inaworldofchoices

[inaworldofchoices]

All Of Us: Book Review

I had to think a lot about how to do a review for All Of Us. And it has nothing to do with the story itself, but with this new concept that Pixelberry tried to introduce in Choices: two parallel stories that overlap and occur at the same time (and in the same settings), with characters who interact in both stories. So, I decided to do something different and write three different reviews: a general one (that is, this one), and two extra parts that are meant to be specifically made for Her Story and His Story (in this order, as this is how I read them).

All of Us is the first fully gay story in Choices. It consists of two books: Her Story, the volume that narrates a story centered on Jo and Tess, and His Story, which is a parallel plot that narrates the story of Dex and Brad. Overall, I must admit I LOVED both stories! I loved the plot of each book, I loved every character in this story (well, except for Stuart, I’m glad he only got a cameo), I loved the slow burns, and I loved the positive vibe surrounding the whole story (not having to deal with homophobic characters was a delight!). But I especially loved how the writers managed to give Jo, Dex, Tess and Brad completely different personalities. You can see these books were made with love and a lot of respect for the LGTBQ+ community.

However, there was one aspect of this series that didn’t allow me to enjoy His Story as I should have. And maybe it’s my fault. Because when Pixelberry explained Her Story and His Story were supposed to be “parallel stories that overlap”, I think I expected something different, at least in terms of the narrative. At first, I expected both MCs and LIs to have different interactions when they were in the same settings (for example, at the café). But after reading a few chapters of His Story, I started to notice certain situations were way too similar to the ones in Her Story (the problem with Stuart) and even some of the dialogs had remained the same or they only had very minor changes (like Jo saying “Just because I think some customer is cute doesn’t make it a crush” and then Dex saying “I can think a guy is cute without it being a crush” in the same scene in their respective books). Sorry Pixelberry, but I don’t think these are “parallel stories that overlap”. These are stories where the same situations are repeated, but with different characters (I don’t want to call it “lazy writing”, but yeah). Fortunately, it seems the writers noticed they were going too far with it and made some changes well into the stories. But it was too late for me, they had already killed my mood (but don’t panic! By the end of His Story, I had already left that bittersweet taste behind and my perception of the book had positively changed).

The fact the MCs and the LIs (as well as the cat) can’t be exported in between books was another let down. I first noticed this while playing Her Story, when Dex and Brad had the default names (in the case of Dex) and sprites shown on the cover of the book. So, when reading His Story, I felt like I had no choice but to keep the same sprites for the characters (and the story) to make sense… only to find out Jo and Tess weren’t the same sprites I had originally chosen, but the ones in the cover. Those weren’t my Jo and my Tess, but some random characters I didn’t recognize at all. I’m assuming the problem was even worse for those players who don’t use the default names as I do. I don’t think it’s that hard to give us the possibility to choose and name all four characters in both books, how is that no one thought about it? But yeah, it sucks. As much as it sucks having to pay for the cat twice. It’s the same damn cat!

Despite these issues (for the record, I don’t think these are minor details, no matter how much I love the love the team put into this project. In my opinion, these are some cases of very lazy coding and writing) and the disappointment I originally felt, I ended up enjoying both stories a lot, much more than I expected. I was prepared to read a lot of clichés. Instead, I got two really cute slow burns that melted my heart. In a Choicesverse that’s currently full of smut and horny characters, having these stories of real friendships and adults looking for a serious relationship with deep connections instead of just a hook-up was beautiful and refreshing. And on a personal note, these stories reminded me a lot of a conversation I had with a gay friend when we were in our 20s about how hard it is for gay people of a certain age to find stability in a relationship. At that moment, his words resonated a lot, so seeing them many years later in these books was a nice reminder of how things tend to be.

Overall, these stories feel real, and I’m so thankful for that. As an asexual person myself, I missed having some representation of the spectrum (even though Tess’ jacket was certainly inspired by the ace flag, and you can’t convince me otherwise), but I can live with it, the fact that we were able to choose the sexual orientation of our MCs was already awesome. The concept is fantastic, and I wouldn’t dare to change it. I wish we had more books like these.

