Here's an interesting exercise for you. Grab a piece of paper or open a blank text document, then imagine a ball. Then write down everything you can tell me about that ball.

If you can't do that, then you have a condition known as aphantasia — the inability to picture things in your mind. My wife has it, as does Arin Hanson from Game Grumps, and doubtless numerous others. And I find it kind of interesting.

You see, when someone tells me to "imagine a ball", my mind immediately goes into overdrive. The ball in question is red, round, textured with a sort of "spotty" surface but unpatterned, slightly smaller than a basketball, looks a bit like a medicine ball you'd get in a gym but is more the weight you'd expect a typical ball to be, is sitting on a grassy patch in a garden which may or may not be the garden I grew up in (in the form it was when I was a child, not the form it is in now, which is slightly different) and is enjoying dappled sunlight streaming through the trees from above on a pleasant spring afternoon. It's been warm and dry for quite some time, so being outside is pleasant and even desirable, and the garden is in a condition where it's actually rather nice to just go and sit on the grass. Remember that wigwam I had when I was a kid that we used to put one of the old sofa cushions in and I'd sit in there and read music theory books… okay, I'm getting off the point a bit, but you get what I mean.

When someone says "imagine [something simple and/or abstract]" I can generally extrapolate an entire scene and possibly even a story from that. When I'm reading a book, I can picture the things described in the book going on in front of me — perhaps not in the exact same way as the author, but definitely in a vivid way. Since delving into Japanese light novels recently, I've found these to be particularly vivid and potent fuel for the imagination, even though their descriptive language isn't typically anywhere near as detailed as in what one might regard as "literature".

With aphantasia, you supposedly have none of that. And I don't say "supposedly" in doubt that it happens — I'm sure it does. It's just interesting that of all the things I can imagine, what it must be like to not be able to imagine anything is something I absolutely, definitely cannot picture!

I cannot imagine what it must be like for someone to go "imagine a ball" and for you to be unable to do so because the person asking you to do so hasn't given enough information about the ball. It feels like it would be remarkably inconvenient — and I find it a bit sad, too. As much as there are many occasions when I don't like how my brain works — and my imagination can certainly play a part in those times, for sure — on the whole, I'm glad I have such a vivid and active imagination. I feel there are certain aspects of life that I can simply appreciate more as a result — and if nothing else, it certainly makes for some pleasingly weird dreams at times.

I wonder how well-known aphantasia is as a condition? For it to have a name, it must be reasonably recognisable and apparently it affects 1-3% of the population — though from a casual browse around the Internet it appears to be a field of mental health that hasn't been studied all that much. I guess it's quite hard to study the absence of something — though there are, of course, various ways that you could assess exactly how far a person with aphantasia is able to "imagine" or "remember" things.

Anyway, that's my thought for the day. Can you picture that ball?

Do you ever find yourself thinking, with no real evidence supporting it, that you don't really like something food-wise — and then find yourself surprised when you eat the thing in question and you actually don't hate it, even finding it moderately to extremely acceptable? I do, frequently.

I mean, yes, there are some foods that I absolutely definitely do despise — onions have always made me retch, for example, and now I'm 40 years old I think my parents have just about accepted that as something which isn't just me being a fussy child — but I have plenty of examples that fit into the category I describe above.

For me, the one that I always keep coming back to is sweet potatoes. I can't remember any time when I would have voluntarily chosen sweet potatoes over actual potatoes, and yet any time I end up with sweet potatoes for one reason or another, it tends to be a relatively pleasant surprise. Andie made home-made air fryer chips with sweet potatoes the other night, for example, and they were really nice — but I would never have said to her before dinner "no, actually, use the sweet potatoes instead of the regular ones".

I don't know what it is. It's some sort of weird mental block. To my recollection, I don't have any past trauma involving sweet potatoes — though if I do, I guess it's been repressed to such a degree that I'm incapable of thinking about it — and thus I have no real reason to feel like I don't really like sweet potatoes. And yet I still do feel that any time the opportunity to eat sweet potatoes comes up.

With one exception: last year, when Andie's friends came over for Thanksgiving and we had an American-style Thanksgiving feast. Then we had one of those absurdly sweet sweet potato, marshmallow and sugar monstrosities on the side of all the rest of our food. That was frickin' delicious. And you'd think that would have cured my mental block once and for all.

