I Want To Talk About Things I Like
It's raining outside, and I'm procrastinating going out to buy bread, milk, and vegetables. After coming back I plan on continuing Clair Obscur, a game I'm having fun playing but that keeps making me think about how much I like other stuff with similar themes. Or other stuff in general.
I want to talk about things I like.
The Little Prince
Everyone knows this book. A lot of people I know don't like it much, considering it childish, or annoying, or preachy. I used to know it by heart (it's been a lot since I've last read it), and I own multiple copies of it: in different languages, a pop-up version, the one I had at home when I first read it. It's my favourite book.
I've gotten a (used) German copy just the other day, so I can use it to practice the language. It's one of my major comforts, and it's been so ever since I was a little kid. I think too much about the very first pages: how adults push their views on children, or just others in general, and how they value things differently. I'm too old to still feel like a child, but it doesn't change the fact that I often do. Is it so bad to feel so strongly about the little things? Is it really that childish? And if so, is that really something that needs to be forgiven?
Urban Myth Dissolution Center
I expected something different. I didn't expect it to stick with me for so long after playing it, either. The mysteries are... alright. The characters are fun, the art is great, the gameplay loop gets old quickly. The music is kind of grating at times (even though I like it).
It stuck with me because it's a story about a loneliness so soul-crushing it corrupts you, presented in a way so raw that made me want to reach into the screen and do something.
But I can't. It's just a game.
Stories like this make me hurt immensely, and wish no one close to me ever felt that way as long as I'm around. It still happens, though... and maybe that's why it hits so close home.
Xenoblade Chronicles 3
I loved the first game and hated the second, so I was extremely wary of the third one. I played it in silence, sharing occasional comments with close friends. I fully immersed into it. Hours upon hours exploring the world, talking to NPCs, navigating the web of people living in Aionios.
Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is a game about people, their fears and their convictions. It's a game about freedom to think, to act, and to feel, to question the natural order, to live and die for what you believe in even if it's only true for you. About what it means to choose for yourself and for others, and where does one's freedom start and end. But it's also about letting go, about grief, about leaving something to the future even when you're not there anymore, about being remembered and staying true to yourself until the end. Ultimately, I think it's also an incredibly kind game.
I played it when I desperately needed kindness. It made me feel like I had the right to feel like myself without asking for permission. It's still something I'm learning how to do, but...
Roads stretch out before us. Which do you choose? That's up to you.
Sometimes, you might run astray. You'll stop, maybe cry in frustration.
But you know, that's all right. For the roads... they go on without end.
So look up, face forward, toward your chosen horizon...
And just...
walk on.1
There are a lot of things I like. But even opening up about things I like takes a lot of energy. Loving comes naturally, but showing it makes me feel vulnerable, and it's still a huge effort for me. Maybe the fact that I'd rather be invisible than hurt says something about me. I'm not sure.
I want to love unabashedly and honestly forever. Is it supposed to be so hard?
Just writing this quote makes me tear up man, I can't possibly be this much of a weakling.↩