What special interests have you had in the past?

[Sparks]

​

Basically, talk about special interests that you've had in the past, basically anything that you really enjoyed over short periods of time! They can be video games, movies, TV shows, etc. You don't have to elaborate if you don't want to. Let me begin with mine:

• Unikitty! (mostly the character, but I enjoyed the TV show too) - December 2018 - early 2020, then briefly again in April - May 2022: Unikitty is my favorite character from The LEGO Movie. I loved her so much I got a plushie of her, although I don't have it anymore. I like the Cartoon Network show, and I've seen most of the episodes, including the 2-part finale. Obviously, this was before My Little Pony, but I still like the character and show, just not as much as I used to.
• The PowerPuff Girls (1998 series) - April - August 2020: This one's an odd one, because I haven't seen any of the episodes at the time! Despite that, I liked surfing through the show's wiki and seeing what it had to offer. Some things work out strangely I guess.
• Pokémon - mid 2020 - early 2022: I've always like Pokémon, despite not having played many games. It was mostly Super Smash Bros. that helped me familiarize myself with these pocket monsters, but it was in the middle of July when I REALLY got into the franchise. During World of Light, I wanted to unlock Luigi so I could play as him, as he was my main at the time. I stumbled across Jigglypuff, and I decided to play through the rest of the story as her. That was fun! It wouldn't be until November 2020 when I finally played a Pokémon game - Pokémon Shield. Many people dislike the game, but I had a blast playing it. Yeah… Pokémon is pretty awesome.
• My Little Pony (particularly Friendship Is Magic) - May 18, 2022 - present: Oh what watching a show out of boredom does to a person! A truly magical show that I'll never stop bringing up and making references to. This is a something that's never going away for me!

 

[Rykitu]

Alright. Here are my fads… (starting from where I actually got sparks that could be considered fads)

Disney (2017-2019) (don't have much to say about this)
Thomas the Tank Engine (2018-2019???) (It took me a little while to phase out childhood shows. At 10 years old, this just so happened to be my favorite along with Arthur)
Super Mario (2020-present) (strength sort of died down during 2022, but returned with the announcement of the Mario movie. Doesn't show signs of stopping anytime soon and is currently my favorite franchise)
Animal Crossing (2020-2021) (was not as strong as Super Mario)
Sonic the Hedgehog (2022-present) (although it wasn't as strong as it used to be)
Angry Birds (2023) (this only lasted 6 months. Don't have much to say about this either)
EXE games (2025-present) (this is the newest fad. It'll probably die down in 2026)

There are more interests of mine, but these are the most notable ones.

 

[Xiahou Ba]

Several interests I took over the years are the following (I don't keep track of the dates). I'm not going to list all the times I've been interested in a game, just ones that stood out to me that I got obsessed over as a franchise, enough to spill into like, buying merch or buying merch from the series or something.

