#fun fact this is even worse as someone who's both read the odyssey and listened to der freischutz. so many of the themes line up it's unrea

[fuckyou-saidtheraven]

i think i hauve covid

[zaggitz]

VIDEO GAMES 2017: ONE MILLION GAMES ENTER, TEN GAMES LEAVE.

Well that sure was the best year in video games since probably 1998, wasn’t it? Nintendo put out a new console and 3 major franchise entries, basically every anticipated game of the early 10′s finally frickin’ came out, we got 4 new English Falcom games, 3 of which with good locs, and they made a new Nier? What??? 

What a time to be alive.

Let’s not waste any time getting to the list, lord knows VIDEO GAMES 2017 has already sucked out enough time from me for a lifetime.

Before we begin, here’s my lists for 2015 and 2016.

Honorable Mentions:

Persona 5:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jaIo82uT0qs

It’s insane that this game isn’t in my top ten, hell, it’s insane that it isn’t in my top five. It’s less a commentary on Persona 5′s quality and more that the games that did make the list resonated with me a whole lot more. VG2017 truly was too powerful.

P5 is mired with stiff localization problems, but even without the loc in consideration, the thematic through-line of the game gets muddled and becomes a toothless version of the promising rebellious first ten hours the game provides by the time you reach the finish line, which also just happens to come 20 hours too late, in my opinion.

What a great looking and feeling game though.

Tales of Berseria:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYXwD2CfxOs

On the flipside we have this game, the first Tales game I’ve enjoyed since Tales of Vesperia back in 2008. This game has an amazing story and great characters with a thematic backbone that sticks to your ribs after you finish it.

Now if I didn’t hate the act of actually playing it and having to scour its way too big boring empty dungeons and crappily designed world, it’d be a list maker for sure.

OKAY NOW IT’S TIME FOR THE CERTIFIED BANGERS:

10. Metroid: Samus Returns

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhQWJG-_Oco

Somehow my least favorite Metroid game got two remakes that both made my list two years in a row?? This game is pretty great in it’s own right though it has a few control scheme imperfections and I could see a switch port easily being the definitive version to get.

The reason this game really makes the list though is because of how it lives up to its title. Finally an official Nintendo Metroid game that comes out and undoes Sakamoto’s vile character assassination of Samus back in Other M. . 

The queen is back, and she has been missed.

9. Horizon: Zero Dawn

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FD0DByDxJBA

An engrossing open world, great stealth/hunting/gathering systems AND robot dinosaurs are just a part of what makes this first outing for what seems like an extremely promising series great.

No, what really sets this game apart from its contemporaries is how it fleshes out its backstory, culminating in the creation of what might actually be the most despicable piece of shit villain ever put to writing for a video game. And he’s been dead for a thousand years so you can’t do shit to him.

Fuck you, Ted Faro.

8. Night in the Woods

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2UUFFMGcgY

This game hit extremely close to home for me. Forced to come back home to a small, dying town full of people clinging to the good old days instead of doing anything for the generation after them, having this game to play and have it be said out loud that yeah, other people are living this nightmare too, was insanely refreshing.

For as much as we all need a bit of direction sometimes, sometimes what we also need to know being a directionless 20-something asshole trying their best is okay too.

Also Gregg rulz ok.

7. Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNgph1g422Q

Great gameplay, great music, fun characters, one of the most fun to explore worlds in an action adventure game. This game truly nails the sense of pure adventure Ys is known for.

It’s a shame then that it’s plagued with one of the most laughable translation efforts in the industry, much of the games personality comes from the fact that even a bad localization job can’t overwrite some character quirks, but this still leaves the rest of the script feeling extremely stiff at best and incomprehensible at worst.

I hope the re-translation patch is good. Until then, Fuck NISA and have a good day.

6. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiU65nQdZE8

I would describe this game as a great first step in evolving the Zelda formula. That’s not even really that accurate, the real first step was in Link Between World’s item rental/no dungeon order systems. 

Nevertheless, BOTW amazes with a sense of scope and exploration no game has ever really come close to, and achieves it almost effortlessly by simply giving you the ability to climb anything.

More music, more proper dungeons, a deeper story and a few durability tweaks are basically all you need to make the next Zelda game the easy best in series.

