Saturday, 29 March 2025

Game completed: Avowed (twice!)

I was very excited for this game. Partly because it was Obsidian, partly because I really enjoyed The Outer Worlds, partly because it reminded me of Dragon Age, and partly because it looked hella cool!

I've seen so many people saying Avowed is just The Outer Worlds but fantasy, but as I played it I got more Dragon Age vibes than Outer Worlds vibes. Outer Worlds is absurd and humoristic with a dark undertone. Avowed isn't like that. The darkness isn't an undertone, it's prevalent and everywhere, any humor is just to defuse serious situations. Threats of famine and invasion with subsequent subjugation are imminent and very real, on top of that there's a plague decimating the population. 

Playing through Avowed I could definitely see that it had the same devs as Outer Worlds, but Avowed is in no way a carbon copy of Outer Worlds in a new skin. 

So, the story. You're a Godlike from the Aedyran Empire sent to the Living Lands to investigate a plague called the Dreamscourge. You're sent as an Imperial Envoy by the Emperor personally, to see whether this plague he's hearing of will hinder the plans to incorporate the Living Lands into the Empire. The people living in the Living Lands are not fans of the upcoming Imperial annexation and there are a lot of rebels and opposing forces going around. As you follow in the wake of the plague you become entwined with the locals and the politics of the Living Lands, and the Dreamscourge has a deeply personal revelation in store for you too.

For my very first playthrough I got as far as the end of the second zone. The big thing that happens there shocked me so much I had to look up whether it was possible to have it end differently. And it was. That's also when I discovered that I had missed a whole heap of stuff. So I decided to restart the entire thing. 

The next playthrough I played all the way to the end and once I got there I immediately started another playthrough to make different choices and get some achis I didn't get the first time around. I think I prefer how this last playthrough turned out. 

The major choices have major repercussions. As it should be.

For my first complete playthrough I played Wizard class. I spent the majority of my time running around with a wand in one hand and a shield in the other :3 All the wand waving made me think of Hogwarts Legacy tbh. 

For my second playthrough I was a Rogue. The game allows for two weapon load-outs and I had bow in one and sword and shield in the other. There was an achi for parrying with a shield, hence all the shields, also I suck at timing things, do the math. 

I absolutely loved all of the companions. Marius took some getting used to and a lot of work to break through his walls, but my heart ached for him once I discovered why he had those walls at all. Giatta and Yatzli are my girls. I loved running around with an all girl team with those two. 

To nobody's surprise, though, Kai *cough* Garrus *cough* is my favourite. Avowed doesn't have much in the way of romance, and that's fine, but there's one instance where you can tell Kai that you like him and then the end slide shows them together afterwards. Warm, fuzzy feeling :3

I fell to my death misjudging a jump more than I died in combat xD Climbing is dangerous.

After having played through Avowed two and a half times I still didn't feel done with the world. So I went and got Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, both of which take place in the same world as Avowed. 

Monday, 24 March 2025

I replayed all of Starfield for Shattered Space DLC

When Shattered Space released I was deep inside Dragon Age The Veilguard, so it wasn't until very late last year that I finally picked up Starfield again. And then played nothing but for over two months. At the point of writing this it's been almost a month since I stopped playing, but I've been distracted from blogging. 

So I wasn't all that happy with my original character which brought me to the decision to simply replay the entire game from the beginning with a new character to eventually play the DLC, rather than do it on my old character. For this playthrough I also added a bunch of mods, and if you know me it's mostly UI changes and added questlines, nothing that changes the game too much. Same deal when I mod Skyrim. 

So I made a new character and started my journey, went through the entire main quest until the point of no return, all side quests, companion quests, mod quests etc, before I jumped into the DLC. Doing this was probably a really great choice because going through Shattered Space as a worshipper of the Great Serpent was eye-opening and there were so many dialogue options related to that single trait which wouldn't have been available if I wasn't devoted to the Great Serpent. And of course I had Andreja with me the whole time I was playing this DLC.

