.: so comes snow after fire :.

I'm back! There weren't any updates lately because it was a boring week. :D

I still have that stupid cough, but my doctor prescribed me a cough syrup that seems to be slowly doing the trick. It's got a lot of plants in it, and it tastes like melted cough drops. As in, not good. Everytime I take it, it makes me smack my tongue and lips like dogs do with peanut butter. Yikes. Luckly the weather has been wonderful lately, with fresh winds and the occasional rain at night, and beautiful clear days, so I haven't turned the air conditioning on in days. That's doing wonders for my throat. ^^

In fandom news, they pushed back Steven Universe, so now it'll come back in September. Luckly Gravity Falls is still coming back in two days, and I'm so excited I've watched and re-watched the teaser A LOT. I can't wait. *____* I've also started a new Dragon Age Inquisition game, as a friend assured me the party banter was finally fixed. Took them a whole year but yes, it works. I've decided to do a completist run (or something close). I was very, very disappointed by the ending, but I loved the rest of it (although to be fair that made the ending even more soul-crashing frustrating), so I'm focusing on the parts I liked, and enjoying finally hearing my characters talking. I'm playing as a female Qunari mage, and loving being taller than anyone else. :D There isn't much else different to her, because the main character suffers of little to no characterization no matter which way you look at it, but it's still fun to play as a mage. I chose Knight Enchanter as my specialization because its abilities allow me to be invincible and super powerful at level 12, and that's awesome. And also because I dislike Vivienne deeply and I much prefer to leave her at home, so it's her specialization for me. ^^

So, news from the last few days!

First, I had another attack of migraine which compromised my sight a bit. So with that and the other problems I've been having recently with my eyes, using a keyboard is a bit harder and very annoying, and that's the reason for the hiatus this week. Sorry for that. I'm getting used to it and powering through it, though, so cheers for me!

I've finished my first playthrough of Dragon Age Inquisition, playing as a female elf warrior romancing Solas. Obviously I won't post any spoilers here, so here's the quick review: at the end of the day, I loved this game. But it has its problems. Mainly two: choices do not affect the story at all, and the ending is very rushed and disappointing. The after-credits scene blew my mind and I loved it to pieces, but it did make me feel like I'd just been playing a long prequel to the real story. Other than that, I loved everything. The open world was amazing, and the characters were so well-done and realistic I wish I could have spent the entire game just talking with them and playing Wicked Grace. They managed to merge the political storyline with the fantasy story in a way that felt natural and realistic. I love DA2 to pieces, I do, but the political story always felt little and claustrophobic to me, especially after the Blight. This time, they managed to do both storylines perfectly, in a way that made it feel like they belonged to the same world.

Next, I'll be playing as a male Inquisitor just to romance Dorian. I want to shower him with love. But I also want to romance Bull at the same time. I wish there was a happy polyamory option. *wishful sigh*

Yesterday I had another anxiety attack, but I recovered from that one quite quickly. In fact, today I was feeling so much better that I went downtown and did all my xmas shopping! The weather was sunny and crisp, a wonderful winter day, and I found myself humming along to the xmas carols in the shops. I'm so proud of my stupid brain today. ^^

I also finished a Bob's Burgers marathon I started on Netflix a while back. I loved it. It's got a weird sort of humor that's never mean or offensive, and all the characters love each other and take care of each other. It's a very positive show while being really funny, and the social commentary is very sharp without it being depressive. Definitely recommended!

And I just finished watching the Supernatural midseason finale, which I loved to pieces. Really amazing, every single scene. And so many beautiful dialogues! Plus, it is now official, every Supernatural episode this season has passed the Bechdel's Test. I'm so proud of them! I hope they'll keep doing it next year too! \o/

I'm back! With the help of therapy, I'm finally feeling better. It's been one long, excruciating anxiety attack that lasted all of two weeks. I'm exhausted. But at least today I finally feel better, even if I still have a little problem with my right eye. Nothing serious whatsoever, quite common with short-sighted people, but it makes reading computer screens a little harder than usual. I'm squinting a lot lately. Other than that, I'm fine. Tomorrow I have a little medical check-up, and then another therapy session before my therapist leaves for a whole week of medical conventions. Glad my brain decided to start cooperating just in time.

