Month: June 2018

Thimbleweed Park

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More video game reviews can be found here.

Genre: Point & Click, Mystery, Adventure
Developer: Terrible Toybox
Release Date: March 30, 2017
Platform: Nintendo Switch

Thimbleweed Park coverStart Date: February 25, 2018
Finish Date: April 23, 2018
Playing Duration: 57 days

Thimbleweed Park is a point & click murder-mystery adventure that winds up being much more than just your run-of-the-mill “who done it?”  Two federal agents, Ray and Reyes are dispatched to the small, titular town to investigate the murder of a foreign businessman, but each of them has an ulterior motive for being there.  Ray, the senior agent, is snarky and sarcastic with no time for rookie Agent Reyes’ overly enthusiastic attitude.  She wants to get in and get out as quickly as possible, and it’s clear early on how much she hates both the town and its residents, especially the irritating and unhelpful sheriff/coroner.  The rest of the town’s residents vary in their degrees of helpfulness, and as everything comes together, more than a mystery will be cracked wide open.

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The State of the Gamer: 6/26/18

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<–The State of the Gamer: 6/12/18            The State of the Gamer: 7/24/18–>

A weekly post updated every other Tuesday detailing my current gaming projects.  I have an account at Grouvee, which is a site you can use to keep track of your backlog, so please feel free to friend me there!

What I Didn’t Finish

Title: Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle
Series: Mario, Rabbids
System: Nintendo Switch

Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle coverDate Started: May 14, 2018
Date DNF: June 26, 2018

There were definitely aspects of the  game I enjoyed.  I was pleasantly shocked at how well the Rabbids were incorporated into the Mario world.  They always came off as a bit annoying to me (like the Minions seem to most people), but this crossover worked surprisingly well.  Even the story that goes along with how it came about makes sense.  I wasn’t too fond of the battle system, which isn’t a slight on its part.  It’s just not for me.  It’s also possible I wasn’t doing it in the most efficient way, but c’est la vie?  I’m going to return the title to my coworker with thanks for lending it to me, and I think I’ll find a nice LP to watch since I am interested in where things go.

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Low, Vol. 1: The Delirium of Hope by Rick Remender (Low #1) (DNF)

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Title: Low, Vol. 1: The Delirium of Hope
Series Title: Low
Authors: Rick Remender
Artists: Greg Toccini & Dave McCaig
Date Added: September 4, 2017
Date Started: October 25, 2017
Date DNF: November 8, 2017
Reading Duration: 14 days
Genre: Science Fantasy, Post-Apocalyptic, Dystopian, Graphic Novel

Low coverPages: 144
Publication Date: March 25, 2015
Publisher: Image Comics
Media: Paperback (Library)

Millennia ago, mankind fled the earth’s surface into the bottomless depths of the darkest oceans. Shielded from a merciless sun’s scorching radiation, the human race tried to stave off certain extinction by sending robotic probes far into the galaxy to search for a new home among the stars. Generations later, one family is about to be torn apart in a conflict that will usher in the final race to save humanity from a world beyond hope. Dive into an aquatic fantasy like none you’ve ever seen before, as writer Rick Remender (Fear Agent, Uncanny Avengers) and artist Greg Tocchini (Last Days of American Crime) bring you a tale mankind’s final hour in the cold, deathly dark of the sea.

Low is about the sun going super nova far sooner than expected, and humanity taking refuge beneath the waves, while sending probes out into space to search for a new home.  It has more of a Rapture (BioShock) vibe to it insofar as there’s a city under the sea as opposed to SOMA’s derelict facility horror.

Per Remender’s foreword, the author was inspired by our sun’s eventual violent death, which will scorch the Earth beyond recognition (if humanity hasn’t already), and how if we don’t discover a new home among the stars (or a way to stop it), our species will be rendered extinct.   While this time is billions of years away, it’s still a reminder that everything is temporary and nothing ever lasts: a recipe for nihilism if ever there was.  Of course the ephemeral qualities of the universe could imbue it with meaning for some, though when you recall the nature of memory and how there needs to be someone to remember, this argument falls apart.

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The Unique Blogger Award

/ The Shameful Narcissist / 6 Comments

Hello dear friends and well wishers.  I hope you’re all having a good day.  As I continue with my never ending catch up, I reach another generous award from Games With Coffee, which, to mine humble ears, sounds like a marvelous idea.  I frequently pair the two together myself so I think it’s a wonderful name for a wonderful blog.

