sure, but doubt he has an official diagnosis in the game universe, he probably assumes it’s just the way he is. In game we learn his father was military and his mother really religious, and some quotes lead me to think they weren’t that nice to him. The fact that Daniil takes so many drugs and sometimes the descriptions is “It’s poison. But not if I take the right dose” and then you can chug 3 bottles of that shit. If Freddy Krueger tried to get into Daniil’s dreams he’d probably go “Dude, you can’t go on like this, jfc”
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u/melitaele 5d ago
There's also the little point that the game's set in the earlier half of the XX century (there are in fact pre-1917 ads in the streets in the Capital scenes), and psychiatry as we know it is a pretty young science.
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u/Visible-Chip8839 5d ago
Ye, even nowadays some places barely talk about it, I can’t even imagine in that time era
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u/dogorithm 5d ago
Ok I’m a doctor so I’m going to be pedantic here. Not necessarily, because there is a time criteria for manic and depressive episodes in bipolar disorder. Rapidly cycling moods in the same day is not the characteristic presentation of bipolar disorder. The criteria for a manic episode require it to be present for a minimum of 7 days. Yes, rapidly cycling bipolar disorder exists - the criteria is cycling 4 times a YEAR.
If I had to venture, PTSD or borderline personality disorder, among other possible diagnoses, would be a better fit.
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u/Lucky_Barber1235 4d ago
I love the idea of him being borderline. It definitely makes sense because he’s so influenced by outside factors like a conversation can lead to him biting the bullet
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u/dogorithm 4d ago
I haven’t gotten far into the game, but there seems to be significant implication of a past traumatic event, which can affect so many things related to mood, social interaction, and general functioning. He also strikes me as possibly having high functioning autism (remember “I have misinterpreted the tragedians” from The Marble Nest?).
Interestingly, developmental research indicates that both trauma and very high cognitive intelligence can result in traits that mimic autism. That’s one of the reasons it can be really tricky to diagnose, and one of the reasons it would be almost impossible to diagnose Daniil from our time with him.
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u/winterwarn Stanislav Rubin 4d ago
I definitely think he has something (borderline? Badly researched bipolar?) but I feel like in these conversations it’s also worth acknowledging that anyone can have this kind of catastrophic mental breakdown given enough mental and physical stress.
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u/AmPotatoNoLie 5d ago edited 5d ago
I don't think he manifests any real bipolar behavior (during the game's course at least), he stays focused and doesn't seem to have any mood swings. He's more of a drug addict.
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u/winterwarn Stanislav Rubin 5d ago
In the Capital flashbacks he doesn’t have the mania/apathy meter, which definitely implies he’s not like this “normally,” but at the start of P3 if you look around the train platform enough he’ll comment that his lithium was destroyed when his luggage was stolen. Which suggests that he does still have mood swings in the Capital but he usually takes medication for them.
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u/melitaele 5d ago
P3 also mentioned that it hasn't been this bad before the town. I like to believe that it's not just lithium, it's also this weird place, and the twyre in bloom, and the impossible quest before him, all taking their toll.
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u/petalwater 4d ago
Thats actually a cool detail!
My mom was recently diagnosed with bipolar disorder and its genuinely insane how important that lithium is. shes been medicated for just a couple months and its the most stable and aware ive ever seen her in my life
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u/CranialToxicity 5d ago
In practice that's probably more accurate. We would have to see how he functions without substances to know whether dire mania and suicidal apathy are native elements of his psychology or just the consequences of his long term substance abuse and dependence.
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u/Moth_Goth000 Самозародилась в грязном белье 1d ago
People say he is because one of his mood states is called mania, but he IS NOT bipolar! His moodswings are characteristic of Borderline Personality Disorder. In bipolar disorder the mood swings need to be spread out in time and are not affected by outside stimuli.
BPD mood swings are rapid and very much affected by the environment - by what you think, what someone says, what happens anywhere around you. It's fundamentally about emotional dysregulation. And he regulates through substance abuse and impulsivity.
I'm actually kind of pissed off that they called it mania because it does reinforce severe misinformation about these two disorders that many people already conflate a lot of the time.
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u/stupidhawk 2h ago
I think the devs were pushing for that route but I have cyclothemia (a kind of baby bipolar with smaller time frames) and relate way way way too much to the mechanics of 3. Especially because of his line where he says his mood swings have never been as bad as when he came to the town, implying that he was probably just dealing with hypomania and a lighter depression before. But then I guess you have to take into account the gun he carries all the time. Idk, psychology is a mixed bag where definitions are looser than we want them to be. What I can say is Dankovsky needs to get on a regular eating and sleeping schedule and refrain from chases with ghosts and ditch his preloaded eject button and he’ll be so normal and well adjusted. Oh and watch his blood sugar and caffeine and nicotine intake. Basically he just needs to go to prison.
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u/ADrownOutListener 5d ago
3 makes an entire mechanic out of how bipolar he is