• Mario: Basically been with me all my life and still remains with me to this day, but it's not my number 1 franchise right now. It's pretty telling I haven't themed myself after Baby Luigi for quite some time on here, but I still love Baby Luigi to death.
• Pokemon: I don't play the games anymore but I'm addicted to solo challenges on YouTube especially with Scott's Thoughts and I still like buying plushies.
• Kirby: Played so much Kirby Air Ride back in the day and I had always loved its platformers more than Mario, I think I even played Nightmare in Dreamland and Amazing Mirror before I even played Mario platformers because they were more palatable to my tastes.
• Animal Crossing: I sunk so much time into New Leaf so I get fond memories of my pansy-covered town every time I see it.
• Tales of (specifically Symphonia): Was hooked onto this game for quite some time and had some on and off with this one. Got me to buy both Tales of Vesperia and Tales of Zestiria but I haven't played those on Steam yet. I did manage to mod Raine Sage into Smash Ultimate and port her as a ragdoll into Gmod which was pretty nice.
• Spore: Got me into PC gaming, sunk in soooooooo many hours in it and made so much content for it. Dark Light is mainly inspired by this game and I still have so much fond memories. I enjoyed Darkspore in its wake and it's such a massive shame EA abandoned it as it is. To be fair, Spore is mostly a Mario simulator but it was responsible for bringing so much of my loved IPs to life and was an outlet for this before I got into 3D modeling and modding things into games like Garry's Mod.
• Advance Wars: When the remake was coming out I watched a bunch of Mangs's videos (yes I'm aware he's controversial) and even bought the remake for myself, though like a lot of single player games, I didn't finish it. I was considering theming myself after Colin on here when the remake did come out but alas...
• The Sims: 4 made me completely crazed about The Sims as I played it religiously and even went back to playing 2 and 3 and Medieval, as well as writing an entire Shroom section about it and even theming myself after my Sims at various parts, I even own a little bag with food icons from The Sims 4. I still love the game a lot but I don't play it as much as I used to, but I DID mod Xiahou Ba and Xiahou Yuan into 4 which was so nice.
• Russian stuff: I was a complete Russophile when I themed myself after Ray Trace so I ended up learning some of the language, watched BadComedian, and played some of Metro 2033, and I also ended up getting its sequel as well as playing Company of Heroes 2, got Command & Conquer Red Alert and got Sonic & All Stars Transformed solely because of General Winter.
• Rayman: Origins and Legends are my favorite platformers of all time, played Rayman 2 on the 3DS and I made a Grand Minimus mod for Left 4 Dead 2 and even themed myself after him in the forums at one point.
• Left 4 Dead 2: I sunk over a thousand hours in this game and it's still my favorite shooting game of all time that I still occasionally go back to, especially in the Halloween season. The Protectors owe their existence to this game and Super Smash Bros.
• Star Wars: Briefly took lots of interest after playing Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga and I watched the first two movies (I didn't even watch all that much movies :/). I even bought myself Kylo Ren's command ship pre-release run mostly for the General Hux figure who was my favorite character in Lego Star Wars. Hell, I even wanted my own lightsaber, maybe someday I'll get a good one. I also loved Star Tours in Disneyland, one of my favorite attractions in the park, wish I didn't get motion sick from it though. I also loved Smuggler's Run and Rise of the Resistance.
• Cars: Favorite Pixar movie franchise, I own a bunch of diecasts in my room and played and loved the Cars 2 video game and maybe I'll play Driven to Win. Someday I'll own a Cars-themed windshield blocker with the eyes. Radiator Springs is my favorite California Adventures attraction, with Radiator Springs Racers being my favorite ride in all of Disneyland. I even themed myself after Boost briefly on this forum.
• Dynasty Warriors: Took my interest by surprise and now is my current favorite franchise right now, I've went back and played 4, Orochi 3, and 9, plus Orochi 4 is in my library. I've ported a large amount of the characters into Garry's Mod and I absolutely adore learning the lore of the Three Kingdoms. I absolutely adore Xiahou Ba to death, and he'll be my first commissioned cosplay I'll ever do (also the most money I have ever dropped at once for a hobby), so I'm excited for that and I can't wait to post pics when it comes!
• Fullmetal Alchemist: Pivoted off my Dynasty Warriors interest primarily because Edward Elric sounds identical to Xiahou Ba and I really like the series, currently going through 2013 version and will watch movies and Brotherhood, and maybe give myself opportunities to read the manga. The anime has kinda reopened interest in checking out anime series in general too.
• The Fairly Oddparents: Themed myself after Timmy Turner in the forums several times, I watched it religiously back in the day, and I wanted to play Nick All Star Brawl if he was playable in them. It did fell off hard after Season 5 but I still love the series very much to this day and I find myself writing detailed responses on the forums should the topic to discuss it pop up.
• Transformers: I've watched Transformers Prime, the terrible Bayformer movies (thanks to Rifftrax), love browsing the wiki, and I own a decent amount of their figures, and seeing their figures is one of the highlights to any visit to retail stores like Walmart and Target. Right now it's in the backburner but I'd be more than happy to give it a spin. Starscream and Knockout are my favorite characters.
• Grand Theft Auto V: I sunk many, many, many hours chilling in its open world and playing LSPDFR and it was the inspiration for one of my Protectors. Los Santos is my favorite world and I know how to navigate the map and where most of the landmarks are. I did go back and get IV but it didn't draw me in as much as V as I modded in so much aspects of it and modded characters in the game.
• The Magic School Bus: Themed myself after this bus on the forums and I always find an excuse to mod anything from its computer edutainment games into my games. I even rebought several of my old childhood books to read again and occasionally played its old computer games on websites, this franchise will stick with me until I die.

