And its already Summer 2025
Oh boy, where to even begin. Apparently the last post I published was for Comic Hunters back in March 23rd. So what even happened?
Video Games
Cruiserweight Raid Tier
At the start of April I joined a raid group that usually does 3 days a week, Tuesday through Thursday. So that took up a lot of my free time.
Some fun glamour themes, switching it up from week to week.
We also got stuck on M6S for like 8 weeks, so that was a tiresome struggle. Thankfully we've been clearing it more consistently and M7S prog has been a lot faster comparatively, we've seen enrage a few times now.
Plus some fun memes and moments to be had.
Dragon Age: The Veilguard
I decided to pick up and play Dragon Age: The Veilguard due to past interest in the series. Reminds me that I never got to finish Inquisition. Apparently I left off at the end of Part 10, so hopefully this one is one that I finished.
Blue Prince
Probably best indie puzzle game of the year, take Myst and turn it into a roguelite game. It's truly impressive just how much depth there is to the game. So many details to keep track of, you'll want to be taking notes for everything in this game.
I ended up watching playthroughs by PointCrow and SmallAnt, so while I may not end up finishing the game fully myself I still got to enjoy it through streamers.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Mine and Xereden's personal game of the year for sure, a masterpiece of gaming. It's like a fusion of Persona style turn based battle mixed with dodge and parry mechanics of Souls-like and theming reminiscent of Elden Ring. It's a theatrical whirlwind of an epic journey through this world.
One thing that made it really enjoyable was memeing with and sharing the journey with Xereden since we were basically in lock step story wise as we went through it.
Legends of Runeterra
Big hype for the June patch for Legends of Runeterra, where my favorite champion, Sett, got his upgraded constellation. So I played a ton of Runeterra during this time.
I was happily surprised with how much they added to the new event, including text dialogue and new mechanics that fit the adventure's theme.
Some of Sett's dialogue in the new adventure.
The new champions have been really great too, Twisted Fate and Akshan have been fun to play, and the new draft format has been an interesting addition to Runeterra.
Date Everything
A cute game of turning objects in your house into datable beings. It's a wonder that they got so many voice actors for the 100+ characters in the game.
Honkai: Star Rail
There was the anniversary event, got to have my letter from Blade. I think they finally understood people were unhappy with how messages from Blade weren't from him but from other Stellaron Hunters, so at least this one can be a direct one.
Fun Astral Tales event featuring Jing Yuan.
Phainon was recently released so I definitely had to get him.
Events
In general, weekends were spent visiting friends or other small things going on. We went to see the Sakura Trees at University of Washington. It was crazy busy and packed.
What was really awesome was we went to the local shops and one of them, Pink Gorilla Games, actually had a GameCube GameBoy Advanced adapter that Fergus was looking for. So we bought it on the spot.
There was Sakura-Con in April, our first going to this anime convention.
The lines for registration were crazy long. Went to an FF XIV Trivia show. And on Sunday saw a local orchestra perform.
Husky Taekwondo Demo Team
The unfortunate highlight was that on Saturday there was a fire at the Cheesecake Factory across the street of the Arch building, which closed the Artist Alley for most of the day. Thankfully it was able to be opened later in the afternoon.
May we went to Vikingfest and ran into a friend that I knew from Microsoft through the LGBT Xbox Gaming group.
Part of the Strongman competition.
The next weekend was the Folklife Festival that we went to in Seattle Center with friends. There was also the opening of the 2 Line extension into Redmond Downtown.
The start of June was a big highlight for me, it was the prerelease of the Final Fantasy x Magic: The Gathering cross over. I ended up getting all the regular commander decks and 3 whole booster boxes of cards. It's been a joy to see one of my favorite game series come to life in this card game.
My lucky pull during prerelease. And when opening packs, I found it really cute that Amborisa and Torgal were right next to each other.
Opening all the packs in MtG: Arena.
And to finish it off, we went to Pridefest at the end of June.
Board Games
Not that I didn't play board games here and there, but taking the time to evaluate new ones or even finish the drafts for Galactic Cruise, The Great Wall and others didn't get prioritized. April and May were light, with only 2 and 5 games played respectively. But there have been some notable highlights. Particularly in June when I got Earthborne Rangers in. Already a little over half way done with my solo campaign but it very much has captured my attention. So definitely expect a full blog post for that one. And in May we started our campaign for Primal: The Awakening. I think if/when we resume that I'll be able to make a post for it.
We also reconnected with friends and played Nunatak: Temple of Ice, Knarr as well as plays of Earth and Money with others.
More to come
So yeah, just a lot of life stuff that put the board game reviews on pause. I've contemplated doing more stuff like there where just general life events and interesting stuff. Sort of like just journaling in general to get my thoughts down. But we'll see. In any case, I'll be trying to resume my board game reviews.
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