Video Game Reviews: Control Resonant

 

Control Resonant is a follow-up to 2019's Control, Remedy Entertainment's hit action-adventure where you take the shoes of Jesse Faden, recently promoted to chief director of the shadowy Federal Bureau of Control, the same organization that apprehended her brother Dylan after an Altered World Event. In Resonant, you play as Dylan, who functioned as a mostly off-screen villain in the original game. Raised by the Bureau to one day take the position of director, Dylan has paranatural powers that you'll eventually unlock. Due to his abuse at the hands of the FBC, Dylan released the extradimensional entity known as the Hiss, but he quickly regains his autonomy at the beginning of Resonant and then joins the FBC to deal with an outbreak that's transformed Manhattan, twisting the cityscape in reality bending ways, along with infecting its citizens with paranatural entities. Dylan is socially-awkward and unsure of himself, and his rapport with his handler Zoey helps make Dylan a sympathetic character, one that doesn't trust the FBC, which considers him a dangerous weapon. Very quickly, you are thrust into an open world, the aforementioned distorted Manhattan, armed only with the Aberrant, a piece of steel that can transform into a variety of melee weapons. Resonant's combat system functions sort of like Devil May Cry's, albeit quite a bit simpler. You have three attacks you can choose from, a primary, secondary, and combo finisher. I played most of the game with the Glaive selected as my primary attack and Crush as my secondary. Enemies are vulnerable to certain types of damage--you may have to break through the armored exterior of a Hiss with Crush, for example--and realizing these vulnerabilities and resistances is key to success. After defeating Resonant Entities (big bosses), you'll obtain paranatural powers. Ignite was one that I used constantly--it bathes Dylan in flames--along with Barrage, which hurls rubble at enemies, often triggering a Faltered state, in which the enemy becomes staggered. A Faltered enemy is able to be Executed--Dylan will perform a canned animation with a press of the left stick button--and then emerge from the Execution in a brief state called Dominance, in which he does buffed damaged. Lining up Executions is a successful strategy to make Resonant's combat significantly easier. Dylan doesn't do much damage with his base attacks, so you'll want to increase that Falter meter during every fight. Also of consideration is the way the game handles leveling up. Dylan's Aberrant strength increases with every unlocked weapon skill. You can only equip three weapons at a time, but you should unlock a talent as soon as you're able, even if you won't use it, because it'll increase Dylan's ability to Falter enemies. So while all of this sounds like a lot, it's pretty simple once you get the hang of it.

Control Resonant features Remedy's in house engine, and it's put to excellent use rendering the distorted urban environments. Eventually Dylan will unlock the ability to change the gravity of a surface, and you'll get used to navigating up subway tunnels and flipping to upside down skyscrapers with the simple press of the left bumper. Inception seems to have been referenced as a visual inspiration, and Resonant might have the most creative map design of any open world game I've ever played. Path-traced lighting was possible at Medium/High settings and balanced upscaling on my 9070 XT/7800 X3D system at 1440p, which is impressive, although I did notice the occasional lighting artifact. Storywise, Resonant offers some fairly satisfying twists. My only complaints are the overuse of mobs in the late midgame, as well as some confusion navigating various environments.

Control Resonant is up there with Resident Evil: Requiem for one of the best third person action games of the year. It's much more gameplay focused than Alan Wake 2, but it still possesses all of Remedy's stylistic weirdness. A fairly thorough playthrough should take about forty hours or so. Screenshots below:

 

 

The Biggest Shit-Eaters of the 2026 Election

Eat up, motherfuckers.

Votes are still being counted, but it sure looks like America's tired of MAGA. I guess two years of constant embarrassment, ICE Gestapo, four dollar gas, bullshit tarrifs, and RFK's meat farts will do that. So let's look at the biggest shit-eaters of this election, and point and laugh at their stupid faces.

Elon Musk--How much cash did you spend there, Musky Boy? 446 million bucks? Sure, that's pissing pennies for a trillionaire, but you know what? Fuck you, you bloated rat man. No amount of cash can fill the empty void in your ballooning chest, and it's fucking amazing that the world's richest man is also the world's biggest loser. I hope the democrats investigate the shit out of you, you Nazi hypocrite. You can OD on ketamine any time.

