Game completed: Assassin's Creed Odyssey

When I decided to take a break from the Elder Scrolls Total War mod I started AC Odyssey which I've been curious about for a while. My curiosity peaked when Kassandra showed up in Valhalla. So off I went. 

When I was growing up, and especially as a teenager, I had a very intense interest in Greek mythology and Ancient Greece, so it was a lot of fun to experience that old passion as a living world. Sokrates is just as annoying in-game as he is IRL. Philosophy is not my thing. 

Kassandra, however, was an extremely loveable character and I enjoyed playing her way more than I thought I would. Her entire quest to save her family was really captivating, but I did it the long way around. After I found Myrrine and she said "I'll see you in Sparta" I went off and completed the entire world; every location, every side quest, every available achievement, and even Legacy of the First Blade DLC. And then I went to Sparta to finish the main quest xD She really had to wait a long time. 

Legacy of the First Blade gets a lot of flak for not suiting Kassandra, but she does mention more than once throughout the game that she wishes for a normal life away from mercenary work. And so she tries that. Makes perfect sense in my book. It goes to poop, but sets the stage for Origins (which I'll play at some point). 

I got very attached to Brasidas and was so sad when I couldn't save him. Even googled if it was possible to save him, but it's not. I never liked Alexios and I blame most of it on the fact that I think they gave him the wrong voice. 

As usual I had a lot of fun flirting and sleeping with every available character. Kassandra gets around xD Especially the side quest with the two brothers both vying for her love was a lot of fun to play. And the side quest where literally everything that can go wrong does go wrong is also hilarious to play. 

It took me a while to get used to warring at sea, but once I got the gist it was a lot of fun. And I spent a substantial amount of hours on the seas.

After I finished the main quest and did the side quests that popped after the main quest was completed I decided it was time for Kassandra to face her destiny and started up the Fate of Atlantis DLC. Elysium was a pretty meh experience imo. Iirc there are two tales of how Persephone became Hades's wife and they chose to go with the least flattering one. In the better of the tales both Hades and Persephone were smitten with each other and Hades gave her an apple as a gift, which Persephone then ate as a rebellious act against her mother, Demeter, which bound her to the Underworld forever. But Ubi just up and chose the more well-known version where Hades thinks she's hot, kidnaps her and then forces an apple down her throat so she can't leave. Lovely. Anyway, working with Hekate and Adonis to bring Perspehone down was a lot of fun.

Then came the Underworld and I just loved Hades. His look, his voice, his antics... He's amazing! Every cutscene featuring him had my finger hovering above the screenshot button so I could take as many shots of him as possible ^^; The Underworld was gnarly though, and it's supposed to be so that was good. Meeting Phoibe again was heart-warming. Charon was a cool dude. Kassandra's sense of humour in this dreary place was on-point.

Finally we arrive at Atlantis and it's absolutely beautiful to look at, but there's some really nasty stuff going on. I decided to run around and complete all the places before I did the quests and then do the side quests before the main quests, just to make sure I wasn't missing anything. 

And then the game bugged out on me. After I deposed Atlas the next quest just didn't show up. Tried reloading an older save and redo the whole previous quest, but that didn't get it to work. Tried restarting the game, but the quest didn't pop. Tried restarting my whole computer because sometimes that does the trick, but no dice. Tried verifying my files on Steam, had no effect. Tried fast-travelling back and forth, still no quest. Tried portal-jumping from Atlantis to the Underworld to Elysium to Atlantis, but the quest still refused to pop up. Having exhausted all of my options that didn't require me to restart the whole DLC and lose all of that progress I decided to just watch the end on Youtube. I had about one hour of playthrough left. 190 hours in and 92 out of 93 achievements. Literally everything on every map completed and I can't finish the game. 

I found one old thread on Ubisoft support forums mentioning this problem, but it was from September 2021 and left unsolved. I made a thread on the game's Steam forum and Ubi actually replied to it asking me to verify my game files and provide a video showing the problem. I did all of that and they haven't got back to me yet. It's been three weeks.

So yeah, my amazing stint in Ancient Greece ended as a flop instead of with a bang. Today (well, yesterday now) I decided to give up and uninstall the game. 

