![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
...featuring a mixture of virus and non-virus news.
It has been an eventful 4 weeks since I was last posting regularly. I had a birthday (fun!) and a serious knee injury (emphatically not fun!). The Baldur’s Gate 3 gameplay preview came out. The FFVII-R demo came out. Castlevania came out. The Night Country, The Lost Future of Pepperharrow, Dagger and Spindle, and Mermaid Moon came out. A mysterious illness decimated my houseplants.
Real life things!
I held my birthday this year at my favorite brewery and around 30 people showed up despite its not being public transit accessible. This was way more than I was expecting and did an excellent job of cross-pollinating my various RPG, gaming, booknerd, music nerd, and beernerd friend groups.
Also, I received this for my birthday:
and am delighted with it.
The knee injury put the kibosh on pretty much everything—running, walking, yoga, kempo—that I do when I am not reading, eating, or sleeping. In the grand scheme of things, I am lucky as it didn't necessitate surgery, but oh, this lack of physical movement is an adjustment.
Media things!
Needless to say, I am super psyched about the Baldur’s Gate 3 gameplay preview; it really does look like it will mimic the creative, environment-driven problem solving of PnP games. I loved that Vincke had technical problems during the PAX preview, and that half of what he tried failed—it was a true preview of what gameplay will be like, versus a dog-and-pony show.
That said, I am a bit disappointed that I’ll have to play one of the pregen characters to get the most fleshed-out backstory and NPC interactions. I much prefer the original BG approach that fit whatever character the PC created—tiefling monk, human rogue, etc.—into the backstory than the direction Larian’s taking here. Character alignment was also conspicuously missing from the preview. Vincke ultimately addressed this in last week’s Reddit AMA, but I am still a bit ambivalent about this.
Still, these are minor qualms, and I am as won over as ever by Vincke’s infectious excitement (Look at this really cool thing I am showing you!) about the game they're putting together.
Currently, I am most excited about the following three books:
which publish in May, August, and September, respectively.
Castlevania is as awesome as I'd expected. Banzai, Warren Ellis.
Virus things.
In less pleasant news, city government decided last Friday to adopt a halfassed coronavirus response that didn’t shut bars or restaurants, but rather forbade bar seating, parties of seven or more at a table, and occupied tables within six feet of each other. Anyone who’s worked service will know that there’s no point in coming in to work when you may only have four tipping guests in 90 minutes of work, particularly if they don’t order drinks. It’s a de facto closure for many venues that shifts the blame from city hall to managers.
Relatedly, my work, in its own halfassed coronavirus response, decided that putting us back on thirds would be as effective a curve-flattening measure as idling us, so I will be returning, kicking and screaming, to hell schedule for the foreseeable future.
これで以上です。
It has been an eventful 4 weeks since I was last posting regularly. I had a birthday (fun!) and a serious knee injury (emphatically not fun!). The Baldur’s Gate 3 gameplay preview came out. The FFVII-R demo came out. Castlevania came out. The Night Country, The Lost Future of Pepperharrow, Dagger and Spindle, and Mermaid Moon came out. A mysterious illness decimated my houseplants.
Real life things!
I held my birthday this year at my favorite brewery and around 30 people showed up despite its not being public transit accessible. This was way more than I was expecting and did an excellent job of cross-pollinating my various RPG, gaming, booknerd, music nerd, and beernerd friend groups.
Also, I received this for my birthday:
and am delighted with it.
The knee injury put the kibosh on pretty much everything—running, walking, yoga, kempo—that I do when I am not reading, eating, or sleeping. In the grand scheme of things, I am lucky as it didn't necessitate surgery, but oh, this lack of physical movement is an adjustment.
Media things!
Needless to say, I am super psyched about the Baldur’s Gate 3 gameplay preview; it really does look like it will mimic the creative, environment-driven problem solving of PnP games. I loved that Vincke had technical problems during the PAX preview, and that half of what he tried failed—it was a true preview of what gameplay will be like, versus a dog-and-pony show.
That said, I am a bit disappointed that I’ll have to play one of the pregen characters to get the most fleshed-out backstory and NPC interactions. I much prefer the original BG approach that fit whatever character the PC created—tiefling monk, human rogue, etc.—into the backstory than the direction Larian’s taking here. Character alignment was also conspicuously missing from the preview. Vincke ultimately addressed this in last week’s Reddit AMA, but I am still a bit ambivalent about this.
Still, these are minor qualms, and I am as won over as ever by Vincke’s infectious excitement (Look at this really cool thing I am showing you!) about the game they're putting together.
Currently, I am most excited about the following three books:
which publish in May, August, and September, respectively.
Castlevania is as awesome as I'd expected. Banzai, Warren Ellis.
Virus things.
In less pleasant news, city government decided last Friday to adopt a halfassed coronavirus response that didn’t shut bars or restaurants, but rather forbade bar seating, parties of seven or more at a table, and occupied tables within six feet of each other. Anyone who’s worked service will know that there’s no point in coming in to work when you may only have four tipping guests in 90 minutes of work, particularly if they don’t order drinks. It’s a de facto closure for many venues that shifts the blame from city hall to managers.
Relatedly, my work, in its own halfassed coronavirus response, decided that putting us back on thirds would be as effective a curve-flattening measure as idling us, so I will be returning, kicking and screaming, to hell schedule for the foreseeable future.
これで以上です。
Tags:
From:
no subject
I'm not familiar with the first book, but I am anticipating Return of the Thief and Piranesi like crazy!
From:
no subject
Mukherjee isn't sublime like Clarke or Whalen, but his books are fun reads and it's delightful to watch his skill as an author improve across each new volume. If you're interested, Death in the East has already been out in the UK for months; alas, thanks to the vagaries of the publishing industry, those of us in the States have to wait till May.
From:
no subject
So, you're back to working nightshift? That's hard (I worked straight nights 11-7 for three years, and was very glad when a day shift position opened up) but maybe it's better than not working at all? Or maybe I'm not understanding your situation?
I hope your knee heals quickly.
From:
no subject
From:
no subject
Hope the knee heals quickly. And sympathy and good luck with the terrible work schedule, argh, schedule shifts like that are absolutely awful...
From:
no subject
And thanks on the knee as well--at least a personal silver lining out of the pandemic situation is that the curve-flattening measures have kept me from overdoing it in re: physical activity.
From:
no subject
I have never heard of the Sam Wyndham series but it sounds super interesting.
From:
no subject
The Sam Wyndham books are not groundbreaking, but they are a lot of fun and Mukherjee improves as a writer with each subsequent volume, which is a lot of fun to experience.