Stream Plans for 2021

 Despite Twitch's constant bullshit this year, they are still going to be my preferred choice of streaming platform for 2021. This is not because I'm already snug and set up there. It's because Twitch is still the best option. That's how bad it is.

tl;dr version:
- Don't know what I'm starting the year with but my primary stream series for the year is going to be a Nuzlocke run of Pokemon Diamond Version.
- I will be streaming Sonic games in June. If you have suggestions, let me know.
- I'm going to try to play some kind of spooky game in October, probably wrapping up with Shovel Knight: Specter of Torment at the end of October.
- We might be in for a Pokemon Ultra Sun Randomizer Nuzlocke depending on how I feel about that after the Diamond one. Ultra Sun might get pushed back to 2022.
- Other games (listed at the end)

In the case that I consistently stream throughout the year and don't lose my wrists to a goblin king,
Here's what we're doing:

Pokemon Diamond Nuzlocke

I might not start out the year with this one but this is one of the things I'm looking forward to the most. I was originally going to do a blind Nuzlocke of Ultra Sun but then I started playing Ultra Sun casually. I'm almost halfway through the game. As a kid, I actually never beat Diamond so now that I have a copy of it again, it will be fun to revisit it the brutal way. I want to finish editing the Pokemon Omega Ruby Nuzlocke series for Randomrings Let's Plays before I start this though. Although I will be streaming it, I am hoping to give my Diamond run a similar treatment to that of Omega Ruby.

As far as the actual run goes, I will not be using any form of Exp. Share. Most people would argue this makes the Diamond run my first "real Nuzlocke". I might add a few more rules to spice things up. I already have a list of clauses ready for the series. My only sources of external information will probably be a type chart, Twitch chat, and what little memory I have of Diamond (not a lot).

The stream schedule for this might be more inconsistent so I can finish it the fuck up. Omega Ruby, for example, took less than two months to finish recording but I wasn't streaming that one. With 3-5 hour streams once a week, it could take a month if I'm really lucky. Given the lack of Gen 6's overpowered Exp. Share system, I imagine this will take up a bit more time. I will still at least be doing it once a week if I can but don't be surprised if I stream Diamond more than once a week.

For those who didn't watch my let's play of Omega Ruby, I'll probably be voicing a good majority of the plot's dialogue. I don't remember a single character from Diamond except for... Dawn? Get ready to hear your favorite Gen 4 NPC's like you never wanted to imagine them before!

Sonic Month in June

June 23rd is the anniversary of the first Sonic game coming out. Since I have masochistically wasted so much time on that franchise throughout my life, I must sacrifice more. Might as well have fun with it and do it live. I don't know what I will play yet but for whatever streams I do in June, it will be of Sonic stuff. Not opposed to fan games but if I can't think of any I find immediately interesting, I'll just revisit old stuff I already have. Probably.

I'm always open to viewer/fan suggestions and I'm especially interested to see what people want for this one. If it's an official game, there's a good chance I already have it on my shelf.

Halloween Month

I will play some spooky stuff if I don't get sick of streaming and quit in October. This past Halloween was fun but kind of a shit-show overall. I'm hoping to allocate most of the month to one game and then maybe play Specter of Torment again, perhaps in a different mode or something, for the last stream of October.

Stuff I might stream:

Pokemon Ultra Sun Randomizer Nuzlocke

I have never done a randomizer of anything. I'm not sure to what extent I'm going to want my first randomizer to be randomized but I'm excited to try it out. I'm going to beat Ultra Sun normally first though. If I'm feeling up to streaming two Nuzlocke runs in the same year, I will. At the same time, I don't really want to be tied to the gimmick or seen as "that bitch who does Nuzlockes while he complains about Pokemon". We'll see how I feel about it. Might push this back to 2022. We'll see.

Final Fantasy IX
Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep (PS3)
The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age
Duck Dodgers starring Daffy Duck
Pulseman
Sonic Unleashed
Indie games that I think are cool
Let's be honest: I'm probably going to stream more Downwell at some point
I think the Scrap Story prequel comes out later this year???

twitch.tv/randomrings
Get fuckin' ready

'cuz one of us has to be

OGIGACA 2020 Revisited

 It's that time of year again where I talk about the small handful of games that released in 2020 that I actually gave enough of a crap about to try. Fair warning, I do mean a small handful.

Here are the games we're talking about so you don't have to scroll down to see if I touched on one or not:

Animal Crossing: New Horizons
Cyberpunk 2077
Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary (Master Chief Collection)
Super Mario 3D All-Stars

I said "small handful".

ANIMAL CROSSING: NEW HORIZONS (Switch)
Verdict: Lost my interest after about 4 months but still pretty great

I already briefly talked about this one earlier this year but I guess I can just briefly talk about it again. Animal Crossing is a series where you live in a little town with a bunch of giant-headed animal neighbors. You get money to get stuff then sell other stuff to get more stuff, finding more ways to get money and pay off your home loan. Your home loan turns into home upgrades until the game runs out of ways to upgrade your house, then I guess by that point you have "beaten" Animal Crossing. New Horizons works a little differently than previous installments and it's part of what makes it great and slightly refreshing for people like me who have been in a vicious cycle with this series for roughly 20 years. New Horizons puts you on a previously uncharted island with Tom Nook, his nephews, and two other randomly selected villagers. Now there's a crafting system, which usually makes me groan immediately. This game actually pulled it off because now if you break your shovel at 2am, you can just grab resources to make a new one instead of waiting until the store opens the next day. Or time-traveling. The crafting system relies on recipe cards you get either randomly or from doing various tasks, some of which give you different specific random recipes. Different seasonal events spice this system up along with DIY recipes you can only get during that specific time. A soft issue I had with every main Animal Crossing game before New Horizons was that once you drain your town of resources, you kind of can't do jack until the next day. New Horizons has randomly generated islands you can fly off to. They cost a specific form of in-game currency to get to but now you can do the monotonous chores you do in your hometown to your heart's content! Everything else about the game is more or less the same just with a way more accessible character customizer. Almost everything is just streamlined to work with the game's new island theme. I am really struggling to think of an example where this new system objectively makes anything worse. As I said above, I lost interest in this game. I have played it maybe three times in the past four months and I was starting to fall out of it pretty hard the 3rd month I played it. The first month is also noticeably slow. I think this is just because I've been playing this game since the Gamecube version, played way too much of New Leaf, and refuse to pay one cent for Switch Online. If you already give into Nintendo's corporate garbo and/or have people in your house to play the game with then this game is probably the game that keeps on giving and won't take you nearly as long to progress as it did for me. Otherwise; meh. It's great and all but it's still just Animal Crossing. I would argue it's probably the best one but it's still Animal Crossing. Also, with all of the updates they've been giving it to avoid spoiling everything for players who haven't gotten to a certain season or month of the game yet, I'm not really sure how well this game is going to age. They say they're still going to be doing some sort of update in 2021 but I can't imagine this going on for much longer than that, nor do I think I really care if it does or not. When the Switch hits the same dirt that the 3DS recently did, is New Horizons still going to hold the same weight and be the experience everyone praises it for today? I guess time will tell. If you want some cute animal time and some weirdly satisfying, grindy bullshit to soothe you during the good old pandemic, you can do a lot worse than Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

CYBERPUNK 2077 (PC)
Verdict: my full experience with Cyberpunk 2020 and I never tried again

Go back to sleep, Samurai. It's not December 10th yet!
                                              - John Ghostcock
                                                   December 10, 2020

HALO: COMBAT EVOLVED ANNIVERSARY (MASTER CHIEF COLLECTION - PC)
Verdict: alright

I bought the Master Chief Collection. The games included released in a set sequence, most of which landing this year. I still haven't played most of them. I did fuck around with Halo 1 though. It's fine. The graphical updates are kind of nice. I particularly like that they don't take away with the old Xbox charm of what the game originally looked like but still look polished. It has been a long time since I have played the original Halo so I can't speak to too many blatant improvements that an actual fan might notice right away. Halo 1 and 2 were the ones I played the most as a kid so, with that minor authority, I would say that this version holds up pretty solid. I can't think of anything mind-numbingly annoying. Halo 2, I still haven't played the new version of but in a general sense, that is one of my favorite first-person shooters ever. That's mostly because I don't really like first-person shooters but I digress. I say this just to let people know I'm really out of my element talking about this one but if you want to experience Halo for the first time, The Master Chief Collection is the way to go, especially if you can get it on sale.

SUPER MARIO 3D ALL-STARS yeah, I know, fuck Nintendo (Switch)
Verdict: well...
Super Mario 64: definitely an emulator for Super Mario 64
Super Mario Sunshine: they patched it but still kind of just the Dolphin emulator
Super Mario Galaxy: a kind of fucking stupid emulator for Super Mario Galaxy, the original is better
Super Mario Galaxy 2: what's that?

Okay so fuck Nintendo for the business decisions made here. I already pre-ordered it before I realized the full gravity of the situation. But I also knew that buying Super Mario Sunshine physically otherwise would cost way more than this licensed pack of emulators. So let me start off by saying this: you are better off getting the original version of all three of these games. But if you can't afford to do that because finding physical copies of Sunshine and Galaxy isn't super cheap these days, maybe you'll get this digitally before Nintendo kills it off. Did I mention fuck Nintendo? Whether or not it's generally worth it to play these versions at all depends on the version and if you are experiencing these for the first time or not.

Super Mario 64

This is probably the best one because it's kind of hard to fuck up. Despite lazily sliding emulators onto a 3DS cartridge, they still went out of their way to take out some stuff from all of these games. In the case of Super Mario 64, this will probably only matter if you're a speedrunner. Casually speaking, this port is fine. It's not worth the price of admission but if you're going to get this compilation bullshit with actual money for some odd reason, this is a welcome part of the package. Alternatively, I don't think an original 64 cartridge is that expensive but I understand not everyone has a TV or hookups to play that shit anymore. This game can also be downloaded on Wii and Wii U as well as the DS remake on Wii U. Or fuck Nintendo and just pirate it, it's probably not even half a gig.