Total War shenanigans part 2

So after my last post I took a break from the Elder Scrolls mod and went to play some AC Odyssey. But it crapped out on me in the very last episode of the very last DLC so I decided to fuck that and angrily went back to play Total War.

My issue last time was that I figured I'd somehow shot myself in the foot when I accidentally made Dagon join my side ^^; I did some googling (nothing newer than 2017 ffs) and apparently there's supposed to be a whole script featuring Bruma and the final showdown in IC. But none of that happened. So when I started up the mod again I found the Champion of Cyrodiil and Emperor Martin and had Dagon suicide against them. When that did nothing I took the three other Dremora I had bribed to join me and suicided them too. No continuation of the Oblivion Crisis script and both the Champion of Cyrodiil and Emperor Martin just stood around and did nothing. So I decided to see if me killing them would make the game count as me having defeated the Cyrodiil Empire faction. It did not, but now all the players of the Oblivion Crisis were gone, but the game still continued counting them as living factions. 

This meant that I wouldn't be able to complete the requirements for victory as the Aldmeri Dominion, as one of the requirements was to wipe out the Cyrodiil Empire, and according to the game they were somehow immortal. So I went for victory by domination instead. And started taking over every region in the game. Great Houses Dres and Redoran proved especially annoying and the Kingdom of Daggerfall had a penchant for assassins. I kept murdering their preposterous amount of priests on my territories and they retaliated by assassinating my generals. Unfair, yo! 

By the time I got into Morrowind Dres had obliterated Black Marsh and made a vassal of Hlaalu. Redoran had taken out Dagoth and occupied all of Vvardenfell and were making advances into mainland Morrowind. Telvanni had retreated to Solstheim and Ascadian Isles and kept on their end. To keep the Dunmer at bay I had originally allied myself with Black Marsh and Telvanni, but Dres and Redoran just gave fuck-all about that and continued their respective expansions. 

Kingdom of Daggerfall helped me obliterate the Clan of Forebears and most of Orsinium. Once Forebears were gone, though, I went after Daggerfall. And once Dres obliterated Black Marsh, I went after Dres and their vassal Hlaalu. 

Morthal was an annoying city that kept rioting for no reason I could figure out. Even at 105% happiness they were still rioting like wtf. 

But in the end I took every single region in the game. Masterfully ending the game by stabbing my only remaining ally (the Undead of Volkihar) in the back and taking their island. 

Stranger Things S04

We had waited so long for this season and we were so excited when it finally came around! But ofc we had to finish Black Mirror first, which turned out to be a good thing because we finished volume 1 of season 4 just as volume 2 released. Perfect timing!

This season, though? Amazing! I loved seeing how the three storylines came together in Russia, Hawkins and... er... pizza van. 

We both loved Eddie and I wish he'll somehow be in season 5. Both of us were in denial about anything serious happening to Max until the very last moment. 

And ofc they went the religious route, because it's the 80s and inspired by 80s pop culture so ofc we need a religious nut job in the mix xD How people actually take them seriously, I'll never understand. 

And how has nobody heard of Running Up That Hill before? It's a classic! 

Grey's Anatomy S18

I've been watching this show since it started in 2005 and I was barely 15, I couldn't stop now even if I wanted to and I really don't xD This season took me forever to get into mainly because the last season was really slow, but also because Hayes was out. I really liked Hayes. 

Anyway, Hayes is out and Nick is in, and I had to dig really, really deep to even remember who Nick was.

I'm not a huge fan of the whole Minnesota storyline, and I'm really not a fan of the residency program getting shut down. Ffs everything was going well and then everything went to shit in the blink of an eye. 

Why can't we just let Mer be happy? Just for once? 

Kai is probably the best thing about this entire season. And Jake's performance as Levi is top notch. Favourite resident? Move over, Taryn, Levi's in the house! 

And Addison's back!!! :D

That season finale though? Oof. Everyone just "Fuck this shit I'm out" and left Mer all alone. And it also celebrated 400 episodes of Grey's Anatomy so all the flashbacks just made me cry my eyes out T_T

This season just... Whew!

Black Mirror

We finally got around to watch this series after having heard so much about it. Every episode had us sat like what the fuck, but in a good way, and we could never watch an episode without talking about it first.

So every episode starts out deceptively normal, but the viewer soon realises that it takes place in some not so distant future, becuse the tech they're using doesn't exist yet. 

