Underneath my yellow skin

Seeing things with a clear mind, part three

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Back to talk more about my brain. I was going to expand on my premise, but after rereading my last post about Kojima, I decided to elaorate a bit more on the last bit. I read that he’s desputing that he was missing deadlines and going over budget, but I take what he says with a grain of salt. Other people are saying that all big budget games go over budget and miss deadlines. I would not be surprised if this was true, but how does that excuse him from doing it? “Everyone else is doing it, Mom!” has not ever been and still is not an acceptable excuse.

And, call it a hunch, but I bet Kojima misses deadlines by more and goes over budget by more as well. In addition, he’s the one in charge so the buck stops with him. If you’re going to get the accolades for being the auteur who is also a visionary, then you have to deal with the blowback of missing deadlines and going over budget.

Look. I am not one to take the side of a corpo over–well, just about anyone. However, in this case, there’s enough blame to go around. I don’t doubt that Sonyy is looking to cut their losses after hemorrhaging money over their ill-conceived idea of being ALL LIVE SERVICE GAMES ALL THE TIME. In addition, they’ve decided, weirdly, not to port their games to the PC. I know they did not make a ton of money on their ports, but it brought their best games to a whole different crowd. And, I think if they did it steadily and consistently, they would have seen a significant increase in their sales.

For whatever reason*, they have chosen live service games over everything else. Even though their last big live service game (Concord (Firewalk Studios, who got shut down because of the fiasco)) was an utter disaster.

So, yeah. Sony’s panic is of their own making, completely. Let’s add to that the fact that they shot themselves squarely in the foot with their stance on physical copies of their games, including the fact that they chided their customervs fdor being naive/not smart enough to realize that, duh, of course they don’t really own anything digitally. This as they’ve taken away movies from their shelves long after customers have bought digital copies of said movies and are SOL.

In other words, they are owning their own goals so hard right about now. The last thing they need is (in their eyes) a high-strung, nervy auteur who is not meeting the demands goalposts they were setting.

I’m not saying Sony is blameless–far from it. I’m just saying that it’s not outrageous that they would cut the cord with

Well, my sleep has been aaaaalllll over the map, and I was struggling to stay awake for hours when I was writing this. I finally gave in and went to bed, so this is me writing the next day.


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Why I might be in my right mind, part two

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In yesterday’s post, I was talking about how the almost universal opinion in the gaming industry was that it was a bad decision for Sony to dump Kojima. There were many reasons listed as to why this was a terrible decision, but they boiled down to he’s a respected figure in the gaming industry. So much so, that it’s almost verboten to even whisper a breath of dissent. It’s been a brutal year for layoffs, but most people were sure that Kojima was safe. Or if they talked about him being fired, they made it sound like it would never happen.

I, on the other hand, could very well see it happening. I’ll get to that in a minute.

It’s interesting to me that Hidetaka Miyazaki (head of FromSoft), is highly respected, but he doesn’t seem to get the same regard as does Kojima. As least in terms of being called an auteur. Don’t get me wrong. Miyazaki gets plenty of accolades and adoration. He’s considered one of the greatest living developers, and he created a whole new genre of games. But, auteur? No. Most people do not call him that, and I have to wonder why.

I have a few theories. One, even though he’s been the head of FromSoft for over a decade, there’s still a feel of the hired gun to him. From has been published by several different publishers, which seems unusual for someone of his stature. Two, he’s a very shy and retiring man. He rarely does interviews, and when he does, he doesn’t really say anything shocking or surprising. He sticks to blandishments for the most part, but also he’s a master of misdirection. I still remember that he (well, a public relations man in the company, but I’m sure it was at the behest of Miyazaki) said with his whole chest that you could finish Elden Ring in 30 hours. Or the main story, anyway.

