It's trying to rain right now. I encourage it to do so, because the nice breeze that this is causing to drift in through the window is thoroughly pleasant — a lot more so than it has been for the last week.

It's been tough to bear with, because here in the UK our houses tend to be built to keep heat in — as such, many houses (particularly older ones like ours) trap a lot of their heat upstairs and keep it there, which, as you can probably imagine, is great in the winter but absolutely excruciating in the summertime.

The poor old portable air conditioner has been working overtime for the last few days and costing us a lot of money in electricity — it's worth it, though, because the alternative is feeling like we're suffocating. Excess heat actually makes me feel genuinely anxious — I'm not entirely sure why, but I have a vague memory of, in my childhood, believing that if you stay under your own bedcovers for too long (as in, put your head under) you'll suffocate. I don't actually know if that's true or not — I suspect not — but I was always scared any time I was under the covers for some reason and felt warm; I think I literally worried that I was going to die.

I mean, I know I'm probably not going to die in the summer heat here, but it's still unpleasant. The worst thing is how it makes you not want to do anything; hopefully the rain that is still trying to happen as I type this will cool things off a bit and make the weekend a bit more bearable. We shall see!

For now, time to head upstairs, put the AC on full blast and enjoy a nice bit of coolth!

I like Olympics games. Always have done. I wrote about the first one I ever played over on Retrounite this week — go check it out here.

I'm not sure why I've always liked this type of game, because I've never been a particularly sporty person, nor have I ever really taken much of an interest in sports on the television.

That said, I do remember developing an interest in the Olympics as a child — I have reasonably vivid memories of visiting my grandparents' house and watching the Olympics coverage on their old CRT TV that was in the corner of their dining room. I believe that would have been the 1992 Barcelona Olympics because I remember the Queen song; at that point I would have been about 11 years old and still playing games on both the Atari 8-bit and Atari ST — including the original Summer Games.

I think one of the things that appeals to me about Olympics games is that — certainly back in the day, anyway — they were graphical showcases. Epyx's games in particular were always beautifully presented, with excellent animation that really showed what the host platforms were capable of.

These days, that's perhaps less true — the most recent Olympics game from Sega opts for a more stylised, cartoony look than going for realism — but it's still an opportunity for developers to show off things happening in a variety of different environments, and characters doing all manner of different things.

Because that's the other appealing thing — the variety of the things you get up to. In titles like Summer Games, some of those events only last for a couple of seconds, but the feeling of satisfaction when you nail them is immense. Okay, these days the load times between events might put more than a few people off spending too much time practicing, but back in the day, jumping from pole vault to diving to running to gymnastics to swimming was the sort of varied experience you just didn't get in a lot of other games.

While the Olympics are on, over at Retrounite I'm going to cover a few more past generation Olympics and Olympic-inspired games — already planning to look at Beijing 2008 and London 2012 on Xbox 360, but if you have any others you think are especially worth exploring, be sure to let me know! The more the merrier!

Had a slightly late appraisal/probation meeting for my work at Rice today, and I'm pleased to say that I don't suck and have indeed been doing well, and thus the site (and its sister Retrounite) will continue to remain in my hands for the foreseeable future. Hooray!

I'm having a wonderful time. I'm getting paid to do something I love — write — about something I love. I've got a great team of people to work with, and the stuff that goes on "behind the scenes" provides plenty of interesting opportunities.

So that's all lovely! I'm very happy to finally be in a position where I can say this, because heaven knows it's been a long time coming — and not for lack of trying. It's all very well to say "follow your dreams", but sometimes it takes a very long while for those dreams to come true — if they do come true at all.

For my part, I'm happy. I'm where I want to be doing what I want to do, and I have things I can continue to learn and improve for the future. And best of all, I still have the free time to do the things I want to do when I'm not "working", too — in fact in many cases I can do things I want to do and actually call it "work", which is always a pleasurable situation in which to find oneself.