Super Mario Sunshine

This was the most fucked up emulator in the bunch but I have been informed that they got rid of one really stupid decision that I'm still baffled about even after it's been fixed. So this is a Gamecube game ported to a system that supports a USB adapter that lets you use your dusty Gamecube controller on it. They purposefully locked off use of USB controllers for Super Mario 3D All-Stars because Nintendo isn't about joy anymore. Again, I've been told that now you can use a Gamecube controller on it. Most of the issues with the emulator with that instilled are essentially what you would expect from any given Gamecube game played on your PC with legally gray methods. This was the main thing that made me want this in the first place because I had never really played Super Mario Sunshine for more than a couple of minutes as a child. I never had my own copy and the original version is a bit more expensive than it was just a year or two ago. One day, I might honestly make some Switch collector's day and sell them this shit for like $20-30 and use that money to get an old crusty Gamecube disc.

Super Mario Galaxy

I fucking love me some Galaxy. But not on Switch! The Wiimote shake is now almost completely exchanged with a button press which is nice. Under circumstances out of Nintendo's hands, this is the version of the game that will lead me one step lesser to the ledge of carpal tunnel, of which I teeter back and forth on. Not so fast though! You don't need a sensor bar for this version either but you still need a little cursor to do stuff, which is just the invisible mid-point of the controller's shoulder-button-gooch. Whether or not this is better I guess is up for debate. I personally think a lot of the issues I find with this port are like the ones in Sunshine where it's just because it's an emulator. Little rare frame drops and Mario freaking out on ledges and crevices. I do feel though that as annoying as a lot of the mini-game-ish missions are in Galaxy, none of them are particularly improved by being on Switch. The cursor awkwardness might be fixed for some by pointing the Joy-Con like a Wiimote but I tried it for a few seconds and fucking hated it. The best way to experience this game is absolutely in its original version or perhaps the Wii U version, I never tried that. On its own, perhaps fine but I still don't think either one of these three games is worth the $60 Nintendo squeezed out of so many kids/kids' parents. If you really want a legal backup to pirate the better versions of these games, then I guess this here is a license to do so but the original versions are simply better ways to experience these games. I would even argue Super Mario 64 DS is a better way to experience Super Mario 64 but the rest of the internet would mostly say "no".

All-in-all, fuck 3D All-Stars and fuck Nintendo. But also I'm keeping them in case I want to stream Sunshine again. What a racket though.

Shoving Music Down Your Throat (2020 Edition)

 Here's more music that I recommend you listen to. I really wore these out this year, being trapped inside, cowering from neighboring idiots potentially spreading a deadly disease. 

To be clear: this is NOT a list of stuff released in 2020 (although some of it is). These are albums (and an EP) I found in 2020. Coincidentally, it can all be listened to on Spotify so I will be providing links so you can indulge in my musical insanity as well.

This is a playlist I made for this blog. It contains one song from each album. Don't look at it as a "best of" or anything like that. It's more just to get a taste of what's going on with each album and seeing if anything slaps you in the face like it did for me.
spotify:playlist:2JWBJbVZsOdXEHGUZHVgzN
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2JWBJbVZsOdXEHGUZHVgzN?si=aB19z_RbSoGTcTaHGmgkqw

Ghost in the Machine by The Police [1981]
genre: new wave, reggae rock

I know, I picked the year where we are all screaming ACAB to start getting into this band. "The Police" is a pretty popular group with a lot of hits under their belt. Ghost in the Machine is probably my favorite album by them, tied with Synchronicity, which is the one that most people cite as the band's best album. They didn't pick a bad one though. Speaking of hits, although nobody talks about Ghost in the Machine, you have probably heard "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic". You may have also heard "Spirits in the Material World", "Secret Journey", or "Invisible Sun", especially if you were listening to the radio in 1981. I was not, and most people within a 3-year range of my age only know "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic". Anyway. This album feels a lot more "brooding" than their previous albums, for lack of a better term. "Message in a Bottle", "Next to You", "De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da", and "Don't Stand So Close to Me" are what people are most used to "The Police" sounding like. This is fair since I just listed off four of their most famous songs to date. This is when they were much more reggae rock than new wave. Ghost in the Machine sounds kind of like this transitional period and I really like the result. I personally think that Synchronicity works better as an experience. On the other hand, the "I'm really enjoying this" to "meh" ratio leans heavier toward "I'm really enjoying this" for most of the songs that are on Ghost in the Machine than that of Synchronicity. Neither album is perfect. No album is. I think "Hungry For You" is just okay. I feel like "Demolition Man" is too fucking long for what takes place on that recording. Adversely, there is a lot of cool shit on here that blows the early 80s out of the water, if only mainstream rock from the early 80s that is worth listening to sober. Also, much saxophone is present in the latter half of this album. I'm picky with what I put on shuffle but I am a simple man when it comes to saxophones in rock music.

Synchronicity was on this list too but I decided to keep it one album per artist/group. The 2018 list had a bajillion Dir En Grey recommendations and this one already recommends the entire discography of Bloc Party, featured below. So If you're going to dip your toe into "The Police", I say their last two albums are the best. I have listened to all 5 a few times each now and their last three albums are worth a spin. Despite the existence of "Message in a Bottle", the first two albums are pretty hit-and-miss.

such saxophone:
spotify:album:5jkwdY6jS1Hzi8epr6HW7h
https://open.spotify.com/album/5jkwdY6jS1Hzi8epr6HW7h?si=sXcmov9VTxmfoSW3DvR6cg

Mr. Bungle by Mr. Bungle [1991]
genre: experimental rock, avant-garde metal

Mr. Bungle is the old band that Mike Patton made. He's the nasal cartoon character that sang "Epic". Around that time, this thing came out that sounds nothing like that. I like really weird music. It doesn't have to be that "weird" because that definition is going to be skewed by everyone's personal experience and what they've heard. What's more important than weirdness to me is a tonal variety or complete disregard for genre. Mr. Bungle is one of the prime embodiments of both or at least one of the most popular examples. This was their first album. Since they have been coming out with new stuff this year (the last album came out in the late 90s), I guess now is a good time to check them out??? Personally, I don't think this is the best Mr. Bungle album. Disco Volante and California have more variety and I think they are more interesting to listen to from front-to-back. The debut album is a really good introduction to what Mr. Bungle embodies for those unfamiliar with them who are also in the mood to give them an hour-long chance. It's dirty, foul, explicit, and silly, all on purpose. There are some catchy moments to be sure. Not many pretty ones, which is why I really recommend Disco Volante and California over those if you're in the mood for some weirdo rock shit. But this is the one I hadn't tried until 2020 for whatever reason. This is more "clown rock" than the others. The opening track is called "Quote Unquote", which I added to this year's playlist. If you aren't sure what I mean by "clown rock", you will have a very good idea after listening to "Quote Unquote".

spotify:album:5TzQq2irJPHeHNnh11atPw
https://open.spotify.com/album/5TzQq2irJPHeHNnh11atPw?si=y4BlTXXCQpWp6yX2hHtbCQ

Awake by Dream Theater [1991]
genre: prog rock, prog metal

There are a lot of bands that have a lot of cheesy ass music. Since they have one or a handful of great or "fast" musicians in their band, they get a pass. If you say they are shit, people will make fun of you. And yet, I feel like nobody's talking about Dream Theater anymore despite being founded by Berklee graduates and playing plenty of cheesy dad-friendly bangers. James LaBrie's vocals almost always leave something to be desired and most of the lyrics are corny. This is not exclusive to Awake. However, if one of the main reasons you don't like Dream Theater is because of the vocals and/or lyrics, I recommend giving Awake a shot. This is one of the earlier albums before extreme food poisoning shredded James LaBrie's voice and was also the last album they created with their old keyboardist. A lot of the album has a more melancholy vibe that actually lyrically ties to their real-life relationship with the keyboardist. The last track "Space-Dye Vest" has this real Syd Barret vibe to it by Dream Theater standards and it was the last track that Sherinian had writing credits on. It is melancholy as fuck. There are silly moments for sure but this is probably the angriest and heaviest album from Dream Theater that doesn't try too hard to go there and fucking fail (like Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence, yeah I listen to this band too often). Normally, I don't recommend Dream Theater to too many people. However, people only really seem to talk about the first album if they talk about this band at all in casual conversation. Now that I have finally gotten around to Awake, I truly don't understand why this one is left out of said conversation.

spotify:album:4jP59Kwqvy3n09eUe1Cge7
https://open.spotify.com/album/4jP59Kwqvy3n09eUe1Cge7?si=CTYqc-RYSeSld0Xz5K9BOQ

Intimacy by Bloc Party [2008]
genre: indie rock

This year, I actually started listening to Bloc Party and fuck me, do I like Bloc Party. Intimacy is my favorite if I had to pick one but now that I've listened to all of their studio albums, I can attest that you can't really go wrong. Unless you only like indie rock that sounds like rock music or you hate "fake" music. If that's the case, skip Hymns. Otherwise, close your eyes and pick an album. But if you don't know where to start, I highly recommend Intimacy. This one has a lot of creative ideas in it that put it beyond most indie rock I've heard from around the same time period without going so far from the genre that it becomes something else entirely. Kele Okereke's voice is very dynamic. For a lot of people, I think his voice might take some getting used to because it is very unique and sounds pretty yelly or closed-throat...y? He is one of the few rock vocalists I have heard that makes up for some of that pitchiness with raw emotion. Really, all of Bloc Party's albums showcase this quality that I like about them though. It's worth noting that I usually don't like typical indie rock, so don't be thrown off by the genre. This is worth the risk. Probably. I hope you don't fucking hate it, anyway.

