Tag: fun

Gaming for Beginners: Stardew Valley

To continue with the trend as of late, I’m going to try another series. As you can imagine by the title, this series will be about gaming. I realized that if someone says video games are “a waste of time” they either 1) Have not played video games or 2) they tried video games, didn’t understand what was going on, got frustrated, and decided video games were stupid. So here I am to help. To remedy the issue, instead of writing reviews geared for those who already play games, I am hand picking games that provide a challenge, have depth, and are easy enough to jump into and enjoy for ANYONE.

Story

So let’s start with stardew valley. The story of Stardew Valley starts out simple enough. You’ve sold your soul to Corporate America and are working at a job you hate just to make ends meet. Sound familiar? Yes, it’s the story of the American Dream! While at the office you remember a letter your grandfather gave you before he died and him saying “open this when life has you in a tizzy”. In the letter, is the deed to the family farm. And thus begins your journey to Stardew Valley.

Gameplay

When you arrive, the farm is a mess. Weeds run rampant and you only have enough money to buy a few crops. Thus begins your first season. You clear land, meet villagers, and tend to your harvest in the hope of having a bigger yield next season to build a farm that Grandpa would be proud of. If you’ve ever fantasized about being a lumberjack, now’s your chance. Instead of growing thousands of pumpkins, plant a thousand trees; once they’re fully grown, chop them down. Want to spend most of your time fishing, use your rod and buy a few crabbing pots along with some bait. Want to hunt monsters all day and be a miner? Buy a sword and grab your pickaxe.

What did I do? Who was/is farmer Mike? I grew bored of planting crops, so instead I built a coop and a barn and had my sheep Ann and my chicken Lucy to keep me company. Then as months turned to years, I built a wine cellar, built a greenhouse (coffee all year round!!!), and grew wheat and hops to make beer. Then I met a villager, fell in love and accomplished what I’ve never been able to do in real life; settle down!

Time

So as you can imagine, this game is quite involved. I failed my marketing final because I had the brilliant idea of buying this game a week before (still got an A in the class). However, this is a game that you could play for 30 minutes, stop, and continue when you have more time. It’s beyond addicting. It has catchy music, beautiful sound effects, a rewarding progress system, and better conversations than you have with your friends in real life. It is a game where you could start playing in the morning, look out the window and realize that the sun has already set, then keep playing till the sun rises again. What’s more, it was developed by one individual during his free time. If you spend money ($15) you’ll be supporting one man who pursued his dreams and made a beautiful piece of art.

Verdict

This game is fun for everyone. If you’re looking for a new hobby, this game is a great starting point. If you’re trying to understand why all your nerd friends would rather sit inside all day than talk to your lovely face, just give this a try. I give this game:

5 out of 5 ripe potatoes: A must play

So there you have it! My first ever video game review! It was a lot of fun to write and hope you enjoyed it as well. I plan to do more in the future and think it’ll be a nice addition to my book and movie reviews. And with any luck, I might even make a game connoisseur out of you yet! As always, thanks for reading! I’ll post a link to the trailer for “Stardew Valley” below and feel free to comment if you have questions!

Stardew Valley Trailer

A thought experiment: Reaching into the void

So I had this idea late at night, went to bed, and still thought it was a great idea when I woke up. Does that make it a great idea? Not at all, but let’s give it a try. So for the last few months I’ve wrote quite a bit but believe it or not, many of my posts have not seen the light of day. So instead of simply discarding the drafts into the trash, I wanted to make a post instead. I took the best lines from each and simply posted them. A few snips here and there and we have a glimpse into my mysterious mind. This is very much what you make of it. The quotes are posted in reverse chronological order so if you want this to be a story, it can. Read it bottom-up or top-down. Or do you find it to be more poetry than story? Really, it’s up to you to decide. I personally am very pleased with how this turned out. so without further ado, enjoy.

As I said earlier, my last week has been nothing but Netflix and chilling. Usually at this point cabin fever starts to set in and the sane start to become insane.  People get guilt tripped into thinking they’re wasting their time. While some experiences may be a waste of time, it all comes down to perspective and how we draw information.

So I’ve been doing some soul searching for the last few months. A lot of big questions with few answers. This idea of knowing who we are, who we will be.

Time. Once gone, it cannot be replaced. No amount of money in the world will buy you more time, another day on this planet. From the day we are born till the day we die we are racing against time.

