Backlog 2021

[Kikki]

Gaining weight is terrifyingly easy for most people, but if you need to make an effort at it... I guess you have a digestive disorder of some kind? Was it fat you can't eat? Fat is the most effective way to gain weight but if you have to avoid it...

[Mikodesu]

Regarding MHS2

Spoiler:

The foreshadowing of the final boss gave me more Dune vibes personally, but that's me. When I actually got to the final boss battle, let's just say I was very pleasantly surprised, and even a bit jealous I couldn't get it as a monstie.

There must be more to it that I haven't gotten to yet, then. Because it seemed like it took an ETERNITY to unlock multiplayer quests properly, even though they were in the menu for half the early game. I wouldn't put 50 hours in if I didn't enjoy the game but there have been some ODD design choices.

Spoiler:

I'm probably still just awestruck by the regular monsters themselves, since the best I've done to now is watch other people play Rise. Even for monsters I HAVE seen there were plenty I couldn't remember by the name alone, so a bog standard "wyrm" enemy doesn't quite live up to the same design prowess as the rest.

As for the Dune vibes, I guess they haven't sold the environmental side of the story all that well yet to me. To talk about another game that did it better without spoiling... You could feel the world shaking as the creature moves, you could move through some of the tunnels it makes BEFORE encountering it, possibly without realizing what made the tunnels.

The environment in Stories 2 is basically set up for it, too! The 'tunnel-like' areas in every environment could have been shaped just a liiittle differently in some areas and, boom. Probably doesn't help that the pits are over-large for the enemy (or maybe the scaling isn't sold well).

@Daikon boy: If nutrition is the issue there are a few foods out there that are considered "nutritionally complete". W/ all the micronutrients the body can't make/needs to survive. Wheatgrass off the top of my head. The TLDR is it provides your cells a LOT of energy which the body can use for healing.

I'm guessing calories are more the issue though. :/ I'm not really sure what to say, there. There are enough calorie dense foods out there that hopefully you can think of something to at LEAST stop the weight loss. Weight gain may have to come later.

[Daikon boy]

@kikki

It's fat yeah. Too much is dangerous for my health so really fatty foods are a special treat. My body usually sticks around the same weight range and I sometimes have phases where I get extra hungry and scarf down a bunch of snacks because I'm hungry all the time until it goes away. I grew an inch as an adult, so I'm not entirely sure I'm not needing/needed extra food towards growing or something too...if that's how it even works. I have no idea if that's done yet and no way to tell since I'm an adult and I'm supposed to be done growing.

I haven't had a problem with losing weight before (except the one time I was forced to try a gluten free diet to see if it was causing any problems and lost five pounds and was starving the whole time) and I haven't had issues with gaining weight either. I've never been sick like this before though so I guess it's never had a chance to come up until now. I usually have a very healthy appetite and I did not for much longer than is good for me. I wouldn't be surprised if my digestive system is weird in weird and unexpected ways because that's about par for the course. It'd be good to know if somethings going on though but. Who knows.

@miko

I honestly probably need a little bit of both. Considering I was barely eating for a good portion of the time I was sick I'm probably both nutritionally deprived and lacking calories. I'm actively trying to make sure I get at least a bare minimum of calories as of today, but I might have to look into some sort of food like that too. If I keep losing weight at this rate it's not gonna go well so I definitely want to at least stop the weight loss. My body could probably use all the nutrition and energy it could get right now.

[Mikodesu]

@Daikon boy:

With gut issues, definitely look at wheatgrass. (Even if a little later, when you're more over this.) I've read through several studies just focused on using wheatgrass to help your body regenerate healthy tissue in the gut. A lot of it has to do with chlorophyll, but yeah, good stuff.

And, I'm sure it's tough to get a hold of stuff when you feel so bad, but... would anybody be able to make something like a congee/rice porridge for you? That's probably the best, low-fat food I can think of. If not maybe a really simple chicken soup, since noodles would also be all sugar and no fat.

Maybe somebody else perusing the backlog thread will have some more ideas. Hope you feel better soon!