Vivek Ramaswamy--If you were running for office against a woman who had been sexually abused as a child by her stepdad and abandoned by her mother, would you run a negative ad with said mother calling her daughter, who she hasn't spoken to for decades, a liar? Even Satan would have second thoughts about that. Vivek, however, didn't, because he's a billionaire, and they're all sociopaths. Better to be the abuser than the abused, right Vivek? Well the voters saw through your meatsuit facade, you stupid fucking shit-eater. I hope Amy Acton and Sherrod Brown get together and take a big fat dump on a plate and then force-feed it to your smarmy douche-bag face. I swear to god, this isn't a fetish. Then again, somebody make this fucker eat real poop. Choke and die, Vivek! Suck a dick!

Mike Johnson--Oh the polls were going to be wrong and shock the world, huh, Mike? What's that? Is Trump bellowing in the next room, calling for your ass to chomp down on his shriveled mushroom dick? Well, you better get to it. You've been sucking it for the last two years. No reason to stop now, Mr. Minority Leader. Fuck you!

 John Fetterman--You just know Shrek was planning on switching parties if the Democrats barely got a Senate Majority. Well, not only did they take every swing state, they also took fucking Kansas. Texas is blue! Maybe big John should just quit, since Pennsylvanians will kick his ass out of town in two years anyway. Then he can mope around in sweat pants like a stupid bum instead of cosplaying as a United States Senator. Eat shit, you bald motherfucker! Nobody likes you and I bet you smell like an old man's pants!

Trump--Trump told people to vote like he was on the ballot, and boy did they. I'll bet he's watching Fox News right now, ass hanging off the end of his chair, diaper full of shit, fetid and stinking. I don't know if I'll ever forgive my fellow Americans for electing a pedophile to the Presidency, but my heart is warmed by the fact that Donald Trump will likely never be happy again. Eat a fat turd, you sorry sack of shit. We're making America great again.

Writer's Block: Farewell

 

Farewell is the poem that closes out my short story collection The Future Is Now which I'm in the process of editing. It's really fun and optimistic, just like my horror stories! Hopefully the aforementioned work will be ready for publication in a couple months or less.

Farewell

Through the fog we move our hands

Too lost to speak of distant lands

Trickling through an hourglass

Until we find our hour passed

Vanished with our memory dear

Shaking off our fallen tears

We crawl and grope and try to stand

Upon our feet that we’ve aband

Oh how we yearn for yester’s youth

Halcyon days of golden truth

Distorted by our nascent eyes

Twisted till the day we die

Will there be a swift release

Or shall we linger in the eve

Spirits wandering off to haunt

Distant pasts so roughly wrought

By memory’s wondrous fleeting drug

That we have bought but cannot shrug

Oh how I wish I never knew

What I’ve forgotten in the dew

That hangs upon my weary eyes

That dart about the hostile skies

This cursed fog that clouds my brain

And renders every thought insane

Who am I and who are you

And what the hell are we to do?

Tell me once again my name

To not remember is my shame.

Weightlifting: A Minimalist's Powerlifting Routine for the Middle-aged Lifter

 

Here's some greasy old fucker deadlifting

At 41 years of age, some might say that's it's time to take it easy and leave those PRs in the past where they belong, just like democracy and reading-comprehension. I say to those people: fuck right off. Sure, it may take all the willpower in my being to get out of bed in the morning, but I'll be damned if I give up lifting heavy. At a bodyweight of 193 lbs, I just bench pressed 265 for a double and squatted an ass-to-grass single with 350 (and I crushed it). Now those numbers aren't exactly earth-shattering, and indeed, they pale to what I did just a few years ago, but I'm a little lighter and there definitely is a difference in the recuperative abilities of a 38 year old and a 41 year old. At 38 I benched 315 and deadlifted 405 for 9; now a max set of deadlifts for 10 would probably cripple me for a week due to the muscle knotting in my traps brought on by farming and weightlifting for almost two decades. As you age, you got to train heavy and smart, and it's that latter factor that so many of us who like to push ourselves miss. To compensate for my dwindling recovery, I only train three days a week now, focusing almost exclusively on the squat and bench press. No more low bar squatting--it tears up my hips, and I've finally cured my hip shifting tendency by squatting ass to grass. Here's the basic routine:

Monday: High bar squat, working up to either a heavy single or rep set usually surpassing 70 percent of my one rep max.

