現在Apex Legends沼

A friend (hi Petra) introduced me to a phrase in Japanese that I think about all the time. They said: ’when you get really obsessed with something and it’s the only thing you can think about, the term to use is (object of obsession)沼に落ちる ぬま　に　おちる numa ni ochiru “to fall into a swamp (of the certain obession).” Similarly to fandom hell in past tense it would be 沼に落った Sometimes people who are very active in fandom will display the kind of swamp they’re in atm on their soc media bios, like “currently in Naruto hell” 現在Naruto沼 (genzai Naruto numa)’

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I am in Apex Legends hell (and I love it)

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I have spoken about this already in two separate texts on The White Pube. The first text, my first of 2022, was about the experience of being addicted to a game. I was thinking about what this game addiction was revealing about me - and it was a short stop from there to the answer. I needed the game because it was distracting me from chronic illness pains, keeping me company with sick housebound-ness and sick loneliness too, and also making me feel accomplished after feeling like I’ve lost so much.

The next text was a review of Apex Legends itself. I wrote about how fascinating it was to me that every drop felt like pulling the jackpot arm on genre, because it could lead to so many different-feeling stories in a way I found exhilarating. 
 Usually when I review a game, even when I’m loving it, a review is like this godly intervention to help me move onto the next one. Close the book, thoughts are finished. But it didn’t work this time - and I didn’t want it to.

I’m in so deep, so wideeeee. I watch people playing it on Twitch in the background while I’m doing emails. Sometimes when I have calls, I keep it on but muted so I have something to do with my eyes. I read the patch notes. I countdown the days to new content. I have so many Apex memes on my phone. I have multiple group chats with the friends who play so we can organise games. The week before last, there was a LAN event in Sweden and I watched all three days of games. My boyfriend could hear the commentary and he went ‘are you watching SPORT???’ E-sports baby

Playing it calms me down when everything feels overwhelming. Playing it with friends brings me so much joy. Playing with people who’ve never played it before feels like an honour, because I was so grateful to the people who showed me the way and allowed me to enjoy this game so much.

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This week, I was so tired that I couldn’t concentrate on work. When I sit at my desk to write, I keep getting this bad circulation thing that means my fingers, my toes and the tip of my nose get ice cold to the point of being painful. It’s so shit. So I sat on my beanbag with a blanket around me, letting my body rest, and I played Apex. There were only a few days left of the split so I decided to play ranked and see what happens, and I managed to rank up to Diamond :) for the first time

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I love this game to the point where I have to watch myself because it’s all I wanna talk about / all I wanna post about lmao. Sometimes I feel like it’s a weird, heavy love - - even the fact I avoid talking about it, because I don’t wanna bore people, like it’s this thing to hide - - this weird, surreal pressure to play well even though nobody cares bar me - - something I worry about because it’s one game and it’s nice to have variety in your life, and not settle on something so all-consuming, hence 現在Apex Legends沼

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But at the same time, hell is warm! Cosy! I’m withstanding the heat because I enjoy it so much. I love the characters. I love seeing myself improving. I love the drama. I love the fact I can use it to hang out with other people - - people I’ve recently got to meet IRL for the first time after hours playing together :) what a nice thing.

Anyway, this is just a silly little blog post because I want to talk about this game every single day of my life and I know that The White Pube readers don’t want to read about it every single day of their lives. So, I’m putting it all here. Best game. So fun. New season starts tomorrow. I’m ready.