[inaworldofchoices]

Across The Void: Book Review

When it comes to a book like Across the Void, the first idea that comes to my mind is that there is no doubt Pixelberry tried to repeat a well-known formula that worked great in the very first days of the app through Rules of Engagement. That is, the story of the main character (Nova), plus their siblings (Pax and Eos) and their stories told from all these three different points of view. Unfortunately, this time the results weren’t even close to what Rules of Engagement was back in 2016.

The book tells the story of Nova Elara, in my case a woman (or cyber) whose dream is to become the captain of a luxury cruise. The premise sounds pretty boring until we realize the galaxy is in the middle of a war between two factions, the Jura and the Vanguard, and the route where we have to pilot our ship (the Atlas) is really close to the war zone. Of course, as we may expect, Nova, her crew, the passengers, and the Atlas not only end up getting trapped in the middle of the war for different reasons and events that occur throughout the book, but in a surprising plot twist, we end up discovering (in the final chapter) that the ship was always meant to be a part of the war itself, in the form of a bomb. Yes, I didn’t see that coming, and I dare to say this must be one of the most underrated plot twists in Choices.

Overall, the book is different to what Choices usually offers their players. The backgrounds are stunning, lots of pink, blue and vivid colors in general, lots of neon, and everything is very futuristic and gorgeous. We also got many, many new sprites (I’d say some of them haven’t even been reused yet, I guess it’s because of their uniqueness). However, when you don’t have a strong plot, everything else seems to be overlooked. And that’s the main problem Across the Void faces. Despite having a super promising premise, the story itself has so many voids (no pun intended) that most of the time the book left me way too many unanswered questions or even wondering why the writers decided to add certain situations to the narrative.

For example, I decided to help Pax hide Izar, the Jura guy who suddenly appeared in the Atlas… only for us to never see him again. Why was this relevant? What was the point of it? Not even Pax knew why this guy was onboard the Atlas! How did he board the ship without any radars noticing he was coming? Did he receive help from Artemis? It’s not like he was there at the beginning of the trip. Same with Nova and Eos helping Heze, the Vanguard pilot. I decided to let her go back to the Vanguards, but then what? We never saw her again. Was the only reason for these scenes to exist to help us decide whether we were pro Jura or pro Vanguard? Pure fillers, if you ask me.

Another example: what happened during the peace talks between Lyra and Prince Barlow in the Atlas? Are you telling me Barlow didn’t try to do anything to her when only a few chapters before he had destroyed Matara trying to kill her, in order to stop the peace talks that would lead to the end of the war from happening? And when did Prince Barlow leave the Atlas? Because by the end of the book, he just appeared on another ship. Weird.

And I don’t know if I was reading this part while I was half asleep, but when did Oberon board the Atlas? I assume it was after the incident in Matara, but it was like he suddenly appeared on the bridge of the ship, and no one seemed to question why he was there. Also, who protected the astradust during and after the attack in Matara? Where did that astradust go? I know the existence of it was supersecret, but Oberon was in charge of overseeing it as Head of Security. And it’s not like this is the same astradust they used at the end of the book, because that one had been hidden by Nova’s parents in Cyber.

Another problem I noticed was the excess of characters, which led to us having an excessive number of storylines and extralong chapters. I can’t even remember how many times I had to restart chapters because I got lost in between plots (not even One Hundred Years of Solitude in my teens gave me these many headaches!). Then, I understood the structure was to show 3 or more subplots that, later in the chapter, would be combined into the main storyline. This was completely unnecessary, it only ended up adding filler stories to the book.