Do the same for bench press, but cycle between four variations: touch and go, paused, close-grip, and low incline.

Do two sets of twelve rows and curls.

Wednesday: Do the same arrangement, but if you did a single on Monday, focus on a rep set for Wednesday or vice versa.

 Friday: Once again, repeat the workout, switching between either a heavy single set or a rep max set in the 70 percent range. Alternatively, you can do multiple heavy singles, or work up to four sets of five pyramid style. Add deadlifts on one of these days.

The point is not to beat yourself up with a lot of volume. I can't do three sets of ten or five sets of five across anymore. By focusing on one hard set, you're still pushing yourself while hopefully accumulating enough stress to grow. I try to increase my hard sets by five to ten pounds weekly, but sometimes you'll know that's not possible. Accessory work is limited to rows and curls because we ain't got time for any of that other shit. I don't find that overhead pressing is necessary for increasing your bench or even for general shoulder health, but I also don't live a typical lifestyle. Because I'm a farmer, I'm constantly picking up fifty pound weights all day, as well as lifting things over my head, so if you're sedentary, you might need more accessory work. At some point, you got to figure out what works for you. 

Writer's Block: Heaven

 

Heaven

He opened his eyes and took in the blinding whiteness of eternity.

A second ago he was on his deathbed, hooked up to machines, fading slowly out of consciousness. Now he marveled at his hands, which were not ancient and lined with liver-spots, but smooth and covered with youthful flesh.

“Where am I?” he asked.

Suddenly a woman appeared to him. She was clad in a white suit, and her hair was golden. In her hands, she clutched a tablet, and she favored him with a professional smile.

“How are you, William? Much better, I presume?”

“I’m not an old man anymore,” he replied.

“Yes, that’s correct. You’ve died, and now you’re in the afterlife.”

“I didn’t really believe… why are we in an empty expanse?” he asked.

“Well, you haven’t filled it with anything. Where would you like to be?”

He thought about it for a second.

“Nineteen-ninety six. My grandparents’ farm.”

And that’s where they were. He saw the barn and silo in the background, almost swallowed by trees. Everlasting fields of corn across the road. The old house with the wrap-around porch right in front of him. He walked over and sat on the swinging bench and breathed a long, trembling sigh.

“What about people?” he asked. “Can you bring them here?”

“In a manner of speaking,” she replied. “Who would you like to see?”

“My mother,” he said.

The door to the house opened and his mother emerged. She looked to be about fifty-five, and when she saw him, she smiled and went over and embraced him.

“Mom,” he managed, a tear trickling down his cheek.

“It’s so good to see you,” she said.

“What?” he asked.

“I’ve been waiting, son. Counting the days.”

He looked past her at the women in the suit.

“What have you done to her?” he asked.

“What do you mean, William? I am here with love in my heart.”

“My mother would never say that,” he replied. “I expected you to start laying in to me for the life I lived. Frankly, I expected a slap on the face.”

“I would never do that, son. I have left all my anger and sorrow behind on the earthly plane.”

“She’s correct,” responded the woman. “There is no conflict or negative emotions here. Those are consequences of mortal existence.”

“My mother without conflict is not my mother,” he said. “I don’t want this.”

Instantly, his mother vanished.

“What about things? Can you give me anything I ask for?”

“Sure,” she replied. “What do you want?”

“I want to unwrap a brand-new Nintendo 64 and play Goldeneye 007.”

“Go in the house,” she replied.

He went inside his grandparents’ house. The kitchen was exactly how he remembered it. The island in the center, the animal tile backsplash, the cookie jars on top of the cabinets. He looked around warily to see if his grandmother was lurking in a corner, but the house seemed unoccupied, and he knew it would be unless he wished it otherwise.

