I’ve always been more of a solo gamer, though. I won’t hesitate to play a 60 hour one-player game with no co-o component while multiplayer only/live service titles usually scare me off. I don’t have as much time for gaming as I may have had in years past; even then, though, the idea of mainlining Halo or whatever FPS du jour never appealed to me. The rigor of constant online play leaves me feeling like I’m working a side hustle.

Yet I can appreciate the tenets of game design that encompass multiplayer games, so I don’t discount myself as a total hater. If a game scratches that itch, I’m down. Which is why, once upon a time, I was so enamored with Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for the GameCube. A dastardly little four-player local co-op adventure that required each player to supply their own Game Boy Advance system, Crystal Chronicles is an action role-playing game where players roam the world in caravans searching for magical myrrh in order to stave off a miasma plaguing the land. I loved this weird little game back in 2004 when it was released in the United States and was chuffed when it was slated for a Remastered edition on modern consoles and (gulp) mobile devices in 2020. Unfortunately, in the six years since its release, I’ve been mostly unable to actually play it with others. Talk about having FOMO.

Over twenty years ago, the gimmick of Crystal Chronicles was clear: Gamers would huddle around a single GameCube with their respective devices, controlling a squad of player-made characters selected from four distinct races. Each would use their GBAs as controllers and a second screen of sorts when traveling through the poisoned realm. When playing with friends, one player is responsible for carrying a bucket near the party, protecting them around the surrounding miasma as they travel; if playing solo, a computer-controlled Moogle will carry it for you as amassing abilities, items and weapons through each stage. It was a lot of work, yes, but the couch hijinks were unforgettable.

While the gameplay and hack-n-slash combat was seemingly simple, it had a surprisingly robust ability and magic system that would allow players to combine spells with a bevy of combinations and devastating status effects. Players would also collect Artifacts through their travels, providing meaningful stat and power increases giving a sense of progression. These systems, along with the customization of the player character and their respective familial side-stories would keep things fresh for each player and playthrough. Charming graphics and a beautifully varied soundtrack give the game a distinct presentation.

In the early aughts, I don’t think I ever eked out a session with four players. It’s not only that I didn’t have the friends in high school to get together for a JRPG party, but I definitely didn’t have enough friends who wanted to play the game, had their own GBA AND their own link cord, too. But I always had my little brother around, and with that we set out to eventually secure two link cables to play together. We had a great time fighting Marlboros and other signature Final Fantasy beasts, even if we never beat the game. Which is why, in an era of remakes or remastered RPGs getting a second lease on life, the announcement of Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles Remastered was so welcomed by me. I could play with my brother again and introduce this world to my children. Finally, I thought, I’d be able to play this game like God and Kazuhiko Aoki intended, right?

Unfortunately, none of that really matters if you can’t reliably play with another human being. On paper, the remaster should have made Crystal Chronicles easier than ever to enjoy. Instead of convincing your friends to lug over a Game Boy Advance, a link cable, and somehow all be available on the same Saturday afternoon, all everyone needed was a modern console or phone and an internet connection. A few taps and we’d be playing together again like Friends was still on TV.

Somehow, though, the process is even more cumbersome. Joining friends can be inexplicably inconsistent, hosting sessions is strangely restrictive, progression isn’t shared in any meaningful way, and there were more times where I simply gave up trying to get a lobby working. I have no idea whether that was the fault of the game’s infrastructure, my friends, my internet connection, or the alignment of the planets. What I do know, is that it was easier cobbling together two old GBAs and link cables to play the original game on my GameCube in 2026 (!) than it was coordinating a lobby with my brother.

What makes all of this so disappointing is that none of these issues have anything to do with Crystal Chronicles itself. The combat is still satisfying enough, experimenting with spell combinations is still fun, and dragging a chalice about remains an oddly satisfying gameplay hook. But while Crystal Chronicles is about getting a group together, the remaster never seems interested in helping you actually do that. Instead of removing the physical barriers that kept so many of us from fully experiencing it twenty years ago, it simply traded them for digital ones.

It’s been just about six years after this game was unceremoniously dumped into our laps. Truthfully, I think about this travesty with frightening regularity. The game just sits there on consoles and Android (iOS compatibility is already out), kinda broken, despite some of the stellar work we are seeing from Square Enix in terms of reconfiguring older experiences for a newer audience. I know it is not a perfect analogy, but what the company did with Octopath Traveler 0 and is now doing with Final Fantasy Resonance - reworking a mobile title with gacha and in-app purchases into a cohesive single player experience - makes Crystal Chronicles feel like warmed up leftovers.

Crystal Chronicles has everything you need to be a successful game right there. But in this current iteration, the secret ingredients never get a chance to coalesce because they are siloed off from each other, apparently in a deeply structural and technical way that allegedly made it impossible to include local and online multiplayer. The end result is the near-constant fumbling of a multiplayer experience that cannot get it together.

I have significantly less time for playing games now than I did twenty-two years ago. Which is why the notion of playing Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles again, without the cumbersome technical limitations that made it impossible to fully experience back in 2004, was so appetizing. But the matchmaking issues, technical problems, and lack of local multiplayer have left a bad taste in my mouth. I guess that’s one of life’s little jokes: I may no longer have qualms about sitting alone at this table to eat. The problem is now I don’t want to take a single bite.

Everyone is a critic, I get it. But in this case, the critics are on to something. Wild Arms 2 is not one of those PlayStation games that has aged gracefully. Nobody is going to mistake it for a timeless visual masterpiece. Character and enemy models are indecipherably blocky, the environments are crude, and the loading times grate. The less said about the abysmal localization the better. And yet I have been having a fantastic time despite (to spite?) myself.

The Wild Arms series are Japanese role-playing games featuring turn-based combat set against a Wild West backdrop that is an anime mashup of genres. You’ve got magic wielding royalty fighting against demonic space aliens in dungeons called things like “Emulator Zone.” I enjoyed these weird little games and fancy to revisit them now and again. I know the sheer force of nostalgia is what brings me here, powerless to the allure of starting a game I loved as a kid once more, with sincere if not serious plans to finish it. I always come back to the same thought when replaying these vintage games: Where did the time go? We never can go back home, even if we can physically return to the house.

I remember standing inside Electronics Boutique at Lakeside Mall sometime in the late 1990s trying to decide what RPG I was going to bring home. This was before you all made influencers a thing. This was during the era of Working Designs, y’all. We didn’t have YouTube reviewers or streamers ASMRing into our AirPods telling us what to like. Back then, buying a game involved staring at the box, reading the back, and hoping for the best…especially if you weren’t reading EGM or PSM Magazines.

Nope, back then I had about 15 minutes of browsing before I pissed off my mom. I used them judiciously, having scanned and reviewed the aisles before narrowing my choices down to Wild Arms and another game called Beyond the Beyond. What I find interesting is that I recall the choice itself so clearly, looking at the boxes and weighing my options and even opening the empty cases to look at the art inside. What I don’t remember is why I ultimately chose Wild Arms. Impactful decision, given that I’m still writing about the series nearly thirty years later.

Because I bought Wild Arms, I played it endlessly. I have memories of sitting on the floor of my sister’s room, playing Cecilia’s prologue chapter. I eventually played Wild Arms 2 for the Playstation a few years later and then again when the series transferred to PS2 with Wild Arms 3. There have been five mainline Wild Arms titles, a PS2-era remake of the first game, a tactics-strategy RPG for the PSP, and (ten years later) a JP-only mobile title that I did indeed play until it was shuttered a lifetime ago. The series, like other franchises over the last few decades, became woven into the fabric of my life in a way that probably sounds ridiculous to anyone who doesn’t play video games.

Meanwhile, Beyond the Beyond simply fell off the shelves of my mind, showing up intermittently (and overpriced) at resale shops or garage sales. I was lucky enough to get a very affordable copy of the game recently and finally decided to see what I had missed out on before Y2K was a thing. Ladies, we did not make it beyond the beyond with this game. We’re lucky we made it beyond the title screen.

I don’t think Beyond was ever going to have a fair chance. By the time I finally got around to playing it, Wild Arms had already spent nearly three decades building a relationship with me. Beyond the Beyond is just some kusoge-adjacent game from the people who would go on to make Golden Sun. Maybe in a Sliding Doors-like world where I’m Gwenyth Paltrow, I picked up Beyond the Beyond instead and you are reading a piece about why it deserves a follow-up.

I don’t think nostalgia is really about quality. At least not entirely. If it were, I would probably spend my evenings replaying nothing but the greatest games ever made. Instead, I’m playing Wild Arms 2 or loading up my save file in Legend of Dragoon, hoping to get past Disc 1 for the first time since my adult teeth have come in. It’s why I’m even uttering the name “Legend of Legaia” in a digital safe-space.

I love these kinda shitty games that hurt to look at and were arguably not that fun to play in 1996, let alone 2026. I love these games I may not have ever beaten but still recall fondly because of who and where I was at the time, even in the face of better games that came out during the same era. Nostalgia really is that bitch, huh? It is, because it also brought us three middling seasons of a Will & Grace reboot.

It would certainly explain why I feel a pang of pride when I look at a PlayStation-era jewel case, complete with a crack in the front. This little guy has been with me through the years, sitting on the shelf during college, law school, children, and more than a few moves. Same for Final Fantasy VII and countless other games I had the good sense to never sell.

When I look at that cracked case, I don’t just see Wild Arms 2. Instead, I see my childhood bedroom with strategy guides strewn about the floor on weekends that seemed like they would never end. I see the start of summer vacation as a reminder of a period of life when getting a new game felt like an event. The game itself is part of the memory, with the rest bundling up the sights and sounds of the time and place where I first experienced it.

That’s why I am unbothered if Wild Arms 2 looks terrible. It’s old enough to have a mortgage. Besides, the graphics are not what I want to revisit. Replaying the game allows me to, if just for a moment, occupy the same space as my child self. I don’t love Wild Arms 2 because I like it; I love Wild Arms because we found each other at the perfect time.

I could have chosen Beyond the Beyond or one of the many other RPGs I never got around to playing. Instead, I chose Wild Arms. Thirty years later, I still carry it with me. Who cares if it looks like shit?

That said…there’s a very specific kind of hell that opens when you introduce a child to the genre, which is something I discovered with the introduction of Pokopia into the family home. In a few short months, my family went from being cozy game agnostics to a home with an emotional and spiritual commitment to maintaining a tiny digital society full of idiots named “Bob.”

At first, it seemed harmless. After having to explain to my son why I wouldn’t download Fortnite or buy something called “Stick Figure Fights” on the eShop, it felt absolutely wholesome. After rejecting requests for games as being too difficult, too violent, or too weird for us to meaningfully engage with, we finally found games that felt collaborative and low stakes, but also fun. Games where we could sit together on the couch before dinner and play a bit.

Now I spend my evenings watching news updates about whether Bob likes pancakes, theorizing as to why Grandma keeps getting into arguments with someone named “????????,” and whether a tiny virtual creature’s teeth have been sufficiently brushed. Again, I blame Pokemon – specifically, a tiny little bastard named Ditto.

At first glance, Pokopia seems like it was made specifically for my house, the Venn Diagram overlap of a first-grader and his over-stimulated father. My son immediately gravitated toward it because of the creature collecting. The premise is simple and perfect: here is a little guy. Go find more little guys to populate your island. By the way, they like treats.

It was great fun to find new Pokemon and bring them into our growing community. I loved watching him light up every time something unlocked. What starts as “look at this cute little dude” evolves into tutorials about crafting systems, inventory management, friendship levels, farming mechanics, housing upgrades, daily tasks, event currencies, and approximately seventeen menus hidden inside other menus. Exhausted yet?

Pokopia isn’t bad by any stretch. It’s great at triggering the same compulsive little reward loops of the base series. But Pokémon succeeds partly because the simplicity was deceptive. You could brute force your way through Pokémon Red with one overleveled Charizard. No such luck here.

Modern cozy games demand my engagement and attention. I feel like I am constantly learning something new about the gameplay mechanics, whether I’ve been playing for two hours or two months. Eventually my son lost interest and we just stopped playing one day, allowing our neglected digital space to slowly collapse into foreclosure. Squirtle was already looking stressed, and that was before we went AWOL. I’m afraid to go back and check on them.

Having burned out on the groundskeeping of Pokopia, I assumed we were done with the digital lording. I was painfully unaware of what awaited until it was already too late: he was showing me videos on the eShop for a game that I initially thought was called Tamagotchi life. If only.

Tomodachi Life Living the Dream for Switch 2 is one of the funniest games Nintendo has made in years. It’s an ant farm simulation. You create little Mii versions of people, dump them onto an island together, and watch them slowly develop interpersonal relationships, grievances, emotional breakdowns, and bizarre musical theater performances.

There are no stakes. There is no real objective. Yet for a while, it completely consumed us. Half our island residents are modeled after actual family members. The other half are just random people either named “Bob,” or some gross concoction of consonants or symbols that could be mistaken for an Elon Musk baby name. I cannot explain why this is funny to children (or me, for that matter). But hearing your six-year-old absolutely lose his mind because “Bob got in a fight with Grandpa again” continues to gain mileage for laughter in this house.

Tomodachi Life understands something essential about comedy. Repetition and randomness can be very funny. So can watching familiar people behave slightly wrong, especially when the game itself treats every absurd interaction with deadly sincerity. A Mii version of my mother spent twenty real minutes furious because Bob ate the last donut. This is my son’s version of Must See TV.