I don't wish to sound like I'm bragging too much, so I'll cut that short there. The knowledge that I've passed that probationary period is a weight off my mind though — I was pretty confident I'd been doing everything I could and that people were pleased with my work, but I always get extremely anxious around appraisal time at any job, because it sometimes ends up feeling like the one time you really have to justify your own existence.

Well, that's all taken care of, now — so onwards and upwards, I say! Upwards to bed first, though; the heat still hasn't broken here so I think it's time to go lie down in an air-conditioned room.

It's still oppressively hot here, but I managed to drag myself out of the house to do a food shop earlier, so at least we won't starve. Anything more strenuous than that feels very much beyond me right now, though, so I've been spectacularly failing to re-establish the gym routine I've been hoping to re-establish.

Still, at least it's not just me; everyone seems to be suffering a bit right now from the heat, so I don't feel too bad being absolutely exhausted. I do feel a bit bad for the cats, though; they look absolutely fed up with this weather right now, and both of them have actually taken to coming and sitting with us in the bedroom when we have the air conditioner on. Historically I've only known cats who really enjoyed baking themselves in sunbeams and on heating vents; our cats are the only ones I've ever known to specifically seek out air conditioning.

Nothing much else to report for today. Drove from Southampton to France and then on to Poland in Euro Truck Simulator 2 this evening, then got jammed in a gate at my final destination. It's their fault for "respecting their heritage" or whatever with an old crusty gate rather than one that is any way practical for a truck to get through. I did at least manage to dislodge myself eventually, but if they thought I was going to reverse park after dealing with that they could very much think again.

Off to bed and an air-conditioned room, I think. Hopefully tomorrow will be cooler. But we all know it won't be. Stay safe, all of you, and drink plenty of water or whatever!

It's too hot to exist right now. It's playing havoc with my concentration, my energy levels and my general motivation to do pretty much anything. Thankfully I haven't completely succumbed to the temptation to just sleep all day and become completely nocturnal as yet, but it becomes more and more tempting every day — particularly as it feels like the heat lasts longer and longer into the night with every passing day, too.

Thankfully there's nothing majorly important I need to be rushing around for or anything right now, meaning that I can sort of zombie-walk my way through the day and still get everything done. But I do find myself wondering how sustainable this is.

Not that we have a choice, really. The weather is the weather and there's nothing you can do to change it — outside of becoming a supervillain, of course, and I think I'm too old for that — so we just have to sort of suck it up and get on with things, accepting the fact that we'll be spending most days gradually decomposing into a gooey mess in our chairs.

Oh well, you never know. It might rain tomorrow. Probably for five minutes, then the sun will come out again.

Come back, winter, all is forgiven.

As I've mentioned a few times of late, I've been enjoying several different "Simulator" games recently, with my favourites at the moment being ol' reliable Euro Truck Simulator 2 (which is 75% off on Steam right now, if you've ever been curious) and Bus Simulator 18 (which, despite being a bit buggy and crashy, is genuinely fun).

I attribute my interest in these games to a longstanding fascination with transportation. I don't mean I'm a particular car/truck/train nerd or anything like that — rather, I'm more fascinated with the concept and experience of transportation, rather than the specifics. I enjoy riding trains. I like getting the bus. I find riding in a van enjoyable (though I hate driving a van) and I suspect I'd have an absolute blast riding in a truck cab.

There's something… multisensory that appeals to me about transportation, I think. It's a combination of factors, and they doubtless sound pretty strange in isolation.

I like the smell of the London Underground, for example. Not the smell of vomit, piss, dead rats or whatever — I mean that curious "smoky" smell that seems to permeate the whole system. I don't know what the smell is, but I believe it comes from the trains — possibly the friction of the wheels on the rails? Whatever it is, I like it. If I smell it somewhere that isn't the London Underground, I immediately think of the London Underground.

Similarly, I like riding the bus not because it's especially comfortable, but because I like the satisfying rattling noise a bus makes when it goes over a slightly uneven patch of road. I was delighted to discover that Bus Simulator 18 actually features this sound — although I'd prefer it to be a little louder — and as such it's very much scratching an itch that I've only been idly aware of up until now.