But what would I have erased? I wouldn’t have included any of the plots involving passengers. If the idea was to show some people were pro Jura and some people were pro Vanguard, then we had enough with our siblings and our crew. But why does Nova have to help people solve their family issues, especially when she already has a fair amount of problems with her siblings? Or why does she have to take some rich women’s pet to have a spa day, as if they couldn’t do it by themselves? Girl, you’re the captain of the ship, not a psychologist or a servant! I would also have gotten rid of Argo and Corvus. Super nice crew members, but zero relevance in the story (in fact, they were so irrelevant that they were the only crew members who didn’t even participate in the final battle). And finally, Oberon. I loved the guy, and I even chose him as the ultimate LI for Eos, but I’d be lying if I said he was a pivotal addition to the story when compared to characters such as Prince Barlow. Same with Aquarius. I decided to save her because the story promised she was going to be a big help to us during the battle if we saved her, but in the end, she was only helpful in saving Vee from dying in the final chapter.

With the amount of characters the story has (32 if we count the pets), it was quite obvious that we would have many LIs to choose from. And at first, I loved the idea, because it was something the fandom had been asking for a long time. But then I realized not every idea the fandom has is actually a good idea. Why? Because Nova had 5 LIs (one of them shared with Eos… I mean, really PB?), Pax had 2 LIs, and Eos had 4 LIs (counting the one he shared with Nova). So that’s 10 out of 32 characters that are considered LIs, not to mention Nova also has an opportunity to flirt with Prince Barlow. So sorry, no matter how much I liked the LIs (in my opinion, they were great characters), having the opportunity to romance this amount of people seems like a lot, especially when they all live under the same roof.

But in the end, I did manage to have a decent love life for my characters, even though at times it looked like a telenovela:

Nova dated Meridian. And the replay completely changed my perception of their relationship. Fun fact, this has been the only time I’ve chosen a LI based on their looks, as I tend to choose them based on who I feel is the most compatible with my MC. So, I used to complain a lot about how Meridian seemed to have so little screen time when compared to the rest of the LIs. But now I realize he gets not only a more than decent amount of screen time… he gets quality screen time, and that’s just awesome. There are no random appearances and the relationship with Nova, despite being short-lived, seemed to be way deeper than I remember from when I played the book for the first time. I genuinely enjoyed this match.

A part of me regrets pairing Pax and Holmes. In fact, I don’t think she should have had LIs options. Maybe it’s because she’s shown as a rebellious character who’s more focused on the war and defending the Jura, but it’s hard for me to picture Pax with anyone. It’s easier for me to see her as an aroace girl having platonic feelings for Holmes. Their relationship kind of comes from a place of caring for someone who feels alone in the world. And that’s it. There is love, but I don’t see passion. I can see partners, but not lovers. Something about this match just never convinced me, but I wanted to give it a try.

As per Eos, I liked the fact that he’s canonically bisexual. For some reason, I think it suits him well. However, a part of me believes that behind his flirty ass, there is a guy who was never able to move on from Oberon. In fact, I had originally paired Eos and Lyra (they gave me all the Bodyguard vibes), but when Oberon appeared for the first time, I felt like it was impossible to just overlook the fact they might have been a couple in the past (in my story, Eos didn’t admit they were a couple when he had the chance to do it in earlier chapters). The sparks were there, and they were inevitable. So yes, they were my perfect match, and I’m more than happy with my decision.

Special mention to Zekei, for being the only LI in the history of Choices that has been shared by two siblings. Please, Pixelberry, don’t you dare do this ever again. I have no idea what the writers were thinking about. The guy was so evidently in love with Nova that trying to pair him and Eos must be one of the most “what the fuck” moments in the book. Did Eos have feelings for Zekei? Maybe he did (or he forced himself to have them in an attempt to forget Oberon), but I like to think the Zekei + Eos relationship is one of mutual respect. And that none of them would disrespect Nova that way. That’s just too low for both of them.

Even though I’ve already mentioned several things I enjoyed and didn’t enjoy about the story, I wanted to save the best, and of course, the worst, for last.

