These weeknotes are full of gaming related topics yet again, but also some reading, let us celebrate such an accomplishment, yay!
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💻 Now that it’s over, it’s weird to think about all the work I did while my workmate was out. It sure was stressful and there were many times where I still felt like I should ask him what to do. These weeks proved to me that even though I’m still not the best, I can handle myself better than I thought—or stall things until he returns and knows what to do better lol.
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💪 Gotta say I have not gone to the gym for a while, work has been a pain and I got phone calls off-hours, I just want to get home and be lazy for the rest of the day, and always ready just in case. Thankfully, I finally returned this Monday night and it was a good time.
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📚 My XTEINK X4—a tiny e-ink reader—finally arrived, at the same time as Jeremy’s, both of us already installed the Crosspoint firmware too. I had some fun setting up wallpapers and
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🍜 Went to a Japanese restaurant with some friends over the weekend! We ate some ramen and had a wonderful time chatting and catching up with each other. We also played a couple of rounds of Garctic Phone, guaranteed fun for everyone.
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📦 Another couple of Nintendo Switch game arrived. I got Gris earlier on, and Crow Country arrived later, the first because of the great experience Amin—and he keeps nagging me to play it—and the latter due to the marvelous experience I had with Resident Evil 2, I may play the original RE first though.
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💾 Transferred a few games to my PSP, the What Did I Do To Deserve This, My Lord?! 2, Danganronpa, BlackRock Shooter, and Mega Man Powered Up!. I wish there was a Resident Evil game for PSP, it would have been so cool…
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🎧 Acquired Gris: Unreleased sketches, a new album by Berlinist with early drafts of tracks from the game of the same name! It’s just 11 minutes long, but it’s wonderful.
Reading
Started
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🕰️ Chrono Trigger by Michael P. Williams - I transferred a few books to my Xteink X4 reader and this was one of them. I already flew through 25% of it! A great book about Chrono Trigger, the author’s personal experience with it, and apparently there’s some interviews and more neat stuff coming up!
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🛰️ Strange Dogs by James S.A. Corey - A novella taking place before the events of Persepolis Rising from The Expanse. It seems super promising so far.
Ongoing
- 🥷 Kagurabachi by Takeru Hokazono - Up to chapter 82. This is great shonen stuff, and it has been rock-solid from the beginning. I’ve already flew past a couple of excellent arcs and I am enamoured by the story, the characters and the pure aura of each panel as the fight scenes and the power system develop further. The progression has been really good and I have no complaints. I ready more than 70 chapters in a week, after all.
Completed
- 🌳 Non-Stop by Brian W. Aldiss - What a book! What a start to Aldiss’ career as a published writer. Among the first stories of its kind, with a lot of ideas, concepts and neat, if dated characters. I reall y
Watching
- 🪨 David - We went to the movies and chose this one on a whim, it’s an animated rendition of the biblical tale of King David’s rise to the throne. I was rather surprised by the quality of it. It’s a musical, but it wasn’t very catchy, at least to me. It still pales in comparison to the masterpiece that is The Prince of Egypt though.
Gaming
Ongoing
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🥐 CrossCode - Last week I stared the first out of three dungeons in Chapter 8, I have now beath two of them and unlocked my way into the third one! The game keeps being simply awesome, the puzzles continue to get my brain muscles to work.
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🍄 Super Mario 3D World - We have managed to complete all the levels and beat Bowser once more. We finally got to the last last stage and did a couple more levels! The end of this game is near, but we are still collecting all the stickers!
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⚔️ Gladiator Begins - I only mentioned this in passing on a Gaming Recap from 2024, I can’t believe I never brought it up in other notes at all… In any case, it’s a great PSP arena fighter with kinda complex controls and depth. I’ve enjoyed it quite a bit, lots of customization and challenging fights.
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🃏 Balatro - Literally one year later, this roguelike was opened on a whim by my friends on my Switch and we ended up playing for two hours. I wasn’t fully present during this time, but I played a few rounds here and there, it is still awesome.
Started
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💀 What Did I Do To Deserve This, My Lord!? 2 - A strange tower-defense/dungeon maker where I have to design a cave system that autopopulates with minions in charge of defending the bad guy. Depending of the shapes I dig, certain species grow, and then bigger and bigger ones that are stronger and more durable. Every once in a while “heroes” will show up to defeat me. The weird thing here is that I have no way to dictate where the minions go, I have to work within their movement patterns and plan accordingly, it’s rather interesting but I can’t figure it out yet and can’t get past World 2.
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🧪 Metroid Fusion - I started it on a whim again, this time on my Miyoo Mini Flip. I reached the first boss of the game! Kind of want to fly through it just because it’s fun.
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🚗 Ridge Racer Type 4 - Started it on my Miyoo Mini Flip too, I think I’ll stick with the PSP one though.
Around the Web
Blog posts
- Unfinished must-want-to-play games - Love listicles like this one.
- The Sandwich - A very personal slice of life.
- Your computer hates you - A rant on technology today, I disagree with many things, but found it worth reading.
- Damn, I Can Still Read - Reading is great, and it’s fun to realize you actually like it.
- Just checking in - Sam has mostly stuck to weekly summaries that are generated from his social media feed, but I’ve been missing a proper post like this one.
YouTube
- Why smaller pixel art is actually harder - The title is pretty clear here.
- The Failed MASTERPIECE That Gave Us Resident Evil 4 - Never heard of this game, looks kinda fun.
- Why Classic Games Feel Better - Nothing like a good old video essay about something I agree with.
- The Return of Polished AAA Games - I mostly play old games that released ages ago, but it’s nice when something new comes out that just runs well.