But nope. So if we're ever in a position where you're making me a meal and sweet potatoes are on the menu, please ignore any indifferent or unsure initial reaction I might make to the situation; I'll probably enjoy it.

My (re)discovery of manga and light novels encouraged me to set up my bedroom to be a little more conducive to reading comfortably. And, oddly enough, this was one of those moments where I'm reminded that, indeed, technology has progressed somewhat as the years have passed.

When I was a kid/teen, I had a great lamp on my bed. It would clip on to something, then it had a bendy but rigid gooseneck sort of arrangement that meant you could position it however you saw fit. It was, in short, an excellent reading light — but it was also an excellent reading light that I had approximately 30 years ago.

Regardless, I found myself on Amazon looking for something similar (I believe I searched for "bendy neck clip-on reading light") and was provided with a wealth of options. The basic concept was the same — clip on a thing, bend the neck to an appropriate angle — but the execution was quite different. Notably, most of them are USB powered now, and also the lights in them are not regular old lightbulbs, but LEDs instead.

Making a choice before I even allowed myself to become overwhelmed with the options, I now find myself the proud owner of a clip-on USB rechargeable amber LED reading light. And y'know what, I really like it. I went specifically for the amber light rather than a white or colour-selectable light because supposedly amber light is good to bathe in before bed, being the antithesis of blue light.

I was concerned that the effect would be akin to reading under one of those orange sodium street lights and I guess in some regards it it — but damn, if it isn't comfortable to read by. And it most definitely has an effect, too; stepping out of being bathed in nothing but amber light into something with more regular-style electric lighting is actually rather jarring. So I'm trying to make an effort to arrange things so that once I switch that light on and start reading, the next thing I will do is fall asleep.

I found the Amazon reviews for the light rather amusing. There were a lot of people complaining that the light is orange. I mean, what exactly did you think you were getting when you ordered an amber light? As amusingly Engrish as the packaging was, the actual product page on Amazon was pretty clear about what it offered, so I feel like turning it on and it being orange shouldn't have been a surprise if you were paying attention. But given that Amazon is a place where people will answer questions with "I don't know" and then wonder why they get downvoted by people looking for an actual answer… well, make your own mind up.

Anyway, upshot of all that is that I've been reading quite a bit before bed of late, and enjoying it. I devoured volume 6.5 of Bottom-Tier Character Tomozaki in an evening and a half, and I'm working my way through volume 7 now. Unfortunately the next volume isn't out until the end of next month, but I'm sure I'll find a way to cope. I have, after all, been stocking up on a variety of interesting manga and light novels of late!

On that note, I'm feeling a bit zonked out, so I'm going to get an early night and read some more misadventures of fictional Japanese high-school students under OMG ORANGE light. Hope you're having a pleasant weekend!

I'm knackered. It's been a busy week! Had to go in to the actual day job office on Tuesday, which meant staying overnight in a hotel on Monday night and driving back home on Tuesday evening. In both directions, it was absolutely pouring with rain, dark and miserable, though mercifully not too heavy on the traffic. It has left me absolutely exhausted for the rest of the week, however!

Thankfully, I'm ploughing through all the Stuff I Have To Do at a good rate and everything will be fine, but I am definitely looking forward to tomorrow evening, when I'll just be able to flop down, go "right, that's that for another week" and relax for a bit. I intend for Saturday to primarily be filled with Atelier Sophie 2 and moving as little as possible. I guess technically that still counts as "work" but I actually want to play Atelier Sophie 2 — it's real good — so I'm more than happy to spend my Saturday doing that!

I think my exhaustion in this case stems from the fact that it is, to say the least, a somewhat turbulent situation in the world right now. And it feels like we've been limping from one instance of "turbulence" to another over the past few years — and that's without even taking the entire COVID thing into account.

I'm sure if I looked back at recent history I'd probably find that human existence has just been one string of "turbulent times" after another, but that doesn't really make me feel any better. Something about the present conflict feels curiously more… ever-present and relevant than other things that have been going on. I think it's perhaps because unlike a lot of other instances like this around the world, people are actually taking action this time around.

I mean, whether or not you think, say, GOG.com not selling games to Russians any more is an effective response to a humanitarian crisis is a matter of opinion and debate, I'm sure, but it does feel like people are curiously "united" in condemning the situation in Ukraine. Oddly, though, that's one of the things that makes it feel all the more exhausting; all the more real, I guess.

