It's gonna be a bit personal, but I'll try to keep it short, I really need advices and reassurance. I never played the first game, simply because I struggled to follow what was popular as a kid, and never really discovered video games on my own. I would just receive one or two for my birthday or christmas, and would just play it regardless of the popularity or story behind it. I started getting into Splatoon with the 2, I started few days before the octo expansion was out. But at that time, I wasn't at my best. I thought I was, but I was just in denial of childhood traumas still hurting me, and I started spiraling down into searching my identity and reasons to live. At that time, because of my previous bad school, I didn't had any time to play, I had an overload of homeworks. I never played the story mode, never finished the octo expansion, and never had time to play any splatfest. The only moment I finally had time for it was after a burn-out because of school, during the lockdown. But I faced a pretty new major trauma, and couldn't play for long. And with time, I just abandonned Splatoon because in my mind, it was associated with my trauma, and those times I tried to hide from it by playing during my sleepness nights.
I really started to get into the game when I bought the 3 right when it came out. And I've been obsessed with it. I'm still depressed but I'm no longer living the trauma, so it feels way more enjoyable to play. It became my hyperfixation, I loved it so much. But my hype about it kinda fell down when I tried to connect with the fanbase online. Anytime I tried to express myself about a topic, search about fans' creations, or even just share some positive messages or encouragments, I mostly received back toxicity. I completely shutted myself from the community and just decided to play all by myself. And I was happy about that, until recently. I really love Splatoon's lore, but after so much overthinking and toxic messages online, my brain keep telling me that I'm not a good fan of the franchise, and how dare I to say that it's my main hyperfixation if I never played the 1st and barely touched the 2nd games ? The only few times I wasn't spat on online, I just felt like I didn't belong there, I realized how much backstories, elements of lore, and universal nostalgia among the community I didn't had, and it's starting to weight on me.
I know that the Splatoon 1 server was shut down, but I still want to try to find it and try the story mode. And I know that it should be easy since I already have it, but I want to go back to Splatoon 2, finally play the story mode, finish the octo expansion, and feel the nostalgia of some maps. I don't know where to find the first one, and I literally can't look at the second one icon on my Switch menu without crying. There is literally nothing related between my trauma and the game, just the fact that I played it while I was going trough this long lasting trauma (watching a loved one slowly die from an uncurable disease over few months) made me associate the game to it. And I'm not mentally stable enough yet to try to force myself to launch it again.
I'm scared that the guilt of all of that might make me lose my hyperfixation and passion about it. And on top of that, I will not be able to play for a couple of weeks because I sent today my joy-cons for repair. I said to myself that I will never try to get back into any Splatoon community after all my bad experiences, but this social media is different and don't have the same users than other popular ones. I trust more a Splatoon community from here than from Reddit or Instagram.
Until I can get my joy-cons back, I really need some advices to feel less like an impostor for all of I just shared, advices to learn to get back to Splatoon 2 and enjoy it before the unknown day the server might get shut down as well. And I also need reassurance about all of that please, if you lived something similar and are comfortable to share a bit about it, I would really appreciate it please, thanks.
◈ Mo ◈