LadyCrimson

^ The series always was,for me, just like Black Mirror, hit and miss. Like 1-3 episodes a fair bit, most "ok-meh", 1-3 "ick." Oh, and when I said cat episode, I meant the blue animated cat vs. devil one. I just watched another bit with a more realistic orange cat animation. I didn't like it as much.

Loved the first one, so I will definitely be watching Nobody 2. When it's available to watch by pressing a button on my remote. But I will definitely watch it.

I liked that cat episode of Love/Death/Robots. shocker, right. I watched a couple others, didn't care for them, the usual. Started watching Bullet Train Explosion, it looks pretty good for the genre, but then I was distracted 1/3 in and haven't gotten back to it. Before bed, I've begun watching the old series Castle via Prime. I never watched it before, only knew of it/clips. I think hubby did watch some of it before so I might've seen a random episode years ago. Anyway, I'm up to ssn1/eps. 8. It's ok. I wish there was more focus on the crime part of episodes. The intriguing thing to me is that even tho I'm not super-into Castle (yet), I rarely FFWD and it mostly keeps my attention. More evidence that for me, certain pacing, camera work, dialogue setups and other patterns in modern tv/films is a factor re: my short attention span/dislikes. I will say that I think I greatly prefer Nathan Fillion as Mal over Castle. Mal felt like he had a bit more substance behind the sarcasm. So far, Castle is just the "entitled rich but lovable goldheart" dufus. Maybe he grows up a bit later.

The Four Seasons (a series adaptation of the old film) - 1st and 2nd episode I think it's supposed to be a comedy, and it did make me chuckle here and there, but mostly it's kind of ... sad commentary re: friendships, marriages and life etc. One of those types. I recall my parents liking the Alan Alda film, so I know the basic premise, but I can't remember if I ever watched it fully. the Big Chill was the one I watched and loved ages ago. Just not my thing anymore I guess.

It's probably my imagination or poor camera angles, but over time re: all the brief little clips I've seen, I've felt like Trump has been slouching further and further downward in that oval office chair. If it continues, at the end of the four years all we may be able to see of him is the top of his fluffy toupee hair. Edit: oh, and I'm taking some singing lessons. Nothing serious. Just something to do. I used to be able to sing "average/ok" but now age and never doing it at all, I'd break eardrums, I'd like to at least not break eardrums.

Don't know - I guess it would depend on what they mean by "imported resources." I'm more concerned with panic buying re: news stories and human nature. Gonna become a real doomsday prepper at this rate. My bunker will have a dedicated room for a cat, of course. Could get lonely down there. On the other hand, too much work. Cat will have to be content sleeping on top of a chest freezer instead.

Another one of those larger stock-up type household buying days. I'm not completely convinced anything (for us) is going to be hugely impacted by tarrifs - day/weekly/general I mean, in terms of shortages/empty shelves - but I did buy enough toilet paper, paper towels, and meats (for the freezer) to last a few months or more. Y'know, just in case. I'm not getting caught flat footed, running around desperate to find even a single 4-pack of the cheapest/roughest 1-ply, or having acquaintances gift you with a couple rolls, like Covid times, again, ever. It's probably more a concern for back to school shopping or for anyone who likes to get a lot of smaller goods, cosmetics/clothes, "impulse" buys, specific needs etc, regularly. Edit: I looked at the package of my fave TP and it said "Made in USA from domestic and imported resources." I can't wait to pay $30 for 9 rolls of TP!

Watched the longish Borderlands 4 gameplay reveal thingie. Looks like Borderlands 3, except with the potential of a less annoying story and characters. Maybe. Didn't hate it, but didn't do anything for me either. None of the "Vault Hunters" look interesting to me. It looks/feels less and less like "Borderlands" all the time, and more and more like a kind of generic action game. Except with giant loot explosions, ofc. Although, at least Legendaries supposedly won't be raining from the sky anymore. BL3 was absolutely ridiculous with it - and the fact 95% of them were useless joke gimmick weapons that would drop over and over (sometimes multiples of the same one from the same boss) made it even worse. Just have the 5%. I keep hinting/reminding hubby that if he wants a new gpu or PC to play it (he's using a 1660 in the pc he plays BL on, I think, and some (newer/not ancient) Xeon type cpu), better get one soon if he doesn't want to pay out the nose just to play one game. So far he hasn't made any move on that tho. >.> I guess he could play at 720p on mostly Low settings. He doesn't care much about fidelity/phat fps.