Then when the DLC was being announced, Miyazaki himself said it was about the size of Limgrave, the starting area in the base game. Sure, if you don’t take into account how many layers there are to the game. And I mean it literally this time. I have not heard the word verticality used so often before this game or since, and it’s spot on. The base game took me 215+ hours to complete my first playthrough. The DLC took 75+ hours. That’s a third of the base game. Limgrave is maybe a tenth of the base game? Probably not that small, but there are several areas in addition to Limgrave.

Back to Kojima. He is not shy nor retiring. He is not diffident or cagey when he’s speaking. In fact, I would say that he says exactly what’s on his mind. Very un-Asian, in fact. I can’t speak for Japanese culture specifically, but I know that East Asian culture tends to be very much guess and not ask.

I mentioned in yesterday’s post that I am not a big fan of Kojima. I watched a Let’s Play of his first game, and it was gross and sexist. Then, his whole bullshit about Quiet needing to wear almost no clothes because she breathes through her skin (uhhhhhh) and that everyone would be ashamed of their reaction when they found this out.

I mean, no? First of all, his pseudo-scientific bullshit was still just that–bullshit. Secondly, he was the one who created the character. She didn’t HAVE to have whatever it was that made her have to be naked. She’s fictional! He was the one who wrote her that way! It was infuriating then, and it’s still infuriating now.


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I feel like I’m losing my mind

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So, a hot bit of news in the gaming industry right now is that Sony dropped Hideo Kojima and his upcoming game–googles it to make sure of the spelling–Physint. It was introduced on January 31st, 2024. Huh. I thought it was earlier than that. Still, though, that’s almost three years ago. Reports are that Kojima has missed important deadlines. I’ll get more into that later.

Sony was trying to do the diplomatic, “We are parting ways because–” but Kojima was like, “Nah, brah. I’m not going out like that. They fired me, yo!” He was pretty blunt about it, which is not how things are done in Japan. Skill Up talked about how pissed Kojima was in this clip. Skill Up, by the way, had one of the more measured takes on the situation. I’ll get to that in a second, too.

People were outraged. So outraged. I saw report after report about how unbelievable this was and how Sony fucked up. How no one saw this coming. And, as I think I mentioned this in a few posts ago, I could not help wondering how I, someone not in the industry, saw this coming from a mile away. In fact, when I watched content about it a few months ago when a flurry of Sony layoffs were happening and the host said with confidence that only Hideo Kojima was safe.

I thought to myself, “Is he?” I didn’t think he was because if Sony was looking to cut their budget, he was an obvious choice. His games are lavish extravaganzas that take forever to make and don’t make back that much money. (For the latter, I’m talking about post-Metal Gear Solids.)

I thought he wasn’t safe. In fact, I thought he was very unsafe. And I wondered if I had lost my mind because everyone said there was no way Sony would get rid of him. He was too vaunted, too revered, and too sacred to get rid of.

Me: Nuh uh!

Let’s remember back to when he was fired by Konami. It was revealed that he had blown the budget wide open and missed deadlines. He denies these claims, but they are widely held to be true. And, to be honest, he’s always rubbed me the wrong way. I found him arrogant and sexist, and I did not appreciate that the latter was breezily ignored (but, nor was I surprised. The gaming industry is rife with sexism).

I felt like he was both supremely creative AND overly self-indulgent when it came to his games. Like many creative people who have reached a certain height, he needs someone who can say no to him and rein him in.

This is my long-winded way of saying that while I don’t doubt Sony acted in their own self-interest in cutting the cord, I don’t exactly blame them. Yes, a lot of their current troubles are self-inflicted (oh boy are they), but I don’t think this is one of them. Except maybe in picking him up in the first place. I mean, I can’t blame them for that, but they should have been a bit more clear-eyed in going into the relationship.


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Triple AAA–Zzzzzzzzzzz, part two

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I’m not sure where to put this because I’m going to talk more about AAA v. indie games, but I want to jump of that into talking about how I think about things in general. And why I have felt so deeply while playing Schrödinger’s Call (Acrobatic Chirimenjako). Add to that why I feel like nothing playing most AAA games. Oh, and just to get even spicier, why I don’t like most soulslikes even though I adore most FromSoft games.