The Oracle starstation was hell. Not because it was bad but because I really really hate the no grav environments. I hate navigating them and I hate dealing with weapon recoil in them during battle. But aside from that what happened at the Oracle starstation was pretty cool and definitely invited more questions and, to me, incentive to find out more. So off we go to the Va'ruun homeworld.

Va'ruun'kai is crazy beautiful, though. With it's pink/purple sky and ebony-like creatures. I was in awe throughout most of time there. That promo picture of a citadel? It's really real. It really looks like that and it's so pretty *w* The new grenades you can make with the remains of the new Vortex enemies are really cool, and generally I enjoyed the new enemies and the reasons for how they came to be. The Promised were nice little mini bosses (or just really tough enemies) scattered throughout the world.

The main quest of the DLC then has you complete a pilgrimage followed by being accepted by each of the Houses. So, so, so many parallells to the Morrowind main quest omg. Once all of that was out of the way most of the main quest would be completed, but it should have given you incentive to explore the area and pick up a bunch of sidequests which give you more on the people and culture of the Va'ruun'kai, which in turn gives you background for how did we get to this point?! There are some real choice and consequence sprinkled in there. You can flood an entire farm as the end result of one quest or choose to save the farm, but then you'll have to stick to the status quo in the place you're at, which uuuuh... probably isn't good in the long run. Which is the lesser evil? Up to you.

The DLC has multiple endings, the impacts of which aren't readily noticeable in true Bethesda fashion. Which ending you get is up to you and the implication of each of them are some pretty great changes for the Va'ruun as a whole. 

Throughout the main story you'll get to interact with the Speaker, and each and every one of those interactions gave me strong Dagoth Ur vibes. There's really so much Morrowind in this DLC. Generally, the Va'ruun is just how they inserted Elder Scrolls into the Starfield universe. They worship the Great Serpent (that's just Satakal) and their society is run by Houses (that's just Resdayn). Not to mention that the name of the Va'ruun Ambassador in New Atlantis is Bal'Mor. Balmora. All Elder Scrolls clues. There's a lot more, but you get the idea. I really wanted to post a Va'ruun prayer or chant to the Great Serpent to pick it apart with Elder Scrolls lore, but I can't find a written version and I don't fancy watching a bunch of Youtube videos in the hopes of finding one so we'll have to make do without it. Why doesn't every game have a UESP?

After I finished the DLC I decided to play enough that I unlocked the last few achievements I was still missing. One of them was to get to level 100. I was around level 85 at the time and figured I could just do mission board things until I got to 100, but that became really repetitive really fast. So I went through the Unity and started all over again in NG+. And then I continued playing way past level 100 while waiting for Avowed to drop. 

Unfortunately, my Steam installation corrupted halfway through this playthrough, when I was mostly done with Va'ruun'kai, and I lost almost all of my screenshots. 

Sunday, 23 March 2025

Ghosts S01-03

We stumbled upon this show on Netflix and thought it looked fun. It was so much fun! Netflix only had the first two seasons, but we found the third season on a different streaming platform so all good.

So the show is about a young married couple. The wife inherits an old mansion from a relative and the couple decides to move in there and make it a B&B. Only issue is that the mansion is very haunted, which the couple are blissfully unaware of until the wife has a near-death experience and comes out of it able to see and talk to ghosts. Chaos ensues.

I adore Isaac and Sasappis. 

Friday, 28 February 2025

Squid Game S02

Finally we watched the second season! It wasn't as fantastic as the first season (when is it ever?), but it was still really good and the stakes seem higher even though the game is still mostly the same.

Can't believe Gi-hun really thought all the games would be the same as the last time around. How did it never occur to him that they'd switch it up so he wouldn't have any insights to share? But tbf I didn't see it coming that the boat's captain was part of the game so eeeeehhh...

I really enjoy a lot of the characters this time around and I hope more of them survive and it won't be like last time when Gi-hun walked out the only survivor.

