danielpholt

Truly inspiring. The Tories are lying stains on our society, but they know how to coin a good phrase. 'Get Brexit Done', 'Build Back Better', fuck, even 'Strong and Stable' meant something. You want to get people interested in politics, you've got to get them invested in a better future; Corbyn (for all his faults) did that, but once again the party under Starmer is found wanting.

I get mine with a friend and like 5-6 other people on their 'family plan'. It makes it much more reasonable. Absolutely wouldn't be paying for NSO if I couldn't spread the cost around.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2021-10-15-nintendo-switch-online-launching-later-this-month-costs-gbp35-a-year Bit steep for me, even as someone that's already subbed to this.

Lots of new features and quality of life improvements. I've got to think that had it not been for COVID we'd have seen these a while ago (some of these really should have been included from the get-go). The ££ DLC isn't as immediately interesting to me, but some of those new home additions really should be available in your own home and I'm surprised it's not tbh. Why can I design someone elses house with nice dividing walls but not myself? *edit* According to Eurogamer, once you have used some of those features in the Holiday Homes they will unlock for your home as well. Happy.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-58930593 This has absolutely no place in British politics, and yet here we are. Two murdered MP's inside what, 5-6 years? It's absolutely fucking horrible news for all involved, and in a larger political context, does nothing but deepen divides, and put more barriers up between constituents and those they represent. Supremely angry right now. I hope they've got the deluded c*nt that did this. Fuck everything about this on every single level.

I'll take Blair and New Labour over anything we've had since in a heartbeat. Iraq was clearly a mistake, but on the whole I feel like the country was in a much better place than it was before, or after the Labour government left office. That being said Blair is far from perfect, and his lack of contrition at times really rubs people up the wrong way. If only Brown had called the election in 2007 rather than 2010; he likely would have won that one and who knows, maybe we avoid 15+ years of a resurgent Tory party.

https://inews.co.uk/news/health/covid-19-inquiry-thousands-deaths-avoided-pandemic-mps-report-lockdown-distancing-1243492 Not much of this is news, we already knew we went into lockdown later than we should have (three times). We already knew the government totally failed to wrap care homes in a protective bubble in order to save thousands and we know that a decade of chronic underfunding to the NHS caused massive issues with regards to PPE. +4 Con Shit like this should end governments, and in a more educated and democratic country I think it probably would, or at least there'd be a serious chance it if causing significant issues going forward. We all know that come the next election, the electorate will largely forget about all this shit and reward them with another majority.

Finished: Ted Lasso S2 All in all it's another good season of the show, albeit maybe not as original or well written as the first. Still enjoyed it massively however, and can't wait to see where the third season goes. We can all see the arc, however they stick the landing and don't force more episodes into the shows run that don't need to be there. Started: John Adams An HBO show from the late naughties staring Paul Giamatti and Laura Linney amongst others. Obviously it's about the 2nd President of the United States, John Adams and two (very long) episodes in and it's checking all the boxes for me.

I know we're joking here but she absolutely hates this shit. I've turned into a toem of presidential facts and figures and she greets each and every one with an eye roll. Anyway... I've started reading Project Hail Mary the newest book from the author of The Martian and it's really engaging. I won't lie, it doesn't have the immediate hook that The Martian has, but after about 120 pages it's really starting to work through the gears. I'll be honest, I've got absolutely no idea where it's going, part of me wonders if ... That aside however, I'm running through it pretty quickly, and that's usually the sign of an enjoyable book.

Sayonara Wild Hearts A short little rhythm game with a super cool soundtrack (there's probably a name for the type of music in it, but I don't have it). Didn't take overly long (around an hour) to beat and I can see you going back to earn a higher score.

I'm not a massive Blair fan, but I do like Brown. I think it was less 'I'll let you take this one on the assumption that you'll do me a solid later' and more 'Okay, I could win this leadership election but it might fuck the party up in the process, so I'll step aside and you'll give me the reigns after 2 terms'.

Event coming next week Will it be enough to get *me* back into the game? Probably not, but Danielle is very excited.

Marvels Avengers Went into this knowing full well that it was a bit of a let down, but I wasn't expecting to be outwardly bored after the first ten minutes. And then when we finally got to the combat, I found it to be rather underwhelming, aside from the Cap/Black Widow combat which has a bit more 'Batman Arkham series' too it. I've just found , I'm going to give it another hour but if I don't find anything to grab onto I think I'm going to leave this one in the dust. What a disappointment.

