Subject: So I just discovered a game...
Author:
Posted on: 2020-06-02 22:23:12 UTC
It's called Sky: Children of the Light.
Sky's a mobile MMO, but it's an actually good one. There's no combat, but there's a ton of beautiful places to explore and puzzles to solve with friends. Really wholesome and low-key, and free!
... I don't really know what to say about it. Just check it out, it's very, very much worth playing. Turn up the volume and clear your schedule.
So it seems like a lot of us might suddenly have quite a bit of free time on our hands for... No Reason In Particular because Nothing At All Is Happening In The World (why yes I am deliberately antagonizing future board browsers, why do you ask?). So I'm just gonna talk about a bunch of things that have kept me entertained lately. I invite others to do the same.
This is gonna be super disorganized and just... go everywhere. Sorry.
Warhammer 40k is an inexhaustible supply of content, and while a few of our more active 40k players have been organizing games through Tabletop Simulator on the Discord (after the recent announcement of ninth edition), I've been digging into other things. Like finally picking up the much loved Ciaphas Cain (HERO OF THE IMPERIUM!) series. Again. Look, I'm easily distracted, but the books are good and funny and as lighthearted as 40k novels can be. And I read all the Ahriman books already.
But as good as 40k's official content can be it's no match for fan creations. Astartes is a 13-minute fan film that is... uh... about Astartes. There's not really much story here, just an excuse for some truly jaw-dropping animation. Like, really good. Five Stars.
Our Lord And Savior If The Emperor Had A Text-To-Speech-Device has also returned. Everyone's Favorite Bisexual Space Dad (aka the Captain General, aka Kitten) sadly hasn't gotten any screentime since the last official real episode (three months ago), but just a few days ago we got a new episode of Bro Trip, which means more Vulkan. And more Vulkan is always a good thing. Additionally, Alfa's been giving us a stream of low-animation "vox-logs" at a rate of about one a month (so, by TTS standards, a blistering pace), which are quite amusing.
Netflix is turning out plenty of good anime, which I've also been watching. Devilman Crybaby is apparently really good and Iximaz has been obsessed with Castlevania, but I've been watching Carole and Tuesday mostly, which is the latest show from the director of Cowboy Bebop. So it's pretty good. Beastars is dark, slick, stylish, and surprisingly fun, so if Zootopia didn't give you your fill on anthropomorphic animal society... well, now here's another one. High Score Girl combines dumb cheesy romance with 90s arcade nostalgia, which I guess means that Japan is now targeting anime specifically at me. Oh, and if you haven't seen the Netflix episodes of MST3k those are pretty good too.
Outside of Netflix, Vinland Saga (one of my favorite manga ever) got an anime, and it's really really good. And also I got into JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. If you want a really smart dumb action series full of variety, cleverness, surreality, and general coolness... well, you're probably watching JoJo's already. If not, Netflix has the first three parts and the rest can be found on any anime service you might have around. I really can't undersell how entertaining these are.
And videogames. Because oh boy I've been playing a lot of them.
But first, if you have an iPhone and/or a Nintendo DS of any sort, you should go buy and play Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective. I'm not even kidding, it's one of the best adventure/puzzle games I've ever played. And it has an amazing story.
Enough of that. I've been playing Halo for the first time. And despite by intrinsic bias against it (long story)... yeah, it's pretty good if you're into that sort of thing. The story is also fairly well-written, especially by videogame standards. It's a decent piece of classic pulp sci-fi/horror. Halo's spiritual predecessors, the Marathon games (which you can download and play for free because Bungie is super cool like that) are also similarly enjoyable, but I can't really recommend them to any but the hardcore madmen like me. The gameplay is all kinds of wonky.
ScummVM, the all-consuming adventure game platform, recently added support for the Ultima Games. This has brought me towards playing some classic RPGs. Unfortunately, classic RPGs are hard to get into. Like, even Baldur's Gate, which is honestly one of the easier to get into. If you're in the mood for dense philosophy though, check out Planescape: Torment. It's got a lot of great writing and general coolness. Or if that has too much combat and insufficient future detective, check out Disco Elysium, a game about being a detective who got so drunk you lost all your memories and now you have to rebuild your identity by talking to yourself. There's no combat at all, but there's a lot of cool characters and smart dialogue and wide-open branching decisions that let you build the detective you want to build. And I mean wide-open: Do you want to be a horrible racist monster? Go for it.
I mean, probably don't. But you can totally do that if you like.
System Shock isn't an RPG. But it does have a lot of atmosphere. It's an early product of Looking Glass Studios, so it's smart, immersive, and full of environmental storytelling. However, it's also clunky, awkward, and unintuitive (although time has healed those wounds a bit: there's mouselook now). Proceed with caution, but if you're a big fan of the later shock games (like Bioshock) you might want to try it.