5. Yakuza 0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYB-D9qEwzI

This isn’t the best game this year, but it is easily, no question, the MOST video game this year. 110 hours in and only 60% complete, Yakuza 0 is the game that keeps on giving, with an enthralling true crime story that reshapes what we know about its protagonists. It’s pretty much a non stop emotional thrill ride to the finish line.

It effortlessly incorporates the best side story aspects from the many games in the series to come out before it, and utilizes them with a fantastical glee that keeps you with a smile on your face for the whole run. This is easily the funniest game I’ve played this year. Thank you SEGA.

4. Hollow Knight

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1unm0LS10ao

God I can’t wait for this game to get ported to consoles. I bought a new laptop basically just to play this game and the absolutely enthralling metroidvania world design, hand drawn and animated aesthetic, and fantastic npc characters blew me away.

The encounter designs are tough but fair(except maybe the Colisseum) and the DLC so far has been great. I can’t wait for all the post release content to come out so I can play through it all again on Switch and probably PS4. 

It’s insane only 3 people made this game.

3. Super Mario Odyssey

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhciLj5VzOk

Nothing to say here that hasn’t been said by hundreds of others. SMO is pure joy distilled into video game form.

I can’t wait for Odyssey 2 to come out and somehow blow this one out of the water like Galaxy 2 did for Galaxy.

2. Nier: Automata

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKOM3lNFajE

An amazing contemplation on what it means to be alive, and a thoroughly satisfying conclusion to a story that, for me at least, has been told since Drakengard in 2003. Game after game of sad tragic stories with bad endings and characters fighting an imperfect world imperfectly and only making things worse while temporarily making things better for themselves.

And really even in those cases there’s caveats.

Caviats???? Anyway.

Ending E of this game finally brings some semblance of peace for this fucked up world where a deranged killer and his dragon fell through the sky and made things the worst for everyone for literally tens of thousands of years. Finally Devola and Popola can sleep. All is well.

1. The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky the 3rd

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wld2q4mLhYM

Another year, another Trails game at number 1. I’ll be real with you, I’m about to drop a bunch of personal rambly stuff about what this entire trilogy means to me so if you don’t wanna read that, that’s fine. 

This game is basically a perfect epilogue to a game that means a whole lot to me and serves as an amazing capper to an amazing jrpg trilogy.

When I first played Trails in the Sky First Chapter, it was the PC version in 2014. Now in 2014 I was coming off being in college for about 6 years, switching majors a few times and not really being into what I was doing but, yknow, you gotta major in something and then you gotta get a job, that’s kind of what getting started as an adult is. 

So I played this weird little jrpg that was, fundamentally, about a country and the people in it trying to move on from a tragic war years prior, hiding their still fresh wounds in plain sight and just trying to go on with their lives. 

It was an extremely interesting game, for how plot-light it was in the early goings, you got to really feel the struggle of these people and the unseemly past they were trying to run away from or avoid repeating. This underlying conflict builds and builds until we can’t ignore it anymore.

When I played Second Chapter a year later, I had been laid off from a job I got right out of College and had no employment prospects. I hated the fact that I’d spent basically my entire adult life up to that point doing something I wasn’t passionate about and then got let down by the system. 

At the same time, the shame of my situation lead me to close up and not tell anyone about the problems I had, I was broke, I owed two months rent, on the verge of getting evicted, I felt extremely alone.

All this to get to the point that Second Chapter was ultimately a game about pulling out the dark shit we don’t like talking about and saying “it’s okay to talk about this stuff, there’s always someone who will listen.” It got me to get over myself somewhat and actually reach out for help, and I’m really thankful for it not letting me hit rock bottom.

Two years later still, I’m in a much better place, I finally feel happy about where my life is and what I’m doing and oh boy here comes Trails in the Sky the 3rd.

Completing the journey I started back in 2014, I found myself playing a game all about how it’s okay to acknowledge the bad things that happened to us, so long as we learn and move on from them accordingly.

This trilogy has so much heart, and so many memorable characters, and so much to say. It’s so, so special to me, and I was openly weeping when all the characters I’ve come to know and love over 4 years finally parted ways.

Thank you Falcom for making these games, and thank you Xseed for bringing these games to us.