Yet that riot at the end doesn't look promising for everyone's survival. Can't wait for the third season!!

Wednesday, 26 February 2025

From S01-03

We picked up this show on a whim because the trailer looked interesting and it turned out to be so good.

So the premise is that people seemingly randomly arrive to a town with surroundings that you can't leave. Once you're there you can't get out. If you try to drive out you'll somehow end up in a circle and right back in town where you started. During the night there are monsters that come out to eat you. They look just like smiling friendly people until you get close enough and then they're just monsters with too many teeth who'll disembowel you and eat your insides. Lovely stuff. 

The first season follows a newly arrived family and their issues with accepting that they can't leave all the while figuring out more about the place. The appointed sheriff, Boyd, has been in town for quite a while and is on a similar journey to find out how the place even functions. 

The second season follows in much the same vein and towards the end of it we found it has become pretty repetitive that every new thing they try is met with eventual failure. However, the third season is when shit goes down. Every single episode was a rollercoaster and that season finale... omfg. 

Just as with Resident Alien we found the show on Netflix, but Netflix only had the first two seasons so then we had to go on a quest to see if we could find the third season anywhere. We found it on a separate streaming service, provided by one of the ordinary TV broadcasters. Signed up and paid for a month to finish the show, only to find out that despite paying this streaming service has ad breaks several times through a single episode. It's just like TV ._.

Anyway, great show. Can't wait for season four :3

Tuesday, 14 January 2025

My Top 20 Most Played Games

1. The Elder Scrolls Online (~2500 hours)

2. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (1568 hours)

3. Dragon Age Inquistion (605 hours)

4. Immortal Diaries (353 hours)

5. Starfield (289 hours)

6. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (281 hours)

7. Red Dead Redemption 2 (277 hours)

8. Assassin's Creed Valhalla (258 hours)

9. Merge Mansion (225 hours)
I enjoy idle gaming lol

10. Cyberpunk 2077 (220 hours)

11. Fallout 4 (207 hours)

12. Total War: Medieval II (201 hours)
The listed hours are actually mainly the Elder Scrolls overhaul mod... ^^; I played this extensively outside of Steam back in 2007/08 though!

13. Dragon Age Origins (200 hours)

14. Assassin's Creed Odyssey (192 hours)

15. Fallout 76 (176 hours)

16. Fire Emblem: Three Houses (175 hours)

17. Hogwarts Legacy (155 hours)

18. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (154 hours)

19. Mass Effect: Andromeda (139 hours)

20. Dragon Age 2 (128 hours)

Monday, 30 December 2024

My last 5 books: Blood and magic

1. The Forgotten Beasts of Eld, by Patricia A. McKillip. I have never ever heard of this book, yet it's marketed as a classic. It read like an old tale, sort of stilted and very proper language. The characters felt unfinished to me like their motivations and personalities weren't properly executed. They were more like embodiments of tropes or storytelling stereotypes rather than people, and I didn't actually care for any of them. The ending seemed like a fairytale ending; after the climax of the story and all that fighting and the conflicts people were just happy together again. This book didn't make me feel anything.





2. The Sea of Monsters, by Rick Riordan. This second Percy Jackson book was really cool and promises even more cool things to come! I like how he made use of the mythology surrounding the Bermuda Triangle in this book, as well as introducing Cyclopses and Hippocampi. If they weren't just kids I'd totally ship Percy with Annabeth. Tyson is really, really sweet and I liked how Percy finally accepted him and took him fully under his wing rather than treating him like some useful but annoying appendix. And omg I want to punch Clarisse. She's so stupid she makes me inwardly groan. I'm excited for the next one!




3. Broken Homes, by Ben Aaronovitch. The fourth Rivers of London book and I feel like barely anything at all happened until the last few pages. Most of the book was speculation and surveillance without much coming from it until the very last minute and then we get a revelation of a traitor, with the traitor having had a huge signpost above their head since around the middle of the book. There was no surprise involved in the revelation. Part of me wants to drop this series, but another part of me clings to it because I find it funny with the modern references to well-known fantasy and sci-fi books, although there's getting to be less of that with each installment. 



