This is a fun topic! Looks like I'm not alone in mine.
Ecco the Dolphin's opening bit traumatized me as a child. After you jump into the air and fall back into the water: the music, the ocean background, and the emptiness. For as long as I can remember, because of that game, I have extreme thalassophobia. Search that term on Google and you get some (presumably) cool looking art that even in tiny thumbnail form almost send me into a panic attack. It was even hard for me to watch Finding Nemo.
It makes playing through a lot of games really difficult. Recent examples include much of INSIDE which was a slog to get through, they kept pulling a lot of bait-and-switches with the camera motions during the water segments that made me think they were gonna pull out to and have you navigate a big expanse, and now that I know that doesn't happen (having beaten it) the game is a breeze. Another silly example is the white cage ending of The Witness, a game I am absolutely in love with: the cage comes up out of the water and I thought you'd get in and it'd go back under. I literally sat around that area psyching myself up for 10-15 minutes. It's really silly and stupid but I can't overcome it, it's such an all-encompassing feeling.
Abzu looks incredible but also like a complete nightmare judging by the quick look. The game part seems largely in shallower waters where you can see both the surface and the floor at the same time so maybe it's not bad, but I can't even approach a game like that because of not knowing.
And don't get me started on the sunken ship Valve VR demo with the giant whale. That shit would probably actually kill me.
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