Unique Blogger Award

Here are the rules:

  1. Display the award (Done).
  2. Thank the individual(s) who have nominated you and include a link to their blog.  A little promotion for their blog is also welcome (Complete),
  3. Answer the questions asked by the individual who has nominated you (Coming up).
  4. Nominate an arbitrary number of bloggers and have them answer three questions you put forth to them (Ehhh…).

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The State of the Reader: 6/20/18

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<–The State of the Reader: 6/6/18          The State of the Reader: 7/4/18–>

A weekly post updated every other Wednesday detailing my current reading projects and what new titles I’ve added to my to-read list.  Title links go to Goodreads, and if you have an account there feel free to friend me!  I’d love to see what you’re reading and/or planning to read.

Books Purchased: 4

Books Finished: 2

Title: The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Vol. 2
Series Title: The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Author: Akira Himekawa
Date Added: August 5, 2017
Date Started: June 1, 2018
Date Finished: June 14, 2018
Reading Duration: 13 days

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Vol. 2 coverMedia: Paperback

I really like this novelization of the game.  I’ll be looking for the next installment.

Title: The King of Elfland’s Daughter
Author: Lord Dunsany
Date Added: June 16, 2016
Date Started: May 16, 2018
Date Finished: June 15, 2018
Reading Duration: 30 days

The King of Elfland's Daughter coverMedia: eBook/Kindle

This was dry, but strangely interesting enough to finish.  The pace was plodding with particular lines repeated over and over and over again, yet you’re drawn into wondering how it will end.  It’s definitely a “be careful what you wish for” story.

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Super Mario Odyssey

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More video game reviews can be found here.

Series Title: Mario, Super Mario
Genre: Platformer
Developers: 1-UP Studio, Nintendo EPD
Release Date: October 27, 2017
Platform: Nintendo Switch

Super Mario Odyssey coverStart Date: October 29, 2017
Finished Date: January 27, 2018
Playing Duration: 90 days
Let’s Player: Olizandri

It’s time to throw my hat into the ring and write yet another review of the latest game in Nintendo’s flagship series.  Before I tell you what I think, let’s go through the basics.

Gameplay

Super Mario Odyssey is a 3D platformer crafted in such a way to be very forgiving towards those lacking 3D platformer skills (aka TSN), but this stands to reason since Nintendo has always been a family oriented company, catering its games more towards younger players with an emphasis on fun over challenge.  This is not to say SMO isn’t challenging, but you don’t need to be an expert player to enjoy or even finish the game. There are 880 Power Moons to collect, but you only need 124 (125?) to power up the Odyssey enough to make it to the end.  This sort of tiered difficulty means that more novice players can still say they beat Super Mario Odyssey, while the challenge hounds can rack up the PMs in order to fulfill their competitive needs.

Mario collecting a triple moon

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The State of the Writer: 6/17/18

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<–The State of the Writer: 6/3/18          The State of the Writer: 7/1/18–>

A biweekly post updated every Sunday discussing my current writing projects and any completed the prior two weeks.

Finished Projects: 5

Project: Story
Title: The Broken Rose
Genre: Paranormal Romance
Type: Fanfiction (FFVII) Novel
Current Word Count: 260,969
Prior Word Count: 261,043
Word Difference: -74
Status: Revising
Progress: Chapter 7 review

What am I doing?  Like seriously.  What am I doing?  I finished up the revisions I said I wanted to do, so what am I doing now?  Well, I’m reading through the remaining beginning chapters just to make sure there’s nothing I missed.  I haven’t done any major edits since Chapter 6.  It’s also not taking me that long to read through them, so as long as I keep up a decent pace with that, I should be back to a posting schedule by next month.

