I started a new (short) series of a playthrough of the CLASSIC 1992 RPG/strategy game Dune, based on the book (and heavily influenced by David Lynch’s movie). It’s an AWESOME game. And also if you search “the spice must flow” on YouTube I’m number 18. (My most successful tag to date is “you have died of dysentery” where I’ve reached the Dizzying Heights of number 4 for this vid.)
My attempt to finish Skyrim continues with a trip to the Thalmor Embassy in the sixth ep of my Let’s Play Skyrim.
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So the loch I try and have a daily run by is still frozen over, and some of the swans have taken to investigating the land. And this cygnet came up to me making ridiculously cute noises – I’d no idea swans had cute noises! And I snapped a few pics. (Mummy swan was not far behind and she was far less cute and much more “hissss – away from my child, human!” to which I quickly obliged.)
Also, new vid up today of another classic DOS game, Castles 2: Siege and Conquest playthrough. I LOVE THIS GAME. Also, it’s probably responsible for my love of siege weaponry and much other medieval nonsense. It’s ridiculously good for the time (1992), with politics, plots, castles, and a well-judgey Pope to contend with as you fight it out with a bunch of other noble houses for the throne of France.
If you have any DOS games you’d rec, let me know! I’ve a fair old list, but am always happy to try something new. And I love talking about awesome older games. Computer games are such weirdly ephemeral media. The great plays, and novels, and paintings, and such will get restaged and reprinted and replicated, but the great computer games, even of just 20 years ago get forgotten. Which is such a shame.
Anyway, Castles 2: Siege and Conquest! A classic, dammit.
There I was, just helping out a guy who’d locked his father in an asylum after he got an ancient artifact stuck to his head 400 years ago and lost his grip on reality, when I opened a door and there was this:
In the post-apocalyptic world of Fallout 4, these bloody monkeys are to be found in various places. Normally I shoot them, despite getting neither XP or loot, because they are scary. But that is when they are alone. When this gang started flashing their DEVIL EYES and clapping their CYMBALS OF EVIL at me, I nicked the clean grey suit from the suitcase (not for myself, for my settlers, who are all well-dressed and have nice hats) and backed slowly out of the room, and ran away.
It’s still not as weird as that time in Dragon Age Inquisition, where I had to alt tab out in fear and confusion to ask the Internet what the dickens has just happened:
That is a large pork pie wearing a top hat. There was also creepy music playing. This DELIGHTFUL Easter egg was discovered after I fell under where Solas hangs out at Skyhold.
I’ve spent the past four years avoiding spoilers about Mass Effect 3, but now I’ve finished my first playthrough, I can go read as much spoilericous content as I like, hurrah! (This is a subtle hint there will be many ME3 spoilers in this entry.)
Last week I finished my first runthrough of Dragon Age Inquisition, and I loved it. Ridiculously. First, it’s Bioware, and I’ve yet to meet a Bioware game I haven’t liked, and secondly, it’s Dragon Age, which has my RPG heart. (Yes, I love Mass Effect, and think it is brilliant and fem!Shep is one of the top sci-fi characters of all time, AND generally speaking I want rockets more than wizards, but somehow Dragon Age was still the one I fell in love with.) *And* this was the very first PC game I’d played for over a year. Reason being, I was concerned about the amount of time I was gaming, and decided to quit for a year to check I wasn’t horribly addicted or something, and I was just making GREAT life choices with all the imaginary adventuring nonsense. Anyway, turns out it’s QUITE EASY to choose not to game, and while I had more time to waste in other immensely creative ways, I did miss the gaming. For gaming is awesome. And DAI was the last game I’d bought before I quit and I never had a chance to play it, so it had QUITE a build up in my head to live up to, and it did. So here are my ten most favourite things from my first complete runthrough. (On a first runthrough, I’m always a wizard (or whatever the glass cannon class is)…unless I find out part way through I can be queen if I’m a warrior/rogue noble human. Ahem.) And here was no different. Also female human. Also generally nice. I don’t like it when the pretend people judge me poorly. Anyway, the things!
As we all know from, um, watching movies and stuff, timeliness is for losers. Thus, despite being released on International Women’s Day, it’s only now that I write this blog post on the ridiculously gorgeous anthology Cranky Ladies of History edited by Tansy Rayner Roberts and Tehani Wessely, in which I have a story, ‘Little Battles’, concerning a kidnapping incident towards the end of Eleanor of Aquitaine’s epic life.
If you can tear your eyes away from the cover (it’s even better in person; I keep stroking the pretty art and cooing at it in a totally normal and sensible way), within you’ll find over twenty stories concerning various historical peoples who challenged the conventional attitudes of their societies, written by all sorts of exciting writers including Kirstyn McDermott, Garth Nix, and Nisi Shawl.
There’s a smashing Big Idea post Tansy and Tehani have up on Scalzi’s blog, which explains rather well the instant “omg, yes” feeling so many people got about this book’s concept. Personally, I was Quite Intrigued at the words “cranky ladies” but then when you add “of history” it’s an instant yes.
Over on Fablecroft, you can read about some of the cranky ladies featured in the anthology under the cranky ladies of history tag, and see the launch report, which I would totally love to have attended, if it weren’t for all those thousands of miles getting in the way, dammit.
The anthology is available direct from Fablecroft, and at Amazon.
Lovely things from elsewhere
– This week’s Verity! podcast concerns the new Doctor Who comics from Titan, and there’s some sort of giveaway we;re having where you can win a $25 gift certificate for Comixology. Free comics!
– And I’ve been so neglectful of blogging this week, there’s also last week’s Verity! where they’re discussing the more intellectual companions. I haven’t listened yet, but I can only assume they’ve all come to the sensible conclusion that Liz Shaw and Romana are best, after Babs, obviously.
– I just got back into Skyrim a few days ago, and have been busy updating my mods (chicken follower!). And this came up on my Twitter feed today: a touching Skyrim mod memorial for a player who’s passed away.
This should really be a post about Nine Worlds and/or Worldcon. It’s not. It’s a post about Posh Mudcrabs. Currently, my game of choice is Star Wars The Old Republic, which I love and adore and is letting me decorate houses at the moment, so I’m spending a lot of time killing Jedi, looting their monies, and spending it on potplants.
But this mod for Skyrim has come Dangerously Close to tempting me back to Tamriel. Look at them! They’re mud crabs! And they have MONOCLES!
