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The Philip’s Best Things of the Year 2017 List

“But Philip, it’s March! Why are you doing your best of 2017 list now?”   Well that’s because it sometimes takes me a while to get around to things, and hey, at least it isn’t April.

Anyway, I had a pretty good time in 2017. There were some really important changes in my life, some great people and events, and a whole heap of good media.

Presented below are some of my favourite medias of 2017. This is stuff I experienced for the first time in 2017, not necessarily stuff which came out in 2017. Also the things aren’t ordered within their sections.

Books

Strange Practise by Vivian Shaw

This was one of those books which I picked up in Waterstones entirely on a whim, and I’m incredibly happy I did (as should be obvious with it being on this list). It explores one of my favourite concepts, that of how the fantastical actually operates in the real world. The main character, Dr. Greta van Helsing (descendent of the usual van Helsing) is a doctor to the supernatural, and through her presence causes the monsters who make up her clientele to feel much more grounded and real than they would otherwise.

The book also makes really good use of public domain characters, placing them in the world such that they feel they belong there, without their public domain status being the spotlight. Another thing the book does well is conveying emotions; in particular it does a fantastic job of conveying emotional vulnerability without it being a synonym for weakness.

Dune by Frank Herbert

You know what Dune is. I don’t need to explain it.

Dune has been haunting my reading list and bookshelf for an awful long time. Every time I would pick out a new book to read, Dune would be there, waving it’s pages to catch my attention and calling “Hey! It’s me, Dune! I’m a classic of the genre. I’m beloved for good reason. You’re not having read me causes you to miss out on many references, and you’re well aware of this. I can explain to you what the Gom Jabbar is. Read me!” And every time I would glance at Dune, think about how long and revered it is, avoid eye contact, and pretend that I hadn’t heard or seen it.

Well this year I finally put that right. It felt good to finally have it stop taunting me, but it felt even better to actually read it, because it turns out that Dune is really fucking good.

The way that the world is built, the interactions between the characters, the way things grow and develop in the book, all of it is just so damn good. It’s Dune, go read it.

City of Miracles by Robert Jackson Bennett

City of Miracles was a fantastic end to a trilogy which I’ve loved. Tying up the major loose ends, answering the major unanswered questions, and taking the world and themes to a wonderful ending point.

The trilogy as a whole did some really nice stuff with the perspective and pacing. Each book has a different main character (though they’re each always important), and they’re set many years apart, decades even. This results in the world feeling and characters feeling very alive and functional in that they’re doing stuff even if we’re not seeing it. The books focus on the three major Divine events since the Blink (incidentally, I’m a big fan of this type of post-big-event setting), and just lets us know that stuff happened during the time between.

The book also contains a bit I adore, in which exposition is explicitly and dramatically avoided in a way which ties perfectly into the characters in the scene.

The Bands of Mourning by Brandon Sanderson

I’d fallen a bit behind on Cosmere stuff recently, so I spent a bit of this year catching up. They were all good, but The Bands of Mourning really stood out to me as excellent, and some of Sanderson’s best work. Something I loved in particular about this book was the way in which it managed reader emotions. I don’t want away too much, so I’ll just say that the reader’s feelings are directed in such a way that it maximises impact and catharsis, and really elevates the later parts of the book.

The Tropic of Serpents by Marie Brennan

The first of the Lady Trent books was good, but it really came into its own with The Tropic of Serpents. The way that these books approach dragons, from the perspective of a natural historian viewing them in a scientific manner, is incredibly refreshing; it’s so nice to see Dragons actually fitting in a Victorian era (I think, I get all the eras named after monarchs mixed up) world, and the characters treating them like they belong.

Even leaving the dragons aside, the handling of the era is really good. It deals really well with the struggle of science in the face of politics, as well as the struggles of women and the lower class within the scientific communities.

The Brothers Cabal by Jonathan L. Howard

I love the Johannes Cabal books. Cabal is a real bastard, and that makes him a joy to read about. He’s not evil mind you, he’s certainly not a pinnacle of virtue either, but he’s mostly kind of a good guy. Any shitty things he does are in service of a greater goal, but he’s still a bastard. It brings a texture to his internal conflicts which you don’t really see often.

