My Genesis 4 Experience

(Sorry, I'm not all that great of a writer. That's why I'm in a comp sci major lol)



I'm never really sure when it comes to majors and nationals in terms of my attendence. I registered fairly late for G4 after decided Genesis was always worth the traveling. I managed to secure a plane ticket and hotel room next to the venue (also one of the perks of Genesis). I had to drop my cat, Pacino, off at the vet for boarding which hurt a little bit since he's quite shy and a little scared of anyone who isn't me. Had a good flight and waited in that big-ass line for Thursday registration.



I had 12:00 pm singles pools, which I did very well in. Genesis is always so good since you have a lot of energy floating around, lots of merchandise to look at, and plenty of top players hangin out. There are so many oppurtunities to chill with your homies and such and there were plenty of good food places nearby. I must admit, I'm not a fan of the hustle and bustle of cities and I especially dislike San Jose and it's weather. I'm a small man, so the cold goes right through me.



I had 8:00 pm doubles pools with Malachi (Mchi) and we made it out losers side losing to Zgetto/Adam from the netherlands. They are both amazing foxes so I wasn't too bummed. Later that night, around 2 am, Malachi and I were both still awake and decided that making the 10:00 am pools and sacraficing the sleep wasn't worth potentially performing worse in singles so we didn't go to our round 2 doubles pool. We both have fun playing doubles together but we've never taken it super seriously so it wasn't a big deal. I got plenty of sleep and went to my 2:00 pm Smash 64 pool.



Smash 64 is a ... weird game. I found it pretty campy and once you got hit you were fuckin toast. I found it somewhat frustrating at the lack of escape options like DI (althought SDI was still a thing) and the N64 controller wasn't all that great to play with. I still had fun playing Luigi though (who somehow has worse airspeed in that game LOL) and I managed to go 2-2 which was cool.





I'm sure those of you who are reading are most interested in this part, round 2 melee singles pools. It started off great, I beat Scythe (Falco) and Android (Sheik) 2-0 and went over to the friendlies setups by the stage to warm up. I played against Duck and managed to take game 1 although he definetly figured me out after that and I didn't take another game. Goes to show how good the adaption from top players is.



So I get up on stage with shroomed and I'm feeling pretty confident in myself. I knew the matchup very well, I believe it to be even. I lost game 1 on FD which is my best stage but I didn't falter. I went to Pokemon, my second best stage, and managed to take the game. I started the next game on battlefield feeling good but a bit nervous since we were on game 3.



I'm pretty comfortable sharing information on my anxiety, since its so widespread of an issue, so here goes:



I've had anxiety and panic attacks since I was 8 years old. They all stemmed from different things and they definetly came and went throughout the years, but they were all very mentally anchored. That is, the only physical symptoms I felt were increased heartrate and sweat. I have pretty good control over my anxiety normally (at least when I'm sober).



I've never had a panic attack, nor have I had a sharp increase in general anxiety, while playing melee. Generally i'm so focused on the set it doesn't matter to me and I'm just playing my game. This time was different. After I killed shroomed with my misfire to take his first stock I felt a familiar numbing in my lower left face. I'm sure some of you with anxiety issues noticed that I started to bring my hands to face and fidget a bit. I was still fairly comfortable as I had been in that situation before.



It started to worse when I was up 3 stocks to 2. My hands went completely numb, which was a new sensation, and I could literally feel it spread up my arms and into my chest. The arms and chest are huge anxiety stricken areas of the body and it was at this point that I became very uncomfortable. You can see me in the vod trying desperately to stretch my limbs and massage my legs/face in a vain attempt to regain feeling in them. I had never experienced a panic attack with such severe physical effects.



We went two stocks to two and I knocked him offstage to the left with a fair. I grabbed ledge and immediately let go of my controller with my left hand. At this point it had progressed so harshly that the only part of my body I could feel were my knees and below. Once I had lost track of my heartrate I entered the real panic mode. The fight or flight response kicked in hard and I began to lose control of my hands, almost completely.



Most people seemed to think I crumbled under the pressure of the match after the flub on the ledge, but it was vice versa actually. I literally couldn't move my fingers to press L to roll up on the ledge - which was my intention - and It was at this point I decided to put my health in front of the match. It hurt, I won't lie. I mean, IT HURT to forfeit. DaJuan looked over and asked if I was okay, since my fidgeting had turned into attempts to leave the chair. I told him something along the lines of, "sorry man, I have to get out of here." I left the match, cold turkey, didn't even pause. My heartrate, from what I could make of it, was somewhere around 180 and I was legitimately worried that I was pushing my body too far under too much direct stress and would cause actual damage.



The top players who were next to the stage were extremely supportive, which I thank them all for. Sfat, Duck, HMW, Phil, Griffin (Captain Faceroll), and Alan (who brought me water. Thanks Alan!) were all there for me, including Crimson Blur who respectively explained the situation to the stream. I'm sure there were others but as you could imagine my memory was somewhat debilitated. I was told that I had to be DQ'ed as I had walked offstage during a set. At this time I could care less about the loss, my body was still completely numb and my vision was spotty at best. I did, however, completely understood their decision and I do believe DaJuan deserved the win. He played so well and his mentality was quite obviously stronger than mine. I drank some water and went backstage to chill. Mchi, my teammate and homie, was there for me as well (thanks malachi, I seriously appreciate it).



During the whole ordeal I felt no remorse about forfeiting the match but I did feel absolutely crushing guilt. I put a huge deppresive wrench in the stream, I let down all the people who were rooting for me, and I made a lot of my friends and fellow competitors worry about me. If there is anything I truly despise it is being a burden on others, and I felt that way whole-heartedly at the time.



After the numbing went away and my heartrate went down I rejoined the tournament, took some time to myself, and went to play my next match against Reno. Unfortunately I don't have a good track record against Reno and I ended up losing 2-1. It was at this point that I started to feel the sadness of my two losses. My goal was top 64, since I got 65th last Genesis as well, and I felt I was so close that day. I walked up to my hotel room and put on the shower to its hottest setting and just sat there for probably 25 minutes mulling over what had occurred and what my plan going forward was.



I decided that I would attend far more majors/nationals than I had been so I could get used to the extreme pressure of the main stage and that I would prove myself and my FABULOUS matchup chart to the world. I was still pretty down despite this realization, and decided to check twitter.



The support was...so...overwhelming.



Reading the tweets that all of you had sent, those of you who were worried for me, those of you with anxiety issues yourselves who were empathetic, and those of my friends who wanted to check on me and make sure I was okay. Reading these tweets made me, by far, the most emotional I had been regarding smash and the most emotional I had been that day. We have a very, VERY friendly community :)



I decided to stop moping in my hotel room and rejoined the tournament, got food with my buds, hung out in other peoples rooms, played some Mario Party with Kira and Phazermuffin (which was rigged btw).



I did get sick that night and as I write this in the early AM of Monday I am wondering how I will sleep with such a headcold. I fought through the sickness Sunday, however, and managed to get some money matches in, specifically with Spark and Blea Gelo. Thanks guys, those were some fun matches we played! Overall the trip was super-amazing and I wouldn't trade it for any other.



Again, a massive thanks to all those who supported me in my vulnerability and followed my twitter. I want to give back with some awesome Netplay, Mario Golf, and etc streams in the coming future.



Anyone with Anxiety issues: feel free to DM me about it, I have some techniques to deal with it when It comes to smash bros and performing in general.



Thanks for reading,

Ben T.

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