The skits, dreams, and newscasts are worth the price of admission. Every time one of the Miis performs some deeply uncomfortable song or bizarre little comedy routine, my son and I lose it. We screenshot them or replay them for the named family member to have a chance to see what their digital avatar is up to. There’s something unsettling and hilarious watching digital approximations of your loved ones sing vaguely threatening lyrics in robotic voices.

Tomodachi Life thrives in the space where child and adult humor overlaps. My son loves the slapstick randomness. I love the accursed social simulation energy. As a result, we’ve become fully invested in the ongoing emotional lives of these weird little island freaks. We discuss them over breakfast now.

Laughing at the commune my son built that’s run by a short man named “Babyton,” aside, this game has helped me realize something about the authenticity of children. My son approaches every interaction with complete sincerity. Every friendship, heartbreak, and argument matters. These tiny digital problems deserve intervention. There’s something sweet in seeing him care for his citizens. Meanwhile, I’ve become some kind of amused island deity, watching the chaos from above. In a media landscape where so much children’s entertainment feels algorithmically engineered to stimulate them into dust, Tomodachi Life feels oddly human. The game can be slow and weird, but it is also willing to skip a beat and let the room breathe.

And then there’s Tamagotchi Plaza, essentially a string of cheerful little mini-games built around helping cartoon creatures run a small-town economy, which sounds relaxing until you realize you’ve spent twenty real minutes competitively brushing digital teeth. I typically refuse games like this, telling my kids that if it looks like it could be played on their Fire Tablet for free while waiting at the airport, I am not going to desecrate my precious console’s hard drive space. Yet, after dinner at a revolving sushi restaurant where they received Tamagotchi buttons, these kids were suddenly willing to throw down birthday money to buy it.

The game has the suspicious energy modern children’s games have now, where you can almost see the mobile gaming DNA underneath everything. It’s a confluence of bright colors and tiny repetitive tasks set to trigger Dopamine loops with terrifying efficiency. We’ve worked as dentists, personal trainers, and clothiers. With the way the economy is going, it might be decent practice at trying new things. It’s definitely had the shortest shelf life of the cozy games running wild over here, but the threat always lingers. I’ve also been swindled into buying a game called Dinkum. My son rage quit the game after I explained to him we needed to pay down the town’s debt after building a new facility. Wait until he’s old enough to learn about taxes.

Despite all my complaining, there is something comforting about these games. They occupy this strange emotional territory where almost nothing meaningful happens, but the act of playing them together – or even being away of these digital worlds - becomes meaningful anyway. We aren’t really accomplishing anything on the island. We aren’t developing valuable skills cleaning Tamagotchi teeth. Pokopia certainly wasn’t preparing either of us for adulthood.

But we’re sitting together, creating bizarre little memories that probably stick around longer than whatever “important” thing we should theoretically be doing instead. The games themselves are often repetitive nonsense. I mean, at some level, most things we do are! But these cozy little bastards create tiny pockets of shared space where everything feels lighter for the entire family.

When I was a kid, gaming with parents usually meant Mario Kart once every six months, for a few minutes. Now I’m sitting here fully invested in whether digital Bob is emotionally stable enough to confess his feelings to a Mii version of my sister.

To me, it’s funny watching my child discover the exact kinds of gameplay loops that consumed me and my siblings as kids, just translated into modern form. My generation had Pokémon and Tamagotchi keychains. His generation gets sprawling cozy ecosystems designed to quietly absorb entire evenings.

And tomorrow night, after dinner, we’ll probably boot Tomodachi Life back up again to check on everyone. We’ll laugh at something stupid. Somebody will get into an argument or sing a horrifying song on the evening newscast. Bob will probably continue whatever psychological warfare campaign he’s currently waging against Babyton.

And honestly? We’ll probably have a great time.

Hell, even when I am feeling fine (which I am now, thankfully) I’m still rewatching old shit. I’ve been rewatching Alias lately, and for me, it’s comfort TV at its finest. The show is ostensibly about Sydney Bristow, a double agent working for the CIA to take down a nefarious organization called SD-6. To do so, she has to work alongside her estranged father, another double-agent. She eventually learns her long-dead mother is alive and a Russian operative. Family hijinks ensue over 100 episodes.

It is the kind of show you sink into like an oversized sweatshirt: that early-2000s color grading, the perfectly absurd spy disguises, Nostradamus-like nonsense written (and spoken by human actors) with complete conviction, and Jennifer Garner doing more emotional labor in one episode than most prestige TV casts manage in a whole season.

The first two seasons are nigh-untouchable. Especially the first season, where every episode ended on some bonkers cliffhanger which would be directly resolved in the opening moments of the next. The first two seasons really are peak TV before that was a thing, especially with gonzo season finales that would turn the show on its head. Alias never gets enough credit since it is forever overshadowed by the other J.J. Abrams show that came right after it.

Even the polarizing later seasons have charm, with Season 4 ditching long-standing serialized storytelling for something more akin to the X-Files and Season 5 being compromised with cast shake-ups and even Jennifer Garner’s own pregnancy (that kid is 20 now). You can tell the writers still cared, even if network notes and cast changes were playing tug-of-war with the story. I’m pleased to say Alias still holds up quite well, two decades on. Can’t say the same thing about Alias: The Game.

To be fair, I’m not sure the game could hold up now when it couldn’t even hold up back then. Developed by Acclaim Studios Cheltenham and released in 2004, it had one genuine ace up its sleeve: the show’s cast returned to voice their characters. Jennifer Garner carries that script the same way she carried entire emotional arcs of the series. Michael Vartan, Victor Garber — the gang’s all here.

The problem is… everything else:

• Muddy, late-PS2-era textures that feel like they were blended on low speed

• Stiff animations that make sneaking look like your character desperately needs to pee

• Combat that can only be described as “hit buttons and pray for mercy”

• Camera and controls that actively sabotage your stealth attempts

I’ve owned this game for twenty-one years. I only recently made it through the first level, and regret it. The game wants to be Splinter Cell. It plays like Splinter Cell, if you’ve had three bottles of wine first. Watching Sydney Bristow karate-windmill her way through blocky henchmen while the camera spasms like it’s trying to escape your TV? Art, in its own cursed way.

There are dreadful stealth segments, which at least have the good sense to let you steamroll right through them without earning a Game Over. But the environments are boring, the sound effects are dull, and combat is wonky. Sure, they include gizmos to deploy during missions, but the thrill of evading security lasers, disarming a safe, or dosing a bouncer with a sedative aren’t fun things to translate into a gamified experience. The tension in watching Sydney perform these feats is gone here. There’s apparently a ten-episode promotional game called Alias Underground that was entirely free to download. Even that seems more exciting than this game.

For context: the first Buffy the Vampire Slayer console game landed in 2002, two years before Alias’s digital misadventure. Buffy nailed it. It wasn’t perfect, but it captured the show’s tone and action far more successfully with solid combat, fast pacing, and a surprising faithfulness to the show’s vibe. It felt fun, which is a wild concept when comparing it to what we have here. And while we’re happy to have the voice cast, everyone’s lines are a bit stiff in comparison to their in-person portrayals.

In the annals of “strong female lead” TV shows turned video games, Alias ranks after Buffy, but still probably before the Desperate Housewives PC Game. Maybe one day I’ll be brave enough to download the Grey’s Anatomy PC game. And the less said about Xena for Nintendo 64, the better.

Rewatching Alias today is a blast. I relish the topsy-turvy twists and spy-fi gadgetry. I love this show. How lucky to be able to watch it again after all this time, and most of it feeling new. Jennifer Garner sells the show in spades. But the game doesn’t have that luxury. It’s earnest in a desire to feel like an extension of the show, but it never feels as exciting - or fun. No amount of nostalgia can drag it into comfort territory.

Some missions are worth reliving. This one should have stayed classified.

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I was just trying to share a little nostalgia with my daughter at a time where my son and I were fangirling over the Power Rangers. As we trawled a store for Ranger toys, she spotted it immediately, a tiny egg-shaped relic hanging innocently from a pegboard. “What’s that?” she asked, eyes wide. And suddenly, I was 10 years old again, lobbying my mother to sign a makeshift contract to secure myself a day-one copy of Final Fantasy VIII.

Seeing a glimmer of myself in my daughter’s eye made the 20-dollar price tag seem marginal in exchange for what would presumably be weeks of parental bonding. An enthusiastic purchase by any means.

Tamagotchi. A real one, not one of those ironic remakes with Bluetooth or cloud syncing. I was drunk with nostalgia. I remembered the joy of those tiny beeps and the satisfaction of feeding it, cleaning up its pixelated poop, and keeping it alive for as long as my attention span allowed. It was a miniature life lesson, packaged in a kawaii plastic shell. And way cooler than those “pretend this egg is your baby” assignments from health class in middle school.

Tamagotchi was released in Japan in 1996 by Bandai, who imagined a pet small enough to fit on a keychain for people too busy for real ones. It hit American shelves the next year, and millions of kids learned what responsibility sounded like through 8-bit beeps. It was adorable, addictive, and (as I had somehow forgotten over the last two decades) ...kind of a pain in the ass. It even spawned a forgettable Game Boy game.

The first day was full of novelty and wonder. The little creature (an Angel Tamagotchi, and honestly a very ugly one) hatched, beeped cheerfully, and we took turns tending to it. Feed. Play. Clean. Treat for illness. Repeat. It was like having a kid, except this one didn’t talk back or need college savings. My daughter giggled every time it did something new. I grinned, watching her discover the same weird little joy back when Bill Clinton was a lame-duck.

By day 5, when the digital angel returned to heaven, my well-laid plans began to come off the rails. We initiated a second generation. At first, she’d bring it to me every time it beeped, prompting me for help the same way she asks for help picking out clothes in the morning. “Dad, it needs something,” she’d announce. I’d dutifully press the buttons, report back on its mood, and return it to her. We’re all in this together!

But then… she stopped asking.

Beep.

I looked over. Nothing. My daughter was wholly unbothered. It beeped again, instilling a sense of urgency. I could feel my eye twitch. Eventually, I couldn’t take it anymore. I picked it up myself, fed it pie to fill its hunger meter before giving candy to fill its happy meter. I put it down, temporarily relieved there was momentarily one less mouth to feed.

Days passed, and I was the one keeping it alive, full stop. The single father of a digital organism. My daughter had moved on to slime kits, writing stories, and soccer practice. Suddenly I had full legal and physical custody of this Tamagotchi. Was it too late to return it? I steeled myself to ignore it and wished for its timely and efficient death.

The problem with Tamagotchi, which I had somehow forgotten since the age of JNCO jeans, is that they don’t just die easily. They cling to existence and demand care, even when you’ve mentally moved on. Every resilient chirp was a reminder that I had chosen this.

Eventually, the creature reached the end of its little life cycle. I watched it fade away with a few sad beeps, a brief silence, and then twinkling stars filled the screen. Relief washed over me as I resolved to remove this cortisol-raising device from my life. It had other plans. Without warning, another tiny angel baby appeared without prompt or permission. Just another blinking, hungry, beeping demon vying for my attention. Exasperated, I stuffed that bitch in the junk drawer.

For a few weeks, the drawer served as a silent grave of pixels. Each time I opened it, I saw those faint stars representing the digital afterlife, twinkling peacefully. I felt no guilt. It was a mercy killing for this damned contraption. Until two nights ago, when my youngest happened upon it.

Of course she did. Pre-schoolers are like a danger-seeking missile, manifesting all sorts of curious trouble. She brought the Tamagotchi out like a trophy, pressing buttons with chaotic enthusiasm. I figured the batteries were long dead and that she’d lose interest momentarily and return to her Bitzee. That night, after everyone else went to bed, I sat alone in the living room, scrolling on my phone, reveling in silence. It was only then, after I let my guard down, that I heard the sound.

Beep.

I stopped, mid-doom scroll.

Beep.

The sound was unmistakable. That shrill, synthetic cry for attention, slicing through the quiet. I turned my head toward the drawer where I had buried it, my pulse quickening. I crept toward it like a gorgeous and young horror movie protagonist about to make a terrible decision. Some real “life imitating art” type stuff given that I am, in fact, young and gorgeous. I opened the drawer. The light from the screen barely flickered in the dark. There it was: another digital devil had emerged from digitized primordial ooze.

No reset. No batteries changed. Just unholy persistence. And here’s the worst part: there’s just some part of me that won’t let him suffer. I heard him beep all day yesterday and eventually gave in. I fed him. Cleaned him. I played his damn games with him. What is wrong with me?

The Tamagotchi sits on my desk now, silent for the moment, its little egg body casting a faint reflection in the lamplight. My children have moved on completely. To them, it was just a toy. To me, it has become something else entirely. A lesson, perhaps.

Parenthood, even the fake digital kind, has no off switch. And somewhere in between the beeping and endless loop of care, I think I finally understand an interaction I had hours after my first child was born. I was a newly-minted father, frazzled at the notion of having to care for an actual newborn, when a night-shift nurse reminded me: “You wanted this.”

Beep.

It wasn’t just Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers, though. The whole ecosystem of early ’90s pop culture bled into our play. This was the same time when my Sega Game Gear went everywhere with me. I’d play it until the batteries drained in record time, cycling through cartridges that looked impossibly advanced back then: Sonic racing across the screen, Streets of Rage turning my handheld into a tiny brawler, and the occasional licensed tie-in that didn’t always play well but kept me hooked. At home, the 16-bit consoles ruled. I can still feel the cheap plastic of the controllers and the rush of seeing “cutscenes” that looked barely better than a cartoon flipbook but felt like the future. Power Rangers belonged to that bright, clunky, and utterly sincere world.

