April 2026 Summary

April is over, there were many birthdays and celebration parties from friends and family, there were also unexpected losses to mourn. My siblings visited for a while and we went out quite a lot. We returned to the moon and landed safely back on Earth, everyone I know of except Amin got an XTEINK X4, I got some new card games that everyone loved. I started to buy books from the Kobo store, I am yet to play Land of Eem again, and this Monthly Summary is a day late.

Let us move.

🎙️ Podcasts

• Into The Aether - Regular weekly episode listening. Make sure to check their bonus episode on Persona 4 Golden, there’s also a bonus on PS Vita and its games on their Patreon, which I’m currently listening through.
• Welcome to Night Vale - Same old night-time listening before going to sleep, I am relistening to old episodes though.
• Eye of the Duck - A film podcast that I’ve always enjoyed, I listened to their episode on The Matrix.
• Stuff You Should Know - Quite a lot of good episdoes this time, about Free Range Parenting, The History of Fire and Roar, the most dangerous movie ever made, pretty cool stuff.
• Trash Taste - Listened to episode 296 and that was pretty much it. Lots of talk about anime movies and My Hero Academia for some reason, I can’t believe I’m kind of interested on giving that super long anime a watch…
• Clarkesworld Magazine - I am relistening to their audio version of The Indomitable Captain Holli.
• Wolf 359 - I listened to episode 46: Boléro, which turned out to be the season finale. I am halfway through a special episode and then will continue to the next season!

🕹 Gaming

Completed

• Resident Evil - I already shared plenty of thoughts on this game on its review earlier in the month. This was a joy to play through and even though it shows its age, it’s still perfectly playable today. I particularly enjoyed the puzzle elements of this game compared to its sequel. Even though it was inferior in other aspects, the way it defined the fundamentals of what a survival horror should be like has remained to this day. Tank controls and all, this game was a delight, and is very fun when approached with the right mindset.

• Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker - This title for the PSP was a grandiose adventure, I decided to start it on a whim a few days after completing Resident Evil, and I couldn’t stop. It became my immediate choice during my commute to work, always managing to complete a mission or two, or listen to a few of the audio logs while the bus rode on. The characters were awesome, the gameplay was great most of the time, and even if the controls felt limited and something actively annoying to use, this wasn’t the case most of the time. I’ll expand more on this as soon as I write my review for it. I got to the end and realized there’s an extra chapter that can be done to connect the story more with the rest of the series. I’ll probably keep playing it for another bit, but I’ll move on if it gets too grindy. It has been a joy so far, either way.

Started

• Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream - This game got me hooked for a whole couple of days, playing it like 15 hours on a Friday and Saturday. Since then it has been a bit more relaxed, only playing it for an hour or less each day to check up on my Miis. I’ve recreated a lot of characters, online friends and people I know in person. It is super fun and chaotic, and sharing what happens to my friends on group chats and such is very fun. I still need to look more into terraforming and creating my own items though.

• Vampire Crawlers - I wish I could say more about this game, but since I my purchase of the previously mentioned title, I’ve only really played like half an hour of this so far. I am sure it’s fun, I only need to invest some time into it.

Ongoing

• Metroid Fusion - A wonderful game I’ve completed before, which I’m enjoying again on my Miyoo Mini Flip. Feel free to check my review for it.

• Terranigma - An Action RPG for the SNES that I’ve been meaning to play once and for all, I’ve abandoned it before due to my own lack of commitment, but I want to give it a proper shot once more. It has been really fun, I love the combat mechanics, the music and the artwork, I’m looking forward to more of its story to develop.

• Balatro - Just a few rounds that I played with friends. I also bought it for my phone, but I am still unable to win a run, rest in peace.

📚 Books

Completed

• To Be Taught If Fortunate by Becky Chambers - This book was a welcome surprise for me, I enjoyed the pacing the characters and the science concepts that allowed the story to develop. There was a lot of variety in the alien life described, which I really loved. I already wrote a review so you may as well give it a read.

