Playing, Reading, Watching

I should really be writing A Dragon at the Gate at the moment. That’s what I sat down here to do. Yet it’s been a long day, my brain is frazzled, and so it’s revolting and craving leisure. So in an attempt to placate my lazy-ass brain while at the same time at least appearing to get something done, I’m going to take a cue from the Geek Bomb podcast folks (who were good enough to have me on their show last fall) and geek out with you a little over what I’m playing, reading, and watching.

PLAYING

So many games, so little time. Seriously, I need more time! It seems like the past few months have just been a storm of awesome game releases specifically designed to catch my interest, and I’m snapping them up without managing to find time to play them all as much as I’d like. At the moment, however, top contenders are:

Pardon my lack of pants. A low-level nuclear blast blew them off.
Seriously.

Wasteland 2: This one’s getting the majority of my focus at the moment. Its isometric, party-based, story driven RPG design snagged my retro-interests, and the reviews it’s been getting pretty much sealed the deal. Created via a Kickstarter by developer inXile Entertainment, it’s a sequel to a game from 1987 that I confess I’d never heard of but which inspired the original Fallout. The Arizona wasteland is a rough, unforgiving place, but it’s a great place to explore, and the turn-based combat system is excellent.

In addition to Wasteland 2, I’ve also got the following games bucking for my attention: Galactic Civilizations 3 (4x space strategy – I’ve played one full game and haven’t been completely blown away by it yet), Magicka 2 (the goofy sequel to the game I pegged as one of my top 5 best recent games), Pillars of Eternity (another Kickstarter’ed old-school party-based CRPG), and, eventually, Divinity: Original Sin. And likely a bunch of other’s I can’t even remember right now!

READING

This one’s a little easier, at least in the sense that I’m currently only reading two books at the moment. (I’ve got a whole bunch more stacked up and waiting for me to get to them, however.) First, obviously, is Rick Riordan’s The Titan’s Curse, my opinion of which is an ongoing series here. The other is a book I’ve been meaning to read for years but have only recently gotten around to: Neal Stephenson’s cyberpunk classic Snow Crash.

Yeah, I know. I write cyberpunk and I haven’t read Snow Crash. Well I’m trying to fix that, okay! I’m only a third of the way in, and the plot itself still has yet to fully coallesce, but I’m loving the world-building and the voice Stephenson is using. It’s also fun to see the things he predicted correctly (even if satirically so), and some of the things that are a little off, such as people still using videotape.

WATCHING

Watching lately is much like gaming: Too much to watch, not enough time. But here’s a list of the major stuff I’ve been chipping away at (when I’m not doing my Farscape rewatch, of course):

The Almighty Johnsons: A couple of friends of mine pointed me toward this one, knowing my interest in gods in the modern day. Rather than Greek gods, however, this one’s about reincarnated spirits of the Norse pantheon. It takes place in modern New Zealand (and includes numerous actors from The Hobbit and LOTR), and it’s filled with humor, mythology, and adult situations as the reincarnated Odin searches for the reincarnated Frigg so his entire family doesn’t die. And yes, it’s got Loki.

Game of Thrones: Well, duh, right? But this is the first season I’ve gotten to watch as it airs rather than having to wait for the DVDs. (I finally gave in and got HBO.) It doesn’t feel like very much has happened this season–I’m not big on political intrigue in a vacuum–but seeing the white walkers finally do more than just be a tease was quite welcome. Oh, and Cersei can die in a fire any time now, please.

Terrible, Terrible Movies: I’ve started to get in the habit of live-tweeting some really awful movies on Netflix with a couple of friends now and again. It’s sort of masochistic in the sense that I’m purposely seeking out terrible things to subject myself to in order to make fun of, usually in the vein of bad sci-fi and/or cheesy horror. It’s fun, but I’m starting to think I need to make a separate Netflix account for that habit so Netflix doesn’t get some really skewed ideas of my taste for its recommendations. I subjected myself to Zombeavers, people. Zombeavers. I may need help.

So how about you, treasured readers? What are you playing/reading/watching?