He’s a great character, but having his brother around elevates him even further. The two of them are fantastic comparisons and foils for each other.

The way in which the Cabal books handle the supernatural is also great. It feels functional and integrated into the world, yet still unmistakably outside of the normal.

Kill All Angels by Robert Brockway

Much like City of Miracles, this was a fantastic end to a trilogy.

The Vicious Circle books are fascinating and notable for a variety of reasons: there’s the way in which they keep two timelines going throughout the whole trilogy; there’s the way it showcases cosmic horror on a human level, as well as placing the horror on that level; there’s the way it handles the idea of humanity, and what it means to loose it; and there’s also the way in which it takes the question “Why is Mario Lopez so weird?” and builds it out into one of my favourite horror series.

I rather not say any more about the series, just know that I really recommend it.

Also when I said “Mario Lopez”, I actually meant to say “A character similar to, but legally distinct from Mario Lopez”.

Games

Doki Doki Literature Club

This game hits like a ton of bricks, and good bricks at that. At this point I think that most everyone knows the deal with DDLC, but I’m still going to avoid big spoilers.

DDLC is one of those games which catches you by surprise, and isn’t what you first expect. It’s got a big old twist, shocks the hell out of you at some moments, and does some terrific integration of mental illness into the plot and characters. All of that is done fantastically, but the thing which really makes DDLC stick out to me is just how good the core game itself is.

The first part of DDLC, before stuff hits the wall, is the best dating sim visual novel I’ve played. That’s super important for setting up and enabling the later stuff, but it’s also just great. If Team Salvato announced that they were doing a pure dating sim, I would be well up for that.

West of Loathing

Considering the amount of time I’ve put into Kingdom of Loathing over the years (spoiler: a lot), it’s should be no surprise that I love this game. However I will say that I was a tad surprised with just how much I loved it.

KoL has always been a game driven mostly by it’s writing and concepts, and this game capitalises on both of those. There’s an awful lot of writing in the game, and all of it is good. Everywhere where there can be a joke, there’s a good joke, and everywhere where there isn’t a joke, there’s some damn good writing which would have had its impact lessened by a joke (to be clear: all of the joke writing is also good; I mean just that there’s always a good reason for jokes being absent).

The story the game tells, and the way it does it, are both incredible; and there’s a real elegance to the game’s art style.

Super Mario Odyssey

This game is a true delight. I’m famously bad at sticking it all the way through games, but this one kept hold of me and I finished it in a weekend. Not that I’ve 100%ed it mark you, but I also didn’t exactly rush through the campaign, I took my time, did a bit of sightseeing and all that.

The game’s also kept me coming back. I keep on finding myself popping back in to pick up a few more moons.

It’s just so joyous, so lovely, so utterly delightful. There’s just so much in the game, and it’s all just so good.

Just Dance 2017

Yeah that’s right, Just Dance. I’d never really played Just Dance before this year, but I have now and I love it. It’s just a whole heap of fun to play, and a nice alternative to going for a run if I want to exercise but don’t want to leave the flat.

I specify 2017 because that’s the one I’ve played.

Monument Valley 2

The first Monument Valley is one of my favourite games, so there was a bit of a worry that the sequel wouldn’t live up to my expectations. Thankfully those worries were unfounded, and I’d put MV2 right up there with the first. It plays like the first, but with twists on the mechanics to keep it feeling fresh. Similarly, it explores the same themes, but from a different perspective. The looks are just as stunning as the first, and go even further in many points, really exploring what the graphic style can do.

Ultimately the game is more Monument Valley, and that’s exactly what I wanted it to be.

Linelight

Linelight was a nice little puzzle game with straightforward, easily understood mechanics and a delightful, simple aesthetic. It managed to excel due to the excellence in puzzle design, and the way in which it conveyed ideas and meaning.

Put simply, if Thomas Was Alone didn’t exist, then these would be the strongest emotions a game has made me feel about such simple shapes. This game however didn’t have a narrator, instead it used just the mechanics to make me attached to some of my companion lines, and did so in a sublime way.