My favourite episodess are usually connected to social media or personal tech that can only be described as cybernetics. And what I also really like is that a lot of those episodes have small hints that suggest they all take place in the same world. Like that one song.

In season 1 my favourite episode was Fifteen Million Merits, which is about people living closed off from the world spending their days cycling and earning merits and constantly consuming content. The cycling powers... something, and the merits can be used to buy your way out of cycling. But it doesn't really go the way you plan. This episode is the first time that song shows up, and then it just keeps popping up in several episodes throughout the series. 

Season 2 was incredible all around and I can't pick a favourite. Be Right Back is heart-breaking and we're still talking about it. White Bear created a discussion on morals and ethics and none of us saw that twist coming. The Waldo Moment could be contemporary for how it portrays politics, and it's scary how possible, even probable, it all seems. White Christmas is etched into my mind and the tech used for the interrogation comes back in another episode. Jon Hamm is in this one and he's just as amazing as usual. The eye-camera tech in this episode is pretty terrifying. 

Season 3 is also incredible all around, but if I have to pick favourites I'd go with Playtest and Hated in the Nation. Playtest is the most horror-ish episode of them all and that twist at the end is perfect. Hate in the Nation is pretty much a crime thriller, but with a tech twist and some environmental disaster warnings in it. That said... The social media aspect of Nosedive was really interesting and also kind of scary. Shut Up and Dance could be completely contemporary, probably the weakest story this season but still so good. The digital afterlife of San Junipero was a really cool concept. And finally, that twist in Men Against Fire was on point. 

In season 4 my favourite was hands-down Black Museum. Mainly because it takes elements from a whole lot of episodes and makes something new with it and I love when they do that. USS Callister is a pretty terrifying mix of online-gaming and digital cloning with a Star Trek twist. I laughed so much. Arkangel and Crocodile were both really on point with the scary future tech. Hang the DJ was cool and we talked about that one for a couple days. Metalhead was probably the weakest story of the season, but it was by no means bad. 

In season 5 they dropped the ball. Smithereens was probably my favourite episode, but all three stories in this season were pretty weak. Striking Vipers puts a future tech twist to VR gaming that didn't do it for either of us. Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too felt like a Disney Channel movie from 15 years ago. Smithereens deals with the attention-span deficit everyone suffers from due to social media, and it got a bit preachy. 

There seems to be a new season in the works, which I'm looking forward to. I just hope they can get back to the brilliance that was season 2-4. 

Sweden Rock Festival 2022

At 4.15AM on Tuesday morning we started packing up the car and at 4.30 we drove off to pick up the last person. Around 5AM we finally rolled out of the city and headed south towards a week of fun, music and friends. If it wasn't for covid this would probably have been mine and bf's 9th time at Swedish Rock Festival, instead it's our 7th time. The best part about this festival is how happy and carefree everyone is, and that ambience was extra strong this year. AFter two years of not being able to come here everyone was so exalted to be back. The crowd was happy and merry even with the not-so-perfect weather and even the bands on stage seemed extra excited to be back on stage facing the screaming crowds. It was amazing. Even more amazing than usual. 

We kept the tickets that were supposed to be for 2020, felt a bit odd to use two-year-old tickets to exchange for our wristbands, but hey! Thanks for keeping them valid for these two years!

Going to Sweden Rock Festival

We arrived around lunch and started building our camp. We're always in the same spot on the same camping. And it was so great to see all of the people again! We usually oonly meet once a year at SRF and two years without seeing each other was just too damn long! In the two years since we could last see each other the camp had gone from being (mostly) in our 20s to being a whole bunch of 30+ people, several of whom had become parents in the meantime. Crazy!

After the camp was built, bf and I went to exchange our tickets to wristbands, buy this year's merch and procure soda to make rum&coke in camp. Our mission was successful!

Wednesday was the first proper day of the festival, but me and bf had no bands we really had to see until in the evening when we went inside the concert area and watched Raubtier. I don't know a lot of songs by them and the one I know the best, they didn't play, but damn the energy they brought and the crowd had just made the whole experience magical! 

