I've been thinking a lot about travelling for the past few months. I miss it. A lot. Not travelling because you're not financially able versus not travelling because the world is closed, are two very different things. And before the pandemic hit I was finally getting to a place to be able to afford travelling on a more regular basis. The state of the world put a firm stop on that idea...
At the end of 2012 I made a post about all my previous travels, and I figured that now it's been nine years (and I'm unlikely to travel anywhere this year too so it will be ten years since that post) it's time to update it and add to it, because I have been to a few more places since I made that post.
2013: London. I returned with Toni. First time for him. Third time for me and this time with the purpose to visit the Harry Potter Studio Tour, which was a magical experience. We did a whole bunch of other things as well.
2015: Murcia/Archena/Cartagena. For my mum's 50th my dad brought the whole family to Spain for a week. It's an area of Spain that he visits frequently due to having business contacts in the region, but for the rest of us it was the first time there. My favourite memory is probably the Roman remains in Cartagena.
2016: Köln. My first time in this beautiful, brilliant city in Germany. My dad goes every year to one of the big fairs organized in the city and this year his business contact brought me along as a kind of interpreter to help with English and French. I even got to use some Japanese when I got some time to myself and headed off to explore the Asian sector of the fair. Seeing the cathedral in Köln never gets old.
2018 + 2019: Köln. Back again, but these two times as a guest of my dad's. I spent most of my time during these two visits to follow him around and offer some input here and there. An idea or two. Mostly I just enjoy tagging along to the fair because it's a lot of fun. After every successful day at the fair we and the other Swedes usually went out having beers (Kölsch!) and dinner and always at the same handful of places.
2019: Edinburgh. Went back to Edinburgh with Toni. First time for him. Second time for me. It had been 11 years since my last visit and there was so much nostalgia involved for me. This time I did all the tourist-y stuff properly.
2020: Edinburgh. Went back as a sort of mini-getaway for myself after a stressful period at work. I had some paid vacation left over and figured why not. Met up with a friend and also followed in Rowling's footsteps and did some writing at the Elephant Café.
I also did go to Copenhagen with Toni back in 2012 on a day-trip, but I can't count that as travelling since I lived 30 minutes away from Copenhagen at the time.
I miss travelling. I miss airplanes. Before covid hit we talked about Ireland as our next destination. Let's hope it won't be too long now until we get to travel around again :3
When was it that we watched the first season? *scrolling**scrolling**scrolling* March 2020. Alrighty then.
Then it makes total sense why both of us were completely lost and confused through the first half of this season. Why was there no "Previously on..."?!?! It's been two years since the previous season - if any show deserves a "previously on" it's Locke & Key.
Anyway, halfway through we had recalled enough to lose most of the confusion. A lot of this season had us not knowing what was going on. Would Josh be a new bad guy? He definitely had some sus things going on. What was Gabe's end-goal? And omg could we get rid of Eden soon?
The introduction of the memory key was a welcome addition and having Duncan on the team was definitely a good thing. Every single episode after Duncan had his memories restored I kept waiting for the kids to use the key on Nina, because it was heart-breaking to me to watch her know that something was going on, but having no way to know what. So when Bode took the leap I was very happy. Can't wait to see how that turns out.
And I really hope Tyler changes his mind. Can't we just have the whole family know? Please?
Making the new villain a 18th century military officer who's already described as a terrible person, promises to make season 3 very interesting.
Toni decided it was time for Squid Game once we finished Gotham. Everyone has been talking about Squid Game for a while now and as usual we're probably the last ones to the party.
Squid Game seemed like an adult version of Hunger Games or Battle Royale, which makes sense in how it got so popular, seeing as all the fans who loved Hunger Games and Battle Royale are now adults and throwing themselves at the next similar thing that's also more mature than what they liked as teenagers.
To me Squid Game was fun and exciting but also very predictable. Nothing really happened that I didn't see coming, less than halfway through the season the writers had pretty much established their formula and after that there were no more surprises. Sure, there were instances of "this would be logical/predictable to follow what happened here - will they do it that way or this way?" but whatever happened would always fit into one of two expected scenarios.
Gi-hun has the strongest plot armour in the universe. Sae-byeok was my favourite character. Ali was exasperatingly trusting. Sang-woo was a calculating ass but I ended up wanting him to win. Deok-su and Mi-nyeo were so annoying we both actually cheered when they met their end.
Squid Game was good. So good. But it would've been even better without some of the predictability. Maybe it's better this way? If Squid Game got even more popular it would've broken the Internet.
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After Squid Game I decided on Alice in Borderland. We had discovered this show way before Squid Game, but it was recommended as something to watch to fill the void of Squid Game for fans of that show. I didn't really have a void from Squid Game, but I figured now was the best time to watch Alice in Borderland. Fresh out of one slaughter show and in to another :P
Less than two episodes in and Alice in Borderland already appealed to me more than Squid Game. It was less predictable for one, and even if Arisu has some plot armour he actually does get hurt sometimes.
The story of Alice in Borderland is a lot more open to possibility and it revolves around the characters' will to survive and to find out what happened. It creates a lot of mystery and the games are very intricate and fun. Fun in the sense that it's fun to try and solve them and figure them out before the characters. Especially that last game had both of us going off in completely separate directions only to discover that we were both wrong.
Arisu is adorable and I can't not like him. Usagi is the strong, solitary type and I like how grounded she is in the midst of all the crazy. Chishiya is probably my favourite character, but Kuina gives him a run for his money. Niragi was unhinged, but I enjoyed watching him being unhinged.
Nothing about Alice in Borderland is straight-forward and that makes it absolutely amazing in my book. Squid Game's popularity is making people discover Alice in Borderland and it's so well-deserved. This show is awesome.
The original Wasteland game is older than I am, released in 1988, and I haven't played it, but I've heard good things about the game and it's subsequent sequels/reboot. I decided to start from the first modern game; Wasteland 2, and then go from there, finishing by playing the remaster of the original if I enjoyed my time in the sequels.
