Things I did today

 This month's surge is a little housekeeping-ish. For a while, I've been trying new recipes, but I've not been putting them on my website and I really ought to! It's been helpful as a reference and to send to friends who are looking for something new to cook, especially if they like their Instant Pot. So Surge 10 is all about adding more recipes to my site. Hopefully I can get another 10 or more up there as it only has 14 currently. No more weekend work in October, which means I'll have time for it!

I only played one new video game between 9/15 and 9/30 because I was working overtime at work. Normally, I work about 90 hours for half a month. This time, I worked over 120 hours. Often, I needed to be in meetings that started at 5am, so even when the day ended around 4 or 5pm, I was exhausted and no mood to figure out a new game.  I was going to try to catch up on weeks 7 and 8 and pretend I was just slow on publishing. But I realized that I had fewer genres to try out. I've already done a few before starting this surge - RPG, puzzle games, deckbuilders and platformers. I also know I had no desire to play any sports games or first person shooters. Instead, I decided to end it early and write up the final review for 20 games I did play since the beginning of September. First, a quick writeup about Vampire Survivors. What a weird game. You wander around, attempting to kill waves of monsters while your weapon autofires, meaning you have to time when you get close to enemies to kill ...

This week, I played Legends of Grimrock, Deathtrap Dungeon, and Universal Paperclips. Legend of Grimrock: Looks pretty cool in the intro! Ah, I've been convicted of a crime, and if I go through this dungeon alive, I'm pardoned? Sure. Why not! Well, let's go dungeon exploring!  Sure, whatever that is. I grabbed the torch behind me, and I'll start my way down the dungeon. Ahh, it's a gross snail! Punch it! Hit it with the stone axe!  Why are you missing when it is RIGHT HERE? Augh, it's bitten one of my players! I managed to kill the snail and move along to a corridor with two  snails. I figure I'll fight them one at a time, until I hit the wrong key and moved when I didn't want to and got cornered. Frustrating. There were other puzzle-y elements that I found frustrating and so my frustration meter went too high. Not having fun, and now punished for one keystroke. I think I'll put this real time RPG away. Not the one for me. Deathtrap Dungeon: A choose...

I decided to finish my 80 Days playthrough. I left Turkey for Ha'il Saudi Arabia to sell some goods that are valuable there, and to pick a southern route from Ha'il to get to a water route around Qatar or Oman.  However, we were traveling via camels with a group that wanted to find a magical temple at Rub' Al-Khali in Oman and apparently, the magic temple had a magical priestess that had the power to Star Trek style atomize us to southern Russia instead! Off we go, on a land based route, but at least in the right direction. We take the Trans-Manchurian route to get to Pyongyang in order to sell some more expensive goods. Went to Manila in order to head to Honolulu! Except Mr. Fogg contracted cholera when we arrived in Manila which had him bedridden for three days. Knowing that any route across the Pacific was going to be long, I hoped I could speed through the United States and get back to London in enough time. I grabbed a harmonica, hoping my route through the US could be...

This week, I focused on two new genres. Interactive Fiction and City Builder. My three games: Firewatch, 80 Days and Banished. Firewatch: After the intro, which was a choose your own path, but all paths lead to telling a similar story as the beginning of the movie Up, you're dropped into a state park, where you have decided to take a job as Fire Lookout in Wyoming, hiking to people doing dangerous things and telling them to knock it off, and investigating things that seem unusual. There is a mystery that starts in the game - you find a backpack belonging to a kid and your supervisor (that you radio often) seems wistful and and tells a few quick facts about a father and son that used to backpack and hike the park often. You've found that kid's pack. And a really large fence. And I just wanted to go back to my fire tower, but there were other things I needed to solve, first. But I felt myself being bored, so I just didn't, and quit the game. I expected a little more struc...

 Since I seem to be having these surges last two months instead of one, I may as well continue the trend. There are a lot of other games I've yet to play, so while I've done 12 new games in August, there are other completely different games that I should experience so that I can get a better idea of new games that are proposed to me. This month, I'll play the genres of Interactive Fiction, Action, RPG, City Builder, War Game, Side Scroller, Game Book and... Spreadsheet. Hopefully by the end of September I'll have covered enough ground that I'll have a good basis of what I like, if someone tells me a game I should play and what genre it is.

Between work and travel, I ended up just grabbing three new arcade games at the local arcade. This weekend, I played Centipede, PacMan and Moon Cresta. I remember one of my brothers playing Centipede when I was a little kid on our home Atari system. Watching a current playthrough, it looked very busy and chaotic, and I was hesitant that I'd last more than 15 seconds. I actually didn't do too poorly, and enjoyed my time! I'd play that one again! Next up was PacMan. While I managed the first screen, I couldn't make it through the second screen, and ended up dying. It also wasn't as exciting as other games at the arcade. Good to have played it, but I don't expect to pick that one back up. Moon Cresta was one I'd never heard of and ended up really enjoying. It's similar to Galaxion, but not quite as busy and the difference is the number of ships that are constantly swooping down near your ship instead of the occasional one from Galaxion. I ended up with my i...

 An overall better week! I played Galcon Fusion, Hue, and Enigmatis 2: The Mists of Ravenwood. Galcon Fusion is a Real Time Strategy game where you send your ships to less populated planets in an effort to take over the map. You weigh if you can afford to take 50% of your population from a planet in order to take over a neutral or hostile other planet, or beef your own defenses on planets you already occupy. The real time part of it is that you are sending your ships at the same time as your enemy in order to take over the local system. I like this game! I like the art and the music, and it's easy to get into. I haven't played past the first few levels, but it is tense, though casual and approachable. I could see myself getting sucked in for 'just one more play' similar to Dicey Dungeons and Slay the Spire. Great game! ------------------------------------------------------- After that, I played Hue, a side scrolling puzzle game. Absolutely fantastic art and an excellent...