TV Shows

Girls’ Last Tour

I’ll be honest with you; I picked up this show because they dab in the OP. It turned out that was actually a good decision, as it led me to one of my all time favourite shows.

Girls’ Last Tour is a slow paced, intimate show. It’s an exploration of the two main characters travelling through a dead world, and just trying to survive. The world feels empty in a way which few other post-apocalypse things manage, mostly due to the fact that there are so few characters. In the 12 episode run, only 2 supporting human characters are encountered, and each is around for only one episode. This means you really get to know the main characters, and to truly see how their time in this dead world is affecting them.

JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable

It’s no secret that I love Jojo, and Diamond is Unbreakable is without a doubt my favourite part so far.

I loved Stardust Crusaders, but I had several issues with it. Diamond is Unbreakable fixes damn near all of them, and it really feels like Mr JoJo learnt some lessons from SC and applied them here. The characters are great and you really get to know them, the fights are cool and satisfying, and all the Stands feel unique and interesting.

Then there’s the actual presentation of the show, which is absolutely stunning. The unusual colour palette gives the world a whole new depth, and the soundtrack is just incredible. In particular there’s a certain use of a certain theme, which results in one of my all time favourite moments in a tv show.

Cromartie High School

Cromartie’s really damn funny, though it’s hard to put into words exactly why. I think a large part of it is the show’s absolute commitment to inconsistency. It’s committed to the extent that not even the show’s inconsistency is consistent. Things are forgotten, the forgetting is lampshaded, but then some characters will remember things whilst others won’t. Storylines will just stop, but then they might suddenly restart at a later date as if they had been going all along. It’s a show where nothing is ever really forgotten, but nothing is ever really remembered either.

It’s art is what I’m trying to say. Pure art.

My Brother, My Brother and Me

That’s right, this one isn’t an anime. It is a spin-off from a podcast though, so it’s a pretty nice lead in to the next section.

Do you like the MBMBaM podcast? If yes, then you’ll love the show. If no, then there’s a good chance you’ll still love the show. The podcast is used as the basis for it, but it’s built up into something even greater. It’s not just that it has editing and a budget, it also shows us new layers to the relationship between the brothers, and puts them in the real world as opposed to the podcast void which they normally live in. Everything in the show is so funny, and so good. I really do love it.

Podcasts

Wonderful

Wonderful is an aptly named podcast; it’s a true joy to listen to.

In the podcast, husband and wife, Griffin and Rachel Mcelroy, talk about the things they like. That’s the entire premise, and it makes for a truly wonderful podcast because it’s just so positive and sweet and lovely. There are no rules on the kinds of things they talk about, so they could be as general as a genre of film, or as specific as a sequence of notes in a particular song.

This podcast is the second iteration of Rose Buddies, which was a Bachelor fancast, and shares the same podcast feed, so watch out for that if you pick it up. Not that Rose Buddies wasn’t also a great podcast, but it was of a different style. The fact that I picked up Rose Buddies in 2016 does make the podcast’s place on this list a touch more dubious, but I’m the one making up the rules here, so I’m saying it’s fine.

Pretend Friends

This podcast is a delight. It’s an RPG podcast with the Continue? guys, and I have a history of finding them funny, so it makes sense I like this podcast. But what really elevates it is the game that they’re playing, that being Space Kings. Space Kings is notable in several ways, one of those ways being that it isn’t actually out yet. The GM of the podcast is one of the devs of the game, and the podcast is a bit of a beta test for it. That’s a nice novelty, but the thing which is really great about Space Kings is how it’s built around making a good collaborative story and having a laugh, rather than being built around firm mechanics.

It’s a podcast of a bunch of friends trying to make each other laugh, succeeding, and telling a story about a bunch of friends travelling around in space and getting up to some good hijinks. At one point a cat cuts a spaceship in half, at another a mop fires a gun. It’s a good time.

The Worst Idea of All Time

You know how I said that Wonderful’s place on this list was a tad dubious? Well TWIoAT is even more dubious due to the fact that I’ve been listening to it for years. The reason I’ve put it here is that it ended this year. TWIoAT was a fantastic ride the whole way through. If you’ve ever wanted to listen to a pair of skill Kiwi comedians lose their minds over a few years, then this is the show for you. Whilst I’m sad to see it go, I’m happy that the two of them can start the road to recovery now.

