all made up with nowhere to go

I finished Inscryption last night!

I don't know why I thought it would take longer. I guess I thought I might have more trouble with the end bosses than I did. I had more trouble with random battles, as it happens. And I got a little bit emotional at the end, which surprised me, because it's not like I didn't know what was coming. But perhaps it was because I was actually experiencing it for myself, rather than via someone else playing on the internet.

( late game boss spoiler )

Anyway, now onto shenanigans with Kaycee's Mod, I guess!

There is a ~thing~ happening that is absolutely testing my shitty social skills, and I hate it. I mean, I mainly hate it because I can't mindread and then know what is happening without feeling like I am tying myself into a variety of pretzels. I'm not giving context, but if you've known me long enough, you might be able to guess, or you might just guess correctly anyway. I will neither confirm or deny anything.

But see also: still wasn't sure if anyone at work actually liked me up until about a month ago, despite at least two of them shouting my name as a greeting when I come into work and sounding happy to see me on multiple occasions. I really hate that prior experiences in my life have fucked me up to this extent where I am in my early forties and still unsure about whether people like me or not (and then am always very surprised when they do). I thought I might have overcome this by now, but apparently not!

~

In other news, I finally bought Inscryption!

It is currently in the Playstation Spring Sale, so I got it :D

I have been playing it for the last couple of nights because placing cards terribly is a nice "switch my brain off" activity, because the last two days at work really knackered me, so I wasn't in the mood for Mass Effect (Good Friday was HELLA busy, and then Saturday I a) walked to work, roughly three miles and b) was already tired because I hadn't slept well).

( some spoilers, including a minor gameplay one )

Anyway, I am a big, gleeful lump now because of it. (I mean, I was pretty happy anyway - my mood's been AMAZING for the last few weeks - but now I am even happier :D )

~

I don't have anything else; time to go and get some food, I think.

My x-ray results came back normal, so there is nothing physically wrong with my joints, which I guess is good news. I also have all my blood test results back, with the following concerns: full blood count, liver function, and vitamin D. I have been advised to take vitamin D supplements, so I'm doing that, and have been for a week. It seems to be going better than the last time I was asked to take it, anyway.

I have to get a phone appointment, and all the bookable ones are gone already (as was the case when I was first asked to make one), and trying to get one on the day is...difficult. I know it's not the surgery's fault but it's flipping frustrating.

~

Talking of frustrating, I made an order of cat litter/food, and for whatever reason, the courier has decided to hold my order hostage.

It was supposed to come on 1/12. It is now 4/12, and all I can get from the courier is, "Whoops, it's been delayed!" Which is very unhelpful.

Now. I get they may be short on drivers for various reasons, but also: I ordered that litter because I was running out and needed to have it soonish. I live in the middle of nowhere, and I do not drive. This is really fucking inconvenient.

So I had to go out on Friday, run round the entirety of the town (almost) to find the right bloody cat litter, because my cat will only use wood pellets, and there is a shortage at the moment. And then I ended up buying the same bloody expensive litter from the same place I ordered from, because that's the only place I could find it. I don't have the money for this! Because of the courier's...whatever...it's actually ended up costing more for cat litter this month than it usually does. I'm really fucking annoyed.

(It's usually DPD who deliver my cat litter, and I have no probs with them, but very occasionally it will be someone else, and that's generally when the problems happen).

~

In other news, I've barely done any drawing for the last month, because I've been busy thinking about/attending medical appointments, and making collages, and doing some sorting through stuff in the house.

So I sat down to do a drawing the other afternoon, and it felt really weird! I've done a couple more since then, and it still feels a bit odd. It hasn't felt this weird for a loooong time. I'm sure I'll get back into the swing of it, but I feel weirdly rusty right now.

~

Finally, I watched a video called How Inscryption Toys With You, which is a really interesting look at how some of the narrative mechanics work, and I thought it was really neat! It contains spoilers for the entire game, so maybe don't watch it if you haven't played/experienced it. But I thought I would share, because I found it interesting.

That feeling when you find a streamer you like who, for the most part, isn't terrible, but then constantly rags on lower difficulty settings for games as being "for babies" :|

I was watching said person play Everhood, and they went through the game on Hard, partly because that's the difficulty the game was based around, so you should be able to beat it on that. Which they did. But they also like going after all the achievements where possible, and Everhood has a bunch where you need to not get hit by the enemies you're fighting. So they did several on story mode, to get it done, and complained about it while doing so.

I suspect part of it was playing to their audience (some of the frequent watchers I see in the chat replay are...unpleasant, let's say), but also probably part of it wasn't. Which makes me sad, but I guess that's Gamers™, and I do realise that not everyone is like me.