When the first Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie hit VHS, I wore that tape down the same way I did with The Pagemaster, Swan Princess and Free Willy. The second the tape finished, I would hit rewind on the high-tech TV/VCR combo in our basement, ready to start anew. Ivan Ooze was terrifyingly goofy, a villain so purple and slimy he looked ripped straight out of a Nickelodeon slime tank. I memorized whole stretches of dialogue, rewound the same fight sequences, and sat glued to the screen while the Rangers faced stakes bigger than anything the TV show had ever thrown at them. Their Ranger costumes in the movie looked absolutely stacked, too.

The second movie, Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie, didn’t land the same way. Maybe it was me getting older, maybe it was the new cast, maybe it was just time moving on. By then, I was shifting into other interests, and the Rangers started to fade into the background. But that first movie never left me. Even today, its campy soundtrack and over-the-top action feel like a time capsule of mid-’90s pop culture, like Pogs. Thankful those haven’t made a comeback.

Fast forward a few decades, and suddenly I was morphing again. Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind brought me back into the fight with a pixel-art style that somehow feels modern and retro all at once. It successfully blends brawler mechanics with animated cutscenes and features graphics and music that sounds *just* enough like the SNES and Game Gear games I would refuse to return to Blockbuster, racking up late fee charges that I simply did not worry about.

Sure, there have been other Power Rangers games over the years, but auto-battlers or in-app purchase laden phone games never scratched that itch. Likewise, I never really clicked with Battle for the Grid, the PS4-era fighting game. Instead, Rita’s Rewind had me feeling like I was a precocious six year old again, yelling “Tyrannosaurus” at the top of my lungs. It felt like Power Rangers, if that makes sense.

The real surprise came when my son discovered the Rangers. One YouTube clip turned into a whole obsession, and before I knew it, we had shelves stacked with the “Re-Ignition” toy line. These toys were a revelation: brand-new, but designed to look almost exactly like the ones I remembered from childhood. They captured the chunky charm of ’90s plastic but with sharper paint jobs and sturdier joints. My son looked on Amazon for the toys, but there wasn’t much there. Telling my son Walmart had them was a mistake, because he then started suspiciously asking to go school supply shopping specifically at Walmart. Wanting to live my nostalgia vicariously through my children like any millennial parent, I was happy to oblige him.

We started watching the original series together. He was absolutely glued to the Green Ranger saga. The moment Tommy showed up, mysterious and cool in that shielded armor, he was hooked. Watching his excitement mirrored mine from thirty years ago. He didn’t know how the story ended, so when Tommy flipped from villain to hero, it was like he was experiencing the twist of a lifetime.

For me, this blast through the past reminded me just how much I had loved the Power Rangers when I was his exact age. It surprised me how reasonably well they held up through fresh eyes, even without an HD upscale. The suits still popped, the monster designs still had that wonderful “guy in a rubber suit” charm, and the fights still had energy. An added bonus: Bulk and Skull’s physical comedy antics always produced a chortle from my son.

But it didn’t stop with the original. Well, in a sense it did since my son was very disturbed by the concept of time given how old Billy looked in the preview for the 2023 Netflix special (which we still haven’t watched). Pretty soon, we found ourselves watching newer seasons I had never touched, like Ninja Steel. At first, I thought it wouldn’t hit the same given how unfamiliar they were (not to mention how the dialogue all sounds like it was dubbed in). But watching with my kids changed that. Their excitement became my excitement.

And honestly? It is fun. The newer shows have their own flavor, their own spins on villains, Zords, and Rangers. While I can’t recite the theme songs from memory the way I can with the original, I’ve found myself genuinely enjoying them. It’s like rediscovering the franchise as something new, not just as a relic of my childhood.

The other day, I caught my son and daughter in the backyard, mid-battle. My son had his morpher in hand, with the action figures spread out across the lawn like a miniature Angel Grove. The same spark that lit me up in the ’90s is alive in them today. I know this is likely going to be a fad for them, and these toys will eventually meet the same fate as the toys I had three decades ago. But seeing my past reflected in their present, if even for a moment, felt like I reached back in time (or more accurately, inside) to give the version of myself who lived in 1993 a high-five. Playing with my children allowed me to play with my inner child in this oddly affirming experience. Is there anything really morphenomenal than that?

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Usually, somewhere between hiding the iPad and caving to Minecraft pleas from my older kids, I think to myself: they’re no different than I was in 1994. Back then, I’d wake up on Saturdays, pour a bowl of something neon-colored with the structural integrity of styrofoam, and slam myself into a chair to play Super Mario World, or later, Chrono Trigger, for hours. No one called it “screen time.” Nowadays, though, the screen isn’t limited to living rooms - they are in our pockets, on our wrists, and seemingly everywhere and anywhere else.

I have fond memories of staying up pretty much all night at my grandma’s house, playing Ocarina of Time with my cousin, or nearly skipping school in 5th grade because my sister and I were both up too late beating Final Fantasy VII. While I might remember spending hours at a time playing games, studies suggest elementary school aged children are spending less time watching TV now (even if they are spending more time on screens in general). Still, back in the day, TV felt finite, watching a bit after school or turning it on specific days and times to catch a new episode of a show. Not just pre-streaming, but even before most shows came out on VHS or DVD.

Even then, I remember hearing phrases like “TV rots your brain.” I may have even sidestepped explaining to my kids what a melted brain would even look like when uttering the phrase in front of them. But in this age of spending most of our lives beholden to a little LCD screen, there has to be some sort of happy balance in the screen time wars, right?

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no more than 1 hour of screen time per day for children ages 2 to 5, and “consistent limits” for older kids to ensure screen use doesn’t replace sleep, physical activity, or family time (American Academy of Pediatrics, 2016). I don’t know about you, but I read that with the same energy I bring to “serving size: 11 chips.”

We all try. Because we’ve read the studies. We know that excessive screen use in young children is associated with delays in language development, reduced physical activity, and lower academic performance (Madigan et al., 2019). A Canadian study even linked high screen time at age 2 with poorer performance on developmental screening tests at age 3 (Madigan et al., 2019).

I can’t really stand YouTube/Kids, so I usually limit screen time to something we’ve seen already on Netflix. If we are playing games, it’s usually something available on the Switch. Because there’s value in watching a show or playing a game together - hopefully enough to offset the empty calories when they are watching or playing something without us. While it's easy to demonize screens, what we often forget is how our kids are engaging with them.

When I was eight, I wasn’t exactly sharpening my social-emotional skills playing Contra. I was just dodging bullets and screaming at my cousin when he died too many times and wasted all our continues. But guess what? We were learning to take turns (sort of) or we were figuring out how to fail and try again; all of which are lessons we’ve hopefully carried into adulthood.

That’s why I’m not into either glower-y blanket ban-moms or no holds barred screen-loving parents. Instead, I’m into moderation, boundaries, and making screen time intentional. Are my kids being weirdly creative on Minecraft in two-player mode? I love hearing them work together when playing as a team.

I don’t believe children of any age should have unfettered access to technology and certainly not the internet. That said, I raise my eyebrows a bit at some of the sensationalized takeaways of studies reported by the media, and especially at any sort of sponcon trying to convince me into buying some new tech paradoxically marketed as a cure-all to screen time dilemmas.

Did my kids get a bit too much screentime this summer during my recent hospitalization and then extensive recovery from a spinal infection? You bet. But they also had trips to the Zoo, the Science Museum, Chuck E. Cheese, and lots of laughs in between. It helped me come to a conclusion: screen time isn’t the enemy. It’s a tool, a temptation, a teacher, and, even sometimes, a babysitter. Just like in the 90s. Perhaps the biggest difference is that this time around, the parents are in on and actually get it. I watch my kid’s shows with them and play games they want to play.

A generation later, some things really haven’t changed. My kids might be glued to Minecraft instead of Nickelodeon, but the arguments are the same ones my parents had with me: “Five more minutes.” “Not before bed.” “Go outside for a while.” To me, the challenge now is making the vilified screen time part of a larger story that emphasizes creativity and connection. But if my kids’ memories of this decade end up being as pixelated and warm as mine are from 1994, I’ll consider that a win.

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Juggling raising three kids can be tough, especially in terms of getting one-on-one time with each kid you’ve produced. I’ve been looking for things my almost-eight-year-old and I can enjoy together. Something that bridges our worlds and is uniquely for us. And then along came K-Pop Demon Hunters, which – as someone who grew up on a media diet of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Sailor Moon - might as well have been stamped with “Made for You” in neon letters.

While the film debuted in June on Netflix, it wasn’t until late last month that we sat down one early evening to watch it, just after her younger brother and sister had gone to sleep. For those unaware (both of you), imagine a high-energy action movie about a K-Pop girl group who secretly moonlight as demon hunters. It’s not wholly original, but the combination of killer choreography, Day-Glo colored weapons, and just the right amount of sass, and you’ve got a fun, vibrant, and exactly the sort of over-the-top fantasy my inner teen still cheers for. My oldest was hooked in the first five minutes. Girl, same.

One thing I loved was how K-Pop Demon Hunters introduces the idea of “confronting your demons” without getting too dark for younger viewers or too preachy to annoy adults. Sure, the demons are literal, but the movie weaves in themes about fear, insecurity, and learning to trust yourself. It’s empowering without veering into After School Special territory, and it packages everything in sparkly costumes and fight sequences so slick they could be are music videos. My daughter got to absorb the message, and I got to avoid that cloying feeling that inevitably shows up during every Disney movie.

Every time she laughed at a joke, I laughed too. When she leaned forward during an action scene, I was right there with her. This wasn’t me sitting there half-distracted on Instagram while she watched something, like I’ve been guilty of too many times in the past. This felt like a joint mission, reminding me how precious it is to have these shared reference points. We’re now calling each other “my little soda pop,” or singing to each other “fit check for my napalm errrra!” I remember sitting on the couch in high school, watching Alias on TV with my mom and sister. I hope that “Cake Pop Demon Hunters” as my youngest calls it helps form a bridge with my daughter that continues into teenagerdom and adulthood. Who knows – maybe years from now, when she’s old enough, she’ll roll her eyes but secretly enjoy watching Buffy together.

Let’s be honest: it’s hard to find kids’ content that’s engaging and appropriate. So much “family” media is either bland enough to bore adults to tears or inexplicably obsessed with pairing every character off in a romance subplot. My daughter’s still living in a world where her most serious relationship is with her Tamagotchi. She does not need to learn about “will-they-won’t-they” dynamics in second grade. Sorry if that makes me a prude (it doesn’t). K-Pop Demon Hunters was refreshingly free of all that. No shoehorned love stories, no awkward “crush” B-plots. Just action, friendship, and big emotional arcs that feel earned, even if the third Act is a little rushed.

I also loved the cultural component of the film. The Korean elements weren’t there like an exotic garnish; they were baked right into the story. Language, music, fashion, little touches of culture all fit naturally, and it felt celebratory rather than performative. Seeing the pedigree of the filmmakers and the voice cast, and it feels honest rather than crass pandering.

As a first-generation American, this matters to me. When I was growing up, pop culture often treated “foreign” as a punchline. Accents were exaggerated for laughs, traditional clothing was played for ridicule, and entire cultures were boiled down to stereotypes. That stuff is insidious, othering, and absolutely seeps in. I don’t want my daughter to inherit that skewed lens of any culture, including the one where half her DNA comes from. Watching something where the cultural component is woven in with respect and joy feels right. It certainly helps that the film may end up Netflix’s most popular original film ever, and that a song from the film sits atop the Billboard Hot 100.

About halfway through the movie, my daughter hit me with a question I wasn’t prepared for. She paused mid-snack, gave me this serious look, and said, “How can Rumi be half demon if her mom’s a demon hunter and her dad’s a demon?” I laughed so hard I almost choked.

Because really, from Buffy to Romeo and Juliet and literally everything in-between, love across battle lines is a storytelling classic. And as much as I want to keep her world sweet and simple for now, there’s a strange beauty in knowing that one day she’ll watch those kinds of stories and understand.

For now, though, I’ll take mental snapshots of popcorn on the couch, the curl in her smile when “Golden” comes on, and the way she leans in when the music swells. Because one day she may too busy, cool, or grown-up to watch movies with dad. But for now, I get to be her co-pilot during these initial forays into glittery heroics. Hopefully years from now, when she’s sitting with her own kid, she might remember the night we met the K-Pop Demon Hunters and smile. That’s a bond no villain, curse, or even a teenage eye-roll can ever break.

K-POP Demon Hunters, a production from Sony Animation and Netflix, is streaming now. The soundtrack is available on all streaming platforms. Check out “How It’s Done,” “Takedown,” “Soda Pop,” and #1 single “Golden.”

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While I was still a fan of Donkey Kong 64, I prefer the straightforward and linear platforming of the earlier games. I just find myself a touch overwhelmed when it comes to the sprawling maps and dozens of hidden collectibles strewn about in DK 64. While Donkey Kong Country would return nearly twenty years later with DKC: Tropical Freeze, it didn’t feel as slick or polished as that 1994 debut.

