I was at the post today, sending and receiving a package, and I think that’s it for the stressful things this year, now it’s mostly just normal work, with the worst of the christmas stress over with, so everyone is a bit calmer and in a better mood, looking foreward to the christmas celebration. It’s such an ordeal getting the beginning of christmas through, stress at work, celebrations, then in it all I have to buy and send presents back home, but it feels good getting it done at least.

Joel also posted a desert island game collaberation that I took part it, and it’s a really fun post that you should probably read as well.

Books

Reading has been a bit slower this week than the break neck pace the last ones, this week I read Game of Lies by Pippa DaCosta, which was fun, it’s still being more half fantasy action than what I expected, and it’s kind of leaning into being more of an elder YA in some ways, but I’m still enjoying it, I really hope the characters are going to learn to trust each other a bit more, because the whole being distrustful and not really great at each other schtick is starting to get a bit old.

After finishing that one I started reading Dark Fire by Rose Mackie, and this one is fun, it feels like it’s a bit better than the first one, but in other ways a bit weaker, but it’s a nice mix, and the characters and the world is really fun, so I’m looking foreward to the rest of this one, and the next ones in the series.

Games

Forgive me, because I have sinned, I wanted to let up a bit on the game buying since last week, but I had to trick myself to do some more uncomfortable tasks, and was getting myself even more games to at least feel that there was something good in the week :p At least it wasn’t a huge investment, I’m sucker for a bargin and got 6 games for 25€ which was a pretty good deal.

I got the first Pheonix Wright triology And I think this is the second time that I buy these, I had the original ones on the DS, and they are fun, never really got farther than the middle of the first game the first time that I played it, so I was thinking I will probably play through it this time, it’s just a lot of fun characters, and stuff here, and who doesn’t like a little murder mystery and court drama.

As a second one, I got Rabi-Ribi as I kind of wanted a bit more of a platformer game to play again, and this one seems different, with a kind of stupid story, and a mix between metroidvania and a tohou-like bullet hell game this one looks quite fun, I’m a bit baffeled by the controls since jump is on B, Melee on X and ranged on Y, it just feels a bit clunky, but I’m having fun with the beginning that I’ve played.

And for last there was a huge sale on Teslagrad 1- and 2 which was also developed by a norwegian developer, so I got that as well, I haven’t really played much of it yet, but the graphics look kind of cool, and they seem to be puzzly metroidvania games, I haven’t really tried them out much though, so will have to see when I feel like it.

I haven’t really put that much time into them yet though, as I have other things that I’m playing, I’m still inching my way foreward on Sea of stars I got the updates for the game last time I was playing the one that came on the cart, now with a lot of updates it seems like they changed around some things, I’m now able to cook more than 10 things at a time, the healing spell costs 3 combo dots rather than the 2 it did, and they seem to have tweaked some other small things, I don’t know what I think about that change yet, but it has made it a bit more challenging at least. I still really enjoy the exploration and dungeons a lot, I’m a bit colder on the battles than what I was, since there isn’t really that much to gain from fighting them, it feels more like they are just obstacles in the way, rather than a way to improve and get better. I just beat the Necromancer now, and got back to help Garl with the stone, and people are coming from the beginning of the game. Hopefully it will grab me a bit more again, the blandness of the story kind of is annoying, I kind of want to read it to get what is happening, since the dungeons are really cool, but I might just get to be okay with skipping it, since I really am not enjoying the writing much at all.

I also did play a bit more Siralim: ultimate Now down to dungeon depth 140, and the monsers I’m fighting are now at double my levels at 800 vs my 400, I got through the round of my team which was based on creatures dying and being resurrected, it’s a really strong group, but the battles have been rather a bit of a chore, since they just take so long with everything that is going on with them, and the whole gimmick being rather slow in general, so I went through the levels with that one, and quit when I was at the place to create a new paladin team, which needs to be one focused on provoke and defence, which could be interesting.

I also did some phone gaming, Halls of Torment is still a pretty competent vampire survivors clone, with a cool diablo skin, it’s fun, I still kind of miss the colourful mismatched nature of vampire survivors though, I just always liked that thrown together feel that it has.

Dawncaster is still a really fun card game, I’m kind of getting the feel that what I get out of this one is what many do out of Slay the Spire, I can’t quite put my finger on why, but I never really liked the world and the art of it, while dawncaster just feels better to me, it’s also a bit easier I feel to find and gather the breaking combos, which is just fun, with well over 1200 cards and some quite fun encounters, I think this one will keep me playing for a while, it’s just quite fun.

Media

Many podcasts are now going into the pre christmas lull, that is before the Game of the year podcasts and recaps start coming out, I have downloaded some extra episodes to tide me over, and we will see, december is always a weird month where the beginning is a bit of a downer, and then the last week is usually one of the best of the year for me personally.

Olexa is still going strong with his christmas blast, and it’s a lot of fun, for some reasons the kinds of videos that I really like usually aren’t doing that great on youtube, and this is the month where he catches up on those kinds of videos, so I’m having a little treat almost every day, which is nice.

I’ve also been keeping on watching SB doing a let’s play of Hades II, the Hades games are kind of a bit of a sore thing to me, I really like the story, art and music, and the collecting thing, it’s just that the gameplay itself isn’t really mine, so it’s a let’s play game for me, now on episode 30 and he’s almost vanquished chronos I think, I enjoy the calm demeanor of the guy. It’s a nice thing to have on in the background.