Essence Of The Shadows

Ending my zen weekend with a zen game. Finished a mission in Aragami 2 without any detection or murders whatsoever, plus grabbing additional in world booty (not what you’re seeing in the photo). Only had time for one mission tonight, but I made it count! I’m one achievement richer.We’re still having nice warm summer days, so when the evening hit it felt nice to feel the cool wind drift through the window as I drank some cherry blossom green tea. Needless to say it helped with the atmosphere a bit.

Meanwhile, on Steam Deck last night I started Aragami in NG+ to set myself up to gather more achievements. On my first playthrough I did a mix of stealth with a bit of killing here and there. This time around I’m going to go for the murder medal. Surprisingly killing all the enemies is harder than you might think, especially when you’re trying not to get detected. There’s also an achievement for killing 100 enemies, all in due time.

Palace and Chill

Took on some Glinthawks tonight and advanced the plot a little in Horizon Zero Dawn. Instead of fast traveling I’ve been walking all over the place looking for treasures and settlements, and maybe the occasional Machine skirmish. I wish I knew more people to talk about this game with. Other than a couple friends between work and online, everyone else I know either thinks it’s too boring, or they find Aloy to be too “woke” *aka* she’s not fuckable enough. Though to me she’s probably one of the best female protagonists since Lara Croft. In fact, Aloy seems more like classic Lara than the current spin of Lara ala Crystal Dynamics. Aloy explores, learns from her environment and adapts, she crafts arrows and other items like modern Lara but without the annoying whining.

Wish I could have played more tonight, but at least I moved the main quest along, and I’m in position for next time.

The Spirit Of Machines

Tonight I found a village where the humans and machines were peaceful towards one another… for awhile anyway.

Most areas of the game have machines that will make no bones about attack you, unless of course you hack them yourself. Of course it wasn’t meant to last, and I ended up having to kill the once friendly machines. The more I play this the more I wonder what plunged civilization into a second stone-age. Somehow I get the feeling a billionaire manchild might possibly have something to do with it, but it’ll be several play sessions before I figure it out methinks.

The Adventurous Sorts

The last bit of my evening was spent losing myself in a very vivid, colorful world with much to discover. I returned to the farmland that was previously on fire, and began to slowly purify the land. I found a few rot, won a few battles and even have a special delivery for next time.

I’m thinking tomorrow night of continuing my adventures in HZD. I played a bit last night, and much like in Kena I was once again lost in a very vivid world. Last night I left off helping the Nora Braves take down some Cultists, destroyed two of three bases and found a few Ancient Vessels for my ever expanding collection. It was fun taking down the alarms and creating an ambush. I don’t know why so many people at work told me this game is boring, it offers a multitude of destroying your enemies.

This Game Is On Fire

It was another productive day. Got off work and continued spring cleaning the desk area, and then rewarded myself with a bit of Kena while enjoying the scent of cherry blossoms and sipping blueberry green tea on a comfortable spring evening. I only played for about an hour, but I covered quite a bit of ground. Found a few more Rot, cleansed a couple areas and explored new found territory with even more to uncover on a future session.

I was going to do some animating tonight, but after spending most of the day on my feet between work and tidying I opted to futz about instead. It’s my weekend now after all, and anything is possible… except finishing a game in March. Oh well, at least I had plenty of adventures along the way with plenty more on the horizon!

Keeping Spirits Up

Tonight’s Kena session was more therapeutic than I expected it to be. I only did the trials, but after beating up and shooting enough demons I got a cool outfit out of it! So far I’ve only cleared one out of the three requirements for the trial: no healing. Now I just need to finish the trial in under two minutes and clear it with zero damage. I came close on the latter, but failed towards the end when a demon biffed me into the ground.

The evening was better enhanced with proper mood lighting, and a new green cherry blossom tea! For being all natural it has a lovely sweetness. It’s very clean tasting, and a good mix of matcha and loose leaf. When I pour the tea it’s so green that it can even be seen in a black mug. I might have to use it as a base for milk tea some time! I also ordered a black cherry blossom to try on a day when I need the additional caffeine.

Hopefully this all clears my head. Every other night I keep having dreams about being late for work. I really need to get away for awhile.

The Misadventures Of Lara Croft

Oops…

Apparently in the new Tomb Raider Remastered Trilogy if you leave the butler in the freezer for too long he’ll actually ice over! Also there’s a Photo Mode!

Lara’s Breakdancing Skillz

I’ll have to take a more careful look at my surroundings, just to get any good photo opportunities stored away. Definitely puts a new spin on an old game!

That Mummy Is Sus

Made it out of Qualopec’s Tomb with the first part of the Scion before calling it an evening. I’m thinking tomorrow night I’ll pick some form of Metroidvania to pad out what remains of my evening.

This One Time, At Pod Camp

I recently went through a five hour Skyrim livestream, and I harvested about 30 minutes of fun from it… some of it worthy of animation! There will be at least two or three videos coming from it. At least one of them being 100% animation! Maybe it’ll make up for the massive influx of pure gameplay video I’ve been pushing out! 😛 That said, there will be a couple of those next month. Maybe they’ll give me time to get this polished and ready. If not, it can be expected to debut in early January, hopefully with more content if I’m lucky. 😛

SFM: Gather Round Teh Bonfier

Got around to doing a little SFM yesterday! Unfortunately this isn’t going to be an animated piece. Instead I needed to come up with a fake game cover, and despite how simplistic it is I kinda like it on its own.

Video production has been going well, though there hasn’t been much in the way of scenes for me to animate. I only have gameplay to share, and not much inspiration to animate any scenes. I’m hoping that will change, though so far it has made for snappy production. I was going to delve into some Wonderlands footage tomorrow, which is dwarfing my Skyrim footage at this point.

Thanks 4k Recording!