TL;DR

[datingadviceonreddit]

My recent experience dating during shelter-in-place:If you're single, odds are that you've been asked, "What's it like dating during the coronavirus?" Welllll my friend, it's like dating during regular times (read: terrible), but 10x worse because the odds of meeting someone just went from 1% to 0% since few of us have single, male roommates. This isn't an episode of New Girl, after all.Things got weird initially. All sort of dating disasters from my past popped up. Seattle Sheriff started Snapchatting me, a NYE makeout from 2016 started responding to all my IG pictures with compliments, a guy who hit on me 7 years ago and now has a live-in girlfriend started DMing me about his "decades long odyssey to spend time with you," Big Suge DM'd me to ask for running advice....clearly, no one was exempt. But then things started to settle down by end of April.Shelter-in-place has separated us into these defined cliques: The Singles, The Couples, The Couples with Kids, The Unemployed, The At-Risk, etc. And while I do feel connected by the fact that we're all in this situation together, it's affecting us all so differently that I feel incapable of understanding what this experience is like for folks in other groups. Each have their own unique challenge. For example. I have never been more grateful to not have kids than right now, and I also realize that some folks might be feeling alone despite living with partners or family during this time. However, since this is a story about my experience, I will tell you that I (cue the dramatics) feel discriminated against as A Single during shelter-in-place! What do you mean I have to stay home by myself for months on end, with no end in sight? How am I supposed to meet someone? Will the government give tax benefits to us bachelors/bachelorettes who have been forced into this solitude? I'd even take an arranged marriage situation right now: take a Buzzfeed quiz and get matched with a suitor. Higher odds than my current situation of masturbating.I've rarely felt alone as a single woman in a vibrant city but shelter-in-place stripped me of my usual 'distractions', like friends, happy hours, workout classes, office culture and parties. My neck was locked up for a few days and I couldn't turn my head to the left and at one point I thought it was moving down my back and I would soon be unable to move, and I had that dark, single person moment of, I'm going to die alone in my apartment and no one could know for days. I've had to look, really look, at the somber, make-up free face in the mirror with the newly appeared dark spots and think about makes her happy when stripped of those things. It's been uncomfortable but it forced me to spend time imaging what the future looks like for a happy Wendy, single or married.I had stopped swiping in February as I wrapped things up with The Cole Valley Bartender, Tatted Writer, and started things with The Mayor, and then shelter-in-place started and I decided there was just no point in starting things up with someone new virtually. I did go on one virtual date that first week with yes, another bartender. We met back when happy hour was still a thing, on Valentine's Day of all days. He was tall with blonde curls and a big smile. Soooo cute. I left him my number on the receipt since it had worked so well last time, and believe it or not, I heard from later that night!Hey Wendy (curly one), thanks for the number and being my favorite today. Don't tell the other people they get jealous. Definitely into your vibe but seeing someone currently. Was I 2-for-2 or 1-for-2? No matter, it was the nicest rejection message that I've ever received. To my surprise, I heard from him a month later!Hey Wendy, weird text to send but things didn't really work out with the person who I was seeing when we met. If you ever want to grab a drink let me know.I was thrilled! The universe was rewarding me for putting myself out there. We made plans for the following week but then shelter-in-place hit and we turned it into a FaceTime date. He taught me how to make my favorite cocktail, made one for himself, and then we continued chatting while walking around our respective neighborhoods. The activity transformed what could have been a dry interview into a fun activity. The texting petered out as SIP continued and he finally told me, "Sorry been out of touch just not really feeling the whole long distance vibe right now." If you couldn't guess before, yes he's a surfing bro. Funny how SIP made us "long distance" but I understood.My optimistic side crumpled when SIP got extended to May and I cried. It felt like my life was on hold but I realized that was because of how I was living it, and this situation wouldn't change for many more months. What was I going to do about it? I started swiping. One of my first matches was with "Jack Ryan." Jack attended a military school (my second one in the Bay Area, how??), rode bikes, skis, and attended the same business school as my roommate. Lots of commonalities made the FaceTime first date easy. He had first suggested a