Thursday was our busiest day! We started the day with Alestorm. After a short break with food and drink in the camp we went back inside. Everyone but me was going to see Devin Townsend, but I went to see Eluveitie and that's probably the best concert of the year. The band was so extatic to be back on stage and the crowd was so excited to be there! It created a magical experience where I spent equal amounts of time jumping, screaming, clapping, singing, and thrashing around in the mosh pit. Eluveitie also taught me I'm too old for mosh-pits now. Everything hurt afterwards! xD

In the evening we went back inside to see Dropkick Murphys, Volbeat and the one band I had looked forward to for years! Nightwish! To my eternal sorrow I was only 14 when the band broke with Tarja and so I never had a chance to see them live with her, but I saw them twice with Anette and this was my first time with Floor. And wow, did she deliver! The whole band did. It was amazing and the experience was only marred by the guy who kept jumping like crazy (both into me and on me) every time they played a song newer than Imaginaerum. On the other hand, every song older than Imaginaerum had me scream-singing in his ear so I guess we're even xP

Friday was a calm day spent mostly in the camp where we got to partake in the traditional activity of "decorating" the first person to pass out in the camp. In the evening we went to see In Flames, which, surprisingly, I haven't seen before. Surprsing considering how many times they've been at SRF and Metaltown. 

On Saturday we were all pretty miserable after four days camping and drinking and head-banging. All around happy, but oh so done with sleeping in tents. That morning we were invited on a backstage tour of the festival thanks to one of our camp members being an ambassador for Hi-Fi Klubben. It was a very cool tour and we got to go up backstage on the second largest stage while Honeymoon Suite were playing. And we got to take a look at the backstage area where the bands hang out. Nothing so glamorous as a green-room on a festival, but it was still a pretty cool experience. 

We decided to leave on Saturday evening instead of Sunday morning. So for our last trip inside the festival area of 2022 we saw Hardcore Superstar and then Within Temptation. I've seen both of those bands before, three times each. But they were just as good. Hardcore Superstar has some crazy on-stage energy. Within Temptation is always extremely powerful. If I could sing like Sharon I'd never shut up. 

The band that would close the entire festival was Guns 'n' Roses. None of us are super fans of the band, and some of our camp members who've been to SRF more times than us told us about the last time Guns were at SRF and they didn't go up on stage until they were almost an hour late. They wanted to see the first few songs and give Guns a chance to redeem themselves. We decided to get in the car instead and start the 7-hour roadtrip back north. While in the car I kept talking via Messenger to the people who stayed for a bit, and found out Guns were 30 minutes late to go on stage this time. Our friends didn't even stay to hear one song. Such a shitty attitude from Guns to end an otherwise amazing festival. 

We started the drive around 10.30pm and arrived home around 5.30am. That shower after you come home after a week of camping is divine. Sleeping in your own bed is like a piece of heaven. 

Going home from Sweden Rock Festival

For more pictures and videos check out my Instagram :)

Atlas Rock 2022 @Gävle

On Friday we got on the train to Stockholm and from there changed to a train to Gävle. Neither of us had ever been to Gävle and so it was nice to discover a new city, except for the fact that as soon as we stepped off the train the sky opened up and poured heavy rain on us, which was soon joined by thunder and lightning. We sheltered in the station building for a while, to see whether the rain would calm down, before we decided to brave the weather and find the bus to the hotel. We found the bus stop with ten minutes to spare and a nice little bridge to hide from the rain under. The bus trip took about 10 minutes to the hotel where we checked in without issue. We got up to our room on the top floor (cosy forest view) to discover the most extensive staff welcome gift I've ever seen. We unpacked and chilled for a bit before we went back down to have dinner at the hotel restaurant. Burger for me, steak for him. After dinner we went back to our room to freshen up and then we asked the reception to call us a taxi to the city centre. We had googled to try to find a rock bar in the city and the only thing we found was this weekend only thing at an otherwise mainstream place. So we went there but couldn't find it. Asked the bartender who told us that they closed down the rock bar part of the establishment after the basement flooded some nine months ago. Somewhat disappointed we decided to stay there anyway and have some drinks and just chill. Around 10pm we left to find a taxi and return to the hotel. Some channel zapping on the TV later we both went to bed. 

After an amazing breakfast we went up to our room to chill a bit, have a nap, and start to get ready for the day. Just after lunch time I went back down to reception and asked them to call us a taxi for 2.30pm to go to the festival area. We got there, exchanged our tickets for wristbands, got patted down, and then we were IN! First festival and concert since 2019 and we were both feeling it. 