While I’m at it, I’ll make the connection between my preference for indie games over AAA games and my preference for indie movies (when I even watch them) over Hollywood movies. To be fair, the last–no, the second-to-last blockbuster movie I’ve seen is–well, no. Let me rephrase that. The last superhero movie I saw in the theater was The Last–er, Guardian sof the Galaxy, and much to my surprise, I really enjoyed it.

After that, I saw Knives Out, which was hyped to an unbelievable degree. And which I was quite looking forward to. Even after seeing the trailer, which I did not like. Look.  I went into the movie excited because I love Agatha Christie. I love huge ensemble whodunnits, and this was supposed to be the next big thing. When I saw the trailer, well, my enthusiasm dipped dramatically. All the cast members were excellent, but there was something amiss. I hated the way the trailer was cut, and I did not enjoy the dialogue at all.

I crashed while writing this, so I’m picking it up today. My sleep has been all over the damn place.

Back to Knives Out. I did not like the first movie by this direction. Rian Johnson. Brick. I found it pretentious, ponderous, and laborious. I did not enjoy one second of it, and I did not understand the hype at all.

I was willing to give him a chance with tihs movie because, well, I’m a slow learner in some ways. I so want a new Poirot (with less British colonialism, please or if it’s another Poirot, an actual Belgian actor), I was willing to overlook my initial doubts about the trailer. I enjoy an ensemble cast, and this one was star-studded. Yes, the trailer had highly-stylized dialogue and hyper-cuts that made me wince, but I tried to put that aside.

More doubts began to creep in when the director made this big deal about pleading with the reviewers not to give ‘the secret’ away. After watching the movie, I have no idea what he meant by that. If he meant the perp, well, I sussed that out the first time I laid eyes on them. I said, “This person did it”–whatever ‘it’ was, and I sincerely hoped it wasn’t the case.

But, alas, two painful hours later, it turned out to be exactly the case.

Look, the cast was fantastic. Jamie Lee Curtis chewing up the scenery gave me so much life. But that was the only thing I liked about the movie. I was so disappointed in the rest of the movie.


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What we talk about in the shadows–of death

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I’m back to talk more about the feelings the first three chapters of Schrödinger’s Call (Acrobatic Chirimenjako) have evoked in me. Yes, the game is about death, but that’s not the emphasis or even the point. If anything, I would call it the backdrop of the game. Everything in the game is shaped by the fact of imminent death, but it’s not really talked about. You’re reminded now and again about it, but more in a way to gently (or not so gently) make you feel the emotions of the game again.

It’s strange because normally, I would not like a game that was so blatantly manipulative of me, but for whatever reason I’m fine with it in this game. I think it’s because, well, let me put it this way. I love musicals. I adore them, even though they are about as far from reality as you can possibly be. In fact, they are the only form of media that isn’t realistic that I actually enjoy.

This game isn’t realistic at all in terms of depiction of the world and what happens, but it’s spot on in terms of emotions. I have not felt this much for or because of a game in quite some time. It’s made me tear up on several occasions and flat out cry more than once.

The whole time I’m playing, I’m tired. I hurt for all the characters–well, most of them. There are a few who aren’t meant to be likeable, but even with most of those, I can at least see why they think and act the way they do. I may not be sympathetic to them, but I can’t hate them, either. My heart actuually aches as I play, and I dread each upcoming moment. Not because I hate the game, obviously, but because each moment is like a shard of glass embedding itself under my skin.

I felt as if I were walking on glass with each step. There were times when my finger hovered over the A button because I couldn’t make myself go on. Especially when it was time to let go. This has happneed to me in so many games. When the time came to let certain characters move on, I just could not do it. In Spiritfarer (Thunder Lotus Games), there was a character named Gwen. She was a hardbitten, cynical deer who was damaged by her father and life in general. She drank a ton of coffee and smoked endlessly. She had a shell around her because life had treated her so badly.

