After my last post, on my lowest-reated games, it was easy to predict that I'd write this follow-up post on my favorite games. My life-time favorite video games are Ultima III: Exodus and The Prisoner, both on the Apple II. But those games were definitely of their time (the early 80s); even though there are remakes and…
After working for a few days on my review of Divinity Original Sin II, it occurred to me that I've written lots of video-game "semi-reviews'. I call them "semi-reviews" because I generally review a game long after it's been released. My opinion of the game becomes almost irrelevant. Then again, given the size and nature of my…
TL;DR: I did not like this game. Get ready for a negative review, with lots of pictures. Context If you've read any post in this blog for the past year, you know that I've developed a fascination for Baldur's Gate 3. I've gushed over the quality of its story, and praised the design decisions made by the…
It may be foolish, but I'm open to resume teaching Acorn Garden again. Why foolish? Honestly, I don't think there are many students out there anymore who are interested in what I choose to teach. The Gardnerian Tradition in which I was trained involves scholarship, structure, an aspiration to excellence. Sure, dancing naked in the woods is…
Just when I thought it was safe to open a box: It's Soul Raiders! This is the Deluxe Grimoire Edition. Shuba approves. Jiku also likes the look of the game. "Hey, Shuba! The game looks nice, but the box the game came in is even better!" "You're right, Jiku. Also, the box is much tastier." I don't…
In an earlier blog post about opening up a trunk of old games, I extolled the virtues of The Empire of the Petal Throne, a world setting devised by M. A. R. Barker. Less than a half-hour ago as I write this, I was reading the introduction to Playing at the World, 2E, Volume 1: The Invention…
wejvatlh javmaH vagh vI' cha' vagh'logh boq'egh loS; chen wa'San loSvatlh javmaH wa' = 365.25 times 4 equals 1461. qaStaHvIS tlhIngan Hol vIHaDtaH loS DIS. = I have studied Klingon for four years. To be specific, I have a streak on Duolingo that's four years long. I forced my way through it solely so I could make…
Yes, you! And you don't even need a copy of Baldur's Gate 3 to do it. It starts with this article that was published in Ars Technica. The article describes how a software engineer set up a public test of Google's AI photo interpretation. I strongly suggest you read the article, then head over to They See…
Today I watched the series finale of Superman & Lois. As a life-long Superman fan, I thought the series was decent enough and wrapped up well. I was mostly watching it because it was the last gasp of the Arrowverse, a set of TV series on the CW network that harked back to my aforementioned DC-comic fan…
In a post in my BG3 series, I observed that, for reasons detailed in that post, I'd taken over five thousand screenshots from Baldur's Gate 3. Through a rather tedious process, those images were transferred to my Photos Library on Mac OS. Let's set aside the question of whether that number of photos was excessive. What I…