[Daikon boy]

We always have a lot of rice, so that's not an issue and while I'm not able to cook my appetite is at least back to normal finally and I have other people who can cook for me, and help feed me. It's funny because I was just looking up rice porridge the other day coincidentally and thinking I should have found that earlier. Foods I can eat as much as I want of are probably a good idea.

I also have chickpeas and rice I can make for a snack, if I have chickpeas, so I should probably make sure I have some of that cooking up soon...then whenever I'm feeling like I need a snack I can just heat some of that up. It's not very high calorie though, but it's a good snack and the protein is probably good for me.

I am geniunely having a hard time thinking of calorie rich foods other than homemade Pad Thai. That's about the only thing I can think of because the noodles we buy have a good amount of calories in them alone, without the homemade sauce or other fixings. I can't think of anything else. I don't know why I can't.

I really appreciate the suggestions and help. My stomachs in panic mode today and it's just so so hungry and frantic about being hungry. I guess my body finally noticed what was going on and decided that it was Very Bad Indeed. Makes it hard to think about things other than food though right now...

[Kikki]

It would be difficult to think of calorie rich foods that are low in fat, because all calorie-rich foods are HIGH fat. Fat has literally double (slightly more) the calories of carbs or protein. Definitely eat as much fat as you're able to without trouble if you want to maintain or gain weight. I don't know how it works for you, if type of fat matters or if all fat is equally bad, or if proportion or timing makes a difference...maybe sprinkling a little fat in with everything...like adding a teaspoon or two of butter or garlic/chili oil to your chickpeas and rice would work better than ever eating something high fat in one go (like a piece of cheesecake. Cheesecake is insanely calorie-dense.)

~

I fell off the ladder this weekend. Well...no. *I* didn't fall. The bottom section of the ladder collapsed, which made it crumple, and down I went. Clonked myself a bit, gave my already sore neck some extra problems and have had headaches since then, so waking up has been a blah process that takes two hours to fully achieve, the last several days. Chiro didn't really help, tbh. I feel like he doesn't, any more...like he just 'stirs' my problems. Shifts them to a slightly different location, or a slightly different intensity.

I believe I'm in the last section of Arise, barring any post-game dungeon, like Tales always seems to have. I'm in limbo with most gigantes, as the ones remaining are too high-level for me as I am...I need to gain about 5 more levels before I'll be able to take on a bunch more of them. Gaining levels is painfully slow in Arise.

I also need to do more training hall stuff.

Olive Town trial begins today and it's already downloaded so I think I may get to try it this afternoon. I want to make sure of that French menu option I was told is there, but can't receive absolute confirmation of. Staxel is out today, too, and the video I saw of it was actually rather cute, though the blockiness is just...too much, I think.

I'm still tempted, though, and Leif (general store guy) is cute.

[Bluie]

I fell off the ladder this weekend. Well...no. *I* didn't fall. The bottom section of the ladder collapsed, which made it crumple, and down I went. Clonked myself a bit, gave my already sore neck some extra problems and have had headaches since then, so waking up has been a blah process that takes two hours to fully achieve, the last several days. Chiro didn't really help, tbh. I feel like he doesn't, any more...like he just 'stirs' my problems. Shifts them to a slightly different location, or a slightly different intensity.

I have a ladder like this at work. The last step is loosey goosey and has a tendency to collapse on your way back down. we're apparently getting a new one eventually, but because our store is out in the sticks its takes foreverrrr to get new supplies in. They gave us a shiny new stool in the meantime, but it only slightly helps the problem loool. Hope you feel better soon!

~

Had a productive day yesterday! I got the next chapter in a fanfic done, I finished and submitted my FFXIV weapon design for the contest, and got some good progress done in Black Desert!

Fic chapters take me around a full month to complete lately mainly because I need time to digest my writing before jumping back in. I have a tendency to reuse scenes and tropes without even noticing, and I think it usually happens due to me wanting to get to the action quickly. With enough time passed, I can look at things more critically and start with a clear head. I started advertising the fic on my FFXIV character description in-game (it's about them, after all) and I've got some more kudos now! Yay validation lmao!