4. Konferensen, av Mats Strandberg. Det är alldeles för länge sen jag läste nånting på svenska. Jag gillade Färjan skarpt, men Hemmet var en besvikelse, så jag började läsa Konferensen med blandade förväntningar. Den visade sig dock bli en bok som jag hade svårt att lägga ifrån mig och läste ut på två dagar. Under flera scener i boken satt jag och halvblundade mot alla blodiga beskrivningar som om jag såg på en skräckfilm. Under scenerna där Jonas blir halvt skalperad och senare får skalpen helt avsliten fick jag tvinga mig att inte gny högt. Alla karaktärerna gjorde mig smått förbannad samtidigt som de var otroligt igenkänningsbara och så fruktansvärt svenska. För tio år sen hade jag inte känt igen mig lika mycket men nu satt jag där och kände att jag personligen hade träffat variationer av alla dessa karaktärer på riktigt i arbetssammanhang genom åren. Denna bok blev helt klart en av höjdpunkterna det här året.

5. The Uninvited, by Dorothy Macardle. After having had a bit of success with gothic ghost stories I was looking forward to reading another one. I had previously watched the old black and white movie based on this book and enjoyed it so I was hoping to enjoy the book as well. It starts off good enough and I was excited for the plot to really get going, except it didn't. Not really. There were some ghostly things going on and then some piecing together of the story, while the male main character was infuriatingly logical about the whole thing because forbid a man to act emotionally even when faced with proof of the supernatural. Also the whole lovestory grossed me out. Roderick calls Stella a child throughout the entire book, even after halfway when he suddenly decides he's in love with her, he keeps calling her child. I suppose it acts as an old-time endearment, but why keep using it after they find out Stella isn't as young as her grandfather wants her to appear. Stop calling the woman you love a child. The book started off great, seemed to lose the plot halfway through, and never really recovered. 

Monday, 25 November 2024

Game completed: Dragon Age The Veilguard

To say I was excited for this game is an understatement. Ten years I've waited for this game! In 2022 I replated DAO and DA2 and this year I replayed DAI as preparation for this game's release. 

As usual I refrained from watching anything but the initial showcase. I wanted to go in as blind as possible while still having a hum of what I could expect. So let's dive in. I'll put all the story stuff and spoilers at the end and warn beforehand. At the start it will just be gameplay, mechanics and technicals.

The game is so beautiful I hardly knew what to do with myself but stop and stare every few steps. 

I've heard a lot of good about the character creator, but I struggled a bit with it. Felt like no matter what I tried my Rook looked old and tired with sallow skin and a man jaw. But I figured it out eventually and ended up with a cute little redhead. 

However it happened more than once that I'd load up the game and the Rook the game loaded up was the character preset and not the one I had spent most of an hour creating. Most of the time I just had to reload the save again to get my Rook in, but sometimes I had to reload five or six different times, which sucked some of the joy out of me because even installed on a SSD the load times were sometimes stupid long. I checked the Steam discussions on this and found many people had the same problem with a character preset being loaded in place of their OC. One suggestion was to go to the mirror and your Rook would be saved or you could redo it. Nobody with the issue was keen on redoing their Rook every time they started up the game and at least one person even said that going to the mirror broke all their saves... So I stuck with reloading until the game loaded correctly. 

My playthrough took 66½ hours and I CTDd twice in that time. First time I got a warning saying something about my GPU. I knew it had been on the absolute verge of being too weak so I lowered the graphics from Ultra to High after this. Game was still insanely pretty so it didn't bother me. The second CTD happened without any popups or warnings or anything. Just boom straight to desktop. 