Schedule I - I definitely feel like I'd like this game, although it does have a curfew/cops mechanic that is occasionally annoying. It's quite solid/sim addictive for what it is. I'm still just messing with the demo a bit tho. Not sure I'd want to EA it. Another "1 guy" project that (imo) is likely to take a long time to finish, unless they consider it almost finished to begin with. One for the wishlist. They keep updating the demo, too - having options greyed out bothers me not at all for the moment. And of course, still No Man's Sky off and on. They need to add a Freighter to abandoned mode so I can have my orbit-traveling storage and garden base. Don't care about having a "fleet" or "fleet missions" available or flavor NPC's wandering around inside (that just get in your way/glitch out sometimes anyhow), just disable all that for Abandoned mode. There are destroyed/derelict freighter encounters in the game - could pretend the chr. takes one of those and fixes it up just enough to be useful.

There has been no actual update for Manor Lords for a while, but there was this "what we're up to/doing" post recently. I think he/they like to use Discord more than anything else last I knew, so it's nice to see something on Steam. I like these types behind the scenes posts. It's not a "1 man" project anymore, either. https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1363080/view/573753783490708647 And the thought process idea of where the progression nodes/skills will be going finally sounds more full-fledged. Although from a city-build pov, it's starting to sound a little bit over-typical vs. something more unique, if that makes sense. I'm still not really getting a sense of Stronghold+citybuilder like I was hoping, tho. We'll see.

^ Postscript: I think I became sick of the XP/character leveling loop. I'd rather skills/abilities be gained through some other method than characters simply "leveling up". There are no chr. levels in No Man's Sky. Granted that's not an RPG but that's what I mean. The Exped.33 mostly intrigued me because of the story elements, which is rare for me. Sounded kinda like some weird surreal fantasy/sci-fi variation of Logan's Run + sci-fi game.

Oh, yeah, I didn't mean it was something like bullet-point dialogue tree rpg's like BG or something. More like some of the jrpg's. Big emphasis on story/plot/dialogues and characters but not full blown multiple choice/consequence ala D&D or something. I was picturing maybe FF/Tales of Arise type story telling. I mean, I've grown tired of even simplistic action-rpg's like Diablo's, Path of Exile, Borderlands. And I don't think I ever really liked/cared about mega consequences, although two or three simple ending paths are nice. Since I'm more of a do it all in one (maybe two, with the 1st run being the learning run) mega-hours-single run type, too many choices for me = analysis paralysis and/or "none of these choices are what I want to do/I feel restricted" and I either never choose anything (eg never finish the main plot), or I quit. Hence my general favoritism towards sandboxes or RTS/sim over the years.

Yeah, I started looking into that Clair/Exped. 33 game because of all the mega positive reviews. My reaction so far goes: ---"Turn based, urgh, not my thing. But it has some real time aspect or something? Maybe that'd be all right?" --"oh, qte's and dark-souls/sekiro parry timings." Then I also saw a long thread in Steam fora from people who thought they were getting just good ol' turn based and not qte semi-dark souls with precise timing. Where half the replies are "git gud" of course, but others gave me a better understand what to expect and some weaknesses of the system etc. Which is a shame (for me). The story sounds actually interesting, the visuals look fantastic, the VA sounds great. I thought it might be an RPG that might make me like an RPG again. I still put it in my wishlist tho - maybe a year from now when it's done patching and with mods. I was definitely interested in the world building/story, for once.

My confusion whilst walking by was seeing Pike mixed in what looked like the ST:OS Balance of Terror episode goings on. Edit: ofc I have no idea what was going on, just sliding by, but that immediately screamed time jumping/alternative times lines. I remember the whole Pike point is him having visions of his future and wanting to alter it I guess. Which makes me roll my eyes. At this point I don't care how they justify it. Such used to be occasionally fun, sure, but I'm so over it. 2ndedit: I can still kinda like one-off time jump episodes, just a fun adventure romp, ala that ST:OS movie, but when they try to get all serious I clock out.

--Spring. Where it's semi-warm one day and goes back to (wimp Californians) a tad chilly the next. Not complaining, I like it. --The ducks are back to occasionally flopping into our little swimming pool - they're not very timid re: human approach so hubby ends up chasing them out with the pool net stick. I think it's hilarious but apparently their poo encourages black mold on pool walls etc which is very hard to get rid of once if it takes hold, so hubby is very annoyed. Resulting in my great entertainment. Other than that, all the usual stuff. Constant fluctuations of boredom and happy contentment. And ofc, the hubster that makes me giggle (not just chasing ducks, ofc, heh). Very important, that.

Does ME= Mass Effect? I still have never played any of those. I wouldn't count on that too heavily.

