It’s the end of the month, it’s time for me to point out to you all these great, corking articles that keep you up to date with the kinds of things I’ve been doing that you may have missed. I know that my particular form of blog writing isn’t for everyone, so I hope having a guide for the stuff I’m really proud of is really useful.
This month’s Game Pile articles:
- Total Annihilation, a game I’ve played a lot and probably never even come close to winning, as a treatise on how you can’t play games wrong.
- Dragonraid, a video article about Christian Replacement Media and ska music. This video explains the Dragonraid TTRPG, examining its terrible character creation and tedious resolution system, and how moral panics work.
- The Dig, a surprisingly strong entry in the Lucasfilm narrative adventure genre, which involves both Steven Spielburg and a truly remarkable Hatsune Miku. You can still like complex work from important creators, and also, unfailingly criticise those creators for being total dickheads.
- Final Fantasy XIV, which is a video, with a fair amount of scripting to it, about the question ‘is Final Fantasy XIV’s story any good?’ It’s a question I found remarkable to attack just because I’m trying to not rely on ‘good’ and ‘bad’ as simple descriptors. That meant a lot of focus on what I enjoyed, and why I found it enjoyable – or not.
- Beneath A Steel Sky, another narrative adventure, in the same model and of roughly the same time as The Dig. In a genre we normally consider for its ridiculousness, I wanted to look at some of its serious entries – even the ones that are funny or frustrating.
And the other side, the Story Pile:
- The Story of Tiffany Aching, a long form examination of one of my favourite Discworld characters.
- Community, a TV Series that doesn’t like the kind of TV series it is, or the people who it’s about, at least if the person it’s about includes Britta.
- Brave Father Online: Our Story of Final Fantasy XIV, a surprising movie that gave me an opportunity to talk not just about a game I play, but the story of why I play, the story of why I did it.
- Fullmetal Panic, an anime I enjoyed quite a lot as a teenager. I talked about the theme music, and also what it was like to enjoy an anime that was just ‘really solid’ at all the things it was doing.
This month, I changed my user avatar from a piece of fanart I’ve used for seven years. I wrote about how annoyed I am by the Fairy type in Pokemon. I even found the time to write about my extensive opinions on the show Victorious, though I’ve only watche the prequel, The Nanny, and I wrote about one of my favourite characters in Bleach. I dedicated a week to talking about Final Fantasy XIV, with an article most notably about how the job system isn’t an alt system, and how much it sucks.
In deference to the importance of my leaving the house a lot now, I’ve made myself some more masks that I can wear going to class, and make sure I cycle my favourite masks more.
These three masks show Wheeljack, one of my favourite shirts, the ‘This Shirt Says Trans Rights’ shirt, and a reference to the Haruhi Suzumiya anime franchise.
Christ I’ve been sleepy this week.
April is a month with my birthday in it. I try to save it up and make something special of it. I try to make sure this month has something in it that feels like ‘I did it.’ In this case, this year, I just haven’t.
I got to play Wingspan with my sister this month. I got to play Wingspan with my other sister this month. I got to play No Thanks with the niblings, and hugged family who I haven’t spoken to in a month.
I don’t have a lot to remember about this month. Two of the weeks have been ‘off’ – no classes, it’s mid-semester break – but it’s been a time when I have not even vaguely been getting enough sleeeeeep.