Another slight annoyance was how long it took the game to load up environments and every time I entered a new zone the game would stutter for a bit before everything was properly loaded. I figured it was my GPU again, but found that people with 4060s also experienced stuttering so maybe the game just isn't properly optimized. 

These few technical annoyances aside I had a really great time with the game. I played as rogue and I enjoyed the fact that Veilguard doesn't lock your rogue into either bow or daggers. You can use both, although you'll probably end up speccing in favour of one of them. I mainly used my daggers, but the bow was great when I didn't want to run across the entire battlefield or to reach things at a distance. I ended up using both quite often. 

Combat was fast and reactive as rogue. Blocks had to be perfectly timed and lots of dodging and fast reactions. I enjoyed that I didn't have to babysit my companions through combat anymore and regardless of class they could all help with healing and buffs. It made for a fun combat experience. I also enjoyed how they all encouraged each other and Rook when they made a cool move or got a kill. Such team spirit :3

The Veilguard is more in line with Origins and 2 when it comes to level design. You have a handful of zones you can go to and that you'll keep coming back to, but you gain access to more of each zone as the story progresses. Some parts will be blocked to you when you first get there, but as you do more quests you'll discover more things, more loot, more collectables (although there isn't much of that and all the collectables have a game mechanic purpose). Throughout the whole game I had such strong Origins and 2 vibes. 

The preparatory stages reminded me a lot about Mass Effect 3, where you spend time and resources to improve the strength of each faction. And you'll want to have them all at their best, in true Bioware fashion. 

Before I go into the story and spoilers I want to address the accusations of "too much woke" in this game. Aside from one character you have to really go look for it. It isn't thrown in your face. Yes, the character creator has options for upper surgery and bulge regardless of gender, but just because those options exist it doesn't force you to use them. Cyberpunk2077 had those same options. As for that one character, yes they talk about it because it's important to them. I saw a comparison with Dorian from DAI and they complained about how Dorian's entire character was just him being gay and how this was similar. But honestly, Dorian's quest, while political, is all about him healing from and overcoming trauma. His father tried to change him with blood magic ffs! That sort of thing will linger and become part of your character whether you want it to or not. When it comes to the character in Veilguard their entire story is about them finding themselves and understanding who they are, and honestly? Their whole arc is handled better than that god awful conversation with Krem in DAI. Let's not forget that Dragon Age has always been progressive with the LGBTQ stuff. Back when DAO was new it was progressive that they had gay and bi companions and relationships. DAI had an openly trans character. I'm not at all surprised by this development for the Veilguard, and I don't mind it. 

Now let's head into the story. 

THERE WILL BE SPOILERS FROM THIS POINT ON. DON'T SAY I DIDN'T WARN YOU.

The game picks up from where Inquistion left off, but it's been ten years. Varric and Harding have recruited Rook and chased after Solas all over Thedas. The very first part of the game is the same part shown in the very first showcase. It's a bombastic start to the game and it really got my excitement up for what was to come. 

The part where I had to choose between Treviso and Minrathous took me by surprise with how early in the game it happened. I saved Treviso and spent the rest of the game apologizing to Neve and trying everything in my power to make her like me again. I succeeded, but every time Neve brought up the situation in Minrathous in conversation I apologized, and kept apologizing ^^; 

Lucanis stole my heart from the start, but when I was on the outing with Emmrich to light candles for the dead he tugged at my heartstrings enough that I started flirting with him too. Way later when Emmrich dropped the bomb about him wanting to become a lich I suddenly found myself needing to choose between him and Lucanis. I couldn't vibe with my boyfriend being a lich so I declined and continued chasing after Lucanis instead. It was all for the best though. Emmrich and Strife make a really cute couple :3 After Lucanis gets with Rook and Emmrich is dating Strife, those two have the best banter. 