In fandom news, the other day I bought my long-awaited copy of Dragon Age Inquisition. I played the first game a few weeks after it was released, and it was my first RPG ever. I fell head-over-heels in love with that game, and Thedas, and all the wonderful characters in it. I still get emotional when I hear the soundtrack. Even with all its little problems (the one dungeon still haunts my dreams), I loved Dragon Age 2 an awful lot too, and I've been replaying them both over the years. I read the books and the comics. I'm a teensy bit obsessed with this world! And so I was equal parts excited and worried about this new chapter. Now I'm 18 hours in (it's been kind of a monothematic weekend), and all my worries are gone. The open world is great, immersive and beautiful, but not as dispersive as Skyrim. One can still get lost doing quests and harvesting herbs, but the characters will remind you of the main quest and keep you updated. The characters are great, very different and all very interesting. I genuinely want to know more about them and enjoy asking them all sorts of questions. But if I ask Varric one more question about Hawke he'll probably set me on fire. :D

The War Council Table mechanics are obviously borrowed from Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, and that makes it super easy for me to exploit them. I think five of those gameplay hours are just me sending people on missions. Fly, my pretties, fly! \o/

And so far the story is very intriguing. Yes, I do still miss the epicness of the Blight, but it's not so heavily political as in the second game. I miss the Darkspawn, but there are demons enough. Not many dungeons so far (I only found two incredibly small ones by accident), but that's probably going to change in the future.

And now I won't touch it until tomorrow, because I've just been given the Choice, the one we have to face in every Dragon Age game, and that still makes me super uncomfortable: do I help the Mages or the Templars? I usually go for the Mages, but then I did a playthrough in DA2 where I only helped the Templars (to get the trophies), and I discovered some horrible things the Mages did that made me waver in my convictions. Still, it'll probably be the Mages again. I just don't like the idea of the Circle.

So here's me, almost definitely out of the woods, and being a huge geek as usual. I missed you guys. ^^

Note to self: avoid replaying favourite games on the weekend, because you lose track of time and forget about everything else. Like eating or sleeping. I've been replaying Dragon Age II lately, and it's way more addictive than I remember. Or, to be more precise, it's exactly as addictive as the first time, I'd just repressed that memory. As in, my aunt had to call me to remind me to eat, at lunch and dinner. Disorienting. She also asked me to help her find a good streaming site to watch The Book Thief, and this morning we had a fantastic talk about it and we fangirled like little kids. Now she wants to read the book and I want to watch the movie. *________*

The upcoming week is going to be a tough one, with some real life stuff that I've been avoiding for too long demanding my full attention, and I won't be able to reach my therapist because she took a week off for a family emergency. I made a Mozart playlist on my iPod, and I have jelly babies cartons strategically placed all over the house, I can do it!

I hope you all are fine, especially those of you in the USA. Here in Italy we've only been having rain, although it hasn't stopped in three days. More annoying than anything. It is the perfect weather for binge watching, true, so I've been watching a few of the movies I had downloaded these past few months, and the Berserk movies. Berserk is my favourite manga, and I was very disappointed with the old tv series. These three movies, instead, are absolutely perfect. Yes, they had to cut many of my favourite scenes, but they captured the heart of the story, and the animation, the music, the voices, everything is stunning. And they didn't censor anything! I squeed a lot when we caught a glimpse of Farnese and Serpico, and I'm so excited at the idea of seeing the next movie: new material at last! \o/

Speaking of which, I'm not reading Miura's new project, Gigantomachia, until it's over and I can read it all in one sitting. Reading Berserk at the pace of a chapter every ten months is quite vexing as it is.

In other news, plunging back again in the Hobbit fandom made me want to replay all the Dragon Age games again. I made a new character last year, shortly after watching Unexpected Journey, and she's a Dwarf Thief, I can't wait to go back to her. I just checked the website for the next Dragon Age game, Inquisition, and we can finally create our own character again, and make our fortress and choose the members of our group and we're back at fighting dragons and dark creatures, I'm so happy I could cry! I loved Dragon Age 2, mainly the characters and gameplay, but the story was short and cramped, and the fact that we couldn't create our character, it was all very confining and claustrophobic. I can't believe we went from uniting all the free races against a gigantic dragon and the whole army of evil, to petty politics.

But from what I can see of Inquisition everybody's head is back in the game, it's going to be epic. *________*

I just finished Dragon Age II! As promised, I skipped almost all the secondary missions in the third act so that I could get to the ending. Now, first the spoiler-free review:

This game was great, the characters were much more fascinating than in Origins, the battle system works a lot better, the dialogues are clearer, especially when you have to make important choices, and the companions are much more involved in the story.

That said, it's not half as epic as the first one. While back there we had to fight the blight, and unite all the free people under one flag, here we are just preparing Kirkwall for things to come. Our decisions change the future, but we don't get to see that future, we just put all the players on the chessboard. Besides, we're always stuck in the same city, with the beach and the mountains, but it's a very limited area.

Most of all I loved how the creatures, non-humans, were portrayed in this game. We got a lot of insight on qunari and dalish elves, and now I feel like I know this world a lot better.

( ...and here's the spoilerrific review. )

So, this was obviously a bridge to a third chapter. I do hope they make lots of well-deserved money with this game because I can't wait to see what happens next, especially in Ferelden, where I kinda left the Architect alive, back in Awakening. Ehm.

