I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue.

Zenless Zone Zero (2024, iOS) -- In the spring, I played Honkai Impact 3rd casually out of a morbid curiosity about miHoYo's aesthetic vision, since it was their oldest (extant) gacha game. When I got bored with it, I put it on the shelf and downloaded Zenless Zone Zero, miHoYo's newest gacha game. It's a lot more fighting-game-oriented then either Genshin or Honkai Star Rail -- in some ways, in fact, it reminds me of the combat systems in Honkai Impact 3rd (and particularly the emphasis on timing when you tag out one character on the field for another in order to trigger additional combat effects). It is also hornier than Genshin or HSR, though I'm not sure if it's as horny as Honkai Impact 3rd. The genre is urban fantasy; the setting is a hip modern city riddled with blighted demonic zones called Hollows; the main characters are two siblings (with a DARK SECRET) operating a video rental store and hustling as guides in the dangerous Hollows. It's fairly generic so far, and the only thing that has made any kind of impression or purchase on my brain is the fact that the game features dozens (hundreds?) of knock-off Minions.




No, your eyes do not deceive you. It IS dressed like Colonel Sanders.

They're little blobby creatures who talk in Simlish-like gibberish and wear silly outfits, and they're everywhere in the game. The sibling protagonists virtually pilot the creatures around when they travel through a Hollow; the creatures staff their video-rental store; the creatures wander the city streets and have various sidequests attached to them; they're even one of the collectible gacha elements of the game. The second-year anniversary video for the game just features the main "Bangboo" dancing in different ZZZ locations. Nothing else in the game means anything to me, but I'm awestruck that miHoYo photocopied the Minion template as mascot-sidekicks for their tag-fighting-gacha game. Their minds!!

Tears of Themis (2021, iOS) -- New story content! The reveal of Vyn's sickly younger siblings was underwhelming, though I did enjoy the entirely unnecessary sequence of sneaking around a creepy mansion complete with its own secret dungeon. As someone who dislikes Vyn, I will grudgingly acknowledge: this was probably the most inoffensive Vyn content that we've gotten. Additionally, I did not have the return of Vyn's evil uncle on my bingo card, nor the fact that he was going to be a helpful ally, nor the fact that he is now accompanied by a blunt and insubordinate lady-bodyguard who is named...Orson Wells? Possibly we've reached the point in this game's lifespan where the writers are just fucking around, and frankly, I salute them for it.

(No, no, you're right: we'd already reached the "fucking around" point with the child-villain-who-is-aging-backwards-due-to-black-market-drugs. We're past that point now. The shark has been jumped. We are no longer constrained by petty expectations of plausibility or logic.)

Bravely Default (2014, 3DS) -- Chapter Six! 67 hours! (Look, I love 2 level up.) I am relieved that the main characters have finally realized at least part of what is going on, because their confusion was starting to approach obtuseness. I also love that Airy's (ostensible) plan is to keep doing the things that have not worked before. Hmm! Sure! Third time's the charm! I've got Edea as a Templar/Dark Knight, and she is shredding everything that stands before her.

Big Walk (2026, PC) -- You go on a long walk with some friends and solve puzzles. This game is very charming, but I think it's more likely to be fun if you played it with people you already knew and liked. I played it with my brothers (great) and their friend (a little less great, just because he and I don't know each other). I had a good time (and they were very gracious to let me drop into their in-progress game and blunder around for a while), but I think I would have an even better time with my own friends.

The only problem: my friends are not gamers, and my attempts to recruit them into this game have not thus far been a resounding success. But! Lockhart agreed to play with me after her dissertation defense next week. So I've got one volunteer, and that is all I need!

On one hand: Work Project kicked me in the head multiple times this week, and now I'm a hollow husk of a human being. Did not enjoy it! And now that it's (basically, fml) completed, I gotta scramble this weekend to finish all the other work I put on the back burner in order to get Work Project across the finish line. Hate this for me. Disgusting.

On the other hand: this week I encountered a work of fringe pornography so perverse and strange and dedicated to its niche kinks that finding it was honestly the highlight of my week. (Which, to be clear, was bad, so it was a low bar, but even so.) This porn's kinks were not my kinks, and I don't think this work awakened anything new within me, but I was dazzled by the commitment and craftsmanship it demonstrated in service to its erotic-horror-comedy ideals. (We're not quite talking Roy Orbison Wrapped In Clingfilm levels of weird art, but close.) I keep turning it over in my head. I keep thinking about all the brilliantly unhinged choices the creator made. I genuinely found it funny and moving and touching. Human ingenuity! It's breathtaking sometimes!