Star Wars IX was... disappointing.

I did subscribe to Disney+, and so, of course, I queued up the latest Star Wars flick.  I'd heard there was some disappointment in the fan base over it, but I pretty well assumed it was the standard "not what we expected/hoped for" thing.  What I didn't expect was a barely-coherent, poorly paced film like this one making it into public view with the Star Wars name attached to it.  I mean, there were times where I thought I was watching the modern equivalent of one of those '70s knock-off films.  Oh well, at least that finally puts the main series to rest, these 40-odd years later.

Another week of staying home down...

...and more progress made on the ol' entertainment backlog!  Just polished off what I was looking to accomplish in Borderlands 2, more or less, and I rather enjoyed it, for the most part.  Mind you, I did start from a previous save that was a fair ways into the main story... one of the advantages of shooters, it's not like you generally have to relearn a whole lot of controls or anything to do reasonably well in them.  If you haven't played any of this series of games, Borderlands 2 is a decent place to jump in.  Also, if you're a D&D player, and you ever had any doubt about how terrifying a Mimic can be, the "Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep" DLC is definitely worth a go... or, you know, look it up on YouTube.  Sadly, that's what I had to do to see the ending on that DLC, since I hit a bug where the game was demanding "all players must be present" to continue, even though I was playing single-player... and considering the game's been out since 2012, a game-stopping bug like that being present is simply sad.

So, yeah, that's it for Borderlands 2.  I might have stuck it out a bit longer without that bug, but probably not.  I could move on to the "pre-sequel" game they released later on, but I never really did care for the low-gravity, low-atmosphere mechanics involved in that game, so next looks to be giving Diablo III another go... it will at least be interesting to see how it feels after having played Path of Exile.

Games aside, I also finally got around to watching The World's End.  I caught it in a 3-pack Blu-Ray disc set along with Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, both of which I quite enjoyed.  As I recall, when The World's End came out, initial reaction was that it was okay, but nowhere near as good as the other two films.  I'm going to guess that a lot of those people either didn't care for the ending, or got the main twist in the story spoiled for them before they hit the theater.  I went in blind, found the first part of the film to be as cringe-worthy as intended, and was caught entirely off-guard by the twist that shapes the rest of the film, so I rather enjoyed it... not the best ending, but try not to let perfect be the enemy of good, or something like that.

Next on the watchables list?  Well, I did get gifted a copy of Parasite that I could watch, and I'm sure I will at some point... but, frankly, I'm still rather in a "light entertainment" sort of mood, so, fair odds, I'll be subscribing to Disney+ before long.  At the very least, I've got the last Star Wars film, the last Avengers film, and one or two oddities that should be caught up on, and what better time than now?

Games catch-up

Well, I've certainly been giving Board Game Arena a workout, and I don't see that changing any time soon... but man cannot live by online board games alone!  So, what other amusements have I found recently?

I just finished my month's-worth of XBox Games Pass, for starters.  Gave several games a go, each of which fell in the category of "looks/sounds like fun, but not nearly enough so to make me buy them at/near launch."  Each of them fell comfortably in that "yeah, this is fine, but not something I'm willing to pay more to keep playing" zone, and nothing upcoming for that service jumped out at me as needing played, so that does for that.  Bit of a shame, really... Journey to the Savage Planet is one I expected to like more than I did, and then there's Nier: Automata.  Mechanically (har!) it's an OK game, but asking anybody to play through a game three times to get the whole story is a pretty big ask, especially in this Internet age... yes, I found videos online rather than keep playing through that game.  The only game in this batch that made me say "maybe later" was when I played some Phantasy Star Online 2... and the "maybe later" there was "maybe when it's on PC, so I don't have to pay for an XBox Gold membership to play."

So, that out of the way, next is diving into my XBox One backlog.  I've skipped all the Assassin's Creed games for now, being neither in the mood for "shadowy organizations facing off through the ages" nor the "genetic memory" shtick they keep using to tie those games to the modern day.  As such, I've gotten back in to Borderlands 2 for a bit of shootery fun... finished the main storyline with my main character, and I'm starting into the "Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep" DLC.  D&D with guns, what's not to like?

Outside of all that, I did get sucked into one other oddity.  Bargain Basement Bathysphere is a free print-and-play solo game, with a bit of a legacy twist (which is a little odd, considering "you died before making it back to the surface" is a likely end to any one game).  The introductory levels ate through my afternoon yesterday.  Still, ol' Snuffbox (that's what I named my bathysphere, at the prompting of the game) is ready to make another descent into the deeps, and I now have an "aquaseum" to hold the fish and squid samples I collect from here on out... I'm looking forward to what else I discover here (without reading ahead, naturally)!