Wasteland 2: The four rookie Rangers in your party are pretty much like the soldiers in XCOM: just characters without much of a personality aside from what their blurb says; but even so I became strangely attached to Pills and Slick. My favourite companion became Corran Cain and his end was strangely poetic. I allowed him to sacrifice himself to save the rest of the Rangers from Cochise. The gameplay is nice and smooth although the dice-rolling mechanic for skill checks are extremely annoying. It became a habit of mine to manually save before any skill check (like lockpicking or disarming a bomb) because even if the meter said 93% chance to succeed, you bet I'd fail *sigh* The story picks up some 20+ years after the events of the original Wasteland, but seeing as the sequel came out so very long after the original the devs are kind enough to not expect anyone to have played the original beforehand (thank you) and there's a lot of storytelling from veteran Rangers to your rookie squad about the events that led up to Vargas being general. I liked Vargas. I was happy I managed to tweak the ending to save him and the others. I enjoyed most of the gameplay and the story. The suicide bombers were massively annoying considering they'd literally blow my squad's clothes off if they happened to stand too close to an explosion. By the time I finished in the Canyon/Temple of Titan my squad was running around butt naked, and I treated every piece of clothing I could find as if it were made of gold and diamonds. The first part of the game takes place in the barren wasteland of Arizona, but the second part takes place in the slightly less barren wasteland of California. Actually it's pretty nice. There's greenery in California. I much preferred the time I spent playing in California. The side stories in California were all much better than the side stories in Arizona. I really enjoyed this game. That song in the end didn't hurt either.
Wasteland 3: It became pretty obvious very quickly that the devs' canon ending to Wasteland 2 is that everyone died. Which made me feel pretty sad. I also didn't like what they did to Angela Deth in this game and I wish they could've left her well-enough alone with her being MIA after the events of Wasteland 2. I much prefer the nuclear winter wasteland of Colorado over the arid barren wasteland of Arizona. After the events in Wasteland 2 the Rangers are in desperate need of help and they reach out to Colorado where a man calling himself the Patriarch his leading a community. He invites the Rangers up to negotiate a deal. Nothing about it goes smoothly. The Patriarch isn't as good of a man as he makes out (but that's just reality imo) and Angela pops up and offers an alternative to the Patriarch's wishes. An alternative that I find to be extremely anti-Ranger and I can't believe they did that to her. No, imho the Patriarch isn't perfect, nobody is, but he's the best they've (we've) got. I became weirdly attached to Vic and if I do another playthrough of this game I might just do everything he wants so that I can keep him in the end. I played this game 1½ years after release and any bugs have been ironed out. From what I've read it was a buggy mess when it released and as usual people were hating on it because of that. But I got no bugs whatsoever. This has been one of the smoothest gameplay experiences ever. I also really enjoyed that they had actual songs to every single defining battle and not just instrumental soundtrack. It added a unique layer to the game that I appreciated. There were so many references ot Wasteland 2 and I loved it. Lucia and Jodie are my girls ♥ I also really liked Darius Kwon. This game went from "alright this seems pretty good" to favourite so fast.
Wasteland Remastered: So if I understand this correctly this game is the same as the original 80s game only with updated graphics and music and with modernized controls. Even if "modernized" seems to be pushing it a bit... In any case the 80s is still clearly visible through the polished exterior. Games were simpler in the 80s and 90s and not always in a good way. This game seems shallow compared to the other two, and while I get that they had less to work with 30+ years ago it's still a bit disappointing that there isn't more depth to it. I didn't finish the game, so maybe there's more to the story later on, but in the beginning it's pretty much the world ended; this is the Rangers; you're one of them. The gameplay is pretty simple, but with a lot of odd things that are completely unexplained and you get to figure out through trial and error. I might pick it up again at some other time to finish it, but for now I feel pretty much done.
1. The Ickabog, by J.K. Rowling. I loved it. It's obviously a children's book, much more so than the first Harry Potter book, and it's written like a traditional fairy tale. There's a bit of Brothers Grimm to it, and a bit of Disney, maybe even a bit of Aesop... I loved watching the story unfold and see how Spittleworth dug himself into an incresingly deep hole. I honestly didn't expect the Ickabog to actually be real after all that came before the reveal, but in hindsight of course it was. And such a sweet thing. The way it's described it makes me think of a huge and green Cousin Itt... The pairings at the end came about exactly as I expected and hoped, and I was happy that Fred got something of a redemption. He wasn't mean; just ignorant and vain. Ma Grunter was reminiscent of the evil stepmom/witch in Grimm stories. This story tickled my fancy and woke up my childish imagination. Less than 50 pages in I just wanted to keep on reading to find out what would happen next. I wanna go again.
2. Shogun, by James Clavell. A friend of mine talked about how great this book was so I decided to read it. It was great, amazing even. Only complaint of mine is on the Japanese romanizations in the book like... either he's using 17th century Japanese, which I admittedly know nothing about, or he just doesn't know Japanese even though he makes a great effort at making it seem like he does. The vocabulary, the word order, omfg what are you doing. Also why can't Mariko pronounce Blackthorne's name when she can speak both Latin and Portuguese? Like if she can maneouver her tongue into Portuguese, then "Blackthorne" shouldn't be very hard... The character development in this book is insane. For the first half of the book I wanted to slap Blackthorne for being such a child. Him and his crew kept throwing tantrums at the slightest thing, every time they didn't get what they want, and omg all the complaints about meat and bread and alcohol... Sit down, shut the fuck up and be grateful that they actually cleaned and fed you. They just as well might not have. And then came Blackthorne's big moment of self-realisation and I was so proud of him. At the same time I couldn't help but feel weird about it, like as a European I should relate to the Europeans, right? I should take their side. But I never did. I sighed and rolled my eyes at the Europeans and their blatant disrespect, obvious superiority complex and annoying tantrums. I was sat shaking my head at all the mentions of bleeding. Sorry 17th century doctors, but the blood is supposed to be inside the body. Blackthorne's subsequent reaction to the conditions in the eta village is reminiscent of a modern person hearing about living conditions several hundred years ago; pure disgust. I went into this book completely blind, but while reading I got the sneaking suspicion that Toranaga was based on Tokugawa Ieyasu; probably the most famous shogun in Japanese history, and after I finished the book I read up on it and found out Toranaga most definitely was based on Tokugawa Ieyasu. There wasn't much in this story that I could see coming from a mile away, but I nailed the history xD As proud as I was of Blackthorne at the end, and as much as I appreciated Mariko, Toranaga was my favourite character. So shrewd and clever and always ten steps ahead of everybody else, but still a decent and pretty jovial person... I loved him. Everytime a character said "so sorry" I heard a "sumimasen ga" in my head. ぜひ読んでください。
3. The Christmas Pig, by J.K. Rowling. This was... lovely. An absolutely heart-warming adventure that gave me the same nostalgic happy feeling as Toy Story 3 or The Polar Express. This story is written for children but it doesn't shy away from the difficult subjects, and that's a good thing. Children should be allowed to explore the darker sides of life (from the warmth of a safe home); they should be allowed to ask uncomfortable questions and recieve the truth (however simplified and dolled up). This book does exactly that. Jack is very young, but he learns a lot about himself and the way of the world through his journey in the Land of the Lost, without ever losing the wonder of his childish innocence. When I was very young I used to imagine that lost things were never truly lost; they had just gone somewhere else and would return once they were found. I have a nagging feeling that I didn't come up with that idea, but that I got it from somewhere but it's only a half-remembered feeling and I can't pin-point it. I'm sure every child has at some point imagined that their toys would come to life behind closed doors and in the dead of night. I did too, way before Toy Story was a thing, and this story just hits all the right buttons with the Alivened toys and the lost Things. This story made me take my teddy down from his perching spot atop the bookshelf and hug him for the first time in over a decade.