The feeling of being slightly overwhelmed is one I share with the 3D Super Mario games, starting with Super Mario 64. It was an eye-popping game, but keeping track of stars, locked doors, and all the collectibles just doesn’t do it for me. I really enjoyed Super Mario Odyssey when it came out in 2017. I promptly played through the story, finished the game, and landed in the Mushroom Kingdom sometime in October 2017. Feels like a lifetime ago – and in some ways it was, as I was trying to finish the game before the arrival of my first child the following month. I beat the game and just kinda…left it at that. At least until 2023 when my son, fresh off the Super Mario movie, decided to give the game a whirl.

Suddenly, we’d be collecting power moons in 2024 and watching them appear on the in-game list, just next to the ones I collected three kids and seven years before in 2017. But for the imposition of screen time limits, he’d be willing to spend hours running around as Mario, throwing his hat on anything that moves in the quest to find more moons. I’m pretty sure he has collected more than I have – and in 2025, we still aren’t finished. This is probably a good time to acknowledge I’ve never gotten a 100% completion trophy in a single video game in my life. It just doesn’t appeal to me.

When the Switch 2 was announced, my son joined me in my thirst for the console, despite its sparse initial game offerings. After the excitement of Mario Kart World wore off him on June 7^th, he went back to playing Minecraft and Luigi’s Mansion. But when Donkey Kong Bananza was announced, he salivated at the announcement trailer. It wasn’t what I was expecting yet was entirely in his lane. Having secured a Switch 2, I preordered both the game and the amiibo for him once rumblings came about the Super Mario Odyssey team played an integral role in developing this game. I knew it would be a special game for him, and that alone was something I cherished as a father of a budding gamer.

Since I’m a responsible parent, my son missed out on the midnight launch of the Switch 2. To make amends, I offered to take him to Best Buy on DKB launch day to pick up the game together. It was something we both looked forward to, marking it on the calendar in my office and giving him periodic updates as to how many days left until the new Donkey Kong game came out. A week or so before launch however, I was hospitalized with Osteomyelitis of the thoracic spine. I was optimistic I would be out in time to still take him, until my projected four-day stay was extended to nine.

My initial dismay at missing the promised launch day party quickly gave way to excitement when my wife dutifully took my son to Best Buy to pick up our preorder, sending me a photo of my pajama-clad son in the car. We Facetimed a bit on launch day, and I was able to watch him, slightly puzzled, as he began navigating the gameplay mechanics. When I was eventually discharged home to begin a six-to-eight-week course of IV antibiotics, I was frankly too weak or in too much pain to plop down on the couch next to him to play the game or even attempt to negotiate the destruction-based gameplay loop. To my great surprise, my about-to-be-Kindergartener had mostly figured it out!

I’ve maybe played about an hour of the game over the last two weeks, but I’ve spent hours watching and helping him play through the game as he reached sublayer 700. I have no idea how far he has gotten in the overall game or how many layers are left, but it does not matter. Sure, the game is wonderful and deserving of the accolades lauded upon it. My true joy, though, has come from watching him negotiate the gameplay and world. Yes, destroying the environment is fun in a not-climate-changey way. Yet seeing my son’s developing coordination, problem solving, and even his map reading skills grow while playing has moved me to proud dad tears more than once.

Even a year ago, playing a game with him mostly meant playing it for him. He doesn’t necessarily need me for that anymore, even if he still needs me to do most of the reading for him. Yet he still wants me there, on the couch with my IV bag, either playing with or just watching him as Donkey Kong and Pauline burrow themselves closer to the planet’s core.

It reminds me of a book we read together, I Can Open It For You by Shinsuke Yoshitake, about a young boy who needs his parents to open everyday items for himself. He laments his inability to do so and imagines a world where he can open literally anything for anyone. For now, though, he has to rely on his mom. When she’s unable to open something, he turns to his father who is practically giddy at the request. He explains that he’s happy to do it because the day will come when his son no longer needs his help. I relate to it with my three children, all in different stages of development. Try reading it to your young child without crying, I dare you.

One day, my beautiful boy won’t need me to read dialogue or perform a double jump for him. Hell, he probably will recoil when I ask if I can sit next to him on the couch. I know it’s normal and all well and good. I can still hate the thought of him being a smelly teenager who rolls his eyes at me. But for now at least, we have each other – and Donkey Kong.

Having just finished the fifth (and best) season of Buffy, I thought I wanted to play a game. Naturally, I turned to the only thing that could match the existential dread of a spinal infection: Persona 3. While I tried to play Reload on my PS Portal, the hospital wi-fi and my attention span alternated turns being too spotty to really work. Instead, I reviewed my list on Amazon and found the next best thing: the four Persona 3 films that adapt the story of the most cheerful suicide metaphor ever sold to teens.

If you’ve never played Persona 3, let me catch you up. You play as a blue-haired transfer student who joins a group of high schoolers that summon monsters by shooting themselves in the head with mystical guns called Evokers. Yes, you read that right. And you thought Call of Duty was giving your kids weird ideas. These students are members of SEES, basically a demon hunting squad masquerading as a school club.

Anyway, our hero moves into a haunted dorm, discovers the Dark Hour (a secret hour of the night that only a select few can perceive, during which their high school is transformed into a Babel-like tower called Tartarus teeming with monsters). During their school-year long quest to discovery the origins of both the Dark Hour and Tartarus, he slowly learns what it means to have relationships, purpose, and the kind of melancholic playlist you'd expect from someone who wears headphones as a personality trait. Following the in-game calendar starting in Spring 2009, players spend the weeks juggling social relationships, dungeon crawling, and even the occasional weekend job.

I hadn’t watched the movies before. Mostly because, like most adults who haven't been hospitalized, I don’t usually have six-plus hours to spare for a moody anime film series about the inevitability of death. But in the hospital? Brother, I was the inevitability of death. Or at least I felt like it every time a nurse tried to find a vein. Here is a generally spoiler-free summation of the films:

Movie 1: Spring of Birth was a reminder that anime protagonists can be awkward loners without needing to be complete jerks. Watching transfer student Makoto (the anime name for the protagonist) navigate new friendships while secretly carrying the emotional weight of a collapsing world felt... eerily familiar. Except in my case, the collapsing world was my immune system and my new friend was a nurse named Jackie who kept calling me “honey” in a lovely, thick accent. I enjoyed this movie because it really captures the essence of the early hours of the game, and a sharp, evocative art style that even now stands out. I particularly enjoyed combat scenes featuring songs from the game.

Movie 2: Midsummer Knight's Dream leaned into the found-family vibes, and as my own family texted “hope ur okay” at odd hours or showed up to my room in alarming numbers, I thought about how much of parenthood is just pretending you aren’t terrified while helping small humans fight monsters they don’t even understand yet. I loved the slice of life moments featured here (and elsewhere), as it demonstrated the deepening bonds of the characters. The sleek anime combat and musical stylings return here to great effect. Who cares that the game’s famous social links are an afterthought? Not me!

Movie 3: Falling Down is where the real depression kicks in, and that’s also when the pain meds started messing with my dreams. Watching the characters spiral into nihilism while my own body spiraled into inflammation? Now that’s what I call synergy. Bonus points for the movie’s pitch-perfect portrayal of teenage hopelessness. It’s like the writers knew I’d be watching this while wondering if I’d ever feel normal again. This may have been my favorite of the four movies, as I loved the poignant scenes of the characters finding their groove and willingness to fight on their own terms. The climax of the film is long coming, but so well done with a sense of foreboding that is definitely lacking when playing the game.

And Movie 4: Winter of Rebirth—hoo boy. That’s the one that slaps you across the face and whispers, “You will die, and that’s okay.” It was about as subtle as a hospital bill, but it hit me. Between the swelling in my spine and the drip-drip of antibiotics, I saw my own mortality in anime form. I cried. Not a sobbing, ugly cry, but rather just a slow, leaky faucet kind of weep. It was similar to the feeling you get when you finally admit to yourself that life doesn’t have a New Game Plus. Watching the characters anguish over how to spend their final days felt like a roller coaster of emotions, even if I had already experienced this before when playing the game (and it’s portable remake…and it’s next-gen remake.)

But here’s the thing: when the credits rolled, I didn’t feel worse. I felt... still. I had been seen. Not by the overworked resident who definitely Googled “osteomyelitis,” but by a group of fictional Japanese teens screaming and fighting into the void. It reminded me that facing death, whether in an anime dungeon or a real hospital, is not about escaping death. Instead, these movies helped me realize that it’s about choosing how you live with it.

So yeah. My hospital stay sucks - whose doesn’t? But it also gave me the space to watch a beautifully depressing coming-of-age story that mirrored my own little crisis. And when I finally get discharged, I will walk a little slower, hug my kids a little longer, and force them to watch Spirited Away so they can start their own existential journey.

When you are trapped in a room for days on end, being poked and prodded, it’s easy to slip into darkness. Watching the Persona 3 movies gave me a chance to identify that existential malaise and situational depression as something that wasn’t just exclusive to me. In doing so, I was able to relate to the characters as they rounded the corner on their anguish while I was doing the same thing.

The Persona 3 movies reminded that even in times of extreme darkness, we can find strength within ourselves. After all, as anyone who has played this game or watched these movies know, living a full, beautiful, and meaningful existence isn’t just what the journey of life is about - it’s also the answer.

“Time never waits. It delivers all equally to the same end.”

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The premise? You’re the prince of a generic fantasy kingdom who gets framed for the murder of your dad, the king. Executed in the opening act, you wake up resurrected in a cursed castle with a sultry voice whispering in your ear, “Would you like to sell your soul for revenge?” Naturally, you say yes. Now, you’re the demonic landlord of a haunted fortress and your job is to murder quite literally anyone who walks through the door.

But you don’t fight them with swords or magic. No, you set traps. Spike floors, pendulums, flame geysers, poison arrows. You're playing a gothic version of Home Alone, only instead of punishing Wet Bandits with paint cans, you're eviscerating paladins with bear claws and drowning peasants in acid. Simply put, it rules!

You’re encouraged to be creative. Combo a floor spike into a swinging axe into a falling boulder? Bonus mana. Make them wet the bed before they die? Extra evil points (okay, not really…but I would’ve believed it). The castle is your sandbox, and murder is your signature style.

But here's the kicker: you can choose to kill them or spare them. Each intruder has a backstory. Maybe the priest looking to exorcise your castle is also embezzling church funds. Maybe the knight trying to slay you is just trying to rescue his cursed sister. You can convert them, trick them, trap them, or, occasionally, save them. You’re not just a demon with an attitude. You’re a demon with moral ambiguity.

Twelve-year-old me had no clue what was going on plot-wise. The translation was rough, the pacing was glacial, and I didn’t care. I just wanted to build a trap corridor that launched people into spikes while I laughed like a maniac. Later in life, I realized the game was trying to make me question why I wanted to do that, and whether I was the actual villain, even in my own revenge story.

The graphical presentation is a bit rough, even by the 90’s standard, but it has charm. I didn’t know it yet, but Tecmo’s Deception was very reminiscent of a game that I would come to love in just a few years: King’s Field.

The first game was successful enough to spawn a surprisingly long series. The sequel, Kagero: Deception II, added more traps, better graphics, and a playable female protagonist who was also unjustly accused and manipulated into demonic servitude. The vibes remained deeply cursed, which is a compliment.

Deception III: Dark Delusion expanded the formula with room customization, more branching storylines, and moral choices with actual impact. But the real evolution came with Trapt on the PS2. Yes, they dropped the “Deception” name, probably because someone in marketing got a little too clever. Trapt kept the gameplay core but leaned even harder into anime villainy and “sexy evil maid” aesthetics. You could still chuck intruders into walls of spikes, but now there were cleavage physics. Not Dead or Alive on Xbox 360 level jiggle mechanics, but enough to make your eyes roll. Admission - to this day, I can’t stand jiggle mechanics.

The latest entry, Deception IV (and its PS4 re-release The Nightmare Princess), hit the PS3 and Vita with all the style and jank you'd expect. It tried to bring the series back by going full ham: more characters, more traps, and even more sadistic glee. But it lacks the gothic and satanic-adjacent verve of the first game. What once felt like a sinister RPG experiment now plays like a grindy murder puzzle wrapped in low-budget anime tropes. Not bad, but not essential. Still, I appreciated the effort. How many games in 2014 let you trap people under toilets?

I don’t know if Tecmo’s Deception holds up for newcomers. It’s clunky. The controls are stiff. The camera is a war crime. But it’s unforgettable and had a nostalgia chokehold on me during a recent playthrough. It messed with genre conventions in ways most AAA studios wouldn’t dare. It made me think about morality in games before BioWare made it cool. It let me be evil, but also conscious of my evil. And it did it all from a disc that cost me $4.99 next to a register selling Halloween candy in July.

Now, as a father nearing forty, I wonder what my kid’s “clearance bin” moment will be. Will she find a dusty indie game on the Switch eShop that scars her in a good way? No, because I gatekeep that stuff in a way our parents did not know how to do in the 1990s. Or will she discover Tecmo’s Deception in my PSX bin and wonder what kind of kid her dad used to be?

Regardless, I’ll be proud. Because while some kids grew up with Disney. I grew up with Tecmo’s Deception.