And weirdly, I think one of my favourite multisensory "things" is the sound of vehicle indicators at night time. You're in a vehicle, it's quiet all around, no-one is talking because they're all tired, and you hear that gentle little "tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-tick" that indicates you're making a meaningful change to the direction you're going. Or changing lane.

Both Bus Simulator 18 and Euro Truck Simulator 2 feature both a good indicator sound and the opportunity to hear it at night time, so I like them both very much indeed.

Anyway, this evening I've been playing a bunch of Euro Truck Simulator 2 and have managed to get myself out of an endless cycle of sending deliveries back and forth between the UK and the Netherlands. I'm presently in the depths of France, just taking jobs as they come and prioritising destinations that I haven't been to yet. It's proving to be a fun experience so far — particularly as I nabbed a bunch of the map DLC on sale today, so there's even more road to explore!

Anyway. As much as I could spend all evening truckin', I think I should probably get some sleep if I want to get some meaningful work done tommorrow. Lots of interesting things to write about this week, so as always, stay tuned to Rice Digital for my daily writing, YouTube for my weekly videos — and the Atelier MegaFeature will return next weekend! With The Davison Cup happening this weekend, I needed today purely to unwind — I'm sure you understand!

On that note, I bid you good night. Have a pleasant evening!

After not being able to do it last year or earlier this year, today finally played host to The Davison Cup 2021 (Postponed from 2020).

For the unfamiliar, the Davison Cup is a day where, usually in celebration of my birthday, my local friends and I get together and play a bunch of video games. I set up a big playlist of stuff, organise some rules and scoring, and for the last couple of occasions, provide a prize to the winner. This year I supplied an Evercade and a couple of cartridges I had duplicates of.

Things went very well, and it was a highly enjoyable day — sadly one of our number didn't quite make it through to the end of the day due to a stomach upset, but the remaining three of us duked it out to the bitter end, only for one to end up victorious and take home his prize.

The day included a wide variety of games, beginning with a selection of Atari arcade and 2600 classics from Atari Flashback Classics, then some selected highlights from 51 Worldwide Games, TimeSplitters 2, Super Bomberman R, Mario Golf: Super Rush, Burnout 2, BeamNG.drive and plenty more. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and I didn't even have to pay for dinner because it was technically my birthday celebration — even though my birthday was back in April.

The most popular games of the day included Canyon Bomber and Skydiver from the Atari arcade games in Atari Flashback Classics, Mancala and Billiards from 51 Worldwide Games, Burnout 2 (always a big hit in Crash mode), and Mario Golf's Speed Golf and Battle Golf modes. I had a feeling the latter would go down well — they're simple enough to be highly accessible, but provide enough in the way of interest to clearly be games of skill rather than just silly minigames.

I'd love to do this more often, as I enjoy the organisation and creativity of setting up the challenges for the day — I think it would work particularly well as something for a group of people to do together and either record for a YouTube video or a stream. My local friends aren't up for appearing online, sadly, otherwise I would have recorded today's challenges for a special video!

A good day had by all, then. I was certainly pleased to have hosted a successful event, and now I have lots of leftover snacks to enjoy!

As time goes on, I'm increasingly conscious of the "addiction" that the Internet and social media has over so many people's lives. And it really is an addiction — one that's starting to frustrate and annoy me in terms of my own behaviour.

I was editing some videos earlier, and I found myself painfully aware that any time I had to wait for more than two or three seconds for something to process or load, I found myself reaching for my phone or opening Chrome to do the old doomscroll cycle around the only three websites that exist on the Internet any more.

And it irritates the hell out of me, because I'm sure I'm someone who used to have focus. Indeed, when engaged in the right activity, I am someone who has focus. But it just drives me nuts when I have moments like this, when I effectively can't "sit still".

I don't need information overload. I don't need to see if anyone has said anything vaguely interesting in the last minute. I don't need to do anything while my audio and video tracks are syncing up, because it takes less than a minute for them to do so and if I just concentrated on one thing at a time I would probably get a whole lot more done a lot more quickly.

