Spring has sprung, and with each new month brings a new opportunity to make continued progress in games, books, and TV. Here are the latest in what has been keeping me busy this month.
Video Game
Theatrhythm Final Bar Line
For those who have read last month’s update, you may be wondering why Theatrhythm Final Bar Line is a game I’ve been playing this month. Rest assured, I’m still very much playing Shadow of the Tomb Raider but Final Bar Line has become one of those easy to pick up and put down games I can play in short bursts during the week, if I don’t have enough time to dedicate an hour or more on Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Revisiting the amazing score and soundtrack of the Final Fantasy series has been the biggest draw for me to get Final Bar Line, and it feels as if this latest rhythm game surpasses the prior ones released for the Nintendo 3DS.
Read my first impressions of Final Bar Line here.
Book
Six of Crows: Crooked Kingdom
After spending the first few months on work related development books, I have finally gotten back to reading for fun and leisure. Six of Crows: Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo, author of the Shadow and Bone series, is the second and last book of the Six of Crows duology. I’m only a few chapters in, but overall, I much prefer the supporting characters of Bardugo’s Grishaverse than the core main ones of the Shadow and Bone series. The Six of Crows crew are a band of thieves who go on exciting heists, while dealing with their own personal demons and secrets along the way. I think the many layers these characters have are better developed than Alina Starkhov, Mal Oretsev, and even the Darkling himself from Shadow and Bone. Regardless, I am excited to see how Bardugo give each of the Crows the proper sendoff they deserve. Not to mention I find the slow burn romance between Kaz Brekker and Inej Ghafa hotter than the triangle between Alina, Mal, and the Darkling.
Television
Shadow and Bone: Season 2
How fitting that my current book read ties neatly into my current TV watch? Shadow and Bone: Season 2 released on Netflix last month, and despite finding the trilogy of books a bit underwhelming personally when I read them, I certainly love the show it’s based on. Season 2 picks up where the first season left off with Alina and Mal on the run from the Darkling, and on the hunt for the amplifiers that will enhance Alina’s Sun Summoner powers to destroy the Fold and vanquish the Darkling once and for all. If they can survive his terrifying new powers in the process.
The second season combines the second book of Shadow and Bone, Siege and Storm with more of the Six of Crows book from the Six of Crows duology. Naturally, some changes have been made from book to screen but I don’t think it detracts from enjoying the show as its own independent thing, especially when Bardugo’s more interesting supporting characters are introduced in Season 2 like Nikolai Lantsov, twins Tamar Kir-Bataar and Tolya Yul-Bataar, and Wylan Van Eck.
I’m a few more episodes away from finishing up this season, and I don’t doubt I’ll be anxiously awaiting the show’s third and final season on Netflix.
What have you been playing, reading, and watching this month?
simpleek 