Honorable mentions:

• Sonic the Hedgehog: I played and loved some of their games, especially their racing titles and got some of their merch, but I don't I ever got *too* obsessed over it? It's a case where the games are like, "it's okay I guess" and I still really like Knuckles and Eggman, but I never got thinking about them in my day to day life nor am I absolutely dying to, like, play their games, including Sonic 3 & Knuckles.
• Forza Horizon 4: I did 100% the Lego stuff and played some of the main stuff. I love this game a lot, but I didn't get like, obsessed over it.
• Burnout Paradise: I did theme myself after a car briefly here and I really like the game but I didn't play other Burnout games.
• Disney: Watched all the movies as a kid and loved them but Disney hasn't really recaptured my attention since. Perhaps one day I can visit their theme park again?
• Monster Hunter Rise: Played it, loved it, even got World, but not enough for me to place on the list.
• Starcraft, Diablo, Doom: Those are the trio of "mature" games I watched my brother play as a kid and loved them so they're always a treat to go back to and read their entries on wikis again as well as mod their content into some of my games.
• Saints Row IV: Oh god I loved this title, but I didn't go out of my way to play other games in this franchise.
• Super Smash Bros.: It's more like I like the franchises it represents (and the mods) more than the game in of itself, as it's primarily just a crossover franchise, so that's why it's on here.

Due to my eclectic interests I may be missing things I very got into but...

 

[Lily]

calling these fads feels kind of reductive to me? idk, you should just be able to enjoy things, have interests.

 

[Sparks]

calling these fads feels kind of reductive to me? idk, you should just be able to enjoy things, have interests.

That would fit better, yes. I made this thread with the intention of other users discussing things that they've really enjoyed across short periods of time.

Everyone has interests, but there are some that are really important and notable to us! Take what I said about my experiences with Pokémon for example. I knew about the franchise since I was young, but I didn't really get into it until mid 2020. Throughout the rest of the year and all of 2021, I was really into the franchise because of its many unique Pokémon and I even played one of the games for the very first time ever. I still like Pokémon now, but I'm not discussing it 24/7.

I've been into the Mario franchise ever since I was little! It's one of my favorite franchises, and therefore, also an interest of mine. I didn't include it as a "fad" because I've enjoyed it my whole life. The same is said for Mega Man.

Hopefully this clears things up. I didn't have any ill intent when making this thread.

EDIT: If it makes things better, I've renamed the thread to "Special interests."

 

[Shmalu Sniffer]

My Little Pony (particularly Friendship Is Magic) - May 18, 2022 - present: Oh what watching a show out of boredom does to a person! A truly magical show that I'll never stop bringing up and making references to. This is a something that's never going away for me!

I was this exact same way, I was just on Netflix watching TV when I saw that this show was recommended and I thought to myself "eh why not let's see how cringy this show is and see why those bronys like it so much" I came in wanting to mock it but after the first two episodes I got hooked and then I thought to myself "wow that was actually kinda good" and thus the rest was history.

 

[Redboot]

I get to discuss the things I developed turbo autism for, hell yeah.

Mario: I mean, clearly, if I've been on this website for 12 and a half years but I also know so much useless information about the Mario games and I'm also the GOAT of Mario Kart according to @Hooded Pitohui circa 2024. That doesn't mean I'm not awful at 2D platformers though, I'm still a 3D person at heart.

Miis: I own every single game in the Wii series (with the exception of the original Wii Fit) and of the nine I can think of offhand, I've modded six. I even spent a month and a half making 111 custom Miis so I could put them into Wii Sports Club and later, Miitopia. I would put them in Wii Party U but I would need someone with coding knowledge to help me with that.

Obscure pop music from the 80s and early 90s: Name any song that hit the top 40 of the Hot 100 and I could probably tell you where it peaked. Alternatively, give me any date in that range and I could tell you what the number one song was. My playlist is full of songs that no one has ever heard of and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Those are my biggest ones but honorable mention to Geometry Dash, which I'm only not better at because I have literally no patience at all.

 

[Flygon64]

Pokemons, was my version of childhood fairytales. actual gospel. it haunts me till these days and awakens primal feelings. material for essays exclusively, i think. Five Nights at Freddy's too but not as primal. Very fundamental mythologies to me.

