I am so ready for my holiday next week. Between the online stupidity I mentioned in the previous post and some frustration at work, I'm very, very ready for a break, some time away, some relaxation and some time with my family.

The especially frustrating thing about the things that are… well, frustrating me is that they're not really things that can be "resolved" easily. I can't magically make people be nicer on the Internet — I can just try and set a decent example as much as possible. And so far as my work frustrations go, the annoying thing there is that they relate to specifics of my job that are so specific, even if I were to complain about them to someone they wouldn't have a clue why they're irritating me. Oh well.

Anyway. After the sour taste of the recent Twitter bullshit, I'm getting rid of the Twitter app on my phone again and using BlockSite to stop me being tempted to look back there again. I don't need to know when there's some new shitstorm. I just want to focus on the things I enjoy… the reason I keep wanting to poke my head in is that cutting myself off like this makes me feel a little starved for conversation at times.

With that in mind, may I remind all you lovely Patrons that you are very welcome over in the MoeGamer Discord any time! It's not super-active at the moment but it would be lovely to see some more of you there. You should have access already if you're a Patron, but if you don't, let me know and I can send you an invite link.

Occasionally I ponder about attempting to return to making social media working for me. I actually had a go recently; I hopped back on Twitter, switched my notifications to only show messages from people I follow and who follow me, muted everyone I still wanted to follow but who always seemed to be starting shit in the timeline.

For a while, it seemed to be working… okay. Not perfectly, but okay. Then today I happened to log in while Kirk McKeand from once-popular video game blog VG247 was lashing out at critics of his self-professed "extremely bad" interview with Yakuza creator Toshihiro Nagoshi.

I've stumbled across McKeand a few times, and every time I have, he's always come across as an arrogant, argumentative piece of shit who would rather insult people than admit he is wrong. This time around, he was being particularly obnoxious; while I thankfully didn't get anything hurled my way this time around (I somehow ended up blocked despite not actually speaking with him) I did happen to catch him insulting the appearance and gaming tastes of someone I'm acquainted with — one of those critics of his atrocious interview.

McKeand never seems to face any consequences for his behaviour, either; as a contributor to a commercial site like VG247, he should be held accountable for the way he interacts with potential audience members, but this never seems to actually occur. And he is by no means the only member of the current commercial games press who acts like this; he and his peers proudly brag about how many thousands (literally) of people they've blocked for dumb reasons.

Now, as a former member of the commercial games press, I know how much shit games journalists can get, and I know how frustrating and upsetting it can be to get dogpiled for something you wrote. However, acting like a high-and-mighty bully is not a good way to get over this or look like the bigger, better man. Spouting shit like "hur, you write about games you like to jack off to" is immature and inaccurate. Posting photos of people and implying unpleasant things about them is deeply unpleasant behaviour. In short, acting like Kirk McKeand does is not a way to get you or your publication taken seriously.

Seeing this whole thing unfold has left a deeply unpleasant taste in my mouth. I think we can call this tentative attempt to see if I can actually have a decent conversation on Twitter in 2019 an abject failure, and frankly I'm thiiiiis close from just deleting my account altogether to remove any temptation to try again.

My cat Meg had a major breakthrough recently: she's started coming upstairs again.

This might not sound like a huge deal, but since we got her new friend Patti a while back, she had been refusing to come upstairs at all. We assume that this was mostly down to the fact that when we first introduced Patti, we restricted her to the upstairs (initially just one room) to allow the pair to adjust to one another. As such, Patti had the opportunity to make upstairs "hers", while Meg was naturally hesitant to enter what suddenly appeared to be another cat's territory.

There's also the fact that when we did actually allow them to see one another face-to-face, they weren't very friendly with one another. Meg would respond to the sight of Patti with hissing and growling, and Patti would often launch herself at Meg. Over time, this behaviour lessened a bit at a time until now, where we're at a stage where I feel reasonably confident in saying they like having each other around — even if neither of them will admit that.

Now they'll quite happily occupy the same room as one another without incident, and I've seen both of them initiating sniffing sessions of each other's faces and arseholes. While this is considered rude in human society, among cats it appears to be the equivalent of asking each other if you saw the new Game of Thrones last night or something.

There's still an occasional bit of hissing and scrapping, but despite the noise they both make, they never seem to be serious fights, and I think they're more attempts to play than anything else. In other words, I think they're finally getting along.