Not too long after we got there we realized something was wrong. The band that was supposed to be on stage at 3pm (Lucifer) didn't come on stage until 3.30pm and there was no explanation as to why. Worse yet was that they offered to information on what would happen next. Would they try to regain the lost 30 minutes? Would they ask the bands to shorten their gigs? Would they postpone someone to the next day? By the time Ugly Kid Joe got on stage they were around an hour delayed. And I decided to call the taxi company and push the pick-up time for our pre-booked taxi back to the hotel that night from 00.45am to 1.15am. Just in case. 

The first show we properly attended without walking off was Uriah Heep. Neither of us knew more than one song by them (Easy Livin'), but damn did they have stage presence, and damn could that old man sing! 

Next up was Powerwolf. Toni was super excited to see them live for the second time, and I was also really looking forward to my first time. They were great! Amazing even! I knew and/or recognized all of the songs they played even if I didn't know the lyrics to most of them (aside from a few words here and there), but the band were all amazing at getting the crowd going and making us feel a part of the performance. Perfect!

Next in line was Black Label Society. Neither of us particularly care about Black Label Society and feet were getting tired so we decided to have a sit-down in the serving area while we waited for the last act of the day. 

And then it was finally time. My sixth Alice Cooper concert. The entire reason I discovered this festival. My whole reason for going to a town 200 km away over a weekend. And I can't really put into words how absolutely stoked I was to see him live again and how happy I got when he walked out on stage and started singing. I love his entire stage persona, and his music, his theatrics, his singing voice... Everything is perfect to me. I was scream-singing along with every song, and I loved how the entire crowd sang along to No More Mr Nice Guy, Bed of Nails, Hey Stoopid, He's Back, I'm Eighteen, Poison, Billion Dollar Babies and School's Out entirely unprompted. It was magical. I had a blast. 

After the concert was over I left with a shot back, aching feet, sore throat, ringing ears, numb palms, a stupid grin, and a solid reminder why I love concerts. 

I woke up today with a medley of Poison, Bed of Nails and Fallen in Love stuck in my head on a loop. After more hotel breakfast we packed up our room, checked out and headed to the train station. Throughout the entire train ride to Stockholm I was listening to Alice Cooper songs and updating IG with pictures and highlights and checking out other people's pictures using the hashtag for the festival. Tired but happy. We're back in business. Live music has returned!

Here's a playlist I made on the setlist of Cooper's concert! Every song in the order he played them! Enjoy!

Trailer for his 2019 tour (I saw him on the Stockholm date) to give an idea of what the gig was like :3

Total War shenanigans

I was going to play Thrones of Britannia, but it ended up just annoying me. No matter the faction I started with I always got assaulted by an enemy army more than twice the size of anything I could even manage financially at that point. Lost more than one of the few zones I had in the very beginning (again no matter the faction). All this basically due to the fact that the game had already decided who your allies and vassals and enemies were before you even started. And after that it just became a game of playing catch-up to an AI that seemed to have played halfway through the game already whereas I was just getting started. 

I like to take my time. I want to start out just building things. Build my towns. Build my armies. Build my coffers. Take a couple of rebel settlements along my borders. And then bam! launch my armies in every direction at the same time and come upon every faction like a wave and disintegrate them. But in this game I had no chance to do any building. Not only because the enemy armies came and stole half of my zones, but also because the timer for recruiting and building was too damn long. Everything took way longer than it needed to for no obvious reason. 

Instead of immediately dropping it I decided to mod it. I went to the Steam workshop, which was admittedly pretty inadequate. But I found a few mods that seemed to be what I was looking for. A few balancing things, without being a total overhaul. 

I gave the game two more attempts as two different factions and noticed the mods didn't do much of a difference. 

At this point I had installed the latest main game; Three Kingdoms, but I was so annoyed with Thrones of Britannia that I decided to just go fuck it.

And so I returned to my favourite ever Total War game; Medieval 2. I've completed campaigns as Venice, Milan, France, England and Holy Roman Empire before. But since I hadn't yet completed a campaign on this version of the game I didn't have all the factions available to me. So I decided to go with England. 

