Tarkov Nostalgia – a social experiment.

Social experiment: I want to reach out to the EFT community and ask what were your individual first impressions of the game? How do you remember feeling when you played your first raid? And finally, how has the game changed since you've started playing?

This is just for my own curiosity (and maybe a YT video in the future), but that being said I think that reading the experiences of both "newbies" and veterans alike could offer a lot of perspective. I recently started playing EFT again after a long hiatus and I've found that playing more for the fights (especially with off-meta gear) than for rubles or survival rate has made a huge improvement in my ability to "tolerate" Tarkov.

My first raid – I built my first (capable) PC in the summer of '18 with the help if a military buddy and I immediately flocked to tarkov. I had been watching a lot of Summit1G at the time and this, "Tarky" game seemed like a completely fresh and exciting take on the survival/FPS genre so I thought I'd take a crack at it myself. Well, I was right – it WAS unlike any other game I had played. With no actual experience of my own, no map knowledge, and not even a second monitor to pull up a map I ignorantly loaded right into a night raid.
Within minutes I was inches away from my monitor and holding back pee everytime I heard a twig snap in game. I spent 45 minutes in a perpetual state of anxiety and crawled my way around Customs until Sir Chaddington the Fourth clapped me behind the bus station outside of dorms.

The entire experience was horrifying and I was absolutely addicted. I've been chasing that high ever since and although I still enjoy EFT with all of its ups and downs, but I am curious how many people felt similar while they were playing.

Cheers Everyone! I look forward to reading your responses!