The Homestucks to horrific consequences. I failed to truly comprehend it by the end, but I did end up speaking about its lot even if I couldn't articulate my like for it. Gender representation and queerness planted woman seeds. and later i revisited and became more LEARNED. I like it a lot conceptually but it's pretty racist.

Parappa The Rapper was the one that turned me into a girl. Lammy resonated with my end of middle school experience, transitional and neurotic and furry. and katy kat. katy kat. yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

i went on google images and scrolled for pretty pictures of um jammer lammy and saved and saved, had a zillion folders dedicated to content related to it. made a tumblr before twitter imploded and the migration hapened JUST FOR THE FANART

some rpg maker bouts, obscure wacky ps1 games with interesting design, visual novels.

had something of a hyper vocaloid phase, had daily miku pfps, played some video games.

Undertale/Deltarune, I had observed Undertale from afar without playing it during the early fandom years, watched the comic dubs and fanimations and followed the discourse. I had a tism thing for the megalovania genre on Youtube for a stretch... Then years later I played Deltarune right before chapter 2 came out and became symbolics and storytelling obsessed FREAK OTHER via Youtube videos. i replayed and replayed and replayed chapter 1 over and over again. later went to undertale and then engaged more with the conversation around it. i think undertale has fallen from grace for me a tinge, cuz it is somewhat prescriptivist. still, it did help reframe the nature of stories and the methods a game can communicate and produce narrative without words for me. very precious to me. mad mew mew also helped girlify too. and i watched some digi charat after encountering her and met digiko so the catgirl neurosis kicked in....


cats. cats. deko demo issyo, tokyo mew mew, vg cats, nyan neko sugar girls, deviantart scrolling at the middle of the night because i couldnt get kitties out of my brain. so many fecking kitties.

danganronpa. monokuma. yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

anyway in-between all this i went through like several rings of hellfire, got half-killed by daemons and the pitchforks, isolated for a year?????? psychopathy overtook or something, went into hysterics and nearly completed the task. smthing or other im here again!! stories don't resonate to the depths and widths they used to anymore because I'm lobotomized lowkey.

I like philosophy and the sociopolitical intersectionality of different media landscapes and semiotics and stuffs. Analysis cool! Newest Fixation!

 

[Redboot]

I even spent a month and a half making 111 custom Miis

Addendum: this is such a special interest of mine that I'm even commissioning a custom plush of one of the Miis I made.

 

[Hint Toad]

Here are some of my most notable major and minor interests.
Note: When I talk about "my comic strip" and don't clarify, I'm referring to The Adventures of Targy.

Spoiler: Major Interests

Video games: I believe one of the first memories of video games is the Wii. The games we had on it were Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort, Super Mario Galaxy, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Balloon Pop that I broke (I was like 3 or 4 at the time), Spy Fox In Dry Cereal, Boom Blox Bash Party and Super Mario Bros. from the Wii Shop. We also had an Xbox and Xbox 360. My favorite games for that were Geometry Wars 1 and 2, MarbleBlast Ultra, Kinect Adventures!. The computer games I remember playing are Poptropica and WhizBall!. I recently got back into MarbleBlast Ultra once I remembered the name of it from all those years ago.

Mario: I've been an exclusive Mario fan for about the first half of my life. Everything a drew was Mario related. I always had Mario music stuck in my head and of course I would mostly only play Mario games. I have a list of every Mario game I've played on my wiki user page. So you can look at that if you want to. I've played every 2D, 3D, Mario Kart and Paper Mario game.

Kirby: In 2011 I started to branch out a bit video game-wise. I believe I have played almost every main line Kirby game along with some spin-offs. The peak of my obsession of Kirby was probably when Kirby: Star Allies came out. I haven't played Kirby Air Riders yet but am hoping to get it soon.

Zelda: I knew about the series from my friend and from picking up Tri Force Heroes from the library. But never was very much into it until my older brother showed me Breath of the Wild. A couple years ago I got into playing the older games, specifically the ones for the gameboy. I also enjoyed playing Wind Waker on the Gamecube. I'm pretty sure I've played all the mainline Zelda games but I don't have them memorized like Mario or Kirby. Ok I just checked. The only ones I haven't played are Twilight Princess and Oracle of Seasons. I'm also one of the few individuals to play Four Swords Adventures. Which requires a Gamecube and a Gameboy Advance for each player. Can't say I'd recommend it tho.