Taash is very young. She's immature and juvenile and she's still working on growing up, which is so clear from all the interactions with her mother and the other companions. She mellows out once she finds herself and it's amazing to see. At the start I thought Taash would be the one who annoyed me the most, but it ended up being Bellara. She's so bubbly and talks with such forced positivity all the time that she just comes across as incredibly fake to me. Yes, I completed her questline, but aside from the serious or sad moments she's always so... much. She's too much. 

With all the Warden and Blight stuff going on I had hoped to see some old characters make a return. I get why they didn't include the ones who could be left in the Fade in DAI, but there are a whole bunch of others. I'd love to see Nathaniel again for example, or since they included choices from DAI in starting the game they could've included whether Blackwall was made Warden and had him play a role if he was. Defeating the demon of Unending Despair in the Wetlands and then gifting it flowers once you complete the Wetlands questline was a really neat thing. Turn Despair into Hope by providing proof that life endures no matter what. 

I loved Treviso and Arlathan. Any excuse to go to either of those zones was fine with me. I could just stare at the scenery for ages. 

There was way too little romance :P

I loved seeing Dorian, Maevaris, Morrigan, and the Inquisitor again. I liked how the game referenced the books and the comics. Although Morrigan never mentions the Well she describes how she came to be Mythal. She references the events of her companion quest in DAO even. Great callback. Mythal is splintered to hell, poor girl. I hated remaking my Inquisitor in the character creator. No matter what I did she looked old and tired, and my last quizzy had really pale blonde hair and that option wasn't even available. At least I could give her Fade Breach green eyes. 

The reveal about Varric broke my heart, but it made me think back to every single instance with him only to realise the truth, like the first time watching The Sixth Sense.

The final fight against Ghilan'nain took me by surprise. Even with all the vibes from the ME2 suicide mission I didn't think anyone would actually die. Not with how prepared I was. Everything and everyone maxed out. Poor Neve went through so much. First she loses her home when the archdemon attacks Minrathous, then she gets taken by Elgar'nan and blighted. She's so strong. I love her. Next time I'll save Minrathous for you. 

As for the main story I love how it all ties together from the very start. I've seen some complaints that Veilguard retconned Solas' character and ruined established lore with him as the villain, but... they didn't. Even in DAO Fen'Harel is described in stories as the trickster god who fought a rebellion against the Evanuris. He's used as a boogeyman byt he Dalish to scare kids into doing their chores and being obedient. And that's pretty much the same thing throughout 2. However, in 2 Flemeth hints to being something much older. In DAI we find out that Solas is the Dread Wolf and he created the Veil to imprison the gods in the Fade and now he wants to bring down the Veil, which was an accident, and return the world to how it used to be in ancient times. That fits with the god leading a rebellion - imprisoning the gods. But when he tries in the very beginning of Veilguard he accidentally lets out two of the Evanuris - Ghilan'nain and Elgar'nan, and as the story goes on we find out that Fen'Harel fought his rebellion over millennia but he could never win so imprisoning them was a last desperate measure. He still wants to bring down the Veil, which will destroy the world as we know it and he justifies it with "People always die! It's what they do!" and that when the survivors see the beauty of the old world they'll understand. He's still that villain. But Solas' villainry seems a bit less urgent when two other gods are attempting to enslave all the mortal races and cover the world in blight. So Solas becomes a temporary ally - the enemy of my enemy is my friend etc. He backstabs us at least once and ultimately the only one who can talk him down from destroying the world is... Mythal. The one he did everything for to begin with. It fits. It's poetic. I like it. 

