Desert Bus, Midgar Edition

One Man’s Two-Year Quest Not to Finish Final Fantasy VII
https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/one-mans-two-year-quest-not-to-finish-final-fantasy-vii

Many have poured scorn on Curry’s venture, particularly since it doesn’t have a charitable component. “This is the most pathetic waste of man hours that could have been used for good that I’ve seen in a long time,” one typical YouTube comment says. On the forum where he first heard about Dick Tree’s idea, Curry posted a spirited, if nihilistic, rebuttal. “To say that our lives are pointless and our achievements meaningless is to state the obvious,” he wrote. “No matter how grand our achievements or how broad their scope, time turns all to dust and death destroys all memory. But that does not mean we cannot ascribe our own meaning to what we do.”

These are bold words from someone whose mission in life was to stream himself grinding to Level 99 during the first reactor mission with Barret, but he's not wrong.

Also fuck the idea that everything has to be done for charity. I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with raising charitable donations, of course, but it's okay to do things just for fun. Not everything has to be about money.

I really love this sort of absurdly unnecessary level grinding, by the way. I find it calming and meditative. It's one of the reasons why I love the Bravely Default series, and it's why I'm looking forward to the Pokémon Diamond and Pearl remakes coming out next month.

Halloween Zine

I've got a short story called "Ms. Weaver's Halloween Candy" appearing in a Halloween-themed zine called Midnight Gathering.

This is a Stephen King style take on the trope of the "creepy older woman," by which I mean that it's more about character-driven family drama than it is about violence and shock value. The protagonist is a fourteen-year-old girl who's trying to deal with a rough patch in her life by investigating a rumor that a woman in her neighborhood makes her Halloween candy out of cats, and she inadvertently discovers that what's actually going on is much more sinister. As someone who tends to root for the villains, I did my best to portray everyone involved in the most sympathetic light possible while still imbuing the story with a sense of creeping dread, and I'm very proud of the ending.

I started becoming interested in the Minotaur myth in 2017 while exploring Hyrule Castle in Breath of the Wild, and this is the first original story I've written that references it. I'm not sure how successful my allusion to the myth is in this piece, and I consider its inclusion somewhat experimental. I'm the sort of writer who has to tell the same story in a dozen different ways before I feel like I understand it, so it's something I'll definitely return to in the future.

This is not my first piece of original fiction to be published, but it's the first that's going to appear in print (fingers crossed). Perhaps 35 is a bit old to be celebrating this, but whatever. I was publishing nonfiction during my twenties, and the paths people take through life aren't set in stone. It does feel a bit strange to be the "old" person in the room on zine Discord servers, but it's also quite nice to see my writing appear alongside the work of up-and-coming artists who contributed a ton of unique and interesting illustrations to the publication.