Normally, I would post a monthly update on what I’ve been playing this month, but I wanted to use this time as an update post to let you know what my current and future plans are.
Personal Garbage
At the time of this writing, I am two tasks away from finishing up my Masters program. I have a test at the beginning of June to take and a one month web development class in July; and then I will be done. Finish. Over with. Never again. Stick a fork in me, I’m done. I am a tired man and wish to rest. My free time will be restored and hopefully my anxiety levels will start to fall.
On another quick personal note, hi! I feel like in the past months I have become less social than I was before. Its to no one’s fault as I tend to go into hyper introvert mode and recharge my social energy when needed. Almost all of my Discord and Twitch notifications have been turned off for a while since I felt like I wasn’t contributing anything and I wanted to focus more on what I needed to do at the time. I do still lurk, so if you see an extra eye looking at you it could be me who knows (chanting my name three times at your screen will not summon me). My shell will start to crack again soon and my efforts to be more social will surface again…once I get enough sleep which doesn’t happen a lot. I do plan on going on vacation late June, so hopefully the time away from my normal walls will help with the healing process.
Plans For the Blog
Between now and August, post from me will be all over the place for the most part. I have new material for post that I want to write about and slowly getting my butt into gear writing them. The one thing that I am focusing on right now are post for the month of June. June is normally my month to write multiple post about a specific series/topics with a little more “polish” to the post. I will be talking about Monster Hunter again, but more of a retrospective of each game that I’ve played. Shouldn’t be bad since I only have to cover Tri, 3 Ultimate, Freedom Unite, 4 Ultimate, Generations, Generations Ultimate (XX), World, Rise, Stories, and soon; the original. That’s…going to be a lot to write and talk about. They will mostly be in the style of my Backlog Tales with maybe a little less humor but still have that charm I like to put into my post. So if you are a Monster Hunter fan, I hope you enjoy these posts because it will probably be the last time I talk about it….until the next game comes out.
After that, it will be full on post about the other games in my backlog and anything interesting that comes along. Collaborations posts are always a good time and I’m happy to contribute if I have something to contribute. Whatever comes after that will come after that then.
Streaming Attempt Number Who Knows At This Point
I promise nothing, but since my calendar suddenly just opened up, I have time to do other things. I have attempted streaming in the past, but I couldn’t keep it consistent and only did it on a whim. I want to start utilizing the technology I have to start capturing my own photos and videos for projects, and streaming would kill two birds with one stone. I think the other motivator is that Kat has gotten a sudden interest in streaming. So for now, I will say that I will be streaming more here and there at twitch.tv/danamesx. Also please consider checking out Kat’s streams when she does. I do play games with her there and make cameos as her tech support.
Games I Have Played, Finished and Acquired in April
Since this post is replacing my normal end of the month recap, I thought I would still share the games that I’ve played, finished, and bought this month. I am a little upset with myself this month since I had the opportunity to finish more games than I did. There would have been three more games on my finish list if other things and Monster Hunter Rise didn’t get in my way.
I started Astral Chain on a whim and found myself enjoying it. I definitely have hit the point of repetitiveness with chapter structure, but things move fast and the chapters don’t last that long, so I would say that I am enjoying myself. Looking forward to talking about this one.
On to a frustrating topic, I finally bought Katamari Damacy REROLL on sale and gave it a try. I don’t know if I’m just trying to hard or what, but the controls make me so mad. There are days where the controls make sense and I have no problem playing the game, and then there are times where I barely beat the clock. I know you can change the controls to make it a little easier, but I’ve been practicing with the default too long just to abandon ship and change now. Minus the controls, I enjoy all the other aspects of the game including the not-so-intimidating-whatsoever King of All Cosmos.
There were two games that I finished this month and one of them was obviously Monster Hunter Rise. I will save my thoughts about the game for the post in June. I thought I was done after doing the village quests since that is normally the “story” mode in these games, but nope. The games decides that you need to do the multiplayer hub quest in order to get the “true ending” and regular Monster Hunter experience (some mechanics are like decorations, layered armor, and monsters are locked behind the hub quest and can’t be unlocked through the village quest). Again, I will tackle more of this in June.