Yoshi: Yoshi has been my favorite Mario character for awhile. But more recently Captain Toad and Hint Toad have taken the spotlight.

Hint Toad: This one's pretty obvious. The reason I themed myself after him is because I drew this comic in high school staring an evil Hint Toad who takes revenge on Captain Toad and Mario. If you guys want, I can publish it in the `Shroom. They're essentially scribbles in my notebook so I'll need to redraw them more professionally. And while I'm at it, maybe a rewrite too. I've been hinting on the plot in various places on this forum. Most notable place is Hooded Pitohui's KG.

Comics: I couldn't tell you what my first memory of drawing is. About 8 years ago I decided that I wanted to be a cartoonist. I've published over 1000 newspaper style comics in my main series: The Adventures of Targy. A few of you might have seen my character Eggbert in the Everyone is Mafia game hosted by Sparks. He's a major character in my comic strip. I draw my comic strip with a dipping pen and ink bottle like how cartoonists used to do it. Tried out drawing digitally but I didn't like the feel of it.

Game Design / Coding: Before I learned to code I would I draw platformer levels in my notebook. I would dedicate a whole note book to a game, mark pages for each world, and then spend hours filling out the levels. This was my way of compensating for the fact that I could only play 1 hour of video games and only on week ends. But then... I found Hopscotch. Hopscotch is a drag and drop coding tool similar to Scratch. I made a bunch of Mario themed games with it. Some got featured which was pretty cool. I haven't used hopscotch in years due to me learning more professional tools. I'm currently making a game for Panic's physical handheld device, the Playdate, that features my character Eggbert. I'll post it here when I finish it!

Music: I enjoy listening to Mario, Kirby, Zelda and Untertale music. I've recently been listening to several Kirby: Air Ride tracks. Other music I like is Chopin's Nocturnes which I sometimes listen to over and over. I also make EDM music from time to time. But more recently I've been getting into the piano. I play by ear and always have a couple songs I'm learning whether it be from a video game or one I'm composing.

Math / Logic / Philosophy / Ancient Greeks: My interest in this is more of an extension of my older brother. My favorite part of the quadrivium is geometry, especially proofs. The proofs... It's... just... so... logical...... so...beautiful... I'm glad I learned this on my own time without it being forced into me at school, which means I can actually enjoy it! Also favorite Pre-Socratic is Thales. He brought Geometry to Grease. He Also believed everything was made of water. But ironically died of a heat stroke due to lack of water. Honorable mention goes to Pythagoras who was taught by Thales. He said everything was made of Numbers. He also invented the first School. But not as we know it today. That is credited to John Dewey. Pythagoras' school consisted of adults. And you had to be admitted in. It was a place of leisure, where you could study on your own time. In fact the word "school" which comes from the ancient greek language originally means leisure. It was a place where you wanted to be. Pythagoras also had some wacky beliefs like you should never laugh and eating beens was morally wrong. You may of heard of the Pythagorean Theorem which was his discovery. It is said that when he discovered it he sacrificed a bull to the gods. But the bull was made of wheat or corn or something because he was vegetarian. (Ok. I originally wrote this section in my Minor Interests but I think this is a better place for it lol.)

Spoiler: Minor Interests

Pokémon: Never really got into the video games, but my brother and I collected some cards in 2012-13 and played the card game a bit. The only Pokémon video game I enjoyed playing was Pokémon: Mystery Dungeon. But a friend had lent it to us so we had to give it back. I went to Target to buy the game but I ended up purchasing Super Mystery Dungeon by accident. I still enjoyed it tho. My biggest problem with the Pokémon games is that if you forget to save you could lose a lot of progress. Which happened to me when playing Super Mystery Dungeon.

My 'Shroom Section: I recently got into drawing Mario comics again and posted a couple here. When I got accepted into the 'Shroom I had a burst of inspiration. I drew like 13 comics immediately and I haven't drawn a single one since. Besides the ones for the KG.

Origami: I got into origami in 2023. The hardest one I've made was this crab that had like 100 steps. It didn't turn out well. I'll sometimes fold cranes out of napkins at parties or restaurants. I got so into it, origami cranes eventually became characters in my comic strip.

Modding: I've had short spurts of modding games on week ends. Mostly for Mario Kart Wii, and Super Mario Bros. 3.

