One of Everything: April

No time but many things

Happy almost May Day. This month was a weird one, I had a lot of time to read but managed to get only halfway through a lot of stuff. I’ve also given up on audiobooks for now, since I keep having to return them to the library after I’ve only read part of it.

I got to go to Brooklyn Independent Comics Fest this week and bought a ton of stickers (and also got lost in Industry City for the first time). I also drew a ton and finished a sketchbook for the first time in awhile. Here’s the other stuff I finished this month.

Book

Bullshit Jobs

Saying you’re inspired by a David Graeber book is like saying you find it relaxing to go on vacation. No shit, really? Despite owning his other two books I’ve never read them, and I forgot from his essays how funny he was. For example, this paragraph about Oxford:

I’m sure in the case of Oxford much of its day to day concerns involve more practical matters such as attracting to the university the children of oil magnates or corrupt politicians who might otherwise have gone to Cambridge.

Like, damn. Burn Oxford down why don’t you.

This book is a much easier read than Debt: The First 5000 Years, and as someone currently finishing my dissertation it’s an example of good academic writing (sure, pop academic, however I have always been frustrated by that distinction and how snobby people can be about it. Half the time that just means well written.) This book had me yelling in recognition every couple pages, and I don’t even feel that I’ve had any jobs that fit his Bullshit category (well, maybe one or two). But if you read any of this, I recommend the intro, where he calls BS on the “AI will give us all a 2-hour work week” thing Bill Gates keeps saying, 7 years before he said it. It’s funny to feel creatively inspired by an anthropology book, but sure, go off.

Game

A Space for the Unbound

A Space for the Unbound makes me believe we shouldn’t give scores to video games. I already kind of think this, to be fair; they aren’t informative and fall into the “grade inflation” trap more often than they should. A Space for the Unbound made me a firmer believer in this though because it’s a total visual and storytelling treasure, on the short list of video games to make me cry (cat wonderland…) and also has gameplay that made me stop playing it for a whole year. I’m speaking about the point and click, find and deliver missions that take up most of the game, and the stealth sections in particular. Some of these would (and did) bring it down some notches in reviews, scored ones anyway.

But I still believe A Space for the Unbound is a games equivalent of a must-see: it's not for everyone, but it can be for anyone. I love how female/male friendships are depicted in this game, with girls and boys as intellectual equals who actually get along. I appreciate how one “villain” goes from irritating to legitimately angering and then all of a sudden looking at them is like looking in a mirror. And I want to visit gorgeous Loka City and pet all the cats. Most of all, as I said about Witch Hat a couple months ao, I love stories about young women embracing their creativity because I really identify with them. A Space for the Unbound isn’t afraid to leave threads of its plot vague or even unexplained completely, and it doesn’t matter at all; the game is esoteric and unafraid to let its characters do magic and bring about the apocalypse. It’s a metaphor but it’s also not. Just go try this one.

Unbeatable Demo

This game has it all: tunes, a blue haired main character, legally distinct Team Rocket. Unbeatable is an upcoming rhythm game in a world where music is illegal. The demo takes place over a few days where you explore a small town and get in fights with your team and also the police while being pursued by formerly mentioned Not Team Rocket.

There’s a story mode but I love the arcade mode the most. There is a menu with album covers that play the song when you select it, I remember menus like this from childhood! And the songs I’ve heard so far are really good. It’s so important for a rhythm game to have good songs. For example, Sayonara Wild Hearts: great songs. Other rhythm games: not so much. These ones feel cheesy but they are such a bop and the choruses channel genuine emotions, not ironic reactions.

I also like the way the characters move in the non-rhythm sections. How Beat jumps off the stairs with both legs in the air, and when you walk up a hill towards the camera and your character gets bigger and kind of slams into the camera. The demo takes place in a seaside town and I wanted to go there so badly and spend a day looking through the shops.

It’s unfortunate the story mode was, well, unbeatable on normal mode for me. If anyone associated with the game happens to read this (it’s possible!) the human enemies are really hard to read in my opinion and I would have had a better time if they were either slower or had more distinct “A” and “LB” moves, because this prevented me seeing the end of the demo.

Blue Prince

On the “Is this game good?” question I say Yes. But I don’t think you should play it if you don’t like roguelikes. The way I got to the credits of this game, besides playing it with my partner after awhile, was having fun with the moment-to-moment of room placement and puzzle solutions just drifted to the top of my consciousness like pond scum. If that sounds boring, I would skip this.

Show

Common Side Effects

Hey, did you ever hate adult cartoons for most of your life and then find one or two you liked, but remain suspicious of the genre because you were always waiting for it to get misogynistic and/or gross? Just me?

Scavenger’s Reign was too gross for me to watch, but Common Side Effects is just gross enough that I can deal. It helps that it’s very funny. It’s a show about what the pharmaceutical industry would do if a cure for every injury was discovered, and my favorite thing about it is that Marshall (the main character) is idealistic and the show is pretty clear that he’s in the right. More shows should take a side like that. My other favorite characters are the 2 detectives, I love them.

Other

Pilot Kakuno

I am not becoming a “fountain pens guy” because nice ones are like $200. But I got a $12 fountain pen from Pilot and liked drawing with it so much that I used up an ink cartridge in 2 weeks. Drawing in pen is fun because you have to accept your mistakes and keep going with the piece, which is a lesson I appreciate. I highly recommend Kakunos as an inexpensive and easy to use first fountain pen (they even have a smiley face on the top to show you which way to hold it).