The other game that I finished this month was It Takes Two with Kat. We streamed the entire thing on her Twitch channel and I can honestly say I enjoyed 95% percent of it. The game has a lot more going for it than simple cooperative platforming that made it hard to stop playing at times. I wrote a post on it already, so if you want to read my full thoughts on it you can do so there.
As far as games that I got this month, it wasn’t a whole lot. I did find a copy of Super Monkey Ball 2 for a not so bad price and I remember having fun with this game with a friend from college. Didn’t expect my GameCube collection to still be expanding, but here we are. The only other thing that I got was New Pokémon Snap. I originally did not care about this game since I found the N64 game fun, but boring after going through each level. I never understood the hype around it then, and I kinda don’t get the hype around the new game. Kat convinced me to get it for us, and after watching her play and finish it in one day, I can see the “long lasting” appeal to this title. There is definitely more to do in this one and different things can happen depending on when you visit the stage. So I will say New Pokémon Snap surprised me with its content, and I hope those who were counting down the days for this are happy.
Ok that’s enough out of me for the time being. One of these days I will figure out how to end something properly, but until then….go play some games?
So. My in-laws are moving out of their house a “retiring” down to Florida. I enjoyed the visits we made to their house during the summer and holidays, but know it looks like I will have to venture hellscape that is Florida to enjoy board games and beer (Florida is not a bad state, I just hate the heat down there). While my father-in-law is not the gamer that he once was, he does find the time to enjoy gaming when he can. He currently enjoys his Switch and is currently playing his second playthrough of Fire Emblem: Three Houses. His influence got Kat into gaming as well; and it is thanks to him that we have some impressive games in our collection (all five mainline Suikoden games just to name some). However, some of our taste in games don’t line up well since he is a big sports fan and I know how to play a game but suck at everything else.
That brings us to this wonderful…thing that he sent us. For the record, I have zero interest in Nascar. I have no idea why people spend hours watching cars drive in a loop, but if that is your form of entertain then please keep enjoying it. The only reason I know who this person is, Jeff Gordon, is because of all the Nascar fans from my school (I wouldn’t have known it was him without the signature on the can). So why was I given this cooler for a sport that I have no interest in? For the contents inside apparently. While cleaning out their basement, they decided to place all of his old gaming stuff into this container and let me shift through it to see if there was anything that I wanted. I really appreciate the thought of letting me look through them to see if there was anything that I wanted. They know I am a video game buff, and sadly they appreciate it more than most people on my side of the family. However, they did not realize my policy of not selling or getting rid of games that enter my possession; no matter what the game is or if I will ever play it. It is a self imposed rule that I placed on myself after selling games that I regretted in the past. So, let’s see what fun things this cooler holds.
When I opened up the lid, the very first game that greeted me was Fox Sports College Hoops ’99….
Sigh. Okay no big deal. I know that my FIL (just going to start using this abbreviation now) is big into sports, so of course some of these will be sports titles. I have never heard of this game, or who would be in it that I know. Kobe? Is Kobe in this? Who played basketball in 1999? Dirk? Is that you? Obviously I know some sportsball people, just my knowledge is slim when recognizing famous players. To get some of my “meh” findings out of the way, here is a highlight reel of all the other ball games we found in this thing.
Madden 2000. I might have fun with this one. My younger brother made me play a bunch of Madden games with him in the past, so I will have some idea on how to play it.
PGA Tour 98. This isn’t Mario Golf. This is regular golf for people who want to play actual golf (ie. not me).
Triple Play 98. I’ve never really had a problem with baseball. There was a baseball game that we would rent out a lot of times on the N64, but I doubt this is the same brand (I looked it up and it was All-Star Baseball 99; we tried to hit each other with the ball). I’ll give it a whack and see if it is a home run or a foul.
NHL 99. The sticker on the case says that this is the “coolest game on earth.” Obviously this was the case before Club Penguin came into existence.
Triple Play 2000. I don’t remember much from the year 2000, but Kat informed me that she was in Kindergarten at the time. This made me go into a fetal position and deny the fact that I’m old for my age group. Also I’m pissed that my Triple Play collection is now ruined since I’m now missing Triple Play 99.
