Playing

Mail Time – Though things irl have been busy, that just makes it more important than any other time to intentionally carve out time to relax, even if it’s only 15 or 20 minutes a day.  So I finally resumed my Steam backlog habit!!  This game is sooo perfect for the season.  It puts me in the same frame of mind as Smushi Come Home, which is one of my very favorites.  The scenery (lots of whimsical foliage with rounded shapes) and visual style (earth-tone pastels with chunky brown scribbly outlines) are Perfect™️.  And it has my favorite type of gameplay: Run Around And Do Quests For NPCs That Are Fun To Talk To. 🤗  I’m sure Mail Time will become one of my very favorite indie adventure games that I revisit from time to time just to enjoy living in its wonderful world for a little while (my other recommendations are Smushi Come Home, Calico, and Alchemy Story; and while I haven’t played them yet, Capy Castaway and Otterly Lost look to be in the same vein).

Hoping to receive my preordered copy of Hello Kitty Party Land soon (seriously, why did I have any faith that Gamestop would ship it on release? 😒), although I might not have much time to play it with the Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake releasing in just a week!

–

Reading

Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley – Yet another among the classics I’ve never read before.  I’ve desired to read this one over the past year or so but wanted to set it aside to read in October!  I’m also maintaining my practice of reading the chapter summaries & insights on Sparknotes as I go, which feels so scholarly 👩‍🎓 and helps me understand some of the 1800s turns of phrase.

The format surprised me – people often express about Dracula, “I didn’t know the story was told through letters!” but I’ve never heard anyone say the same about Frankenstein, which is epistolary as well.  It makes for some questioning moments, where the sea captain that’s recounting this story oddly knows the details of Victor’s life in EXCRUCIATING detail.  In fact, the very start is almost comedic, where the captain and sailors are dying to know the story of the man they picked up out on the ice, and when he’s finally recovered enough to speak, begins with relaying how his parents met.  It’s like the old joke exchange that goes like, “Tell us what happened, start from the beginning!” and the character answers, “Well, I was born in…” 😆

I definitely see the common interpretation of Victor that he is blinded by arrogance and vanity, not only in his pursuit to create life but also by insisting all throughout the narrative that not a single soul in all the world is suffering as much as he is.  He’s very “I made a mistake greater than any man has ever made and now I’m sadder than any man has ever been, 😢” repeatedly, at least once per chapter.  You know, in 18th century Europe.

And then the monster appears at the end to appeal to the captain, “Well how do you think I feel, I’m the one that had to kill people!” (the captain does have the presence to call him out on this lol.)

Anyway I’m glad I read it!  @Washedupslapper is telling me to watch the recent del Toro movie now.  Shall I? 👀

Murders in the Rue Morgue by Edgar Allan Poe – Another classic I’ve been interested in for a long time but wanted to reserve for an October read.  There are three stories of the Dupin trilogy and I downloaded all three from Librivox but have only listened to the first so far.  Alas the twist of this first mystery was already spoiled for me before I even got started, just by hearing other people talk about this story over the years.

The murder method and description of discovering the bodies is grisly!  Murder mysteries have overall toned down since this one LOL.

A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle – I’m certain that I read this many years ago when I first began collecting all of the Sherlock Holmes books from the old used book store near where I used to live, but all of the details were totally gone for me other than the word “Rache” written in blood on the wall.  But this is something we wanted to listen to together to catch all of the references and character names that are used in The Great Ace Attorney, so I sought out this Librivox audiobook.  It was excellent to listen to Dupin first, then follow up with this, because Watson exclaims, “You’re a regular Dupin!” and we were like WHOOOAAAA. 🫵🤯

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes by Anita Loos – I’ve read this once some years ago and loved it to pieces, this time it was in audiobook form for that long car ride.  It’s so, so, funny and has a totally different plot from the Marilyn Monroe movie (and takes place during a different decade).  Naturally, the heroine’s phonetic misspellings are lost in audiobook form, but sometimes the narrator enunciates in such a way that you can tell the word isn’t quite right lol.  When we finished listening, @Wreckscalibur’s observation was that the heroine “Mr. Magoo’d her way through life”, which had me rolling. 😆

My favorite scene remains her interview with a “Doctor Froyd,” who is just flabbergasted to encounter someone like our heroine, who seems to have no inhibitions whatsoever.  He asks, “And what about if you ever desire to harm someone?” and she so breezily answers, “Oh, yeah, I shot a guy once.”  (I told you it’s a different plot than the movie.)

