I want to like Horizon Zero Dawn (HZD), but I can’t. I tried. I’m wondering why it took me so long to give it up.

A greedy CEO of a mega-corporation builds powerful robots. The Robots become self-sustained and decide to do away with humanity. Humans realize their mistake too late and nuke the planet (I’m not sure about that last part yet, but I’m taking a wild guess). Apocalypse happens. A hero emerges some 100 years later. Bla bla, humans are now nature friendly, bla bla bad guys dig up an old technology and start all over again, bla bla, what’s the lesson to be learned, kids? It’s a formula that works, so why change anything?

Yet another case of a beautiful open world with very little to do in it. Walls you can climb are highlighted (what I’d like to know is who placed climbing cables in glowing yellow on the outside of a skyscraper after the apocalypse?) The space between metal beams can be big enough for a bus to get through, yet an invisible wall blocks your path. The navigation system keeps nagging you like an overbearing parent, so you can’t even entertain the thought of getting lost.

My favorite annoyance: there’s exactly one kind of bush across the different biomes of this vast open world you can hide in. You can find it in deserts, jungles, and frozen mountaintops. No other thing in this game will hide you, not even a thick bunker wall.

I stopped playing this game twice before: once after a boss I couldn’t beat (there were none of them bushes to hide in), the other due to poor framerate that made a fight with a translucent enemy impossible. I should learn to trust my instincts. No matter how many people admire a game, if it doesn’t work for me, it doesn’t work for me.

If you go to the first page of this blog, you will notice something odd. There are some old posts (dating back to 2018) with a big gap leading back to 2022.

This is because I started pulling posts from my old blog. For the most part, I copied the old post as they appeared originally. This is despite the fact some of them make me cringe; some of them are terribly written.

Some posts won’t make it over here and will end up on the wiki, while others won’t make it at all. Who knows, maybe I’ll be able to find some older posts still (from before the days of TAONAW) and add them as well.

I’m on a train heading to Pennsylvania. We were stuck in New Jersey for an hour or so. Some complications with the power lines involving balloons, a parade, and people with too much alcohol in their blood in honor of St. Patrick. The ride takes 3.5 hours as is, so I’ve had more than enough time to contemplate what’s on my mind.

It’s been busy at work. Not just the actual labor; there was a lot of mental effort. We have a finite amount of energy each day, and we tend to underestimate how much of it we spend on things we don’t fully grasp. It’s one thing to evaluate a 3-hour project in terms of time and money, but how do you evaluate it in terms of mental energy? You can’t bullet-point energy units, and it can be difficult to know when you stopped autopiloting and wandered into brainstorming land. Comparing the mental “cost” of one project to another is hard as well; we don’t have a catalog explaining that “all projects in X category cost Y energy bottles.”

When we’re sick, we go see a doctor, get medicine, and take a day off of work. But when we’re mentally depleted we shrug it off and keep going. Why is a “mental day” considered a privilege still for most people?

I’m far from being the first one to ask such questions, but I realize I owe myself to ask them more often. I’m just tired. A bit of a rest, a walk in the sun, good music - and I’m recharged. Good to go. Medicine for the mind.

Today I beat the Fire Bellowback in the Sigma vault in Horizon Zero Dawn. The boss’s weapon: stressful mash-button panic that makes me rage-quit a game and not pick it up for months, if at all. This time, I emerged victorious.

Games 🎮 can teach you life lessons. Hades, a game you have to try right now if you haven’t, (seriously, stop reading, buy and download it, and come back after you’ve died several times) is a masterpiece lesson in never giving up. I don’t think I would beat the Fireback if it wasn’t for the daddy issues in Hades (If you play it you’ll understand).

Facing fears is a lesson no game taught me better than Subnautica (turns out I have a phobia of being under seawater). A game about accepting death? Try What Remains of Edith Finch. Regrets and leaving a better world behind you for those you learn to care about? Try RDR2. In my opinion, the game succeeded where many movies failed.

That’s not to say there aren’t some terrible games out there (actually, I’m not a big fan of HZD, I think it has many issues), but even the bad ones can have some gold nuggets with things to teach you to become a better version of yourself.

When I was a teenager, my parents told me I’ll “grow out” of playing games when I’m older. I’m glad that’s one of the items on the “you won’t do or be X when your older” list, for sure. I don’t think I’ll ever stop playing games or cherish what they have to offer.