Video Games

mockup of a wikipedia article, zoomed in on picture and caption. picture features a kitten sitting with its paws on a controller. Caption reads a gamer partaking in an act of intellectual stimulation, known as gaming

What I'm Playing

Grandia, Developed by Game Arts, Published in the U.S. by Sony Computer Entertainment. Playstation, 1999.

Grandia is a JRPG, originally made for the Sega Saturn. I discovered it through Hazel's YouTube video about Cozy Anime RPGs. Cute setting, fun writing, cheesy voice acting, and a neat implementation of an active time battle system. I am not accustomed to JRPGs, but it has been a great blend of challenging and approachable.

animated gif from game, featuring characters sharing a meal at a dinner table

Update 2025-05-23: I fell off playing until recently. I am about 17 hours in, and I have zero clue as to how far I am. I know I will eventually hit a disc change, but I am avoiding online guides so I can experience this thing organically.

It has also been a great game for my emulation handheld. I have an Anbernic RG35XXSP (a mouthful, I know), which is basically a chonkier GameBoy Advance SP with a 4:3 screen. I'll probably write a little review for this thing sooner or later.

Cyberpunk 2077,Developed by CD Projekt Red, Published by Warner Brother Entertainment, Xbox Series X, 2022 (PS4 and Xbox One versions released in 2020)

I am somewhere between one-third and one-half of the way through Cyberpunk 2077, and my feelings on the game have sine-waved quite a lot. I find the setting and social commentary really interesting, but CDPR's UX and controller layout always has this veneer of jank that I struggle with until I settle into it.

Additionally, I am starting to reach a point where odd glitches and annoying level/encounter design is starting to irk me. I had to put the game down for the night last night, after getting stuck in the level geometry on try #3 of a tricky section. Wack.

On the whole, however, I think I am mostly enjoying my time with it. I find the main narrative thrust, that of a main character losing himself and choosing to either fight it or embrace it, pretty compelling. Its commentary on technocracy and corpratocracy is also poignant, and feels like the extremes that the writing team came up with in 2020 are closer to reality in 2025 than I would like. But I find some catharsis in throwing a wrench into the game's world system in part because of that familiarity.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Developed by Sandfall Interactive, published by Kepler Interactive. PC, 2025.

Short clip from Expedition 33 Male lead character Gustav catches a flower petal in his hand while female character Maelle walks up behind him.

Where do I even start? I saw the hype boil over post-release and got curious. I had not been keeping up with new releases, but discovered it was available on Game Pass. I was absolutely blown away by the prologue and early sections, and after discovering the game ran decently on Linux, I hopped off the Xbox to buy the game on Steam.

The dev team knocked this game out of the park. Excellent story, a great implementation of old school JRPG mechanics with some modern creature comforts, an excellent soundtrack by a composor that the devs discovered on SoundCloud, and an altogether great experience.