Web Shows

Super Beard Bros - Dark Souls 3

Beard Bros is a long time favourite of mine, and I think that this might well be one of their best series. Brett is just such a fantastic addition to the crew, and allows the other two to shift into slightly different roles. All of them are on utterly top form in this series, and it leads to a fantastic atmosphere, and lovely series.

The core of it is how wonderfully positive it is. Alex gets frustrated at times, but never really angry and seems to be having a great time with the game. Brett’s a fantastically encouraging person, and a true delight to listen to. And it’s so nice to get to hear Jirard chilled out, and finally having the time to make the wrap of the day.

Press Buttons ‘n’ Talk - Phoenix Wright 2

I discovered PB’n’T late last last year (2016) with their playthrough of Phoenix Wright 1. From there I worked my way through the rest of their stuff and caught up in PW2, which was a pleasing symmetry.

The channel is always great to watch, but the Phoenix Wright games are where they really excel. The voices given to the characters really bring the games to life, and they’re off high enough quality, and consistently enough applied that they’re now firmly in my head as the cannon voices for the characters. Even Phoenix himself, who’s handed back and forth between the two of them, feels consistent and has a real identity in his voice.

It’s a good series.

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Paddington is a delight

I finally got around to watching the Paddington movie last night, and I’m so glad I did because it was wonderful and I genuinely believe it’s one of the best films ever made. I could spend an awful long time singing the film’s many praises, but for now there’s one particular bit which I’d like to highlight.’

Shortly after first appearing, Henry Brown says the line: “Keep your eyes down, there’s some sort of bear over there. Probably selling something.” It’s so damn good. It’s a perfect line. The one line completely sells the concept of the film. The line, and it’s delivery, perfectly sets up a world in which a talking bear can walk the streets of London without it being a big deal. It gets in early, answers one of the big questions, and lets us know what to expect going forth. Wonderful.

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I’ve figured out Waluigi

Waluigi’s a strange character, with many questions surrounding him. Who is he?Why doesn’t he appear in the main games? Why doesn’t he have a game of his own?

He’s a celebrity guest star.

This ties into the fairly common interpretation that the Mario games are actually shows (plays, movies, tv shows, whatever) put on by the Mario gang; this is supported by all the show-business gubbins throughout the games, and explains why Mario and friends play tennis with the bad guys.

The reason that Waluigi fills the role he does is the Mario games are not the things that he’s best known for. He’s not in the main series games much because he’s usually working on his own projects, and he never takes the lead because that’s not what guest stars do. He gets brought on, gets a big cheer from the audience, and then goes back to his own things.

 Most likely, he used to do a lot of work with either Luigi or Wario, and that’s why he’s used the way he is. I’m going to use Luigi for this example timeline, as that’s the one I prefer.

In my proposed timeline, Waluigi and Luigi spent much of their early careers working with each other in a series of B-list (or lower) projects, usually with one of them playing the hero and the other the villain. They worked well against each other, and so the studio often cast them against each other. Maybe they were even an official double act with measure of creative control over their projects. Think of Laurel and Hardy, but with them usually being cast as  enemies (this bit isn’t really necessary, but I like it). They had a bit of a cult following but nothing major, so eventually they each moved on to new things. Luigi managed to find a niche in the Mario show, something which was small when he joined it, but later grew to be a major franchise. Waluigi however took part in a lot of different things, and worked his way to major stardom without being tied to one character (I imagine he got lots of work as villains early on, and was eventually able to parlay this into more starring roles).

With the two now each famous in their own ways, their old work started to get more attention, and the knowledge of the two of them as a pair became more common among fans and many wanted to once again see them against each other.

So when he was introduced in Mario Tennis as Luigi’s evil counterpart, it was as a massive nod to these fans and to their old partnership. Nowadays he’s invited along to all of the fun side shows (which now that I think about it, are probably charity events) because it’s a chance for all of them to hang out together, and it’s a continuing nod to their old work.

