Like I say, I can use the brightness knob on the back to dim it, so it is fine. You can also dime the knob if you want to give yourself a retina tattoo.

No need to resort to stage gels; there are people who will sell you brand-new reproductions of any overlay you like. Or new ones. Holographic overlays are the latest fashion accessory, it seems. There must be only a few thousand surviving Vectrexes still out there, but the scene sure is dedicated.

I just got myself an SD card reader cartridge. Some of the modern games for the system are very impressive. I've been getting into writing 8 bit assembly code lately (Z80, not 68xx, but the principles are similar) so I'd be quite keen to try writing something for it myself once I'm done with my current 8 bit project.

Been playing through the PS1 RPG, Suikoden II -- almost at the end. I just replayed S1 recently, and I think S2 might be worse in terms of bad/rushed 90's localization. There are so many badly written item and spell descriptions, it's crazy. S1 had a lot of weird typos, but S2 borderlines incomprehensible. It looks like the localizers got lines and lines of Japanese text without context and just did their best, but it was a messsss.

The Talos Principle II.



The story is, so far, meh. But the puzzles are as enjoyable as they were in the first game and the DLC.

Bridge Constructor: Portal because I bought it with my Google survey money and remembered that I also bought it on Steam.

I recently picked up Mario Wonderland to play with my wife and see if my kid would enjoy video games. Its the Mario game I've been waiting for since Super Mario Brothers on the SNES. I've only gotten through the first level, and this game is a true descendent of classic Mario, with a lot of cool modern video game stuff on top. The Mario games can feel a bit too kid-like, but this one is up there with Mario Kart 8 as far as top-notch, best Nintendo Switch games. Makes me forget all the things I hate about Nintendo and fall in love with their games like I was 10 years old again.

They had one Nintendo Switch game at my local library so I checked it out: Bayonetta 3.

Granted I only gave it an hour and I was mourning the end of Zelda TOTK, but I didn't like it at all. Highly sexualized protagonist battling demons, cut scenes with a lowly henchman with a Tarantino like commitment to saying 'Fuck'- what's not to like? Somehow making an R rated video game just doesn't impress me. It seemed hell bent on blowing a 13 year old boy's mind and little else, like "Whoa, when she jump kicked I think I saw a boob!".

Against the Storm, and it's fucking great.

2023 was Bloodstained : Ritual of the Night randomizer speedruns, then Dead Cells (currently at 4BC and haven’t played for a month or so), then Metal Unit (surprisingly great for costing like $3), then Monster Hunter World (just started into the Iceborne expansion stuff) and then I got Witcher 3 - Wild Hunt a week ago and am loving it.

50 or 60 hours in and the world is just so huge and immersive. It reminds me a lot of BOTW/TOTK if they had substantially more depth to them, and though the “adult” aspects of it can be a little weird at times (do I really need to see characters fuck? No) it’s nice that all the NPCs shout random shit at you that’s totally vulgar and just feels very realistic. Whole thing has a very DS kinda vibe, too.

scott wrote: Mon Jan 01, 2024 12:08 pm ....then I got Witcher 3 - Wild Hunt a week ago and am loving it.

50 or 60 hours in and the world is just so huge and immersive. It reminds me a lot of BOTW/TOTK if they had substantially more depth to them, and though the “adult” aspects of it can be a little weird at times (do I really need to see characters fuck? No) it’s nice that all the NPCs shout random shit at you that’s totally vulgar and just feels very realistic. Whole thing has a very DS kinda vibe, too.

This was probably going to be my next deep dive game, and I think you just got me very psyched about it.

“Dusk”, loudest of the new wave of boomer shooters, is a wonderful game, a perfect example of something that evokes the older form it references while being quietly modern: the inventiveness of the level design, the steady escalation in enemy types, the movement; and the vitality of its art direction had me pushing immediately into the next level every time I finished another, wanting to see what came next.

I quite like the term “boomer shooter”.