10 years ago i heard about a game called undertale. i only saw bits and pieces of it from videos and fanart online but it immediately sparked my interest and i thought it looked so cool!

But i was too scared to play it. I wasn't scared of anything in the game itself but i was scared i would get caught playing it. Because it was against the rules, not rules from strict parents but from my sister. or as i knew her back then, my bully. Everything i liked or showed the slightest bit of interest in was bad or "cringe". so i stopped. i stopped enjoying anything that wasn't approved of by my sister and undertale was one of those things.

and so I didnt actually get to play undertale until around 2020. when i finally was able to let myself play it I felt sad that I didn't get to experience it earlier because i knew that if i had played it in 2015 it would have meant so much to me.
It would have been the first time i had seen a non-binary character and the first time i woud have seen any queer/neurodivergent characters in general portrayed in a positive light rather than being a joke, which would have been amazing for me back then as a sad and confused queer and autistic kid. it would have changed my life back then.

But now when i look back on it, undertale did actually change my life, just a little later than i had hoped it would. Playing it was the first step i took in being myself again, in not being ashamed of my myself and my interests. It was scary but since then i have taken lots of small but impactful steps to being myself and living free of fear of judgement.

its funny, playing the game i was so scared to play actually ended up being one of the best decisions i ever made. I might not be who i am today if it weren't for undertale, so happy 10th anniversary undertale and thank you for helping me be me! :)

Also fuck cringe culture <3