4. Samurai William: The Adventurer Who Unlocked Japan, by Giles Milton. So this book is a reconstruction of events of the very real Anjin-sama who inspired the story told in Shogun. (And which also inspired the story in Nioh, and I'm sure many other things). Interestingly, this book carries the name of Samurai William but told more about the Dutch and English mariners who came to Japan after William Adams and employed him and his expertise to gain a foothold in the country. This book tells you more about the unruly 17th century Europeans who literally behaved like teenagers. All money they ever received was used for drink and sex, and then they complain that they have no money... 17th century Europe was suitably aghast to discover Japanese pornography and dildoes. (That was fun). This book details the story of how Europeans tried to access the mysterious country of Japan, situated on the edge of the world; how William Adams came to end up the first Englishman there and how he gained the trust of the shogun; how another group of Englishmen arrived over a decade after Adams and their subsequent struggles; and finally how Japan ended up a closed country for over 200 years. It was a super interesting read that struggled with the extent of information it tried to put out. I had to take several breaks from it because the outpour was intense for such a short book. But did I enjoy it? Yes, very much.
5. Harry Potter: A Magical Year, by J.K. Rowling & Jim Kay. I know this book is supposed to last for a full year, with a small snippet of Harry Potter to read each day, but all those small snippets did was leave me wanting more and so I read all of January in my first sitting. Then I tried to not pick it up again but still I did and went through all of February and March for my second sitting. I tried to forget about it and yet I picked it up a third time (just to look at the pictures) and ended up finishing the whole thing. I adore the illustrated versions of the Harry Potter books and Jim Kay's illustrations are marvelously perfect. Unlike most material out there, his illustrations are based entirely upon the descriptions in the books and not on the movies and I'm all here for it! His portrait of Dumbledore is amazing ♥ I've wanted illustrated Potter since I got my hands on the first book back in the 90s and I will collect every single illustrated version to come. This book made me want to reread the entire Potter series again. Might be about time I do that...
So I finally got around to playing the latest DLC for Valhalla. I started on the DLC just a few days before Christmas and finished it just a couple days after Christmas.
After the base game in 2020 and the Wrath of the Druids DLC in 2021 I felt like I had a pretty good idea of what to expect, and I wasn't far off the mark. I kept waiting for another Order to go through, but there wasn't any. As much as the Children of Danu was expected in Wrath of the Druids I felt a little bit cheated that there wasn't something similar in Siege of Paris, especially after I picked up an emblem from Little Mother. I thought that would be the starting point for another Order, but no such luck. I kind of missed the investigative element of trying to solve the riddles of where to find the Order members.
I knew a little bit about the history concerning the very real Viking siege of Paris and so I was excited for the story and it ended up being better than the story in Wrath of the Druids. There was a lot more choice and consequence in this DLC than in the previous, including the base game iirc. Mostly concerning whether to fight and kill every French person in sight or whether to try and talk to them. I mostly chose the diplomatic approach, which made Sigfred call me Eivor the Talker, but I felt vindicated (and also a little sad) when I talked him down from his final confrontation and watched him leave. I ended up really liking Richardis. For the most part I felt sad for Charles. History says he was probably epileptic, but the game makes him out as probably schizophrenic.
The siege itself was epic and well worth the wait caused by diplomacy and preparations throughout the game.
One annoying mechanic that I wish wasn't in the game was the rats. I hate hate hate the rats. They made exploration hell wherever they were, even though the game makes it quite clear on how to deal with them.
Rebel Missions were just the same kind of deal as the Royal Demands in Wrath of the Druids. They were repetitive as hell, but I did enough of them to get the achievements associated with them. I ended up running through this DLC with a big ass scythe in one hand and a short sword in the other while completely decked out in the Reaper armor and shooting rats at unaware enemies so I could watch them get devoured by the rats. Fun stuff.
Side note: All the French accents in the DLC inevitably made me think of Orlais in Dragon Age.
After I had finished the DLC I still didn't feel quite done with my time in the game, so I decided to finish up on some of things I had left hanging from my playthrough of the base game. So I did a bunch of drinking games, and defeated all of the Orlog players. I finished up some easy-to-get achievements that I had missed; like lighting all of the braziers on Hadrian's Wall, swimming 3km on the horse, sliding 150m in the snow, and assassinate an enemy from the horse. Then I completed all of the Hunter Deliveries, before I turned my attention to the fishing. I really, really dislike fishing (both in games and irl), but I set my mind to it and spent the two following days just fishing and fishing and fishing. Until I managed to complete all of the challenges and recieved the Swordfish.