Reading / Writing: When I was really really young I was super into the alphabet. Which is ironic because when I got older I hated reading and writing. (Which was probably the school's fault.) I eventually found that I actually enjoy reading and writing, especially in comic form.

 

[Toadettefan]

Childhood special interests:

Dora the Explorer (2004-2009): This was the first major special interest I had when I was little. I had several of the dvds, the Dora house and twins house, Dora clothes, Dora video games on the PS2, Wii, and PC, and even a Dora cake for my first birthday. My interest in the franchise waned soon after I got into other Nick Jr. shows later on, such as Backyardigans, Ni Hao Kai Lan, Wonder Pets, and especially Max and Ruby.

Disney Princess (2006-2016): I had almost the entire set of Princess DVDs from 2004-2006, only missing the Christmas volume, the first story volume, and the two Princess Party volumes. I also dressed as one of the princesses for Halloween and had a baby Aurora doll in my childhood toy collection. I also collected a fair number of Palace Pets, pastel colored animals that the princesses owned from 2014-2018. Although I still like Disney, my interest in the princesses stopped because I just liked other Disney films better, mainly the ones with animals in them, like Bambi, Dumbo, and the Aristocats.

Max and Ruby (2010-2013): I watched this show very religiously as a child. It was my go to comfort cartoon, and I had plushies of both Max and Ruby and several dvds. I also liked borrowing the books from my local library. But when the show was put in hiatus around 2013-2016, I dropped the show entirely and sold my collection of dvds.

Cute animal toys, books, cartoons, anime, and plushies: For some reason, I just had several plushies of animals as a kid. These mainly included Penguins, Pandas, Kittens, Horses, Rabbits, and Hamsters. I watched Pengu as a kid, as well as reading Happy Happy Clover, Chi's Sweet Home, and Hamtaro Manga books. I also had lots of animal toys, including My Little Pony, Littlest Pet Shop, and Care Bears, alongside generic animal toys. While my fascination with animals hasn't slowed down, I've downsized my collection over the years, mainly to make space for other things I like.

Fairies in general: I dressed as a Fairy for Halloween several times as a kid, engaged in Fairy related media such as Disney Fairies, Rainbow Magic, and Barbie Fairytopia, liked many Fairy-Type Pokémon, and always dreamed of Kirby having a Fairy Copy Ability. As I got older though, I found that less media about Fairies was produced in general, and could never get into Fairly Odd Parents or Winx Club. I still like the concept of Fairies, but think that Fairy related media has gotten abandoned in favor of rehashing old ideas.

Teen Special interests:

Crash Bandicoot (2018-2023): My interest in Crash started when my oldest brother brought over Crash Nitro Kart on the GameCube on Easter Sunday 2018. While I liked a few of the characters in the past, my passion ignited when I saw Oxide, Zem, Zam, and Velo for the first time. I never knew of these characters prior, and wanted to play as them outside the game. After I introduced Toadette and Cream, Oxide was the third main character I created for MCCW, and soon after he debuted, Zem, Zam Velo, and N. Trance entered the story. However, I sucked at the N. Sane Trilogy whenever I played it, and could not get into Crash Team Racing Nitro Fueled. My interest in Crash slowed significantly as a result, and the alien characters became less interesting as I continued writing them within MCCW. I still like a few Crash characters today, but the aliens aren't amongst my favorites anymore.

Obscure Video Game franchises (mainly The Legendary Starfy, Super Monkey Ball, Nights Into Dreams, Shantae, Klonoa, Ri-Star, Panel de Pon, Digimon, and Yo-Kai Watch.): I had a deep fascination with old video games that I either only played a couple installments of in the past or never played at all, but always liked the character designs. I had The Legendary Starfy for the Nintendo DS, Klonoa: Phantasy Reverie Series, Digimon World DS, the first Yo-Kai Watch game, Super Monkey Ball Deluxe and Step and Roll, and played both Ri-Star and Panel de Pon through NSO. Shantae and Nights were the only two that I never played, mainly because Shantae's games are eShop exclusives, and Nights never got another game after Journey of Dreams in 2007. I still have an interest in some of these games, but Ri-Star and Shantae aren't one of them anymore, mainly because I never got into them as much as the others.