If you listen to all of their stuff and get kinda sad that the discography is over like I did, most of Kele Okereke's solo stuff is also on Spotify. To be honest, a lot of it sounds like Hymns. But more singer-songwritery. Again, don't let that genre label fool you.

have fun joining me in listening to too much Bloc Party:
spotify:album:0ZdR2zjN6X6Wvffw8l87yl
https://open.spotify.com/album/0ZdR2zjN6X6Wvffw8l87yl?si=6ni7o3nkT8-4Zs97BhP1zw

Wolf's Law by The Joy Formidable [2013]
genre: alt-rock

This is really cool indie rock from Wales. I heard of The Joy Formidable forever ago because they were touring with Foo Fighters. To be clear: I don't give a fuck about Foo Fighters but I was hoping for something within that kind of genre that might be more interesting than them. I finally found one. I then saw music videos by them on public access when I lived with my parents. I guess this was before Wolf's Law came out. This is their second album and good lord is it fucking fun. It's a cool album with that harder indie rock flare that never gets unnecessarily wracky. The psychedelic parts are less noisy than on the first album. That might sound bad but the first album had a few parts that were pretty much rock concert song outros without the dad-rock shreddies. I don't know what's up with Wolf's Law conceptually but it all feels like it really goes together well. It can also be conveniently shuffled in with other stuff, though I think the best way to experience this one is front-to-back. The lead singer has a good voice and is a good guitarist. What does that even mean? Go listen for yourself, I have other music to force onto you. I don't have all day to text out the audible qualities of The Joy Formidable.

spotify:album:3fn4TpavfAcdnAg4ZNpA3c
https://open.spotify.com/album/3fn4TpavfAcdnAg4ZNpA3c?si=nYFtjMWTQaehvIdD6ri_SQ

The Mountain by Haken [2013]
genre: prog metal

This is one of those progressive metal bands to come out of the past 15 years that certainly has extended range guitars and slaps different time signatures into pretty much every song. Unlike most of those bands, they aren't screamy. They also aren't super shreddy either. Most prog metal bands are either kind of cheesy in that regard or they are almost diving into psychedelic territory. Haken is delightfully in between, most of their stuff being decidedly melodic. Their biggest hit seems to be a song about uh... conversing with a giant cockroach, I think? That's on The Mountain. I haven't really researched this but there seems to be an overlying story told by the entire album. A lot of recycled motifs are used. Most of them are pretty tasteful. The chorus melody from "Somebody" is arguably used too often. Don't get me wrong, it's a good one but fuck me do they repeat it a lot during that song on its own and then reprise it later in the album. From front to back, the album is a great listen though. Is it their best? I dunno. It's just the one that got me into them and I still really like it. I also listened to two albums after this one; Affinity and their new album coincidentally titled Virus. Don't worry, they released Virus in July and it doesn't sound like they threw it together to be like "hey, COVID lul". That one's supposed to be in the same conceptual universe as Vector, which I haven't listened to yet so yeah; not an album inspired by the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Anyway, The Mountain. It feels like listening to the plot of a cool fantasy movie, even though I have no idea what the album's about. For those who aren't a fan of the super heavy shit, it really doesn't feel like a heavy metal album for the most part. It never gets crazy "noisy" and is only occasionally dissonant so if you're not super into metal, you might still like The Mountain.

spotify:album:3RBULTZJ97bvVzZLpxcB0j
https://open.spotify.com/album/3RBULTZJ97bvVzZLpxcB0j?si=PsDrOvs5QriF1dpk4aWBow

To Pimp a Butterfly by Kendrick Lamar [2015]
genre: jazz rap

Remember all that cop stuff and how "unnhghhh 2020 was such a bad year"? Yeah, it was but the world wasn't that much better before the 2016 election. Case in point, Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp a Butterfly is a poetic, conceptual parallel to the terrible shit you heard about in 2020 and it was released in 2015. Even then, the album clearly illustrates that police brutality and systemic racism have been happening for a long time, we just noticed more in 2015, then subsequently not again until 2020. But it's not just a sermon. To Pimp a Butterfly has a lot of really cool jazz influence while still maintaining an accessible hip-hop feel. This is already a pretty acclaimed album, I'm just really late on this one. As such, I won't say a whole lot about it other than "listen to it". It has been a long time since an album hypnotized me and just took my undivided attention, making me gasp, giggle, and squirm at my PC while listening to it. I've listened to a lot of stuff. This one really got me and I still like all the songs on it individually too. Big recommendation, here.

spotify:album:7ycBtnsMtyVbbwTfJwRjSP
https://open.spotify.com/album/7ycBtnsMtyVbbwTfJwRjSP?si=Vu61FBMIQ1SC-5OdrGWCoQ

誰のせい by sajou no hana [2019]
[Dare no Sei roughly translates to "Who's Fault"]
genre: j-pop I guess

Not much to say about Dare no Sei other than "it good". sajou no hana is the band that made the Mob Psycho themes, they just aren't credited as sajou no hana for whatever fucking reason. In any case, if you like Mob Psycho's intro and outro music and wonder why there isn't more of that shit, there is! They have 4 whole songs on Spotify right now! They're all great! But between this EP and the other one, this one has my favorite song on it. The first one. I don't know my Japanese as much as I would like to.

spotify:album:4D2yss0tMnzkWW2IIf7LpF
https://open.spotify.com/album/4D2yss0tMnzkWW2IIf7LpF?si=bPa5aC5HSzaYGgedsnU4WA

3.15.20 by Childish Gambino [2020]
genre: alternative hip-hop, alternative R&B

Childish Gambino has been a big deal for me since because the internet was fairly new. This, in hindsight, makes me feel fucking old. I didn't expect Childish Gambino to come back to that level in terms of albums that hit me that hard and make me think about how I make my own music. 3.15.20 did it. This album barely fits into a genre and that's why I like it. It takes more hip-hop inspiration than anything else I can point a finger at but there is so much more to it than that. Telling people that this is a hip-hop album feels lazy to me. However, I think one thing that a lot of people like about Childish Gambino is that there is a lot of instrumental variety and a lot of "real" instruments. This one has a lot more synths and heavy pitch correction techniques. I fucking love it but people who have a probably unhealthy obsession with Camp over the rest of this guy's discography will probably be a little miffed. Most of the instruments still sound very different from each other across the album's songs and there is a lot of cool guitar sounds throughout the whole album. The guitars just aren't as wracky and present as they were on culdesac, which in my opinion is an upgrade. Most of the lyrics tell a more broad story together about sheer existence rather than having a lot of songs about fucking girls, though there are still one or two of those too. He pulled this off without the album sounding comparatively disingenuine. The only "downside" that's probably universal to most people that will listen to this is the fact that all of the songs are timecodes for when they appear in the album's overall runtime with the exception of "Algorhythm" and "Time". The album is better-experienced front-to-back anyway, it's just going to be harder to show people songs from the album in an attempt to get them into it and slowly form a hivemind of armed soldiers that have similar music tastes to yours. Two of my favorite bands are The GazettE and The Mars Volta (a Japanese metal band and a prog-rock band primarily led by two delightful weirdos with heavy Hispanic influence). I'm used to loving a lot of songs with titles that look like gibberish to the average American so this doesn't bother me. It's just something interesting about the album that you'll have to get used to once you realize you love it too.

spotify:album:600ClrWRsAr7jZ0qjaBLHz
https://open.spotify.com/album/600ClrWRsAr7jZ0qjaBLHz?si=24noEqEWQwODA4xyZYU7TA

Palimpsest by Protest the Hero [2020]
genre: progressive metal

Protest the Hero is one of my favorite bands ever. I have been listening to their music at least a song a week since 2011. I pre-ordered Palimpsest before the virus hit. I also ordered a shirt to match, which is something I rarely do for music releases. All of Protest the Hero's albums usually have some kind of concept or at least an overlying theme to them. Palimpsest has a particularly interesting concept because they went from telling stories about aliens, killing gods, and apocalyptic tales to American history. They're Canadian. It's a very interesting and honestly heart-wrenching portrayal of various American staples from native genocide to women's suffrage. The album ends essentially in present day, making direct jabs to the Trump administration and the people who directly supported it. They even had the balls to use his dumbass campaign slogan as the last song's chorus, making it the only song by them I turn down or completely turn off if I think people near my car can hear it because I don't want to give them the wrong idea. Although there are silly moments and such on the album, Rody Walker, the vocalist, took the concept very seriously while reciting historical stories that weren't directly his own. Honestly, a lot of the songs' stories I don't immediately recognize which might just speak for the album's timely importance. I know, that's giving a lot of credit to a fucking metal album where you can't understand half of what the fucker is saying upon first listen anyway. I genuinely feel that Rody did that good of a job with this hot potato of an album concept though. Musically, Palimpsest is probably the most straightforward and accessible album in terms of overall composition to date. The main thing that separates Palimpsest from their previous works is the consistent use of symphonic instruments. Most symphonic metal sounds cheesy but this album still feels like a metal album, just with really good orchestration mixed in. It really doesn't feel gimmicky at all. It also isn't a huge step out from their previous shit where they have had synthetic orchestral instruments used anyway. One thing that did take me a while to get used to is Rody Walker's voice on this album. His voice took a turn for the worst after they released Pacific Myth a few years prior. Upon writing this new album, Rody had to get with a professional vocal coach to make sure he was healthily up to snuff for what the band was making. You would think that this is the album where they finally take a break from Rody hitting really high notes every fucking 20 seconds but no. The shit he does on this album is even higher. There's even a song where he might as well be rapping in that register. It does sound different and a bit goofy at times but the more I listened to it, the more it honestly became kind of endearing in a way. He mostly uses it to convey a thematic dynamic anyway. He can still hit those notes in falsetto and chooses not to when it fits the song to go full head voice. That said, this album isn't going to be for everyone. I've shown it to one or two people that don't really go for all that screamy mumbo-jumbo and they actually didn't hate this so maybe that means something? It's substantially more melodic than what the average modern prog-metal album sounds like and this one doesn't usually stray too far from 4/4 or 3/4 time signatures. Have fun listening to this with your aunt. Be prepared though; they might just become more fucking metal than you. You little fucking baby.

spotify:album:6eIp2v5MyeY38ul4k0nGnS
https://open.spotify.com/album/6eIp2v5MyeY38ul4k0nGnS?si=PNm8MSd4TPSEumCoi9J_wg

Honorable mentions:

Mares Profundos by Baden Powell [1966, 2008 re-release on Spotify]
Songs From the Big Chair by Tears For Fears [1985]
Fatherland by Kele Okereke [2017]
NINTH by The GazettE [2018]
Tales by Charles Cornell [2019]

Name Change Vent

 Holy fuck. Hopefully whoever sees this never has to go through anything like this.