I'm so going to play it all over again, this time with a male character. I want to try and have a rival-mance, or what the hell they're called, with someone. Maybe Anders? We'll see. :D

Today is the first day of spring, so happy spring everyone! Here it's a beautiful sunny day, the air is warm, and even if I slept five hours last night I don't feel tired at all.

A couple of links! I completely ignored this movie up until yesterday when I first saw the trailer, and now I'm consumed by a burning desire to watch it:



I have a strange relationship with Zack Snyder's movies: I hated 300 with a burning fury, and loved Watchmen with the same level of passion. One way or the other, this guy never bores me. And this trailer is just too freaking amazing. The problem is, I'll never find someone willing to watch it in a cinema with me, I wonder if they'll play it at the small cinema downtown that I can reach by bus in the afternoon.

I'm probably the last one on the planet to watch this, but they sent me the link yesterday, and I almost fell on the floor laughing.



The mermaid, oh god, the mermaid. They have to stop talking when the music starts, so true. The youngest, prettiest, political daughter. XD I loved Downton Abbey, but the more brilliant something is, the funnier its parody is.

On Dragon Age II news, I managed to have a romance with Fenris. Only after that, I realized his voice was Balthier's. I spent hours while he was talking mumbling to myself "I know this guy, I heard him talking a lot, but where? ...Doctor Who?", and he was Balthier. I managed to sleep with my favourite sexy sky-pirate, and I didn't even notice. XD Anyway, I'm halfway through the second act, and I'm seriously considering dropping some of the secondary missions. After a while they get kinda boring, especially since I want to know what happens next!

Today is the first day of spring, so happy spring everyone! Here it's a beautiful sunny day, the air is warm, and even if I slept five hours last night I don't feel tired at all.

A couple of links! I completely ignored this movie up until yesterday when I first saw the trailer, and now I'm consumed by a burning desire to watch it:



I have a strange relationship with Zack Snyder's movies: I hated 300 with a burning fury, and loved Watchmen with the same level of passion. One way or the other, this guy never bores me. And this trailer is just too freaking amazing. The problem is, I'll never find someone willing to watch it in a cinema with me, I wonder if they'll play it at the small cinema downtown that I can reach by bus in the afternoon.

I'm probably the last one on the planet to watch this, but they sent me the link yesterday, and I almost fell on the floor laughing.



The mermaid, oh god, the mermaid. They have to stop talking when the music starts, so true. The youngest, prettiest, political daughter. XD I loved Downton Abbey, but the more brilliant something is, the funnier its parody is.

On Dragon Age II news, I managed to have a romance with Fenris. Only after that, I realized his voice was Balthier's. I spent hours while he was talking mumbling to myself "I know this guy, I heard him talking a lot, but where? ...Doctor Who?", and he was Balthier. I managed to sleep with my favourite sexy sky-pirate, and I didn't even notice. XD Anyway, I'm halfway through the second act, and I'm seriously considering dropping some of the secondary missions. After a while they get kinda boring, especially since I want to know what happens next!

Yesterday the full moon was the closest to the earth it can get. I was sure I was going to miss it, since it had been cloudy all day, but then, at 1:30 am, the sky opened up and there it was. It didn't look much bigger than usual, but it was so bright. I had to turn my eyes after a while because it was getting too bright. A wonderful experience! *____*

I finally bought the Tangled bluray. So pretty, so, so pretty. The details, the colours, just... wow. The floating lanterns scene was amazing! And her hair, so many details. I also bought "Yours Truly, Angry Mob" by Kaiser Chiefs, because it contains THE perfect Jim Moriarty song, My Kind Of Guy.

About Dragon Age, I finally started Act II. I have all the characters, I'm level 17, and up until now I'm loving this game. My only complaint? The dungeons are all identical. Not in a "well, seen one Deep Road, seen all of them". I mean it's the same three maps, repeated all over. They're so identical I don't look at the map anymore, and just go where the treasures are. The only difference is the enemies you meet.

Dragon Age II update. You know that every game has those bugs and glitches that sometimes stuck the whole storyline? It had to happen to me sooner or later, and today it did. I lost 10 hours of gameplay because of the Wayward Son glitch, and as a Supernatural fan I can see the irony. Funny thing is, skipping all the dialogues, I managed to do in one hour and a half a good six hours of former gameplay.

Glitches aside, this game is amazing. The animations, the voices, the story, everything leaves me speechless. The only problem? Romance. I just can't decide a partner for my Layla, because I want to sleep with everyone in my party. Right now Fenris is winning, but I just met Isabela the pirate, and Andraste's blood, she's perfect.

I'll probably try and have multiple romances and piss off everyone, but it's so worth it. :D