Since it’s the last recap of the year, I guess we need to look back on the highlights of my year in blogging:
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OK now that that’s done, we can go on with the regular recap. I really had no highlights to speak of and I am once again asking myself why I even bother with this blog given how infrequently I post to it. I keep promising myself I’ll write more but time these days feels so precious and I never have enough to do all the things I want to do. Since blogging doesn’t frequently make it to the top of the list I guess I need to accept that it isn’t that important to me. But, y’know, inertia. I’ve been writing it for over 20 years.
Bah, that’s not a very upbeat way to start the final recap of 2024! I’m also stalling because I took no notes this month and can’t really remember what I played. [dramatic pause while I try to remember] OK I think I got it, let’s go!
Playing
At the end of last month I’d finished playing My Time At Portia and I almost immediately rolled into My Time At Sandrock but didn’t stick with it very long, just because I was dealing with a bit of “My Time at…” fatigue. I definitely plan to go back to it at some point after giving the series a bit of a rest. My immediate thoughts were along the same lines of everything I’ve read about Sandrock: it is like Portia, only better.
December was also the month I got back into MMOs, plural. Talk about not having enough time, right? I finally got into World of Warcraft‘s “The War Within” just about the time my sub ran out. I thought about resubscribing but when I compared the $15/month cost to the 4 or 5 hours/month I was playing, it just seemed silly. I’d just left the Isle of Dorn, which I very much enjoyed. Maybe at some point I’ll re-sub and just play through the story content. My general issue with MMOs is they never end so I can never ‘finish’ them and move on to one of the hundreds of single player games I really want to play.
I also got back into The Elder Scrolls Online, not that I remember exactly how that happened at this point. I think it was a super sale on the last expansion and all the expansions before it. I brought my Playstation account up to date then got sucked into the Golden Pursuits event they were running. When I got the free mount (pictured at the top of this post) it made me wonder why I’d bothered. That thing is hideous!!! But the event did push me out of my comfort zone. I did a PUG dungeon and 5 rounds of PvP Battlegrounds, just to advance the Golden Pursuits. Both were the type of content I generally avoid like the plague but in the end, they both went well. The Dungeon was even, dare I say it? Fun! Anyway I’m still playing ESO, casually. I paid for a month of ESO+ but don’t expect to continue that; ESO is a game you can play without the subscription if you just want to dabble. [Technically you never have to pay but when I’m playing seriously I find I really miss the ESO+ perks.]
And Warframe, which I actually wrote a post about. I’m still having a lot of fun there. There are so many types of content hidden away (hidden to those looking at the game from the outside, I mean) in this game. The other day I was running hoverboard races and pulling off tricks and stuff. Who knew?
Aside from MMOs I’ve been bouncing around various single player games, trying to finish something, somewhere, and completely failing. I REALLY want to finally finish Horizon Forbidden West and Death Stranding. I started Like a Dragon: Ishin and was having a great time but just drifted away. Oh and after watching the Borderlands movie I found myself back to playing Borderlands (the OG Borderlands). At least I finally tore myself free of being a slave to Fallout 76‘s Season Pass which kind of led to me finally stop playing.
I am noticing a bad pattern with me and Season Passes where I start to obsess over them which quickly leads to me playing a game not for fun but to try to advance the season pass. Doesn’t take long for that behavior to turn the game into just another daily chore to get through. This in turn leads to developing negative associations with a game that I initially was enjoying. Anyway I need to work on that aspect of my gaming personality. I don’t think ‘swearing off’ Season Passes completely is the answer; I need to find some kind of middle ground.
Watching
Again, didn’t take notes so…
Star Trek: The Lower Decks (Paramount+) final season was wonderful. I’m really going to miss this show but I expect I will re-watch it often over the coming years, as I do most Trek shows.
Silo (Apple TV+): We’re in the midst of Season 2 and man waiting a week for each new episode is killing me! We love this show! We went back and re-watched Season 1 which felt worth doing, just as a refresher and because we picked up some foreshadowing we missed the first time through. I’ve never read the books but Part Purple has, and we both enjoy it so make of that what you will.
Man on the Inside (Netflix): Ted Danson plays an elderly engineering professor who goes undercover in a retirement community even though he knows nothing about being a detective. I would like to say hilarity ensues, but it’s more like amusing warm feelings ensue. And some melancholy. It was a wonderful show, though also a bit frightening if you’re someone of my age!
