This week I’m taking a look at China Mieville’s speculative fiction hardboiled murder mystery “The City & The City”
Category Archives: News
Video Game Review: Judgement
The fourth of my 2025 New Year’s Resolution games – Judgement – has finally been beaten. It took me about 40 hours of playtime – so now it comes to the question of what did I think about the game?
Continue readingDeadly Fight in Hiroshima Video Review Blocked
As a quick heads up – my video review of Deadly Fight in Hiroshima has been blocked internationally by Toei. My written review is still up, but the video review is done. I might try re-recording the review as video only, but honestly, the video has had a pretty good life. This is the problem with trying to discuss a visual medium in another visual medium – sometimes the people who own the works want more control of the dialog around the work than the people doing the talking – which is even more of a situation if you’re working with creators from countries which don’t exactly have Fair Use protections enshrouded in law. Ah well.
Please support my Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/countzeroor
Buy me a coffee at Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/countzero
Watch my Live-Streams on http://twitch.tv/countzeroor
Check out my Let’s Plays at https://www.youtube.com/@CountZeroOrPlays
I’ve changed my web hosting from WordPress.com to Bluehost, and I think it’s important to talk about why.
Please support my Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/countzeroor
Buy me a coffee at Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/countzero
Watch my Live-Streams on http://twitch.tv/countzeroor
Check out my Let’s Plays at https://www.youtube.com/@CountZeroOrPlays
Donation Links…
- To support relief from the Palisades Wildfires: https://www.charitynavigator.org/discover-charities/where-to-give/palisades-fire-2025/
- To support relief and recovery in Ukraine: https://www.charitynavigator.org/discover-charities/where-to-give/ukranian-crisis/
- Donate to Doctors Without Borders: https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/get-involved/ways-to-give
- Reproductive Health Care: https://www.charitynavigator.org/search?causes=Reproductive%20health%20care
- Trans Rights: https://www.charitynavigator.org/search/?causes=LGBTQ%20rights
How To Support The Blog
Having moved hosting companies from directly going through WordPress to going through Bluehost, I’ve possibly gotten some new readers through the site getting re-indexed. So, while I have included notes at the bottom of each post on how to support the site, I haven’t elaborated any further on those methods. So, here’s a more in-depth list of ways to support me.
Continue readingMy Next Two Let’s Plays
We’re coming up the end of Mark of the Ninja, so it’s time to announce my next couple games – if you’ve been watching my Twitch Channel (http://twitch.tv/countzeroor), you’ll already know what these are, but if you haven’t (and you should) here’s the picks – determined by a semi-unscientific poll on one of the Discord servers I’m on, since I didn’t get any responses on the Patreon. Both of these are games on my Video Game New Year’s Resolution List.
Next up is probably one of the biggest shames on my Pile of Shame—a game that I’ve played extensively, including for Nintendo Power Retrospectives, but never got around to beating (at least not that I remember)—Super Mario World. This Let’s Play is already completely in the bag, with all the videos recorded as of this writing.
After that, continuing my pincer strategy of making my way through both ends of the Final Fantasy series, it’s Final Fantasy XVI, including the DLC.
Please support my Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/countzeroor
Buy me a coffee at Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/countzero
Watch my Live-Streams on http://twitch.tv/countzeroor
Check out my Let’s Plays at https://www.youtube.com/@CountZeroOrPlays
Why I Switched My Hosting from WordPress.com
You may have noticed, in the past few weeks, that my site has been looking a little weird. That it’s had a few visual hiccups in terms of how it looks and is presented. (If you’re only reading everything I write on Patreon, you probably haven’t noticed). That’s because I’ve switched my web hosting from WordPress.com to Bluehost, and I feel it’s worth mentioning why.
A smaller reason why is, honestly, it’s slightly cheaper. I was paying about $300+ a year for my hosting through WordPress.com, in order to get a plan that allowed for advertising (in an attempt to finally reach my Google Adsense payment threshold). I’m paying about $250-ish a year with Bluehost, so that’s significantly less expensive.
The larger reason is that the person who runs WordPress.com, Matt Mullenweg, has been, frankly, acting like a git. He’s been harassing hosting providers and alienating plugin authors. It’s been involved enough that TechCrunch had to write an explainer article. In short, he’s he kind of git that, candidly, is causing problems for the WordPress platform as a whole – to enough of a degree where I can sincerely see WordPress forking, the way that OpenOffice forked to LibreOffice. If that happens, and the fork comes, if I’m still on WordPress.com for hosting, I can’t go either way. So, I’m off WordPress.com, and am now on Bluehost on the foreseeable future.
As a quick note – this has broken Email Subscriptions. In the interim, I’d recommend using RSS, or following my BlueSky or Mastodon accounts.
Anime Review: Ranma 1/2 Season 1 (2024)
Much as Urusei Yatsura received a revival from David Production, now Ranma 1/2 has started to receive a revival from Mappa, distributed internationally by Netflix. It’s a pretty good adaptation, though thus far it hasn’t had any of the series trickier elements to deal with.
Continue readingI’ve got a bit of a medical procedure coming up that could interrupt my streams and videos, so here’s a heads up – and also some quick thoughts on things the VGAs can do to improve.
It’s the week of Christmas, and the last full week of the year, so it’s time for my holiday greeting!
Thoughts on Slay The Spire
So, I haven’t yet “beaten” Slay The Spire – but generally, I’ve gotten a handle on my feelings on the game, and I figure I might as well put my thoughts out there.
Continue readingTime for a bit of a Sealed Envelope Video, where I talk – in advance of the Analogue 3D’s release, of the feature I want the most from the console.
As a reminder, the weekend of November 8th I will be at Kumoricon. Desert Bus for Hope starts that week, so I won’t be streaming that Friday or likely the following Friday.
Reminder of upcoming schedule stuff
Like the title says – go vote!
Check your registration status: https://www.usa.gov/confirm-voter-registration
Find your polling place: https://www.usa.gov/find-polling-place
Anime Explorations Episode 25: Dark Gathering
We have some horror anime this month with Dark Gathering, which is available for streaming on Hidive & Hulu/Disney+.
The election is coming up in the United States – and in many states there is an option for early voting. In Oregon we do Vote By Mail (and also with ballot drop boxes), so have voted in the comfort of my home with a hot cup of coffee. This does mean we don’t get neat “I voted” stickers – but that’s okay. Instead, this weekend I’m going to borrow a custom from Australia, and have a homemade Democracy Sausage (though probably in an actual roll instead of a slice of bread – blasphemy, I know). So, this is my encouragement to you, if you are registered to vote, to go vote. And then have a yummy sausage, and maybe post a picture in the comments.
Go Vote! (In the US)
Nintendo’s getting antsy about who talks about their games and how, so Nintendo Power retrospectives is going to take some time off until Nintendo settles down.
Anime Review: Spice & Wolf (2024)
I absolutely missed the boat on Spice & Wolf when it first aired – which probably may have worked out for the best, since the main series of novels was still ongoing at the time, so the original TV adaptation was never quite able to provide an adaptation of the big emotional climax of the story and its core romance. Fortunately, the series is back with a reboot, with much of the original cast returning, making for a good time to jump on board and see the story told once again.
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Remembering my Kitty, Patacon
So, I’ve posted a bunch of pictures on the blog of Patacon, but I never really got around to talking about Patacon. I should do that.
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Reminiscences Inspired by Current Events
So, I had something else in mind for today, but recent events inspired me to write about something else – particularly something somewhat formative from my past – my time spent volunteering in my local library.
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