I, Robot (BBC Radio Drama) – I found this by accident while searching for an I, Robot audiobook.  I, Robot is one of my favorite short story collections of all time and I thought they’d be a blast to listen to in the car, but discovering that radio dramas still exist shifted the whole nature of the rest of my entertainment searches lol.  There’s a unique twist to this retelling of the story that isn’t present in the book, so it’s worth giving this a listen even if you’re already familiar with the source material.  (And again, the original plot of the book in the first place is totally different from the Will Smith movie plot.)

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (BBC Radio) – The reminder that Radio Dramas Exist brought this series to mind, an old favorite from way back that I’ve experienced in many media formats now. 😅 I’ve read the books, seen the movie, even watched some (very little) of the old TV series… but never listened to the original radio show that started it all.  I totally understand now how Hitchhiker’s Guide revolutionized stereo sound and completely bazonkers sound effects for radio because all of the sci-fi spaceship noises in this go absolutely wild.  We listened to all of “Phase 1” on our trip, roughly the equivalent of the first book but I noticed that it overflows into the content of the second book (The Restaurant at the End of the Universe).

The Tale of the Pie and the Patty Pan by Beatrix Potter – After listening to so many audiobooks during the drive, especially the radio play versions with multiple actors, it made me want to seek out more, and I went looking for an old favorite Beatrix Potter story.  This “dramatic reading” on Librivox (chapter 9 further down the page) features different readers for each character and the main ladies are just wonderful.  It’s only 16 minutes long and somehow manages to depict pure chaos, a true comedy of errors.  I love this silly story so much, I’ve actually posted about it on Tumblr once before, all the way back in 2019.  

I Am A Cat: The Manga Edition – Okay, yeah, I only learned who Soseki Natsume is from playing The Great Ace Attorney.  But then at least I read the introductory paragraph about him on Wikipedia. ☝️  So I knew of this book, and then saw it (this manga version) at stall at a fair, and thought it looked cute, so I bought it, and read it.  The daily mundane events and activities of a 1900s Japanese household from the point of view of a cat is kind of cute.  Although the human characters are oddly casual to insult (and aggressively threaten?) their neighbors and others around them, even their friends they are close to.  Then they try to be philosophical about it and the cat observes their double standards.  Perhaps skip this one if animal death and morbid philosophizing would be upsetting to you! 🙃

–

Watching

Magic Knight Rayearth – We’re only like two episodes into the second season so I’ll save that write-up for next month, and instead use this entry instead to talk about the conclusion of the first season.  …I love it. 🥺 It’s emotional, it’s dramatic, it’s such a classic JRPG-like twist (and the whole story of this anime, especially their evolving weapons & armor as they level up, is so very much like a JRPG).  Rayearth is definitely one of those formative anime if you catch it at just the right age (14-16?) where the plot twist just wrenches your heart and changes your whole life forever because you didn’t know stories were allowed to do that.  If you’re like, 25+, it’s more like, “Yeah that’s about where I thought it was gonna go” lol.  Anyway, super stoked to see all the new characters that are about to be introduced in the next season, because like I mentioned before, I’ve never seen Rayearth II in anime form but still own the manga today (and it’s from that era where it was printed flipped left-to-right and everything!).

Rio: Rainbow Gate – I don’t know what compelled me to watch this, usually pervy anime tropes are so eye-rolly that I’m turned all the way off, but there must be some magic secret ingredient being used here that transforms the perviness into something cute and light and fun?  I guess the easy way to make me want to watch something is by making all of the supporting characters bunnygirls.  You see, it’s very simple: horny fanservice is annoying unless I’ve decided that I like it. 😌  The outfits Rio wears are sooo cute (and I bet they come from the animated winning screens of the pachislot game this universe is adapted from.  yeah, this is an anime for a pachislot game.  Rio is beloved enough as a Koei mascot that she is sometimes included in crossover games), and the gamble-battles are bonkers. And the humor is so lighthearted and silly (like the ghost obsessed with chicken wings) that it keeps the tone just right.

…Is what I typed up when I was 4 or 5 episodes into the series, but then the plot really did take a turn somewhere around episode 7 or 8, and now the ridiculosity at the start is extra weird. 😅  I’m not sure how that resolved because I kinda stopped watching and have been listening to radio dramas during breakfast instead.  (That road trip really opened my eyes to them I guess lol.)

Sagas of Sundry: Darkling Gate – An actual play of Call of Cthulu in a Regency setting with really wonderful characters.  I don’t have any particular like toward cosmic horror or Lovecraftian things, and I know nothing about the Call of Cthulu game system, but the Jane Austen-inspired setting and general joy around the table has me hooked.  A couple episodes in, the dark horror aspect seems to veer toward a spooky Otherworldly faerie nature rather than, y’know, the tentacled squid-face guys, so I’m having a great time.

–

If you’re reading this within a few hours of this being posted, I’m probably camped outside and handing out candy to trick-or-treaters RIGHT NOW! 🎃