This year, I changed my name. Legally, the process was fairly simple. However, using that name for anything has been a 3-month long battle. Right now, I'm in a 45-67 minute line for the USPS to get back to me so I can tell them for the millionth time that they fucked me over entirely. But hey, let's rewind so you can get the full picture. Because there is no fucking help for this scenario. When it happens, you are absolutely alone. So I just want other people to know three things:
1) this happens and I have it easy in relativity
2) any trans person you've met that has legally changed their name has probably gone through something equally stupid and degrading
3) if you have ever thought about changing your name, trans or otherwise, this is going to be a good read

I'm not trying to scare people who are thinking about changing their name, here. Still, I was unaware of just how stupid this would be so just don't go into the process thinking it will be a cakewalk. It surely should be and maybe it is for many. It has been my experience that I have pretty much only heard horror stories about this sort of thing.

I'm not going to give away too many details because I don't like disclosing even a general location. I live in the USA and that's all the information you need for this story anyway. To start the process off, you need to figure out what your local county clerk wants for this process to go smoothly. Part of that is money. Not like the wad of cash the DMV forces you to hand over either. We're talking triple digits and it's like that in most states.

DISCLAIMER:
Do NOT take the rest of this as the absolute truth or think that it is universal. Different states have different procedural steps and necessary credentials. This is how it worked for *me* and it paints a generally accurate picture but that doesn't mean it will be the same in whatever state (or hell, certainly country) that you're trying to do this in. Alright, that's out of the way now.

So how I thought it worked based on what the state says online was you send them a filled out name change form, a valid copy of a legal ID (driver's license works), and then they send you more information on what the fee is and what your next steps are. NOPE! They sent me a you-fucked-up form weeks later saying "hey dumbass, you didn't even give us our check, you cunt. You also need a notary. Geez." And I want to just make it clear here: fucking nowhere on the official government site did it mention how much the fee was. Nowhere. So I printed out the form again, filled out the one minuscule box I didn't think I needed to do, got all that notarized, and drove back downtown to put that envelope in the same goddamn box. Yeah, the USPS has fucked me over more than the average person can probably imagine so if I can hand deliver something important and achieve the same hypothetical result, I'm driving. This time it went through. To my surprise, it only took like a week for them to get back to me with that chunky envelope. What's in the chunky envelope? A form saying "you did it, this is your name now, and you have ten days from this filed date to get that to the DMV". There are also four signed copies of an official form saying that this is my name now and it can be changed in whatever system. This sounds pretty straightforward but if it were, I wouldn't be making this furious blog.

Ten days from the filed date does not exempt how long it takes for the USPS to get that letter to you. In my case, this left me with seven days and it was before the weekend. You know, that two-day period where I can't do anything driver's license-related. Now normally, you take one of those copies the clerk gives you and tell the DMV people to update your driver's license with your new name. NOT WHERE I LIVE! You *need* a social security card that reflects your new name. Well gee, I gotta grab one of them anyway, yeah?

For reasons never fully confirmed by the USPS (they will not fucking respond to me), I have had mail from the SSA come up in informed delivery but not show up in my mailbox at all. I have filed cases for them and digitally notified them separately that I never received their mail to which the USPS might as well have said "sucks to suck, bitch". This would already be frustrating but in order to get a name change on your official social security card, you need to send in some other official ID. It can't be a copy. So I sent my birth certificate. I still don't know where that is either and there were originally two envelopes that came up in informed delivery. I'm sure the second one was just a letter wishing me a happy Halloween and not an irreplaceable document.

"Well, calm the fuck down. Yeah, that's frustrating but it's just a name. You'll get it eventually" you may be thinking as you read up to this point. Well without a social security card I can't get my new driver's license and without either of those things, I'm pretty well fucked on identifying myself with my new name without seeming "fraudulent". I love the irony and I can't wait for someone to try to tell me I'm being fraudulent for using my deadname that, believe me, I do not want anymore. This includes banking information. This means I can't update it with my current employer so I'm still deadnamed at least once a week. To clarify, I can give them a release form but then they are sending the health benefits and money information from one name to an account with a different one. I know this company is too fucking stupid to not fuck that up once so I'm not even trying it. They already occasionally fuck up our normal pay. That same release form (the SS-3288) can't be used to make a new bank account. There is another reason I don't want to get into for why I need a new bank account and can't just update the name on that account. Since I don't have the social security card, I also can't update my name with my place of residence. As such, I can't officially file with my new name to the USPS. I think that's why the mail carrier refuses to put my social security envelopes in my mailbox. Or so I thought. A few weeks later, they put in some other fucker's mail in there. It's not anyone that even lives in the building. I have no idea who that guy is. But it showed up in informed delivery, then showed up in my physical fucking mailbox. So mail for Stranger McWhothefuck; the address matches so shove it on in there. Really important looking mail for Ayden Iona; mistake, don't put it in the mailbox.

"Why are you freaking out about this now? It's been months, idiot", you may be thinking now. Because every case I file with the USPS either gets completely ignored or completely ignored and then they send me a survey asking how they did. This means that they are systematically ignoring me and how the fuck do you get the USPS's attention without suing them? I guess you don't. Or you keep spamming them for three months and hope they finally give you what you want. That's where I am at now. It seems I have exhausted every other avenue and in between official complaints, I think about how if I were a rich prick, I could probably tell Daddy "I want to change my name to just Cheesecake" and I probably wouldn't have to pay jack shit. I'd have a new name by the weekend. 

"Then talk to the local Social Security office". Mm. Good idea. So I tried that and the lady that answered thought I was blaming them for the USPS losing it so she was kind of passive-aggressive and hostile with me at first. I'm sure many idiots have done that same thing but I wasn't so like, maybe calm down. I told her "well, I'm just checking to see what you think was in those envelopes based on my story. I know it's not on your end that they are lost, I just want to make sure I should be freaking out or if that mail could be anything other than my social security card and birth certificate." She said she couldn't imagine it being anything else, which was genuinely helpful. Now I know my outrage was justified. That call was almost two months ago now. Actually, it might have been more than that, I'm not looking at my call log.

I swear this tale is almost over. Well, ya know, "to be continued" more than "over" but you know what I mean.

After that phone call, I bug USPS, actually begging them to give me my stuff or at least telling me where it is. Nothing. Absolutely no response. Not even the stupid survey.

"Okay, that is bad. But it's so bad that you should just call the SSA now. Stupid." Hm. Well, that's what I did a few hours ago. So let's recap as we approach that subtopic:

"Hey USPS, you said you had two social security envelopes for me but I never got them. Where are they?"
"How did we do?"

"Hey local social security office, is that envelope my stuff?"
"We didn't lose your stuff but that's almost definitely your stuff. Bug the USPS."

"Hey USPS, I'm screwed without that stuff, can you please give it to me?"
"You have mail from Spectrum!"

"Hey SSA, it's been months and nobody is helping me. I'm assuming they send back mail so where is that?"
"Sir, I'm in California. That's between you and the local office."
"The local office said USPS has it."
"Look man, that's not my job, the USPS has to have it or they sent it back to the local office. I can reissue one, that's it."

"Hey USPS--"
"Your wait time will be between 45 minutes and 1 hour and 7 minutes."

So yeah. Cue "Roundabout" by Yes because its title is fitting and that's where I'm at for now. I just needed to type this out because I'm sick of bumming out my friends all the time with this and I don't have therapy enough for this shit. I'm so fucking angry and I don't have a big enough power on my side to help me. I can do the rest of the legwork but I need my social security card. And honestly, where in the f u c k is my birth certificate? After so many weeks of the USPS just not responding to me, did they lose my stuff? Did the delivery fucker just steal my identity? Why is this such a hassle?

I have finally talked to a human with a new service request. Hopefully, this one works in my favor or at least lets me know what to do next.

Anyway, I'll post another blog to update how this story ends when it ends. Or if it gets crazy stupid even beyond this and I'm still fighting this battle in 2021 (which honestly seems likely at this point), I'll give an interesting update on this. Until then ["Roundabout" bass and acoustic guitar]

Randomrings Stream to Randomrings Let's Plays

Yeesh, this blog has really become just stuff about stuff I'm making or not making hasn't it? Ouchie. Well, here's another.

My original plan was to record while I stream so I can make a funny little video out of a 2-6 hour live stream. I have found this to be tedious and personally maybe too self-involved.

My new mentality is to convert a stream into a Randomrings Let's Play video if other people's voices are present. Like. Not in text form. I have had friends drop in the chat for hours and they do make the stream entertaining. I just think it creates a weird dynamic for RLP. Part of what I like about editing let's plays is this organic feeling stripped into bite-sized segments so there aren't too many lulls. Something about having to zoom in on text all the time kind of gets rid of that sentiment completely. I could just read the chat text in post and do silly voices but that's going to get old for me and for the audience after a while. I also don't want to start doing that with people I don't know that wind up in my stream chat. I'm going to end up doing something stupid or making someone feel self-conscious. It's not worth it.

Plus, as much as I don't watch stream archives very often myself, I still have stream archives. The moments that work aren't completely gone.

There is still the Resident Evil Zero stream that I have edited down from 3.5-4 hours of gameplay to like 30 minutes. The only reason I haven't released it is because I want to make it even shorter. That and, admittedly, I have not even started on the thumbnail art. This video has two of my friends in chat but not with voice. It just feels awkward regardless of the fact that I zoomed in on their text when they talk.

Also, I stream every week and when it comes to let's plays, I know what destructive roads my brain will go down. It will get to a point where I try to edit everything into a let's play. This will make my streams feel more like means to an end and less special for the audience. This also will drive me fucking nuts considering how much other stuff I am juggling in my fleeting spare time.

On a slightly related note, I have stopped playing Final Fantasy XIV as often. I fell into a real slump there for a bit recently.

So from now on, I'm only editing Randomrings streams into RLP videos when there are multiple voices to be had. There may be an exception or two down the road but this is my mentality going forward.