I wonder if humanity will know proper peace at some point? It honestly feels like a far-off, fanciful dream these days, whatever sci-fi might have tried to tell us in the past.

Back at university, there was an individual on the periphery of our friendship group known as Andy L. I describe him thus because no-one really liked him all that much and he just seemed to sort of come as an "attachment" with some other friends — a particularly unkempt, greasy sort of "buy one, get one free" deal.

Supposedly one of our number particularly appreciated debating philosophy with him. They were fellow philosophy students, after all, with all the insufferability that comes with; the difference between them was that one was in the field because he enjoyed arguing, while Andy L was in it because he was one of those people for whom university represented some sort of great political awakening, and a philosophy degree appeared to be the best way for him to explore that.

Fair enough, on that note, and as someone who studied English and Music because he liked both of those things, I'm not really in a position to comment. Rather, Andy L was an unwelcome presence for me in particular because of a habit he had. And when I say "habit" I really mean it; it was non-stop, never-ending, constant. And to this day I find myself wondering how on Earth I managed to put up with it for so long without ever exploding in rage at him.

Andy's habit was quoting Blackadder. Now, that may not sound like a particularly serious habit, and indeed it isn't when compared with any number of other vices that some people get involved with during their university years. But I really mean what I said about it being non-stop; it never ended. For Andy, an adequate substitute for conversation was simply saying a line from Blackadder or, in the worst cases, making a noise that Stephen Fry's character made.

Both of these things are funny in context, but when you've heard them fifty times that week because someone keeps saying them out of said context at you, it grates after a while. It got so bad for me that, to this day, I absolutely cannot bring myself to watch any series of Blackadder ever again, even knowing that it is a classic of British comedy. Its memory is just so sullied with the incessant repetition of the same lines, over and over again in lieu of actual conversation. I'd genuinely rather have awkward silence.

These memories came back to me recently because it occurred to me that they relate to a big problem I have with how people communicate on the Internet these days. There's a lot in common with how Andy L behaved in our friendship group, and how people behave in YouTube comments, Twitch chat or on social media: people feel the urge to say something, but have nothing meaningful to actually add to the conversation, so they fall back on something they heard somewhere else before. Only the problem these days is that there's not just one Andy L suffering this problem, there's a whole army of the buggers.

All this ties in with meme culture, where a significant proportion of the Internet appears to believe that incessant repetition equals effortless humour. To be fair, this was an issue long before meme culture took hold — just look at "catchphrase comedy" and how poorly a lot of that has aged — but the real problem we have today is that the freedom of expression social media provides means that everyone thinks they're a comedian.

Energetic piece of music on YouTube? Someone's going to comment "me when I'm late for school" or something similar. The question "who is [x]?" is presented? Someone will respond with "everyone asks who is [x], but no-one stops to ask how is [x]?" Steamed Hams being held up as the pinnacle of humour. Spongebob "a few moments later" cutaways being constantly used in YouTube videos. You get the idea. I'm so tired.

Last I heard, Andy L had become some sort of fortune-telling hippy called Zelda. As for whether those fortune-telling sessions involve relentless quoting of Colonel Melchett, I couldn't say. But perhaps that's a more peaceful life than being online in 2022.

Might be developing the first signs of an addiction to yuri manga. Have really enjoyed the first three volumes of Our Teachers are Dating! and am about to start on I Can't Believe I Slept With You! — and am eager for more. I love yuri.

Part of the appeal is, of course, beautiful ladies doing beautiful things with other beautiful ladies, but there's also just something about the overall atmosphere and feel of yuri titles that feels distinctly different from your average shoujo, bishoujo or whatever you want to call it "straight" stories. And it's not necessarily one specific thing you can point to, either; a fair bit of yuri goes for the heavy melodrama angle, which can be a lot of fun — the Nurse Love games are great for this — but stuff like Our Teachers are Dating! goes for something that is simply… heartwarming (and, occasionally, pantswarming).

I'm definitely going to be exploring the subgenre more in the coming weeks and months, as there's a lot of yuri manga out there that I don't think gets explored all that much. Indeed, in the afterword for volume 3 of Our Teachers are Dating! the author indicates that they've had a fair amount of frustration in this regard in the past — so part of me hopes that they have the opportunity to see me covering it on Rice Digital, even if they don't speak English themselves.