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Where The Good Wife had its roots in high-gloss scandal, cases ripped from recent enough headlines and clever legal drama, The Good Fight becomes its own savage beast over the course of six seasons. When the show launched, it originally had Diane Lockhart, the ever-composed liberal lioness, poised to retire in peace. But then Trump won. Literally. The show scrapped its original pilot and rewrote the first few minutes so we could all join Diane as she stared blankly at her TV while Trump was sworn in. She decides to retire to a chateau in France, except she then learns her retirement fund vanished in a Ponzi scheme, and her plans for a graceful exit were replaced with a reluctant, angry re-entry into the legal grind.

The decision to toss the script and start with a gut punch set the tone for what would become one of the most politically raw shows on television. While other legal dramas worked in a fictional vacuum, The Good Fight was reading the New York Times and Politico right alongside the rest of us in real time. It didn't just acknowledge the Trump presidency. It made the administration a crucial part of the show’s identity, looming large over the characters (and us) as we tried to get on with our lives.

The plots weren’t subtle. There were Russian pee tapes, Michael Cohen cameos, alt-right judges, and the infamous Memo 618, a mysterious document suggesting some people were legally untouchable. In particular, season four’s Memo 618 plotline fascinated and rankled me as an attorney who believes in the rule of law. There were also musical explainers about NDAs and fascism, even one involving Google and China which CBS forced the show’s creators to remove. At times it felt like the writers room had mainlined Twitter. And yet, it worked. All six seasons of the show rank 91% or higher on Rotten Tomatoes, and Variety places it in their 100 Greatest Shows of All Time.

Watching it in real time during Trump’s first term felt like a fever dream – so much so that I finished the first season in 2017 and didn’t watch the show again until 2025. I had enough DJT in the real world, why did I want to invite his specter into my downtime? The show refused to offer the usual TV comfort of resolution. Cases were lost. The rules were bent. Even Diane—our polished, pearls-and-pinot liberal hero—got sucked into a secret resistance group and started microdosing to cope with the existential dread. Honestly, relatable.

Then Trump lost the 2020 election. The collective exhale came quickly. It felt like maybe we were moving on. The Good Fight wasn’t so sure. Even after he left office, the show kept sounding the alarm. His presence loomed in the storylines like a stain that wouldn’t come out. This chaos had changed the world, and the show’s writers following much of that chaos through logical conclusions, including an episode about January 6^th.

I can’t really explain it, but watching this show – very much so about Trump’s first presidency – is oddly comforting. Maybe it’s because it felt like there was so much more to make fun of during the first term. But now, in the early days of a second Trump term moving to effectuate its policies with lightning speed, revisiting these plot points from the first term feels almost benign.

What once felt too loud or too anxious now feels almost soothing. Pee tapes? Sure. Cohen being shady? Familiar. Diane trying to fight the slow death of the rule of law while looking like a million fucking dollars? Honestly, that’s comfort TV now. In a world where institutions feel even shakier than they did the first time around, there’s something oddly therapeutic about watching characters who never believed everything would be fine in the first place. And over six seasons, the show evolved into something almost unclassifiable: part legal procedural, part satire, part fever dream, and part resistance art. Where else are you going to get episode titles like “The Gang Discovers Who Killed Jeffrey Epstein?”

The Good Fight didn't age into a relic of the Trump era. It aged into a warning label. It was a show that shouted “this is not normal” long before anyone else stopped pretending it was. And revisiting it now feels like reconnecting with that one friend who saw the train wreck coming and tried to tell you it wasn’t just a weird detour.

Diane Lockhart never got her peaceful retirement. She got fake judges, shadowy conspiracies, and an endless string of moral compromises. And somehow she still put on her blazer and showed up for court. That’s the kind of hero I need in this sequel timeline we’re all stuck in.

So no, I don’t think I’d recommend The Good Fight to just anyone looking for a distraction. But if you're a lawyer, a political junkie, or just someone quietly screaming into your morning coffee these days, go ahead and check it out. It might make you laugh. It might make you mad. But at the very least, it’ll remind you that you’re not crazy. Things really were (and still are) that messed up.

And for what it’s worth, Diane never gave up. So maybe we shouldn’t either.

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I’m 38 now, a father of three, and most of my gaming happens in stolen hours after bedtime routines and before I inevitably fall asleep on the couch. But every now and then, I look back at the strange little milestones that were midnight console launches. Those cold, chaotic, oddly joyful nights somehow meant more than just bringing home a new piece of tech.

My first launch was the Xbox 360. I was a freshman at Michigan State, still getting used to living away from home, fueled by cafeteria food and the boundless energy of someone with no back pain or kids. A few fraternity brothers and I heard whispers that the local Best Buy was getting a shipment. Naturally, we had to be there. So we drove out, stood in a line that wrapped around the block, and waited with dozens of strangers, all buzzing with the same nervous excitement. We had no guarantees, no preorders, just hope. And somehow, I walked out with one. We brought it back to the house and stayed up all night setting it up, playing Call of Duty 2 and arguing over controller turns like we were ten years old again.

The Wii came next, and with it, a different kind of memory. I was back home, standing outside a Best Buy again, this time not for a midnight sale but for a lottery. That’s how Nintendo rolled back then. A crowd of eager fans gathered, each one clutching a little slip of paper and silently praying to the gaming gods. With me was my 12-year-old cousin Martin, who was absolutely convinced he was walking out of there with a Wii. My number got called. His didn’t. It was the kind of moment you laugh about twenty years later. At the time, though? Sorry again, Martin.

When the PlayStation 3 launched, I was a college sophomore. The price tag was $600, which felt absolutely bonkers at the pre-recession time. But I wanted it, like we all did. The demand was brutal, and stock was even worse. But a cousin of mine, with questionable but apparently effective connections, managed to slip me one through a back channel at GameStop. It wasn’t quite a midnight launch, but it felt like one when I finally plugged it in.

Then came the Wii U. I lined up for that launch too, more out of tradition than necessity, and with far less fanfare. I remember walking out with the system, eager to see what Nintendo had in store. The answer, it turned out, was ZombiU. Still, I was there on launch day, and that counts for something.

The last real midnight launch for me was the PlayStation 4. It was 2013, and I had become a bit more organized about these things. I preordered mine, like an adult. My brother and I drove out together to our local GameStop. It was quieter than previous launches but still buzzing with energy. Everyone was there for the same reason, and there was something comforting in that shared excitement. We got our consoles, came home, and stayed up playing “Killzone” and “Resogun.” I remember thinking it might be the last time I’d ever do something like that.

And in a way, it was - at least for a while.

The PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X arrived not with a line but with a tracking number. COVID-19 made midnight launches impossible, and I had entered a new phase of life anyway. Both consoles showed up on my porch courtesy of UPS. I opened the boxes in the middle of the day while my toddler watched from her highchair. There were no crowds, no chaos, and only a little bit of excitement.

Convenient? Absolutely. But I missed the experience. The cold air. The countdown. The quiet conversations with strangers in the parking lot about what games you were getting and how you planned to stay awake until morning.

And now, with the Switch 2 on the horizon, something funny is happening. I’m planning to line up at Best Buy again. It’s still going to be a midnight launch. This time, I’ll be there for eight minutes, just long enough to pick up my preorder. No lottery. No frantic guessing. Still, there is a kind of full-circle comfort in it. I’ll be back where it started, doing something that used to be routine, now wrapped in nostalgia. I even have my two older kids insisting that I wake them up and bring them to the midnight launch. Maybe next time, kids!

I know I won’t stay up all night playing anymore. I’ll take the console home, probably let it sit in the box until the kids go to bed. I’ll update it, download a few games, and maybe, if I’m lucky, get an hour or two of peace to see what it can do. But that’s okay.

Because for me, it was never just about the console. It was about the energy around it, the people, the places, the anticipation. It was about being part of a larger community, even briefly. A little family of caffeinated nerds in the cold, waiting for the future to start.

And if the future takes eight minutes and a QR code to access these days, that’s just fine. I’ll be there anyway.

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The borderline frivolity of the film is in stark contrast with the manga series about the doomed Queen, the influential and elegant The Rose of Versailles. First written in 1972 by Riyoko Ikeda, this sweeping historical drama was one of the earliest shōjo (girls') manga to delve into political turmoil, gender identity, and tragic love. Immensely popular, it shaped the genre’s direction for decades while also spawning a treasured 1979 anime adaptation and numerous stage and film adaptations. For myself, it’s one of many revered classic anime I simply never had access to while growing up, and never really made time for - until recently

When The Rose of Versailles debuted, it captivated Japanese readers with its unique fusion of historical drama and romanticism. Set against the backdrop of the French Revolution, the story follows the life of Oscar François de Jarjayes, a woman raised as a man to serve in the royal guard, and her complicated relationships with Queen Marie Antoinette, the Swedish noble Hans Axel von Fersen, and her loyal friend André Grandier.

Ikeda’s work was groundbreaking not just for its genre-bending themes that explored female agency, longing, and class struggle, but also for its layered characterization. Oscar, in particular, is an iconic character. Torn between duty and desire, identity and ideology, she was a rare example of a gender-nonconforming protagonist in mainstream manga nearly twenty years before I was born. Marie Antoinette, too, was not simply vilified as a lavish aristocrat but rendered with compassion and vulnerability.

The artwork is luscious: sweeping curls, billowing gowns, and gleaming, emotive eyes. Ikeda, clearly inspired by European painting, infused her pages with both operatic drama and quiet intimacy. In 1979, The Rose of Versailles was adapted into an anime primarily directed by Osamu Dezaki. The anime preserved the heart and artistic flair of the manga, bringing Ikeda’s lavish Versailles to life in motion. The series ran for 40 episodes, becoming a sensation.

What set the anime apart was its dedication to visual artistry and emotional pacing. Dezaki, known for his dramatic use of freeze-frames, stark lighting, and split-screen compositions, heightened the series’ tragic atmosphere. His iconic "postcard memories" of soft watercolor freeze-frames lent a poetic gravity to key emotional beats. The score from Kōji Makaino echoed the grandeur of 18th-century France, with dramatic leitmotifs and a memorable opening theme.

Every element of the production, from the costumes, voice performances, even the pacing felt tuned to deliver melodrama that straddled the line between operatic and excessive. Perhaps most importantly, the anime gave viewers time. Time to sit with Oscar’s growing disillusionment, to watch Marie Antoinette’s arc from child bride to tragic figure, and to mourn alongside André as he watches the woman he loves dive headfirst into mortal danger. Was it slow? Yes, but like a budding flower, it soaked that time up so every petal could blossom.

A 1979 live-action film version directed by Jacques Demy (simply titled Lady Oscar) brought the story to Western audiences in English. It was an ambitious effort, featuring Japanese financing and a European cast, shot on location in France. Yet, despite its authenticity in setting, the film struggled to capture the grandeur of the source material. Compressing a sprawling 10-volume epic into a 2-hour runtime meant sacrificing character development and nuance. The result was visually authentic but emotionally distant - a recurring issue in Versailles adaptations.

Other attempts followed, including Takarazuka Revue performances - lavish stage productions famous for their all-female casts - which became some of the most cherished retellings among Japanese fans. And now we arrive at the latest addition to the Versailles legacy: the 2025 anime-musical film produced by anime studio MAPPA. Touted as an anniversary project, the film boasts a star-studded voice cast, great songs, and stunning imagery.

Indeed, the film is gorgeous. In some shots, it feels like a painting in motion. Oscar’s military garb gleams with precision. Marie Antoinette’s many gowns continually delight my youngest, especially during “Ma Vie En Rose.” Even the English dub has a stellar cast and localized songs that simply sound great. In terms of production value, the film is sometimes so hard to look at - it’s that beautiful. Yet… it is too quickly paced.

Oscar’s upbringing, her complicated relationship with her father, and her transition into adulthood are glossed over. Her loyalty to Marie Antoinette, and the slow erosion of that loyalty as revolution stirs are hurried past. The scene depicting Marie and Oscar’s last exchange is one of the anime’s most foreboding moments. There’s no catharsis like that anywhere in this film.

André’s quiet devotion to Oscar is glossed over in song. Even Marie Antoinette’s transformation from naive monarch to reviled queen, which once unfolded like theatre, is now presented in summary. It took a few views of the song “Ma Vie En Rose” to realize it was essentially reducing a multi-episode arc involving Madame Du Barry to a seconds-long montage. Later on, other characters featured prominently in other adaptations appear for a split second (if at all) to utter a phrase before being forgotten.

It is, to put it bluntly, too beautiful to feel. There is no time to fall in love with these characters, to worry for them, to hate them, to mourn them. The political intricacies are reduced to subtitles between scenes. The emotional stakes are flattened beneath the pace. Yes, this is an anniversary project but it expects you to already be a fan, substituting exposition and character building with goodwill and general knowledge of what happens.

It’s a curious thing: a film so dedicated to honoring its source material in visual fidelity but failing to understand why that material moved people in the first place. The manga and anime gave us moments. We watch Oscar struggle with her identity; we observe André’s panic over his deteriorating condition; and we marvel as revolution spreads throughout France. The film doesn’t have the luxury of time, so it uses our prior experience with the characters as a nostalgia crutch, so that there is weight to the proceedings. The 2025 remake, while clearly made with love and respect, feels like watching a speedrun of a masterpiece. You can admire the technique, delight at the visual execution, but you leave without the ache in your chest.

The Rose of Versailles remains a landmark in manga and anime history because it dared to be more than a romance or a political drama. It was not afraid to be slow, emotional, and thoughtful. It makes the audience sit with discomfort and longing. It was never just about revolution or rococo aesthetics. What a shame it’s so easy to forget that while watching the film.