And finally, Earthbound. Man, this game just... oooozes charm. It's the most charming game I've played in forever. It can be creepy and messed up at times but it's also very innocent. Playing it feels like cuddling into a warm cozy blanket that was masterfully crafted by blanket artisans. And if you liked Undertale at all, like, even a little bit... you owe it to yourself to play this game.
Well, that's about it for now.
Yes, I've finished the first Ciaphas Cain novel. And now I'm going to talk about it!
Ciaphas Cain is one of the most beloved series and characters in 40k. And it's not hard to see why. The very concept of Cain, a cowardly comissar celebrated as a hero across the Imperium despite being out to do little more than save his own hide, is intriguing. And unlike his clear inspiration (Flashman, for the record), Cain is genuinely likeable: He tends to do the right thing in the end, even if it's for the wrong reasons. With plenty of entertaining mishaps, side comments to camera (the books are framed as his (top secret) memoirs), and a general sense of humor that nicely contrasts the grim darkness of the setting which is still undeniably there.
Of equal importance to Cain is all the footnotes (in quantities that almost put Pratchett to shame), in-universe annotations from his Inquisitor acquaintance, Amberly Vail. Vail and Cain have a good chemistry even in simple writing, but when they're both actually interacting in the story it's even better: they're each as cunning and manipulative as the other, and both of them know it.
So the character dynamics are really good (the rest of the characters, even the bit ones that really don't have much personality, are quite memorable). The plot of this first outing is fairly solid as well—it's set on an imperial world contested by the Tau, on the verge of civil war between pro-Tau and anti-Tau factions, and more focused on intrigue and uncovering sinister conspiracies than outright fighting (in fact, all-out fighting is what's trying to be avoided), with a bit of The Dirty Dozen thrown in for good measure. It held my attention pretty well, and was fairly engaging.
The one place the book fell down a bit was the prose, which... isn't great. It's not awful or anything (aside from a few deliberately-bad in character sections), but it's serviceable at best. And it could have used a bit of improvement in a few places.
But on the whole, yeah. I had a lot of fun with this one.
It's called Sky: Children of the Light.
Sky's a mobile MMO, but it's an actually good one. There's no combat, but there's a ton of beautiful places to explore and puzzles to solve with friends. Really wholesome and low-key, and free!
... I don't really know what to say about it. Just check it out, it's very, very much worth playing. Turn up the volume and clear your schedule.
This is, apparently, "Doctorin' the TARDIS" by KLF. It's more or less a remix of the Doctor Who theme and a stadium chant, and in the video, an old black-and-white runs over a square, cardboard Dalek. I have no explanation, but it's amusing!
For entertainment, I'm currently watching the final season of She-Ra and the Princesses of Power on Netflix, which is AMAZING, and if you haven't seen She-Ra yet, you should put it on your list. Every single main character is well developed and sympathetic and makes you care about what happens to them. Every. Single. One. Plus, hella strong female leads, normalizing non-hetero relationships, a variety of skin tones and body shapes, and there's a character who uses "they/them" pronouns who shows up in season... three? ... and it's just good, you guys.
I've also been catching up on Arrow, which is fine for brain candy. Season four is rough, but I'm past it now, and season five is okay. Will probably move on to the rest of the Arrowverse eventually, because I want to have all the context for the musical crossover whenever I get to that. >.>
I'm reading a book called The Genocidal Healer by James White. Came across it in a used book store, and with a title like that I couldn't not pick it up to see what it was about. So far, I'm enjoying it a lot! The alleged genocide is not the main plot, as you might expect; it's basically a pre-credits cold open. Our non-human protagonist, Lioren, is an amazing medic who was sent to help cure a plague that was killing a newly discovered race. Unfortunately, in Lioren's zeal to solve the problem, he rushed into administering the cure too quickly, and this indirectly resulted in a whole lot of the race killing each other. (It's complicated.) Lioren, absolutely destroyed with guilt, wants to be executed for his crime, but everyone else is like "Sorry, but we're a civilized intergalactic federation and we don't actually have the death penalty. How about you go intern for Sector General's Psychology Department under the supervision of the best possible doctor instead? Hopefully you will learn to live with yourself and we won't waste your brilliant mind. Win-win!"
I've since come to find out it's part of a whole series of medical sci-fi books set in Sector General, an enormous multispecies hospital out on the galactic rim. The author's philosophy is nonviolent and non-xenophobic. There's really alien aliens everywhere. Apparently Earth-humans are one of the only races that consider nudity and sexuality taboo (more on how this is handled as I come across it). Do I even have to tell you how much this appeals to my interests?
Seconding the rec for If the Emperor Had a Text-to-Speech Device! The latest episode was... pretty much as manic and entertaining as they all are? I don't even know how to explain. {X D
Oh, BTW, Thoth! Phobos tells me there is an actual character in one of the 40k books by the name of Thoth! ... He's a servitor scribe who works for Iskandar Khayon, and was given that name by Khayon. I'd say Agent Thoth wears it better. ^_^ The book in question is The Talon of Horus, if you're interested. Haven't yet read it myself, but I'll get there! More Thousand Sons stuff is always good.