To me, it really doesn't matter. If a game has difficulty settings, I pick it based on if I've played that game/genre before, and whether I want to have to think about shit or not. If you beat a game, it doesn't matter how you did it - if you set out to beat it, and you did, congrats!

Anyway, moaning about people complaining aside, Everhood is a game I will never EVER play, since its gameplay depends on quick reactions, and I'm not the greatest at that. But it has some interesting things going on story-wise, and the soundtrack is BANGING.

In other game news, Aoife streamed Inscryption for a bit, and that was aces (I don't know if she'll continue, though, and that's fine, but I'd love to see her reactions to the rest of it). And I also watched her and Ian stream some of Stranger of Paradise, which is out today!

I have no interest in it at all, and watching that stream did nothing to convince me I'd want to play it, either. It just looks like such a mess, and you shouldn't need THAT MUCH TEXT to explain everything! Also JFC your first boss fight should not be that hard or frustrating! Like, Aoife is no stranger to difficult games or bosses, but you could clearly see how irritated she was by it.

Apologies if you're looking forward to SoP, though! I hope you do enjoy it when you get to it, I just don't think it's for me. (Which is hilarious (by which I mean it isn't) since someone in the live chat said it's aimed at people who already like Final Fantasy a lot. I disagree).

And then, for me and video games, I've done with the nonsense that is the marks/hunts/Cie'th stones/whatever in FFXIII. I had a go at Attacus, and it's SO HARD to damage, and has 9 million HP????? I get it's part of that specific enemy type - the Wladislaus is also difficult for the same reasons. But after the Neochu and then that, I was fed up, and I was only really doing those quests until I decided to play something else anyway.

So I switched to Persona 5 Strikers, after thinking I'd broken my PS4, but it turns out I was actually very tired and pressing the wrong button repeatedly (it doesn't help, imo, that they're so tiny as well!) So it was yelling at me for pressing eject when there was nothing to eject, oops?

I...am not sure how I feel about Strikers, so far. I'm only around 10 or so hours in. I feel it overexplains some stuff that I already know, but then doesn't explain other things like, say, how to use spells outside of battle!

I liked everyone for the most part in P5, so having another game with them in is aces. Also it's another Megaten game, so obviously I'm not going to be unhappy about that. But I'm not sure I like the play style (musou is a genre I am not familiar with), but that's mainly because I'm not used to it.

More when I get to it, though I will try my best to keep spoilers behind a cut since it's only been out in English for a year.

~

In non-video game news:

# I think I'm growing a psoriasis patch on my right elbow. My dad had one, also on his elbow (but in a different place, and possibly the other elbow; I can't remember now), so I'm honestly not that surprised I may have one.

# I haven't read a book since November, but I am weirdly sort of okay with that.

# I discovered if I'm watching a youtube video on my new computer, it will stay awake so the video doesn't cut out! THAT'S SO COOL. (I am only used to my phone and tablet doing this; I've never had a computer that did it).

# I'm making some art to actually sell the originals of! They'll go up in my ko-fi shop, no promises when, and they obviously won't be cheap, but I will also be offering prints of them as well!

I watched a full playthrough of Inscyption and, while I like the game overall, I'm dissatisfied with it from about two thirds of the way through to the end. Mainly because I would have liked a bit more info on certain plot points*. I was trying not to spoiler cut this, but it looks like I will have to!

( beware, MASSIVE spoilers within, including some of the ending! )

Griping aside, I do love the art for the cards, and it looks like a fun game to play, but if only there were a bit more to it!

(Subreddit says more may come, as has happened with at least one of the developer's past games, so honestly ???)

*I know it's not a game made by a big studio but, like, a little bit more info even textually would have been nice.

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In other news, I watched the second Matrix Resurrections trailer, and I am kind of hype again!

I won't be able to see it in a cinema - money aside, neither of my local ones is getting it (at least not on release date**), and I reeeeeally feel leery about being in cinemas right now, even if they're following covid guidelines and whatnot. And obviously, I don't have US HBO Max, so I will just have to wait till it comes out on DVD. Which. It would be hilarious if that happens around the time of my birthday.

**And the one in Burnley will be closing to make way for a "discount supermarket", whatever that means. I assume another Lidl, since they already have two Aldis.

~

Got my booster jab booked! Annoyingly, it's not at my local health centre for some reason (it doesn't appear as an option on the NHS booking site), so I have to go elsewhere for it, but at least I'm getting it. Just before Xmas, yaaaaay.

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Anyway, I think that's it for now. I've not been up to much since I've been at work for the last few days.