For newcomers, the 2025 film may serve as a gateway, but it is only a beautiful glimpse of the whole series. To truly experience The Rose of Versailles, I suggest Riyoko Ikeda’s pen and Osamu Dezaki’s lens. The original manga and anime didn’t just show us the fall of Versailles - they made us feel it, one heartbeat at a time. That’s where Oscar breathes, where André suffers, and where Marie Antoinette grows up on the edge of history, dancing towards a doomed fate she never could have imagined.

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First serialized in Nakayoshi magazine in 1991, Sailor Moon was created by Naoko Takeuchi and quickly took off. The original manga spanned 18 volumes, mostly produced in tandem with the show. The story follows Usagi Tsukino, a clumsy but kind-hearted teenage girl who discovers she is the reincarnation of a magical warrior who lived on the moon. Alongside her Sailor Guardians, she fights to protect the Earth from increasingly malevolent forces while also juggling the trials of growing up. The show ran for 5 series, slowly introducing Guardians from the outer solar system and then even beyond.

For me, what set Sailor Moon apart was a combination of humor, drama, and team-based action reminiscent of the Power Rangers. It was an easy match for another favorite series of mine, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It was more than just catchy themes and bombastic attacks, but the way it balanced action with themes of love, friendship, and sacrifice. Usagi wasn’t just a superhero; she was a friend, a leader, and sometimes even a bit of a klutz. The show resonated with young audiences worldwide, many of whom are now, like me, well into adulthood. The English dub was all over the place in terms of production, localization, and even voice cast. After the last batch of episodes aired here in 2000, the series - and my interest - went dormant.

Sailor Moon wasn’t confined to print, a host of video games, and animation. In 2003, Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, a live-action adaptation, debuted in Japan. It reimagined the series first story arc/season with real actors, blending the magical elements with deeper character development. Despite its low-budget special effects, it has a certain charm with some inventive monsters-of-the-week, and makes some bonkers deviations from both the anime and manga.. It reminds me of Power Rangers, just in a different (and less favorable) way than the anime. To this day, I have been unable to commit myself to getting through the entire series.

While the reception to the live-action series was decidedly mixed, there are the immensely popular Sera Myu stage productions - the Sailor Moon musicals. First performed in 1993, these stage adaptations brought the Guardians to life complete with original songs, elaborate choreography, and dramatic storytelling. Over 30 different productions have been staged, with cast members cycling in and out, much like Broadway productions. These musicals became a cultural phenomenon, but another aspect of the series that remained Japan-only. Not just a retelling, the musicals take many creative detours, with some introducing original villains and side stories. In 2013, to mark the 20th anniversary of Sailor Moon, the musicals were revived with updated choreography, new cast members, and new takes on the classic arcs. This resurgence introduced a new generation to Sera Myu.

For a long time here, we lived in a Sailor Moon deadzone. Fans whispered the series would never be licensed again in the West. However, In 2012, I remember studying for the bar exam when Sailor Moon Crystal was announced. Described as a faithful adaptation of the original manga, it was advertised as being closer to Takeuchi's original vision—darker, more mature, and with sharper animation. First airing in July 2014, it’s a bit polarizing, with some decrying the frankly cheap animation from the first two arcs (episodes 1-26). The entire production has been a bit of a mess, with a two year gap until the third season, which featured a wholly different animation style. Four years later, we’d get the fourth arc - except instead of thirteen episodes, we got two films (Sailor Moon Eternal) that felt like a breathless sprint. Another three or so years later, we would get the final arc, again compressed into two films (Sailor Moon Cosmos) with another breakneck pace.

While the original series would churn out 200 episodes and three movies in five years, with Crystal we would get 39 episodes and four movies over a decade. I’m of two minds about the remake series. I am glad it exists, even though I have many complaints about pacing and animation, especially at the beginning. While I generally enjoy watching the movies due to their increased production quality, they are too rushed and rely on the viewer’s prior familiarity with the series. I can’t complain, though, as we were also given an excellent brand new re-dub of the ‘90s series and years of decent merchandise. However, this time around, western fans would be able to get their own taste of the Sailor Moon musical experience - without hopping a flight to Japan.

First announced in 2019, Sailor Moon The Super Live brings the theatre of the Sera Myu experience to the West. It features a brisk retelling of the first series (the “Dark Kingdom” arc) and a minimal cast, given the fact this was an international production. Although I obtained tickets to see a 2019 performance in Washington DC, we couldn’t make it and I presumed my chance to see the show was gone. Five years later though, and I would get my second chance when another run was announced for 2025. The closest show to me was in Dayton, Ohio, over four hours away. I initially balked at making the drive, until my brother said he would come with me.

Driving into Dayton, it was impossible to ignore the remnants of its industrial past. Once a thriving manufacturing hub. But with the decline of U.S. manufacturing in the late 20th century, the city fell on hard times. From 2000 to 2010, Dayton lost nearly 15% of its population as factories closed down. According to the Census Bureau, the city’s population has hovered around 137,000. Sixty years ago, it was over 260,000. Unemployment is high and the poverty rate is double the state’s average.

Walking through the downtown in the evening to get to the show, and it’s clear. It’s the portrait of a Rust Belt city still struggling to redefine itself. We had dinner at a busy restaurant, which afterwards I found out was closing in just a matter of weeks. I’m not a hater - I live in Michigan, which is just a stone’s throw away from the Rust Belt proper. Plus, Dayton has a rich history that was worth exploring while we were here. I couldn’t help but wonder what this city looked like thirty years ago, at the start my Moon fandom just a few hours north. Back then, I never could have dreamed I would be a grown adult going to see an official stage musical of an anime series - let alone in Ohio.

When we made it to the theatre, I wasn’t sure what to expect as I had come in mostly blind. It’s definitely a musical, with a handful of hot tunes. The performers were flawless, capturing the spirit of the characters with a kind of joyful abandon. They were able to embody the mannerisms of the anime characters in a way that translated despite a clear language barrier and infrequent speaking.

The show is cleverly designed for an international tour and audience. There is a minimal set made of platforms and stairs, allowing characters to move across different elevations for musical numbers and battle choreography. Most of the story is told through songs, with lyrics displayed in English across a screen that serves as a backdrop. The background visuals are evocative of the manga, with pastel colors and bright effects. When the story concluded, the cast came out and performed a handful of additional numbers, including the original show’s theme, “Moonlight Densetsu,” drawing a sharp response from the crowd.

Overall, I was surprised at how much I enjoyed the music and the performances. There was little speaking outside of the songs, and most of it in Japanese, with a few exclamations from Usagi in English - there’s a funny exchange where she avoids an enemy’s attack, turns to the audience, and congratulates herself. It was one of a handful of moments that made it very clear this production is a labor of love for those traveling to see it, but also those traveling to create it. I was also surprised to learn that this version is actually a different production than the 2019 version, with changes to the script, cast, and music. I really enjoyed the OST here, although the earlier one is available on streaming for those curious.

The drive back home was punctuated by bursts of conversation about our favorite moments and listening to music from series we have watched over the years. We laughed about how we used to argue over whether Sailor Moon or Goku from Dragon Ball would win in a fight, before agreeing that it has always been a pointless debate. The Dragon Ball characters are all power levels and energy blasts, but that’s not where the power is in Sailor Moon.

I tell my kids the reason I love Sailor Moon is because one of its primary themes is to always believe in yourself and in the goodness of others. Sailor Moon isn’t particularly strong - she isn’t even the strongest Sailor Guardian - but it is her determination and love that always triumphs over evil. Even if something is destroyed or ruined, their power is a restorative one that emphasizes justice always. I’m a lawyer - I love that shit.

I was glad to make the trip to Dayton, with its crumbling factories and struggling businesses reminding me of things that fade and things that endure. Growing up in the Midwest watching Sailor Moon, it felt like an oddly appropriate place to see this production. Like Sailor Moon, places like Dayton, Ohio survive because it’s more than just a flash-in-the-pan from a lifetime ago. It’s a promise that light can still shine in dark places and that hope can blossom anywhere. Being a part of Sailor Moon’s western renaissance after a long dormancy has me hopeful that places like Dayton and the rest of the Rust Belt are able to see a revitalization of their very own one day, too.

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In this market saturated with AAA games bogged down by formulaic tropes and droll, grey post-apocalyptic landscapes, Expedition 33 and Enotria: The Last Song stand out due to bold artistic vision and cultural inspiration. These games don’t just borrow aesthetics or a historical period – they immerse themselves in the rich cultural heritage of France and Italy, creating distinct experiences that feel strikingly original. It is this commitment to cultural identity – not just in look and lore, but in atmosphere and ideology – that makes these games so sumptuous, enough so to overlook gameplay and design flaws.

Enotria: The Last Song, developed by Jyamma Games, bills itself as a “Summer Soulslike” – a phrase that may induce a few eyerolls, until you see the game in motion. Rather than drawing from the bleak and decayed worlds typically associated with the subgenre, Enotria is drenched in sunlight, its environments inspired by Southern Italian villages, baroque architecture, and mythological folklore. The game has players control the “maskless one,” a living puppet tasked with breaking the Canovaccio, a curse which has gripped the land. Villagers are seemingly trapped in an endless theatrical performance, repeating songs and dances against their will in perpetuity.

What makes Enotria particularly engaging is how deeply it commits to the bit. The very name “Enotria” references an ancient name for the Italian peninsula, signaling from the jump that this isn’t just another Soulsborne (I hate the term) with a macchiato – it is Italian at its core, like your neighbor who is so proud to be Sicilian but has never been. The game’s world, characters, and themes are infused with Italian theatrical tradition, particularly Commedia dell’arte, and its employ of masks, roles, and shifting identities. This exploration of identity - the way it changes, constrains, or liberates – is both narrative and mechanical, offering players the ability to switch “masks” that radically alter their abilities and combat style.

The visuals, the music, the pacing – it all feels like a celebration of Italian culture and ingenuity. Where many games draw fast and loose with inspiration from Western Europe’s darker medieval period, Enotria strikes a vibrant balance – one filled with tragedy, drama, flair, and elegance. As a result, even with my minor complaints about gameplay and even design, it still feels refreshing and meaningful.

Expedition 33, by comparison, leans heavily into French Romanticism. Developed by a small team at Sandfall Interactive, the game has Paris Fashion Week-level style. The production is taut, an AA game making the most with its budget - but they make it work with only a glimmer of trouble underneath the hood at times on my non-Pro PS5. The world is a surreal blend of late 19th-century Parisian elegance and post-fantasy ruin, opening up with shots of a destroyed Eiffel Tower and other landmarks across the cityscape.

The game begins on the cusp of a massive ritual in the town of Lumiere wherein a large chunk of the town’s adults will vanish, biblical-Rapture style, in an event known as the Gommage (guess what this means in French). This event has happened every year for the last 67 years, culling the morale and population of this island. The opening hours are harrowing and beautiful. There is beauty in decay here, mournful and poetic but never hopeless.

Just like Enotria, Expedition 33 doesn’t merely adopt a look – it embodies a worldview. The characters, costuming, environments, and tone are all shaped by a romantic fatalism and an artistic eye. Even the color palette leans toward delicate pastels and overcast skies, evoking impressionist paintings more than traditional RPGs. When first announced, the screenshots seemed to suggest Persona x Lacoste. After a handful of hours of Expedition 33, it feels more Final Fantasy x Les Misérables.

The game is not perfect by any means. It chugs along in some spots on my PS5; and sometimes transitions in/out of combat or cutscenes suggest the game is holding on for dear life. I vacillate between finding the character models fabulous or frightening, depending on the angle; and even surprised at how kitchen sink-y some of the actual gameplay is. There’s so much DNA from other series here, especially Persona and Final Fantasy in terms of combat, world traversal, and oddly, the user interface. The combat is great, but the combination of QTEs and parrying isn’t groundbreaking or even fresh to me. It’s a bit amusing that the actual gameplay is arguably the stalest part of the package here. Again, it’s the game’s commitment to its heritage as a north star that makes the game so memorable.

The story and its presentation are mysterious enough to keep you moving forward (even if confused by lack of a map). I can’t find a good place to put the game down! I’m hooked in a Prestige TV kinda way, because it feels like prestige TV, just produced in France and airing on the BBC. With some mostly gorgeous character details and a vibrant soundtrack, Expedition 33 is such a pleasant surprise, especially in terms of art and sound direction.

The reason these games stand out is because they bring something rare to gaming: a genuine cultural point of view. In a global industry understandably homogenized for mass appeal, Enotria and Expedition 33 represent a beautiful, European mode of artistic resistance. They root themselves in histories and aesthetics that feel lived-in and authentic. This cultural particularity isn’t limiting – it’s enriching.

In much the same way that Studio Ghibli films feel inherently Japanese or that The Witcher is unmistakably Polish, these games are proudly and deeply European — not just in geography, but in spirit. They celebrate the ornate, the tragic, the expressive, and the theatrical. They remind players that fantasy can be bright and baroque, that combat can be elegant, and that storytelling can feel like opera instead of just exposition served through in-game menus or clunky dialogue.

For players looking for something more than just the next loot grind or basket of anime-tropes - both of which I enjoy regularly - Enotria: The Last Song and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 offer something unique in worlds that are not only beautiful, but meaningful. They are love songs to French and Italian culture, written in the language of games. Perhaps gamers - and developers alike - would do well to listen.