~Neshomeh
Oh my shpx I love this show it has swords and cool fight scenes and a very lesbian cat girl and her crush is a big dumb idiot who is still actually smart and a precious angel and so are her friends and so is recurring villain Scorpia who I will cuddle and caress and massage and her perfect wholesome smile lights up my life and oh shpx me this is what having a waifu is, isn't it.
Ahem.
Yes. Princess show good. Big swords. Girls look different to each other. Is v v gay. Scapegrace doin herb an Approval. I will now cuddle Scorpia some more.
I keep meaning to read that book. It's ADB and people mostly like him. Mind, the book itself seems a bit controversial... actually, that's a pattern with a lot of thing ADB wrote.
Anyways, yeah. Khayon is the Son who split off from the Sons early on and signed on with Abaddon. He also binds demons to Tarot cards, so if TTS introduces him as a character and doesn't make Kitten play Yu-Gi-Oh! against him that will be a missed opportunity.
(Yes, that's a running gag in TTS)
I actually made my own post on this thread recommending it, but I just can't do so enough.
Still, I think the two totally separate posts emphasize just how darn good this show is. ^_^
~Neshomeh
I adore Double Trouble. They're such a chaos numpty and my favourite character in the show; I just wish they got more screentime.
Does Dax like to shapeshift into them for a laugh? Ab. So. Lute. Ly.
I've been really into two things during this period of... lots of free time: painting and Japanese movies. I've been planning to make a Dreamwidth post about my favorite underrated gems of Japanese cinema, but there's one that just begs to be introduced to y'all.
Legend of the Eight Samurai is an 80's Japanese fantasy movie/hot mess that's an absolute nonsensical, hysterical delight from beginning to end. It's the movie adaptation of an epic serial I haven't heard much of, but I love this thing with my entire heart. Nothing in this movie makes any damn sense. The story is about a princess trying to defeat an evil clan with the aid of magical dog warriors (not a single samurai in this, by the way, although I blame the English title for that one) - and that's just the way it starts. Events that have absolutely nothing to do with each other happen all the time, people react to things in the weirdest ways (what to do if you find out you're the villain's son? Start playing a magic flute!) the villains' henchmen teleport all over the place because they always appear literally out of nowhere; there are flying snakes, giant centipede monsters, magical balls (please... for the love of... just call them spheres), bubbling lakes of blood, people turning into stone for no reason whatsoever, a Gustave Klimt painting in the background of a fight scene (don't ask, because I don't know), an intensely awkward love scene, Hiroyuki Sanada in black leather and fishnet (jusy try to take him seriously after this one), and the whole thing is scored with the most ungodly cheesy American synthrock ballads. I swear I'm not making up that last part. It's amazing. I beg y'all to watch it, just make sure you get the subbed version and not the English dub.
That is really, really odd. All I can say is “that really doesn’t make sense. I might like it” and “no, I won’t call them spheres because they’re magical balls”
If you'd be hearing about the zntvpny onyyf bs gur Rvtug Terng Yvggyr Oblf (I swear this is in the movie), you'd be begging to call them 'spheres' too.
Uhhh... yeah, I’ll be happy to call them spheres. Also, that movies sounds so weird that I might watch this the next time I have enough free time...
And merry watching. As of right now vg'f ba Lbhghor, but you haven't heard this from me.
...Is She-Ra and the Princesses of Power on Netflix. I binged the first four seasons back in February and the fifth and final season came out on May 15. It's got all sorts of great representation and manages to realistically address some heavy topics while remaining safe for kids (it's a Y-7 show), even though there are some scenes that make you wonder if the censors were paying attention.
The series finale is utterly amazing and satisfying and has actually launched a minor fanfic explosion as the fans explore aspects of Season 5 and what comes next for the characters.
The only negative is that some corners of the fandom can be pretty toxic if you don't share their opinion of certain characters.
...that I'm absolutely obsessed with Castlevania now. To the point I've written 80k words of fanfic for it in less than three weeks and am absolutely not letting up.
If you don't mind animated gore and sex and lots of angst, absolutely do go check it out—it's a very dark show but has a ton of amazing snark and I cannot express how much I love this dumb thing. It's only three (very short :( ) seasons so far, but a fourth has since been renewed and there's a rough estimate of release by summer/fall of next year.
It's all hand animated and gorgeously so. If you like anime with the rougher feel of frame by frame animation, at least, it's worth checking out if you don't mind the gore. XD
This is my 30th day in the PPC, and there’s just so much stuff that reading PPC stories is the only thing I’ve really been doing (Other than eating, sleeping, etc). I just finished reading the Blackout story and man, it was good. There are so many stories I still have to read...
Yes, if you’re wondering, I’m plugging PPC stories in the PPC board.