Book 1 of 2024 - Blindsight

Blindsight

Author: Peter Watts
Genre: Science Fiction

Pages: ~360

Finished: Yes
Final Rating: 8.8/10

This is a book that I think needs to be read at least twice. Dense, heady, and full of scientific jargon, Blindsight is a challenging hard sci-fi treasure.

In the late 21st century, thousands of alien satellites, dubbed "Fireflies", suddenly appear and burn up in the atmosphere, alerting humanity to the presence of an extraterrestrial intelligence. Years later, a crewed ship is sent to investigate a radio transmission coming from Big Ben, a super Jovian object in the Oort Cloud.

The central theme in Blindsight is consciousness. Specifically, is consciousness absolutely necessary for an advanced intelligence? Is it an evolutionary dead-end, perhaps?

Blindsight is a first contact story that I think really nails the 'alien' part of what an alien might be. Intriguing, exciting, and sometimes terrifying, I think this belongs on any sci-fi lovers' bookshelf. If you're not into science fiction, maybe skip this one.

Game 1 of 2024: Robocop: Rogue City

Robocop: Rogue City

Developer: Teyon
Publisher: Nacon
Platform: PC
Genre: Action, FPS

Difficulty: Moderate
Hours: ~10

Finished: No
Final Rating: 6.8/10

Robocop: Rogue City presses all the right nostalgia buttons for 80s action movie fans while delivering what I would describe as a fairly mid experience. 

The game is faithful to the source material to a fault. Our protagonist, Robocop, is rendered in loving detail (seriously, he looks fantastic) and is even voiced by Peter Weller.  Detroit looks like it does in the movies, that is, a bombed out urban wasteland populated by desperate lowlifes and the corporate crooks that profit from human misery.

gee real subtle guys

First, the gameplay. Robocop moves around just like he does in the movies: slowly, with heavy footsteps. You can sprint, but it doesn't give you too much of a speed boost. You clear stages the same way Robocop would, by slowly and methodically shooting all the bad guys.

Robocop always has his trusty Auto-9, which has unlimited ammo, but can also pick up weapons from fallen enemies, like assault rifles and shotguns. The Auto-9 sounds like it does in the movie, and it's great fun to watch the blood fly as you blast away at the bad guys. What is less fun is the enemies themselves. You spend levels mowing down waves of the same three dudes whose AI ranges from ok to downright stupid. The game makes up dumb enemies by making enemies unerring marksmen that see you as soon as you appear on the level.

The enemies become bullet sponges later in the game, which can be a bit frustrating. Especially ED-209.

yooo fuck this guy

Robocop: Rogue City's environments and protagonist look amazing, but the character models could use a little work. They're fairly generic and often kinda creepy lookin'. Peter Weller's voice acting is excellent, but the same can't be said for the rest of the cast, who range from passable to downright cringey.

One of the best things about the action movies of the era is that they didn't overstay their welcome. They got in, did what they needed to do in around 90 minutes, and got out. They knew what you were there for and respected your time.

I can't really say the same thing for Robocop: Rogue City. I spent more time wandering the police station and hospital making idle chitchat (something that could have been a quick cutscene) and completing silly side quests like fetching a towel for some dude in the shower. I think the game clocks in at around 20 hours, which is way too long for a game like this in my opinion. You can skip side quests, but then you miss out on experience you can use to upgrade your abilities. Speaking of abilities, some seem downright useless (Psychology) while others are absolutely necessary (Armor).

Robocop: Rogue City is a decent game, but I can really only recommend this to diehard fans. If you're interested, maybe wait for a sale.

Hypnospace Outlaw - Game 20 of 2023

Hypnospace Outlaw

Developer: Tendershoot, Michael Lasch, ThatWhichIs Media
Publisher: No More Robots
Platform: PC
Genre: ...I'm not really sure. Puzzle? Adventure?

Difficulty: Some hard-ass puzzles
Hours: ~5

Finished: Yes
Final Rating: 9.7/10

I'm not sure how to describe Hypnospace Outlaw other than FuCkInG aWeSoMe!!!!!

I choose T4b1l3sp00n as my handle, which was funny to listen to the AI pronounce

Dive back into the 90s internet as a HypnOS Enforcer. Your job is to moderate Hypnospace, a network that users log into while they sleep. Users access Hypnospace via a special headband that they wear while sleeping, allowing their subconscious to socialize and browse while their body rests.

As a volunteer Enforcer, you'll be tracking down cases of harassment, copyright infringement, illegal file sharing, and malware. You're not paid in real money but in Hypnocoin, which you can use to buy  things like music, desktop wallpapers, and virtual pets.

The hypnopages just scream 90s internet, complete with cringy boomers, conspiracy theories, edgy spinning graphics, and embedded music. There's even a collectible sticker game (SquisherZ) which has a theme song and it slaps! It's these details that really help make Hypnospace Outlaw something great.

Even Hypnospace isn't immune to bullshit moral panics.

Hypnospace Outlaw also gets fairly difficult later in the game. The first few cases you get can be solved by just browsing some webpages, but eventually you need to peace together clues yourself, using snippets of information you get from webpages along with the search function to find the information you need. A few of these puzzles are tricky, but so rewarding once you find the solution. 

The game also has a great, tense, story that's told through webpages, email threads, and cases, which kept me playing late at night. It's not a horror game, but there are moments that are truly unsettling.

Hypnospace Outlaw is absolutely worth your time. I feel guilty grabbing it for cheap during a Steam sale, as I would have gladly paid full price for this one.

