I am finally done.

What a nice rainy night!

Book maintenance

The weeks had passed swiftly. I had worked in the day and at night at home. During weekends, I cleaned the study, re-arranged the books on the shelves. There were two decades of grime and dirt. Many books were stained. Time had gone by in an eyeblink. I should have a more regular maintenance programme to look after the books.

The shelves were finally done, now, just a few hundred books to wipe clean.

I am lethargic. I am trying to do some work.

Trying out games

As I do have a vast backlog of unplayed games, I spent time trying them out lately.

I have tried Master of Orion (remake), Halo: Spartan Strike, Halo: Spartan Assault, Townsmen: A King Rebuilt, Stronghold Crusader 2, Star Control: Origins, Order of Battle: World War II, Payday 2, Railroad Empire.

I have decided to stop trying out games and also playing them for a period of time. I want to read!

Conan Unconquered has been tedious and aggravating. The upkeep for each succeeding building is impossible. It makes it rather not fun to play. I have set it to easy and I had meant to finish it once and uninstall it after.

A tale within a tale

"Tony & Susan" is a powerful, absorbing psychological novel of anger, repressed feelings and betrayal. The narrative voice entrices, compells and lures one into the tale of murder, anguish and justice in "Nocturnal Animals" while in parallel, examines the thoughts and feelings of the reader, being Susan. The fact that the novel is titled "Tony & Susan" and not "Edward & Susan" is indicative. One of the central themes examined was that of passiveness and letting events and people sweep one by. The powerful character studies within does make this disturbing novel a worthwhile read. Recommended.

Note: This work is not a thriller. This is a literary novel. If one reads it expecting a supermarket thriller, one would be severely disappointed.

The size of things

Drawing on paper of different sizes does force one to think differently. The shape and size of the canvas can dictate the composition for a given piece.

I found an unfinished piece of a space from five years ago on a piece of A3 paper. The very size had expanded my imagination in ways that an A4 canvas could never do. I was astonished at what I had drawn, it would suggest that I was of a different mindset and mentality, perhaps even a different person from five years ago. Of course, I am the same person, yet, the thoughts in my mind and what my mind had conjured then...

Dreams of a city

It is not often that I draw on A3 sheets, I draw mainly on A4 sheets. It has been years since I drew on such a large piece of paper. I took out a A3 pad earlier and looked at a pencil rendition of a city which I drew about five or six years ago. Two of the buildings were in ink while the rest were in pencils, the city was about 90% complete. I will continue at a leisurely pace and complete it. I like what I see.

I have frequently been astonished by what I had imagined in the past.

Time flies. I read in the day and work at night.

I have cut down on gaming in favour of reading. I did give Cliff Empire a try. I can't see much game in that game but the building design is appealing. The artist is to be commended. As for gameplay, I am not sure.

Tonight, I will rush at least 300 entries for work, 300 write-ups. I will also need to do some market research to assist the company.

Fading Eagle: Politics and Decline of Britain's Post-War Air Force

Fading Eagle: Politics and Decline of Britain's Post-War Air Force by Ian Watson is a chatty and meandering narrative of the decline of the post-war RAF which doesn't really provide any new insight into what is already known, the dwindling budget of a fading empire.

The writer is knowledgeable, but in most of the volume, he is mostly bemoaning the fact of the RAF's decline. 

Siege of Centauri

I finished Siege of Centauri last night. I bought the game just a few days back. It is a tower defence game. The game is well made and polished. It has a science fiction theme. By its nature, tower defence is a fantastical notion, not really anchored in reality, thus it lends itself well to science fiction, fantasy and horror themes. I came upon the tower defence games late. I have played a handful over the years, the best being Deathtrap, created by the makers of the Van Helsing action RPG games.

The Siege of Centauri is a tower defence games of building turrets. It is straight forward in that sense, one does not get mobile forces to sally forth and engage enemies, one does not have to build prerequisite buildings to get others. In any case, the map designs do not lend itself to that. Instead, one gets the usual turrets or towers, those beginning basic damage dealing ones, the medium damage dealing ones, the ones that slow the enemy, the ones that does long range damage, the ones that does damage affecting and area and more.

The graphics are attractive, the design aspects of the hardware are convincing. As for the story about posthumans and all, and also the narrative arc, I am not too sure. It seems unresolved and contrived.

The gameplay is just right without being overly difficult which is a pleasure to play. There is a tendency for games these days to be overly hard and tedious, with the Darkest Dungeon, XCOM1 and XCOM2 being the worst, shameful offenders. I finished all the scenarios in normal with the exception of three. This doesn't count as a normal finish as I didn't get the "achievement". Some scenarios did require a few tries. As for difficulty levels, it is flexible, it has a gauge allowing one to tweak the difficulty level as to what one is comfortable with. The game requires positioning, careful thought and planning based on the composition of the coming enemies and the direction of their approach, and lastly, the turrets chosen and what to upgrade.

All in all, it is a good game, I enjoyed Siege of Centauri. I would recommend it.

I will return to Conan Unconquered in time to come. The Conan tower defence game has a lot of tension and the upkeep aspect, the command point aspect and the population aspect are tedious. I will also be looking at They are Billions.

Monsoon season

The weather has fluctuated a fair bit lately. The last three weeks has seen Singapore visited by thunderstorms and scorching hot weather. Even as I type, I can hear rumbling thunder.

Warframe

I was telling Kun Rong earlier about trying out Warframe for the first time last night. I installed Warframe a few years ago. It was a 2013 release. I only played it for the first time last night. Warframe is about warframes, another word for powersuits. It has been constantly updated. When I looked at the graphics, I was blown away from first impressions. I gather this would be rather commonplace these days. In any case, environmental design has come a long way. I played it once last night and finished the introduction and one mission. I find that I can play this without getting nauseous which is great. However, the third person shooter perspective is exhausting. It feels like Guild Wars 2 and Dauntless in that aspect. I think I will stop at this point.

It is a good game from first impressions, no doubt about that. However, it is exhausting. I don't like leaping off walls like parkour or something to that effect and trying to get up higher levels. I had seen that in Titanfall. It is a good game but just not for me.