See you on the ol' YouTube or live on Twitch.

Why Did I Change My Name?

 This is a weird process that most people never go through. A lot of people don't want to be an online spokesperson for this for whatever reason(s) and I don't blame them. I like informing people about this sort of thing and people have been asking me about it here and there. I also don't want to go to bed right now so I might as well talk about this. Yes, this is usually about the mind frame in which most of Randomrings Blog is curated.

Can You Change Your Name?

Here in America, yeah. One of the reasons a lot of people don't want to talk about this crap is because it isn't one-size-fits-all. Even within a subsect of people where 100% of them want to change their name, it probably isn't one-size-fits-all because the legal procedure varies from state-to-state. I won't disclose where I am but here's what you had to do where I filed for mine (skipping a few details to keep my location vague):

- Find official name change form for your state online
- Fill out all of the necessary information (may include where you were born down to the fucking c o u n t y so just be ready for that)
- Print that out
- Put the filled out name change form, a check covering the name change fee for your current state/county, and some valid form of ID containing your date of birth (for me, a scanned copy of my drivers license was good enough) in an envelope addressed to your county
- Wait for them to send you a follow-up in the mail

If you did it the way they wanted you to with the right amount of money for the fee, they should send you a few copies of an official order stating that your name is changed legally. If not, they'll send you a different form telling you what you did wrong. And by "wrong" I mean the stuff you didn't know because even the government-officiated websites for this shit don't tell you jack about how to do this. I only screwed up once because I thought the form was first and then they would send back official instructions on what to do next. Apparently, they just wanted the form, ID, and money in one fell swoop so they can deal with me for the least amount of time possible.

They give you a few extra copies of the official order because you have to give it to your bank, your employer (if applicable), your insurance company, your car insurance company, and you need it to change your driver's license.

Sounds easy, right? The government will most likely fuck you over one way or another just for thinking that. Now, during the pandemic, you can't do social security stuff in person unless the SSA deems your situation "critical". So although I have indisputably and legally been Ayden for 3-4 weeks, I have almost no official record/proof of that. I'm not even going to get into that spiel here because thinking about it actually makes me angry.

Here's the other kicker: on the form, you have to give a reason for changing your name. Like, if I was going to do something fraudulent, I'm not going to fill that blank with "vote six times". The reason I gave had nothing to do with my gender, though in reality it kind of did. Imagine being like a trans woman or something and having to deal with this shit under a government that recently passed a bill that gives medical practitioners the right to treat you like hot garbage. Never mind, don't imagine that because it's really fucking sad and some of you reading this may have experienced this.

But yeah, technically, money and time are the only things keeping you from changing your name legally. And of course, this should go without saying, if you change your name to anything without filing it for the government, people should still respect that. They can fuck themselves if they don't. I myself am very fortunate and have friends who are more dedicated to my new name being shoved into conversation than I am.

Why I Changed My Name?

I have three reasons for this that sum it up the most, I think.

Reason 1: Gender. I was kind of fed up with identifying as a cishet man when that never felt wholly accurate. After further exploration, some women's clothing, and the purchase of an IPL hair removal device, I get why now. My, for all intents and purposes, "deadname" was three consecutive masculine names. I have never been a huge fan of the gender binary anyway, so I kind of just picked shit that I thought sounded the coolest without falling too far into one end of the polarized bullshit of Western gender norms. Ayden and my middle name, Levi, are both pretty gender-interchangeable or gender-neutral. Iona seems to be used as a woman's name 9 times out of 10 but I could not find a last name that resonated with my weirdo mind as much as that one. It's also the only one out of the three names that is primarily Scottish, which looks like it fits for anyone who ever sees me in real life. I would look like some kind of loony cunt if I picked "Yoshimura". A great name to be sure but a red-flag name for a pasty, freckly white fucker born and raised in the states. As someone who feels more in-between than outwardly masculine, I felt gender-neutral names made sense. I still feel that way after the fact.

Reason 2: Heritage. This is the main reason I stated on my legal name-change form. I was thinking about changing my name long before I came out as enbybyboi. The first name of my deadname was the one I had the least problem with. It was supposedly adopted from some guitarist from some band. Sometimes, my dad doesn't even remember where he pulled it from. My middle and last names were directly inherited from my bloodline. My family has been full of transphobia and homophobia for years. There are a lot of things about my family that I am not proud of and have not wanted to associate with for a long time. I haven't talked to many family members in years. A vast majority of them gave up on reaching out to me and the feeling is mutual. To have a future where nothing on my desk or in my closet or on my computer reminds me of the hateful environment I was raised in is an unreal thought that is becoming more real every day. Changing my name in that self-affirming mindset feels really good.

Reason 3: Video Games. I don't think I've used my real name as an input for a video game character in about 14 years. Every time I am prompted, it's something goofy, something I would name a character I was writing, or some permutation of "Randomrings". Do you wish you had a cool name like that in real life? What an escapist fantasy! Oh, wait! No, it's not! You can just do that in real life! So I did! "Ayden Iona" seemed more fitting than my Persona 5 name, "Ringer Snorkly".

Why Did You Pick That Name?

The above says a lot of it. I just kind of addressed myself as certain names in my mind, imagined myself being called different names by others, and sometimes I looked in the mirror and would call myself various names at different, spaced-out times throughout the day.

Ayden is a Gaelic name. It means something like "fire" or something like that. I'm sure there's some deeper symbolic meaning that fits me but I honestly didn't think about it that hard. I just mostly wanted Gaelic, gender-neutral, and something without a lot of biting syllables like "er", "or", or "ar".

Levi has Hebrew origin but has been used in several other cultures for hundreds of years. I feel like this one is generally more associated with masculinity but it is technically gender-interchangeable. And really, gender is kind of learned, societal bullshit so "Ralph" can be a girl's name because a girl named Ralph said so. Levi means "attached" or "joined". I liked the juxtaposition between this and the "fire" of Ayden. I come off as edgy/angry/scary to a lot of people but the people who come closest to me know I'm a sucker and want to help my friends more than most things anyone could do in life. I also like to think I'm a pretty empathetic bubby.

Iona is just a pretty name. It's a Scottish river. I have a note on my phone saying it also means "blessed". I'm not sure how accurate that is but I'm sure it was a contributing factor. This goes best with "Levi" because when I picked "Levi", I thought of my friends and my connection to them. As I said a bit ago, this name is generally perceived as feminine. A lot. This isn't a "Kim" or "Taylor" kind of deal. This is a "sooooo, you named your daughter Brutus, huh?" kind of thing. But since it's my last name, no one fucking cares and it's genuinely wonderful! I got my pretty gorl name and nobody asked any shitty questions!

Honorable mentions for various parts of my name were Asher, Reid, Zephyr, different spellings of Ayden, and Blair. These weren't all the options I sifted through, just the ones I went back to and contemplated the most. If not for my irrational loathing of the American "R" sound, I probably would have picked "Asher". That was the number 2.

Also, the acronym for my name is "Ali" because I'm an ally to many! Isn't that cheesy?!? I get four names, bitch!

Hope this shed some light on the mystery of changing one's name. I can answer more questions about my own name but in a general sense, I don't have all of the answers because it varies so much from person-to-person and region-to-region. Time for me to stop blabbering on with this blog and go the fuck to bed. Thanks for reading this. Sleepy-bye time for me. Sleepy-bye time for you. Maybe not. But surely for me.

Another Update (It's Been a Bit)

 God, it's been a while since I've released a scripted video. I just looked back on old Randomrings Blog entries and stumbled across an update one from last summer. This was right before I moved into a terrible apartment complex. I now live in a much more tolerable apartment complex. I can now make toast without setting off the smoke detector too. That's probably not the kind of update you wanted.

I don't even know where to begin. I guess I'll start with "the goods". The stuff you actually give a damn about.

Randomrings Channel

Yeah, I don't fucking know. I have an unfinished Gumflap script centered on Final Fantasy XIV that talks about MMOs in general. I added characters and a bunch of dialogue that beefed it up too much. This made me lose motivation to gut the script so I haven't touched it in months. I have a new idea for a scripted video that will look like my Pokemon Battle Revolution Gumflap episode but won't feature me. I mean, it will but not in character. It would be more of a mini, faux-animatic thing? It covers a more serious issue than "I love/hate this video game". I don't want to say too much about it in case I actually do it. But right now I'm trying to think of entertaining ways to express the idea and it hasn't clicked yet.

I have debated just making short opinion blurb videos about games, TV, or movies. Wouldn't be the first time. I have a handful of scripts for these. Still don't know if I'll go through with them. We wouldn't want another cookie-cutter, cynical review channel on the internet, now would we?

I have been posting Twitch updates here. That's about it. Hopefully that will change in 2021 but well, read below.

Randomrings Let's Plays

This new channel ended up being more of a daunting beast than I anticipated. I just care too much about making stupid let's plays. But now that's up. I have more Pokemon Omega Ruby Nuzlocke in the chamber. At some point, the audio capture for the game just gave up. That's why we have been stuck on Part 12 of the series for a while now. Among other things.

Randomrings on Twitch

I have been trying my hand at streaming and it has been fun so far. I plan on streaming whatever I want really but am most excited to stream games that people don't really talk about very often. So far, I have streamed Downwell, Resident Evil Zero, and some Mario games. But I want to get into weirdo stuff in the future. Stuff like Ristar, Pulseman, Threads of Fate, Shiness: The Lightning Kingdom. Just stuff no one really talks about or at least not anymore. For now, it's October, so I'm streaming Halloweeny (heeheehee) games. In November, I might stream something like Shiness: The Lightning Kingdom or Dragon's Dogma. I could also revisit Super Mario 3D All-Stars Super Mario Sunshine but probably won't any time soon.

I don't have much of a goal with Twitch. I don't think I even necessarily want to go Partner. I would be plenty content with Affiliate status. I guess I just want a big enough following for people to come in often enough to have a good time.

If you want to join in on the fun, as of October 2020, I have been streaming on Thursday nights at 7:00pm EST. Check @RandomringsChan on Twitter for updates to that or just check twitch.tv/randomrings

Randomrings Blog

Still exists.

