Author Archive

29
Dec
2019

Lumo

categories: platformers; word count: 282 words

If you’re looking for a really cute puzzle platformer, you don’t need to look any further than Lumo. It pays homage to the nineties when these games were being manufactured a lot more, and it shows in how isometric each of the levels (as well as the main character himself, a child who got sucked into the video game and now has to solve fourteen floors of puzzles to get out and find his way back home) are. The main character looks a bit like a black mage depending on what angle you’re looking at him from, and I suppose that might have been what piqued Bub’s interest playing alongside me — after all, he did look a bit like Vivi.

I found the game challenging, but not enough to want to make me put it down. And there are two different modes of difficulty, one giving you unlimited lives, removing the timer, and allowing you to save much more frequently for those of you who may want a substantially easier time gaming through it… that was the one that I chose, just to make gaming with Bub that much easier, as well as to make it easier on myself since I had never played the game before. It was just motivating enough of a puzzle platformer to keep me going, and keep me wanting to solve it, without being so difficult that it made me want to give up and stop playing.

And it was one that I did consult a walkthrough on for brevity’s sake. That really helped out a lot, too.

All in all, though, it was a really enjoyable game, and I would recommend that people play this one.

28
Dec
2019

RemiGirl: Lost Girl in the Lands of Lore

categories: hack and slashers; word count: 254 words

Ever wanted to play a hack and slash game but needed one that was a bit less difficult, a bit more light? Wanted one that was a bit cuter? RemiLore: Lost Girl in the Lands of Lore might just be the game for you then? No, seriously. It probably is. It tells the story of Remi, who finds a magical book named Lore in her school’s library and is then transported to another world that she must hack and slash her way out of with the help of said book. It’s just challenging enough to be fun, but not so challenging that it will make you want to put the game down and never pick it up again. And the fun thing is, when you hit objects (or enemies), desserts spill out of them — if you collect these, you can spend them as points to get better weapons, as can you spend them to get better skills and learn magical powers. So the game rewards you for trying, even if you fail, because you can keep amassing dessert points to get stronger and stronger when you struggle to get through a level. Some people out there complain that “it doesn’t have a rich plot”, but I feel like it has just enough plot to make it compelling, and it makes up for that by being a really, really fun hack and slash game.

Bub also enjoys watching me play it as well, so there’s also that. He likes when desserts pop out of things.

27
Dec
2019

My Ancestry results are in!

categories: personal; word count: 90 words

According to 23andMe, I am:
56.9% British and Irish
27.5% German
1.7% Scandinavian
10.5% Broadly Northwestern European
2.2% Southern European (this was formerly Portuguese/Spanish)
1.1% Broadly European
(and before this, 0.10% Broadly Northern East African, where’d that go?)

According to Ancestry, I am:
71% from England, Wales, and Northwestern Europe
25% from Ireland and Scotland
4% from Germany

That’s quite a stretch between the two of them.

Honestly, I think my Germanic DNA and my Irish DNA are having a fistfight.

I didn’t expect them to be so vastly different in terms of feedback, but here we are, I suppose!

26
Dec
2019

“I won’t defeat this boss for my kids.”

categories: personal; word count: 313 words

This is actually something that I have heard gamer (gaming?) parents say.

It’s usually also the ones who state that “anyone who uses walkthroughs is not a real gamer, or not a good enough gamer,” so the two kind of go hand in hand. I try to avoid these parents if I see them “out in the wild”.

They literally say, with their mouths, that if their kids struggle in a game that they will not help them. Or some of them say that they will, but that they “won’t help them with the final boss, because they have to do it on their own”. Do you know what kind of message that might send your struggling kid, especially if they’re young? Not only do the kind of parents that say these things tend to… carry it over into other aspects of parenting, but this is a really fantastic way to make your child want to give up on gaming (which is another thing that these parents, the Patrons of Gaming, would probably seethe over if it happened in front of them).

Tell me though, what is so bad about helping your child when they need it?

What is so bad about helping your child when they need any sort of help from you?

Because that sends the message that they can come to you for help for any reason and that you will be there to help them no matter what. And this will achieve exactly what you want to achieve but are going about trying to achieve in the worst possible way — your child will remain interested in video games and might pass that interest on to their children. (Or, you could do exactly what you’re doing now, cause your child not to be interested in video games at all, and stop that with this generation. This is your call here…)

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