Blog
While I do plenty of writing for work, all of it is technical and done for an audience behind big metal doors.
I love making a well-crafted powerpoint as much as the next person, but that can only become so much of a
creative exercise before your boss takes you off the project. To make up for that I'll be using this space to talk
openly, freely and without financial risk. Expect plenty of talk about giant robots, video game narratives
and blogging. Perhaps a pinch of prose every now and then, too.
[5-29-2025]
Metaphor: ReFantazio really got my gears turning about the concepts of nobility and regality. The game raised some good questions about what
makes a person "regal" in nature, and inspired me to do a little research project on the topic. I've been reading some tales of the world's great heroes:
I finished
Romance of the Three Kingdoms about a month ago, and have since turned my attention to T.H. White's collection of King Arthur. I felt
particularly inspired by the latter, and felt compelled to write a little short story in an Arthurian flavor. It's my first time in a long while writing
prose, and I think it shook out well.
Come sit by the fire and listen to the tale of the Good Lady Lenne and her lover the Knight Galhain.
[5-2-2025]
After ten long years stranded on a different planet, the final piece of the
Xenoblade mythos found a new home
on the Nintendo Switch. I've been somewhat avoidant of
Xenoblade Chronicles X due to its black sheep status: locked on a
different console, outside the mainline canon. Having finished every single other
Xeno game a few years ago, the time seemed perfect to
finally give
XCX the look it deserved. What I saw there was a remarkably different take on the meta-franchise, and one that was refreshingly
its own thing.
Mira should be everyone's tourist destination this summer.
[2-25-2025]
I decided to check out some cool looking indie games in this quiet period at the beginning of the year, while I wait
eagerly for
Monster Hunter Wilds and
Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition. My most recent exploration
was
Stories From Sol: The Gun-Dog, a loving tribute to PC-98 ADV game sensibilities and 80s mecha anime. It's easy to
bang out in a weekend and very much worth your time. Since the package overall is so short, I decided to forgo a proper review and instead
make a photo gallery of some of the references I noticed!
[1-10-2025]
Around the holiday season, I finally decided to take a stab at the
Outer Wilds and get it off my backlog. I did not expect
it to be such a moving piece of art, in all honesty. As a change of pace from the long-form review I did for
Metaphor, I felt
more inclined to do almost a creative writing exercise to describe my experience with the game.
Outer Wilds is probably something I will think about for a long time coming.
[11-18-2024]
I closed the book on
Metaphor: ReFantazio and was pleasantly surprised to see the new Studio Zero team come out swinging.
There were some narrative and mechanical missteps, but in new ways that don't retread issues this team has had before. Overall,
the game carried itself with sure footing and I happily walked with it on its way.
Here are my notes from my audience with the king.
[8-4-2024]
I finished up
The Sopranos right around the start of the summer, and loved every bite of that spicy meatball. I
had to get some thoughts down about that ending. Beyond being incredibly narratively satisfying, I thought that
there's a few thematic tricks done in the last five minutes or so that really make the final scene shine.
Come grab a plate and listen up.
[5-8-2024]
This past January, I saw the English premiere of the movie adaptations of
Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann.
Those movies gave me a lot to think about; I grew up with the show, and being thrown headfirst into the past
like that gave me a chance to reflect on what I love so much about it.
Dig into my thoughts on it here.
[10-1-2023]
Inspired by the recent conclusion of
Xenoblade Chronicles, I dedicated
2023 to
The Xenoyear, an excuse to explore the back catalog of the broader
Xeno franchise. I
wrote down my thoughts along the way, and have been trying to condense them into something others can reasonably
interact with. I'm still working through some of those pieces, but feel free to follow along as I finish them up!
The Xenoyear posts
start here, with more to come.