This is good, because we were really worried about Meg after her former Ruby passed away last November. Although Meg would often give Ruby grief in the same way she does to Patti now, it was clear they liked each other a lot and enjoyed having one another around. (We think they may even have been related, which just made Ruby's passing all the more heartbreaking.) Meg was noticeably depressed when she was on her own, particularly on days when both Andie and I had to go to work and leave her alone for the day.

It looks like she's in a much better mental state now, though, which is great. Of course, just as we get to this phase, we're going to head off on holiday for a week and leave the pair of cats in the care of my mother in law… but I'm sure they'll be fine!

I've spent the evening playing Lapis x Labyrinth. As you'll know if you've listened to the brand new MoeGamer Podcast (out today!), this is a game I've come to absolutely adore since picking it up on a whim when two friends separately commented on how much they'd been enjoying it. Chris and Flame — thanks!

I'm not going to do a full writeup on the game until I've beaten it properly, as it's a game that gradually unveils its hidden depths the further you progress, and I feel there's still a decent amount left to go. I've cleared I think six of the main dungeons now, and each clear has unlocked a new method to progress and power yourself up. There are a wide variety of ways to customise how the game plays according to how you enjoy it, and no obligation to do things you don't want to do.

I'm having the most fun playing as the Witch at present. She's a powerful fighter that has an interesting combo where she cycles through a series of elemental spells, the last of which is a slow-moving fireball that passes through walls and obliterates anything in its path. Since Lapis x Labyrinth is a game about not getting hit in order to keep your combo up, her ranged abilities are a significant help in this regard. Plus she's a cutie with cat ears.

There's something so, so fundamentally satisfying about this game. I might even go so far as to say on a primal level, this is one of the most satisfying games I've ever played. I'm not talking about narrative payoff or anything like that — while there is a story that gradually reveals itself, the mechanics are the star here — but rather a simple feeling while playing that I am having a good time and I want more, more, more.

Perhaps best of all, as we mention on the podcast, it achieves this addictive, intoxicating quality without resorting to underhanded tactics like "fun pain"; this is pure fun, yet for those who want to truly master the game's mechanics, there's a lot to engage with and practice here, too.

As I say, I'm saving a full writeup until I've at the very least beaten the main game, but in the meantime rest assured that if you're after something a bit different — and incredibly satisfying — then Lapis x Labyrinth is well worth your time.

Podcast editing is all done! I started a little later than usual but still managed to get everything wrapped up before the end of the day, so that's great. I hope you enjoy tomorrow's episode — it's a fun roundup of the stuff that caught our eyes at E3, and I think we had some really interesting discussions along the way.

For me, now begins the countdown to holiday time! The wife Andie and I have just one full week of work to survive until we have some blissful time off — I have a week and a day, while she has a couple of weeks. We're going away to foresty holiday park Center Parcs for the first week, then visiting my parents over the weekend — my brother and the rest of his family are also visiting for the first time all together in… I don't know, actually, a very long time! (My brother, for those unaware, lives in California, which is on a whole other continent to where both my parents and I live, so we don't get to see him as often as we'd like.)

I took the following Monday off just so I have a day to myself after the holiday and the visit and everything else. Recovery time! Some time off from being "on holiday", if you like. Andie, meanwhile, has most of the following week off to enjoy the new Final Fantasy XIV expansion Shadowbringers, which I'm going to try very hard to remain unspoiled on, as I intend on playing through all of Final Fantasy XIV's main story as part of my upcoming Final Fantasy Marathon series of videos. That is a long way off yet, so there will certainly be even more story than exists at the launch of Shadowbringers by the time I get there, so when I do finally get to that point I'll be able to offer some honest, hopefully unspoiled reactions to what happens.

As I've mentioned before, I'll be posting on MoeGamer as normal this week and probably queueing some stuff up for while we're away rather than posting "live", but I won't kick off a new Cover Game feature until after I'm back from the trip. That way, I can give it my full attention.

I'm pondering what should come next. I've shared with you the things that I'm very interested in covering — that in many cases I've had in the queue for a long while — but there are also some interesting things that have come up recently that I think are worthy of multi-part deep-dive coverage.

Chief among these is not a particularly "big" game or anything, but I think it's something that there's potentially a lot to explore in: The Expression: Amrilato, which eagle-eyed readers will note is the game that MangaGamer have had trouble with bringing to Steam recently. The VN as a whole is, according to the chap from MangaGamer I spoke with recently, "between 10-30 hours depending on how much you engage with the 'study' side of things" — so I thought it might be interesting to err on the upper side of that and see if I can actually learn some Esperanto from a video game. I think that'd be pretty cool.

