For no particular reason I'd like to ask everybody to please continue
taking precautions and staying in good health, as the number of people I
personally know who have caught the thing now numbers in the *hundreds*
and it's honestly still frightening.

Play:
--=--

Yakuza 5 Remastered (PC) - I seem to recall that I haven't started the PS5
version of this, and I haven't come to the game since experiencing it
(grudgingly) as a download on the PS3. So these story beats in Kiryu's
introductory chapter are really weighty and emotional in the context of
all the rest that we know is coming. It's also interesting to view Kiryu's
experiences with fresh eyes, because not having completed Yakuza 4 right
before means that I get to imagine the questions a brand new player would
be asking. Why is he so mad at the two guys laughing about the idol
singer? How can he be so polite to everybody but such a brick house
fighter against those street punks? What secrets is he carrying around
that the head of all the Tokyo yakuza families would seek out his advice?
I don't have a proper explanation for why that's so satisfying, except
that it's like seeing a favourite episode of a long-running television
show accidentally late at night.

Kunio-Kun World Classics Collection (PS4/Switch) - Sadly the JPN-region
Famicom games are not translated in any meaningful way, which is to say
all the text is in the original Japanese and you have to depend on the
kindness of FAQ authors to make your way through. No matter, as the
western localised versions are right there in the collection alongside
them and they play flawlessly. Better even, as the emulator in use smooths
out the performance hiccups that would otherwise be faithfully emulated in
a lesser release. With that all said, all I want to do now is dig up the
3DS remake of the first Kunio game and see if I can swallow enough pride
to start a new game in easy mode.

Want:
--=--

More time (RL) - Too much of my day is being spent preparing to play games
or cleaning up from playing games. By way of example, I've been trying for
about 48 hours now to find a spare minute to set up the third PS3 I just
picked up so that I can do multi-screen Gran Turismo 5. Problem is I might
not have enough screens and I certainly don't have enough space. That'll
be fun to report on in the podcast.

Bin:
-==-

Nothing game-related.

Expenditure:
-----=-----

Balance forward - $1,702

Evercade 18 - Worms Collection (Evercade) - $20
House of the Dead Remake (Switch) - $40 (preorder)
Another Playstation 3 (PS3) - $80

Total to date - $1,842

-KKC, who is determined not to catch COVID and will happy stay inside.
--
-- "People with happy families don't become spies. A bad | kendrick
childhood is the perfect background for covert ops. You | @
don't trust anyone. You're used to getting smacked around, | io-nyc
and you never get homesick." - Michael Westen, /Burn Notice/ | .com

Kendrick Kerwin Chua <kendrick@nospam.io-nyc> wrote:

> Play:

Mr. Driller Drill Land (PS4) - more of this. Back on Classic I cleared
Druaga and World Drill Tour on level 3 with items, but I doubt I'll
manage any more than that.

Mr. Driller (DC) - also this. The main thing you notice playing it
after MDDL is just how fast the block-dropping gets after 500m.

Mr. Driller (PS1) - and this. Surprisingly I managed the full "5000ft"
on this version (just barely), for the first time in years probably.

> Want:

Nothing.

> Bin:

I hate to say it, but... Mr. Driller (DC/PS1) having some pretty harsh
collision mechanics, especially when compared with MDDL. You can get
squashed by a block you seemed to be marginally outrunning, not dive
out of the way of a block it seemed you probably should have, and so
on.

-Rus.