I have been bouncing back and forth between a bunch of different things this month, with new games coming out, books that I have been reading, and movies that have been released in theaters. There have been too many to write a review for each individual one, but I wanted to highlight a couple that I have been reading/watching/playing that I have some thoughts about. Let’s jump in! SEASON: a letter to the future This was a game shown at The Game Awards in 2020 and immediately captured my attention. The art style has a cel-shaded quality to it that of a Studio Ghibli style. Personally, it reminded me more of The Legend of Zelda: Windwaker, which was groundbreaking back when it was first released due to its cel-shaded art style. What really brings that comparison to the forefront of my mind is the NPCs that you encounter on your journey. They have unique personalities and standout as products of their environment, which help build out the small slice of the world you explore.
The story of this game seems simple from the outside, but the deeper you dig, the more detail is uncovered. Scavengers Studio (the development team) packed tons of world-building and detail into this small slice of this grander world. You play as Estelle, who has taken upon the task of recording the end of the season which in this story means the end of the world. Traveling across Tieng Valley, you record, write, sketch, and photograph the world as you see it and decide on what you think is important before the end of the season and the start of the new one.
Overall, SEASON: a letter to the future is a video game experience that is either going to impact you greatly or come off as slow paced and boring. Biking as the main form of transportation is a cool idea and using the adaptive triggers on the PS5 help with immersion, but it became a pain to control with the camera and the novelty of it wore off quickly. It is a short experience, with it taking me about 5-6 hours to finish doing everything and getting all the trophies. It is a melancholy game about time and memories, and asks the question: are you weighed down by the past or is the past what makes you who you are? I think that is an interesting concept to build a game around, I just wish the developers cultivated that theme more with the detailed world they had built. If you are looking for something different after playing through some of the bigger AAA releases that have come out this year, I think this game is worth checking out and is a great palette cleanser from traditional game releases. Take My Hand
Our book club pick for the month of February was to highlight an African American author and an African American focused story for Black History Month, and we chose Take My Hand. This book is by Dolen Perkins-Valdez and follows the story of Civil Townsend and the Williams family, primarily the two daughters Erica and India.
The story is based off true events about a group of nurses who blew the whistle on women’s health/reproductive clinics across the United States that were sterilizing young women and teenagers without giving full context to what was happening to them. It was found that this was happening predominantly to women and households of color, specifically targeting ones that were reliant on government assistance. Valdez does a fantastic job of highlighting this issue, bringing awareness to something that I did not know anything about, and I suspect that most Americans do not know about either.
Unfortunately, that is the most positive aspect and thought I have of this book. I don’t know if my expectations were set too high, but throughout my time reading it felt like the book was just missing something. I thought it was a weird choice to position Civil as this strong and independent female character but have her constantly thinking about and worrying about the men that surrounded her. The book also sets up tons of questions that it then does not spend the time to really answering them, for example in present day Civil is a doctor, but in the past, she spends her time fighting against that including ignoring a textbook gifted by friends to help her study for getting into medical school. The book never explains what changed her mind, what impact that this situation with the Williams family might have had on her deciding to become a doctor, it felt like Valdez ran out of pages to explain everything.
I am glad that we decided to read this book and this story is an easy read even with the serious subject matter it delves into around sexual health. I think this is an extremely relevant topic to highlight right now with women’s reproductive rights being under attack recently. If you have your expectations appropriately set and know going in that all the answers you want will not be answered by the end, then Take My Hand could be worth the read.
Knock at the Cabin This was a movie that after seeing previews and trailers jumped to the top of my most anticipated list for the early part of 2023. It is the latest in M.Night Shyamalan’s low budget thriller/horror renaissance that he has been doing for the last few years. The story is adapted from a 2018 novel “A Cabin at the End of the World” by Paul G. Tremblay and has a small cast that is headlined by Dave Batista. I don’t want to give too much detail of the plot, because like with all of Shyamalan’s movies that is where they either live or die. The basic premise is this family of three go on a vacation to this secluded in nature cabin and are visited by four strangers who kidnap them to help save the world from ending.
The standout performances are from the four kidnappers, especially Batista and former Harry Potter star Rupert Grint. This really cemented Batista for me as someone who deserves more serious acting roles. Between this and his small parts in Dune and Blade Runner 2049, he has shown the acting talent to headline a starring role and in my opinion is the best wrestler turned actor. The run time of the movie is a perfect length at around 100 minutes (about 1 and a half hours). The movie primarily takes place in one area, but Shyamalan really uses the small space to his advantage in sharpening the suspense levels. Also, this has one of the better endings of his recent productions.
If you have been a fan of his work in the past, I would go and seek Knock at the Cabin before it leaves theaters. Alright those have been the three biggest things in media that have watched, read, or played in the last few weeks. While not all of them lived up to my expectations, I can say for certain that I came away with something from each of those and I consider that a success.
Quick Update!
For stuff coming up, I am slowly making my way through Part 3 of the Pixar Watch and Ranking, just having finished Toy Story 3 (it is great!) and I have been playing Atomic Heart (it is not great). I also have been working on getting my streaming setup finished, and it is almost done! Hopefully soon I will start streaming playing games solo and with friends on a semi-regular basis