I finished her last moments fairly early in the game, but I could not let her go. This was my flaw–I was so selfish. I had to keep her with me. I knew I was being selfish, and, yet, I could not let her go. She meant so much to me–hell, she was me.

This is one reason I vastly prefer indie games to AAA games. They can say and do things that AAA games would not dare to touch. The newest Wolverine game came out in the past few days. The scores have varied wildly, but many reviewers agree that it’s the equivalent of a summer popcorn movie. Even many people who like it admit that it’s pretty much by the numbers. It’s not groundbreaking in any way, and it’s definitely a PlayStation game.


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When we talk about lo–death

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My post yesterday was about the third chapter of Schrödinger’s Call (Acrobatic Chirimenjako), a game that barring an absolute collapse/disaster in the final chapters, will most certainly be on my favorite games I played this year list at the end of the year. I don’t know why no one’s talking about it (I had written a whole thing about it being released at the same time as the highly-anticipated Hollow Knight: Silksong and having a similar score, but they weren’t released at the same time. Then I thought it was Mina the Hollower, but that’s not really the same time, either. I know I read an article about it because that’s why I looked up the game in the first place, but I can’t find the article) because it’s so damn good.

It really came and went with barely a ripple. The few reviews I could find (and caautiously skimmed the first few paragraphs) felt the same way about it tas I did. That it’s an emotionally affecting game that lies heavy on the heart. One even said that they had to take breaks while playing it, which is exactly where I’m at with it.

It’s interesting that my favorite game of the year may turn out to be one I can never play again. From the first moment I fired up the game until now (chapter three done, and a glimmer that I’m closing in on the end), I have played with a very heavy heart. I have not had this experience with a game before. Maybe a movie? I’m trying to think. Wait. Was there another game  I felt this way about? I want to say there is, but I can’t think of one.

I’m torn between if they should have just made this a graphic novel (which it essentially is) or if they should have tried to make the gameplay more engaging. I think giving how the strength of the game is the story, I would have bene ok with no gameplay. That’s hard to say, though, because I don’t usually play graphic novel games, so I don’t know if I would have tried this out if it were that. Then again, I might have because the review I read for it was so intriguing.

I have a unique perspective when it comes to death because I’ve already expreineced it. It’s strange, though, because I don’t remember dying (twice!). And, yes, that still a amuses me so I’ll continue to write it this way (twice!). I don’t remember it, obviously, and it’s still wild to me that it actually happened. It makes me think differently about death, though. Or rather, I have a different relationship to it now.

I wouldn’t say I’m friends with it, but I would say that I know it better than most people do. I would also ay that I would rather not talk about it. But I do ponder it from time to time. Not as much these dayys as before, but still.

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Schrödinger’s Call–A Quick Look, part two

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I’m back for the second part of A Quick Review of Schrödinger’s Call (Acrobatic Chirimenjako) after playing the third chapter. I mentioned at the end of the last post how I would probably need a break before playing the third chapter, and I was right.

I love this game. I adore it with all my heart and soul. I wanted to state that upfront before I quickly add, I have such a rough time playing it. It’s nearly two months to the day I played chapter two, and I went in with a heavy heart. Not because I thought it was going to be bad, because I knew it would take a toll on me. In fact, Hamlet, the cute, round, and sarcastic black cat explicitly told me in the game that doing a certain action would cost me. It’s pretty clear that this game is trying to tackle some pretty hefty topics. Does it succeed? I’ll get to that later.

Let me get the frustrating parts out of the way firs. My biggest gripe with the game is the gameplay, ironically. The minor gripes: there is a lot of text to button through, and sometimes when I’m on automatic, I press the button one too many times. Fortunately, I haven’t missed anything too important, but it bugs me, anyway.

Two, it’s usually clear what the game wants from me, but occasionally, I don’t know which exact phrase they want me to input. There’s a lot of dialogue saved in my notebook, and the game can be pretty cryptic at times. I risked looking up the answer once when I got stumped and got a mild spoiler (I think?) and to add insult to injury, didn’t even get the answer I was looking for. I eventually figured it out, but I did not want that in my cozy game about death. Well, not so cozy, but definitely about death.