NCAA Football 2000. What would make the college football games more interesting would be to let the marching band take the field and watch them play a game. Similar to the mascot mode in later games.
Madden 2002. Apparently Madden 2001 wasn’t that great, so he skipped straight to the 2002 version.
And that is all the sports games that were in the cooler. I joke, but I am curious to test run these games even though I’m not sweating at the palm to play them. Realistic sports games are not my jam. I prefer playing games like the Mario spinoffs or any other fun and creative game that uses a sports formula. There might be a ton of people who had fun playing these games back in the day, and I hope seeing them again brought back some good memories. My memories of these games will probably be bad, but don’t let my dismissive mind tarnish yours.
With that out of the way, let’s look at some things that did peek my interest. Some of these I will talk about in more length than the sports games, and some I will have no clue what the public’s reception is to them. If I had to put them in some kind of ranking of excited to own, I would say these games get an eyebrow raise from me.
Sentient. I have no idea what this game is about. The back of the case tells me that this is a 3D adventure game where you have to solve a murder mystery in space…I think. From what I can tell, this game came out early in the PlayStation lifespan and most critics were very critical about it. I’m sure there maybe some redeeming qualities in it, but I will never know until I try it one day. This game is one of the only games that feels odd in my FIL’s games that is outside his normal genres. He likes sports, strategies, and RPGs. Having a semi horror adventure game seems out of place for him to own. Add the fact that their are faded faces in the back ground and the case has semi claw marks on them, I could convince myself that this game is haunted.
Warcraft II: The Dark Saga. I have not played any of the Warcraft games or any other game by Blizzard outside of Overwatch. I have no idea if playing a real-time strategy (RTS) game is comfortable with a controller or not, but sadly I don’t see myself playing this anytime soon.
Jeopardy. Rip to the great legend that was Alex Trebek. Jeopardy will never be the same without him. I used to have a Jeopardy game for PC way back in the day; and surprise surprise I was terrible at it. I imagine I will be terrible at this version since this game came out in 1998. Kat and I will definitely get a kick out it one day and she will dominate me since she is the better one at trivia.
That does it for the mid tier interest level finds from the crate. Again, not bad things, but things that didn’t get me overly excited. These next few items listed are what I consider my highlights from what I found. I thought I had already found the good stuff when I was looking through his games before, but somehow these things skipped my attention at the time.
Riven: The Sequel to Myst. This may sound like blasphemy, but I have never played Myst. That didn’t stop me from being intrigued by what I assume is the collector’s edition of Riven. I have no idea what is going on, but this 5 disc game came with unique slide cases for each disc. For all you Myst buffs out there, this might look really cool to you. I have no idea since this was the first time I realized Myst had a sequel. I have no way at the current time to play this since I lack the software requirement to try (a CD drive), but I’m sure the digital version exist out there. For the time, I will admire how cool and maybe rare this might be (you can tell me in the comments if it is rare or not).
Beyond the Beyond. I have never heard of this game before. What makes me excited to check it out is that this game was developed by Camelot Software Planning. If you don’t know who they are, they mostly now do the excellent Mario Gold and Tennis games, as well the first three Shining Force games and freaking Golden Sun! You can tell that it is from the same developer since they share a lot of aspects in the menus and battle. Some of the screenshots that I’ve seen make this look like an early concept of Golden Sun without the fun Psynergy puzzles to do. Critics didn’t find this game to be special at the time, but I’m always down to try out older JRPGs and see how they stand today. If anything, it will scratch that Camelot RPG itch that I’ve had ever since finishing Golden Sun: Dark Dawn almost 10 years ago.
A Toys ‘R’ Us PlayStation Demo Disk. This still has the factory seal on it, so I guess no one was interested in trying out any of the games on the disk. I’m surprise he held on to since there are some interesting demos on this disk. This disc was trademarked in 1998 and offered some really good games. This disc demoes for the following games:
Gran Turismo
Blasto
Tekken 3
Hot Shots Golf
Jersey Devil
Einhander
Gex 2
Tomb Raider 2
Tomba!
