Media Recap: September, October, November & parts of December 2013

Summary: Quite something, long time overdue.

So, apparently I was in a little over my head during the last few months, doing stuff for university, working a bit, worrying, being sick and generally not in the mood for writing which is a shame. This will be a cleanup post in which I try to collect everything related to consumed media that I haven’t already put up or linked to in the Reading tips. Since I was still busy during the pre-Christmas time I added parts of December’s media to the list.

I’ll begin linking video games to http://mobygames.com from now on. The site seems to be large enough and respectable enough to hold quite a lot of information while not being wikipedia. Its gaming focus is something I prefer over the much more general information source that wikipedia is. Scratch that. While revising this article and transforming it into the threefour-month-monster it is now, I figured out Mobygames wasn’t adequate. Read: they didn’t have an article on the newest Pokémon games. Generally I’m not too fond of Metacritic since there are many ways in which this rating collection system is being abused, be it by hiring companies or game sellers. However, they are a good source of information, which is my main reason for linking there.

Movies

• Prestige (German)
• Romeo Must Die (German)
  Watched old DVD again. In German. Synchronization issues are gross. Believe me, their lips are wrong.
• 21 (German)
• Assassin's Creed: Lineage
  ACL is part of the ACB collector's edition and shows a part of Giovanni Auditori's life before the events of AC2. It provides additional background information.

Games

• Assassin's Creed 2
  Played AC2, finished AC2. Nothing exciting here, just redoing stuff to get up to speed for part 3.
• Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation
  I love the Ace Combat series and replayed part 6. Had a blast even though I still remembered most missions. Part 6 doesn't suffer from any annoyingly difficult passages.
• Terraria
  More Terraria on iOS. Not as much as I thought though. Talked to Chris who told me that Hardmode is not yet implemented in the iOS version. Interesting when you take into account that this is about half of the game in the PC version.
  Haven't been able to check out the Christmas update yet.
• Pokémon Y
  I'm enjoying my pre-Christmas gift. I've always like the Pokémon games, having played the first, second and third as well as fourth generation. I skipped the fifth generation since I thought there was nothing new to see. My main gripes were (and still are) with the ways the player character is controlled. I preferred the touchscreen controls of Pokèmon Ranger to the control pad of the major games.
  Finished the main story line on the train. Will now try to get more Pokémon and eventually reach the pinnacle of what's realistically achievable without cheating or heading to faraway places only for the distribution of some legendary. Waiting for the Celebi promotion that will be introduced together with the Pokémon bank. Might be the first time I'll legitimately have one of those not encountered in the game on a standard playthrough.
• Tiny Death Star
  Killed a lot of time. Realized time is valuable. Stopped playing after getting bored due to a lack of variety.
  Haven't checked out the Christmas update.
• Kingdom Hearts
  Rediscovered my love for Kingdom Hearts's mix between Disney and Final Fantasy. Finished the game in about 40 hrs, doing most of the things except for fighting Sephiroth and getting Sora's "Cheer" ability. I hate the 100 Acre Wood with passion. I used an old save of mine to replay the Sephiroth battle instead of maxing out the party's level again.
  Furthermore I spent many hours reading in the Kingdom Hearts wiki, looking up details on the universe and on the games I won't be able to play due to not owning the respective console. Note: a lot of video game consoles got at least one release of Kingdom Hearts - however, while they are all canon, they are not all relevant for understanding the entirety of the plot. I look forward to playing KH3 sometimes in the future. Although that requires the purchase of a new console. I think my wallet may be silently crying in the next room.
• Prison Architect
  Manuel showed me the alpha build distributed through STEAM and it seemed like a nice game. The animations when contruction workers build objects are adorable. The story elements and animated narrative sequences are likable as well. I was reminded of Theme Hospital, an old favorite of mine back from when I loved playing a demo of the game for PS1 but never bought an actual copy.
• Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
  Started ACB, my favorite part of the AC series so far. Looking forward to playing The Da Vinci Disappearance.

Let's Plays

• Final Fantasy VIII (German)
  I'm quite fond of FF8 myself - as you might be able to recognize from my logo being a symbol taken from the game - and talked my girlfriend into watching a German LP of the game with me.

Magazines

• Progress edition 08/2013 (at least that's what I think, I lost my girlfriend's copy on the train)
  The magazine had some interesting topics and parts of the writing were really good. However, the "gender gap" recently introduced into German writing makes enjoying longer texts a pain. The stylistic hell it presents to the reader strikes me as unbearable. I am fine with being called anti-feministic or conservative for this attitude I firmly believe that the "gender gap" transforms the joy of reading into something akin to a gargle with acid while trying to focus on a mentally exhausting task. It's made unnecessarily hard by something for which I personally fail to see the point.