issue 7: a bit more adult
Hello and welcome back. This is Issue 7 of “a bit of bird words” and I’m writing this to the sound of some very chatty sparrows. It’s been a good winter for birdwatching—we saw our first owl, for instance.
But what did this bird play and read in February? (It’s me, I’m the bird.)
Game of the month: Persona 3 Portable
ATLUS, 2009 (PlayStation Portable)
I’ve always enjoyed RPGs, but the Megami Tensei games—and the subseries Shin Megami Tensei, and the sub-sub-series Persona—have always eluded me a bit. I’ve started Personas 4 and 5 at least twice each, but have never played past the first dungeon. Something about these games never “clicked” for me.
Persona 3 finally clicked.
I started off playing this game last year, in fact, as part of a game club on the insert credit forums. Basically, we played this game as close to synced to the real-world calendar as we could, since the Persona games have an in-game calendar. This is how I played Boku no Natsuyasumi 2 in January as well, but I will tell you: this is a miserable way to play Persona and a guarantee you will forget what is happening as you go.
However, it was good for giving me some level of structure for playing the game, so I’m grateful for that.
What to say about Persona 3 itself? I enjoyed the game flow of dungeon crawling mixed into daily social life, enjoyed the characters that make up your party throughout the game, enjoyed contemplating the way these kids would gladly choose to fight, to have a chance at survival, rather than accept things as they are. The ending was “very anime” as described to my partner, and I mean that with sincere love, because anime understands that the entire world being at stake is how it feels for teens. It’s easy to make fun of media from Japan constantly raising the stakes to end on “teenagers kill God,” but that is adulthood, isn’t it? We kill our metaphorical gods—our parents—and become adults in our own right. The interesting question is what we do once we have become gods (adults) ourselves.
Games finished this year: 7 (+3)
Book of the month: A Court of Mist and Fury
Sarah J. Maas, 2016
I started reading the A Court of Thorns and Roses series on a recommendation from a colleague; I was vaguely aware of the series prior to that, but knew effectively nothing before jumping in.
I actually read the first book last month, but it did not “wow” me in a way I was expecting. But I still decided to press on with the next books. Mist and Fury is the second book in the series, and it absolutely blows all the others out of the water.
Without saying too much, Mist and Fury is, effectively, a kind of “after ever after” in its setup. It tackles trauma and how traumatized people can hurt themselves and each other, tied in with the challenges and pain of finding love after love.
Also, just as a forewarning, if you choose to read this, be prepared for a lot of heteronormative sex. The lack of romantic and sexual diversity is noticeable, especially after reading the third book, where it feels like Maas suddenly remembered gay people exist and throws a bunch at us. On one hand, I don’t necessarily mind—I read the best smut from fanfiction authors anyway, and a lot of my shelf is sapphic fantasy-romance—but on the other, I would have hoped for better. But I’ll give Maas some credit: she managed to write a character that felt perfectly tailor-made for me, and I deeply enjoyed watching the growing romance in this book.
Books finished this year: 6 (+3)
What else?
February was a quiet month, which I know I’ll be glad for, because March and April are packed. The most interesting thing this month is that I purchased another journal, this one with the express purpose of being a daily language journal. I write something in Swedish every day and he proofreads it for me. I hope that this, combined with perhaps watching some nature documentaries in Swedish, will improve my language skills.
My recommendation for you this month is to read some fanfiction! There are so many works available on places like AO3 that you are guaranteed to find something you like, and make sure to toss the author a kudos or comment.
Thanks for reading. You can check out what games I’m playing on Backloggd and what books I’m reading on The Storygraph.