This June begins my summer shutdown from work and includes a bevy of wonderful things, the Steam Summer Sale, anyone? I just made a move at work, albeit for the better. I think this will mesh better with my personality. I’m going back to the land of production control, to a world of OEMs and new old stock. I’ve been returning to study an old passion of mine: chess, the game of kings. (Thank you, Netflix!)
System Shock on PC: After making the switch to the new PC, I had to reinstall this all over again to play it. Unfortunately (but then maybe not so unfortunately) Nightdive updated and patched the game so much, I had to start all over again. Fortuitously, the old adage, “If I could just go back in time, knowing what I know now,” actually works in the world of PC gaming (if only we could use it in RL!). So, I’m getting close to where I left off when I first started playing it. This is still a game that upon donning a set of cans, cutting the lights, and cranking the volume up, washes into a dreamy neon cyber existence in another world. There’s no handholding or guideposts here. Welcome to gaming in the early 1990s.
Some Kind of Wonderful on Blu-Ray: John Hughes knew the world of a teenager perhaps better than any other filmmaker in existence. And this particular movie has always been near and dear to my heart. The theme song, “Turn to the Sky” by the March Violets has been my ring tone for over a decade. This was Eric Stoltz at his best, coming fresh off Mask with Cher. And this is the movie that developed my forever crush on Mary Stuart Masterson. With Leah Thompson in the casting as well, this was a perfect vehicle for John Hughes. A big shoutout should go out to my sister, Lisa Nogelmeier for turning my attentions to this movie in the first place.
Tropico 5 on Steam: I’ve tried to tackle this game multiple times. It’s fun, but so overtly difficult I finally had to give up and uninstall it. Doh! Playing as a South American dictator started out being a blast, but having people constantly revolt, and not having any direction as to what to do next. I’ve always been part purist and part masochist. I will trudge on through a game come hell or high water to get it beat. I have to face the fact there are some games simply impossible (for me.) Tropico 5 was one such game. Time to move on!
Anno 1800 on Steam: And move on, I did. I bought the deluxe version of this game when it came out. It’s a beautiful city builder, taking place in the early 1800s. Imagine a lavish child’s playset made of shiny brass and silver. That’s what this game is. The water looks pristine, and the waves crashing against shore look as if you have a little piece of the ocean in your computer. The wood details on the ships are amazing looking, and the ambient fauna and foliage add to the whole artificial but realistic environment. It’s on sale on Steam for the summer event at an incredibly reduced price right now, too.
The Queen’s Gambit on Netflix: I am and always have been late to the party. I finally watched this, or rather binge watched it with Mrs. Burton. Even though she has no knowledge of the game of chess (and has no desire to learn it) she found the series as compelling as I did. This awakened in me a whole new rekindling of my desire to play the game, especially when I saw that Bruce Pandolfini (who coached real life chess grandmaster Josh Waitzkin who you remember from the movie, Searching for Bobby Fischer) was a consultant to the movie. Taking place in the 1960s and 1970s this movie had no clear-cut anachronisms. The style of everything, the environment, the cars, the soundtrack (especially) was spot on.
The Searchers on Blu Ray: A grandiose John Ford western in the truest sense. The sweeping sets in glorious VistaVision were commonplace in the 1950s and this film is a testament to how amazing these films look. The film was a critical and commercial success. Since its release, it has come to be considered a masterpiece and one of the greatest and most influential films ever made. It was named the greatest American Western by the American Film Institute in 2008, and it placed 12th on the same organization's 2007 list of the 100 greatest American movies of all time. Entertainment Weekly also named it the best Western. The British Film Institute's Sight & Sound magazine ranked it as the seventh-best film of all time based on a 2012 international survey of film critics and in 2008, the French magazine Cahiers du Cinéma ranked The Searchers number 10 in their list of the 100 best films ever made. In 1989, The Searchers was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the United States Library of Congress, and selected for preservation in its National Film Registry; it was one of the first 25 films selected for the registry.
Assetto Corsa Competizione on Steam: Probably the “prettiest” racing game I’ve ever had grace my computer, this concentrates on the GT3 Racing Series, and boy howdy does it! I had played it before, but again, this is a game that once I reinstalled it on my new rig, my saves were wiped. I had to start over again. Fortunately, I was only 15% of the way through it, heh, so not much was lost. After two races in career mode, I’m already past it. These cars are low slung, ground hugging tornadoes, and driving one is like riding a tamed rodeo bull.
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