My short story “Emotional Resonance” is now out in The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2024!

This is a brief write-up of 12 indie games that caught my eye from the 2024 Summer Game Fest showcases. There’s also links to all the showcases because there’s too many games and I’m crying.

This is the awards eligibility post for V.M. Ayala for her two short stories, “The Void Door” and “Emotional Resonance”, published in March and December 2023.

Here are around 30 demos I played and enjoyed from February 2024’s Steam Next Fest. I hope you find something to wishlist and look forward to!

For most of my Dredge playthrough I didn’t stop to question the player character. But when I got the ending, the one you get when you gather all the relics and give them to the Collector, the plot grabbed me by the shoulders and dragged me into the depths of hyperfocus and would not let me go for days. This essay explores the cosmic horror themes of self and monstrosity in the indie fishing game Dredge.

Here’s a list of my favorite reads from 2023. Includes a lot of gothic and Southern gothic fantasy books as well as science fiction and space opera~

Here are the indie games that stood out the most from what I streamed in 2023

BOSSGAME: The Final Boss Is My Heart is a delightful boss rush indie game with amazing queer characters. It’s complex and thoughtful—and the queer relationships aren’t doomed to tragedy, subtext, or queerbaiting. The fact that this game exists brings me joy. I love it not only because it gave me several emotions but also because it shows a lesbian couple being honest, communicating in the face of difficult moments, and being unashamedly in love with each other and flirting constantly, it’s great.

Welcome to Part 2 of my Breath of the Wild’s Zelda Narrative Thoughts series, where I flail about the ending and the structure of Zelda’s story specifically and why it impacted me so much.

Breath of the Wild’s Zelda does so much with so little. She’s integral to the plot and Link’s success, despite not having much agency at all. Sometimes a character simply trying to survive the constraints of their reality and do their best is more engaging than a stereotypical knightly hero.

Welcome to my first Narrative Thoughts! This series will explore some element of storytelling or characterization in a piece of media, often games, and what I liked or found interesting about it.

Yesterday Square Enix published the FINAL FANTASY XIV: Stormblood - a brief history of Doma page. The page includes a writeup of the history of the Doma, a Japanese-inspired setting introduced in the Stormblood expansion back when it was first released in 2017. It also includes a small Q&A with Lead Character Concept Artist Ayumi Namae about Yugiri’s design.

Emet-Selch is one of my favorite villains. He’s irreverent, unapologetic, tragically full of despair, and connects with you even in his final moments after your final fight with him in Shadowbringers. Solas is also one of my favorite companions-turned-villains, and Dragon Age: Dreadwolf is setting him up for a similarly epic and emotional fall. How Shadowbringers and Endwalker handle Emet-Selch’s story arc made him a fan favorite, and I hope BioWare takes notes in order to make Solas a more compelling villain in Dragon Age: Dreadwolf.

FFXIV isn’t constrained to the hero’s journey archetype, but starting a new era in the game means returning to a simpler, less epic story in scale for now. And what better way to do that than by focusing on the newest Scion, former Crystal Exarch, and beloved catboy G’raha Tia?

This guide will walk you through what Hunts are, how to unlock them, and how to use them to get more currencies for gear and weapons in Final Fantasy XIV.

I’m pleased to announce that my debut fantasy short story, “The Void Door”, has been published at Beneath Ceaseless Skies.