Obscure and Forgotten 80s, 90s, and 2000s toys: I often wondered about the origins of famous companies like Hasbro, Mattel, MGA, and their subsidiaries, and what their product lines might've looked like before I was born. I often see people pass by old toys in second hand stores and yard sales in favor of newer things their kids actually like, often because they can't identify them. I used to visit Ghost of the Doll to learn about old toys from Hasbro, Mattel, and others, but after 2018, the site's owner hardly updated it, and I don't think children should use it now because the ads that appear on it are very suggestive. This interest extended to cartoons based on toys as well as several failed pilots for them. I don't really collect toys anymore, but I still think these old lines are quite fascinating. However, I believe people should use different resources for identifying them, such as fan wikis, online storefronts, and old pamphlets and catalogs from the companies rather than an ID site that children can't touch anymore.

Current special interests:

Baking and cooking related media: I got into cooking at a very young age, and love helping my family prepare meals and pastries in the kitchen. I have my own baking apron set, and we have lots of recipe books as well as printed ones we found online. Usually, the recipes we use turned out nicely. I also like watching several Food Network shows and the Great Canadian Baking Show with my mom, and used to watch both Kitchen Nightmares and Master Chef. I took cooking classes in High School as well, which taught me lots of different techniques and skills. I prefer home cooking to eating in fast food restaurants, and try making food that is both healthy and tasty.

Drawing: I often took art classes in high school, and had several coloring books and how to draw books growing up. I filled both of my sketchbooks with drawings, but outside of school, I often drew fictional characters instead of landscapes and portraits. I usually draw whenever a line of inspiration passes through, allowing me to come up with ideas for scenes and pictures that are purely my own. Over the years, my techniques have gotten better, and I often learn from other artists as well.

The Color Pink: I have a lot of pink clothing, several of my favorite fictional characters wear pink outfits or have pink in their color scheme, my room has pink walls, and I use pink quite often in my drawings. I like many other colors, including purple, orange, yellow, and blue, but pink is my favorite out of all of them. Contrary to popular belief, pink isn't just for girls or young children, and many people still bully kids for liking pink if they're male, which is why Pink Shirt Day is celebrated in February. Without pink, I don't think I would know about colors like teal, indigo, turquoise, magenta, or lavender.

Flowers and gardening: I have a large flower garden at home and helped my parents take care of our plants every Spring and Summer. We grew not just flowers, but also many fruits and vegetables. Although my parents are planning to stop gardening outside next year, I still like the smell and appearance of flowers and take care of the plants we keep indoors.

My Little Pony: I collected lots of My Little Pony toys during my childhood, not just from G3 and G4, but also from G1 and even a few G2 ponies. I watched the G3 movies, My Little Pony and Friends, and My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic a lot as a child, and had My Little Pony books, plushies, and PC games. Although I never saw every episode of FiM, I still cherish my memories of it to this day. Many of my classmates in elementary school also liked MLP, and I even got MiracleDinner into it on this very site.

Pokémon: I got into Pokémon around the age of six years old. I had fond memories of watching the anime with my siblings on YTV until around the Fall of 2014, when it moved to Teletoon/Cartoon Network Canada. I also played several Pokémon games, owned a good amount of figures, books and plushies, and collected the trading cards for many years. My favorites are Eevee, Vulpix, Teddiursa, Torchic, Piplup, Zorua, Zoroark, Fennekin, Marshadow, Alcremie, and Tinkaton, and the types I like best are Psychic and Fairy. While I don't play the spin-off games anymore, don't follow the anime, and don't collect the cards as much as I used to, I still get excited whenever a new Pokémon is revealed and play the mainline games whenever I can.

Kirby: I got into Kirby around 2014, when I got my first Kirby game, Triple Deluxe, for Christmas that year. I watched all of the anime episodes, played several Kirby games, and he was one of my mains in Smash Bros alongside Jigglypuff, Bowser Jr., and Mr. Game and Watch. Kirby also became my favorite game series of all-time, and I love whenever a new Copy Ability is introduced or a new character makes their debut. I'd love to visit the Kirby Cafe alongside Super Nintendo World if I ever get to go traveling to Japan in the future.

