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Stuff: Shrines and roses
Sep. 4th, 2013 10:47 amBooks:
A Shrine to Saint Ann: A very enjoyable little fantasy ebook, reminds me of the Curse of Chalion series by Lois McMaster Bujold but with less racism and more sarcastic reanimated corpses. Like Bujold (and Megan Whalen Smith, who I was also reminded of) a little too in love with gods and royalty and not enough with regular people for my tastes, but that's what I get for reading fantasy. It was still a quick enjoyable read with interesting and diverse characters and worldbuilding, focussed very much on complex female characters being fascinatingly terrible. And only $3!
The Circle of Magic 1: Sandry's Book/The Magic in the Weaving by Tamora Pierce: Light and mostly innoffensive children's fantasy about a mismatched group of children with different magical gifts gathered together to learn magic and the ~power of friendship~ etc. Obviously trying VERY HARD to be DIVERSE (about race/class/gender/body type) which gets wearying sometimes (and is undercut by some skeevy subtext) but is a nice change from books that don't try at all and creates lots of natural moments for character growth and contrast.
TV:
Watched the Cowboy Bebop movie and I did indeed enjoy it more now I know it affects NOTHING in the series chronology and is just a random side adventure. Still makes no freaking sense.
Games:
Flight Rising: Briefly opened for new members! Hello all! You will have to friend me if you want to be friends, the notifications were annoyingly lacking in lair links. Also, the comments to this post have some good advice.
Gone Home: a very good little interactive story (not a dating sim! Or fighting game!!) where you play a woman who arrives home from an overseas trip to find the house empty. You wander around trying to figure out what's been up with your family while you've been gone, and are railroaded enough by having to find keys for locked doors etc that the clues you piece together form a coherent and affecting story. Note: the vast majority of items you can interact with are there purely for atmosphere, don't waste time trying to figure out the Secret Meaning of the toilet paper or how to set it on fire, because there is none and you can't. *cough*
And now two very fluffy fantasy visual novels with f/m dating sim elements.
Blue Rose: I played the demo of this and enjoyed it but not enough to pay $20 for the full version, especially given all the typos and general amateurish feel. It's fairly generic fantasy with lots of anachronism and unconvincing worldbuilding, the characters were varied and kind of interesting but the dialogue was often stilted. The one f/f romance option seems nice but bland. Blindingly white, even the (blonde!) woman who seems to be from pseudo-China.
Everlove: Rose. This I enjoyed enough to pay $5 for the full version and I'd say I got my money's worth but I wouldn't rec it very strongly. The historical setting is SO SHALLOW and the vast majority of scenes are identical on every path even when you make drastically different choices. But the art is pretty, the characters are likeable enough and the plot was interesting the first time through. The puzzles are easy (on an iPad) and not super fun but do break up the plot. You have the option to declare yourself a lesbian in one scene but otherwise it's very heteronormative despite your female best friend having the cutest sprite :( I wasn't very satisfied with the special ending you get after doing all four paths.
A Shrine to Saint Ann: A very enjoyable little fantasy ebook, reminds me of the Curse of Chalion series by Lois McMaster Bujold but with less racism and more sarcastic reanimated corpses. Like Bujold (and Megan Whalen Smith, who I was also reminded of) a little too in love with gods and royalty and not enough with regular people for my tastes, but that's what I get for reading fantasy. It was still a quick enjoyable read with interesting and diverse characters and worldbuilding, focussed very much on complex female characters being fascinatingly terrible. And only $3!
The Circle of Magic 1: Sandry's Book/The Magic in the Weaving by Tamora Pierce: Light and mostly innoffensive children's fantasy about a mismatched group of children with different magical gifts gathered together to learn magic and the ~power of friendship~ etc. Obviously trying VERY HARD to be DIVERSE (about race/class/gender/body type) which gets wearying sometimes (and is undercut by some skeevy subtext) but is a nice change from books that don't try at all and creates lots of natural moments for character growth and contrast.
TV:
Watched the Cowboy Bebop movie and I did indeed enjoy it more now I know it affects NOTHING in the series chronology and is just a random side adventure. Still makes no freaking sense.
Games:
Flight Rising: Briefly opened for new members! Hello all! You will have to friend me if you want to be friends, the notifications were annoyingly lacking in lair links. Also, the comments to this post have some good advice.
Gone Home: a very good little interactive story (not a dating sim! Or fighting game!!) where you play a woman who arrives home from an overseas trip to find the house empty. You wander around trying to figure out what's been up with your family while you've been gone, and are railroaded enough by having to find keys for locked doors etc that the clues you piece together form a coherent and affecting story. Note: the vast majority of items you can interact with are there purely for atmosphere, don't waste time trying to figure out the Secret Meaning of the toilet paper or how to set it on fire, because there is none and you can't. *cough*
And now two very fluffy fantasy visual novels with f/m dating sim elements.
Blue Rose: I played the demo of this and enjoyed it but not enough to pay $20 for the full version, especially given all the typos and general amateurish feel. It's fairly generic fantasy with lots of anachronism and unconvincing worldbuilding, the characters were varied and kind of interesting but the dialogue was often stilted. The one f/f romance option seems nice but bland. Blindingly white, even the (blonde!) woman who seems to be from pseudo-China.
Everlove: Rose. This I enjoyed enough to pay $5 for the full version and I'd say I got my money's worth but I wouldn't rec it very strongly. The historical setting is SO SHALLOW and the vast majority of scenes are identical on every path even when you make drastically different choices. But the art is pretty, the characters are likeable enough and the plot was interesting the first time through. The puzzles are easy (on an iPad) and not super fun but do break up the plot. You have the option to declare yourself a lesbian in one scene but otherwise it's very heteronormative despite your female best friend having the cutest sprite :( I wasn't very satisfied with the special ending you get after doing all four paths.