The “Protect Our Kids” movement has become an unignorable force in the culture wars - across social media, school board meetings, and political campaigns. The premise, of course, sounds noble—what rational person doesn’t want to protect children? But in practice, the movement often veers into sensationalism, leveraging moral panic and viral outrage to push agendas that are less about child welfare and more about fear-based control. It’s a brand, not a cause. And like most brands built on outrage, it’s designed to sell clicks, votes, and influence.

There’s an entire ecosystem of headlines and social media posts screaming that children are under attack—from books, drag shows, public school teachers, even cartoons. The framing is almost always maximalist and emotionally charged: “Our kids are being groomed!” “Schools are indoctrinating your children!” “This book will destroy their innocence!” The targets are often cherry-picked or wildly exaggerated, aiming to provoke rather than inform. It’s performative parenting, outrage theater, and sometimes pure conspiracy.

There’s a reason why the “Libs of TikTok” woman and Riley Gaines - a non-Olympian college swimmer - are constantly making their rounds in conservative spheres and amplified on social media to generate clicks. Gaines in particular was able to use an “incident” at the end of her collegiate swimming time as a diving board into a lucrative career as a Fox News podcast host.

The irony is the loudest voices rarely seem interested in practical solutions. They don’t lobby for better funding for mental health care, advocate for universal child nutrition programs, or push for safer schools in any systemic way. They post screenshots of one page from one novel and demand a ban. They spotlight a TikTok clip and declare a national crisis. They seem more concerned with clicks and culture war points than with actual child development or safety.

But here’s the twist: every so often, they’re not entirely wrong.

Having literally grown up on the internet, I am hardly a prude. I also recognize that once the toothpaste is out of the bag, it’s impossible to close Pandora’s Box. There are some things you can’t unsee. I can cite studies about children’s screentime usage, exposure to harmful materials at earlier ages, whatever. This is the digital age’s version of finding Playboys in an attic.

When I saw these posts on Facebook about “Disney + advertising Dying for Sex on its home page,” I had a healthy dose of skepticism. There is no way Disney is just tossing this title card next to Bluey and Ms. Rachel on your landing page. I logged into Disney+ and tapped into the children’s profile, looking for Sex. It wasn’t there, but it was on my home page - the one that bundles Disney+ and Disney-owned Hulu, which is the streaming home for cable’s FX Network, which produces the critically lauded Michelle Williams series. It suddenly made perfect sense to me - these idiots were not paying attention to their parental settings1. Smugly, I turned the TV off and returned to my regularly scheduled judging of other parents online.

The next morning, however, while making coffee I decided to turn the TV on. I’ve been a Samsung TV King since my sophomore year of college, but over the last decade or so did their TVs come equipped with Samsung TV Plus, their house brand version of Pluto or Tubi, featuring hundreds of channels with constantly streaming programming. It’s really convenient for watching something like Rainbow Ruby, which I can’t find anywhere else. One of its quirks is that you can’t edit the display of programming - what comes up when you first turn the TV on. Just hours after laughing at others, I found myself facing my own discomfort.

No big deal, right? I figured I could resolve this like I could with the non-issue with Disney+. There is a user end solution to this, or at least there has to be. I tried removing the listing from the screen by pressing up on the remote which would let me move or replace an app on the toolbar, but that was not an option here. Puzzled, I sat down to troubleshoot this. Five, ten minutes later, I still did not have a solution. Removing the affiliated apps from the TV did not work, as it is listed under “new TV,” again on the home screen. Turning off the internet connectivity would turn it off, but it would also vitiate the point of having internet access at all. Could I use the PS5 for streaming means? Yes, I could, but it seems like a dumb solution in a house full of smart devices. I’m still looking for a solution, having contacted Samsung for comment.

This just seems like a layup, especially in the current politically charged climate. Why not go the extra mile to avoid rankling the Mama Bear (™) types, especially when doing so can avoid you scores of scathing Facebook comments or worse, considering that influencers have access to the administration. This incident (or lack thereof) underscores just how harmful the virulent “Save Our Children” clickbait can be when it comes to raising awareness for actual issues. Why make actual strides to protecting kids when you can make a buck off hysteria?

Strip away the hysteria, and underneath the noise are legitimate concerns about kids that do need addressing—data privacy, social media addiction, online predators, or even age-appropriate sexual curriculum. When influencers and apps are designed to hijack attention spans and mine personal data from children, or when real transparency issues exist in how schools handle sensitive topics, the conversation becomes more nuanced—and more important. But those moments are quietly adrift in the sea of moral panic.

The problem is that by crying wolf so often and so loudly, the movement undermines its own credibility when it actually stumbles onto something worth talking about. If every book is pornography and every teacher is a villain, how do you distinguish real harm from imagined outrage? You can’t. As a result, the legitimate critiques go unheard or untrusted.

Protecting kids is a worthy cause. But it demands thoughtful, evidence-based discussions, not TikTok-fueled witch hunts. The current approach—more spectacle than substance—distracts from the real work. We should absolutely be vigilant about what kids are exposed to and how society shapes them.

Yes, we have the tinfoil types who think Disney is trying to offer your children to the demon lord Moloch, but we also have the more insidious types who argue the liberal media is trying to exploit your children. Both of them are loud, histrionic, and ultimately harmful to the actual laudable aims of sequestering youth from precocious material that is either wholly inappropriate or should be left to their parent or guardian to determine.

I have three kids, one of which is in 1st grade. It’s up to my wife and I, in conjunction with healthcare providers and educators to determine the methods and procedures for having these sorts of discussions with children when appropriate. We’ve already broached age-appropriate topics, but it’s prompted out of respect, protection, and love. And it’s on our timeline, not a corporation’s.

Do I think the Dying for Sex title card placement is a huge issue? Not for a minute. But for a second there, sitting in my own discomfort with something being displayed on the TV in my house where my young reader could easily see it, and I could see how for some, the caterwauling from Chaya Raichik-types would begin to make sense. Now that’s what I call unwanted exposure to harmful material.

The Suikoden series has long been celebrated for intriguing political plots and sprawling cast of characters, featuring 108 recruitable characters in each title. Beyond these grand tales of war and revolution, the series also shows a deft hand in portraying the emotional and deeply intimate relationships between its male characters. I previously wrote, “Suikoden sees players assume the role of Tir McDohl, son of a Great General to the Scarlet Moon Empire. Shortly after beginning his own service to the empire, Tir and company are quickly exposed to corruption & greed that has rotted through the political establishment.’

In the opening hour or so, the Empire discerns that Ted, one of Tir’s vassals, is in possession of something known as the Soul Eater Rune. In an attempt to retrieve it, Ted is mortally wounded and transfers the Rune’s power to Tir before dying. His death is dramatic, but feels like a story beat designed to kick start the action. Even then, his line about waiting over 300 years for a real friend strikes a nerve because the brief time spent with him feels genuine.

Suikoden’s true heart lies within the relationship between Tir and his devoted caretaker, Gremio. During the game, not much is known of the scarred gentleman, other than his paternal devotion to his charge which is punctuated by Gremio’s almost nag-like demeanor. He’s constantly worrying about Tir, taking his occupation as caregiver very seriously. Perhaps he takes it too seriously, seemingly preoccupied over losing him as a result of the war.

In a sad bit of irony, then, it’s not Tir that succumbs to war, but Gremio himself. As the party escapes Soniere Prison, they are stopped by Milich Oppenheimer, the flamboyant General of the Empire. He traps the party in a room after breaking a bottle filled with “Spores of Agony,” unleashing flesh-eating spores on the group. Gremio forces the party out of the room before barricading himself in. Trapped on the other side of a locked door, Gremio speaks to Tir one last time: “I’m sorry I can’t protect you anymore,” he says. As the spores claim his faculties, he stammers out: “Promise me you’ll always follow your heart. That is my first, and final…request.”

It’s an eye popping moment that affected me in 1997 and again in 2025. There are no fancy cutscenes or intense displays of graphical processing power - just sprite graphics (“blurry Mario,” as my kids describe) and a few lines of text, bringing on the heartbreak. While Gremio can come back at the end if all 108 Stars are recruited, it almost feels (to me) like a GameShark code that undermines the narrative impact of the moment. The loss of an intimate partner is real here - even if the intimacy is purely platonic and non-sexual (to the chagrin of about a million fanfic authors over the years).

Tir’s relationship with Pahn, another retainer, is much more fraught than his relationships with Gremio and Ted. Although Pahn has been a protector to Tir for nearly his entire life, Pahn’s true obligation lies with Tir’s father, General Teo. When Tir defects from the military, Pahn is unable to join him out of obligation to Teo. As a result of his hesitation, Pahn stays behind in Gregminster when Tir flees. He eventually rejoins the group, but the wound of his betrayal lingers, driving a wedge where camaraderie previously existed.

Later, Pahn redeems himself and proves his loyalty to Tir by defending him in a duel with his former master. “I was a coward once. Never again,” he dutifully states prior to the battle. If Pahn wins the battle, he lives; if Pahn loses the battle, he dies. Regardless of the outcome, his redemption feels earned, not perfunctory. When playing the game for review, I think I encountered an RNG bug where Pahn simply could not win the duel. I tried dozens of times. I restarted the console, hard reset it, unplugged it, googled “can you clear a PS5’s cache” in an attempt to keep Pahn alive. It never worked, and I eventually took it as a sign the universe wanted him dead. If Pahn dies, Gremio stayed dead. See? Even the universe agreed. Pahn dies, having redeemed himself in the eyes of himself, Tir, and probably even Teo.

In Suikoden, regular party members can only die in one of two ways: the story writes them out, which we see infrequently; or the character becomes incapacitated during one of the army battles (a handful of these occur in the game) and is reported to have died. It happens infrequently as well, and can be avoided with a simple hit of the reset button. The death of a character in an army battle feels demonstrative, but also kinda fake - why is Lepant’s wife even there to begin with? That’s why these handful of deaths in the first game feel like a gut punch. Other deaths feel like a plot device - sorry, Odessa!

While Suikoden focuses on Tir and his squad, its sequel focuses primarily on the relationship between two boys on the cusp of manhood and war. Suikoden II explores the reality that ideals, loyalty, and love are not enough to keep friends together, even while an unshakable bond remains. Again, I wrote:

In Suikoden II, players control Riou, who, along with his best friend Jowy are members of the Highland army’s youth brigade, soon caught in a self-slaughter by its own forces as a conniving pretext to justify the invasion of the City-States. After defecting from their murderous military, each boy obtains one half of the Rune of the Beginning, which then places them in a seemingly eternal and escalating conflict as the two halves of the rune jostle to be reunited at all costs.

During the game, Jowy’s analytical thinking leads him to one conclusion: that peace can only be effectuated through decisive and merciless action. This calculus leads him to commit a stunning betrayal and defect to join Highland, fracturing his relationship with Riou. The two will come before each other a handful of times during the game.

At the end of the game, Jowy has achieved his goal - he is the King of the ruined Highland nation, but he has suffered immensely. He is physically deteriorating and left with nothing other than the desire to face Riou one final time. There are technically four endings to Suikoden II, and the “best ending” requires all 108 Stars of Destiny to be recruited, among other choices. During this ending, although Jowy demands a duel, Riou refuses three times. Instead, he simply holds his hand out to his childhood friend, waiting for him to accept. They walk away together, leaving behind their mutual trauma. Reunited with their childhood friend Nanami, the three disappear from history.

Suikoden II is never about a simple rivalry or betrayal; instead it explores the dynamics of this friendship bound by love and ideals but ripped apart by fate. The conflict between these boys is never driven by hatred, a point emphasized by endings which encapsulate the game’s themes of friendship, loss, and the toll of choice. It’s up to the player whether Riou finds peace, becomes leader, or ultimately fades into obscurity. Regardless of the outcome, it underscores a painful reality of life: sometimes, love is not enough to keep people together, even if they want to be.

Another example of enduring intimacy in Suikoden is that of Viktor and Flik, occurring during both Suikoden I and II. During these games, their dynamic shifts from a shaky partnership to a stalwart brotherhood marked by mutual respect, grief, and Odd Couple-style bickering. Viktor is brash and free-spirited while Flik is dutiful. They initially rub each other the wrong way, with Flik finding Viktor’s demeanor simply offputting. However, after Odessa dies, Viktor offers moral support to Flik with sarcasm and grace: When Flik calls Viktor an idiot, he replies by telling Flik that he swings his sword and leaves the thinking to people like him. Sighing, Flik states that attitude will kill Viktor, who says “...You’d better stick around to make sure it doesn’t.”

That playful banter marks their friendship throughout the first game. When we see them a few years later in Suikoden II, they are partners in crime. They went from The Odd Couple to Lethal Weapon offscreen. Here, the war against Highland places them on the board of war again. Except this time around, they don’t just fight for the cause - but also for each other. When Suikoden II ends, they prepare to set out together once more. Viktor tells him, “...admit it - you’d be lost without me. Flik simply scoffs before saying, “Maybe. But don’t expect me to say it out loud.” The two walk off together into the sunset. While the main characters take up most of the screen time, it’s a delight to watch these two go from comedic foil to bosom buddies over the span of two games.