Medieval 2 is one of the few Total War games that has a cheat console. One of my favourite things to do is to recruit a shitload of diplomats and send them out into the world and with my unlimited money (cheat code) I'd let them buy settlements and bribe generals until a faction was left with nothing but their capital, faction leader and faction heir. Those that can't be bought or bribed. 

Of course I'd also do the traditional fighting and beseiging with my own armies and generals. The most nerve-wrecking wars of the campaign this time was my last war against Hungary (when it was pretty much just me, Sicily, The Papal States and Hungary left on the map). Those poor cities were beseiged so many times and switched hands every couple rounds (Budapest/Vienna/Bucharest/Constantinople). No wonder the people rioted, revolted and threw us out *cough* Budapest *cough* (once Hungary, once me); and my war against the Timurids. When they showed up late in the game I had taken over most of the middle eastern parts of the map and was slowly working my way up into Russia and was just waiting for the Byzantine Empire to backstab me so I could devour them. The Timurids showed up much like the Mongols and started to just sack settlements without settling in them. I sent a horde of diplomats and assassins after their nomadic group of armies and the generals I didn't bribe into joining me I killed with my assassins. When the Timurids finally settled we were in full out war due to all my assassins and I was hard pressed to keep my settlements in Russia and Ukraine/Moldova. 

Hungary killed the most of my generals. I had two fleets on the way from Europe to the Middle East transporting seven generals because I had way too many generals in Europe and not enough in the Middle East. Hungarian fleets attacked and attacked and attacked my poor fleets and finally sank them before I even reached Greece. Killing seven generals in almost one fell sweep. Middle East had to keep managing without generals. And I bought three of Hungary's settlements as revenge. 

I always keep playing this game even after I've technically won the campaign. I still have turns left to use. So I play until I run out of turns. When I finished my turns in this campaign the Mongols had one settlement, the Timurids had two, Russia had one, the Moors had one, Sicily had two, Hungary had six, the Papal States had five, and the rest belonged to me :3

After I had finished the campaign on Medieval 2 I was leaning towards starting Three Kingdoms, but instead I downloaded and modded Medieval 2 with a complete overhaul mod that I first heard about a couple years ago. The Elder Scrolls: Total War. Since it's modded on Medieval 2 it's an engine I'm 100% familiar with and when I managed to load it up and start playing I was just giddy

I decided to go with the Aldmeri Dominion as my faction and the 3rd Era as my time and holy shit this mod is so well done. So much going on! So many things possible! If you take over Rimmen and build a specific building you can recruit the Tsaesci left there by the Akavir. If you take over all of Valenwood and build an altar in either Falinesti, Elden Root or Silvenar you can start the Wild Hunt and ally yourself with Hircine. Mannimarco shows up pretty early on and you can choose  to ally with him which will give you the option to dig up graves in every settlement and use them for necromancy to bolster your ranks with skeletons, liches, draugr etc. If you build a specific building in a port in Summerset, Valenwood or Elsweyr you can ally yourself with the Maormer. I did all of those things.

I even allied myself with Hircine so hard that he was adopted into my royal family, got married and had babies xD

The winning conditions for the long campaign in this game are pretty extensive, but I was well on my way there. I had taken over all of Valenwood, Anequina, and Pelletine. I had the Empire on the run and had taken over all their settlements, but the Emperor was on the run and couldn't be found so couldn't end the Empire, and I was slowly working my way into Skyrim and also taking over settlements from the Clan of Forebears. I was allied with the Clans of Black Marsh and the House of Dagoth, and then...

The Oblivion Crisis happened. You can choose before the game starts whether you want the Oblivion Crisis to happen or not. I decided I wanted it, but I thought I'd have more time. Out of seemingly nowhere I was suddenly thrown out of Kvatch, which became a Hordes of Oblivion settlement, and armies from Oblivion showed up on several of my doorsteps. They took Shimmerene and started to go from Kvatch towards the Imperial City, Anvil and Arenthia. They also showed up in Morrowind next to the Velothi mountains, among the forts on the Empire side of the same mountains, and in the middle of Elsweyr. Suddenly all my armies were hard pressed to repel the invaders. I managed to get Shimmerene back (but lost royal family member Ancano in the process) and assassinated and bribed my way through a bunch of armies, and yet I couldn't get Kvatch back no matter how many armies I threw at it. Martin and the Champion of Cyrodiil showed up as fully decked out generals outside Cloud Ruler Temple, but they were no help at all as they just stood there doing nothing. And in the midst of all this the Nerevarine prophecy was fulfilled xD Messed up timeline!

