I'm still in a bit of a mindset where the whole COVID-19 situation feels… strangely unreal. Sometimes you can look outside and it's as if nothing is happening — although for the most part it's rather quieter and more peaceful than it would be under "normal" circumstances.

Then you get a reminder of it all: the bare shelves in the shops; the people queueing six feet apart just to get into the local convenience store; the almost palpable sense of mistrust in the air. It's a strange time to be alive, for sure.

You never can predict these things. I was thinking the other day that if I'd told the "me" from ten years ago — a "me" who was having a particularly bad time in his life — that in ten years' time, Donald Trump would be president of the United States, Boris Johnson would be prime minister of the UK and we'd all be strongly advised to stay inside our houses due to a global pandemic of a virus that may or may not be deadly according to how "vulnerable" you are (and occasionally, completely disregarding that, from the sound of things)… I would have probably laughed. It would have been a welcome laugh at that time in my life, too.

Looking back at my daily blogging from "today" ten years ago, it seems I was writing about being shit at strategy games. Ten years later, I am still shit at strategy games, and no-one has been able to successfully offer any sort of helpful advice at improving.

Ah well. The more things change, the more they stay the same, or something.

Do you have any weird beliefs that you've come to just sort of accept in your mind? I'm not talking about ideological stuff, I'm talking about stupid little things that, somehow, you become totally convinced of over the years — usually because you haven't received any evidence to the contrary. Perhaps because it's impossible to do so!

I have a few of these, but the one that sticks in my mind the most is this:

Toast doesn't stay warm for as long as it did when I was a kid.

There's no rational reason for this to be true in any way. If it was true, that would suggest a fundamental shift in the laws of physics, or at the very least a shift in the average ambient temperature of an average family home. But no; I'm absolutely convinced that toast does not stay warm for as long as it did when I was a kid.

It's entirely possible that this is nostalgia goggles talking, of course; fond memories of sitting around the kitchen table with my family (and cat, who was inevitably sitting on the heating vent, hoping something tasty would be dropped for her) and having a nice breakfast. But no, I'm absolutely, 100% convinced that when I had toast at home, it stayed warm rather than going cold almost immediately after removing it from the toaster.

Maybe I've been toasting wrong for my entire adult life and my parents actually had some secret technique. Maybe the toaster I grew up with — which lasted a very long time, since I believe it was already fairly old when I first became aware of it — was actually some sort of crazy powerful monstrosity rather than today's energy-efficient devices.

Whatever the reason, I believe that toast stayed warmer longer when I was a kid.

Enjoy your day!

Game Grumps put out the first part of a Dead Rising 3 playthrough earlier. I found it quite entertaining, but man if it didn't confirm everything I suspected about that game… and provide a good reminder as to why I have very little interest in big-budget triple-A Western open world games any more.

I've only played the first Dead Rising; it was ages ago, I never beat it and I got quite frustrated with its weird mechanics and structure. I played it back around the time it first came out though; I consider that to be a period of time when I wasn't studying games quite as intently as I do these days, so I feel if I went back to it today I'd probably appreciate it a lot more. I did actually pick up a super-cheap copy a while back, so I might actually do that.

But I digress. For me, Dead Rising was always about the inherent absurdity of zombie movies. They're dumb. They're ridiculous. And Dead Rising not only embraced the typical absurdity from '70s and '80s horror movies, it really added to it with things like the ability to dress up the main character in ridiculous ways and fight with all sorts of crazy weapons.

More significantly for my observations today, the whole thing is drenched in colour, providing a nice juxtaposition between the happy, welcoming primary colours of the mall in which the game is set, and the horrific things which are going on. It's really effective because of this.

Dead Rising 3, though, is that special kind of brown that a lot of Western games — particularly from a few years back — seem to be covered with. The opening is too dark to see much, and when you get out into the sunlight, it's just drab, drab, drab.