Ongoing

• Clarkesworld Magazine #211 - I did finish The Indomitable Captain Holli, which was the longest of the entries in the magazine, a fantastic novella featuring a great concept and a lot of mysteries and things that are unexplained, but slowly unfold as the story continues, I highly recommend giving it a go. It’s available online for free.
• Strange Dogs - I feel bad because I still barely read this at all, I should move it to my XTEINK X4 so I actually make progress on it…

💬 Manga

Started

• Smoking Behind the Supermarket with You - A manga that I had added to my TBR list for years, but never got around to it until now. This is a manga about Sasaki, a middle-aged guy working for a black corporation who goes to the same supermarket at the end of each shift, to see Yamada, a cashier who he admires, and always cheers him up. Yamada has an alter ego called Tayama, who dresses and acts in a much “cooler” manner, and invites him for a smoke (behind the supermarket!) where she teases and tests him, to see if he doesn’t have bad intentions. A relationship develops from there that feels very human and real, as Tamaya is afraid of confessing shes lying to him, and Sasaki doesn’t want to be a bother for her either. I already caught up to the manga, which has a monthly release, and some incredible revelations have been teased on the following chapter. Looking forward to it all.

Ongoing

• Fly Me To The Moon - Up to chapter 289. I’ve been flying through the pages of this rom-com and really having fun with its characters and the diabetes moments in it. It was very much taken over by the manga above though during the last two weeks of April, I woulc be caught up with it otherwise.

• Spy x Family - Up to chapter 133, I’ve read the weekly releases and have had a great time. There was some fun dynamics where Loid, Yor and her brother were stuck together in a hostage situation which turned into a very chaotic fun.

• Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou - Up to chapter 70. This month I decided to read a couple of chapters of this masterpiece. Alpha has been walking and wandering without a set destination, really, and she managed to find an old and small airport. There she sees a plane upclose, and a couple more surprises. Lovely as always.

• Kingdom - Up to chapter 871. I read quite a bit of chapters of this and quicly catched up, but there’s been a few that I missed since I started the other manga. In any case, this keeps being great.

• Dandadan - Up to chapter 229. I am a couple chapters behind, but having fun.
• Blue Lock - Up to chapter 342. I am behind as well on this, but yea, just the usual.
• Sakamoto Days - Up to chapter 229. I am super far behind.

📺 Anime

• Orb: On the Movements of the Earth - I completed this masterpiece, and I highly recommend everyone to give it a watch. I already wrote a pretty extensive set of paragraphs about it on my weeknotes, where I basically wrote a short review of it. I may even write more about it in the future.

• Jujutsu Kaisen Season 3 - Up to episode 8. I was watching it with a sibling when she came to visit during Easter vacation, unfortunately I’ve not returned to it since then, I don’t know if I’ll get to continuing it, but the battle choreography and animation work seems to be top notch.

📺 TV Shows

• Malcom in the Middle: Life’s Still Unfair - My favorite sitcom of all time was next in the list of nostalgic TV shows to have a return to the screen. This one was very enjoyable for me! I think it managed to capture a lot of the original’s magic, it was extremely over the top multiple times and I loved it because of it. There were some things to criticize of course but overall, I recommend it, but you must watch the classic first.

🎥 Movies

• The Super Mario Galaxy Movie - The only reason I remember the plot of this movie it’s because of its similarity with the game, and also Fox McCloud shows up on it. Yeah it’s a Mario movie, I can’t expect a cinematic masterpiece out of it. Fun time though.

• Project Hail Mary - A science fiction adaptation of the book of the same name, it doesn’t really get a lot of the science to the screen, and a lot of things feel convenient because of it, but I really loved seeing the characters come to life, the visuals and the practical effects. The score was also pretty great! Not the best hard sci-fi ever, but a good flick nonetheless.

✅ Goals

New

• Make something to simplifly keeping track of these goals on Jekyll.
• Create some pixel bears for a few friends (2/10?)
• Complete all the games from the UFO 50 compilation (0/50)

In Progress

• A full website redesign (??)
• Fully sorting and labelling everything on my shelves for once
• Finish a pending commission for a friend
• Finish a pending commission for my parents
• Complete 15 videogames (4/15)
• Complete 15 books (5/15)
• Read the whole bible in a year (38/365)
• Finish listening to Wolf 359 (45/61)

This is day 60 of #100DaysToOffload