After having done all of that I decided to get through the free update content. Starting with River Raids. It was a fun concept, but it soon became pretty repetitive. I played through the entire quest arc in one go and half-way through Ireland I was getting pretty fed up with the repetition. Especially since my crew were so fragile and no map provided enough rations to counter-act their fragility. Eivor was running around like crazy collectiong every berry and mushroom on every raid site just to collect enough stuff for rations. The champion fights in each region provided the best diversion from the repetition of the questing and gameplay, to the point where I kept going with the questing just so I could get to the next champion fight.
When I had finished the River Raids arc. I decided to quickly do the Yule Event, which took maybe 30 minutes all in all, but it was pretty fun, nothing special. And then I headed on to the Mastery Challenge free update, which I started on a little bit just before I played Wrath of the Druids. I only managed to get one gold medal, but got enough silver and bronze medals to complete the quest. It got pretty annoying towards the end, especially on the maps where Eivor had basically no armour and all it took was for one enemy to swing their weapon ones and Eivor was "dead" and I had to restart the challenge. So many sighs and eye-rolls on this one. But I felt pretty good once I managed to complete it.
And then I turned to the Isle of Skye free update, and hello Kassandra. After all the achievement hunting, raiding and challenges it was fun to run around a new zone, do a story and hunt down all the collectables. I wish the questline had been a bit longer. I know some fans complained about the fact that Kassandra showed up in Valhalla, since her story takes place around 200 years earlier, but the devs did make her immortal so...¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Anyway I did enjoy the Isle of Skye update and it made me want to play Odyssey even more. Which I still haven't done...
Once that was done it was time for the last bit of content I had left; the Tombs of the Fallen. I expected intricate, difficult puzzles and fully expected to need a guide to get through them. But I went in blind to all of them and found that they were pretty straight-forward and kind of simple. The first Tomb is just outside Eivor's settlement (that's handy) and it serves as a tutorial for the rest of the Tombs. In each of the three following Tombs you can find an artifact that probably will be needed to open the big gate in the tutorial Tomb. "Probably" because you need five artifacts to open it, and there are currently only three of them in the game. The Tombs were fairly simple puzzles that were entertaining enough without posing much of a problem. I enjoyed these a lot more than I thought I would.
I still want more Valhalla, though, so I'm excited for the next DLC coming in March :3
So after Fate I chose Gotham as our dinner show, and since it's five seasons long it has taken us a while. But it's been well worth it, damn this show was good.
So we knew from beforehand that this show wasn't a Batman origin story, but rather a Jim Gordon origin story and the story of how Gotham came to be what it is when Batman is around. That being said, there was quite a lot of the Batman origin story in it too.
And they've found such good actors for all the roles! Such amazingly good fits. Every time Penguin was on screen I was just inwardly squealing with how good he was. And did we ever really see an episode without me going "He's such a good Penguin!" at least once? Riddler was good too, and Joker (especially in the later seasons), and Alfred, and Zsasz. Bruce and Selina were really good fits too. Just generally a really good cast. Most of them should get asked to do any upcoming Batman movie.
I grew up watching Batman: The Animated Series and so I always compare any Batman live action character to the animated ones. I can't help it. And that final iteration of Penguin, after the 10 year gap... I was just squeee. He's perfect. Absolutely perfect.
I had a lot of fun with this show and it managed to defy every expectation I had of it. I expected a kind of police procedural drama with a twist, but it's so much more and it's just perfect. Even with the slight changes to the lore to fit the time period and still make it Batman they've done everything respectfully. I could easily go through this entire series again.
Before release we followed all the trailers closely and we were perpetually confused. The trailers explained nothing, said nothing, and yet we were both intrigued by what we saw.
The game released for PS4 and seemed to be an exclusive, and with me being as bad with controllers as I am, I resigned myself to not play it myself but watch Toni play it. I watched him play through a lot of it, although not everything, and halfway through his playthrough the announcement came that it would release for PC. I stopped watching anything story-related in the game, but from time to time came to watch his gameplay.
He talked a lot about the little annoying things. Little annoying mechanics that were there to give the game a sense of reality, but only served to make it annoying. We usually don't find the same things annoying in games and so I figured that most of those things he mentioned wouldn't bother me. Because we don't think the same way when it comes to games and gameplay.
Then I got it and started playing it. I was excited to get started. But the story failed to pull me in and all the little annoying things Toni had mentioned annoyed me too. All that and much more. I got to the point where I got fast-travel and felt cheated because I couldn't bring anything with me. The game explains the whole thing that he can't take anything with him apart from himself. Then why does he have clothes?!
Anyway I got super annoyed by my constantly breaking boots, by him constantly dropping all the stuff he was carrying, and by the JRPG-ish mechanic of getting attacked every 10 meters (that annoys me in every JRPG tbh - just let me go where I'm going ffs).
The characters failed to be engaging. The story failed to pull me in. The gameplay annoyed me to no end. It's like one of those artsy things that are weird just for the sake of being weird.
After I got to the first big city, the point where the rest of the game kind of opens up I decided to take a break and play other things, but with every intention of coming back to it. That was mid-October 2020.
Then I didn't play it for all of 2021 and I decided to just drop it.
I loved the soundtrack, the vibe, the atmosphere... But none of the things I loved about it could outweigh the things that annoyed me.
It's the little things that can make or break a game. And for me, the little things broke Death Stranding.
There are some games where you play 10 hours and it feels like no time has passed. Then there are games where 10 hours feels like an eterenity. Unfortunately, for me Death Stranding ended up in the latter category.
Showing off some of the vibes/atmosphere and soundtrack that I loved about it.
1. The Alienist, by Caleb Carr. This book took way too long for me to actually get through. I only picked up this book because I loved the TV show, which meant I already knew the story. And that was probably what shot me in the foot with this book, because I already knew everything. The story pacing is pretty slow and without the feeling of "I need to know what happens next!" this book becomes pretty tedious. Sara and Kreizler are the most interesting characters in the book, and the most intelligent, but for some reason the main character is Moore and the book is mostly about him being confused about things and Sara/Kreizler patiently waiting for him to catch up. Which is a drag, because the book is from his POV. If I hadn't known the whole story before-hand I would probably have enjoyed this book a whole lot more, since I really like the setting and the old-timey serial killer story (i.e. Jack the Ripper). And Sara is awesome.