Lexi Karma

I have an itch for making music but between the stuff listed above and making money to do all that, I just can't buckle down long enough to make satisfying progress. Part of my problem however is that I keep working ahead to other Lexi Karma ideas before I finish the one that I said would probably come out 3 years ago. So I guess I'm working on that and hopefully my distractions will pay off in the form of shorter development cycles for the other ones.

Personal Life

Going to therapy after a year/life of gaslighting, abuse, and manipulation from family and people I have become close to in platonic, romantic, or sexual fashion. I was planning on taking a big plunge and getting out there more, seconded by my therapist. Then COVID-19 appeared. I don't trust people and now I really don't trust people because even people with good intentions could kill me because of idiots. Anyway. Therapy has been going decently okay though. Probably helping me more than I realized. Sorry that this whole post is almost completely void of humor. It's almost 2am as I type this.

I changed my name. Any old work you see is with a name I don't want to associate with anymore. Now, for those who don't already know, I'm Ayden.

I came out as an enby man or masculine non-binary. This means a lot of different things for a lot of different people. What it means for me is that I have always considered myself to be a "girly man" even as a teenager. I just kept a lot of cis man stuff on the up and up because it was socially expected. Now I shave almost all of my body hair and a few of my tops and jackets were originally designed for women. And I really like them. My pronouns are still he/him, which is why I didn't make a big announcement or anything. At first, I only came out to three or four people. There are still people I haven't come out to because I don't really think it would change anything in our relationship one way or another. They already know me and how I appear. They don't need a label.
[edit: I no longer identify as an "enby man", just "enby". I don't like masculine labels. I now use they/them, he/him, and she/her pronouns to identify myself. Many of my friends refer to me as "they" but "he" is also fine.]

I started at home "laser hair removal" which is not wholly accurate to what it is but that's basically what it is. I'm about a month or month in a half in now. I don't see too much noticeable change but am now much more accustomed to the pain of it. I can't wait to rarely have to shave. To the point where I am still considering HRT. I'm still not sure if growing little boobs and risking dick atrophy is worth having better pores. But you have no idea how much I want girl skin and girl hair follicles. The kind that don't grow in with full force every single fucking day. Having some hips wouldn't hurt me either.

Lost some friends and was kind of betrayed by a few more. I look back on these moments and think "how do I still keep faith in any section of humanity?" I still have no answer.

Web comic

Still writing, I swear.

That's the update. I need to go to fucking bed. I've been up for about 18 hours now. Stay tuned for any of that stuff that might come out. A lot of it probably sounded kind of pessimistic but facing my gender and changing my name have made me feel more in tune with myself than I have ever felt and it feels so fucking good. I'm doing fine over here and can't wait for us to all bask in the glow of my weird brain bile!

What is Randomrings Blog?

 Hey, you. When I started this blog, I made a post about who I am and what this blog is. Since then, a lot has changed and some of that information was no longer completely accurate.

Randomrings Blog is an offshoot of my main YouTube channel called Randomrings Channel. I mostly talk about video games but have been known to take on topics about mental health and television. Randomrings Blog is just where I spit out quick thoughts that I don't have to edit into a video I might regret making later. I also talk about current events and other things I find interesting to talk about in hopes that you do too.

So other things about myself:

My name is Ayden!
My preferred pronouns are they/them, he/him, and she/her.
I have another channel called "Randomrings Let's Plays" where I do let's plays. They are not a stream of consciousness kind of thing like most people are used to. They are more heavily cut up and edited. I only leave in bits that I think might be funny or otherwise entertaining.
I'm a musician. You can hear my original music under the moniker Lexi Karma. It's prog-rock with some synths, bits of alt-rock, and whatever else I feel like mixing into that.
I like cartoons more than most forms of media.
I have a BFA in creative writing. I focused on screenwriting.

Every year on this blog (hopefully I'm able to keep up with this yearly), I talk about games that are coming out that pique my interest and I talk about music that I found striking.

Here are links to my stuff but they can also be found on any given blog post or the blog page itself.

Randomrings Channel
https://www.youtube.com/user/randomringschannel

Randomrings Let's Plays
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8CO_DixeW8mySoQ2ybdd0w

Lexi Karma
https://open.spotify.com/artist/0FqW6eB9bWbGIivSr3Fzu4?si=y_0DWMRQTh2frLn_jCLRcQ

Lexi Karma is also on YouTube, I suppose
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXHGC7X6xMMjJWZVBHByJdA

Shoving Music Down Your Throat (2019 edition)

I did this last year and I liked it. I hope other people got something out of it too... because I'm on that bullshit again.
To clarify, since I didn't last year, this is mostly not music that came out in 2019. This is about albums that I listened to front-to-back in 2019. One of them came out in 2019 but a lot of them are actually arguably pretty fucking old. I am trying to confine the list to stuff that is on Spotify so those of you that use Spotify can also listen to it. I will put a playlist here with a song from each album that I discuss.

spotify:playlist:4PXiCYZRUVUUtd3c0o8wb5

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4PXiCYZRUVUUtd3c0o8wb5?si=9g5wS6yLRneSNfkVT8KNoQ

Chaos Chaos by Chaos Chaos [2019]

genre: indie, synthpop

Don't worry, the rest of them won't be this goddamn long.

Remember that episode of Rick and Morty Season 2 where Rick is sad at the end? Remember that song that plays that made you want to cry? That was by Chaos Chaos (that song is called "Do You Feel It?"). They made a full-length album in 2019 and I really like it. The first time I listened to it, I grinned ear-to-ear for most of the album. It has been a ridiculously long time since that has happened. Something about Chaos Chaos's new album though really struck a nerve consistently. Now having listened to it a few times, I don't love it as much. I wouldn't consider it one of my favorite albums of all time or anything. Easily top 30 for the decade though, probably top 20.

Chaos Chaos is a group of two ladies that make poppy music with a rock edge. They do a lot of vocal harmonies and they are really good at taking simplistic, repetitive beats and changing up just enough to make them interesting. "Committed to the Crime" is the EP with "Do You Feel It?" on it and I think that this EP is a poor representation of what to expect from Chaos Chaos as a whole. "S" is superior in my opinion. More importantly and accurately, it represents what I like about the band. They are great with composition, sound design, and vocal quality when it comes to presenting a mood more than just a tone. "S" creates that variety and carries a unique enough sound to not feel like a stereotypical indie two-person pop group. There is something more serene and eerie about Chaos Chaos though that makes me not want to call them pop, kind of like how St. Vincent and Lana Del Rey fall into a certain category but are way too unique to fall victim to that category. This makes Chaos Chaos difficult to recommend to people. Fortunately, Rick and Morty forced one song onto people so now they at least know who I'm talking about. *dons feathered cap* Yet alas, I still feel like they really don't.

*takes off feathered cap... for now*

What I like about "Chaos Chaos" as an album is that it feels more personable. Like "S", it is very emotionally versatile, which I personally appreciate a lot. The album is never too sad, too silly, too cynical, or too angry. It really feels like a fluid experience despite not being a concept album (or at least I haven't been informed that it is). "S" felt a lot more otherworldly for "pop". That's why I like it and why it is probably still my favorite by them overall. "Chaos Chaos" (by Chaos Chaos) is a bit more accessible and feels more like a rock album with synths instead of guitar focus. Most of the album hits hard for these reasons. There are a few songs that I don't mind having on in the background while I'm driving or typing but they don't really stand out as well as the other songs. I know you can say that about almost any album but I really feel like there are a few songs on the album that take away from the album as a whole. In my opinion, an album with four songs I really like and eight songs that bore me is not an awesome album. Even a half-in-half ratio I would not consider it great. Like "2112" by Rush: "2112" is one of my favorite songs by the band, "Tears" is cool, "A Passage to Bangkok" is fun, "Something For Nothing" is kind of okay, "Lessons" sounds like some AC/DC bullshit. Would I recommend "2112" to someone by that merit? Absolutely, but I would do so with the disclaimer that it's not all gold. Some of it is copper and "Lessons" is that weird deteriorated shit that grows on copper. I guess that's sort of how I feel about "Chaos Chaos" but without the extreme lows. I could say there is a "Lessons" equivalent but it still is not nearly as grating or inexcusably lame as "Lessons". Probably "Berlin" off the top of my head. The worst parts of Chaos Chaos's new album are still fine. The ratio is more of an 80/20 than "2112"'s 60/40 if that makes sense. I'm getting close to numbered score territory so I should move on to another album. Yeeeuck.

This album feels sentimental on almost every feel I can think of so if you want to listen to it, here you go:
spotify:album:6hm7Kun6RH4I8KExbTisqG

https://open.spotify.com/album/6hm7Kun6RH4I8KExbTisqG?si=wCsXhFAWSjyta_Mcy9OMeQ

Shaking the Habitual by The Knife [2013]

genre: experimental electronic

When people say "I like some weirder stuff", they usually don't mean this. Even when people say they like "noisy stuff", they usually mean Daughters or something else that is usually just math-rock with a lot of dissonance. Shaking the Habitual is not the weirdest thing that Karin Dreijer has ever done but it's an arguable top 3 (if you don't count Fever Ray concerts). There are definitely beats and occasional melodies here but as far as a general audience is concerned, the rest will melt your brain. However, the versatility of Karin Dreijer's voice and their unapologetic creativity gives this album goosebumps. Also, it's just a creepy sounding album. I'm not talking that Avenged Sevenfold bullshit where the guitarists find out what a harmonic minor scale is and throw in some minor seconds to throw 13-year olds through a loop. Shaking the Habitual sounds like it was created by a specter. This is what demons call Top 40. Does that make sense? And it's not to say it's all noise. A lot of it is pretty catchy. But there's a reason that there's only one relatively popular song in The Knife's fanbase and general notoriety from this album. No, it's not because the album sucks, it's because the rest of the album is just too fucking weird. And for many of you, that will mean it totally sucks. I still love it. I love it a little less now that it's fever dream shock value has diminished but I like that it's a psychedelic trip that can be enjoyed track-for-track and back-to-back. I feel like that's kind of rare.