There was a boxy CRT television in the living room on top of an entertainment center. He ran across the wooden floors, plopped down before it, and torn open the red box that held the Nintendo. In a few minutes he had hooked it up to the television and started playing video games just as he had as a child. He did so for about fifteen minutes before suddenly putting the awkward controller down and turning toward the woman.

“It doesn’t feel the same,” he admitted. “I was wanting that feeling I had as a kid. That sense of endless wonder and possibility. I don’t feel that at all. I feel like an old man living in the past.”

“I see,” she said. “Is there anything else?”

“Kristen Sanderson. Senior year. In her cheerleader uniform,” he said instantly.

He heard steps coming down the stairs and there was Kristen, golden hair in a pony tail, the white and blue uniform looking as vibrant as it did in his memory. She walked over to him and extended a hand and then looked behind her at the stairs, beyond where the bedroom awaited. Without a delay, he leapt to his feet and bounded up the stairs like an eager puppy. The white-suited woman waited patiently in the living room, looking down at her tablet and checking her watch ever so often. After about ten minutes William came downstairs looking dejected.

“Why is it not the same?” he asked. “I felt like I was making love to a doll.”

“Because you’re just reliving your old life. Or rather, you’re playing fantasy. You can’t really live here,” she explained. “You’ve died, after all.”

“So I’m doomed here?” he asked. “For all eternity?”

She took a minute to savor the expression of abject horror that came across his face.

“Is this really heaven?” he asked.

“What do you think?” she responded.

“Can you send me back?”

“Not as William. You already lived that life, and as you already admitted, you lived it to the disappointment of those who cared about you. They are gone, and you are gone, and now all that is left is a chance at a new beginning. It’s either that or you stay here. Or you can choose the nuclear option and just end it all for the sweet sanctity of nonexistence. The everlasting bliss of the freedom to not be.”

“Can you make me like a Senator’s son?” he asked.

“Nope. It’s purely random. You might not even return as a person. You could be an ant. Or a barnacle. Or a parasite that lives in the intestinal system of a whale.”

“Christ,” he whispered.

“I know. It’s heavy, isn’t it? Like I said, there’s always nonexistence or the simulacrum that is this place. But you know, that’s what makes life exciting. The chance. The randomness. There’s no thrill without the danger. There’s no wonder when you know every possibility.”

“Send me back,” he said. “I’ll do better this time. I’ll be a humanitarian or a pastor. I’ll do something great, something wondrous. I won’t hurt anybody or live selfishly. I promise. Just give me a fair shot.”

She smiled and shook her head.

“Alright, William, if that’s what you truly want. Are you ready?”

“Yes,” he said instantly.

She snapped her fingers and he vanished. For a while she made some notes on her tablet until a door opened in the whiteness and a figure emerged, horned, red-skinned, and toothy.

“Another one, mistress?” it asked.

“It’s amazing how little imagination they have,” she said. “He could have used the powers of this place to create a new world of sentient beings. That’s how the universe was created, after all. But they all just want to be players in a game someone created. They like being puppets on strings. Oh well. Send me the next one.”

New Music: The Machine

 

Machine Games' Dawn of the Machine expansion for Quake is one of the best games I've played all year, and so I put together this instrumental rock song based off a riff that I've had lying around for quite some time. The Big Muff, stratocaster, and mini-wah are all featured here. 

Bad Poetry: Every Apple

 

Every Apple

You must accept 

That you will not pick

Every apple

Just like you won't

Seize every day

Sometimes,

It's all a waste.

Beware

Beware the fascist light

of your inner darkness.

They will take your house,

Steal your paycheck

And shoot your dog.

And when you are alone,

Crying out

"What else could I have done?"

You will know the truth.

You should have done

The right thing.