Also apparently yuri manga gets oddly valuable. Volume 1 of a yuri anthology called "Syrup" sells for £90+ second-hand. Why? I have no idea. But I kind of want to find out!

I introduced myself to Tehkan's (now Koei Tecmo's) Star Force today, as I spotted that it was available in the Arcade Archives series, and I'd mentioned it in the Atari ST A to Z video on Plutos a while back.

A few observations: firstly, Plutos was most definitely inspired by Star Force, not that it was attempting to hide that fact in any way. Secondly, Warhawk was also most definitely inspired by Star Force, and in retrospect that was not attempting to hide that fact in any way either.

I find the latter quite interesting, because I recall Warhawk specifically being praised for being a relatively fresh and original-feeling shoot 'em up on its original release for Atari 8-bit (and other platforms) — but it turns out that yes, it's absolutely a shameless ripoff of Star Force. In fact, I'd probably argue that Warhawk is more of a Star Force ripoff than Plutos is — and Plutos is much more commonly known as being an "homage" to Star Force.

Warhawk goes so far as to wholesale lift enemy designs and their respective attack patterns from Star Force. Remember the annoying "Pac-Man" type ships in Warhawk that float straight down the screen until you cross their path, at which point they float horizontally? They're in Star Force. The waves of enemies that simply scroll vertically down the screen at you? Star Force. Waves of enemies that go wibbly-wobbly from side to side? Star Force.

I suspect Star Force itself didn't invent a lot of these things, but it just amuses me how shameless people were back in the Good Old Days — and how these things can come to light much more easily today than they ever would have done way back when. Sitting in front of my TV right now, I can immediately call up Warhawk, Plutos and Star Force and play them all alongside one another if I really wanted to. I mean, I don't, but I could if I wanted to.

As for Star Force itself, I really like it. I'm developing a real soft spot for this sort of mid-'80s vertical scroller that occupies a space somewhere between limited 8-bit shoot 'em ups and the slightly later, more spectacular 16-bit affairs. If nothing else, Star Force is one of the most relentlessly chipper and cheerful shoot 'em ups I think you'll ever play, and that certainly has to count for something these days, right?

Developing a bit of an addiction to manga of late. I go through this every so often, but it feels like it's "sticking" somewhat this time — particularly with me having successfully made it through all of Gal Gohan and written about each and every volume.

Occasionally I find myself thinking that I should be reading "better" things than manga — which is at least partly why I started on some light novels, which I'm also enjoying — but then something draws me back in and reminds me that, as a medium, manga is not inherently "better" or "worse" than anything else; it simply has its own unique benefits that are distinct from other ways of presenting and telling stories.

A common refrain from people is "oh, I wish this manga was an anime" — but to be honest, I think I've reached a point where I'd rather see the two forms of media continue to distinguish themselves and do what they're good at.

Having read all ten volumes of Gal Gohan, for example, I'm not sure I want it to become an anime as some people do — at least, not as a means of enjoying that series. I can see the value for bringing new people in to the series — watch a series of anime, get frustrated that it cuts off at a critical moment and is unlikely to get a second season, buy all the volumes of manga instead — but I didn't come away from reading Gal Gohan thinking "yes, I really need to see this animated". The manga did what it needed to — it was fun, it was sexy, it had an entertaining story and it resolved nicely.

Likewise, the short four-volume series Our Teachers Are Dating! that I'm currently reading would also probably work as an anime, but part of its appeal is in how it makes use of the manga medium with little asides, subtle visual jokes and suchlike; again, an anime series may well bring more people to the series in general, but ultimately I feel like the manga simply does everything it needs to already.

And of course, there's hentai, too. I bought three FAKKU! hentai books recently and really enjoy them — and many of those really wouldn't work as anime. Not because they're hentai, mind — there's plenty of hentai anime out there already, of course — but, again, because they make excellent use of the manga medium and format to tell their stories, twist things in unexpected directions and crack jokes. Once again, hentai anime has its own distinct, unique appeal — as does hentai manga. And I'm not sure the two need to cross-pollinate for any reason other than as a promotional tool.