I’d say the most disappointing aspect of the book is how the topic of war was addressed. I feel we never got to understand why there was a war in the first place. We never got to really know what the Jura and the Vanguard stood for and why they had been fighting for so long in a war that evidently affected every single character in this story. I have no idea how the writers missed that, when it was some vital information for us to not only understand the plot, but also for us to be able to make some choices throughout the book. I managed to remain neutral 95% of the time, but then one choice sent me towards the Jura (even though my Nova would have probably agreed more with the Vanguard, mainly because the fact that she and Zekei were classmates gives me the idea that the training she received was actually the same the Marshalls received, that has to have some effect on the way you think about the situation). Luckily, I was able to go back to neutral at the end of the book.

Despite everything I’ve already mentioned, I’ve always thought that replaying a book gives you a whole new perspective on things, and Across the Void is not the exception. In fact, while replaying the story I noticed situations I may have overlooked the first time (maybe because I was too overwhelmed trying to understand everything that was going on).

One of my favorites is how the writers play with the idea of destiny and how the topic seems to be present everywhere! The book is full of references to the future and how we have plenty of time to do certain things when, in fact, life may change in a matter of moments. And not only that. Every single character seems to have a certain destiny written for them, too! For example, Zekei was not meant to have knowledge because he was a technical cyber. Zaniah had constellations that told her purpose in life. Prince Barlow was able to see many futures (Dr. Strange is that you?). Nova herself claims at some point in the story that she felt she wasn’t able to guide her own life. When I discovered it, it blew my mind. How is it that I never saw this before?

The fact that our siblings were annoying also had some very interesting turns. The amount of mistakes they made was almost unforgivable. Like Pax hiding a Jura guy in the ship despite knowing how important the job was for Nova. Or Eos not telling Nova about the importance of Lyra, despite Nova being the captain of the ship. We may have wanted to kill these two, but every single time something like this happened, we could see that no matter how big the argument was, none of them would put the Jura and the Vanguard interests over their family. Their loyalties were clear, and even though they explicitly said the opposite, I’m pretty sure they’d always put their family first. In fact, you could even see them breaking their own rules when it came to helping or protecting their siblings! The best example is probably when Eos helps Pax hide Zaniah’s wrongdoing and to keep their secret safe. Or when Pax questioned Artemis for having her brother as a prisoner of war for so long even though she knew who he was. So, no matter how hard the story tries to convince us Pax and Eos are willing to kill each other for defending their ideals. That’s not going to happen.

And this is where I want to stop for a moment to talk about Pax. Because after replaying the story I have some mixed feelings towards her. She’s annoying, that’s for sure. But at the same time, I feel sorry for her. It was sad to see how many times she was disappointed by the Jura. I could feel her heart being broken over and over again. In fact, if you ask me, I’d say by the end of the book, she had questioned her loyalties a lot. Did she defect the Jura once the war was over? I like to think she did. Did I get the same vibe from Eos? Absolutely not. His personality was more like Nova’s than we give him credit for. In the end, he just wanted to protect the ones he loved. His methods weren’t the best, though. Especially because at times it felt impossible to have a serious conversation with him. I mean… grow up, dude!

Finally, Across the Void felt different after the replay. It didn’t feel better or worse, it was simply different. I found out this was more than a story about a war we never got to understand. This was the story about a bunch of broken characters who found in the Atlas not only a crew, but also a family. And that’s why Nova’s sacrifice in the end makes sense to me. In her own words, “most of us would do anything for the ones we love”. And that’s exactly what she did for her biological and her chosen family.

For a really long time, I felt this wasn’t the ending she deserved, especially because she didn’t ask to be part of this war. She deserved to be happy. She deserved to keep exploring her relationship with Meridian and to see her siblings in peace. But happy endings are not always wholesome. And this is one of those cases where the saddest ending was most definitely the best one.

[inaworldofchoices]

LIST OF REPLAYED BOOKS

So, I won't be posting much in this blog as this is more of a notepad to myself, but I've decided I'll replay old books in alphabetic order. I'll also be playing newer books and posting reviews/making some notes here.

Currently reading:

Alpha II Wolf Bride

Replayed books:

A Across The Void All Of Us All Of Us - Her Story All Of Us - His Story Along Came Treble Alpha