The reason I think The Expression: Amrilato is an interesting case for a Cover Game feature is precisely because it's not particularly well-known, but it has the potential to be very valuable for more reasons than one. There are a number of ways in which it can be explored, too: there's the narrative, themes and characterisation of the overall experience to explore, but on top of that there's how it treats the use of Esperanto as part of its narrative, and its distinct component that aims to actually educate the player in how this language works.

Either way, Cover Game feature or not, I'll be writing about The Expression: Amrilato in the very near future, so please watch out for that.

Right. I've had a long day, so I should probably sleep so I can be vaguely bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for this "last" week of work. Who am I kidding, I feel like walking garbage of a morning even if I go to sleep at 9pm. All-night Lapis x Labyrinth session, anyone…?

Forgot to post one of these yesterday, apologies! The reason for that was… well, no, the excuse I'm choosing to use is that my good friends Chris and Joe joined me for an epic-length recording session in which we explored our thoughts on the E3 that has just passed us by. Hopefully the episode will be available for you to watch and/or listen to tomorrow, so please look forward to it!

With the topic of the podcast in mind, I'll refrain from talking too much about my own personal E3, but suffice to say there are a lot of cool things that were announced or confirmed that I'm very excited about. Oddly enough, several of these announcements related to things I already own in one form or another, but there ain't no way I'm going to miss out on a physical copy of the excellent Freedom Planet or Blaster Master Zero for Switch.

I'm ecstatic about both the Trials of Mana remake and the Collection of Mana. I've preordered the limited physical release of the latter from Square Enix's store; if you have the slightest interest in this, I recommend getting in early, as this will likely be your only chance to own a copy of Seiken Densetsu 3 — that which is now known as Trials of Mana — in English, in packaged format.

There's plenty more to explore in the podcast itself, so please look forward to its release tomorrow! It's one of our best (and longest!) yet! 🙂

I read somewhere earlier — it might have been Penny Arcade? — that this time of year is sometimes referred to as "Gamer Christmas". Given the amount of preorders that have arrived on my doorstep in the last week alone — with a few more on the way in the coming weeks — I get it!

In just the last few days I've received my limited edition copy of Death Mark for Switch, fresh from Aksys Games' new UK store (which appears to be under the Reef Entertainment umbrella, same as NISA Europe and Idea Factory International), Lapis x Labyrinth for Switch, Worldend Syndrome for Switch, Dragon Star Varnir for PS4 and… probably some others I've forgotten! Before that, there was Kotodama from PQube for Switch, and at the end of the month there's Super Mario Maker 2.

It is, as they say, a Good Time to Be a Gamer.

Now I've got to figure out what I'm going to be covering next! Kotodama and Lapis x Labyrinth are both thoroughly interesting, and I'll definitely write something about them both, though whether or not it will be a full Cover Game feature is something I haven't decided yet. Worldend Syndrome looks like it'll be a really good time, and definitely Cover Game feature-worthy, and likewise for Dragon Star Varnir. I'm keen to jump on both of these relatively soon rather than leave them sitting on my shelf for too long.

After today's news surrounding MangaGamer's new release, I'm also going to make a point of writing about The Expression: Amrilato in the very near future. That will be a fascinating game to explore, since it aims to not only tell a touching yuri story, but also educate the reader in the real-life language of Esperanto, too. MangaGamer and the original developer seem very pleased with what they've produced, and it's certainly an extremely intriguing prospect.

Ah, it's good to have lots of choices! I don't think I'm ever going to run out of things to write about at this rate…

I finally finished recording my New Game Plus run of Atelier Rorona DX this evening! That's a weight off my mind, as it was taking a while to get through, but I finally made it. Did I get the ending I wanted? You'll have to wait and see when the video is released tomorrow!

Unfortunately, the camera I use to record my ugly mug inexplicably stopped recording after 59 seconds for some reason, so there's no facecam for this final episode. That's a bit of a bummer, as, not to spoil anything, but there were a few "firsts" for me in this finale that it would have been nice to be able to show my reactions for. Oh well. You'll have to settle for my voice! Hey, if it's good enough for channels with millions of subscribers like Game Grumps, then it's good enough for me. For now. 🙂

I mention this at the end of the video, but this brings New Game Plus as a video series to a close for the immediate future. I'm going on holiday at the end of the month, and I'm going to give myself some Fridays off from making videos in the meantime. When I get back, I'm going to kick off the Final Fantasy marathon, which I'm very excited about doing! In the meantime, Warriors Wednesday and the three Atari A to Z series will continue, as will all the usual stuff on MoeGamer.net, of course!