Nobody Wants This (Netflix): Once we were done with Man on the Inside we headed over to another The Good Place alum, Kristen Bell and her new(ish) sitcom. We’re enjoying this one too but be warned it’s a bit on the raunchy side, but it has its share of romance too. We’re still in the middle of it but since it’s a sitcom I don’t anticipate any big wrenches being thrown into the works. Good fun so far.
Yellowstone (Peacock): I’m finally watching the 5th season of Yellowstone, mostly so I can cancel Peacock. I had Peacock for Premiere League Football but I rarely watch any more and I’m trying to cut some streaming costs here and there. If you haven’t seen Yellowstone somehow, the best way I can think to describe it is The Sopranos in Montana, only with more lawyers. I find it compelling even though almost every character is pretty awful.
Dr Stone (Crunchyroll): This has been my anime of choice this month. I liken this one to a survivalbox game in anime form. Something turned all humans to stone for 3700 years until one science geek ‘wakes up’ and figures out how to wake up others, while at the same time he tries to jumpstart technology using all his knowledge. It’s pretty fun so far (I’m still in Season 1).
Reading
A Christmas Carol gets read every year, and this year was no different.
Also finished Running With The Demon by Terry Brooks and rolled right into the sequel, A Knight of the Word. These are his “pre-Shannara” books and are basically urban fantasy. UF is not generally one of my favorite genres but this time out it is working for me.
And that’s about it for December. Next thing I’m looking forward to is Wuthering Waves coming to Playstation on Jan 2nd. I’ve heard so much good about this game that I’m really looking forward to playing!
I’d be very sad if you gave up blogging because Dragonchasers is consistently one of the most interesting and entertaining blogs I read. Doesn’t matter if you don’t post regularly or often, just so you post when you have something to say. Also I’ve read quite a few tips here on good stuff to watch and play which is not something I can say about every blog I follow. Taste is a strange thing…
I think I found A Man on the Inside funnier than most people. I’ve seen plenty of comments along the lines of “heartwarming but not all that funny”. I laughed out loud several times. It has to be said, though, that Iaughed a lot more at Nobody Wants This. No spoilers there but while I wouldn’t say there were any wrenches thrown into the works, it didn’t end quite how I thought it would.
I haven’t seen the final season of Lower Decks yet. I’m assuming it will end up on whichever of Netflix or Prime the others seasons are on in due course but if not I might either have to sub Paramount+ briefly or else buy it. It’s a very divisive show among Trek fans though. I can think of at least one who absolutely loathes it as a blot on the Federation’s escutcheon , whereas you cleary see it as exemplary. As a non-Trek fan I just think it’s a very funny, well-written sitcom.
I nearly put Dr. Stone on my watchlist then decided against it. I’ll change that on your recommendation. When I’ll get around to watching it is another matter though.
Thanks for the kind words about the blog!
I did find A Man on the Inside to have some really funny moments but I guess there was enough melancholy that it kind of offset the funny moments, if that makes sense?
I dunno if this is a PC thing to say but I am amused at how Kristen Bell, who to me just has this ‘wholesome’ vibe, keeps doing these rather raunchy roles. I think in some ways it makes them even funnier to me. I mean she is in Frozen and now she’s doing vibrator humor. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her in a role where I didn’t like her.
I liked Nobody Wants This a lot.
Doctor Stone is pretty cool — I watched it — but it has a lot of “well why didn’t they try THAT” moments; also, it’s the kind of show where everything works first time. Makes engineering look easy 🙂 There was a YouTube channel that was trying to make Dr. Stone machines in real life and things weren’t quite as easy as depicted in the anime.
I like Lower Decks, but then I really liked Discovery so maybe my opinion re: all things Trek is suspect.
On Crunchyroll at least, Dr Stone comes with a “Do Not Try This At Home” style warning, which I found kind of funny, but I guess at some level the science is legit? But as you say, everything goes so smoothly.
For whatever it is worth I wasn’t a huge fan of Discovery. Well I liked S1 but not as a Trek show, I LOVED S2, but once they did the time jump it started losing me. Love Strange New Worlds, though!