The first two Suikoden games especially deliver heartfelt explorations of emotional male relationships especially within the context of RPGs. These relationships transcend the basic tenets of male friendship, eschewing locker room style antics for deep, meaningful bonds. Tir and Riou have complicated, dense relationships that are defined by their interpersonal dynamics and shared histories rather than just being colleagues or party members who decided to team up to fight the government. This is not an easy feat, given the sheer number of personalities abound here.

By embracing emotional vulnerability and probing the complexity of these dynamics, Suikoden challenges the notion that RPGs must rely on romance or ideals of bombastic heroism to create compelling character interactions. Instead, these games do just the opposite. It finds beauty in the quiet moments shared in a jail cell, love through the virtue of sacrifice in the face of death, and unwavering loyalty to a trusted companion. There isn’t a damsel in distress here. Instead, Suikoden proves that love, in all its forms, is a force that propels even the most damaged of hearts to do all sorts of things - like giving up your carrots.

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First published in the 1950s, the seven Narnia books tell the story of the titular land, a world of fantasy magic and mythical, talking creatures. Over the course of the books, readers get to see the birth and fall of Narnia, punctuated by adventures of human children who are typically whisked away to Narnia at the behest of a magical god-like lion named Aslan, who has sought human intervention in order to defeat encroaching evil. Published in nearly 50 languages, the stories have sold well over 100 million copies. It’s not exactly high art, but for a young boy in the 1990s, the series had it all: talking animals, time travel, sibling superpowers, and epic battles between good and evil.

While the books had it all, the then-only film adaptation I was exposed to in the 1990s were snippets of the BBC version. It’s strictly okay for a British miniseries produced before the Gulf War. The world of Narnia was mostly limited to what I had read on the page or imagined in my mind, with a handful of images from the BBC version, including a few of the White Witch. The low-fi images from VHS recordings emphasized the exotic allure of British cable programmes. This would all change in a few years, thanks to a handful of other magical British kids.

The first Harry Potter movie, released in 2001, was a game-changer. Like Star Wars for pre-teens, it lit the box office and the world on fire. The global success of Harry Potter led to a wake-up call for the producers, who realized the younger audience could jive with the setting. And they did - when The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was released in 2005, it was the third highest-grossing film of the year earning $745 million. The first was Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the fourth (!) film in the series to come out in as many years.

Three years later, the first Narnia sequel would be released, titled Prince Caspian. It performed well - just not as well - grossing over $400 million globally. Still, it was the tenth highest-grossing film of 2008. It kept the same director as the first film, and much of the cast returned as well. Still, the box office dip did some damage to the generally well-received franchise. The third film - Voyage of the Dawn Trader - would release in 2010. Its global box office was just a few million less than Prince Caspian. Despite the sustained momentum, it would be the last Narnia production to grace our screens.

One of my favorite things about these games is just how earnest they are. The developers really lay it on thick, starting with the sheer number of games there are. With Lion, you could play three separate and distinct games: the Game Boy Advance version, which featured simpler gameplay and mechanics; the Nintendo DS version, more akin to an Action-RPG, and then the series of console games for PlayStation, XBox, GameCube, developed by Traveller’s Tales (Crash Bandicoot, the Lego games). Do you think we would be getting such service in this economy? If anything else, it would be limited to cheap mobile tie-ins. Don’t worry, the Narnia games had those, too!

The console versions of the Lion open up with clips from the film's beginning. It presumes, practically begs that you’ve seen it - hopping around a bit with an odd tutorial level before sending Lucy off to Narnia for the first proper level. The game features an absolutely sinister transition from film clip to in-game engine that is so cursed, I would not dream of including it after this very sentence:

The tutorial levels that take place in 1940s England frankly suck. You first escape from your burning building and then spend a level in the mansion hiding from the nanny. Once all four sibs are in Narnia, the game mechanics reveal themselves. You can switch between the available siblings, doling out their special abilities as needed. They each have physical tricks, too: Lucy can ride a snowball while Edmund can climb trees, for example. There are plenty of collectibles, too: coins (to purchase power-ups), animals (to join the army, no less), or bonus medallions. There are light puzzle elements, combat encounters, and a smattering of set pieces imitating the on-screen action. Each level is bookended with scenes from the film but leaves a lot of the narrative tent poling left to the imagination, which is disorienting if you haven’t seen the movie in twenty years.

While I haven’t played the Game Boy Advance version, I rather enjoyed the RPG elements present in the DS version. The characters level up and feel stronger, as well as develop abilities to deploy during battle. While the combat can feel a bit redundant, it’s still an impressive display of talent from the developers on a console less than a year old at the time.

Released a few years later, Prince Caspian is also competently made by Traveler’s Tales, but this time also includes a PlayStation 3 version. Here, players control up to 20 different characters from the film across a handful of levels. Also included are light puzzle elements and new large scale battles, mimicking the set pieces from the film. These encounters provide a sense of scope missing from the first game. Even though there are some nice touches in the console version of Caspian, the earlier title feels more accessible, and the smaller number of playable characters makes each one feel different. With the excess here, some of them begin to feel redundant.

The DS version of Caspian also emphasizes RPG elements, in another nice touch that is better suited for the confines of the handheld. Here, combat takes place in a separate field and is turn-based RPG facing. However, the DS gimmick here is overplayed, with combat and nearly any other action requiring the player drag a stylus, time a strike, or blow air into the microphone. It’s interesting during the tutorial but begins to grate. Did we find this so charming 15 years ago?

Both DS versions suffer from a lack of worldbuilding. The console version’s incorporated scenes help establish a narrative concept. You can figure out who these kids are and what happens to them because of what you are expressly told. The DS versions don’t do this at all, providing a few lines of text and a few images to do all the heavy lifting. Even if you can get on board with the gameplay mechanics, the lack of immersion diminished the experience for me. We’re here for the tie-in first, after all.

The last film in the series did not get any console or handheld releases. Instead, we got this mobile game released by Gameloft. On second thought, maybe those DS versions of the game aren’t so bad, huh?

The presentation hinges on bringing the world to life, and the graphics mostly deliver. The titular wardrobe looks great in-game, and let’s be real - Croft Manor has nothing on this mansion. Even the winter scenescapes convey the sense of wonder these children feel as they come across Narnia for the first time. The sound design liberally borrows from the film scores, except the samples seem a bit too short. A few climatic scenes are slightly diminished by a looping score that cycles back a bit too quickly.

That’s the thing about these games, though. Even with their quirks, they are still pretty good video games, and great tie-in games. Hell, even the GameLoft mobile games from yesteryear are better than some of the trash we are getting now. The teams here were motivated to bring the world of Narnia to gaming consoles, and it shows. For the most part, they kinda ate? Something is so endearing about the pride the developers feel for their work.

It’s a bit funny, because the films almost feel a little too at arm’s length: they are beautifully made with strong performances and great effects, but they still feel a bit stiff. Meanwhile, the games themselves have this bombast the films themselves could have benefitted from. Who knows, maybe with some of that extra swagger in the films and we could’ve stretched this series into eight films, too.

With a new generation of Narnia films coming out, I’ve been wondering when to introduce the series to my older kids. I think the movies are arguably a bit too intense for children their age, so I’ve decided to slow drip the series. We will start with the first book and then we may dip into the console game. I figure I have a year and a half to adequately convert them into fans in time for the new adaptation in 2026. If all goes well, there will be a few more Narnia kids in this house.

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Remember this?

When recruited, players can purify them or keep the stronger, wild beast in their party. It presents a bleak choice to the player: do you want to do the work to be better? It reminds me of shadow work, which is the process of exploring one’s shadow self within their subconscious to uncover facets of themselves which they have hidden or repressed. It’s a buzzwordy term that gets co-opted by influencers, but it’s rooted in Jungian psychoanalysis. It simply refers to the parts of yourself you’d rather not deal with.

While I tire of Pokémon Go easily, one perk of the game is that it allowed me to introduce Pokémon to the kids and gauge what sorts of games they may be interested in. With my daughter, it turns out her favorite Pokémon game is…the card game. While I wasn’t expecting it, I have wholly reveled playing with her. Not only has it been great fun, but it’s also allowed me to do some shadow work of my own.

Pokémon is a multimedia franchise created by (among others) Nintendo, launching with Pokémon Red and Green for the Game Boy in 1996. There are dozens of games, TV series, movies, books, toys and more. The Card Game, released in Japan in 1996 and globally in 1998, sees players building becks for competitive play where you summon Pokémon, attach energy cards, and execute attacks to knock out the opponent’s team. It’s one of the world's most popular trading card games and still carries on strong today. Like Magic: The Gathering, another collectible card game that was popular in my youth and somehow still (more?) popular today.

Both Pokémon and Magic games were things I was interested in as an 11-year old. They were aligned with my interests, as I was already a budding RPGamer with a slant towards anime stylings from Japanese developers. I loved JRPGs before we even knew to call it that. But as you may also remember, anime fandom in the late 1990s/early aughts was significantly less mainstream than today. I may have loved Final Fantasy and Pokémon, but I wasn’t finding many friends and neighbors similarly situated, leaving me a bit insecure with regard to wearing my trainer badges on my sleeve.

I resigned myself to simply collecting a few cards, staring at them, and trying to convince my siblings or cousins to play the game. The matches we played were haphazard, either without enough cards to sustain two decks or with the players themselves lacking the wherewithal to know exactly what an energy card was for, let alone how to attach or use it. Simply put, I didn’t know how to play (even after reading the rules), and had nobody who could teach me (or wanted to learn). Even my cousin Mike had a big box of Magic cards; we just stared at the impressive art.

It was card games like these, and even the notion of playing Dungeons & Dragons, that seemed out of my reach during my teenage years. There was always an impediment - money, access to the actual game(s), insecurity, or simply nobody to play with! I was too self-conscious to put my neck out there and try to make friends with people who would actually know what to do. Over the years, my small collections of these games were lost in the shuffle in moves to college and thereafter. I wrote them off as simply not for me. I had growing up to do and my time for these experiences had come and gone.

For nearly twenty years, that was the case. Before I started having my own kids, I last played a Pokémon game in the late 2000s and hadn’t even thought about playing tabletop games. While Pokémon Go came out just before I had my own kids, it was a cultural shift that helped me, at nearly 30 years old, release any sort of insecurity about being a gamer. I stopped worrying about what others thought about my hobby because I was able to stop worrying so much about what others thought generally. A decade later, I’m a nearly 40-year-old lawyer who moonlights as a video game writer going on a half-decade.

As a result, it felt natural to introduce my kids to the hobby, even if in small ways. One of my daughter’s first experiences with gaming was simply dancing together to the main menu of Chocobo’s Mystery Dungeon: Every Buddy! It would be a while before she would formally play games, but in the interim the kids were fine with plushies and characters. While we dabbled in the games and show, one day at Best Buy my daughter spotted a Pokémon card binder, igniting her curiosity. She wanted the binder, but I refused to buy it since we didn’t have any cards to put in there. Hours later at home, she found one that had been hiding in a junk drawer since the last time McDonald’s gave them out as Happy Meals. With a card to put in the binder, I felt obliged.

We marched back to the store where we picked up not only the collector’s binder, but also the box that could’ve changed my life as a twelve-year-old: the Battle Academy box, which comes with detailed instructions, damage markers, a gameplay board (telling you where to put everything to get started), and three sixty-card decks. The game walks you through a few turns with specific instructions before letting players continue the match. First released in 2020, it proved very popular - especially in this house.

My daughter has become an absolute shark at the game, dominating with high-powered Pokémon and using items or other cards with actual strategy. It’s a bit scary, to be honest, since I think I was still learning how to tie my shoes at her age. I couldn’t believe it: here I was, in 2024, actually playing the Pokémon card game. Better (thirty years) late than never, I suppose. We’ve played dozens of matches against each other. I’m chuffed to finally play it, but even more to be able to play it with my daughter. It’s given another opportunity to instill values about playing fairly, good sportsmanship, and fine: a little bit of trash talk every once in a while.

Playing this game with my daughter has been oddly healing for me. It had been years since I remembered feeling insecure about gaming or wishing for someone with an earnest understanding of the game mechanics, but physically shuffling, preparing the decks, and laying the cards out on a table brought back those memories that feel both alien and wholly familiar, as if they occurred yesterday. I had spent so much of my life, especially as a kid, insecure about something that I loved because I was preoccupied with the thoughts of other people or internalizing some weird self-judgment because my sisters didn’t want to play Pokémon cards and my brother was too young to read at the time. Why did I do this to myself?

Why do any of us do that to ourselves? Through shadow work, we’re able to confront concepts or memories about ourselves that we’ve stuffed in a shoebox in the back of our mind’s closet. We can hide parts of ourselves as much as we’d like, but they are still there. We need to do the work in order to reconcile these facets of ourselves to be fully realized and whole. I’m not talking about crystals and auras but rather addressing uncomfortable truths and recollections about ourselves. It’s empowering and something I look forward to continuing.

In Pokémon Go - just like in real life - the shadow version of ourselves is just us, burdened by the past. We’re able to quietly ignore them for as long as we like, but they are still there waiting for their moment in the sun. Many of us are too afraid to do the work to reconcile their shadow and light selves. I’m so grateful that my daughter’s curiosity led us to this card game, which we continue to enjoy. I absolutely love playing this game with her, ending with a high five or a hug after an earned victory. What she doesn’t know is that I’m also giving my ten-year-old self a hug, too. It’s one both he and I didn’t know we needed.

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February 27th is Pokémon Day, marking the anniversary of the first games on the Game Boy in 1996.