Redwolf's Journal (continued)

I don't know if it's a good or bad thing to have seasons getting into the 6-7 episode realm. It's hard for me to think of them as seasons. Then again, some shows have 50+ episodes in a season, so what's it really mean? Ah well. After watching season one , I was perhaps fairly critical. With these seasons, I may be a little less so. It's still overly simplified in a lot of ways. Catra is still the best part of the show, in my opinion. Watching her rise and fall (and rise and perhaps fall again?) remains more compelling to me than basically anythings else while the good guys are repeatedly learning to work together and Adora spends most of the seasons stressing out about trying to live up to a legend that's pretty vague to begin with. Catra is smart, tough, and manipulative as fuck. If she actually stopped seeking validation of others, she might be the most dangerous person on the planet. Then again, without that motivation, she might not be so badass. The plo...

I was interested in The Surge when it came out, as a sci-fi Souls-like game sounded entertaining. That one just didn't quite reach the critical level of interest for me to buy and play, though. The sequel, being widely seen as an improvement in most ways, was an easy pick-up. As one might guess from the genre label, it's very heavy on action combat. The zones like to twist and turn back on themselves, providing a number of shortcuts. Overall, it might differ mostly from the Souls games in having a story that is based on "now" rather than uncovering ago-old lore. I'm not going to say it's the greatest sci-fi tale of any particular time. I had a fair idea what the "twist" was well before it was openly stated. But the story of waking up after a crash in a city going through a nanite apocalypse works fine. There are challenging fights. There is (or at least can be) a fair degree of grinding for improvements. It felt like a solid entry in the genre pret...

I mean, I'd be blind to miss it at this point. And what caused it? Well, that's harder to pin down. I think "brain chemistry" is a valid contributor that is rather difficult to do anything about, especially in the short term. I could point at entertainment, perhaps. Watching a character go through an existential crisis while knowing he, as part of a fictional narrative, really does have a purpose can certainly drive home the lack thereof in real life. I could wave at a lack of entertainment. Between schedules, health, and moods, I've seen very little entertaining only roleplay in the recent past. Some of that, of course, sits squarely on my own shoulders as I really shouldn't expect others to go out of their way any more than I do. And I ended up sitting out of yesterday's superhero game session. I'm not sure how much to blame the apparent shift it directly, but I really wasn't feeling up to it by that time (which makes me feel even more disconne...

So, yeah, I took in the second season of The Dragon Prince over the weekend. Looking back at my notes from the first season  I see my opinion has changed little. I enjoyed it and am invested. I like most of the characters and their interplay. The animation feels decidedly more fluid this season, much to my appreciation. And I still have an issue with the tonal shifts and fluctuating feel of some characters. Claudia is cute, caring, a little ditzy... and so utterly amoral in her quick usage of dark magic. The way she turns to it in desperation to heal Soren would, in may stories, be a display of how noble intentions can lead to atrocity, but the impact is sort of lost due to how gleefully she uses that same power the rest of the time. Soren picks a fight that puts him in a position that could lead to some serious character development as he's forced to face the consequences of his actions. Though the final fallout hasn't happened by season's end, I fear taking away the mo...

Survival games are sort of a tricky business. Unlike games where you battle enemies or compete against opponents, the survival game experience is mechanically very front-loaded. You are most vulnerable when you have little or nothing at the beginning. Dangers like running out of food and water don't scale with level or ramp up by zone, they're just there. It makes for a different sort of experience from most other game types, with all the discovery - learning recipes, dangers, and map details - tapering off as time progresses. Green Hell really drove this point home to me. After a brief tutorial segment that sets up the story and teaches a couple things, the game drops you on your own with little more than a notebook. Some of the shelter patterns within specify they allow you to save the game, but the game doesn't otherwise make clear that shelters (crafted or a few pre-existing in the world) seriously are the only way to save your game. That's how on-your-own you are...

Heh. A week later, and I still have Steven Universe songs bouncing around in my head. What can I say? For as much as they're often short, there are a lot of them, some are quite catchy, and most have some solid meaning behind them. Stronger Than You remains a favorite, its significance wrapped up in a main character - or a few, depending on how you count. Change , from the movie, has been a new contender. For being only a couple stanzas, there's solid message and meaning to it that's tied into the climactic fight. It was definitely the characters and interplay that drew me into the series. If I'd been watching seriously, it might have happened earlier, but it was actually the 38th episode that clicked with - watching the Crystal Gems creating a test chamber for Steven (with no actual chance of failure) in an awkward attempt to boost his confidence. Steven is understandably upset by being treated like a kid (even if he may be one), but actually manages to swallow tha...

Eh, I'm not really down, per se, but feel a tiny bit in that direction, if that makes sense. My car is running. The water heater is heating water without spilling it all over. My sink repairs seem to be successful. I have functioning video and audio for my desktop PC. All of these are good things that bring life back to "normal." In the process, though, my summer was a few thousand dollars more expensive than it otherwise would have been. That isn't world-shatteringly painful, but it does make me more conservative with spending. I've definitely held back on a few games I otherwise would have picked up. It also means when I saw some clothing online and thought "hey, this is a cool style that could go with the costume stuff I was making," I had to take a step back. My sorta-spending-freeze kind of halted my work in that regard. And while there are certainly some things I could do with the things I've already gathered, my drive to do any costuming h...