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The Daemoniac by Kat Ross (Dominion Mysteries #1)

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Title: The Daemoniac
Series Title: Dominion Mysteries
Author: Kat Ross
Date Added: October 13, 2016
Date Started: September 28, 2017
Date Finished: October 25, 2017
Reading Duration: 27 days
Genre: Mystery, Historical Fiction

The Daemoniac coverPages: 334
Publication Date: October 12, 2016
Publisher: Acorn
Media: eBook/Kindle

It’s August of 1888, just three weeks before Jack the Ripper will begin his grisly spree in the London slum of Whitechapel, and another serial murderer is stalking the gas-lit streets of New York. With taunting messages in backwards Latin left at the crime scenes and even more inexplicable clues like the fingerprints that appear to have been burned into one victim’s throat, his handiwork bears all the hallmarks of a demonic possession.

But consulting detective Harrison Fearing Pell is convinced her quarry is a man of flesh and blood. Encouraged by her uncle, Arthur Conan Doyle, Harry hopes to make her reputation by solving the bizarre case before the man the press has dubbed Mr. Hyde strikes again.

From the squalor of the Five Points to the high-class gambling dens of the Tenderloin and the glittering mansions of Fifth Avenue, Harry and her best friend, John Weston, follow the trail of a remorseless killer, uncovering a few embarrassing secrets of New York’s richest High Society families along the way. Are the murders a case of black magic—or simple blackmail? And will the trail lead them closer to home than they ever imagined?

I believe change is coming, and we can either get out of the way, or be knocked down flat.

Harrison Fearing Pell is a consulting detective in this Sherlock Holmes inspired mystery where she isn’t even the Holmes analogue, her more famous sister Myrtle is, but the older Pell is away on business, and the game is afoot.

The author did a fantastic job differentiating this not only from the Sherlock Holmes stories (which…I’ll be honest, I haven’t read, so I might be completely talking out of my ass), but also from mysteries in the same vein.  Cleverly weaving more Sherlockian lore into the narrative with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle as the uncle of the Harry and Myrtle.  So while The Daemoniac is inspired Sir Arthur’s work, in the narrative the famous mystery writer is inspired by his nieces.  There’s also a similar dynamic between the Pell sisters and the Holmes’ brothers (at least from what I’ve seen on the modern BBC version) with some virulent competition that unfortunately crossed over into bullying with the younger Harry as the victim.

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The State of the Gamer: 6/12/18

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<–The State of the Gamer: 5/15/18            The State of the Gamer: 6/26/18–>

A weekly post updated every other Tuesday detailing my current gaming projects.  I have an account at Grouvee, which is a site you can use to keep track of your backlog, so please feel free to friend me there!

What I Didn’t Finish

Title: Final Fantasy V
Series: Final Fantasy
System: PlayStation 3

Date Started: June 17, 2017
Date DNF: May 27, 2018

I called it quits after the Ancient Library.  The job system is just not working for me.  I like the characters and enjoy the story, but it started being a chore to play it.  I told myself if I could find a decent Let’s Play, I’d concurrently watch V while starting VI, and that’s just what I did.

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The People of Sparks by Jeanne DuPrau (Book of Ember #2)

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Book of Ember

<–The City of Ember (BOE #1)                                      The Prophet of Yonwood  (BOE #3)–>

Note: Since this is a sequel there are spoilers for the prior book even in the blurb.  Something to keep in mind if you haven’t read The City of Ember and don’t want to be spoiled.

Title: The People of Sparks
Series Title: The Book of Ember
Author: Jeanne DuPrau
Date Added: September 12, 2017
Date Started: October 22, 2017
Date Finished: October 23, 2017
Reading Duration: 1 day
Genre: Mid-grade/Young Adult (YA), Fantasy, Post-Apocalyptic, Dystopian

The People of Sparks coverPages: 338
Publication Date: May 25, 2004
Publisher: Yearling Adventure
Media: Paperback

When Lina and Doon lead their people up from the underground city of Ember, they discover a surface world of color and life. The people of a small village called Sparks agree to help the Emberites, but the villagers have never had to share their world before. Soon differences between the two groups escalate, and it’s up to Lina and Doon to find a way to avoid war!

In the riveting sequel to the highly acclaimed The City of Ember, Jeanne DuPrau explores the nature of conflict and the strength and courage necessary to overcome it.

We will renounce violence, which is so easy to start, but so hard to control.

In the second Book of Ember, Lina and Doon play Moses in leading the exodus from their dying city.  The find a settlement called Sparks where the descendants of the Disaster survivors live.  Having absolutely no experience or even knowledge of the world they’ve found themselves in, they ask the leaders of the village for help.

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