Mew2King explains why the Melee scene made him quit esports

Melee God Jason ‘Mew2King‘ Zimmerman recently begged the Super Smash Bros. community to stop pressuring him to play competitive Melee again.

A well-known personality in the Smash scene, Mew2King was a top Melee competitor in the 2000’s and 2010’s. He started showing up to tournaments less frequently later in his career, becoming a coach and dabbling in Ultimate. But his focus on labbing, character depth and mechanics has fans wanting him to step back in to the esports scene.

“Please stop peer pressuring me to enter Melee,” Mew2King tweeted in a (long, long) rant. “People put too much stress and expectations on me when the truth is I played Ultimate way more than Melee the past six years. I lost all my skill, habits, reactions. Switching games is impossible unless I’m Jigglypuff. This makes it un-fun.”

Mew2King went on to say that too many people are ‘entirely negative’ about the competitive Smash scene and they made him feel like his only value as a person to the fanbase is to play Melee. Mew2King said that he previously played for himself but he’s become bogged down with negative messages from Smash players, even picking on his disabilities.

A few years ago, Mew2King opened up about a botched circumcision after getting pulled into some Smash drama. During a time when pro players were being revealed for inappropriate behavior, someone accused Mew2King of indecent exposure. In response, Mew2King felt he had to reveal his personal struggles to avoid the damning accusations.

He said: “Since that video, people have not been very kind to me. And yes, unfortunately a few bad apples do have a large impact — and it’s a large reason why I stopped playing. Mang0’s influence was a major part of this, with how he acts like my entire time period playing Melee doesn’t matter and convinces everyone else of that.”

The bullying from fellow pro Joseph ‘Mang0‘ Marquez is a big reason that Mew2King gave up practicing Melee. His fans on Reddit felt that Mang0 was just joking around when he mocked older Melee and Mew2King for not playing, as part of his personality — but some of his more toxic fans could have taken it a bit too far when chiming in.

“This isn’t to say I’ll stop forever, but I did start to HATE the community after I had to make a video that I couldn’t feel pleasure, otherwise people would believe fake screenshots. I started to hate everybody after that moment and my mentality on many things changed from that,” Mew2King said.

Mew2King said he’s been considering coming back to Melee recently but does have to deal with his deteriorating mental state first. He also admitted he has to brush up on his Melee skills quite a bit after switching to Ultimate the last few years.

The Melee community responded with overall support for Mew2King, telling him that they understood what he was going through and hoping he can feel better. Others felt that Mew2King needs a better therapist. Either way, Melee fans are still hopeful that Mew2King will find it within himself to compete once more.