(Don't miss today's Finger Puppet Show!)
Some days I don’t have a blog post planned and I just open Weebly and wait and see what comes to me. This is the method I was sticking to today, but it took me ages to even gain access to the internet. While waiting for the connection to be restored, I reflected on just how dependant I am on the internet. While I do a little bit of short story writing every week, most of the writing I do is for my blog and my webcomic. To lose access to the internet would be to lose a lot of my creative energy and would likely be very frustrating. As odd as it may sound, I'd have much less motivation to write these things knowing that I couldn't post them right away or schedule them to be posted soon. Plus, of course, with no internet I'd lose the power to search for more work and writing opportunities and also lose my main way of backing up things up (Dropbox). In some ways it's very interesting to look at the impact that internet connectivity on creativity, in other ways it's a little sad...
(Don't miss today's Finger Puppet Show!)
0 Comments
Free to play games are very popular at the moment, so it wasn't a surprise that Nintendo and The Pokémon Company came out with Pokémon Shuffle. Pokémon Shuffle has you fighting Pokémon through puzzle-type gameplay. On the bottom screen you'll have a grid with several Pokémon faces and on the top you'll have a Pokémon. You are given a limited number of chances to move the Pokémon faces around, and each time you match up at least three of the same kind of Pokémon, it will launch an attack on the Pokémon on the top screen. If you run out of moves, you lose the battle, but if you win the battle, you get a chance to catch it. You can catch lots of Pokémon as you go along, and before each battle you choose which ones you want to bring along. As with regular Pokémon games, you then use the Pokémon with appropriate types to deal more damage to your opponents. The game incorporates the concept of Mega Evolution too, and (if you have a stone to activate it) some Pokémon can Mega Evolve in battle and then matching them up will cause even more damage. Plus, Pokémon are even able to level up if you make regular use of them, which I quite like. The free to play element of the game is the fact that you have five hearts and you use one up every time you do a battle. Once a heart is gone, it will take thirty minutes for you to get another. When all the hearts are gone, you can wait to get more, or you can just spend real money to buy crystals which can be used to buy more hearts (or to buy items which will make the battles easier). You might be happy to wait, but then there are legendary Pokémon which appear for a limited time only which might be frustrating to some. Later levels are also ridiculously hard and clearly designed to make you spend money, which I did not appreciate at all. It's a fun and very addictive game and you'll be pleased as you battle and capture more and more of your favourite Pokémon. The minor RPG elements are appreciated and I think this is the kind of game anybody could enjoy, even if they've never played a Pokémon game before. Puzzle and Pokémon fans will enjoy this especially, but generally this is a fun game with a broad appeal. Rating: 8.3/10 (Don't miss today's Finger Puppet Show!)
Deep Time tells the story of an African expedition lead by cryptzoologist Brendan Merlie who is hoping to find some evidence that certain extinct species might still be living deep in the jungle.
You may think this sounds like a fairly standard adventure story (and indeed, the Anthony says in the author's notes that he was inspired by the classic adventure novels) but it's so much more than that. This book covers environmentalism, religion, science, morality, sexuality, ancient history and so much more (without it ever seeming forced). But I think, most of all, what I loved about Deep Time was its characters. Brendan, Salome, Curtis and Vince are four characters who I grew to like immensely. All of them were very different, all of them had their own motivations, beliefs and ideologies, all of them had their flaws, all of them had their qualities and all were very believeable. I really cared about what happened to all of them, and that's just the main characters! There were several smaller characters that I grew to like just as much. It was Brendan and Salome that I was the most fond of, however. Brendan is a scientist and often hides behind a slight degree of rational detatchment to protect himself, but he certainly doesn't lack emotion and it's clear that many things affect him to a large extent. He always tries to be pleasant and upbeat, even in the face of disaster, and I think this makes him hugely likeabe. Salome, meanwhile, is quite different to Brendan and is frustrated by the ordered nature of science. She's very much a free spirit, but with strong moral convictions and I always loved to see her standing up for the things she believed in. At times, I felt like she was a little mean to the other characters, but then there are so many terrible things that happen to her throughout the duration of the novel, that she can be forgiven for occasionally seeming short tempered. One thing about Deep Time and something which might put some people off, is that there is quite a lot of sex and violence in it. These are things I don't usually enjoy in fiction, because I tend to find them used in tasteless ways that feel a bit on the nose. In Deep Time, every act of violence and every instance of sexual interaction felt perfectly natural. The sex and violence really complimented the story because, in a way, Deep Time provides a critique of human nature, and are not sex and violence large parts of human nature? Something else I really appreciated was that there was a lot of nudity in it, but that there was a strong emphasis on nudity as a non-sexual thing, which is a perspective I have a great deal of respect for, but which I don't encounter too often. I could go on for a long time about why this is an absolutely superb book, but I'll wrap it up now to avoid this review becoming too long. Deep Time is a fantastic sci-fi adventure novel, wrapped in lots of scientific language which helps makes the unbelieveabe believeable, while also telling a deeply emotional story. At times you'll laugh at lighthearted interactions between characters and at times you'll find things utterly heartbreaking. It's definitely worth a read and I hope it will be remembered for years to come and that Brendan and Salome will enter the pantheon of great literary characters. Rating: 9.5/10
I find the English language a very interesting thing. In fact, I find all languages to be very interesting, but I'm especially interested in the English language, what with it being the only language that I can speak. As such, I was very interested in The English Language by Robert W. Burchfield.
