Life is a game and true love is a trophy

Before I start talking about being a ‘geek couple’, let me introduce myself first. My name is Sakuraflor. Though people mostly call me Saku. I am 24 years old and I am half Dutch and half Spanish. I am an artist who is specialized in three different art styles, which are: chibi, manga and semi-realism. Next to that, I am a diehard cosplayer also know as Sakuraflor. But more about that later! I’ve been gaming since I was little, always being the Luigi to my older sister’s Mario. Gradually I started playing more on PC and I kinda got stuck on that.

Love, love, love

So my love story did not begin through gaming. Well not directly. I actually met my boyfriend Karel on the basketball field 8 years ago. The way we met was super geeky and weird. But hey, it would not be me if it wasn’t. I basically hadn’t seen him before on the field. And since I am the sort of person who talks to everyone, I decided to step up to him and say: “Hey, I don’t know you yet, what’s your name?” I know… very romantic, huh? We started to talk and the day after I left for a holiday to Spain for a month. But the romantic person that is Karel, he started sending me emails everyday with genuinely interested questions to know more about me. From that point on I knew he was worth it.

Break up

Our love story wasn’t all smooth sailing. We had been dating for 3 years and I traveled a lot back then. We noticed that we gradually were drifting apart and eventually after 3 years I called it quits. I was convinced that I wasn’t in love anymore, so we ended it. However, we stayed friends for the following two years. Being the best friend one can ever imagine (Ofcourse it was only after this that I released his evil plan behind it all, haha).

Escape from the Friendzone

After having broken up, Karel insisted on being friends. Claiming that there were no feelings involved. And I have to admit that he was the best friend anyone could’ve ever asked for. And after two years of being in the friendzone I started to realise that he was irreplaceable. I was unable to be without him. It wasn’t just “friendship”. After two years we got back together and even now, almost two years later, I am still happy with the decision. We have gone through literally every form of relationship and I know the lengths he’s willing to go through for me. He’s not only my soulmate, but also my best friend.

Gaming Geek Couple Sakuraflor & Karel

When I was younger I used to game a lot, but Karel was actually the one who got me back into it again. It started with a game called Eden Eternal where we would spend countless hours taking on quests, levelling and even creating our own Guild. From there on he introduced me to Blizzard and that was when my social life disappeared! We started playing together in Heroes of the Storm and he was always my mentor while gaming, since he was way more experience than I was. It felt good knowing he was always there to protect me even if I messed up.

Then Overwatch came into the picture and all hell broke loose! The second the trailer came out I was in love with the character Tracer. This is where we combined our hobbies, gaming and cosplaying. Having so much passion for the game, I decided to cosplay countless of characters, including: DVA, Tracer, Widowmaker and Ana.

Of course as a couple we couldn’t let this chance slip by, and even though Karel has mostly been my support when I was cosplaying, we just had to make this ship sail! So we ended up cosplaying Ana Amari and Soldier 76 from Overwatch, among many other couple cosplays.

Even though our lives are mostly filled with making cosplays and traveling to cons for cosplay purposes, we still make time to game and just rage in a few rounds of Overwatch!

Altogether, I couldn’t have asked for a better partner in crime!

Follow Sakuraflor on het Instagram for more cosplay. Or read about her experience at Blizzcon.