A lot of this is intentional, of course; Dead Rising 3 came out around the time The Walking Dead was really hitting its stride, and bleak zombie stuff was fashionable. But for me it just seems to so fundamentally miss the point of what made Dead Rising great that it might as well not be the same series. It's all a self-consciously diverse cast of characters yelling at each other and saying "fuck", plus a bit of extreme violence for good measure.

The one hint of old-school Dead Rising that is in there is the weapon combo system, whereby upon finding blueprints you can affix two weapons together to make something ridiculous. But there didn't seem to be any real joy in using these items; it's just another thing to hit zombies with.

There's the usual emergent comedy that comes from open world gameplay coupled with a solid physics engine, but that isn't enough to carry a game; after a while you start to crave a bit of structure. And certainly the early missions in Dead Rising 3 seem to very much follow the Western open world game mould of following icons on a minimap, then following a waypoint on your HUD — all those design aspects that leave you unable to actually appreciate a game's setting because you're spending all your time following little blips.

I don't know. Maybe it is actually super-satisfying to play and I'm the one who's missing the point here — I do intend to watch more of the series and see how it develops — but it just reminded me of how far my tastes have deviated away from big-name, big-budget stuff these days. And, to be honest, given how much fun I'm having with the PS2 Atelier games right now… I don't think I'd have it any other way!

I find it fascinating to look back over old games magazines and even websites. In the former case, it's largely a nostalgia thing; it reminds me of the good old days when you'd go out and buy the latest issue of your favourite magazine each month, keen to devour it in detail (inevitably on the bog in my case) and explore the cover-mounted floppy disk or CD.

What I've become a bit more keenly aware of recently, though, is that particularly back in the early days, writing about games was… an inexact science. A lot of people — professionals, even — really weren't actually very good at it at all. It wasn't at all unusual to read an article in something like, say, ST Action (which is probably the worst offender from my recent revisits of such publications) and discover that the entire review was largely paraphrased stuff from the manual, or what keys did what, with maybe a paragraph in a boxout reserved for the reviewer's actual opinion.

There are exceptions, of course. Atari User featured strong content for those interested in doing more with their microcomputer than "just" gaming — a common desire back in the 8-bit days in particular. And Page 6 magazine, which my brother, father and I all wrote for at various times, excelled at long-form reviews and features — particularly on specialised subjects. I understand now why my father was so exacting about immaculate standards of spelling, punctuation, grammar, phrasing and solid arguments before even thinking about submitting a final piece. The bar may have been set pretty low by some publications, but that didn't mean it wasn't worth clearing it by a significant margin!

But when it was bad… man, it was really bad. At least part of it was undoubtedly down to cramming things in to fit a word count and page layout, but I've seen a lot of articles that really aren't terribly helpful or even interesting from back in the day. And this actually extended into at least part of the Web era, too; just recently, I've been looking back at reviews of the Atelier Iris games from when it originally came out, and been surprised to see some pretty dodgy articles that, in a lot of cases, get fundamental facts wrong; I saw more than one claiming it was a Nippon Ichi game, for example.

It's easy to look back on this stuff with the benefit of hindsight, though. The world of video games is one where the craft of writing about it has had to develop at the same breakneck pace as the technology itself, and people haven't always been able to keep up. Unfortunately, the direction a lot of mainstream coverage has gone these days — while often technically proficient — isn't necessarily super-helpful either, albeit in an entirely different way.

Oh, and just to make sure: I'm not saying the way I choose to do things is the "right" or "best" way by any means, nor that I'm in any way superior to those who have done this for a living at various points in the medium's history. I just find it fascinating to look back and see how far we've come… and, well, how far we still have to go. Perhaps in a slightly different direction!

I had to go in to the office today; my computer wasn't accepting my Remote Desktop connection, so something was evidently wrong. When I showed up, it turned out a Windows update had gone wrong and my computer had forgotten that it had a hard drive, but a quick reboot solved things, as it usually does. Unfortunately a quick reboot is not something you can do from afar.