This is a post about fear, vulnerability, and the future. I am currently unemployed, alone, and still searching for happiness. Happiness can come from fulfilling work, meaningful relationships or any reason in-between.

When I was growing up, the portable cellphone was a novelty and house phones were all too common. That was 1993. Remember floppy disks, then the Walkman, then Zune? The birth of CD’s, the internet as a source of entertainment? Hard to believe that’s all been within the two decades that I’ve been alive.

So I’ve been stumped about a topic for the last week. I keep writing drafts and then shelving those ideas to continue my Netflix spree. I have been home for the last two weeks and forget that my brother and I are yin and yang.

For most of my life it has felt as though something has been missing and every once in a while I’ll get a taste, a flutter of the heart and then an emptiness as the moment passes.

I was terrified of almost everything. Perhaps most so, my future. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what we fear and in the end, how much of a relief it is to face them. I spent a lifetime running from my fears. The one emotion I haven’t been able to conquer is love. Relationships are messy, complicated, and to be honest, don’t seem to be worth the hassle. People are terrified. Do people love because they care or because they are afraid of dying alone?

It’s time to talk about the voice inside the back of our head. The one that leaves words unsaid and gives doubt a field day. Yes, I’m talking about ourselves! As the old adage goes, we are our own worst enemies. We can spend years perfecting who we are only to have our little voice tell us our work isn’t good enough.

Life is made up of little moments and it is in these little moments that we hold our future.

As much as I like to think of myself as a man who has freed himself of his problems, that I have not. For some reason, when life is good, I simply can’t appreciate it. This year I learned to live in the present moment, to appreciate life as it comes. I wanted to be better, so I worked on being vulnerable.

A man of two worlds; the old and the new.

If you like what I write, feel free to share with your friends. And please let me know what you think! The last few months I’ve been playing around with lots of different ideas and so far the reception has been overwhelmingly positive! If you have an idea, comment! And who knows, I might write a post about it. As always, thanks for reading!

The life of a Traveler

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” – Marcel Proust

As I currently plan out my future from now till my death bed, I thought it would be fun to talk a little about travel. A year ago come August, I left for my study abroad experience in Germany. I forced myself to go. College was a time for stepping outside of my comfort soon and becoming the person I always wanted to be.

As it currently stands and as I will say many times, I am making my way North. Portland is a fantastic city and I could live a happy life here but it would not be a fulfilling one. I would wake up one day and ask myself, “is this what childhood Mike would’ve wanted?” The answer would be no. The kid who would dress up in a suit with a clip-on tie for school photos, the kid who, when asked what he wanted to be when he grew up would reply, “successful.”  It would be a dis-service to every dream I’ve ever had and dreams yet dreamt.  Call it cabin fever, call it wanderlust but the world is meant to be explored.

Life is not measured in the things we own but rather the experiences we have. And as it would come to argue, it is much easier to create new experiences when you’re on the move.

I lived 5 years in Corvallis, Oregon for College so Portland is a nice change. Yet imagine Seattle. Then Vancouver, Canada, then Quebec. Spend a few years in France, then Germany, Austria? That’s the life people envy.

And perhaps we can broaden our definition of traveler. Why limit it to the scope of a geographic location? The reason I love travel is the immersion. I’ve always wondered what it’s like to see the world through someone else’s eyes and am sure many have felt the same, if only for a fleeting moment.

If you’re in Germany, you drink beer. France, you drink wine, smoke slim cigarettes and eat snail. Jokes aside, there is a reason I still practice German. There’s a reason I started learning French. It’s a connection through language.

There’s literally no point in staying put. Take a good friend of mine for example. He majored in chemistry and minored in dance. Guess which degree he uses the most? Dance. I envy him. That’s fulfilling. To go against the tide of others expectations and do what you love. Some spend a lifetime searching and even then…

I think we could all use a little more dance in our life. I’m not talking about black-out drunk, making questionable life choices dancing. I’m talking about something a little more elegant, a waltz. Or perhaps a tango, cha-cha, etc. A little spice, a little fire. Travel fulfills. No one became great from staying exactly who they were. They might become good enough, but does that really sound like a life worth living?

So go travel. Start with a country and then evolve. Through a dart at a map and buy a one way plane ticket. Terrified of a country? Pick a city, a town, a new friend. Start somewhere. Who knows, life might just surprise you.