2. The Angel of Darkness, by Caleb Carr. As with The Alienist I had watched the TV show before I read this book and so I expected to go into this book knowing exactly what would happen and how it'd turn out. Except nothing in this book matched the show. Nothing aside from names was the same, and once I realised that this book soon became a lot more interesting than the first one. This book is narrated by Stevie Taggert instead of John Schyler Moore, which is definitely in its favour. I didn't care for Moore in the first book or in this one, but Stevie is a sweetheart. Now knowing that Carr is originally a non-fiction history author makes the long-winding descriptions and explanations a little easier to bear, although they still were a drag to read through. Sara and Kreizler are still the best characters to grace these pages. Any time Moore opens his mouth I want to smack him. I enjoyed the roundabout feminism in this book and seeing clearly how the story protested against the common mold that all women were/are supposed to fit into. Not as much nowadays as in the past, I suspect, but the mold is still ever-present. Libby Hatch is a psychopath, but her case is a sad one. Monsters aren't born; they're made. A point this book and the previous firmly tries to prove. Kreizler's idea of context is the precursor of modern day profiling. Having finger-printing thrown out as an unproven and unreliable science in the courtroom made me laugh. Reading Lucius' claim that there's no way to differentiate one type of blood from another gave me much the same feeling as hearing Dana Scully talk about science that doesn't exist in 90s X-Files - a kind of smug "oh if you only knew" feeling while cosied up in my 21st century chair. It's certainly obious that Carr isn't first and foremost a fiction writer, but I did enjoy this book a lot more than the previous one. I kept waiting for that one death from the TV show to happen in the book, but it didn't and that made me very happy. Although I did shed a couple tears over the one death that did happen. All in all, I don't know why this book took me so long.
In 2021 I read very few physical books and the ones I read took weeks or months for me to get through, but that's not to say I didn't read. I started to read ebooks via Radish and did a deep-dive into romance; a genre I never really cared for before. Most of the stories on there are pretty short, but there are some honourable mentions from that app. Off the top of my head there are four authors whose stories I just couldn't stop reading until they finished, and even then I wished they weren't done. The one person who caught my interest the most was Abigail Barnette. I loved her series The Boss and even though it has probably been a couple months now since I finished that story I still feel like I need more Sophie Scaife in my life. Amy Brent and Katee Robert became my go-to for short and fun stories. Just something light to read every now and then. And then we have Lexie Miers, whose story I now follow. Amy, Katee and Lexie are all good, but they pale in comparison with Abigail. The Boss encompasses eight volumes. I also read the spin-off, comprised of three volumes. Amy's and Katee's stories are all pretty short and what I've read from them would probably fit into a decent-sized short story compilation each. Lexie's story is ongoing, but that's sizing up to a pretty normal-sized book.
I feel kind of bad reading ebooks on my phone when I have a bookcase full of unread books... I will try to read more physical books in 2022 :)
Death to 2020 (2020) This movie pokes fun at the mess that was 2020. It was the first movie we watched in 2021 and I've since been recommending it to everyone I know. It's a mockumentary and its self-depricating humour is exactly what I needed after the shitshow that was 2020.
Downton Abbey (2019) I wanted to watch this at the cinema, but had nobody to watch it with and it never made it outside of the independent cinemas and so it wasn't running for very long. Long story short: I missed it. Then I found it on Prime and ofc I had to watch it. All the nostalgia came flooding back and I realised how much I had loved this show, to the point where I started to watch the show again.
His House (2020) The first horror movie of the year and it was weird. Not bad weird, just weird. I loved that it was the woman who saved the day even after being repeatedly told by her husband that he'd handle things and she shouldn't worry about it. On top of being a horror movie it was also a heart-wrenching account of war and refugees and trying to find your footing in a foreign country. I enjoyed it despite its weirdness, and there were some really creepy moments.
Hot Fuzz (2007) I have a hard time with comedy, usually, because all it tends to be is me hiding behind a pillow in shame and embarrassment, which is why I had never seen this one. Toni talked me into watching this with him after it showed up on Netflix and I had a great time. This is a classic and it's so much fun. Absolutely loved it.
Little Evil (2017) Horror comedy is usually my cup of tea and this was no exception. It was funny. It had jumpscares. And it was heart-warming in all the right places. It's a parody of Omen and it showed, but it was definitely better than I thought it would be.
No One Gets Out Alive (2021) Our horror movie for Halloween week. It was great up until the monster reveal as these things usually are. Same as with The Ritual last year. But from what I could tell online they did a pretty decent job with the mythology. I did spend the entire time feeling exasperated that this girl who's an illegal immigrant is so damned trusting, especially of people who are in the same desperate situation she is. But other than that, this movie was solid. The internet doesn't agree with me that it was solid, though.
The Mitchells vs. the Machines (2021) One of the first movies we watched this year and probably my favourite movie of the whole year. It's funny and chaotic and heart-warming. It shows the value of family without getting high and mighty over what's normal, all the while providing a stiff middle-finger to the idea of conformity. I love it! The humour is tongue-in-cheek and extremely punny. Both of us were laughing our asses off watching this. I laughed until I cried. It was great.
The World's End (2013) The next movie in the Cornetto trilogy that I had amazingly never seen before, due to me being skepitcal of comedy. It was hilarious. Not as good as Hot Fuzz, but still so funny.
Watchmen (2009) This one was on everybody's lips back when it was new and I overheard many discussions concerning whether it was good or not and how it had dealt with the source material. Somehow I never watched it back then, but it showed up on Netflix this year and so we decided to watch it. Having never read the source material I can't say how it did there, but I really enjoyed the movie. Especially Rorschach (should come as no surprise to anybody).
Zombieland: Double Tap (2019) The original Zombieland was one of the first movies Toni and I watched together as a couple. So when this one showed up on Netflix it was a given that we would watch it. It was fun. It was good. There were a lot of laughs. Especially during the scenes where they meet different versions of themselves. Not as good as the original, but a solid movie.