I thought it would feel stranger to be out and about in the midst of this supposed "lockdown" but there were still cars on the road (albeit less than usual, making my commute to work much less stressful) and even people out walking for some exercise. There were occasional reminders of what was going on, though: people queueing six feet apart outside Tesco Express just to go in, empty car parks, darkened buildings.

Andie thought she might have caught the virus earlier as she was feeling crappy, coughing a lot and having a bit of difficulty breathing, but realistically there aren't many opportunities that she could have had to pick it up. We suspect that she's having an unfortunately timed cold or perhaps a chest infection; she's asthmatic, so those things also cause a bit of difficulty breathing at times. Nothing serious though; she's fine now, and whatever it is/was doesn't seem to match the symptoms of the virus, but of course we'll be keeping a close eye on things just to be safe.

On that note, it's Friday tomorrow, so a few days of complete "freedom" at home await. With any luck Chris and I will be recording a new MoeGamer Podcast on Saturday, so look forward to that coming up early next week. In the meantime, I'm off to bed!

Well, what do you know? After my complaints yesterday, my review of SeaBed went live! You can read it here:  https://www.nintendolife.com/reviews/switch-eshop/seabed1 

I was really impressed with this. I'd been aware of it in passing for a while because I remember some people I follow being quite enamoured with it and excited that it was getting a localisation, but it seemed doomed to remain a niche-interest, digital-only, PC-exclusive visual novel. I'm really delighted that it's had a Switch release and that I've had the opportunity to praise it publicly on a decently sized commercial website… because it really does deserve it.

I'm also delighted that eastasiasoft, who have been putting out a bunch of really cool physical releases for a while now, have put together a lovely packaged release of SeaBed for Switch, with a very affordable limited edition. You can find it on Play-Asia.

I'm going to write something more in-depth about SeaBed on MoeGamer tomorrow, because a thousand words for a review is nowhere near enough to dissect and analyse this one — it's a super-interesting one. So that will be tomorrow's article!

Anyway. I'm off to bed. Hope everyone's "quarantine" is going OK. We're all good here at the moment — I got my games, my cats, my wife and enough food to keep us going for a bit, so there's not a lot else I need really!

I'm a little frustrated. My next review still hasn't gone live on Nintendo Life — the embargo date for its coverage was the 19th (last Thursday) and I busted my ass finishing it ahead of schedule so I could make any edits if necessary… but still, nothing.

This is doubly frustrating because I know that the localisers of the game in question, Fruitbat Factory, are quite excited to read my review, and I'll also be complementing said review with a piece on MoeGamer too, because I ended up feeling rather strongly about it. In a good way.

My frustration stems not just from the fact that something I spent time on hasn't yet been published, nor from the fact I feel like it's letting down a group of enthusiastic localisers that I'm keen to stay on the good side of — but because the reasons for it not being published feel… rather transparent.

If you look at the front page of Nintendo Life right now, there's a lot of Animal Crossing. There are guides, there are news stories, there's a review somewhere in there… it's the latest example of a big release getting a zillion articles written about it because clickety clickety click. And with the thing I covered — SeaBed — being a niche-interest visual novel… well, that obviously gets pushed right down the priority list, since Nintendo Life appears to operate on a model where they limit the number of things they publish per day, particularly reviews.

Don't get me wrong, I understand the reasons this has happened; I just feel a bit bad for Fruitbat Factory, who have been eagerly awaiting some coverage of their new release! I also can't complain too much, because Nintendo Life are actually covering SeaBed at all in the first place… plus out of every outlet I've ever freelanced for, they are by far the most prompt people to pay up I've ever encountered!

But anyway. SeaBed is amazing. If you're in the market for a thoroughly compelling, lengthy read, SeaBed is an absolutely superb kinetic novel with some of the most mature writing I've seen — and an excellent localisation. So pick it up. And when (if?!) my review actually goes live, be sure to give it some views and show that people want to read this sort of thing… preferably in a timely manner! 🙂

Well, we're officially locked down. Well, okay, we're not quite locked down, but it's as near as dammit.