As a final part of this, my head cannon reason for Luigi not being in Odyssey is that he was making a film with Waluigi, a return to their old double act style, and there was a scheduling conflict.

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Some crazy revelations coming out of that Last Jedi leak. Honestly I kind of wish I hadn’t seen it, and had gotten to be surprised in the cinema, but what are you going to do you know?

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It’s time for a thrifty tip

That’s right, here’s your thrifty tip for the day:

For a cheaper alternative to fake blood, why not try actual blood.

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the money skull, reblog for money and or skulls

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Either, or.

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An anime trope I hate

There are a whole bunch of shitty tropes in anime that I hate, but the one I’d like to talk about today is “character who is bad at their job through fault of their own and never faces any actual repercussions for it”. It’s quite a specific one, but it still comes up surprisingly often.

Let me start with someone who doesn’t fit this trope, because I’d like to avoid that confusion. The food loving Dragon in Dragon Maid (I can’t remember her name, let’s say it’s Erma. It might be Erma). She works at the same place as Kobayashi, and by all accounts is not very good at her job. However there’s a reason that she’d bad at her job, and that’s that she’s only just started and is still learning how to do it. She isn’t expected to be particularly good at the time of the show, is trying to be better, and will (probably) become better at her job in time. She is not an example of this trope.

There are a fair few examples of characters who fit this trope that I can think of, but the example I’m going to be using is Maika from Blend-S, because it’s current, she’s a very good example, and I actually like that show (despite the fact that I spend the rest of this post getting angry at it) so I have more to say about it. 

Maika is committed to being bad at her job. She has a natural talent for it, but ignores this and puts actual effort into failure. She’s hired to play a character and she knows this, but she keeps on trying her best not to play it. You know that meme of the chap who’s looking at the girl in red rather than at his girlfriend? Well if Maika is the guy, then the girlfriend would be “The clearly defined parameters of Maika’s job”, and the lass in red would be “The job parameters which Maika has made up because she is a bad employee”.

Yes, it’s played for laughs. Yes, it’s part of the joke of the show. It’s still infuriating though. Every time that she looks at Older Sister Character and thinks “I should try to act more like her”, she’s completely ignoring the fact that her and OSC have very opposite roles. She’s blatantly ignoring her position based on an idea of “customer service” which she knows is not important to her job.

Even with her plot-given ability to fuck up every situation in a way which hurts someone she’s still shit at her job. She should be getting taken aside and given an official warning to get her act together, but she won’t be because the manager’s smitten with her and would just shout about her hair.

Think about the bit in the most recent episode when they’re swamped and all the other servers accidentally let their true personalities through, and that’s painted as a failure on their part. Maika does that all the fucking time! Even when they’re not swamped she still keeps on doing that. Thankfully her plot given ineptitude turns much of it into faux-sadism, but she’s still constantly dropping character.

If this sounds like me getting angry about a character in a comedy anime doing something which is part of the joke, it’s because that’s exactly what I’m doing. It’s because it’s an unnecessary and not particularly effective part of the joke. It’s because the bits where Maika decides to be bad at her job don’t add anything to the humour or feel, and mostly serve to make her unlikable. It’s because it’s a frustrating trope which is being invoked for no good reason. Can’t the fact that she doesn’t have to try to be good at her job be enough without her then trying to be bad at it?

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Who the fuck is Porky Pig?

I saw this comic earlier, and it’s been messing with me a bit. Because seriously, what the hell is Porky Pig’s personality?

I know the core joke of the comic is Ryan North’s misguided opinion on Elmur Fudd, but I just cannot get over this realisation about Porky Pig. Every other Looney Tune who’s more than just a mindless animal has a distinct personality, all of them have some description I could give to convey who they are. All Porky Pig has is a bowtie and a stutter.

I’m not exactly an expert on Looney Tunes, but I still feel like I could hazard a pretty reasonable guess about how any one of them would act in a given situation, save for the pig. Taking it even further than that, I cannot even think of a situation in which I could think of how Porky Pig would respond (beyond stuttering at it), that’s how devoid of distinct personality he is to me.