I legit almost forgot about the weapon design contest, thought I had more time to work on it, but in a week or two, submissions will be closed. I was initially going to design a White Mage staff, but I couldn't get a good idea for it or the ideas I did have wouldn't transfer well onto paper. Then I got a silly idea for a Blue Mage cane and it came out pretty well! I figure the Blue Mage contest pool will be smaller anyways because it's a joke class and it takes a lot of effort to level and build properly, so maybe I'll have a chance of at least being a finalist! I want the Serpent of Ronka umbrella SO BAD. I'm going to enter every contest from now on until I get one! >:/

So, Black Desert Online is legit fun. I was going through the motions yesterday, running around and smacking mooks around, and then it all of a sudden clicked. The combat is extremely addictive, especially the more combos you unlock. I absolutely love kicking enemies airborne and then WOOOSHING them around. I play a Race/Class called a Shai, and they're basically Lalafells from FFXIV, but with healing wind powers and giant boomerangs. I recreated my first FFXIV character and joked with my friends she got Isekai'd to Black Desert Online and that's why she's not around anymore! Also discovered the player run market board and managed to make bank off it by selling something that came with my physical edition of the game. I couldn't use it, it was unequipable, so selling it to the masses who can't get said item without paying real money for the boxed version of the game netted me an extreme amount of in-game money. I have however been informed that money quickly disappears in the game once you need to start upgrading equipment, so I'll enjoy this while it lasts!

[Kikki]

Thanks Bluie Right now I feel worst whenever I bend over to pick something up or etc, so I just have to go to the chiro once or twice more to get that much fixed and I think that'll be pretty much normal again. It wasn't a bad fall; I only fell three feet and I landed on my back on the grass. I did clonk my head a bit, but really it just jarred me and made my already wonky neck slightly wonkier, so...not a disaster at all. It did something weird to my left ankle/shin, too, but I think that'll disappear on its own, whatever it is.

I hope your shiny new stool gives you joy (Though more than that I hope they give you a good ladder!)

~

Olive Town unlocked (as the current free NSO trial game) right on the dot of 1pm, and sure enough, on the title screen (but NOT in the in-game options, btw) there was the option to choose your language. I am now playing Printemps 1 (Dim).

The opening is charming, honestly...quite sweet looking, and the music is relaxing, not irritating. I like the character I designed, and I was able to name my farm EndlessAcres. I would have preferred oooooone more letter, so it could properly be Endless Acres, my favourite farm name, but oh well. I could have tried spelling it Endlis Acres. Actually, I think I should have. I could even pretend that that's my character's surname, that she's Cricket Endlis. can't decide if I want to restart to do so, or if I should just leave it. Gotta decide before I get past the first day!

So, I like the graphics and the music at this very early point. I haven't left my tent yet, after seeing the beginning...it's very slow, playing in French. I think I understand what they're saying, but then decide I don't know precisely...I know just enough French to get the general idea of what they're talking about without without having to look it up, but without recognizing the full wording...so I go check it out a translation. That really slows things down! Turns out I did know what it meant, though. But I guess looking it up precisely is what makes you learn, rather than just assuming you know what it means. Right now the game seems to be telling me something about alpacas and sunshine, lol. This is going to be a slooooooow playthrough! We're forced to take French from kindergarten all the way through Grade 9, here, but unless you choose an emersion program, it's still really rudimentary. But anway, now that I've confirmed the way you can choose language, my choice is cemented: I'll just go ahead and buy this, now

I should finish up Arise first, before continuing, though. I should just shut this down and restart it (so I can have Endlis Acres Farm) after I complete Arise.

EDIT: Btw, Olive Town is Oliville in French, it seems. I knew town was 'ville', but I didn't know 'Olive Ville' would get contracted into Oliville. Also, is this child really saying he has lasers in his eyes? He looks like a turnip, not a robot.

[Shan O 123]

^
Feel better soon!!

Also I’m glad you’re enjoying the free trial. The game really is great and you can go in your own pace. If you fully buy it I hope you’ll have fun with it.

[Daikon boy]

@kikki

I hope you're doing alright, and you have a good pillow for your neck or something. Even if you only fell a little that can still mess you up or hurt for a while. I hope it feels better soon, and doesn't leave any lasting effects. Do you know what wrong with the ladder?

