PixlBit

I'm with you, Joe. I much prefer Sunshine to 64. It's not a popular opinion, but it's the 3D Mario game with the best level of challenge, and the greatest degree of control. You can do amazing things with FLUDD once you understand the mechanics and the levels where it's taken away are some of my favorite 3D platforming challenges ever.

Super Mario 64 is a fine game and I love it too, but Sunshine totally eclipsed it for me and I'd choose to play Sunshine over it any day.

I'll definitely have to check out the video. I really loved Breath of the Wild, but I agree that it's very dissimilar to the more traditional 3D Zeldas.

I think my biggest disappointment was the lack of proper dungeons. I liked the shrines and all that, but the divine beast "dungeons" were mostly pretty easy and didn't really scratch that dungeon itch. That being said, I love the game for what it is, but I'd love to see them bring the scope in a bit, add major dungeons, and do another adventure on this engine. I'm hoping we'll see something akin to what Majora's Mask was to Ocarina of Time.

This year has been absurd so far. Going to play Yooka-Laylee today, which I'm super stoked for. Persona 5 is sitting on my shelf just waiting patiently and I also just picked up Nioh for $30 yesterday. I still also have the second DS3 DLC waiting, which I've heard tons great about. I have no idea how I'm going to get to all these games.

And yeah, Nier looks incredible and the demo was phenomenal. I decided to just wait on that because the queue is already out of control.

SO EXCITED MY BODY IS READY

I used to be a movie person back in High School. I guess it was a thing to do with my friends, so we'd catch pretty much anything that came out. It was $5 for a movie back then, so it always felt reasonable. These days, it's crazy how much it costs to see a movie. Tickets are $13+ for a matinee showing here and for a family of 5, that's an insane price for, what, 2 hours of entertainment?

That aside, I'm just not super into TV/Movies these days. I watch the Marvel movies and the Marvel Netflix shows, as well as South Park and that's it. Whenever there's a movie on at home, I find myself consistently losing interest and fishing for my phone to do pretty much anything else. There's always the rare movie here or there that will catch my interest and hold it, but generally those are few and far between.

I will say though, when there is a good crowd at the theater it can make all the difference. Opening night for Snakes on a Plane is one of my fondest movie-going experiences ever. Me, Chessa, and a group of our friends all went to see it after a huge build up period. The show was sold out and it was at midnight. At the time, I was in college, so of course, we all snuck in copious amounts of liquor (as did basically every else in the theater). Between the ridiculousness of the movie and colored commentary from the crowd, I was laughing so hard it hurt for the entire duration of the movie. If every movie-going experience was like that, I'd have a hard time saying no to go to the theater, regardless of the price.

This book is awesome! Chessa got it for me for Christmas and I basically read it to my kids one chapter at a time every night, voices for the characters and all. We had a ton of fun with it.

I agree wholeheartedly though; these days Nintendo would never make something like that. There's tons of adult humor and topics they'd stay far away from today. The games still have the soul, but Nintendo's image (and their characters) are so tightly curated these days that something like this would be completely neutered if it were published now.

I know your story well, Julian. Puberty did me no favors, along with somewhat typical teenage depression. I ballooned up in High School and hated that I was no longer the stick I was in my younger days. Senior year I finally got my shit together and started working out every other day and I got down to a solid 170... then college started and I gained 100 lbs. Soda, junk food, and repeat depression due to the challenges of school amongst a slew of other things just ruined me.

Before getting married I managed to drop 80 lbs. The doctor basically told me I was borderline for getting diabetes and that was enough to scare me into doing something about my habits. Since then I've managed to keep pretty consistent between 190 and 210. Primarily, I cut soda out of my diet and started eating simpler meals that were high in protein so I'd stay full and eat less. I also started running, which hasn't really done a tremendous amount for my weight, but generally speaking, just makes me feel better both physically and mentally.

Weight control is still something I feel like I struggle with every day and the pull to fall off routine just never seems to go away. It's really frustrating, so I know how you feel. Getting started is always the hardest part, but hopefully you can hit stride and get better. Best of luck to you man, I've got faith that you can do it!

I'm about 20 hours in on this. Another 135 hours seems so crazy. I wonder if I'll have the lasting power to make it all the way through.

I've been wanting to do some sort of embedded IM system for a while. Hopefully I can figure it out. Notifications on all article types is definitely in the mix though. I've already got a plan on how that feature will happen for anything posted to the site.