As for the mind-blowing pieces:
• The original elves, the Evanuris, were spirits. They stole lyrium to make their bodies, which created a war with the Titans whose lifesblood is lyrium, which ultimately ended with the Titans losing everything, including their connection to the Fade and their ability to dream. Which is why the dwarves can't dream, can't use magic because magic comes from the Fade, are the only ones who can mine lyrium safely, and who can feel the stone in their guts and hear it sing. They came from the Titans.
• The blight that exists in the world is only a teeny-tiny piece of the real thing which is also imprisoned in the Fade. This is what Ghilan'nain and Eglar'nan wants to bring into the world. All of the blight. They brought more with them when they escaped and Ghilan'nain molds it into whatever she wishes, using it as a tool of creation. In DAO we can see on the in-game map how it blackens as the Blight spreads from Ostagar and north. The Inquisitor's letters describe how the blight loosened into the world has blackened most of Ferelden. We can see it ourselves in the Hossberg Wetlands. But the blight boils are new and the darkspawn are different, courtesy of Ghilan'nain. 
• Solas didn't want to take on corporeal form, but he did it for Mythal. When she joined the Evanuris he betrayed her, but when he found out about the Big Blight and how the Evanuris wanted to use it, he returned to Mythal to ask for her help. She confronted the Evanuris, and they killed her. He did everything for Mythal. He fought for Mythal, and in the end only Mythal could make him stop. 
• The tablet from the First Invasion of the Qunari mentions fleeing from the Devouring Storm, and there were spread mentions throughout the game of things beyond the sea and wanting to find out what it was, if other places suffered the same kind of things as Thedas. Blight? Elves? Evanuris? Could the Devouring Storm be Blight? Were the First Invasion not actually invading, but fleeing from the Blight? Are we getting more than Thedas in a future DA game?
• Harding brings up the Andrastian faith when you watch Solas' memories. That the Maker created the Golden City, but Solas' memories confirms it was the Evanuris, and Elgar'nan calls himself "the creator of this world" just before the final fight. Elgar'nan is the Maker :3 I can genuinely see how Solas awoke to find the world a frustrating and broken mess. Everyone got everything so wrong xD
• The Secret Ending which you get post-credits if you've found the three mysterious orbs in-game references all of the previous DA games ending with "We come". The Blight seems to be concious. Is it the Blight? Or more gods, like the old gods of Tevinter? Or... the magisters who blackened the Golden City? Corypheus was only one of them. Could I please get a callback to the Architect, pretty please?

Monday, 11 November 2024

Digging myself deeper into the Elder Scrolls hole

It's been pretty quiet over here for most of the year and it's mainly been due to the hole I've been digging since July 2023. 

Let me start from the beginning. Since early 2021 I've been part of the r/Skyrim discord server and since 2022 I've been a moderator there. The server has hosted lore tests since forever, and while the lore test has been reworked and remodeled several times over the years sicne the server's inception in 2016, the main purpose of the test in recent years has been to pass it to get a role which will show you as a knower of the lore. The Elder Scrolls lore.

Anyone who has poked beyond the game's story varnish of any Elder Scrolls game has glimpsed the expansive behind the scenes of the games. TES lore is huge.

In July 2023 I decided I wanted to learn so I started to study a bit, reading the books, taking notes, observing lore discussions on discord, listening to podcasts and watching (vetted) Youtubers. 

But that also meant I immersed myself completely into The Elder Scrolls. I finally got around to play The Elder Scrolls: Blades, I picked up The Elder Scrolls: Castles as soon as it dropped in Sweden in early February this year, I started a new character in The Elder Scrolls Online and replayed all the content from the beginning to the most recent chapter, and I started a new playthrough of Skyrim.

When I wasn't playing Elder Scrolls, I was watching or reading Elder Scrolls. 

In March of this year I attempted the lore test for the first time, and while I did pretty well I didn't pass. Thursday last week I attempted it again and this time I passed :D 

I still have lots to learn, but hopefully the obsessiveness will pass a bit now :P 

Great timing for all of this when it's Elder Scrolls' 30th anniversary and ESO's 10th anniversary :3

There'll be lots more TES coming xD

Monday, 4 November 2024

The Good Place

For the past month we've been watching this show and it's been a wild ride. About four people and their struggles in the afterlife. 

It's been a lot of fun and we both just adore Jason. 

In my opinion the first two seasons were the best. The third got a bit off track, only for the fourth season to bring it back. The ending was very final but also very fitting. It was sad, but I liked it. 

