A Self-Proclaimed Dreamer

     Hey friends, I think I would be making a wild understatement here if I were to tell you that the Paper Mario franchise has had some weird steps. The series began with two solid turn-based RPGs, then an action RPG/Platformer, then a couple RPGs with linear pathways, limited characterization, and terrible battle mechanics, followed by a game with great world building, but still pretty bad battle mechanics. In the year 2024, to the joy of everyone, Nintendo announced a full remake of what many consider the crown jewel of the franchise, Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door.  It was a great game when I played it as a kid, but I never beat it back then, the final boss was just too hard for me. This is probably because I didn't understand how RPGs worked, so hopefully I'll have an easier time going through it this time around. Everyone hop on the boat, we're headed for the seedy town of Rogueport today! Just Another Normal Adventure for Mario!     Paper Mario: The Thousand Y

     Hey friends, it's rare that a game will come out and it just so completely resonates with me that I almost have to play the whole thing as soon as possible, but that's what happened last week. Astro Bot was released on September 6th, and it was a joy to play through from beginning to end. There are very few games of this quality and genre that aren't put out by Nintendo, and it's such a delight to see Sony not only putting out an excellent 3D Platformer, but also appealing to nostalgia and making a connection between these older franchises and some younger fans. It's time to board the PS5-shaped ship, friends, because it's time to go to space with Astro and his friends! An Intergalactic Quest!     Astro Bot is the sequel to the PS5 pack-in game, Astro's Playroom,  which functioned as a tech demo for the console itself as well as what the DualSense controller could do. Even though the PS5 has been out for four years now, it's still probably the bes

     Hey friends, I have a question for you all today. How do you know when you're ready to take the next step? In any situation, be it a romantic relationship, a job that you want to become more involved with, a project that you want to do, how do you know when you're ready for it? Sometimes these realizations come in moments where things seem the bleakest that they've ever looked, when a change has to be made, or you'll be crushed. In the smash box office hit, Frozen 2, Anna faces a similar situation.      Elsa is dead, Olaf has come undone without Elsa's magic, Kristoff hasn't been in the movie for the past 40 minutes because the writers didn't know what to do with him in this film. Anna doesn't know if there's any way back from what has occurred to her friends or family, her life seems completely hopeless. It would be so easy for her to just give in to the feeling of helplessness and just cry, but instead she focuses on the need to keep going and

      Hey friends, lots of gaming news coming out every week, huh? This week, we got a Nintendo Partner Showcase and an Indie World showcase back to back, so I thought it would be good to spend a little time going over some of the announcements that were shared this week as well. This presentation was only 40 minutes with the two segments combined, so I should be able to be a little more short-winded than I have been on some topics. I'm almost hoping for less gaming news next week because there has been so much recently, I've only been able to write about that for a while! Thanks for hanging with me while I focus so much time on my favorite topic. Two shows for the price of one!     This is the first time that Nintendo has ever combined two of their smaller showcases into one big showing, and I feel like it went over really well! The two best announcements for me were definitely getting Pizza Tower and a DS Castlevania collection on switch right after the presentation. Indie

      Well friends, we're still in news mode for video games, and Gamescom just kicked off in Germany this week. Geoff Keighley was on the scene Tuesday night to have the Opening Night Live showcase, and while the show went on for two full hours, there weren't all that many announcements that caught my attention. I'm hoping that this will be a slightly shorter affair than some of my previous write-ups have been for that reason, but there was a lot of stuff shown! Let's get started, and I'll point out some things that stuck out to me from the two-hour long event. Another Geoff Keighley Production!     In a sense, it's good to see something headed up by Geoff Keighley, since I've learned that most of the things that he focuses on (which is to say the companies that pay him) are not the types of games and experiences that will super appeal to me. There are a lot of shooters, strategy games, town building, Overwatch and other MOBA (Massive Online Battle Arena)

       Hey there, friends! Do you smell the excitement in the air? That means it's D23 time once again, and while it did happen this past weekend, I would like to spend some time this week to talk about some of my favorite announcements! In case you're not familiar, D23 is a convention that takes place every 2 years or so, where the Walt Disney Company announces the newest ideas for upcoming films as well as attractions for the Parks and Cruise Line. Let's go ahead and dive into the film roster... made up of a lot of sequels with a few original products sprinkled in. A lot of folks have thoughts on that, but we'll see how they go! From "WDW News Today" Coming Soon to Theaters Near You (or Disney Plus)     We got a lot of titles being announced in the presentation for all of the movie news along with some movies that are coming out this year and a bit sooner. We'd be here all day if I listed all of the information that we got for these things, but I'll