Tulip Fever (2017) I watched this movie on TV during Christmas, because it was on. I had no idea what it was, but I became weirdly invested in it as I first lazily threw an eye in the direction of the TV and then couldn't stop watching. There wasn't a lot of action or humour, but the storytelling was great and I do enjoy a good story.
Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga (2020) I watched this movie on my own last year and I really liked it. I nagged on Toni to watch it, simply because he tends to enjoy movies starring Will Ferrell even if he doesn't enjoy Eurovision. He wasn't convinced. But then I got to choose a movie for us to watch for my birthday so I decided that we should watch this. I enjoyed it the second time around too. Toni wasn't convinced. But we spent weeks afterwards singing Ja Ja Ding Dong.
Death to 2021 (2021). We started the year by watching Death to 2020, and we finished the year by watching Death to 2021. This one wasn't as great as the first one, but it made us chuckle from time to time. 2021 has been a hell of a ride.
I had been feeling the itch to replay Skyrim for weeks. but I kept ignoring it until the Anniversary Edition released. Thanks, Bethesda, for (like EA) giving me a reason to replay this! :D As part of my own Skyrim anniversary celebration I bought and downloaded the new edition while watching the Anniversary Concert.
I played completely unmodded for the first time in years (since Special Edition released tbh) and it was with both bittersweet nostalgia and amazement that I rediscovered all the bugs and glitches. You'd think that they'd take the time to do some bug fixing while polishing up the game for a new release, especially if said new release is going to break all the mods and fan-made bug patches. But no such luck. I'm just happy I play on PC where I can just bust out some console commands to bypass bugs and solve them manually.
When Anniversary Edition was first announced I read through the official FAQ to get a picture of what the AE would include and what made it different from the other Skyrim releases, and from that I got the idea that Anniversary Edition would be a brand new release. But when release day came I realised that that wasn't the case. For consoles it's a brand new separate game. For PC they released it as a DLC for Special Edition. I'd had the idea that I could keep my Special Edition separate from my Anniversary Edition and thus have one modded game and one un-modded game, but no such luck.
The main difference between AE and SE is that AE includes all the Creation Club content, which is basically paid mods. Since I have never paid attention to the Creation Club before it was all brand-new for me. There are, in total, 74 Creations and all of them are included in the Anniversary Edition.
And man, was it a nostalgia trip!
My favourites were all of the slightly more lengthy questlines: • Forgotten Seasons • Saints and Seducers • The Gray Cowl Returns • Ghosts of the Tribunal • The Cause But basically I also really enjoyed anything that made me go "oh hello, I remember you" from previous ES games (Wraithguard, Sunder, Goldbrand, Shadowrend, Chrysamere, Knights of the Nine...). Umbra was a nice reaquaintance and along with Kaarstag, the Reaper and the Ebony Warrior, one of the toughest enemies in the game.
Forgotten Seasons was completely Dwemer inspired, and I do love everything Dwemer. Solving the puzzles and finding all the pieces to get my Dwarven Crown, and Dwarven Horse (hello, ESO), as well as shutting down the weather machine was very enjoyable and one of the first major Creations that I jumped into on this playthrough.
Saints and Seducers is a series of quest relating to the Shivering Isles DLC from Oblivion. Such a nostalgia trip, but not really made for a low-level character as I found out the hard way. The first Saints camp was pretty close to Whiterun and so I ran over there pretty early in the game and got my ass handed to me on a plate. The enemies hurt like hell, so I resolved to wait to do this questline until I had leveled up a bit, which turned out to be somewhere at the end of the Civil War.
The Gray Cowl Returns was a callback to the Oblivion Thieves Guild, and it was a nice stealth/heist quest that I really enjoyed doing. The reward, of course, was the Gray Cowl of Nocturnal, which I never used because it made all the guards hostile on sight.
Ghosts of the Tribunal was the last CC questline I had left and it was such a Morrowind nostalgia trip, with so many Morrowind items and fashion and weapon styles from the Morrowind game. This questline made me want to pick up Morrowind again. Running around with the cult of Almelexia, killing a cultist of Dagoth Ur and saving the temple from Ash Zombies... My Skyrim character even looked straight out of Morrowind when I was done with this questline! xD
The Cause was the return of the Mythic Dawn from Oblivion. Complete with an Oblivion Gate and a trip to the Deadlands. I hated the Deadlands in Oblivion, to the point where I started to run in the opposite direction if I noticed an Oblivion Gate opening. It was way too repetitive! But for this Creation I ended up being kind of disappointed that it didn't have me run up towers to destroy Sigil Stones. Instead the way to close the opened Oblivion Gate was much more simple. This creation also featured a borderline lore-breaking trip inside an Ayleid ruin. The Ayleids never got as far north as Skyrim, which was firmly Dwemer territory. But they kind of got around it by placing the entrance to the Ayleid ruin far inside a cave system that started in the southern mountains of the Rift. Which would place the Ayleid ruin somewhere in the northern mountains of Cyrodiil... Probably somewhere east of Bruma. I wish this questline were longer, because it felt a little rushed, but it still ended up being one of my favourites.
Everybody talked about the addition of fishing for this edition. I dislike fishing in any game, but I gave it my best effort in Skyrim. The first few fishing quests I completed as intended, by going to a specific location and then fish until I got the different kinds of fish that the quest asked for and then handed it in to the questgiver. But it soon became exactly as mind-numbingly boring as fishing is in any context, and when that happened I turned to the console and just added whatever they asked for to my inventory via console commands and handed in the quest. The only fun thing added by the fishing Creation was the quests concerning crazed mudcrabs. Although the end was kind of disappointing. I wanted something Cthulhu-esque to come out of the Sea of Ghosts and instead it was just a massive spirit mudcrab. Although I guess it was fun to use catapults instead of just peppering the enemy with arrows, and it was kind of fun to watch ridiculous amounts of soldier NPCs get slaughtered by frenzied mudcrabs xD
The farming Creation was kind of fun, but the quest leading up to actually owning a farm and managing it was really just a downer.
I enjoyed the addition of the Wild Horses and especially the unicorn, which gave me all sorts of nostalgia feelings towards Oblivion, and I exclusively used the unicorn after I got it. Even the Dwemer Horse had to take the backseat in favour of the unicorn.
