Sunday, February 3, 2013

Almost done, a vacation (?), computer games, and Crunchyroll problems

I don't think I'll manage to finish a review post this weekend, but I still wanted to post something. So, enjoy some random stuff.

I think I only ever wrote once, back in September, about the medication I'd be taking. I'm now just days away from being finished! Although the first 12 weeks turned out to be the hardest, I'm still very happy I'm almost done. I did my last injection a couple days ago, and I'll be completely done with the rest of it after Friday. Then I've just got blood tests for a year or so, which will hopefully all come back perfect.

All the doctor stuff put my original vacation plans on hold, but now that the end is in sight, I can start planning. At some point I'll have to commit to a travel date and buy the plane tickets, the very thought of which gives me butterflies in my stomach. This will be my first time planning a trip to Germany myself.

Now for some stuff more related to this blog: computer games and online TV. One of the reasons I've had less to write reviews about lately is because computer games have been taking up time I would otherwise have devoted to reading or TV-watching. The long holiday break got me hooked on Steam again. I discovered a couple "visual novel"-style games (Analogue: A Hate Story and Magical Diary), enjoyed the cuteness of Botanicula, became briefly addicted to Little Inferno and its somewhat dark humor, and have just started to dig into Quantum Conundrum, a Portal-like game that so far seems better in some ways (the puzzles are more difficult and involved) and worse in others (I already hate some of the platformer aspects). Oh, and for hours of fairly mindless fun, I have Gyromancer (imagine a cross between Bejeweled and Pokemon, only considerably less cute) and Triple Town (ninja bears!).

For online TV, I still have Netflix and Crunchyroll. I'm "meh" about Netflix's selection, although it helps that I'm incredibly behind on live action TV. Its pathetic selection of anime would bother me less if I weren't currently having problems with Crunchyroll. Although I still love Crunchyroll's catalog of titles and am relieved that Crunchyroll still works via my computer, it has developed hideously bad buffering problems via my TV. The problems started while I was watching Kimi ni Todoke, although I didn't actually get into contact with Crunchyroll's tech support until late December.

For those of you considering signing up for a Crunchyroll membership, a word of warning: their tech support is terrible if you have a problem that cannot be solved by one of their all-purpose fixes. My opinion of them tanked when they ignored my questions about the status of the problem. I don't even know if they've figured out what the problem is or if they're still working on it. My suspicion is that they know exactly what's wrong and can't, or won't, devote the money and/or time necessary to fix it. I only just recently renewed a year-long membership (conveniently, just before the buffering problems started), or I'd probably already have dropped them and given FUNimation a try. Here's hoping Crunchyroll gets its act together and remembers that surpassing 100,000 Premium subscribers is only a feat worth crowing about if they can actually retain all those subscribers. In the meantime, the number of Crunchyroll shows I'll be reviewing will probably drop - given a choice between watching stuff on my TV versus watching stuff on my computer, TV wins almost every time.

Well, that's about it. I'm part of the way through a few books and a couple TV shows. I only have one thing ready to be reviewed, but the review is giving me trouble. Oh, and I might celebrate my last days of horrible medication with a new tablet, if I'm ever able to make myself part with the money. The Google Nexus is very tempting.

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