Oh, the third gripe is something I mentioned in the last post was that some of my choices don’t matter at all. The game wants me to go down a certain path, which I’m fine with! But then don’t allow me to choose and give me a stock answer if I make the wrong choice. I get why they do it, but it’s frustrating at the end of the day.

I mentioned that the game continues to break my heart, and chapter three completely broke me. I will not be talking about the chaarcters themselves because you really need to go into the game unspoiled.

I can talk about general themes, though. Despair, loneliness, grief, ousider-ness, and more. All the characters are broken in one way or the other, underlying the fact that no one is completely normal*.  I’m in a dark place right now, and this game isn’t alleviating that feeling. On the other hand, it’s the perfect feeling to really sink into this game, so who knows if it was a wise choice or not?

I think I’m getting close to the end. I’m not sure, though, because I have studiously avoided anything related to the game. You really need to experience it as fresh as possible, and even when I read reviews before playing the game, I stopped the second they started spoiling even the smallest thing. Oh, and I read them after I played the demo (which was the first chapter), but before I played the second chapter.


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Sleep, eat, overthink (part seven)

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My car would not start tonight. A month or two ago, it wouldn’t start and I charged it overnight with my battery charger (after talking to my brother about it). He said that I should start it every few months or drive it twenty minutes every few months to keep the battery juiced. I tried it a few days ago just to make sure it started. I was meeting a friend for dinner tonight–and the car would  not start. All the lights were lit up like it does when the battery is dead. My friend came to pick me up (the restaurant was only two or three minutes from my house), and when I got back home, I called put my car on the charger.

Then, I called my brother to tell him what happened. He immediately said that I needed a new battery; I was morbidly glad that I had properly diagonosed the siuation. But, then a weight settled on my shoulders because I hate doing car shit. Especially since I have a hybrid, so it’s a bit trickier than if I just had a gas car. Also, tomorrow/today is Friday. And I am single, which means I have to just do it myself. Or call my brother to help me. I don’t like to rely on him too much, though, because he’s very busy.

Oh, and the reason I was checking to see if my car worked was because I want to get one of my meds before the weekend. Sigh.

My sleep has been terrible the last two nights. I went to bed earlier for me, and I got three hours and four-and-a-half hours, respectively. Maybe closer to five the second night, but that’s still not enough. It’s so frustrating to actually try to do the right(ish) thing and still not get enough sleep. I’ve been snoozing on and off while I’m “awake”, which is very frustrating.

I need to get more than six hours of sleep tonight, but with the car woes on my mind, who knows?

I don’t think I’ll finish this tonight. I’m so tired, and I keep nodding off. I’ll write more tomorrow.

(Written the next day.) I managed to get over seven hours of sleep last night, so I feel a bit better. My car place wasn’t open past ten a.m., so I did not get to talk to them. But I was able to start my car and went to pick up my meds.

Still. I’m feeling pretty down for a variety of reasons. Some big, some small, but it’s just all adding up to me being pretty unhappy at the moment. And still exhausted from getting shitty sleep the last couple of days. I’ve been nodding on and off, and never feeling awake, really.


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Sleep is such a jerk, part six

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In the Discord I’m in, we were talking about breakfast sandwiches, specifically sausage egg cheese on a biscuit. That was my fave when I was able to eat wheat and dairy–or more to the point, when I ate it. McDonald’s breakfast sandwiches, to be precise. So fucknig good. I would eat one in a heartbeat if I could. It didn’t seem like it would be that hard to make a simplified version so I bought eggs and bagels. I already had fake cheese. I was optimistic that I could scramble a few eggs. I’ve done it before. It’s really one of the easiest things to cook. For me, anyway. Oh, and I bought some cooked sausage patties as well.