The disc also has some special videos that I’m guessing were teaser trailers at the time. Those videos include:
Spyro the Dragon
Metal Gear Solid
NFL Xtreme
MLB ’99
Resident Evil 2
Gex alone would have made me play this disc nonstop. I am interested in Hot Shots Golf since it was developed by Camelot Software as well. I know the age of demo disc are a thing of the past, but it is sometimes fun to play old demos and see what a game was at a certain point of development. I’ll pop that seal off one day and do some investigation.
The Final Fantasy Legend. Probably the rarest game that I found in the crate. The Final Fantasy Legend was the first game in the SaGa series that was renamed for us in the states for better sales I’m guessing. I have only played two games in the SaGa franchise and I enjoyed what I played. While this doesn’t have the Free Scenario gameplay that the later titles implement, it might be fun to play an old school RPG and discover its charm. Right now you can play this game on the Switch via the Collection of SaGa if you don’t want to hunt down a copy.
Shadow Madness? Never heard of it. For some reason I get budget title RPG vibes from this. If you have played this game before and loved it, let me know. It looks interesting based on the information on the back of the case. Too bad I won’t be able to test that theory since…
There was no game in the case. How are you going to tease me with this terrible looking game that could be amazing? I’m not going to lie and said this made me want to find the game even more, because while nice I don’t have any intention to seek this out. But why would my FIL just pack an empty case? Did he believe that there was something inside and just packed it in haste? Or, was there something else hidden on the other side of the case (since this is a multi-disc case). Sure enough, I open the other side of the case and found this.
Original release copies of the Final Fantasy Anthology. Why is this here!? Did he lose the case to this at one point and decided to hide them away in a place no one would think to look? Regardless, this might have been my second favorite find out of everything that was packed. I already own these games for the PlayStation, but my copies are the Greatest Hits rereleases that replace the disc art with a generic label. I think that’s what made me excited about finding this since the disc art on these are gorgeous. Final Fantasy V’s disc has the four heroes in different job class outfits. I don’t think I have ever seen this artwork before, so it is a neat bonus. Final Fantasy VI’s disc has the iconic artwork of Terra on the magitek armor overlooking the capital of Vector (I think). Look, I just find this really neat to have since I miss the days of effort in packaging an item. Am I eager to play these…ehh maybe one day when I have the patience to tolerate load times. I do own both of these for the GBA, so it might just be a crossing off my list type of ordeal.
That does it for the games that I found in here. Not all the games I found were bad, just games that will be hanging around until I get the curiosity of playing one day. That doesn’t end all of the other things that were included in this package. There were other random things in there, like tons of PS1 controllers. Most of them were all third party controllers with some I just outright tossed since they were sticky and falling apart. I did keep most of them including a wireless PS1/2 controller that has the L2 and R2 buttons further down the bottom of the controller. I honestly like the design of it since the button rest where my middle fingers would on the dualshock controller. I have to make sure that the receiver that was in the case is the correct one and see if it still works.
As much as the controllers were cool, they were pointless to me since I don’t own an original PlayStation. I came in late to the PlayStation game by getting a PS2 right as the PS3 came out and was the new kid on the block. I had the chance of getting a PS1, but I had no way of justifying the $7 USD price tag and purpose at the time. That’s no longer an issue now since towards the bottom of the container was my FIL’s PlayStation.
The collector side of me is happy since I now almost have a complete PlayStation console collection (looking at you PS5). I may now play my PS1 games through the original console for that “authentic experience.” All I am missing now is the CRT TV.
And that is where the highlights end. I hope this was entertaining for you as it was for me to randomly pull these out of Gordan’s can. My in-laws do want the cooler back, so unfortunately that will not be rotting away in my backyard. There were a few other miscellaneous items inside, but they weren’t much to talk about. There are more boxes to go through that have come from my in-laws house, so if I find anything else interesting that’s worth talking about, I might post them up on my Instagram (trying to force myself to post more there). If you would like for me to do another box opening post in the future, then I would need to go like thrift shopping or visit yard sales or something. Magical boxes full of video game items just don’t show up at my door all the time, so don’t hold your breath something else like this will happen again.
One year ago, I started this little blog site to talk and share my stories about gaming. I created it on a whim, and didn’t put much thought into what I really wanted to do with it. Over time, the blog started to take shape, and A year later and I noticed a problem, I really haven’t been doing that.