Black Mirror, recent season: 1st episode was interesting, if not especially entertaining. 2nd was ok. 3rd I turned off after some minutes (just found it not-interesting). Skipped to the USS last episode. Didn't like it either. Hubby's decided to watch all of ST: Strange New Worlds. I walked by once and noticed something that confused me Pike and Kirk -lore wise - I guess they are using the alternate timeline/universe stuff, or something. I think one reason I became tired of so many sci-fi/fantasy is the overuse of alternate/multiverses to give familiar/fave chrs new arcs that would otherwise maybe require new characters. Not just ST, but superhero, even shows like Supernatural, etc. Then again, I seemingly dislike everything now, so ... I'll crawl back into my cave.

Is that what that Stewart/dungeon beginning was? I don't even remember. I just remember it was boring. There's something about ES where the combat/action stuff feels so --- clunky and restrictive somehow I can't explain it. Combat (and the level scaling) was never something I liked in ES, not even in Morrowind.

According to one review I saw - nope. I bought Oblivion because I liked Morrowind, and also, Patrick Stewart. I recall starting in that dungeon, wandering around some green hills, got to some castled town, quit, and never fired it up again. I just didn't find the early sections, combat, visuals (not quality, but lighting/tones, UI/menu/other changes vs. Morrowind) attention grabbing. Felt kinda meh. Which is exactly what happened with Skyrim. The only Bethesda game outside of Morrowind that I played for a moderate time period was FO:4, and that only because of the dog and the simplistic base building. Edit: for some reason after Morrowind I found the whole menu UI interface re: ES off putting. The PC vs. console UI perhaps. The emphasis on graphics in UI vs. text. I have the same gripe re: Borderlands 1 vs. the rest, too.

Schedule I - sounds like a joke game, right. And it's Early Access. But it has a good longplay demo so what the heck. I load in, spend a few minutes deciding what colors I want my character to have, and then am given quick tutorial tasks like "grab a cash-stash over there, get a motel room, go to a hardware store to get starter stuff" etc. Which is all fine and dandy, but what I immediately became obsessed with for 20 minutes was dashing around, picking up trash off the street. Because for every can you stick in this box, you get $2! Plastic bottles are worth $3! Who needs a drug empire, I'll become a millionaire recycling trash! Sold! ---Worth noting: a save from the demo doesn't carry over/transfer to the full/priced game, you'd have to start over. I think the demo simply restricts/greys out progression re:what you can make/sell, etc, but you could probably get several hours with just the demo, or more if you like it enough. Best demo (technically/what it gives you) in ages.

Pfft, those screens are ok, but if you want sooper graphix, this game can't be beat! Look at those trees, that distant vista! And behold my beautiful druglord character! ( Schedule I )

Oblivion Remaster is great for those that love the game and just want better visuals for their fave game. Nothing wrong with that. Although I've heard that this remaster may not be fully moddable/limited re: modding, so if one wants their mega/more complex mods, one might have to stick to the other versions? https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/oblivion-remastered-doesnt-officially-support-mods-but-the-mods-are-rolling-in-anyway/ For my brain, if it's only visuals and not very moddable, I would stick to the moddable version. Or at least wait until it's on sale for $15 and/or see how far modders can work with it.

I spent 12 bucks on a photography sim called - Lushfoil Photography Sim. I like photography, I like taking game screenshots. I probably will like this game. ---location areas are locked until you take pictures of certain things. I suppose this helps it mentally qualify as a "game" (goals) but I was hoping for more freedom from the start. ---based on real locations, it's quite beautiful in that game-y way. But it's empty. No ppl, I haven't noticed any wildlife to speak of - maybe I saw a cat - so it feels kind of hollow. And kind of over-brightened and monotone outside of occasional splashes of bright color buildings. I bet it would be cool in VR tho. ---it's basically a make your own nature wallpaper walking sim. Pics you take get put in a folder as png and you can do what you want with them. In the end, I didn't finish (yet). I would say I didn't dislike it, but it didn't feel creative to me (taking pictures). Just walk along take a picture of a lake, a tree, a rocky vista. It might be immersive visually for some for a while, but that's about all it has. I would rather roam around in Death Stranding and take screenshots.

^ I saw Little Girl Who Lives Down the Land on TV when I was maybe 11. I liked it a lot then. Surreal in a way. I guess Apoc. Now was what cemented M. Sheen in many minds? He's had a long career but I'm not sure I'd call most of his films/tv must watch. He played a not-creep/baddie in Gettysberg, just to say. I don't think he was that great in that, but it was more the long winded, pontificating script. Only Jeff Daniels came out shining in that one, imo. In other: I've decided I like "teasers" more than full trailers these days. This one (thriller/horror I gather) tells me nothing of the film, outside of the notion that some children are missing - but it's just weird imagery of kids running with arms akimbo. I may not see the movie, but I like the teaser.