First Impressions | Pokemon Sword

Although Pokemon Sword and Shield were released in November 2019, I didn’t get my copy until Christmas which means I’ve had a lot of Pokemon adventures to catch up on. Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been pouring my time into Pokemon Shield and exploring the new features, settings, and pokemon available in my edition of the game. Now turned out the perfect time to be playing through the game as well as there was a Pokemon direct announcement yesterday which revealed that Nintendo will be releasing Pokemon Sword and Shield DLC in June 2020 and Fall 2020 which will bring two new areas full of adventures, friends/rivals, and pokemon which is very exciting.

Until then, I’ve got quite a bit of the game left to play and wanted to share with you all my first impressions of Pokemon Shield. I hope you enjoy and, if you also have a Nintendo Switch, feel free to add me!

Review: A Mortician’s Tale | A Little Journey into Death Positivity

TITLE: A Mortician’s Tale
DEVELOPER: Laundry Bear Games
PUBLISHER: Laundry Bear Games
SERIES: N/A
RELEASED: October 2017
GENRE: Casual Indie
CONSOLE: PC (Steam)

KEY INFO: Casual games, single-player, narrative-driven, art aesthetics, short games, emotional, educational
CONTENT WARNINGS: Death, Dead Bodies, Grieving Families
Note: This review does not contain any images of dead bodies but does discuss the act of preparing dead bodies (though does not go into any detail about this)

Synopsis: A Mortician’s Tale is a narrative-driven death positive video game where you play as a mortician tasked with running a funeral home—preparing the bodies of the deceased (via embalming or cremation), attending their funerals and listening to their loved ones’ stories, and running the business.

A Mortician’s Tale was everything that I wanted it to be; an aesthetically pleasing little game that was empowering yet sensitive towards death yet also pleasantly surprising with its diverse characters. Possibly one of the only drawbacks of the game is that is disappointingly short, taking only 0.9 hours to completely even when going through the game slowly, and this is one of the only reasons I couldn’t quite give it 5 stars. Overall though, A Mortician’s Tale is a brilliant little game that I would highly recommend to anyone interested in the funeral industry, death practices, and narrative-driven games. 

 

Review: Old Man’s Journey | A Bittersweet Symphony

TITLE: Old Man’s Journey
DEVELOPER: Broken Rules
PUBLISHER: Broken Rules
SERIES: N/A
RELEASED: May 2017
GENRE: Indie Puzzle
CONSOLE: PC (Steam)

KEY INFO: Casual games, single player, ‘puzzle adventure’, visual narrative, art aesthetics, short games, emotional

Synopsis: Old Man’s Journey, a soul-searching puzzle adventure, tells a story of life, loss, reconciliation, and hope. Entrenched in a beautifully sunkissed and handcrafted world, embark on a heartfelt journey interwoven with lighthearted and pressure-free puzzle solving.

A visual narrative about life’s precious moments, broken dreams, and changed plans, uncover stories of the old man’s life told through beautiful vignettes of his memories. Interacting with the serene and whimsical environment, solve playful puzzles by shaping the landscape, growing the hills to create the old man’s path forward.

During this compact gameplay experience, you’ll be transported to a vibrant and wishful world, exploring life’s complexities through the old man’s eyes. Meditatively delightful and reflective, Old Man’s Journey invites you to immerse yourself in quiet and inquisitive puzzles, and experience the old man’s heartache, regret, and hope.

 

Old Man’s Journey is without a doubt one of the most beautifully cozy games that I have played, producing an immersive gaming experience which was relaxing and enchanting. It is a short game which can be played through in one sitting, taking me only 1.5 hours to complete, but was entirely satisfying. There is so much to love about Old Man’s Journey and I came incredibly close to giving it 5 stars yet there was something about the storyline that struck a wrong chord with me and resulted in me downgrading the overall rating to 3 stars.

Games I Want to Play in 2019

As I’m sure you’ve noticed by now, I’m a gamer as well as a reader! However, my gaming often gets put aside for reading so one of my goals for this year was not only to play more video games but also blog more about video games. Although I already write articles for Sidequest, a great website which focuses on the unconventional in gaming and centers marginalized voices, I want to share more about gaming here on my blog as well. Video games have always been such a huge part of my life, so much so that I am (hopefully) doing a PhD about them, and so I’m aiming to make a lot more time for them in 2019.

Inspired by Becca and Destiny‘s posts, I thought it would be cool to kick off my video game blogging and the year with a little list of the backlist and new release games I’m looking forward to playing in 2019. Obviously this isn’t the entire list because I don’t want to keep you here all day, so if you’re curious ask in the comments.

What I’m most excited about at E3 2017: Xbox Conference

Anyone who knows me will know that I am not a massive fan of Xbox, and their presentation at E3 did nothing to change that, even with their announcement of their new Xbox One X console which they dub “the most powerful console in the world”. Whilst I admire (and snark on) their enthusiasm and release of a diverse array of Xbox “exclusives” which suit a wide range of audiences, there is nothing in there makes me gasp and go “I must immediately sell everything I own to get me the new Xbox One X console”. So, whilst I have provided a list below of the games that excited me most at the Xbox One X conference, it’s good to bear in mind that these are ‘Launch “exclusives”‘ aka we just got to announce the game, or ‘Timed exclusives’ meaning that they will be quickly available on other consoles, if they not immediately.