It's pretty hard to say anything at all about this show without spoiling the plot, but it's a fun show, with great characters and a good story. You should watch it!

Saturday, 28 September 2024

Alice in Borderland S02

This is long overdue. The second season released in December 2022 and we've just been putting it off regardless of how much we enjoyed the first season. 

But we finally watched it! And it was amazing!

That last game was *chef's kiss*.

And yet they still don't know why or how this whole thing happened. But it looks like we have another season coming!

Arisu and Usagi finally got their shit together ♥ Chishiya is still my favourite character ♥

Thursday, 12 September 2024

Resident Alien S01

We wanted something to laugh at and this seemed fun from the trailer so we picked it up.

It was really great and we both liked it although it turned a lot more serious than we initially thought it would be from the goofiness of the first couple episodes.

It's about an alien who comes to Earth with a mission, but his ship crashes and he is forced to assimilate while he tries to find his device and make his ship functional. There's a lot of crazy happening while he tries to learn to be human.

When the first season finished we looked up whether there was more and found that season 2 and 3 in Sweden are exclusively on the streaming service of a ISP that we don't have :C 

Honestly, genuinely, fuck exclusives. 

The show is great though. Watch it!

Monday, 2 September 2024

The Umbrella Academy S04

Last season of The Umbrella Academy and as great as it was to see the characters have their own lives and struggle in their own ways with the mundanity of being without their powers it makes for a very underwhelming start to the season. 

My favourite episode this season is probably the one where Lila and Five are lost in the subway.

Jean and Gene were highlights of this season (also known as Ron and Tammy lol).

The ending of the season (and the entire show) left a lot to be desired, and I've heard even the actors didn't like it, but that it was due to Netflix shortening it so they scrambled to rewrite and make a final ending. So it wasn't supposed to be this way, dammit.

Sunday, 1 September 2024

Dealing with backlog: Evil West

This has been a long time coming. Once we finished Redfall back in May, we chose Evil West as our next co-op game. It's vampires meet the wild west with definite weird science and gothic noir vibes and I love the aesthetic and general vibe.

Unfortunately the gameplay aspect seemed haphazard and the co-op aspect seemed like a last-minute addition without much thought to it. 

The haphazard feeling came mainly from the key bindings, which was probably intended for a controller, but even then I feel like it'd be too many buttons to keep track of. Why not just have a weapon wheel and 1,2,3,4 for abilities? Instead pressing X for this, Y for this, Z for this, F for this, R for this, Q for this. Click 1 for this weapon, click 1 again to switch to this other weapon. It was confusing af to keep track of with the result that we ended up mostly using the same 2-3 things all the time because it was what we could each remember how to use. 

And why we got the feeling that co-op was a last-minute addition? Because we were both playing the same dude. Only the host gets gameplay progression. And the game literally doesn't allow you to explore without the other person tagging along behind you.

For generic enemies the game went with the tactic that "more advanced means more HP" which in reality meant that higher tier enemies were supreme bullet sponges and tedious to fight. 

Why does the game tell me what I missed in each chapter if it isn't going to let me go back and replay that chapter in an attempt to find what I missed?

The boss fights were all really cool, though! The fight against William especially. All of the boss fights required tactics and figuring out mechanics, which was a nice pace from "dodge when it charges and hit it when it doesn't".


The story was pretty generic as far as vampire stories go. Enslave humanity, blot out the sun. The usual. But the different varieties of vampires and how they were made were really interesting. Some of them were very wtf.

I got a bug towards the end where every time I opened the skill perk menu the game sound would vanish and when I exited the skill perk menu the game would lag and stutter considerably until it simply crashed to main menu, where I still had no game sound. I needed to restart the entire game to get game sound back, and yet the same thing would happen every time I opened the skill perk menu. To the point where I didn't dare to assign my new perks until we were safely behind an autosave. Because there's only autosave, you can't save manually at all.

So all in all, amazing vibes, poor execution.