Random Thoughts

Things have been pretty rough recently for various reasons, so I'm going to distract myself from all that by talking about a few things which have been bringing me joy.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons 2.0
A couple of months ago I decided to do a bit of date manipulation to finish off the art collection (by resetting the same day over and over) so I could finish my museum and maybe quit the game. I accomplished this, and Nintendo promptly announced a huge update with thousands of new items and new things to do every day. So I'm back on that horse and loving it again.

I've updated my dream at DA-4989-3336-9453. It's been raining so once again there are flowers everywhere, and I've rearranged a few things so all my spare flowers are hanging out on the beach. Which is to say, if you need flowers, please let me know! New things since last time are a new entrance with two bridges, a farm area, the beginnings of a treehouse, and a redesigned museum garden. Also, the clock room is getting out of control.

I also spent way too much money on packs of the new Amiibo cards so if anybody wants to trade doubles, I'm in!

Speedrunning
Pokemon: Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, Nintendo Switch remakes of the 2006 Nintendo DS games, were released the other day. I mention this not because I'm playing them (I'm not), but because the speedrunners have discovered a ton of new glitches and strategies to go fast, and I'm loving watching how excited they are to find them. So far this includes:
- If you turn the music off, the game skips all the level up and healing jingles and it shaves minutes off the run.
- If you hatch an egg in front of a particular NPC he will no longer block you from proceeding to Sunyshore City while it is experiencing a blackout
- If you use surf immediately after fighting a trainer near the water, you can float over the terrain (or under it) and progress the story in unintended ways, including by skipping Victory Road completely

It's still early days and they're still trying to figure out what categories and rules to formalise on the leaderboards, not to mention the risk that any of these glitches could be patched at any time, but it's the discovery process that's bringing me joy anyway.

Mini Metro (iOS)
Friendship ended with desktop PC version, now mobile version is my best friend. I'm not going to say I'm good at it, but I also haven't linked it to any social media, which means it won't show the global leaderboards, so I have no idea! I'm finding I get the most joy by coming up with my own challenges, usually "only use the 3 lines it starts with".

Unpacking (PC/Switch/Xbox)
This is a very fun, short puzzle game about unpacking a person's boxes into various dwellings over their lifetime. It has a wonderfully subtle type of storytelling, as you get to know the person through their belongings, what changes and what goes with them from house to house, along with the decisions you have to make about where to put their belongings in each house. Very cute pixel art, some of it very nostalgic. It's short for how expensive it is, but I really enjoyed it. Since I finished the main story, I'm just achievement-hunting now.

I feel like I've been coasting on neutral for a while, so here are some random good things in my life to remind myself that there are things to talk about.

* I made a large pot of ultra strong T2 Sticky Choc Chai, adulterated with extra loose leaf Ceylon tea, and froze it in 1/2 cup portions. Now I can just defrost one with some milk and extra water and have chai without the trouble! It's really good.

* Had my second Pfizer dose on Monday. Spent Tuesday in a feverish haze but was feeling decent again by Wednesday. You go, little immune system!

* Finished Chicory: A Colorful Tale with my spouse and thoroughly enjoyed it. I haven't quite got 100% of the things yet but I'm pretty close! I wanted to do a full reaction post but to be honest, I don't have a lot to say. The soundtrack has been bringing me great joy and brightening my workdays.

* On that note, I got a new contract for part time work until the end of the year. This is ideal, because I'm also studying.

* I got this set of photopolymer stamps for swatching watercolours, which I loved so much I immediately ordered a stamp and die set to do individual colour swatches. It's shipping from the USA so it will be A While before it arrives, but I am looking forward to having some neatly categorised swatches.

* Speaking of things that are shipping from overseas that I won't see for a while, I ordered Yet More Watercolours and am impatiently waiting for them to arrive. Relatedly, I'm also waiting for a new palette to arrive because I've run out of room in my existing one...

* I also bought more materials for making greeting cards! Would anybody like to receive a random card in the mail?

🎮 I missed the chance to post here about the Indie Bundle for Palestinian Aid on Itch.io, but I did buy it, so if you have any recommendations for games in this bundle please send them my way!

🎮 Chicory: A Colorful Tale, a game I Kickstarted way back in 2019, just released! It supports local co-op play, where the second player controls an additional paintbrush, and I really wanted to take advantage of that and get my spouse to join in. This kicked off a very frustrating 45 minutes trying to get the game to recognise two controllers, and ended with purchasing a new bluetooth card and completely reinstalling Windows. So I've only played about an hour of the game, but I'm enjoying it so far!

🎮 I'm still playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons nearly every day. I've been working hard on redoing various parts of my island - my goal was to finish it and upload a new dream before the snow settled. I failed at finishing everything but I did update the dream, so check it out at DA-4989-3336-9453 if you like.

🎮 A while back I came across the Kickstarter trailer for Unbeatable: A game where music is illegal and you do crimes. It's one of the best Kickstarter game trailers I've seen, it really gives an idea of the aesthetic the devs are going for, includes actual gameplay and has fun high-energy attitude. There's a demo out now - it's a simple two button rhythm game which I completely failed at, but on the bright side it has difficulty settings and a no-fail mode, and the final version promises more accessibility options.