I use a little bit of olive oil in a pan for my chickpeas to cook them in, and to mix the spices into a sauce so there's flavor. I try to stick with foods that most of the time have 10% fat or less, so that it doesn't add up to too much at the end of the day and I can also eat more of it. I do need to have some fat in my diet because the body needs fat to function, so if I actually managed a zero fat diet that would end up bad too. It's really just a balance of making sure I don't have too much, and if I have something super fatty trying to have less fat throughout the rest of the week or something. And I try to use the healthier fats when I can, if I'm cooking or something and substitute if I need to. I just generally need to eat a low fat diet basically, and I'm more careful/consistent about it then some people would be.

Chili oil sounds really good though and I was not aware that was even a thing, so now I'm going to have to look that up and see what it is. I'm not sure if it's what I'm imagining or not. Garlic oil too. I also didn't know about the calories and fat thing but that makes sense. It gets more complicated with home cooked meals too where you have no idea really how calorie dense they are. I'm gonna stock up on a lot of snacks I think, at least, so even if my meals aren't enough the snacks might help fill it all out. And try to drink smoothies every day.



I hooked up my ps4 again. I'm going to try and play it again tonight and maybe tomorrow and the next day. I think I'm good enough to be able to do that now, so hopefully it goes good. I'll probably only be able to play for an hour or two but it'll be good to get back into it if I can, and I have a few new games to try.

[Mikodesu]

I fell off the ladder this weekend...

Holy « Cow Poopoo », Kikki, I'm so glad you're safe! A friend of my mom's had a similar fall recently (in the bathroom though, so...hard surfaces) and ended up in the hospital, with two holes in her skull to reduce the swelling on her brain. :/

Hopre you're able to take it easy right now, and that the soreness goes away soon!

--

More Stories 2 tonight. Remembered even more general plot threads that have yet to be addressed so...this thing isn't over yet, is it?

There are a number of indies out recently that I'd like to play if I had more time! Sable just dropped and that's looking really good. Kena: Bridge of Spirits is doing the Epic Exclusive thing, so I guess I can wait on that. :/ I can't remember if it's on PS4, or if it's PS5 exclusive... based on the graphics I'm gonna say PS5 exclusive. The game is « Snuggly Bunny » gorgeous. Sort of like Spirit Farer, but...an action puzzler. And 3D.

Oh...and there is supposed to be an "anniversary livestream" for Genshin. I'll be watching, largely because I work from home so I'll be here, and awake, so why not.

[Daikon boy]

@Miko

I really wanna play Kena, but I have to wait until I get a ps5 to play it. I'm saving the spiderman miles morales game for that too, even though I really really really want to play it. When It was announced I was like, that's everything I wanted the next spiderman game to be, and I want it so bad. But I'm waiting on a ps5 even though that's going to take much longer than it should because I need to have money to buy one.

[Kikki]

Thanks everybody; I'm perfectly fine, other than headaches (they're rising-from-the-neck headaches, not concussion headaches, so no biggie) and a twinging ankle I suspect will clear up quite soon. Oh, Daikon boy...the ladder collapsed because it has FOUR safety latches on he many hinged sections and I didn't know that the lower ones weren't locked...they were supposed to be but it looks like they were unlocked when someone else used it for a bit and I didn't know what the locked position looked like. So when I got up to the third step, it just buckled and I tumbled down. I landed on the grass, so I didn't even get a scratch, just a bit of a jarring.

Kena released on PS4, too...it's not exclusive to PS5, if anyone wants to try it but hasn't gotten that console yet.

I can't sleep for reasons, so I finished Tales of Arise. The ending animation was HIDEOUS. Ruined the ending completely! The landscape stuff was gorgeous but the character art in the animations is just terrible, they look incredibly derpy and not like themselves at all. Tales animation often is like that, though...the in-game models look way better than the animated version of the characters. I know a different team does it, but I wish they'd stay truer to how the characters you spend so much time with actually look. Bleah.

The game was very padded, toward the end. You spend half an hour watching cutscenes to play for three minutes in between, to get to the next half hour cutscene, or ten skits in a row, or etc. That'd be good, maybe, except once you got past half way or so, the subject matter was always the same...they just kept repeating the same speeches and rehashing the same subjects. And it was very, very Tales. No surprises. Gorgeous game, though (well, not the animated parts! But all the rest is wonderful.) and they remixed this one more thoroughly than many others, particularly in the first half or two-thirds of the story, so even if you're used to the tropes, it felt a bit fresher than usual.