But then this is probably why I don't run an anime company. I am, however, buying and reading a lot of manga — and, more to the point, I'm finding doing so somehow more practical and enjoyable than sitting down and watching a lot of anime. Maybe that's just me — perhaps I'm hardwired to appreciate books a bit more. I was certainly an avid reader in my youth — though like most people these days, I haven't done nearly as much book-readin' in recent years as I feel like I probably "should" have.

Ramblings aside, keep an eye on Rice Digital, 'cause everything I'm reading, I'm writing about. My long-term intent is to build up a "library" of complete series reviews — it's another one of those long projects to do a bit at a time, but I think it'll be something fun to work on, particularly on slow news days!

For today, go read my 10-part Gal Gohan review, check out my look at the thoroughly adorable first volume of Our Teachers are Dating! — and if you're feeling frisky, take a look at Viewer Discretion Advised; the latter is an article about hentai manga, but features no explicit pictures, so click with confidence! 

I'm really impressed with new-Apogee's Secret Agent and Crystal Caves "HD" versions. I haven't yet tried Monster Bash but I'm anticipating something similarly excellent. And I sincerely hope that new-Apogee continues to trawl its back catalogue for titles that are ripe for this treatment: stuff like Bio Menace and Major Stryker (off the top of my head) could really benefit from the "HD as a means of making things move smoothly" treatment.

Mostly I think I'm impressed at how well both Secret Agent and Crystal Caves hold up as games. They're simple, but they're very, very playable and enjoyable — and the improved presentation makes them more enjoyable without compromising the fundamental things that made them good in the first place. They still feel very much like the original games, but they run much better than they ever would have done back in the day — I described Secret Agent HD over on Retrounite as being "the game it always wanted to be".

This is a really interesting approach to "HD remasters". While I'm sure it's tempting to do a remake of something that fundamentally changes what the original was all about — remaking rather than remastering, essentially — this approach is something I'd dearly like to see more of, and I can imagine a whole host of classic shareware games from the early to mid '90s that would really benefit from this treatment.

I mean, just take Jill of the Jungle (not Apogee, I know), which I've done some vids on recently, as an example. Imagine that with smoother scrolling and sprite movement, but the same fundamental gameplay — it'd be great. Commander Keen would benefit from this treatment, for sure. Even Apogee's really old stuff like Paganitzu would be interesting to see remade and modernised in the same way as Secret Agent and Crystal Caves.

It remains to be seen if we'll get any more of these; new-Apogee is also pushing some of its new original work at the moment. But if they have any sense they'll capitalise on the fondness people have for the classic Apogee brand and bring back even more '90s shareware classics. I will certainly buy each and every one of them!

Been having some oddly vivid and memorable dreams of late. Not 100% sure what's been causing them — if anything — but they've certainly been an interesting experience.

Last night was especially… I guess exhausting is probably the right word, as I woke up feeling pretty tired from the experience. Alas, I couldn't just sleep it off, as I had to get up and do work, but I did manage to sneak a nap in later in the day — a dreamless one, for a nice change.

Anyway, the gist of said dream was that, for some reason, a group of companions and I were bursting into Castlevania Dracula's dining room ready for our final confrontation. I can't remember who my companions were, but I have a vague memory of at least some of them being people I went to school with — people I haven't seen for a good twenty or thirty years in some cases. That's not important. The important thing is that we were there to fight Dracula, and we were absolutely not ready for it.

Dracula promptly set fire to his own dining room and essentially obliterated us almost immediately — but we weren't dead. Apparently this was a boss fight we were supposed to lose, despite seemingly being the grand finale, and after a moment's darkness we found ourselves high above Castlevania, which, of course, was floating in a black void by this point.

Ahead of us was a long, winding and branching Super Mario 64-style slide, and we knew what we had to do: one by one, we launched ourselves down it, in search of stacks of grimoire pages that we needed to collect in order to defeat Dracula once and for all. Each stack seemingly contained over a hundred pages, indicated by a helpful meter that appeared in the top corner of our vision — I remember this because the first one I grabbed contained exactly 164 pages.

As noted, the slide branched off in a number of different directions, and at one point I made the decision to take a left turn, which led down into what appeared to be a semi-ruined public toilet. The slide weaved around the open cubicles, rising and falling — somehow we were perfectly able to continue sliding uphill when required — before rising back into the sky.

I believe I woke up before we obtained the required number of grimoire pages, so I'm not sure if our second encounter with Dracula went any better. But if nothing else, we'd had a lovely ride around Castlevania in the void.