Wordsmith's Anvil

  Image Credit: Night Shade Books As strength goes.     That's something that we hear a lot in Cook's Darkwar trilogy. From Doomstalker to Warlock, and Warlock to Ceremony, Marika's lesson from the Ponath sticks through. And it shows.     Marika is the main character and centerpiece of Cook's science-fantasy series. She is from a feline race called the Meth, and grows up in a sector of the planet that has been restricted technologically. If it sounds a bit like The Hunger Games , it is. In that respect only. The comparison stops there.     Being raised by a band of hunters who are averse to anything they don't understand, like mental powers in the form of a spirit-guided telepathy, Marika finds herself in a bit of a conundrum. Exploring these talents has the potential to save those she loves from her village, but also could result in further examination by those who are already concerned that she could be the "Doomstalker." This Doomstalker, or Jiana...

  Image Credit: Saber Interactive Space Marine II was an absolute first for me in one regard.     I have literally never played a game where the very first gear and appearance your character has is absolutely badass, and virtually anything that comes after that makes him look like a goon. Congratulations, Saber. You played yourself.     Titus starts off the game in the Death Watch, rounding out a century of service to the emperor for coming close to heresy without actually crossing the line. As such, he is a commander and is dressed to the nines with a skull helmet, red cloak, dark grey armor, and is an absolute monster on the battlefield. So much so, in fact, that upon his death he is essentially reanimated with additional parts in order to continue serving the Imperium.     No retirement plan?  What a sucker.     After his reanimation, Titus is reinstated into the Ultramarines as a lieutenant. Definitely a downgrade from his former ran...

  Image Credit: Egg Nut In order to do this game justice with my review, I'm going to keep it short and sweet. That is exactly what the developers did, anyway.     In Tails Noir you play a private investigator named Howard. Howard's typical clientele are people looking for cheating spouses or those who have misplaced a valuable bauble or two. Nothing big time. And he knows it. He also is well aware of how lame his life feels as a result.     The latest case that drops in his lap seems just like all the others. A pregnant mother is looking for her deadbeat husband. She just knows he's two-timing, but she doesn't want to fully boot him out without proof. Howard is on the case! When investigating this particular dirtbag, however, Howard discovers a lot more than he bargained for. For one, the guy is dead. And secondly, his corpse is being chopped up and packaged off as if it's going to market. Could there really be people in elite society feasting on the flesh of t...

Images Credit: Disney & Yihyoung Li Woo. It's been a minute since I've read a Star Wars novel, and even longer since it's been one that has actually been considered canon. Most of the stuff that's been churned out over the decades has just been shuffled to Star Wars's "Legends" section, a sort of catch-all that looks at things more like a reimagining than anything. That is not the case with the books of The High Republic .     The High Republic effort by Disney includes books, audio dramas, comics, graphic novels, video games, a children's show, and a more adult-centric show that completely flopped. Whether or not that show flopped due to its content or due to the heavy review bombing that happened is perhaps up for debate, but I'm not going to discuss that in this particular post. I'll focus instead on the first two stories set in this era.      In an even longer time ago in that same galaxy we've come to know and love... Convergence s...

Image credit: Ember Lab Oh man. I don't think I've ever actually done back to back 10/10 reviews before.      You ready for it?      I know I am.     Kena: Bridge of Spirits is one of those games that comes by and captures you from the moment you set forth in the titular character's shoes. As a spirit guide, Kena is expected to help wayward souls on their voyage to the afterlife. Or maybe just accept the fact that they are not of this world any longer. Either way, it's a job that she inherited from her father but has always felt a bit apprehensive about. This is mainly because she feels like she could never be as great of a spirit guide as those who came before her.     She is wrong.     Kena's journey goes across a village and the surrounding acreage to include some river landscape, forestry, farmland, and even a bit of snowy peaks. Along the way she encounters several spirits like Beni, Saiya, Rusu, Taro, Hana, Adira, Zajuro...

Image credit: Jump Over the Age "'More Human than Human' is our motto," Tyrell says with a mixture of matter-of-fact clarification and barely contained pride.     Deckard scoffs at the very idea that one of these replicants could be anything like a human.       Let alone more.     Blade Runner is, and probably always will be, my all-time favorite movie. It combines the raw human emotion I love in films alongside great sci-fi action. I could go on for hours, but we're not here to talk about Ridley Scott's masterpiece. We're here to talk about the one created by Jump Over the Age.     You read that right.     In Citizen Sleeper , you play as a "sleeper" on an almost-forgotten space station in a remote corner of the galaxy. To figure out just what the hell I'm talking about, let me clarify a few things. First off, in this distant future AI has been outlawed entirely. Perhaps not such a bad thing... Either way, it is illegal for an...