Gamedec - Game 19 of 2023

Gamedec

Developer: Anshar Studios
Publisher: Anshar Publishing
Platform: PC
Genre: RPG

Difficulty: Easy
Hours: ~4

Finished: No
Final Rating: 6/10

In Gamedec, you take on the role of a... Gamedec. A Gamedec is short for Game Detective, someone who traverses the virtual worlds of the near future and solves crimes.

Fletcher Garrett, my Gamedec

Gamedec takes place in future Warsaw; it immediately throws a shitload of jargon and worldbuilding at you and never freaking stops. You have a journal where you can look this stuff up, but that doesn't really do you a lot of good when you're in dialog and one of the options is "Use Screen Jibba Jab Matrix" and you don't know what the fudge that is because it's never come up before.

Honestly, I wish we spent a little more time in future Warsaw because it seems like a really interesting place. Instead, we are originally thrust into an extreme S&M virtual game (it's not really racy or anything). Following that, we visit Harvest Time, the future's version of Farmville, I guess.

The areas you explore are rather small and self-contained. What you have is a very linear story; once you're done in Farmville Harvest Time, you won't be coming back. The story, at least what I experienced, seemed decent. Both meatspace and the virtual worlds you traverse are populated with some interesting folks. You'll come across characters that are exploiting children for cheap labor (and pumping them full of stims), the spoiled, psychopathic scion of a wealthy businessman, and some cross between Cthulu and uh, It?

Subtle.

All in all, Gamedec isn't bad, but I just couldn't make myself finish it. Awkward dialog, limited exploration, and what I felt was a clunky deduction system all kind of took away from the interesting world I felt was there, but just out of reach.

Book 7 of 2023 - Jewish Space Lasers - The Rothschilds and 200 Years of Conspiracy Theories

Jewish Space Lasers - The Rothschilds and 200 Years of Conspiracy Theories

Author: Mike Rothschild (no relation)
Genre: History/Politics

Pages: ~280

Finished: Yes
Final Rating: 8.5/10

Do the Rothschilds have a combined net worth of 200 trillion dollars? 

No.

Did Nathan Rothschild make enough money after the Battle of Waterloo to literally buy the British government?

No. He made the modern equivalent of roughly 600 grand, no big deal to a fella like him.

Did the Rothschilds sacrifice goyim children to some dark money god for unlimited power?

No.

So why do people believe these things?

Antisemitism. The short answer is antisemitism, propagated by far right conspiracy theorists.

If you want a bit more than that, check out this book. Mike Rothschild (no relation) takes a deep dive into the history of the famous Rothschild clan in an attempt to understand how these tall tales even gained traction in the first place. (The answer is antisemitism).

Springblades - Game 18 of 2023

Springblades

Developer: Sokpop Collective
Publisher: Sokpop Collective
Platform: PC
Genre: RPG

Difficulty: Moderate
Hours: ~7

Finished: Yes
Final Rating: 7.5/10

Springblades is a bite-sized, Paper Marioesque turn-based RPG rendered in a juvenile MSPaint art style, which I don't mean as an insult because it's awesome.

The story is simple: the princess needs you to collect three gems possessed by three strong bosses. Along the way, you'll meet all kinds of enemies, like rabbits, horses, deer, flop ghosts, pet rocks, farmers, chickens, you get the idea.

In addition to the three super bosses (indicated by a red skull on the map), there are a host of other bosses, usually guarding a town or some other location you can buy stuff at. The map is larger than I expected, and when you unlock a new location (usually by beating the boss) you can use it to warp to other locations you've unlocked.

Character progression is simple. With each level up, you can choose more HP, more energy points (so you can do more on your turn in combat), or more BP (badge points). Badges are one of the three equipment types you get, the others being weapons and armor. They usually give you some sort of perk or special ability, like the ability to bite or a bonus to accuracy.

The player's abilities are derived from their equipment; the right combo can make a super-difficult boss (dwarven prince lol) trivial. I had a lot of fun tweaking my equipment to certain encounters, as some combinations which seem amazing (badges that deal free damage when an enemy misses, for example) can absolutely screw you over in certain fights.

Good stuff.

Game 17 of 2023 - The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante

The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante

Developer: Sever
Publisher: 101xp
Platform: PC
Genre: Visual Novel/RPG

Difficulty: Surprisingly Difficult 
Hours: ~6

Finished: Yes, sorta
Final Rating: 8/10

I can't really say too much about my playthrough of The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante without spoiling the game. It's great, though, really.

TLASOSB is, if you can imagine, a hardcore RPG/visual novel mashup. As a kid I read Choose Your Own Adventure books religiously, and it's kinda like that plus you have stats that change with the choices you make.

You play Sir Brante from birth to death, and yeah, he often suffers. There are no 'good' or 'optimal' choices here; you can't please everyone. Someone is always going to mad at you. During my playthrough, I stood up to my asshole grandfather and he just fucking wasted me right in front of my parents with his cane, giving me my first death. You get up to five deaths before you experience 'true death' and face judgement from The Twins (the gods of Sir Brante's world).

TLASOSB is very well written and paced, with a compelling branching storyline and many complex characters. It comes to life in the pages of Brante's journal, complete with nice illustrations and character portraits. Brante's journal contains a map and pages that show your stats and relationship with the characters you've met so far.

Also, Sir Brante's voice actor sounds like a dude straight out of Baltimore.