In the Bittercup Creation I chose wrong and ended up with a very short and simple quest that didn't do much in terms of story or content. I read up on it afterwards and honestly, not making a choice at all seems like the best choice in terms of story.
Unholy Vigil was another quest I enjoyed while doing it but the end of it just made it fall flat. Like that's it? We're done? Already? The way to get to the disappointing ending was a lot of fun though. Kind of like a detective story concerning the Vigilants of Stendarr. The start of this quest is a bit buggy though. The Hall of the Vigilants is destroyed after you reach level 10 if you have Dawnguard DLC installed and the letter that starts the quest is originally on a table, but supposed to fall underneath the table... Instead it's stuck inside the table so you kind of have to noclip to get to it. Thanks, Google. Story was awesome. Ending sucked.
There were also so many new houses in AE! Like damn, so many. The first one I used was the Tundra Homestead just next to Whiterun, but it soon became too small. I started to consider building a Hearthfire mansion like usual, but then I came across Hendraheim and used that for the longest time. Until I did the quest Guests for Dinner (which was so obviously a trap) and at the end got the house Bloodchill Manor, which (unsurprisingly) became my favourite Skyrim house ever. And I used that for everything, including the petting zoo added by the Pets of Skyrim Creation. Mystwatch was also really cool and reminded me of the wizard tower house in Oblivion.
In this playthrough I decided to do everything the base game had to offer on top of all the new content. Including all the Ritual Spell quests and all the minibosses. I had done Destruction and Restoration Ritual Spell quests before, but I had never bothered with Conjuration, Illusion or Alteration. I bothered a bit more with them this time around but not enough to get them to max level... Console, here I come. Conjuration was a pretty fun quest. When it comes to minibosses I had fought Karstaag and the Reaper before, though never on the same playthrough, but amazingly I had never fought the Ebony Warrior before. Because he just never bothered showing up during my playthroughs where I got past level 80. He didn't this time either. I jumped around all the hold capitals, waited around, got assaulted by several other spawns, but he just never showed. So I forced him to show up via console so I could do the fight and the last quest I had left. Karstaag is still the hardest miniboss in the game and the only one that actively requires kiting and a stock of healing potions/food and/or restoration magic.
I had a lot of fun playing through Skyrim again and all the new content was definitely worth it. Now it's time to shelve Skyrim for the forseeable future and when I get that itch again the modding community will hopefully be up and running for the AE too :)
I wanted to wait a month after launch before I did this post, because my (limited) experience with MMO launches is that it's always a mess at the beginning, and New World was no different. It's been just over three weeks now and I can't wait any longer.
I played this in the Preview last year and in the Open Beta this year.
After the Preview I was skeptical of the entire game, but the trailer looked soooo good, I couldn't quite give up hope yet. After Open Beta I was hopeful and positive to the game. Granted, it had some issues, but I figured those would just be growing pains like any MMO has just after launch (even WoW and FF14 had those, and let's not even mention the mess that was ESO).
The first week was a mess. The servers were capped at 2000 people each and they had millions wanting to play. It wasn't feasible, and thus New World became Queue World.
Playing on EU my queues were in the 1500-3000 people bracket, unlike the US servers which were in the 10k bracket, so I guess I lucked out on queueing just by being where I am xD But by the next week the queues were gone. It was so weird to be able to log in during prime time and just get straight into the game.
To get rid of the queues they locked servers for new characters, rigorously kicked/banned people who were afk-running against walls, added more servers, and also upped the limit from 2k to 2,2k people in each server. But it worked. In the second week the queues were gone and so were the afk-runners.
Apart from the queueing and some small things I very much enjoyed the game in the beginning and I encountered very few bugs and glitches. For the first 2½ weeks I was in love with the game and couldn't wait until the next time I'd get to play. Unfortunately, as I levelled up and moved from the newbie zones to the more endgame zones I started to notice more and more small things that all added up to make my continued experience miserable. If it wasn't for the Company and my guild mates (both new and oldies from my ESO days) I don't think I would've continues to play for as long as I did.
The game is stunningly beautiful. Graphics and lighting are both amazing. But the skybox sucks. Stars and moon are static. There's a full moon every night. There's no gradual darkening or brightening as the sun goes up and down. It's just boom now it's dark, or boom now it's day. Morrowind in frickin 2002 could handle a proper day/night cycle.
There are no NPC vendors. There's only the auction house and the economies in several servers tanked completely within the first three weeks. Basic mats are needed to craft high level stuff with high level mats so basic mats are sold at outrageous prices while literally everything else isn't worth squat. The crafting system seemed interesting and innovative and unique to start, but it has now become obvious that the pyramid style crafting doesn't really work. There's no use selling any of the useless gear you pick up. Instead you get to salvage them to get repair parts that you nees to be able to repair the gear you habe equipped, and trust me, you'll need it. To be able to fast travel you need a resource called Azoth which you can get as either loot or reward. And you'll want to fast travel because there are no mounts. Everything is taxed. Selling, buying, owning a house, fast travelling... Repairing your gear with repair parts from salvaged gear costs gold.
Questing was fun in the starter zones and the mid-tier zones, but once you got to the endgame zones the fun ended pretty abruptly. The enemies' respawn rates are ridiculous and players rarely manage to kill the mobs in and around an area to safely be able to loot it before the first few mobs have respawned again. And because they respawn so quickly it isn't unusual to get overwhelmed as the group you literally just fought joins the fray with the group you're currently fighting. Even with a high gear score and being several levels higher than the enemies they can still easily overwhelm and kill you. Because in endgame zones, even at 5 levels lower than you the enemies hit like trucks. It forces you to use your precious resources that aren't so easy to come by at the endgame because money is probably the rarest commodity in the game. Unless you're a tank you'll probably dodge a lot, but in the endgame zones the enemies are placed so close together that if you dodge out of reach for one enemy you'll accidentally aggro another. Ad infinitum.
All the questing in the game is still fetch and kill quests, but they're more baked into story so they feel better. That said, after you leave the newbie zones very little is voice acted, and you don't really form a relationship with any of the NPCs. You remember maybe one or two from the starter zones and after that it's just an endless blur of voiceless characters without personality.
