A weekly status update from everyone’s favourite caffeinated weirdo.

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Welcome back to Whatcha Up To! Coffee here, and it’s been a while, hasn’t it?

It’s unfathomable how much damage can be done to one’s mental state through words, actions or gestures. I won’t lie – I’m suffering from all the rhetoric going on around the world. Mentally, I was not in a good place for the last month and a bit and it affected, well, everything as a result. I had no desire to come back to the site and post content when there’s so much uncertainty happening. It’s come to a point where I had to scrub out all the sources of negativity to salvage my mental state – namely Reddit, news feeds and Instagram/Threads, among other places. I won’t be using those platforms anymore, so the only places you can find me now are on BlueSky and Twitch. Yes, Twitch.

I haven’t been on the streaming platform for a long, long time, but I’m thinking of making a comeback of sorts. I miss the vibes, I miss the games and I miss hanging out with my audience. And frankly, interacting with people is what I need right now. I’ve felt so isolated lately and it’s hard to join clubs or do workshops without severely disrupting the hectic family schedule, so, I figured returning to Twitch would be the lesser of all evils. As for what day I’m going to make my comeback, I can’t say at this time. I’m just workshopping the idea at the moment.

(Also, I loaned my capture card to my cousin for him to use, so… But then again, I’m also due for an upgrade… Hmm…)

With the major distractions removed, I should be more active with Games with Coffee. Instead of opening stupid apps and doomscrolling, I will endeavour to put my energy back to where it belongs – my writing. How this is going to go is anyone’s guess, given my track record on promises. Doing something – anything, even – is better than doing nothing at all.

Which leads us back to the premise of this post: What have I been up to lately? Well, let me tell you:

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Whatcha Playin’, Coffee?

Shadowrun Returns is done, finally! After 7 long years, I finally got through the game. And it was a good one too! I love how immersive atmosphere of the Shadowrun universe. Dare I say it, I prefer this over the Cyberpunk universe. Methinks it be due to the D&D influences.

Know what else is done? Landstalker! Also finished that recently and I loved it! Well, except for one stupid puzzle at the end of the game that relied on near pixel-perfect player placement (say that five times fast) to complete. Otherwise, it was great! I still prefer Alundra over its predecessor though.

Want more backlog? Well, you’ll be proud to read that I finished both Journey to Silius and StarTropics almost back-to-back! Thank you, NSO haha. I actually liked both games. Silius was very difficult, but short enough to get through in an hour or two. StarTropics was a nice Zelda-like experience. I was not a fan of the dipping-the-map-to-get-the-secret-code thing, but still, I loved it. And yes, I looked up the code lol.

On the library side of things, I 100%-ed Kirby and the Forgotten Land. It’s my all-time favourite Kirby game, thus far. I might look into getting a physical copy. I’m now currently knee-deep in the Apollo Justice Ace Attorney Trilogy game, which I borrowed from a new branch of my local library (It’s so clean and so new!!!).

Whatcha Writin’, Coffee?

Almost done Chapter 30. Like I said, mental state’s been pretty bad lately, which makes it hard to churn chapters out. I know what needs to be done, I just need to get off of my butt and do it. That’s all.

Speaking of getting off of my butt, I’ve resumed writing the Backlog Busting posts. The next game coming up is Final Fantasy XVI, which I enjoyed despite the controversy. It’s a common refrain from me – me enjoying games that the reactionary masses find controversial. I mean, I really liked Forspoken and we’ve all seen the flak from that one, right? People can enjoy 6/10 or 7/10 games; not everything needs to be a masterpiece that you can hang in The Louvre.

I wrote a quick review for Super C, one of my all-time favourite run-and-gun games on the NES. You can find it on The Pixels.

Whatcha Readin’, Coffee?

I finished reading The Land of Lost Things. Overall, it had similar vibes to Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz, with an ending that trended to the positive side. A good read. Speaking of The Wizard of Oz, I finished reading Toto, by A.J. Hackerman. It’s an alternate take on the classic tale, with Toto as the main character. The story is now set in more modern times as opposed to Kansas in the Great Depression era to better reflect current social commentary. It was a witty and fun story to delve into.

In related news, I submitted my short story within The Major Arcana anthology to be featured in a Local Author Showcase. If selected, a copy of the book will be available to borrow from the library, meaning people will get more opportunities to read these amazing stories. Plus, I’d get a bit of personal promotion too! Win-win for all involved, I’d say!

How’s Trainin’, Coffee?

I’ve been pretty on and off lately. I have some tightness around my lower back and waist area that probably requires more stretching. That growing tightness has been an issue in the three months since I started this new program. I may have to rethink the training program a bit and focus more on improving the stability and core muscles instead of increasing mass. Muscle optimization doesn’t sound fun on paper, but when you apply a game-oriented approach to it, it makes it more manageable, I think.

So, going forward, I’m going to restructure my workouts to focus on building up those stability muscles and getting that tightness addressed before building upwards. Frankly, I should have done that a while back, but I had different priorities then.

That’s it for what’s been happening recently. Anything new on your end? Let me know below, or on Bluesky. 

~Coffee