Have fun living an auditory nightmare while wide awake:
spotify:album:6GWQ6fq8krujlglglMPyPu

https://open.spotify.com/album/6GWQ6fq8krujlglglMPyPu?si=iChWQ7l6SrGN3xrlewwEgg

Plunge by Fever Ray [2017]

genre: electropop

Into Dreijer's less weird (but still pretty damn weird) work, we have Fever Ray. I was remiss and disappointed in myself for never getting around to Plunge when it was new. I feel like an actual jackass for not listening to it sooner. It has so many fun songs on it. The most infamous album by Fever Ray is the self-titled, debut album, Fever Ray. That one was melancholy brooding in music form but not in a lame emo way. It's on that level of weird but more dancey. That's the best way I know how to describe it in a paragraph. I have been a fan of The Knife for about 5 years now and still say Plunge is one of Karin Dreijer's best albums overall.

Join me on the bright side of this hellscape:

spotify:album:3UHMhYzYnfTBEuDxb1JmxC

https://open.spotify.com/album/3UHMhYzYnfTBEuDxb1JmxC?si=iQQOUur9S92Qc4dRfyrK5g

Comedown Machine by The Strokes [2013]

genre: indie rock

Honestly, Comedown Machine is just a sequel album to Angles. There is a more laidback tone toward the end of the album where there are more soft songs than there were on Angles. They have equal tonal variety but overall it teeters on the edge of a formulaic cliff. This is why a lot of people don't talk about Comedown Machine and why a lot of fans frankly don't like it as much. Personally, I don't see "sequel to Angles" as a net negative. Angles was a great fucking album. This one's not as great but it doesn't have to be in order to be another great album.

Enjoy Angles Jr.:
spotify:album:4WnkQO4xD9ljQooB3VIxCV

https://open.spotify.com/album/4WnkQO4xD9ljQooB3VIxCV?si=g3uCyPkjQcShReZfbfp2uw

Fragile by Yes [1971]

genre: prog rock

For years, I didn't like Yes because everyone I knew that did like them was a 40+-year-old guitarist. I gave this album a chance because it's seen as one of the big ones. I don't think (and correct me if I'm wrong) that fans consider Fragile to be Yes's Master of Puppets. More accurately, I think they see it as one of the best diving board albums for newcomers to Yes. Again, I could be completely wrong. Overall, I would say this is a great album to dive into for the prog-rock genre as a whole. I still love Rush way more than Yes but I don't think any solitary Rush album would do the genre justice as much as Fragile would into being an accessible prog album that's not too heavy and not too weird while still demonstrating what to expect from the genre. On its own, it's pretty damn good anyway. The vocals are much more impressive than what one would expect from an early 70s rock album and the overall composition is ahead of its time, even considering the genre. Like I said before, it isn't trying to out heavy or out-speed anything. It's also not just "Roundabout: The Album" so don't expect it to be. It all sounds like it fits together purposefully. The album is a cohesive piece of art. I would be more disappointed if it was "Roundabout: The Album". I like having a prog-rock album in my known arsenal that I can recommend to such a wide array of people.

Show the other dad-rock albums that you mean dad-business:
spotify:album:4X6gq5bgpGXcHINlFWzriM

https://open.spotify.com/album/4X6gq5bgpGXcHINlFWzriM?si=LzbwqbAMSOqOxdwDQ8rkeQ

Invisible Touch by Genesis [1986]

genre: new wave

You know Phil Collins and if you don't he's the guy that kept singing over Disney's Tarzan while you were trying to watch funny monkeys swing around. Genesis was the band he did before he became a household name on his own. Invisible Touch is the album with "Land of Confusion" on it and I did not expect it to have so many weird synth choices and a fucking 10-minute prog-rock track that is not just a bunch of Pink Floyd-y guitar wank bullshit. In fact, despite what one would expect from an 80s rock staple album, there is a pretty surprising balance of guitar and synth-based arrangement here. By no means is it the best album I've ever heard, not even close but it's one I have and still will recommend to others without feeling embarrassed. A little boomery, maybe but not embarrassed.

He sings about monkeys on this album:
spotify:album:632b0oXuFpstA4DO2cUKdG

https://open.spotify.com/album/632b0oXuFpstA4DO2cUKdG?si=uFC-hU-BS4yyUJe8EFtwag

Loopified by Dirty Loops [2014]

genre: jazz fusion, pop-rock

Dirty Loops is one of the five-million YouTube bands that do covers of really popular songs that kids born between 1985 and 2010 will recognize, for better or worse. The difference between Dirty Loops and the other 4,999,999 bands is that Dirty Loops has three instrumentalists that are better at playing their respective instruments than I will ever be at music as a whole. Their keyboardist who does the lead vocals is also fucking ridiculous to watch and listen to. After years of a few originals slung about with mostly covers of Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, and Adele shit, they made a full-length album and it's a good time. That good time is called Loopified. Now recently (2020), they have been putting out more original work and it's good stuff. I hope this means a new full-length is coming soon but I digress. Even if you absolutely despise the song they're covering, the cover is usually much more impressive and listenable. I didn't know "Roller Coaster" was a Justin Bieber song until I researched this album more. This was also after hearing the whole album a few times. This is a small testament to how creative and imaginative their covers are. I recommend them on their own. However, their original work is nothing to stick my big-ass nose up at either. One of my personal favorites by them is their (amazing) cover of the (kind of lame) hit "Circus" by (contractually incarcerated, Google "Free Brittney") Britney Spears. However, "Crash and Burn Delight" hits me just as hard, if not harder because it isn't a silly Britney Spears cover. They clearly know how to make their own pop song too but are just too busy being amazing at jazz fusion to pull a Maroon 5. It took Maroon 5 three albums to become terrible though so I shouldn't count my polyrhythmic chickens before they hatch.

Enough of me gushing about Dirty Loops. Go listen to Loopified for yourself:
spotify:album:4XAAYiLpnRgXBBbBW53C8D

https://open.spotify.com/album/4XAAYiLpnRgXBBbBW53C8D?si=P79W5H__RRSg3lyyc-fwSQ

OGIGACA 2020 Kind Of

"Only Games I Give a Crap About" or OGIGACA is a thing I have done for the past few years on this blog. I have an OGIGACA 2020 draft saved here but I am not going to release it. Wasting time on it is usually something I enjoy. I also love sharing the games that I think are interesting with other people. While searching for games to talk about for OGIGACA, I end up finding games that I had not heard of otherwise. Showing those games to others is a cool thing I think about too. This year, I was going to talk about the following:

Persona 5 Scramble: The Phantom Strikers
One-Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX
Animal Crossing: New Horizons
Final Fantasy VII Remake
The Last of Us Part II
Cyberpunk 2077
Digimon Survive
Yakuza: Like a Dragon

In the initial post of each OGIGACA, I give my excitement for each game on a scale of 1 (cautiously optimistic) to 5 (I am most likely going to buy the game and talk about it unless something really stupid happens in development or I'm too broke to buy too many new games). Most of the games on this list had a 1, so what was even the point of doing the whole thing? Also, I forgot that I just left it in draft mode to be perfectly honest. So by now, there is already a playable demo of Mystery Dungeon DX. The FFVII remake is out. On top of that, the One-Punch Man game is already out and I am actively playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

However, New Horizons was one on the list with a 1/5 excitement rating. The only two that didn't have a 1/5 were Persona 5 Scramble and the FFVII Remake. So at the end of the year, I might post an "OGIGACA 2020 Revisited" like I did with OGIGACA 2018 and OGIGACA 2019. This time, instead of going off of a contrived list of games I didn't play, I will just talk about the games that came out in 2020 that I did play in either December of 2020 or early 2021 before Spring.

Even if the list only ends up being The Master Chief Collection edition of Halo 1 and Animal Crossing: New Horizons, I am still going to post about them damn it! If there is other interesting stuff I found, I will talk about why I didn't play them if there is a specific enough reason.

That's pretty much it but if you want to know my current impressions of the games I did list in typical OGIGACA fashion, I will rant about them a little below:

Persona 5 Scramble: The Phantom Strikers
I love Persona 5. It is a lengthy-as-hell JRPG that I was really wary of grabbing at all. I have now essentially played through it twice and I have only had it for about 11 months. It takes roughly 150 hours to complete the main campaign if you don't skip the dialogue but the way the game is organized makes the lengthy run time entertaining throughout. But anyway, I already ranted about that game in a previous post.

Persona 5 Scramble is the Dynasty Warriors treatment of Persona 5. Once I found out it is just a Dynasty Warriors game set in the Perona 5 universe, I became less and less excited. Dynasty Warriors is not a bad franchise or anything but once you have played one, you have kind of played them all. When they make their way into different franchises like Gundam, Fire Emblem, and Zelda, things get a little more interesting but it is still a fairly braindead hack 'n slash for the most part. Post-game content and multiplayer are what make these games engaging, or so it seems. I don't really want to sink that much time into a Dynasty Warriors game even if it is a sequel to one of my new favorite games. Persona 5 Scramble doesn't seem to do much differently from other modern Dynasty Warriors titles or even other franchise tie-ins with Dynasty Warriors. On top of that, the game is set mere months after the end scene of Persona 5 and they made some pretty... noticeable tiddy physics. These characters are definitely not 18. If that doesn't bother you, Atlus has released a gracious amount of footage of the game on YouTube and maybe that's worth checking out. For me, the Dynasty Warriors lowers my excitement and expectations and the pointless sexualization of teenagers makes me uncomfortable. Two big no-nos already for me.

One-Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows
Without Googling it, I'm honestly not even sure if this game came out yet. I think it did. This is another Shonen Jump anime cash grab fighting game. The only reasons I am talking about it are that I really like the first season of the One-Punch Man anime and there is a gimmick that sets this game apart. For those unfamiliar, One-Punch Man is about Saitama, who lives in a world of superheroes and otherworldly villains for them to fight. Saitama is nearly indestructible and can basically decimate any opponent with just one punch. Instead of being this sexy Superman-esque poster child for the community of heroes and for the general public, no one really knows or cares who Saitama is. Most of his acts of heroism go unnoticed or are pegged onto someone else. A lot of his heroics are also on accident. So how do you make a fighting game with a bunch of powerful superheroes and supervillains wherein the protagonist is nearly immortal?