When it comes to making unique content, you have to make it fun to write. I enjoy writing stories about gaming, but the last proper story from my past was back in May (I kinda wish I could rewrite that post). Early on I tried reviewing games that I recently finished, but I quickly learned that I hated writing them. My experiences are and will be different from others, so why should I try and convince someone that a game is bad or good? I want to focus on just my experiences and share with others, and in return learn about their experiences.
Then, an idea came to mind. I would like to present something new I want to try.
EXP(erience) Share Post
(Real creative name)
Similar to weekly tags that have been floating around, I want to try something similar, but on a once a month basis. The idea of this came from my wife Kat wanting to write about some of her gaming stories on my blog, but felt it was inappropriate (even though I told her I had no problem with it). My idea with this is that anyone regardless of being a blogger of games can participate and share their stories. Kinda going to the old tagline of my blog, “everyone has a story to tell.” Some might just need the right space and motivation in order to share it.
The idea is each month I will announce the topic for the month. There is no pressure in trying to come up with something for the prompt if you cannot think of anything. If you would like to suggest a topic, please please please let me know! At the end of each month, I will try and compile them all into one post. Just please tag me and the prompt so that I can easily find them!
With that, I would like to go ahead and announce the first prompt for this series! Since we are currently in the middle of October, this prompt will go on until the end of November. So you have until then to share your story! The first prompt is:
The video game that got you into gaming.
I think this is a very interesting topic. It could be the first game you played, a game that you played later in life, or an event that triggered the spark. Whatever your reason for getting into gaming, share it with us! I will make another post at the beginning of November to remind everyone of the topic again, and then on the first of each month I will post the next topic and so one. I’m really excited to give this a try and read everyone’s story!
Along with that announcement, there are a few others that I would like to make.
Monthly Activity Reports
If you noticed, I didn’t post my normal gaming report for September. The reason for this, I am redoing my entire game spreadsheet. It…is not a fun task, but an important one. What started as a hobby back in 2015 turned into a passion project that needed countless updates. What really made me want to redo my spreadsheet was that a lot of information was inaccurate and I was missing some titles here and there. Plus, all of the colors were starting to get confusing and on my nerves. My word of advice to anyone who wants to catalog their collection, do it while your collection is small. I enjoyed doing this, because I am a crazy person who likes to create and work with spreadsheets. If you know anyone looking for a cataloger of sorts, I’m crazy enough to do it. I will write a separate post at the end of the month to go over changes and a new grand total of my collection.
Streaming
(Geez, this is like the fourth time that I’ve had to rewrite this part.)
I have been going back and forth on this one for a long time now. For 5 years, I have been toying with the idea of streaming my gameplay and maybe entertaining people along the way. The problem in the past was that I didn’t have the minimum requirements to do it. Jump forward to this year and free time due to a certain worldwide phenomenon, I took the time to upgrade my computer and played around with my settings. I have done a few streams here and there just to test the waters, but I never really announced that I was going to start streaming or become a streamer.
So here is where the confusing part comes in. I am interested in streaming, but I don’t want to be considered a streamer. I mostly want to do it for fun and motivation. I want to share my gameplay experiences with people who want to watch, but I have no intention of becoming a full-time streamer or earn money from it. Streaming would also give me a chance to start and finish a game since if I start it on stream, I should finish it on stream. So, those are my reasons for wanting to stream. I do have some other ideas to do special streams that Kat helped me come up with like Co-ople (Co-op + couple (it is a dumb, ridiculous name and I love it)) streams, multiplayer with friends, and if we can work it out, a stream with the legend himself, my older brother Super CJ.
I want to avoid sharing a schedule yet until I get comfortable and in the groove of everything. I will always stream on Sunday as that has been a constant so far (didn’t stream last Sunday so record already broken). I normally post on Twitter when the mood is right and the brain is working.
I promise that I’m almost done.
I think that is about it for this super long (update?) post. I want to thank everyone who has enjoyed my silly blog space over the past year. I have met a lot of people during this time, and I’m glad that we are all able to talk and share our passions with others in this format. There are too many people that I want to thank for making my first year doing this a fun experience, and I will never stop being humble and saying thank you all the time. I would still be doing this even if no one was reading, but all the support makes it fun to do so.
