If you've known me for a long time, you may be wondering why I've suddenly decided to start going by a different name after going by "3-UP" for so long. To answer that, I should explain where the name "3-UP" came from.
Back when I was a little kid with too much unrestricted internet access, I didn't really have a main username I would stick to. Whenever I would join a new site or the opportunity arose to change my username, I just went with whatever sounded cool to me at the time. You can still see remants of my old usernames to this day on the various accounts I've made over the years. As you can imagine, some of the names I came up as a kid aren't as cool sounding when you're an adult.
That brings us to the name "3-UP". In my early internet years, I used to frequent the mariokartwii.com forums, which was the precursor to sites like MKBoards and MKCentral that hosted Mario Kart tournaments. Back then, I didn't really understand how the whole tournament scene worked, I was just there to chat with people about various topics. As much as I would love to dig up the various posts I've made on there, it's very hard to do so nowadays when the site has been deleted a decade ago. Probably for the better, because of how cringy I was back then.
On that site, you couldn't change your username all willy-nilly. The only real way to change it was through special events, where you could request staff to change your username. (You may have also been able to change it by buying the supporter role, but I don't remember) These events would happen pretty rarely, so whenever they popped up, I would take the opportunity to change my username.
"3-UP" was the last username change I would make before I lost interest in the site. Back then, my favorite character was Luigi, but I didn't feel like picking a name that had "Luigi" in it. The first thing I thought of was "1-UP" because of the color green, but that was already taken. Then I asked for "Greeny", which was taken too. Then I came up with "3-UP", and that's what I would end up sticking to for years.
Back when I picked up that name, I didn't really think much of it. But as the years went on and I became more well-known in the Mario Kart community, it did feel weird to me sometimes whenever someone mentioned my name, especially in voice chat. I mean, you typically don't say numbers out loud when mentioning someone by name, and it's also kinda weird to be associated with an object from a Nintendo game. Nevertheless, I stuck with it, because it's a pretty recognizable name, and it would feel weird to just change it when so many people know me by that name.
But eventually, I did feel the need to have a more "normal" sounding name. Partly because I wanted to be taken more "seriously", partly because I wanted to remove that association with Nintendo for more artistic projects, and also I didn't like using my actual real life name.
There was a phase in a Mario Kart Time Trial server I was in, where people would gather around a Discord gacha bot to claim their characters. It sounded really silly at first, but once I found out you could claim characters from any piece of media ever made, I became hooked.
One of those characters I re-discovered was Dorothy Haze from the game VA-11 HALL-A. When I was still figuring out what sort of new name would fit me, I jokingly thought about using "Dorothy", but that felt a bit too on the nose to me. "Haze" sounded better, but still not quite it. Then it hit me to combine those two names together. And that's how "Daze" was born.
I can't exactly just use "Daze" for a username though, so I needed a way to differenciate myself from the other Dazes out there. That's when I figured out to make a pun out of "Daze" sounding like "days", thus "daze_on_end". I also like to think about how that phrase reflects myself in a way, working on something for days on end that connects me with other people.
I still wasn't sure whether I wanted to switch to using "Daze" though, so I would give the name a test run, slowly incorporating it into places until I felt comfortable enough to make the switch.
The first place I went to was actually playing Everhood 2! I have some... mixed feelings about that game myself (the first game's still amazing though!), but the thing I want to focus on was naming your own character. Whenever a game gives me the option to name my character, most of the time I use "Greeny", but this time I went with "Daze". I didn't think this change would really matter at first, but whenever the game would use that name, it just... felt right. It didn't feel out of place to me and I felt happy whenever my name got mentioned.
That's when I knew I had to incorporate "Daze" into more places. Whenever I signed up for a new account, I would make my username "daze_on_end". I then changed my profile name to "Daze" on Clone Hero, which would carry over to screenshots I posted and tournaments I've participated. Finally, on the new year, I would change my Discord name on all servers to be "Daze (3-UP)". And then my cover album and website would also use the name "daze_on_end".
Now, I don't think I'll ever truly get rid of the name "3-UP". I've essentially engraved that name into so many places at this point, that changing it now would feel awkward. And I think that's okay. "3-UP" will still be there for name recognition, but when it comes to my personal side, "Daze" is a name that I'm more happy with.
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