I tried tonight. I cracked towo eggs into the skillet (oil first!) and…forgot that I should have whisked the eggs first. I put in a few slices of fake cheese and basically broke up the egg with the spatula. So it was more like chopped sunny side up egg. Which, fine, I guess (I’m pretty sure I cooked it thoroughly), but I was disappointed in the result. I put a thin layer of cream cheese on the bagel halves, then the heated up sausage patties, then the egg/cheese mess. It was…fine. I had one half bagel and that was enough. ‘Coz I was full, I mean, not that it tasted awful. It was, as I said, fine.

Would I try it again? Maybe. It wasn’t really worth the effort, but I do actually know to whisk eggs before scrambling them. I just forgot because I hadn’t done it in quite some time. Made eggs, I mean. It really wasn’t worth it, though. If I’m going to be honest.

Yesterday, I went on a rant about why I don’t like to cook and that I found it might be a neurospicy thing. When I read into it, it makes sense. People who like to cook and who are good at it like to say how easy it is. As I said, when I complained to my brother after I bought an intapot because the only thing it saves is cooking time (I still had to do all the prep–which is the part I hate), he said dismissively, “Well, yes. Of course you still have to do that” as if I were stupid for thinking otherwise.

Which in retrospect, yeah, it was silly of me to think that, but as someone who doesn’t cook, how the fuck was I to know? This thing had been touted as a game changer, a miracle, and from the descriptions I read, it implied that it involved no effort whatsoever. Pardon me if I did not have the experience to know the difference between it’s a miracle* and it’ll save a bit of time.

Again, as I mentioned in my last post, it’s hard for people who are good at something to realize what they consider basic may not be so basic to other people.


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Thinking about how I think, part five

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I’m still thinking about my thinking and what parts of it I want to/think I’m able to change. In yesterday’s post, I talked about my unending difficulty in getting to bed at a reasonable time. It’s something I’ve struggled with all my life, and any time I think I might have a handle on it, I don’t. It’s the hardest thing I’ve done in my life, quite frankly (trying to get a decent sleep schedule), and I don’t know if I can actually do it.

Huh. This is the first time I’ve actually admitted that.  Let me clarify. By “it”, I mean getting to  bed at 2 a.m. every night. I think even 3 a.m. is pushing it. I have said for many years that it’s possible while I continue to not do it. Most emphatically not to do it. Right now, I’m getting to bed around seven to eight, which is the latest I’ve ever done.

As for eating, I’m also in a pretty bad rut. I’ve been DoorDashing way too much as it’s way too convenient. I hate cooking. I see it as a huge waste of time, especially as I live alone. I don’t mind eating the same thing several days in a row, so I get the idea of cooking in batches. But it’s still so much work for such little return. I hate all the prep work so much. But, I can do simple things when I put my mind to it. Like pasta and sauce, scrambled eggs, and salads. The last isn’t cooking, obviously, but it’s still more effort than I actually want to make.

Here’s the thing. It’s really hard to separate to stop thinking of myself as lazy because it’s what I’ve been told all my life. Seriously. How the fuck hard is it to put a simple salad together? I can even buy the bagged lettuce for fuck’s sake. It is literally buy the bag of lettuce/spinach/whatever and a bottle of  dressing. Yes, I can add tomatoes to make it even better. If I’m very ambitious, I’ll buy an avocado and let it rot. This is the problem. I have all the good intentions in the world, but that means jackshit at the end of the day if I don’t actually eat them.

I have a dozen eggs sitting in the fridge right now. I bought them several days ago with the intent to make breakfast sandwiches. People in the Discord were going on and on about them, and it inspired me. I like eggs, and I can actually make a good omelet/scrambled eggs. I put in fake cheese, some kind of veggie, and sometimes chicken or ham. It truly is simple and doesn’t make time at all. Oh, sometimes I put lactose-free sour cream in it as well.

I have yet to make anything with the eggs. They are sitting guiltily in my fridge, and I am aware that time is running out. Will I make anything with them before I have to toss them? Who knows? If I don’t, then I’ll feel so bad when I throw them out. And yet.


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