Super Mario: I was interested in Super Mario ever since I was seven years old, when I first played Mario Party 8. I love playing Mario games with my family members, especially the platformers and party games, though I also played a few Mario sports games as a child. Toadette is my favorite character, but I also like Toad, Peach, Pauline, Daisy, Rosalina, Yoshi, Birdo, Boo, and Bowser Jr. As I got older, my skills in Mario platformers improved significantly, and I love using the wiki to help find hidden treasures and learn more about the franchise.

Sonic the Hedgehog: While I never played any mainline Sonic games, I liked many of the characters, including Amy Rose, Cream, Vanilla, Rouge, Blaze, Tails, Charmy, Marine, Tikal, Trip, Honey, and Sticks. I often watched my older siblings play both Sonic Heroes and Shadow the Hedgehog, and played Sonic spin-off titles like Sonic and All Stars Racing Transformed and the Mario and Sonic games. However, I could never get into the TV shows and comics, mainly because they tended to stray away from the canon of the mainline games.

Animation from the 90s and 2000s (mainly Dexter's Laboratory, The Powerpuff Girls, Invader Zim, The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, and Ruby Gloom.): I often like to watch old cartoons and anime in my spare time, since I didn't really follow any shows from the 2010s besides MLP:FiM. Dexter's Laboratory was very funny, and laid the groundwork for many modern shows. I like The Powerpuff Girls mainly because of its action scenes, strong female characters, and fast-paced stories that pack a punch.

Invader Zim was the first cartoon that I watched in full that wasn't an anime, and led to my interest in exploring other dark toons with similar humor. Ruby Gloom was sweet and comforting, and I loved the character designs. But I wouldn't have gotten into Billy and Mandy if it wasn't for MightyMario convincing me to give it a second chance after seeing some horrible clips of it on TVTropes. The three main characters are some of the only autistic potrayals in animation that are the stars of the show, rather than supporting characters or villains, which makes it feel kind of outdated in some places, and ahead of its time in others. However, these five were the only ones I seriously got into beyond just watching the episodes, and I moved away from watching old cartoons because they just failed to make a proper impact on me as a whole afterwards.

Sanrio Characters: Although Cinnamoroll is my favorite Sanrio character, my interest actually started with Hello Kitty. I had several pieces of Hello Kitty merchandise as a child, loved Hello Kitty's Furry Tale Theater, and play Hello Kitty Island Adventure frequently. I didn't know about Cinnamoroll until around 2015, and the only other Sanrio Characters I knew about prior were My Melody, Kuririn, Keroppi, Badtz-Maru, and PomPomPurin. My favorites, besides Cinnamoroll and Hello Kitty, are My Melody, Kuromi, My Sweet Piano, ChocoCat, and Kuririn.

 

[fantanoice]

Simpsons: 1991 - Present
They'll never stop The Simpsons

 

[spongario99]

despicable me
still like it but not like i used to
but darn was i a boss in minion rush
2015-2018

 

[Carissa]

A very incomplete list off the top of my head:

Current Special Interests

• Mario (especially the Paper Mario and Mario and Luigi series, but also a huge fan of some games outside the RPGs such as Mario Galaxy and Mario Odyssey)
• Ever After High (including both books and the show, but not collecting dolls)
• Monster High
• My Little Pony G4+G5 (including Equestria Girls, especially the first movie which is my favourite movie of all time)
• DC Super Hero Girls G2
• Adventure Time
• Minecraft (slightly less now than during teenage years but still love it)
• Teen Titans Go
• LEGO Games
• Coraline
• Lolirock
• Some Disney movies (e.g. The Little Mermaid and the three Brave Little Toaster films)
• Software/Linux
• Veganism (including food, advocacy, cooking, community, and more)
• Reform Judaism
• LGBTQ+ community
• Femme fashion (especially dresses, skirts, tights, makeup, swimwear, leotards, and hairstyles). Not really into jewellery anymore though.
• The German language
• Spoiler: cw: shows with mature content

  Hazbin Hotel, plus Helluva Boss to a lesser extent

Past Special Interests (Teen/Early Adult Years)

• Little Mix*
• Genealogy (Family History)*
• Maths

Past Special Interests (Child/Pre-Teen Years)

• Astronomy
• Prestidigitation (Magic)*
• Trains (e.g. Thomas the Tank Engine)
• The Amazing World of Gumball*

*asterisk indicates past interests I do still like, but no longer with enough intensity for me to consider them "special interests" in the present.