The dungeons are stupid. There's no grouping tool so to get a group together you basically just stand around for an hour shouting in the chat. *Flashback to when ESO's dungeon finder didn't work* The first dungeon (Amrine) is very basic without much tactics needed. Don't be an idiot is basically all you need. The second dungeon (Starstone) requires a bit more. But not really tactics. If you focus the boss and just let the adds get caught in any AoE, you're golden. The third dungeon (Depths) is where things get tricky. But the middle boss is harder than the end boss and the only tactic you need for the end boss is to keep an eye out for when to dodge. The dungeons has one annoying mechanic. If you die once your team can revive you. If you die twice you can't be revived and have to respawn at the closest respawn point. Which effectively locks you out of any ongoing boss battle, which will prevent you from updating any quest objective involving defeating that boss. Which means you'll have to go through the dungeon again to finish any quests. Oh and you can't access the dungeon without a key. That you either get when you get a quest for said dungeon, or you have to craft it.
In the endgame there's one world boss that requires a 20 people group to defeat, but you can only access the boss if you have the quest related to the boss. So you can't ask for help from anyone who isn't currently on that quest. And the quest isn't repeatable.
I'm a INT build so logically/traditionally I should be running light armour. Not so in New World, because if you don't run heavy or at least medium you'll be too squishy for PvE. Even healers run medium...
I haven't even talked about the PvP yet, but that's because I haven't done much of it. I've been too busy getting beat up in basic PvE to want to get beat up in PvP. Every time I play nowadays I feel like either the enemies are badly optimised or I just suck. But I've talked to several people who feel the same way about the endgame so maybe it's not me :P
The game starts out so good and I had so much fun that I could easily overlook all the little things. But the little things add up and by the time I was approaching the endgame I couldn't ignore them anymore. The starter zones have recieved so much love and care from the devs, obviously much more than the endgame zones, that you (or at least I) couldn't help but get pulled in. The magic weakens after level 30 and by level 45 you're completely disillusioned. There's no incentive for people to keep playing after level 60. Other MMOs struggle with endgame too, but in New Worls there's basically nothing. There's the PvP wars, I guess. But unless you know someone in the warring company you're unlikely to get a spot in the war.
I want to love this game. I wanted it to be the new game that took the place of ESO. Something new I could play for years. But the way things are now I don't know for how much longer I'll play. The guildies keep me going at the moment.
Two weeks ago Facebook reminded me that it was two years since I went to my last Alice Cooper concert. September 27th, 2019. That was also the last concert I went to before covid hit. And I miss it so badly. Since 2006 I've been to at least one concert pretty much every year (that's including festivals) and somehow the thing I've missed the most while the world was ending was to be pressed against a whole lot of people jumping and screaming to my favourite musicians.
When the world closed in March of 2020 I was still hopeful that I'd get to go to my annual festival that June. How bad could it be, was what most seemed to be thinking. But here we are 1½ years later and I've missed TWO festivals since then, because both 2020 and 2021 got cancelled and I don't even want to think about how many potential concerts there could have been...
The best memories I have from concerts are:
• Lordi in Malmö 2006. My first ever concert and it was just an amazing experience.
• Edguy in Malmö 2009. I was up front to the stage and cried when they played King of Fools.
• Disturbed in Copenhagen 2010. First time seeing them and it was a great show.
• Alice Cooper in Stockholm 2011. My first ever Cooper show and I was so happy.
• Lordi at Sweden Rock Festival 2016. First Lordi show in eight years! I cried when they played Blood Red Sandman.
• Twisted Sister at Sweden Rock Festival 2016. Farewell tour and I was so happy to finally get to see them.
• Sabaton at Sweden Rock Festival 2016. One of the best concerts I've been to.
• Aerosmith at Sweden Rock Festival 2017. I was sitting by the other stage waiting for Edguy and just watched the show on the huge monitors. When they started to play I Don't Wanna Miss a Thing the whole festival area started to sing along whether they were attending the concert or not. It was magical.
I've seen Alice Cooper live five times (2011, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2019). Disturbed, Lordi and Edguy three times each. Within Temptation and Nightwish two times each.
Due to how things were in 2020 and in 2021 a lot of musicians started doing virtual live shows. Lordi was one of the first that I heard of and of course I was there for their Scream Stream. If that counts, then I've seen Lordi four times (and Cooper 2019 wasn't my last concert). I missed both of Within Temptation's and Nightwish's virtual shows due to work.
I can't wait to get back into the concert crowds and fight my way to the front. Can't wait to get pressed against the fence and have my ears blasted by too loud music, while I'm screaming my throat raw and killing all my muscles by jumping and waving and headbanging for two hours straight. It's gonna be great.
And if everything can just keep going in the right direction then the next concert I have planned is an Alice Cooper show in Gävle next year. Seems almost poetic if I can have both my last concert before covid and my first concert after covid be Cooper.
My seen live playlist on Spotify consisting of Lordi, Edguy, Nightwish, Alice Cooper, Marilyn Manson, Slipknot, Disturbed, Children of Bodom, Dir En Grey, Mustasch, All That Remains, Girugamesh, MUCC, DragonForce, Evergrey, In Flames, Lamb of God, Sabaton, Within Temptation, HammerFall, Dark Tranquillity, Avatar, Korn, Motorhead, Soilwork, Amaranthe, Black Sabbath, Rob Zombie, Alter Bridge, W.A.S.P., Arch Enemy, Powerwolf, Motley Crue, Toto, Airbourne, Hardcore Superstar, Thin Lizzy, Helloween, The Ark, The Sounds, Queen, Twisted Sister, The Hellacopters, Avantasia, Blind Guardian, Sixx:A.M., The Struts, Aerosmith, Scorpions, Ratt, Steel Panther, Apocalyptica, Iced Earth, Iron Maiden, Ozzy Osbourne, Stone Sour, Turbonegro, Tarja, In This Moment, Nazareth, Pain, H.E.A.T., The 69 Eyes, Kiss, Def Leppard, ZZ Top, Tenacious D, Amon Amarth, Three Days Grace, Black Stone Cherry, and Indica.