Enough rambling. Back to playing more video games and sharing those experiences!
Hello! Your friendly neighborhood DanamesX here. This is a quick post to let you know that things may be quiet on the blog for a little while. I work at a university and classes just started this Monday. I haven’t had to wake and be somewhere in about 5 months, so I’m slowly adjusting to my normal work flow (for how long we stay open). On top of that, I resumed my online classes Monday, so I am trying to create a schedule for when I need to fulfill my student obligations.
It has only been three days since things took off and I have been coming home exhausted each day. On top of that, I am trying to get a handle of my over worried brain so I can sleep peacefully at night. I’m enjoying the fact that my lazy days are coming to an end, but I was not prepared for the sudden burst of activities.
I have zero plans to abandon or let the blog fall to the side line. On contrary, I have several drafts that I have been working on, but I haven’t published for one reason or the other. I am slow when it comes to writing, and I like to polish things before publishing them. There is one post that I am writing that I wanted to put out this week, but again life dictates where I have to put my focus in. Once I get back into the swing of work and find a schedule for school work, everything should fall into place (unless a certain game coming out on Aug 28th doesn’t destroy everything).
If you are still reading up until this point, thank you for sticking around! I’m coming up close to the one year anniversary of the blog, and I want to start doing more things with the blog and within the community. To give you a sneak peak on what I have been working on in the background, I am possibly doing one of the stupidest things only I would have the patience to work on. I have been working on this all summer now, and I want to get it done before my one year. Along with that, I hope to have another announcement if I think I can get it to all work out.
So that is my mini life update I guess. I am very active on my Twitter if you need to reach me there, and I drop/ghost in the Support Role discord regularly. Again, thank you for enjoying my random thoughts and opinions and I hope to get back writing soon!
Things have been rough. My home has been turned into my office and there is no real feeling of “freedom” after I clock out for the day. Being home meant that I could breath and kick back with either playing video games or writing for this blog. It took me way longer than others to finally adjust to this new norm, but I think I am finally at a comfortable place to get back blogging. Writing used to be an escape from school and work when I wanted to write something different than procedures or essays. Now that I am out of school for the summer and not many task at work, I am left with this unknown time that I need to start using. With that, I am going to start focusing on this blog more to provide more content for all of you. My first real goal that I am establishing for my blog is to post at least one post per week. I’ve listed below some of the content that I have planned out.
Gaming Post (Duh)
I have finished more games this year than I did the previous. This is a giant accomplishment since we are not even halfway done with the year (for better or worse). There is a lot to talk about the games I’ve played, but I struggle on where to start. I want to talk about the pros and cons of the rich storytelling in the Legend of Heroes Kiseki trilogy and how you need to commit 200+ hours to get the most of it. Final Fantasy VII Remake was a game I was not excited for, but I enjoyed the hell out of it. I don’t want to talk about Sonic Forces, but I do want to talk about Bloodstained and how it compares to Castlevania: Symphony of the Night to me. I have all of these ideas, but it is getting the pen to that paper that I need to connect.
My Older Brother Co-op Tales
This was supposed to be a monthly series. Obviously, I missed last months post. I had two post done, but after rereading them it didn’t feel special. These tales are suppose to talk about gaming with my brother and how he influenced me to be the person I am today. Nothing in those old post told that story and I had to start over. Before the end of this month, I will have two chapters in this series done and then continue the trend until the end of ther series.
The Month of June
June is a special month for me since it is my birth month. I don’t normally do anything special for my birthday, but lately I have been more open to celebrate the occasion. For the month of June, I want to create content around a specific game franchise or topic. I have decided that this year it will be about the world of Monster Hunter. Monster Hunter is one of my favorite series of all time and I generally like talking about it. Six is the magic number and that is the minimal number of post that I have to do. I might even through in some streams if I can convince my friends to join me.
And that’s about it. I wish my writing habits were on point as my gaming right now. I am always on my Twitter and I need to remember that I have an Instagram. I don’t know how to end this post, so keep doing you and drink plenty of water.
Tales From The Backlog 