Ikenfell is a "turn-based tactical RPG about a group of troublesome magic students", available on PC/Playstation/Xbox/Switch and largely developed by one person (Chevy Ray Johnston). I played it on PC via the Xbox GamePass.

I enjoyed it a lot, even though I had to use the difficulty settings in order to make the battle system tolerable. The plot is very linear, which for me is a selling point (no pesky decisions to make!), and went in some unexpected directions. There are lots of queer and non-binary characters, and their identities are not treated as plot points. The save points are adorable sleeping kitties. The soundtrack is by aivi & surasshu who are apparently best known for creating the soundtrack for Steven Universe.

The general pattern of the game is: You are given a place to go to chase down a plot point. You walk through a dungeon to get there, fighting monsters, solving puzzles and hunting out secret extra items. You fight a boss battle (or two). You are given another place to go. Repeat.

Skills required:
Timing (adjustable, can be disabled)
Tactical combat decisions (can enable an instant-win option)
Puzzle-solving (logic, observation, timing)

Content warnings:
Can be enabled in-game! ( Spoilers )

( More thoughts under the cut (Spoiler-lite) )

( Actual spoilers go here )

But like I said above, I genuinely enjoyed it despite its annoyances. Solid use of my 22+ hours.

I decided it was finally time to tackle the most recent Ace Attorney game to be localised in English (which was released in 2016).

I'm enjoying the puzzle-solving gameplay and the characters, as always, but I'm finding the new prosecutor this game introduces extremely frustrating and I need to rant about it a bit.

( The rest is spoilers. )

My physical and mental health have been teaming up to put me in a downward spiral of despondency recently, so I'm glad Summer Games Done Quick 2020 is running right now to provide some distraction.

If you're not familiar: Games Done Quick runs charity marathons of speedrunning (which is finishing a computer game as quickly as possible). It's a great way to find out more about speedrunning because all runs are commentated with the assumption that many people are unfamiliar with the game and/or the speedrun. This particular marathon supports Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders and is online-only, for obvious reasons.

I'll be keeping it on the TV while I study/browse the internet this week. If you're watching, feel free to recommend runs to me! I don't have anything in particular I'm hanging out for this time around.

For my own reference, along with anyone who may have visited my island, here is the list of design codes I use on my island, along with the source and/or how I found them. My intention is to update this as I add/remove designs.

My Animal Crossing Dream Address: DA-4989-3336-9453

Museum stone path border: MA-5093-4566-9963 (found via YouTube video)
Woodland stone path: MA-6624-9147-4107
Terracotta path border: MA-2579-1401-1104
Galaxy brick paths: MA-5047-0001-1952
DIY recipe sign: MO-Y77T-Q2YK-955F
Arcade floor: MO-88NY-8GQV-QDHW
Diner stage: custom, based on this design
Stardew Valley-style fruit markers: MA-9749-4582-4863 (Found via Reddit discussion)

This morning I checked my island rating with Isabelle in Animal Crossing: New Horizons (Switch) and it came back as 4-stars. She suggested I might want to clear up some of the items on the ground. Oh, I thought! I'm almost at 5 stars!

Spoilers: I was not close to 5 stars.

I am, however, very stubborn.

There are a lot of guides for how to hit 5 stars, and I'm here to tell you that a lot of what they say is not what I did, but it may be easier or faster to follow those instructions anyway. I chose to just follow whatever Isabelle suggested to me and change what I was doing when her suggestion changed.

( Here's what I had when I finally hit 5 stars: )

This took ~5 hours of solid playtime. I went back and forth to Isabelle many, many times.

I picked up Child of Light for free from the Ubisoft store a few weeks ago, and I just finished it last night on April 20.

Story: Fairytale-inspired portal fantasy
Graphics: Beautiful 2.5D watercolour-style art
Gameplay: RPG with platformer elements, 2 difficulty settings

In short: I finished this game, so it was clearly fun and absorbing enough to keep me occupied, but I don't recommend it as a cheerful isolation distraction.

( More details below the cut. )

Child of Light was free on the Ubisoft store - I would have posted about it here but I discovered it literally 10 minutes before the deal ended. I'd had this game on my wishlist for a while but decided even though it looks absolutely beautiful (I love watercolour art) I wasn't sure I'd enjoy an RPG right now... but free is always worth trying! So far I've played about 10 minutes and it's as gorgeous as promised.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is out and I'm not playing it because I don't own a Switch. I've been saying for months I would buy a Switch when the new Animal Crossing came out, not realising this would coincide with a nation-wide Switch shortage! You can't buy a non-Lite in this Switch at all right now, even online (I want the docking function because my neck is not up to extended handheld gaming these days). Anyway, I'm deeply envious of all of you who are playing and I hope you are having fun ♥

A bunch of games are free on iOS right now (see this CNET article for a full list), including She and the Light Bearer, Cat Quest and Takoway, all of which I've now downloaded, and Monument Valley 2, which I already had.