Thanks for reading! If you like what I write, be sure to follow and tell your friends. Feel free to comment below. Talk about travel, bestow wisdom, anything.

The curious case of Michael Cole: A tale into the art of being stuck

So it’s time for my evolution. Like a Pokémon, I’ve leveled up enough to become someone else, something else. But what is that something? That’s what we’re going to explore today because as of right now, I’m stuck and yet I’m free. If I were to take from 1984, I would call this doublethink, the idea that I can be two seemingly contradictory things at the same time. I got my degree and my tunnel vision has been lifted. And while I’m happy right now, I’m not satisfied, I’m not fulfilled. Call it a quarter life crisis where I must choose my future. I have knowledge yet I don’t know where to apply it. Call this my therapy, writing words on paper (so to speak). A public brainstorm if you will.

Goals

What goals do I have? As a newly graduated college student, it’s tough. I was so eager to hit the reset button that I didn’t realize what that meant. It’s one thing to think, it’s a whole different story to live. My goals, as ambitious as they have been, have been achieved and now I can create a set of new goals, both short term and long term. Short term is easy, catch up on Supergirl, The Flash, Arrow, and Legends of Tomorrow. But long-term? Oh my, that’s much tougher. I think my main issue is assembling my team, my inner circle if you will. My most trusted, most competent friends that will follow me as I build my empire. I never thought I’d achieve independence yet here I am. The problem is now I must seek interdependence. The collaboration of brilliant minds, to create ideas that I cannot even fathom at this moment. That is the dream, yet how do I get there, that is the question. This is a new challenge. A college degree was the ticket to my future and now that I have that ticket, now I have to figure out what train to board. Sales, marketing, management, research, writing; I want to do it all. Yet how? I am great at answering the “why” yet the “how” is always something I’ve struggled with. I want stability yet I also want the unpredictable, the exciting moments that come from branching out.

Can we have it all?

I believe the answer to this question is yes. That’s the “why”, the question is the “how”. And it is OK to say I don’t know but personally I like shortcuts. People say there are no shortcuts in life yet that’s not entirely true. We have so much information at our disposal that answers are simply a google search away. Yes, you’ll still need to work for what you want, but we save a lot of time nowadays with our connected world. So this is an exploration topic. If we can have it all, what are the right questions? Depends on the situation. Yet there has to be a standard and with all the books I’ve read, I still haven’t found a universal law or standard. Yet this is the wild west, the exploration of the human mind. Understanding what makes us human. So what does? Love, human connection. That’s all fine and dandy yet it’s easy to implement. It’s a necessity, not a solution. Altruism? Giving more to others than you give to yourself? Noble, but unfortunately is not a philosophy that will lead to long-term happiness. Creativity? Yes, perhaps, but how? People say creativity is lost and yet I don’t think that to be true. I believe creativity to be ever present and that people have simply closed their minds (whether knowingly or not). So let’s start there for the rules to set in place.

The Rules

And perhaps the rules don’t have to be in chronological order. So how does one spark creativity? I recently experienced burnout. I love learning so I didn’t think one was possible for me. Yet towards the end of College, I couldn’t seem to keep myself engaged. I was successful and it bored me, who would’ve thought? And now I search for more answers. The creativity question just recently popped into my head. That perhaps my problem isn’t in what I can do but rather in the fact that my mind is dry. Interesting concept. At this point I would be considered incredibly smart, handsome, and funny (sarcasm, I’m not that much of an egomaniac) and yet it’s not enough. Why? The creativity, or diversity of ideas problem. If you keep achieving you have to constantly improve otherwise you risk being trapped in The Void. You reach a new level of being and if you cannot stretch the mind, you cannot innovate and you cannot create. The solution? The rules? Oh, that is the question! And I’d say it’s as simple as acknowledging this fact. That creativity is always there and that all you simply have to do is take the plunge, the Great Dive. And that you do not dive once but you keep diving until the day you die for once you fear the plunge… Then you cease to live and forever remain in The Void…

Thanks for reading! Hopefully you enjoyed my musing and exploration in today’s post! As far as the coming weeks, months, etc. I am looking for ideas. Eventually I want to have a team of writers but for now it is still just I, with all the intimacy you’ve come to expect. In the next week or two I might start pumping out reviews and recommendations or I may not. I need to refine my writing process and I’m starting to develop systems to do so. Expect better content as the blog grows and I’m glad you could join me on this journey! Questions, thoughts, ideas? Feel free to post below!