Now maybe this is all on my end. Maybe I just never saw much of Porky Pig, and so never formed a concrete idea of him. But I think it’s much more likely that he was just never given a proper personality, and was kept like that so that there would always be a character who could fill any empty roles in a story.

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Do you want to know what deeply saddens me?

I just finished reading “Blood of Elves”, one of the Witcher books. During the events of the book, there’s a rouge band of non-humans (primarily elves, but with others thrown in) who are performing repeated attacks against the (primarily human) kingdoms in the area. 

There’s a whole bit where a bunch of soldiers and civilians are talking about the Scoia’tael (the rogue band) and what needs to be done to combat them, and turn to talking about civilian non-humans. It’s a perfect reflection of current islamophobia, to the extent that I’d almost call it too on the nose were it not for the fact that the book was written 20 years ago.

I keep on coming across stuff like this, and every time it crushes me. Are we really so stuck in cycles of hate and violence that stuff like this will always be relevant? It’s current year argument and we’ve advanced in so many ways, but stuff like this still remains topical because we never change. Why is it that after all these years Watson is still an Afghanistan veteran? Why are we still fighting the same wars and falling into the same old traps? 

The only thing which tempers this is that kindness has also stayed the same after all these years, but that doesn’t stick out to me because it’s so much more general and pervasive. That’s the bright side of this, and the one that I hope carries on forever.

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A bit of Joseph I really like

I’m a big ol’ fan of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat”, and I just wanted to show some appreciation for one of my favourite bits of it.

“Potiphar” and “Who’s the Thief?” end in almost exactly the same way. The same refrain, played in the same way. It’s fitting because both of them end with someone being accused of a crime they didn’t commit and being threatened with the repercussions; reflected in the desolate, hopeless refrain.

This is nice, but the contrast between them is what I really love. In the first case, Joseph is all alone in the world, with no one to speak up for him. The refrain leads into “Close Every Door to Me”, which is a powerful, serious, desperate song. But in the second case, Benjamin is with his brothers who all speak up for him (due to their changed priorities over the years), and so the refrain leads into “Benjamin Calypso”, which is one of the more upbeat, silly, and fun songs from musical. 

It’s a really nice way in which the music of the show ties the themes together, and highlights the way these similar situations fall out.

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Baths are really wet

Now hear me out. I know you might look at that title and think it’s just a goof, or that it’s really obvious or something, but I’m going somewhere with this.

Baths get you wet. Like mad wet. When you get out of the shower, you might feel like you’re as wet as you could get, but you’re not!

After a shower you can towel yourself off and you’re ready to go, but when you’re in a bath the water really has a change to get deep into your skin, all up in your pores. When you get out of a bath you’re going to have to work to get that water out, either that or just wait a while for it to make it’s own way out.

There’s a bit in Stephen Fry’s “The Hippopotamus” where the main character has just had a bath and needs to get dressed. He describes a technique he’s developed to allow someone to quickly get dressed after a bath (the liberal application of bath oils), and when I first read it I simply didn’t understand why that would be necessary. At the time I falsely assumed it was like a shower and you could simply towel off and get dressed, but now I know better.

I’ve tried to get dressed soon after a bath, and it just doesn’t work. The water gets deep in your skin, and will grab hold of any passing cloth, even when you feel dry. You really do need help getting dressed after a bath.

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Video Games Hot Dog is a good podcast

As the title says.

I listen to quite a lot of podcasts, but there couple a few things which really make VGHD stand out to me; which makes it different to the rest.

I don’t listen to particularly many video games podcasts nowadays, but back when I listened to more VGHD was unusual in that all of the others were hosted by games media people (in their various forms) whilst VGHD was (and indeed, still is) hosted by devs. The immediate impact of this is the different perspective it provides on things, seeing the other side of the figurative curtain. But it also changes the way that games are spoken about.

The very vocabulary used to talk about games was different as a result of the hosts being devs, and the way that they experienced many things was different too. 

The other thing which makes VGHD stand out to me is the way that jokes work on it. Most funny podcasts have the style of improv or of stand-up, but VGHD is different. Two of the hosts are explicitly comedy writers, and the other two are adjacent. This means that the way that jokes are formed, presented, and bounce around is different; the jokes are built and worked on in a way I don’t see in any of the other podcasts I listen to.