Still, you know what they say — the first step is admitting you have a problem. Then the difficult part is training yourself out of that mindset.

Perhaps we'd all be best off back in the days of 16-bit computers that didn't do multitasking!

Spent a bit of time playing Euro Truck Simulator 2 this evening — it's a nice game to chill out with and yes, it will be making an appearance on Simmin' and Chillin' at some point, because obviously.

I haven't played this game a lot over the years I've owned it, but I always have a good time when I do. You don't have to think too hard, you don't have to remember lots of complicated button presses… you just pick up your cargo and drive.

In some respects, I feel like it's probably the closest we're likely to get with a game concept I've had in my head for years — "what if Elite, but with lorries?" — but it doesn't really have the strategic depth of complexity of Elite. At least not in its early hours, anyway; I suspect it might get more interesting in that regard once you expand your trucking operation, hire more drivers and start making more money.

I'm also intrigued by the "World of Trucks" setup they have going on, though I haven't looked into it yet. The idea of a persistent online "world" of virtual trucking businesses is an interesting one — particularly with the "Convoy" multiplayer update the team is experimenting with right now. I wonder how much "fun" Euro Truck Simulator 2 multiplayer would be — it's not exactly either cooperative or competitive, but I suspect it might actually be rather enjoyable to go for a drive with a friend, chatting along the way.

Anyway, that's where my evening's gone — that and a nap that lasted a little longer than originally intended, but such is the way of life. I'm off to bed now. Sweet dreams of big trucks and forest fairies.

Had a chance to get together with local friends this evening for some tabletop gaming. We played two things: Flamme Rouge and Kingdomino, both of which I liked very much.

Flamme Rouge is a race game based around cycling. Each player has two cycling team members — one with an emphasis on sprinting, another with an emphasis on being something of an all-rounder — and has to reach the end first.

You achieve this by drawing cards for both your team members each turn. Draw four, pick one, put the rest back on the bottom of your deck face-up — when you reach the face-up cards, shuffle 'em up and continue.

The cards simply have movement values on them. Play a "5" and you move 5 spaces — so long as there's space for you in the destination space. Uphill and downhill segments of the course vary the movement rules slightly — you can never go further than 5 on an uphill, and you'll always go at least 5 on a downhill — and "slipstreaming" rules keep things dynamic and interesting between turns.

It's a very interesting game with pleasantly simple mechanics but an enjoyable amount of depth to it. Because the cards you use are permanently removed from the game, there's a certain amount of hand management involved — particularly because ending up at the front of the pack leaves you with "exhaustion" cards to add to your deck, which see you moving just two spaces.

It actually works quite well thematically, too; I almost won by my all-rounder being out front for most of the race and chewing up all the exhaustion cards, then overtaking him with my sprinter towards the end. Unfortunately, I didn't quite have the good cards I needed to take final victory, but I came a comfortable second. I peaked too early, I guess.

Kingdomino, meanwhile, is another simple game, but one that plays a lot more quickly than the 45-60 minute Flamme Rouge. As the name suggests, it's loosely based on Dominoes, but also has a slight whiff of Carcassonne about it.

In Kingdomino, four available "dominos" are laid out on the table in order of "value", and players take it in turns to pick one they want to take. Take the most valuable and you'll be last to pick next turn; take the least valuable and you'll go first next time.

The eventual aim is to produce a 5×5 map containing several different types of land depicted on the dominos: green livestock fields, dark green forests, yellow grain fields, brown swamps, black caves and blue lakes. At the end of the game you score points according to contiguous areas you managed to arrange in your kingdom — though in order to score any points for a land type at all there needs to be at least one "crown" tile in there. You get (number of crowns) x (number of tiles) points for each contiguous region you create — harder than it sounds!

It's a simple game and the puzzly element is fun — each new "domino" you take can only be laid so it touches either your starting tile or a matching terrain type. I really like games where you build a "map" like this, and this is an enjoyable small-scale take on the formula that is a nice quick filler game.

Definitely a good time had by all, even if I failed to win anything. But it's the taking part that counts, right?