I got pretty sick of throwing all my guys at Kvatch so decided to take a break and play something else. It was only during that break that I realised I may have shot myself in the foot. The notification you get when the Oblivion Crisis starts says to defeat Mehrunes Dagon and repel the invaders. I was working hard at repelling them... But I also managed to bribe Dagon to join my side. Which means I can't defeat him. I may have to use him as the general of my repeated attempts to take back Kvatch and maybe he will be killed by his own hordes...

But that's a problem for when I come back to Elder Scrolls :) I'm nowhere near done with this mod, but I had to take a break. 

Doctor Who S13

This is probably the best season Jodie has done for Doctor Who. Too bad it was her last proper season. 

The entire six-episode season spans the same storyline without interruptions. It starts out confusing as there are several enemies, characters, storylines and timelines seemingly happening separately but they all come together at the end to form one giant cohesive story and it's brilliant. 

I'm still not a fan of the whole Timeless Child story and I kind of wish Russell T Davies will retcon the whole thing. 

The Village of Angels episode could've touched more on and built upon the fan theory that Weeping Angels are disgraced Time Lords. It kind of grazed it, but there could've been so much more. It's been a fan theory since Tennant's last special End of Time where Time Lords were standing in the Weeping Angel pose behind the Lord President. Just make the theory canon, goddammit!

Otherwise? Absolute banger of a season. Dan is an amazing new companion and I love seeing him with Yaz. 

AND THE RETURN OF UNIT! I was so excited when they mentioned Lethbridge-Stewart in the 1967 episode! I was hoping they'd bring in an actor to portray the late great Nicholas Courtney as a young Lethbridge-Stewart as he looked in Classic Doctor Who, but no such luck. He just got a mention. 1968's Web of Fear episode is Lethbridge-Stewart's first Doctor Who appearance :3

Arcane S01

This show...

I had heard it was good, but damn...

It's breath-takingly amazingly awesome!

I don't play LoL. I have never played LoL. Couldn't care less about LoL. But that doesn't matter when it comes to the show. The story, characters and universe get introduced and represented very well on their own without the crutch that is the game. If the game title wasn't on the show's title card then nobody would have guessed the show belonged to the same universe as the game. 

The first few episodes before the time-skip foreshadow a lot of darkness to come, but the foreshadowing doesn't even begin to cover it. 

But the characters are oh so amazing, and characters I thought I'd hate ended up being some of my faves. Silco, Viktor, Jinx... The darker and morally grey characters ended up my faves (so not a surprise in hindsight)

Not much else I can say without spoiling the whole thing. But it's perfect. Animation is on point. Voice-acting is top notch. It's probably the best thing I've seen so far this year. 

Fan made music video below contains spoilers.

My last 5 books: One good thing in a sea of meh

1. Frostbitna, av Lena Ollmark. Det är fem år sen jag läste förra delen av Firnbarnen och den här har antagligen suttit i min bokhylla lika länge. Jag gillar skarpt hur kusliga alla böckerna är och flera gånger blev den här delen så pass kuslig att jag satt med rysningar. Jag kommer aldrig se nattfjärilar på samma sätt igen. Frostbitna utforskar ursprunget till ondskan och barnen (speciellt Natta) tar reda på vad som hände för att lärarinnan skulle hamna där hon hamnade. Jag uppskattar hur författaren skriver barnen. De är tolv år gamla och hon gör det så tydligt att de står med ena foten i tonåren och den andra kvar i barndomen. De vill så gärna bli tagna på allvar av de vuxna i sin närhet och inte bli sedda som "bara barn", samtidigt som de kräver stöd av sina äldre. Barnen beskriver den nya läraren Viktor som så mycket äldre än dem, men samtidigt som mycket yngre än de andra lärarna, vilket får mig att tro att Viktor inte ens är trettio år än och hans beteende genom hela boken är något som jag verkligen kan relatera till. Natta försöker desperat upprätthålla sin image som den duktiga, Teddy försöker desperat att bli sedd som en person utöver det vanliga, och Leo försöker desperat att bryta från sin ligistimage. De är barn halvvägs ur barndomen och författaren beskriver de så väl. Teddys suck och stön över att de vuxna inte förstår är något som jag fortfarande kan relatera till. Under bokens gång får läsaren "höra" diverse olika spökhistorier och de hänger alla ihop med ondskan. Jag läste den här boken mitt i natten med minusgrader utomhus och jag rekommenderar starkt att alla gör likadant. 