I'm going to go back and do the quests you can't really do until post game, and find the owls that are locked until then, too...that kind of thing.

It's raining like wild, here. We have a rainfall warning, and I think we're finally living up to it. We haven't had rain in quite a while, though, so it's not a bad thing, so far.

Playing Olive Town in French is exhausting. I feel like my brain is panting for breath after half an hour or so, lol, begging to put the weights down and let the burn die out before I try to remember any more verb sets. It takes a lot of time to type it all into a translator, too, if I don't recognize a phrase. Can't decide if this will make the game more of a chore, or if I should switch between French and English once in a while, or what. I did want to stretch my brain a bit, I just didn't expect it to be so tiring.

EDIT: Omg, guys...it's been this many hours and this is the FIRST time I've seen this camp interaction between Alphen and Rinwell. It's one of the ones where you don't actually have a skit attached. They play catch with Hootle. And by that, I mean, Hootle is the ball! Rinwell and Alphen gently toss Hootle back and forth between them and he flooooats over like a dandelion puff, never using his wings...he's just being the ball, lol.

[Bluie]

EDIT: Omg, guys...it's been this many hours and this is the FIRST time I've seen this camp interaction between Alphen and Rinwell. It's one of the ones where you don't actually have a skit attached. They play catch with Hootle. And by that, I mean, Hootle is the ball! Rinwell and Alphen gently toss Hootle back and forth between them and he flooooats over like a dandelion puff, never using his wings...he's just being the ball, lol.

I was gonna be like 'Poor Hootle! Don't bully the baby!' but if he was actually fine with it then I guess it's ok???

~

Welp, for of my wishlist games went on sale today. I picked up the Code:Realize 'trilogy' and Raging Loop. While I am mildly burnt out on Visual Novels this year while simultaneously trying to get through one of the longest in the genre, Code:Realize is my favorite VN of all time. I've been meaning to replay it and then play the fandiscs but didn't want to pay $40 for each one. I'll play them when I'm ready. Raging Loop I've heard nothing but good things about it, so I may as well pick it up while it's cheap. It's probably going to be a long while before the rest of the VNs I want to play go on sale as they all released this year, but I'm in no rush so *shrug*.

[Kikki]

EDIT: Omg, guys...it's been this many hours and this is the FIRST time I've seen this camp interaction between Alphen and Rinwell. It's one of the ones where you don't actually have a skit attached. They play catch with Hootle. And by that, I mean, Hootle is the ball! Rinwell and Alphen gently toss Hootle back and forth between them and he flooooats over like a dandelion puff, never using his wings...he's just being the ball, lol.

I was gonna be like 'Poor Hootle! Don't bully the baby!' but if he was actually fine with it then I guess it's ok???

It honestly looks like they're doing it mostly for Hootle, lol...like when a little kid wants to walk between two adults, holding their hands, and have them 'swing' the child once in a while. It's hard to tell who in that trio is the one having the most fun with playing 'float the Hootle'. (Though Alphen freaks out when Hootle is so light that he nearly bounces right out of his hands, like a feather on the wind.)

~

I finished up almost all the post game stuff, except for coliseum stuff (in this game I think it's called the training hall or training grounds) and I just went into the final, post-game-exclusive dungeon. Not really into that part, dunno if I feel like doing the dungeon. I have 70% trophy completion, and two of the ones left are for FISHING, which I hate, so I'm not going to be going for 100%. I hate that TWO of Kisara's skill branches depend on fishing accomplishments.

It's so dark out again today, and soggy and cool. We do NEED this rain, but at the same time, the sun goes out for two days and I'm glum. Looks like there's a decent chance it'll rain for 3 or 4 more days after this, then the sun may start to break out again, but more than a two days in the future and the weather forecast is basically completely unreliable.

Guess I'll try to tighten my brain up to play a bit more Olive Town. Maybe? I've had a headache since I bonked my stupid noggin, and headaches seem to make it harder to think. Though that's probably more of a feeling than a reality.