The game utilizes a tag team system similar to that of Marvel vs Capcom 2. Both players each have a team of characters and either or both of the players can choose Saitama. If Saitama is chosen, a timer starts to count with a little screen of Saitama trying to make his way to the fight. The player who chose Saitama is stuck with the other character(s) they chose. If they manage to survive the opponent's attacks long enough, the timer will run out and they can play as Saitama, who basically takes no damage and, as the series name implies, can KO opponents with one punch.

This is a fun idea. Not one I plan on spending $60 on but a fun idea nonetheless. The rest of the game seems to fall into the line of more Shonen Jump tie-in fighting games with nothing really special to note, which is why I'm not getting it anytime soon. Back when I was a kid, this was not such a big deal because these games would most likely end up being $20 full-price the next year and in a dollar bin within the year afterward. Now it's 2020 and these games get truckloads of DLC so the game can be jacked up closer to $100 after all is said and done. The game already has DLC characters. If you couldn't tell, I'm not really on board for this. If you're a die-hard fan of the One-Punch Man franchise, you're probably going to pick this one up anyway. For me, I'm just going to sit back disappointed unless it gets super-discounted some time this year.

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX is a remake of the GBA cult(?) classic, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Blue Rescue Team and Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team. Instead of making fans and newcomers pay for the same game twice like a certain other creature collecting game that came out last year, someone made the decision to just make this remake into one game. I played the demo of it and it looks pretty good. I am not a fan of the originals, I never played them. I was too busy playing way too much Pokemon Ruby and forgetting about society.

Rescue Team has lovely new graphics that I am sure someone is still going to bitch about like they did with Link's Awakening. The gameplay has you going through a dungeon as a Pokemon with a party of other Pokemon. The button layouts seemed pretty sensible and most of the game mechanics were taught pretty well or easy enough to figure out before the tutorial blocks tell you. I don't know how much of the game has a foundational improvement over the original. Having no frame of reference, I can only softly recommend the game from afar. If I had a copy of myself that I could take shifts playing video games and enjoying some semblance of actual life, I would pick up this game in a heartbeat. Maybe one day, I will play it but I wouldn't expect to hear about my opinions on the full game at the end of the year. Maybe one day, I will get an exact copy of myself and not do anything terribly inhumane to him but I wouldn't expect that at the end of the year either. Even if I had that done, I probably wouldn't tell you because I would be guilty of doing at least a handful of inhumane things to him.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons
I am actually actively playing this one! I am assuming most people reading this don't need an introduction to what Animal Crossing or its new installment Animal Crossing: New Horizons is. Not only are you all a bunch of nerds but New Horizons happened to come out in the midst of a crippling pandemic that rendered a bunch of people rightfully cowering indoors. If any of this sounds like I'm knocking the fans of this game, I assure you, I'm not and even if I was, let me be the millionth person to say "what perfect timing to release a life sim in one of the biggest life sim series of all time". Point being: this is probably going to continue to be one of the most talked-about games of the year and unlike most modern games like that, this one isn't shit!

New Horizons has continued to surprise me with how much it does differently from previous installments (I have played the Gamecube one, a fuckload of Wild World, and several fuckloads of New Leaf). Better is debatable. From what I have played so far there are some things I find kind of stupid, a lot of things I find sort of tedious even by Animal Crossing standards, and one thing I find to be an obnoxious bunny-ass bitch who probably had to move nest in lieu of an angry mob. I have considered joining said angry mob. On paper, the only thing New Horizons does is start you off on a deserted island with Tom Nook, his nephews, and a couple of randomly-selected animals that want to tell you about all of the absurd ways they exercise. Trailing off from that basic idea leads you into the logic circle of crafting. Resources are necessary to do most things in this game. The progress of the game would be a flu-ridden snail's pace without the crafting mechanics. The game is still slow, as all of the Animal Crossing games are but the game shows you non-cheating ways to speed up that progress. If you get lucky (the measurement of fortune, not Lucky, the dog villager), you can go to randomly assorted islands that will give you even more stuff that your home island will consider exotic and give you a buttload of money though. There are more exciting things than the crafting system but I feel like, beyond that, the rest of the game can be simply explained as "the new Animal Crossing". There's nothing wrong with that. New Horizons just streamlines a lot of things and gives a much wider and immediate sense of growth than previous titles and for that, I can see a lot of people calling this the best one. Do I say that? Eh. I might talk about that more after 2020 ends or I know no more games I care about are going to come out. New Horizons isn't for everyone just as Animal Crossing is not for everyone. It's still a molasses-slow game teaching kids about supply and demand and teaching adults that a life where they have a fulfilling income and guaranteed home is an escapist fantasy. If that escapist fantasy sounds mildly interesting, maybe look up some footage or something before dismissing it or taking the plunge. I find the game pretty relaxing but for some people, "relaxing" games are simply "boring". That's me most of the time. I still really like New Horizons though so read into that how you will.

Final Fantasy VII Remake
I was actually debating playing this a week or two after it came out but my current job kind of did some virus-related fuckery even though I wasn't sick. Long story short, I don't want to swing a bunch of money around on games right now. In any case, the Final Fantasy VII Remake is a huge, show-off remake of what is considered one of the best Final Fantasy games ever. For me, it looks exactly like what I expected when I heard a lot of people who worked on Kingdom Hearts were making a big-budget remake of FFVII. If that's all you need to hear, stop reading this and go buy the damn thing. It's already out.

Personally, I still don't know how I feel about it being episodic. It seems like they crossed the idea of "let's make FFVII feel as big and revolutionary as it did in 1997" with the idea of "let's make an episodic game that isn't like Life is Strange". The final result seems to have a lot of bloated shit that just serves to get in the player's way in a shoddy attempt to make the game more "cinematic". That's the best way I know how to describe it. As a former Uncharted fan, I can say with some authority that this never makes the game more fun and doesn't even really make it any more enjoyable. Anyway, as I said before, check it out if you want. I feel like this is another one of those games that recommending it or not is pointless. You already know if you are going to get it or not and if you don't, asking an actual FFVII fan who has played both games is going to give you a much better perspective of what to expect. Or just looking up footage of it like I did or watching a let's play of it like I also did.

The Last of Us Part II
The more I hear about this game, the more I don't give a shit. I heard it got delayed again recently. If it doesn't come out in 2020, I'm not talking about it again in 2021. To clarify, I'm not one of those babies that boycotts a game because it got delayed. I'm pretty patient for the most part. I just don't have much interest in The Last of Us as a game because it is much more movie than game. Also, it's worth noting that I have seen a decent amount of behind-the-scenes features about the development of Uncharted 1-3 and The Last of Us. Most of the time they just think of something that would seem cool and then the chop it into an actual story later. It doesn't invoke much of a thought-out, character study to say the very least. For Uncharted, this worked. Uncharted is an action movie where you are the James Bond. It doesn't need more than it has in regards to narrative. The Last of Us tries to present itself as this intense drama that gets slowed down by a survival stealth game. If you like it or if you're excited, great. I just drifted away from this kind of game. I'm glad it got delayed because it has made me realize how much I don't actually want the game.

Cyberpunk 2077
I personally have not given much of a shit about this game since its announcement and no, Keanu Reeves being in the game has not swayed my opinion. If anything, mo-capping a celebrity to give your game a sturdier mainstream edge makes me less interested, even if it is Keanu Reeves.
Cyberpunk 2077 is supposed to be this open-world, dystopian sandbox deal with RPG elements, shooting mechanics, and a gripping narrative. So far I don't see gripping narrative, I just see nudity for shock value and snarky banter between characters I don't care about. Everything else seems like something I have seen before. People keep telling me that I'm an idiot for not being excited about this game and that the game is based on some tabletop game with online interactive elements. The website and what I have seen about the game so far does not seem to infer anything like that. The only other thing keeping me interested in this game is that they swear your choices will affect the world around you. I've played Mass Effect, thanks. However, unlike Mass Effect, the world in this game is really fucking big. I haven't played Middle-Earth: Shadow of War. People are also pumped because its from the development team that made The Witcher III. I have not played too much of that game myself but everything I've seen of it makes it look pretty competent. I personally don't think it's as mind-blowing and captivating as everyone else seems to be but I guess the theme of this paragraph is that I hate things that people enjoy. That's not what I'm trying to get across, I just feel like I'm digging my opinion's grave here.

Bottom line: this is a vast game that the developers put out a lot of footage on. As much as the game looks pretty damn boring to me, I will give them praise for being so transparent about the development of a triple-A title. In any case, info on Cyberpunk 2077 should not be hard to find if you want to go ahead and order the Super-Epic-Gang-Punk-DLC-My-Son-Died-Please-Cry Edition.

Digimon Survive
A new Digimon game is coming soon and as usual, I'm the only one talking about it. There's not much to say here. At its core, it's Disgaea with Digimon. This is not inherently a good or bad thing. It seems to have a side-dish of plot served up kind of like how it was in Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth; the only Digimon game I'm not embarrassed about recommending to people. There's footage up and it seems to function decently. If you think this is an unnecessary statement and is kind of expected of a game from such a long-established franchise, look up uncut footage of Data Squad for the PS2.

I don't even know if I would say I'm "excited" about this one as much as just curious if this being a Digimon game separates it from being a worse Disgaea. We'll see.

Yakuza: Like a Dragon
I have not played a Yakuza game but they look pretty good. Like a Dragon pissed off a lot of fans by being significantly different in gameplay to previous titles. It seems to have some kind of 4-party-member, turn-based RPG shit going on while still being a Yakuza game on the surface. Such a drastic change intrigued me because that was a pretty ballsy move and one that seemed to have some kind of creative purpose behind it.


And done.

There you have it. I'll come back at the end of the year to talk about these. If I missed something you think I might like, feel free to let me know. I know games are always releasing left and right so I want to keep track of the ones that particularly impress me as much as possible.