Anyone watching this Beeb documentary about New Labour? I'm only one episode in so far but its been pretty interesting to me (as a Labour Member who wasn't old enough to really remember the Blair years in any significant way). They've got another four episodes on iPlayer right now and it's going to run through the end of Browns tenure in office. One of the most startling things I noticed was just how different Brown and Blair both saw the idea of succession. Brown still seems to have a chip on his shoulder with regards to how he stepped aside to let Blair take a run at the party leadership after the death of John Smith in 1994; only to then find himself waiting longer and longer before Blair stepped down and handed over the party. Going forward, I'm interested to see how they handle 2007. I think if Brown calls an election after taking over from Blair then they win an election in 2007; the delay cost them vital time and gave the Tories a massive boost with regards to the crash in 2008; at that point it was basically over for New Labour and Brown, a man who I do think would have made a decent PM.

Just finished Echos of the Eye, the recently released DLC for Outer Wilds. Whilst I don't think it'll have the same effect on me as base-game Outer Wilds (one of my favourite games of all time), it's a worthwhile sledge of content for a game I truly love. As for Echos itself, it's got everything you'd want from DLC to that game. The way these people deliver story without a second of dialogue or (in this case) even any language whatsoever is something else; super impressive what they can do with some nice art and top-tier music. If you've not already played Outer Wilds, I really recommend you give it another look (and don't worry too much about the ship controls, it's a space ship made of wood and sticky tape, it's okay to crash it).

It absolutely plays better on the PC (nothing major, but the mouse definitely helps with some of the navigation - but I think we knew that anyway), but if that isn't an option then this version seems decent enough.

The Artful Escape The game is at its best when it lets you stand still and play music. Unfortunately those moments don't come as often as I would have liked and instead you're left with this Alto's Adventure styled gameplay mechanic which is fine in short doses, but feels a bit sort of.....meh by comparison. Still, it's on Gamepass and for that alone I think its worth a look.

Ted Lasso gets an awful lot of crap for how utterly..... saccharine it is but you know what, I don't feel the need to defend it because I adore the show for that. I don't know that a TV show has ever been a more perfect antidote to how my brain is working right now.

This just landed on Switch and it's a day one pick up for me.

Apex has a fair bit of 'down-time' too, given that a large part of battle royal is just sort of walking around looting, it gives players a chance to be absolute dicks to one another.

Splatoon? I don't know, I think the game being at its core being a squad based FPS means that those community issues are pushed to the fore in a way that you don't see in other shooters. I've had squad mates go out of their way to drop me off maps, fly me through insta-death beams on drop and decide they just didn't want to deal with a solo-random and then quit out on me the second they get downed. It might only be a little micro-aggression here and there but when you're playing with others each and every time in a squad setting, it adds up to a hell load of blurgh.

There's not been a significant content drop for a year now, and the updates they are doing tweak along the edges rather than bring anything substantial to the game. I don't think people want radically new ideas or anything...just new shit to unlock and use around the island. It's not helped by the fact that many of the series core features were stripped away for New Horizons. It all feels a bit bare bones.

Biggest shock of 2020 wasn't the global pandemic. No. It was that I fell head first into a sudden and shocking love of US Presidential history. So yeah. I'm treating myself to one white dude a night (kinky).

Apex Legends I found myself taking a second look at this a few months back and it's still as good as I remember at launch.....it's still got all those annoying bugs and an awful community too, which takes the shine off of it in many ways. That being said I find myself ignoring the very obvious negative aspects of this game and its community because the cycle and shooting is just so damn good. Super Mario Maker 2 Turns out Mario Maker 2 is extremely my shit. Again. Nintendo did this game dirty. It should be something they support going forward, but it would appear that they've all but finished with it and whilst the basic game itself is in a decent place, it's community is itching for new styles, gameplay tools and interesting new features, Nintendo said no. Rocket League I think this might be my favourite game of all time. I've put thousands of hours into it and even now, over 6 years later I'm still playing it almost daily.

I think we've got a combined 1000+ hours in Animal Crossing in my house, but even now, over a year into this thing I think Danielle has finally lost interest in running her little island community. It's a real shame because I know for a fact that she wants to keep going back to that well, unfortunately Nintendo just isn't providing the updates the game needs to sustain itself long term. Real shame because if they supported this thing in the same way they supported something like Smash they'd have a game that people would happily play (and spend money on) going forward for years.