Anyway, it’s a good podcast. Go check it out.

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I made myself a big ol’ sandwich today. This actually isn’t very common for me as I tend not to have bread in the house, but I was wicked craving it at lunch, so I bought myself some stuff a whipped up the sandwiches (I should have mentioned, there were actually two sandwiches). It was good. Ham, turkey, tomatoes, mozerella, cucumber, the whole gang was there. 

It really satisfied my bread craving.

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Good sky last night

I was walking home late last night, and really appreciated the sky, it was on one of my favourite modes.

It was the kind of sky where you don’t really see the sky at all (not that I have anything against the sky). There was a distant fog; such that it didn’t affect my vision unless I was looking at considerable distance, but still thick enough that it could be illuminated by the reflection of the lights of the city, and the lights of the sky.

The result was a wonderful uniform glow all across the sky, with incredibly sharp silhouettes formed by the things around me. The city below me (I was on a hill, which is where most of the best skies are found) was distant enough that is was just as lost to the fog as the sky above, but the lights cut through appearing more star like than ever.

It was a good sky. I approve.

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Some Early Thoughts on Metroid: Samus Returns

There was a time in the past when the only thing I had which could play games was the game boy pocket I shared with my brother. At first we only had two games which worked on that, and one of them was Metroid II: Return of Samus, so I’m going into this remake with some fairly heavy nostalgia and expectations.

I’m not very far in at the moment, but I’m definitely enjoying it so far. That said, it’s not all great. Let’s go over some specifics.

Clarification. This is a good thing. Things make a lot more sense in this version, the acid lakes don’t drop for no reason after killing a certain number of metroids, instead they’re dropped by machines. In general it feels like it makes more sense. 

Melee counter and the Aeireireirereorrroron system. This is something I’m mixed on. They’re nice additions, but they already feel a bit too central. Obviously I’ll have to see where the game goes with this, but Nintendo doesn’t exactly have a good track record in this area.

Spider ball. Spider Ball! It’s here! It’s good! It’s the same as always! I like it!. The reason I’m highlighting this is that I was really scared that Spider ball was going to be changed to only work in certain areas, something which would have massively disappointed me. I was happy to see that this wasn’t the case.

Graphics. Really good. The world feels really well brought to life, and the environmental storytelling it really well done.

Music. This is not so great. So far there has been exactly one point at which I’ve recognised the music, that being when the new version of SR388 played. That was great. I loved that, it was a perfect nostalgia hit. I want more of that. Instead all I’m getting is environmental sounds. Don’t get me wrong, they’re good environmental sounds, but Metroid II had a fairly impactful and melodic soundtrack. Sure, many of the creepier tracks were probably intended to be environmental, and limited by the hardware they were built on; but I still feel that the constant ambient noise in Samus Returns is a bit of a let down. I want more SR388 and Ruins dammit.

Anyway, these are my early thoughts. I’ll probs revisit when I’m further along.

[explosionofpaper]

Concerning Strange Practice by Vivian Shaw

This was an absolutely lovely book. I may well come back to it in the future, because I've got a whole lot of good to day about it, but I wanted to get something down now, just after finishing it.

As I said at the start, the book is lovely, I think that really is the most appropriate term for it. I'd say it's almost background urban fantasy in a way (if that phrasing makes any sense, I'll probably think up something better later), with the primary setting being something of a gap in most of the genre. The whole idea is who do the monsters go to when they need medical care, and it's nice to see that realised like this.

The characters and their relationships, characterisations, and growth, are all believable and natural in a wonderful way. Nothing they do ever feels fake or insincere (from a writing view that is, not necessarily a character one), and they're all sympathetic in a way, regardless of whether or not they're monsters. One of my favourite things about it is the way that it portrays emotional vulnerability in a casual way, and without it being synonymous with weakness (I could say an awful lot more on this subject, and may well do so, but for now I'll leave it at this).

It makes good use of its public domain characters without them ever feeling forced, and does a really good job of grounding itself in the "real world".

A lovely book, and an absolute joy to read. I masively recommend it, and am already looking forwards to any future book by Ms. Shaw.