This book tells the history of the English language, and I have to say, before I started reading I was a little concerned that it would be boring; it seemed like a very academic book and I worried that it wouldn't really be very engaging. I've read things like this before which were very informative, but written in a very dry, boring style. The good news about The English Language is that it is very entertaining to read; I think this is a very important quality for non-fiction works, as the information is much more likely to stick with you if you enjoyed yourself while reading it. When reading, you'll gain a general overview of the language's entire history. You'll learn about the other languages which fed into it, the origins of phrases, etymologies of words and lots more. One bit I remember being particularly entertaining (and enlightening) was a comparison of the same passage from the Bible as presented in the different translations. So if you've ever wanted to gain a stronger understanding of how languages develop and what roots the English language has, The English Language is definitely worth a read. It's not enormously long, so it obviously doesn't go into a huge amount of detail (think of it more of an overview) but it is still very interesting and informative. I definitely recommend it. Rating: 8/10
(Don't miss today's Finger Puppet Show!)
A writer like me is always keen to increase their social media followers; the more people who follow you on social media, the more people who will see your work when you share it. I work as a Content Marketer and a large part of my job involves social media marketing; I'm good at social media marketing and this is the third time I've done social media work professionally. I've managed to get a large number of new followers for other businesses in the past, yet my own social media feeds lack followers. It's a bit of a shame, really, but that is the curse of the social media marketer; the business they work for will have lots of followers, because that's what they'll dedicate their time to, but when they get home they don't want to spend more time doing social media marketing for their own accounts... Or, at least, I don't (and I know I'm not the only one). It's sad really, because if I had the time to do the same for my own accounts, it could well prove to be very beneficial, but as things are, I just don't have the time (and social media marketing does take a lot of time.) So, as ironic as it is, social media marketing people quite often have smaller numbers of followers.
(Don't miss today's Finger Puppet Show!)
Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood is a game I'll always remember very fondly because it was given to me out of the blue as a kind gift from a good friend. So, really, the game got quite lucky, because if it weren't for that pleasant context, I'd probably not think of it fondly at all.
Ha! I am exaggerating a bit, but in all honesty Sonic Chronicles is very much a mixed bag. It's a first for the Sonic series because it's an RPG (rather than a platformer) and since the Super Mario series' RPGs were always fantastic, I went into this with high hopes. Maybe too high. As is common for DS games, this game is controlled entirely with the touch screen. This is good and bad; it makes walking around the world frustrating, as it can be hard to make Sonic go where you want him to (boundaries are unclear), but on the other hand it gives the RPG battles a fun and unique edge. Having said that, once I got further into the game and the battles got longer, I got tired of the touch screen controls and wished I could just press buttons. Speaking of battles, later in the game, these go on far too long when it comes to random encounters. Towards the end, I was running away from literally every single enemy because I couldn't be bothered to waste five minutes fighting an insignificant enemy. Annoyingly, a large number of later enemies can 'counter' a lot of your attacks too, which means that if you hit them they don't get hurt, you do, and sometimes they regenerate health as well! But let's talk about the game's positives. While the story is a little hard to summarise, I loved the game's writing. Many memorable Sonic characters appear and are playable. While there is no voice acting, you get to enjoy all of the usual comedic Sonic dialogue in text form. I was especially pleased when I found out that Big the Cat is playable in this game. I shan't comment on how he is involved with the story, but Sonic Chronicle's might just contain my favourite appearance of Dr. Eggman (who I already love). Shadow, Amy, Tails, Knuckles and several other characters also appear in big roles. Also, I won't spoil it, but I found the ending side-splittingly hilarious; what's worrying is that I'm not sure if it was supposed to be funny or not! But then, another negative is the game's absolutely terrible soundtrack; it's droning, monotonous and fails to create any kind of atmosphere. Rumour has it that the 'real' soundtrack was accidentally lost shortly before release and so they had to rush out another one, and judging by the quality of the finished product, it wouldn't be a surprise! The bad soundtrack gives you a certain feeling as you play and probably makes everything feel even less fun than it already is. Ultimately, I am happy I played Sonic Chronicles. The writing was often delightful, there are lots of references and connections to older games and at times it was genuinely enjoyable. But if you do want to play this game, just don't forget that it does have quite a few significant flaws! Rating: 7/10 Regular readers may have noticed that there's been a recent decline in the number of book reviews that I've been writing on here and, since I think of my book reviews as an important part of this blog, I felt that it was important to explain. There are three main reasons for my lack of book reviews: firstly, I usually write a review shortly after finishing a book, but at the moment I've been reading an especially long book which is taking a while (I'm nearly done now, though!). Secondly, now that I am working, I don't tend to have quite as much time to read, and usually do all of my reading on the weekend; my work day is eight and a half hours long, then once you've added in travel time and house work, my free time is quite limited; plus, even when I have time to read, I need silence to focus on a book, which I don't often have access to. Thirdly, I had gotten quite behind on my video game reviews and I wanted an opportunity to get up to date with them, so I have been focusing on them more, when it comes to reviews (though am still about thirty behind!) and it all culminates in a lack of book reviews here on the Trusty Water Blog. If my book reviews were one of your favourite things from me, then I hope you haven't been too disappointed. Next week, no matter what, I will write at least one new book review and I hope to get back into the swing of it soon. I felt it was important to clarify the reason behind this move away from my regular routine.