New Game Plus, as I think I noted previously, will probably return as a series of articles that give me the opportunity to explore new game plus and postgame content at a bit more of a leisurely pace than requiring weekly video uploads. I'm not ruling out a return to the videos at some point, but frankly I need a bit of a break from having to juggle too many things at once!

Anyway. I hope you enjoy the Atelier Rorona finale when it releases tomorrow, and beyond that the Final Fantasy Marathon when it kicks off in early July. In the meantime, thanks as always for your continued support, and please continue to enjoy my other work on YouTuber and MoeGamer 🙂

Those of you who have been following a while may recall that I had some therapy a while back. While I have mixed feelings about its effectiveness — primarily due to it being delivered via text chat online rather than face-to-face appointments — there are a few things that I learned, reinforced or otherwise made a point of trying to remember over the course of the period I spent undertaking the program.

Probably chief among those things was the idea of setting up some sort of mental checkpoint before allowing things to "get to me" too much. This is an important means of controlling incoming thoughts and feelings — particularly "negative" ones such as sadness and anger — so that they don't overwhelm you all at once, and it's something that I've often struggled with. Hell, I still do, to be perfectly honest, and it requires often exhausting mental effort to keep it up even bearing the strategy in mind… but it's an effort worth making.

The checkpoint asks a simple question before allowing the incoming thoughts into the depths of my brain: "does this matter?" If the answer is yes — and the incoming thought can provide a convincing reason why it matters to me, here and now — then I allow the thought through. If the answer is no, I turn it away, remaining aware that it might try to "cross the border" again at another time in the near future, perhaps in disguise.

When you make a point of being rigorous with your incoming thoughts like this, it's surprising how many of them you can turn away. There are a lot of things that don't matter. There are a lot of things that it isn't worth getting sad or angry over. Sometimes they still manage to sneak through, of course, but if you recognise those feelings and know what to look out for if they return at a later date, you can better equip yourself to send them packing the next time they come around.

I feel like life probably shouldn't be such an ongoing, constant mental battle with oneself, but unfortunately with the way we all live our lives today, it's hard to avoid — short of disconnecting entirely from the Internet and the media. Which is not really an option for most people.

Still, you can make that battle easier by closing doors that don't need to be open and restricting the potential flow of incoming thoughts and feelings. It's your life, your mind and your own sanity, and it's worth taking assertive control over now and again.

Every Tuesday and Friday at my work, we have a "Good Morning Call". Sounds pleasant, doesn't it? A nice way to get remote teams together and have a nice chat over a coffee and croissant or something.

No. The Good Morning Call is possibly the ultimate example of a plague on modern workplaces: endless, needless, pointless meetings.

Ostensibly, the Good Morning Call is intended for our team and our overseas colleagues to catch up on the various projects that we're working on, but in practice what it tends to turn into is an hour or more of us listening to one person drone on and on as they simply read out what our online project management tool says. Anything that does get discussed tends to be a conversation between our overseas colleagues, who are all in the same office anyway.

I get that organisation is important, but so much time is wasted in meetings and conference calls these days — not just at my place of work, but pretty much everywhere. And it's one of those things I don't really understand; how did this happen? I don't know anyone who likes, enjoys or finds these meetings and conference calls valuable. I don't know anyone who would be sorry if they stopped being a thing. Even the people in charge of them seem bored shitless… so why are we doing them again?

Still, at least it's not as bad as the meetings I had to suffer while working at energy company SSE. Company policy dictated that each of those must begin with a "Safety Moment", which was where someone in the meeting explained something that made them "think about safety". (This usually ended up being someone whingeing about drivers on the road on the way to work.) SSE was obsessed with health and safety to a fault; you actually got reprimanded if you didn't hold the handrail going up stairs, so it's unsurprising their meetings would incorporate such mandatory asininity.

Oh, that and colouring in. On one particularly memorable occasion at SSE, we had a residential weekend that was ostensibly a conference, but at which we spent a significant portion of the time colouring in a poster about, you guessed it, safety.

I guess things could be worse.