August Round-Up '24
Another extremely busy month is in the books... and it's only going to get busier from here!! Many things happened this month from personal obligations, to escaping heat, to meeting new friends, to brewing up game ideas, and otherwise. I don't have anything I can show from my current projects, so I'll give a run-down of some my offline highlights before touching on the cool media I enjoyed!
A quick medical update: this is the first month in over a year that I didn't have any dental issues!!! Though I can still feel twinges of pain where my surgery was and in some crowns every now and then, I think I'm finally healing for real!!!!! I have a routine cleaning next month, but otherwise I shouldn't have to deal with anything for a good long while. I also just got both my updated Covid and Flu vaccines yesterday, with a TDAP vaxx happening in a couple days; my body's very juiced up for the busy months ahead!
A big blessing of this month was having not one, but TWO opportunities to visit the best shop in the world: RATNEST!! If you're ever anywhere near SoCal you've absolutely gotta check out this incredible shop! It fits snugly at the center of many of my niches - games, anime, 00's internet culture, arcades, cats, plus way more - and provides a cozy, welcome space to all who enjoy any of its many wonderful offerings. The store owner, Robbie, is sincerely one of the coolest people and I'm so, so thankful he operates this dream of a shop simply filling it with what he loves (which I love too!!) Please visit this awesome indie shop! (I'll detail one of our cool pick-ups from it below in the Games section of this Round-Up!)
I drew the store mascot (Hell) for Robbie and he put it in the friend art section of the shop!! You can actually find some of my stickers around the store, too!
My family came into town to celebrate something special that's coming up for my little sister, and I'm looking forward to seeing them again in a few weeks to celebrate further together. It was nice to hang out for a short time, introduce my parents to Dog Haus, and share how Dance Rush Stardom works (they were thoroughly entertained)!
A few pics from family time - some cute sugar cookies, a rainbowy evening sky above the road, and... misspelled takoyaki?!
Games
I've been streaming Final Fantasy 7 Remake during my streams and just started Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth! If you'd like to catch up on my journey through its world I've got VODs up for each of my play sessions (starting with this one), plus I'll continue playing through Rebirth this coming month. Come by my Twitch on Mondays and Wednesdays to enjoy it with me!!
Chris picked up Visions of Mana on its release day a few days ago and I absolutely ADORE our experience so far!! It's one of the most gorgeous games I've ever seen in my life, and seeing each of the character and creature designs makes me wanna go out and create worlds of my own!! It's a sincerely inspiring game so far, and I'm really digging the story too. Neither of us has completed a Mana game before so I'm very excited to see where the game goes!
At RATNEST we managed to snag an awesome hacked PS2 with 2 TB of games on it so Chris and I have been playing a whole bunch of titles to see what we may want to dive into after Visions of Mana! I'll probably make an entry for whatever we continue, but so far I've enjoyed Digimon Rumble Arena 2, Ape Escape 2, Megaman X Command Mission, Amplitude, and Ecco Defender of the Future.
Gatomon (from DRA2) stares into your soul!!!
A friend who comes to my streams just released a game they've been solo developing for a pretty long while: Brawn, Scorn and Ammo! I haven't gotten the chance to play too much but I'm really digging it so far! The gameplay is very cool - I love that you use your attack as an additional platform - and the characters are super adorable! I especially love the little personal details Crit added to when you're picking Brawn or Scorn; it gives them both (and the game itself) so much personality! Please give it a shot and leave them a comment while you're at it!!
Chris and I tried VRChat for the first time - it's very fun!! I can't play it for long periods of time because I get motion sickness, but thankfully there are in-game settings I've changed to help with that. The amount of content people have created in the virtual worlds, including avatars and the worlds themselves, is stunning - we've had a blast exploring things together a little at a time. I really like using the "Tigerbee" avatar, and my favorite world is a cute Karaoke lounge with lots of great song choices from my favorite games!!
Chris is the Rena here looking at me all spooky!!!
Anime
To celebrate Odaiba Memorial Day on August 1st, Chris and I watched the latest Digimon movie: Digimon Adventure 02: The Beginning. It was... weird!! I didn't hate it, but it also felt like it didn't explicitly need to be connected to season 2's cast; the crew felt like secondary characters that merely followed along with the new character's plot line. I loved the horror vibes and actually think they should have pushed it further. The action sequences looked really cool, and Ukkomon's really cute, but I'm not sure that I'd be rewatching this one.
We've been slowly getting through Digimon Frontier (AKA Digimon Season 4) and are enjoying its campiness immensely. I'd watched the first 3 seasons of Digimon religiously every Saturday growing up, and had only seen scattered episodes of this one as it aired since they changed its schedule. I'd never had a strong opinion of it growing up - I thought it was alright, not my favorite, but I didn't like how they removed the partner Digimon idea. After giving it a shot from the beginning, I still don't think it's a top pick but I'm very much liking what we've seen!
To kick off the end of Summer, we checked out California Crisis: Gun Salvo. I was taken by surprise by how neat it was! The art direction is heavily stylized to match retro ads, and it was a delight to see places I'm familiar with being featured as places the characters pass by or run around. Awesome Summer vibes, extremely California all the way through, and there's a fluffy kitty! You can watch it here!
It's been awhile since we played the Planetarian visual novel, and on a whim checked out the anime adaptation of its prequel story Snow Globe and the short series of the VN itself The Reverie of a Little Planet. It was nice to revisit the game's world! It was pleasant like the original VN, a post-apocalyptic story about a lovely robot working at a planetarium, though I think the VN is the best way to experience it. We wanna see the sequel movie at some point too!
Other media
Ridiculously silly, yet fully sincere and chock-full of cat facts, I picked up the manga Nyaight of the Living Cat on a whim and was very delighted by how fun it is! It's only got 12 chapters published currently, but I'm looking forward to more AND its anime adaptation coming next year.
Is Love the Answer? is a manga about a young person coming to terms with her view of "attraction" and "love" not matching her peers, and trying to find the words to describe what she feels. Her new college professor helps guide her towards the answers she desperately seeks! I thought the story overall was nice, with a message of acceptance and understanding at its core. It's so awesome to see more stories with asexual protagonists - it's very under-represented!!
Chris and I finally got to see Godzilla Minus One and oh my GOSH what a phenomenal Godzilla film!! I'm a lover of the series of movies but was incredibly impressed with how they handled the story in this one, where at its core is about handling PTSD and finding reasons to continue on outside of yourself. Despite some scenes feeling a little contrived or too convenient, overall it hit me very hard and I love it greater the more I think about it. Give it a watch if you'd like to see a genuinely awesome film!
Here comes September!
I'm already in the spooky spirit and super ready for Fall!! I'm planning to decorate for Halloween within the coming days since the beginning of October is going to begin the busiest time of year for me. If you made it this far - thanks for reading, and I hope you found something that might've intrigued you within what I wrote! Feel free to reach out on social media and tell me what you think - I'd love to hear from you!
One last little fun tidbit... I finally found a good In-N-Out to eat at!! I get the "veggie burger" (all veggie no patty) and it's delicious!!!