2. The Shape of Water, by Guillermo del Toro & Daniel Kraus. Four years ago I saw the trailer for the movie and thought it looked cool so decided to pick up the book. I still haven't seen the movie. Not sure I want to now. As much as I love the creature and his childish amazement throughout the book, it doesn't take away from the fact that this book is entirely predictable and full of terrible people. Strickland is the worst, but it isn't his fault. It's obvious that he suffers from several layers of severe untreated PTSD that's slowly making him lose his mind completely. Reading about Lainie made me worried her stupidity was catching. She's a sheltered housewife yearning for independence. I can get behind that. But not when her sheltered-ness leaves both innocence and naiveté behind and just rushes forward to dumb. Not sure if she's a result of her times or if she's just *that* dumb. Zelda mostly makes me sad. She has settled throughout her entire life and she can't seem to stop. I really wanted to like Elisa, her being the protagonist and all, but everything about her was predictable and that predictability made it so that she had no personality. She liked shoes. Preposterous shoes. The ending? Saw that coming from a mile away.

3. Pottungen, av Anna Laestadius Larsson. Det är flera år sen jag läste Barnbruden, men varje del i den här serien är tillräckligt fristående för att det inte ska vara några problem. Den här andra delen i trilogin berättar om händelserna efter Gustav IIIs död. Gustav III hade gjort sig själv enväldig, och efter honom följde en rad av lynniga kungar, och som vanligt är Sophie och Charlotta mitt i smeten utan att kunna  påverka någonting. När jag var klar med boken kändes det som om ingenting alls hade hänt under hela boken. Ingenting hände, men på ett intressant sätt. Om Barnbruden var uppkallad efter Charlotta och hade henne i fokus, så var Pottungen uppkallad efter Johanna och hade henne i fokus. Och jag kan inte bry mig mindre om Johanna. Eller Nils. Filip gör mig bara irriterad. Vad är poängen med den lilla familjen alls? Boken var lättläst och gick relativt fort att ta sig igenom. Men det var dödfödd läsning. 

4. Räfvhonan, av Anna Laestadius Larsson. Sista boken och tydligt uppkallad efter Sophie som står i fokus. Sophie är en sån som gärna gnäller men som inte like gärna försöker göra någonting åt problemet. Charlotta försöker göra något åt problemet och blir skrattad rakt upp i ansiktet. Trevligt, Axel. Den här boken berättar om startskottet för den svenska omvälvningen från ståndssamhället till arbetarsamhället. Det är tydligt att den gustavianska adeln fruktade att det skulle gå lika illa för dem som för den franska adeln bara dryga trettio år tidigare under den franska revolutionen, och visst blir det farligt för dem. Speciellt för Axel men han gjorde sig själv till en vandrande måltavla genom att vara en ständig påminnelse om franska revolutionen och därmed en ständig påminnelse att folket kan ställa sig över överheten. Författaren har ändrat slutet på Axels historia och flikat in Nils där. Men det var väl ett ganska påtvingat slut för Nils för att räta ut historien. Räfvhonan var bättre än Pottungen, och den innehöll mer action, men samtidigt kändes hela läsupplevelsen väldigt... meh. 

5. The Orange is the New Black, by Piper Kerman. I only picked this up because I loved the TV show. But compared to the show the book was very mediocre. I enjoyed reading it, but it was nowhere near the level of the show. The book was pretty impersonal and it was clear that Kerman tried to describe it all in as general a manner as she could manage, which meant that a lot of the people, places and happenings lacked personality and character. Time and time again she repeats how lucky she was/is and it gets pretty repetitive. This is by no means the common experience of a prison and she makes a tremendous effort to point that out. Everything is from her perspective (and understandably so) but she is a clear outsider in this world and so her perspective isn't a reliable description of prison life. This book is just too smooth for the places and people it deals with, and it's flat.