social distance bike ride but I didn't feel comfortable doing that, not with roommates. Six feet is the quarantine version of a condom. "I don't know where you've been, Jack!"Our first date lasted 90 minutes. I remember thinking he looked a little disheveled because his hair was long, but cute. The conversation flowed easily, we had a lot in common and he asked questions. By the end I was grinning and I had the odd desire to touch him. Oddly didn't have that with Surfing Bartender, who I thought was objectively more attractive.Our next date ended being up that social distance bike ride. Meeting up during quarantine means having a weird version of the "let's be exclusive" chat super early."I've only seen my two friends from 6ft away.""I've only seen my roommates."I was stumped on what to wear. Didn't need padded bike shorts for a 10 mile spin but also couldn't get away with jeans given my thighs and propensity to sweat. Plus, a helmet makes me look like a dude so I wanted to wear my hair down to compensate, but the helmet limits your options. I ended up going with dark jeans to hide sweat spots, hair half up and down, big hoop earrings to really hammer home that I was a woman in case anyone thought it was a man bun, and mascara.The first thing I noticed in person was his size. From 6ft away he looked to be my height, 5'8", and not the 5'10" as advertised on his profile. Swallowing my disappointment, I mounted my bike and we pedaled to Ocean Beach and did a lap around Golden Gate Park and then stopped at the Conservatory of Flowers for a picnic. I had brought a beer for myself and he had brought beers for both of us, plus a snack. It passed in a blur and I couldn't tell you what we talked about except that he was a great conversationalist with the same sarcastic sense of humor. He biked me part of the way home before we waved awkwardly and promised to do something again.Our third date was a proper bike ride. When he proposed it, I started to wonder if he was looking for a cycling buddy instead of a romantic partner, but the athlete in me couldn't say no. He wanted to ride to Stinson but I hadn't been riding much this year so I only made it as far as Pantoll station. He pulled out chocolate chip cookies out of his jersey for a mid-ride snack. That he baked.I rode home with a full belly and a big ass grin on my face.Our next date thankfully didn't involve bikes or my nemesis the helmet. Instead we had drinks and takeout burritos in Lafayette park. It started as a warm, sunny day but SF being SF, the fog started rolling in as soon as we plopped down our blanket and by 8pm our teeth were chattering too much to even talk. I was hoping he'd kiss me, I was living alone at this point and no longer had to be concerned with spreading to anyone else, but instead we waved from maybe 3 ft away. We met a week a later in Duboce park and I brought to-go margaritas and all these stories that I wanted to share with him. I had brainstormed with Tinker Bell prior to the date about how to broach the topic of touching but thanks to those margaritas, he needed a bathroom and I conveniently had an empty apartment a few blocks away. Once he was inside it was, Game. On.He kissed me in the kitchen, we dry humped on the couch (Sorry, roomies) and he ended up spending the night. The Covid wall was successfully broken, hopefully my vagina walls were next.Dating during the coronavirus has felt like if "Love is blind" and "Too hot to handle" had a Netflix love child. I obviously knew what Jack Ryan looked like from his Bumble profile but quarantine forced us to take it slower and we spent an entire month just talking without any physical touch. I truthfully don't know if I would have continued seeing Jack Ryan had we met in regular life. I am, ashamed to type this out, shallow in regards to height, and was initially put off by his stature. I think there's a chance I would have noticed that upon walking into the bar, decided there was no attraction, and not given him a second date, but maybe I would have thanks to our great first conversation, I really don't know. Fortunately I couldn't see his height via FaceTime or on a bike which allowed us time to build an emotional connection. I was concerned that first month that there was no chemistry but when he finally kissed me, I didn't want it stop. I still don't.I'm still working through this—the cynic in me says I'm maybe latched on to him because of shelter-in-place and I'm lonely and my vagina is purring because I hadn't been touched in months, but I'm trying my best to ignore that because he's great and it's okay to just be excited, no disclaimer necessary. Time will show if it's the man or corona. And here's why I like him: he's a great listener, he's thoughtful, he's intentional, he's smart, he communicates, he's equally invested in my pleasure, he gives me the spotlight to be weird, he's active and he's handsome. In the words of Issa Rae, "Hold up, he dicks you down, makes you laugh, and he don't work at the airport? What's the problem? Cause I don't hear it." Me either Issa, me either. via /r/dating_advice