issue 5: something you love
Hello and welcome back. This is Issue 5 of “a bit of bird words” and we have, at last, reached the end of 2024. A new year approaches. But before we look forward, let’s take a look back at December.
Game of the month: Webfishing
lamedeveloper, 2024 (Windows)
Technically speaking, I didn’t finish Webfishing. (Is it a game you can even finish?) Actually, to be honest, I didn’t really finish all that much this month. I counted this one, as well as a couple of others (Peglin, Short Trip), but I wasn’t really in a “finishing games” kind of mood this month.
Instead, I spent a lot of time fishing.
I did quite a bit of thinking about games this month while watching my partner play Final Fantasy VIII and then Castlevania: Circle of the Moon. I thought about how finishing a game doesn’t have to mean rolling credits. And I thought about how I had maintained a two-year streak of playing games every day since the start of 2023.
I want to intentionally break this streak. I want to be more okay with not finishing games. I want to just go fishing.
I don’t ever want games to feel like a job, an obligation. I want to take a “don’t pay me” approach to games. I don’t want games to be the means by which I do…whatever. They are the end. The fun, the adventure, the tragedy, the camaraderie…that’s the point.
Take some time to go fishing.
Games finished this year: 47 (+3)
Book of the month: Kometen kommer
Tove Jansson, 1946
I’m a latecomer to the Moomin series. I had virtually no exposure to the books or many animated versions that exist, but I was introduced to the 90s anime (which, fun fact, is almost exactly as old as me) fairly recently. I was immediately charmed by the characters, the atmosphere, and the feeling of nostalgia for a childhood I didn’t have.
This prompted me to go back to some of the source material: the books Tove Jansson wrote and illustrated. I’ve opted to read them in Swedish (actually in Finno-Swedish, finlandssvenska) rather than English, both for the language practice and for an opportunity to maybe one day be able to pick out things like intentional word choice and tone from the writing.
This is the second book in Swedish I’ve finished, but it took me a long time. The world is ending in Kometen kommer; a giant comet is coming to destroy everything the Moomins and their friends know. As a result, the journey that Moomintroll, Snufkin, and Sniff—and later Snork and Snorkmaiden—take to learn of the comet and then to find their way home to warn everyone…well, this journey was extended over many months, the threat of the comet hanging over everything.
But the comet, despite causing temporary hardship and damage, does not destroy the world; it passes by, leaving the creatures of Moominvalley to take up their lives once again. We all carry on.
Books finished this year: 83 (+5)
What else?
I wrote briefly on my blog this month about one of my micro-reviews, the one specifically for Final Fantasy II. It goes like this:
“Secretly an all-timer. A game that asks you to stand up again, no matter how bleak things may seem. Tell your loved ones how you feel, before it's too late.”
It’s probably the best thing I’ve ever written, and it haunts me this month. I lost one of my best and oldest friends this December. I can never again tell him how I feel. But I have to stand up again. I have to carry on. I’ll do so with the memories of his kindness and love in my heart.
My recommendation this month will borrow his words: “You could be dead right now. Go listen to something you love.” Listen to something you love. This could be a song, a TV show, or maybe another person. One day we won’t be able to listen to the things and people we love the most. Listen now, before it’s too late.
Thanks for reading. You can check out what games I’m playing on Backloggd and what books I’m reading on The Storygraph.