I never thought I'd get sucked into a game like this. I tried Stardew Valley and it didn't relax me at all, instead it did the opposite and made my anxiety go through the roof. Being limited to only having so much time in the day and then having each thing you do take away stamina was just overwhelming to me. So I figured this game would be similar and didn't even give it a chance.

I'd see a post about the New Horizons pop up on the front page of all or rising and would think "That does look fun but oh man look at how complex everything is!" I'd go through pictures and posts on this subreddit and just be like "It's too much".

Friday I was trying to show PowerShell to a new guy and he was getting overwhelmed and I started breaking it down into baby steps. I told him to not think about the whole project but just look at each small task and take them one at a time because looking at the big picture can actually set you back mentally with all kind of dread.

Then I realized I could do the same thing with this game. A friend of mine offered to loan me his copy because he wasn't playing and I started yesterday morning and I have barely been able to put the controller down. I'm hooked. I can't believe how mentally soothing it was to go across the whole island picking weeds. Like it triggers something pleasant in my OCD riddled brain to have had something kind of dirty and then made it clean.

And I didn't have a time limit to get it done. I didn't lose energy pulling the weeds. I was able to go run around and fish or catch bugs or swim and dive for sea creatures. There wasn't any penalty for just enjoying the game.

For the first time since this damn pandemic started, I was actually excited to get out of bed to see what my house would look like and to donate more items to the museum. I'm definitely looking forward to continuing to play and hopefully some day I can be creative enough to have an island worth showing off. But for now, I'm happy with it and that's all that matters :)