(Don't miss today's Finger Puppet Show!)
This game is the sequel to the original Sonic the Hedgehog game. I have to say, I didn't really like the first game and so I was quite cautious going into the second game; I wasn't expecting much and I just hoped it wouldn't be too bad.
It turns out that I actually enjoyed this game! Though in many ways it's very similar to the first, the formula has been refined to such an extent that it is no longer bad. Most importantly, it felt a lot fairer. Story-wise, Eggman has been up to his old tricks again and has encased lots of innocent creatures inside evil robots. In this one he's also building some kind of space station too. Sonic doesn't head out to stop Eggman by himself this time, instead he travels with his friend Miles 'Tails' Prower, the two-tailed fox who would go on to become one of the main characters in the series. Tails is pretty cool and you can choose to be him or Sonic as you play through (though it is mainly just an aesthetic change). But it's in terms of gameplay that I was most pleased with this game. The idea of Sonic is that he can run fast and the level designs in this game actually allow for this kind of gameplay; there are no cheap traps or hazards which make you have to go slow for ages. I'll admit, not every level is about running, but some of them are. There's a good amount of variation and the levels stay fun. Mystic Caves was my favourite level, a really nice 'spooky' location which had a great atmosphere and was lots of fun to play through and other highlights include Aquatic Ruins and Oil Ocean. The last couple of levels are pretty tough, but I suppose I can forgive that since they come at the end. This game also introduces multiplayer options: you can either do a two-player race (one person Sonic, the other Tails) which is okay, but a bit bland, or you can play through the story co-operatively! Whenever you start playing single player mode, Tails will be CPU controlled, but at any time a second player can pick up a controller and play as Tails! The screen follows only Sonic, so Tails can get left behind, but he also cannot die, which means he is perfect to use for exploring! On the whole a very enjoyable experience, if a little short. It's exactly what the first game should have been, and if you're looking for an introduction to retro Sonic games, go for this one over that. Rating: 8.1/10
(Don't miss today's Finger Puppet Show!)
I'm feeling especially happy today because I've been making the plans for my annual Christmas meals. Every year I arrange two Christmas meals: one of them is for all of my Corsham based friends and the other one is for all of my Bath based friends... Well, for all of my friends from non-Corsham locations. This year it seems like there's a good chance that all of my guests will attend, which has me very excited, as that's not happened before. I try and make these meals a little better every year; this year I'm paying the cost of everybody's meals so that it's just as much a treat for them (getting free food) as it is for me (getting to see lots of friends). I sometimes like to imagine how I'll do this event in the future; I'm sure I'll eventually be able to host it in my own flat, where I will cook all of them a Christmas dinner and have gifts for all of them. Maybe I'll be able to host it at a really nice and fancy restaurant that everybody will enjoy (though, having said that, Nando's is pretty amazing) but that's all in the future. Right now I have two Christmas meal days to look forward to. For me Christmas isn't just the 25th of December and these are two days I look forward to equally.
Just yesterday I bought my poppy for Remembrance Day. Some people might think of me as the kind of person who might not wear a poppy because I'm quite anti-military and an utter pacifist and the poppy is often used in a pro-militaristic context. So why do I wear a poppy? Well, I wear it in memory of the millions of people who were murdered because of their governments. The poppy is an anti-war symbol as it is a reminder of the enormous loss of life which is inherently tied to war. The poppy is a way to pay tribute to those who had to live in extremely adverse conditions and had to do terrible, terrible things. Really, I think it's wrong that poppies are ever used as pro-military symbols. To use one in this respect, to me, seems to be to miss the point entirely. But, of course, having never been forced to live through anything so terrible, it's not really for me to decide what it is that poppies stand for, but from my perspective, they're the perfect thing to remind us that the price we pay for war is seldom justified. (Don't miss today's Finger Puppet Show!) |
About the AuthorAdam Randall is the author of the blog. Is he a good or bad writer? Who knows? Why not read a few entries and make a decision! New to this Site?
Click here for all the best posts.
Archives
I'm currently in the process of completely overhauling the archive system to make it more easy to use. Bear with me, it may look messy for a bit.
Anecdotes Funny & Silly Entries Archives
February 2016
Categories
All
Any Suggestions?
Give me them here.
|