From this evening onwards, we apparently are not allowed to leave our homes except for "essential shopping, as infrequently as possible", one form of outdoor exercise per day, any medical need and "essential" work. (This means not you, GameStop… not that we actually have you here, but whatever.)

This is an interesting time to be living through, for sure. As I mentioned a few days ago, I feel oddly calm about the whole situation, despite the risks — and last night's realisation that I may have actually already had this thing probably helps with that — and that allows me to sort of observe what's going on with a certain amount of curiosity.

And, of course, frustration that people not taking the situation seriously means that we have to have Big Daddy Boris tell us all that we're grounded. I wonder if this will have any impact on the stupid shop situations; I went to Tesco earlier to go and pick up a prescription and the toilet paper shelves were completely bare. Like, not a single pack there. We presently have eight and a bit rolls left. I may have to ration my poos. Unthinkable.

Anyway. That's what's going on. Outside of that, hopefully tomorrow I should have another article going live on NintendoLife — it was originally supposed to go live on Friday, but they wanted to clickbait the shit out of Animal Crossing, so it's been pushed back several days, much to my frustration (and my considerable apologies to poor old localisers Fruitbat Factory, who are quite keen to see the review!).

But hopefully it absolutely definitely probably should happen tomorrow, and regardless of whether it does or not, I'll also be writing about the work in question on MoeGamer tomorrow, too.

On that note, I guess we better lock the doors or something. Have a happy quarantine!

I'm wondering if I've already had coronavirus, COVID-19, whatever you want to call it.

A few months back, I had a pretty unpleasant few days with a dry, "non-productive" cough and general feelings of… unwellness. It was something that went around a bit and didn't quite feel like a normal cold or the flu.

The reason I'm wondering this is that some people seem to think that coronavirus has actually been around since about January or so, and that the current pandemic is the result of not taking the potential threat seriously. Whether that's a conspiracy theory or not, I don't know, but the supposed timeline would certainly match up.

I guess it doesn't really matter now, what with the measures in place right now and Our Illustrious Leader Boris warning that stricter measures will become necessary if people don't start taking the situation a bit more seriously.

It's going to be strange to look back on this time when it's all over. It's also strange to think that we have no idea how long this situation is going to last. I'm pretty fine with the necessary measures right now, to be honest — as I've noted previously, it's not especially a huge change to my lifestyle generally, since I'm not big on going out and socialising anyway. I guess I might feel differently in a few weeks… or months.

Ah well. Not worth worrying about right now. And now I have a cat sitting on me, so I'd better pay her some attention. Hope you had as pleasant a weekend as possible under the circumstances!

There has, for obvious reasons, been a lot of discussion over "panic buying" and people "stockpiling" things due to uncertainty over how long this whole pandemic thing is going to last. And, indeed, if you head on down to your local big-name shop (Tesco Express in our case) you'll find empty shelves, stressed-out employees and, more than likely, signs politely informing customers that they really should think about not being dickheads to retail workers.

I popped over to the shop Andie and I affectionately refer to as "Funny Shop" earlier. Funny Shop is your proper traditional British local convenience store, packed with a random assortment of crap — including the kind of sweets you probably haven't seen since the '90s — and, generally speaking, far fewer customers than your average Tesco Express.

They also had both toilet roll and bread, which Tesco Express is notably lacking right now. I guess when "panic buying" people just go straight for the big-name stores and don't think to support local little family-run franchises. Well, I know where I'm going when I need some more bits and pieces — it'll take some of the pressure off the poor folks at Tesco and it'll support the local community. Double whammy of win, no?

I hope retail workers end up acknowledged as some of the real heroes of these trying times. Having worked retail several times in my life, I feel their pain right now… and they absolutely should be drawing a much more substantial salary than minimum hourly wage for what they're having to put up with!