Lyrics from the Worst Country Song in the World

Buttfucking on a Saturday night

Everything feels alright

Take that snake out of the bush

Stick that mamba in the tush

Writer's Block: The Sylph

 

The Sylph

I walk in the daylight among the rest of you, watching, slinking, moving from tree to alleyway to mailbox to parked car, weaving into the crowd every so often, anonymous, quiet, unseen. I watch people on their phones, watch as they order their coffee, watch as they run down the street. When they speak, I listen and murmur the words to myself in the darkened alcoves, letting them wash over me, the stolen sounds of another person’s mind. No one can bear to look right at me; if they stare they look over me, and so they see nothing, a tramp, perhaps, but more likely an inanimate object, a dumb thing lacking agency and life. When night falls I rummage through the garbage bins, dining on their refuse, their half-eaten sandwiches, their rotten apple cores, lapping up sour milk from grimy cartons that collapse in my hand, their outsides wet and stinking. Afterwards, I go and look into windows and observe the people as they stare at the screens, their faces hollow, their spirits draining into the ether. Sometimes I try the window latch; sometimes I turn the knob on the backdoor. I can come into a house uninvited; I am not a vampire, and the owners have little ownership over vacated space. And so I wander about, turning over couch cushions, looking under chairs, taking dropped change and little things to hide on my body and ponder in the cold loneliness of the morning, when I am away from those who cannot speak to me, who will not see me. I watch them sleep sometimes, hovering above their stretched-out forms, watching as they breathe through their mouths and choke on invisible spiders. It would be nice to sleep, to relax and forget. The little deaths that they are granted are not given to me.

I wonder often about my lot in life, and question why I am not afforded the little pleasures that others enjoy without notice. I have never felt the touch of another; I have never gazed into the eyes of a pretty person, nor have I felt an embrace. My words disappear as soon as they are spoken; my thoughts float away on the breeze, lost on the winds that spawned me. In the countless years I have spent contemplating my nature, I have concluded that I am either a sacrifice given so that others might live, or I am the future stuck in the now, a prophesy given sentience.

The living drift closer to my sphere every day. They have given up on each other; they walk alone, enshrouded in their personal cones of silence. It used to be that I fed off of their conversations, but I now I must lean over their shoulders, staring into their flickering screens, feebly attempting to obtain some nourishment from their solipsistic concerns. Perhaps they will amuse themselves to death, and they will join me as elemental spirits, and we will all walk, severed from each other, picking through the garbage of the past, as we search for some trace of former identity, some god that will tell us, finally, how to live.

Video Game Review: Quake: Dawn of the Machine

 

Dawn of the Machine is an official Quake expansion released by Machine Games to celebrate the thirtieth (!) anniversary of the classic shooter. It is, quite frankly, an amazing experience. Utilizing the tech that Nightdive Studios developed to remaster the original game, Dawn of the Machine features architecture that would not have been possible to design in 1996, lest your humble Pentium and 3dfx Voodoo explode. Tying together the three main thematic designs of the original game (Lovecraftian horror; dark fantasy; sci-fi shooter) while greatly expanding the scope of the levels. this is simply the best Quake has to offer. It's hard, too, people, in the way that classic shooters are hard. This expansions throws Shamblers at you like crazy, and you'll often have to manage your ammo to some degree since you'll face much bigger mobs than you did in the original episodes. But the eye candy on display just triggers my nostalgia so hard. Games don't necessarily need cutting-edge graphics when the level designers are so good at creating ambiance with basic dynamic lighting, which is added and heavily featured. Just check out some of these screenshots below. If you have any interest in classic shooters, download the remastered version of Quake (which is free for those who have purchased it in the past) and boot up Dawn of the Machine.

 

   

Video Game Reviews: Devil May Cry 5; Halo Campaign Evolved; Doom Revelations DLC

Devil May Cry 5: I've never played a Devil May Cry game, so I had little idea what was going on with the story in Devil May Cry 5. It didn't really matter, though, because this is an incredibly deep third-person beat 'em up that I never quite mastered yet thoroughly enjoyed. Switching between Nero, V, and Dante for various missions gives perhaps a little too much variety, but oh well. Nero has his chain sword, a giant revolver, and various mechanical arms that give him weapons like a rocket launcher or a whip. V relies on demon summons, and Dante has about a million different weapons and stances. It's a challenge to keep those combos going, especially with the bosses, and I never really gelled with the control scheme or the game's general feel. This is a game that's fun and that I wanted to get good at, but my lack of familiarity with the genre and the depth required for tripe S rankings defeated any intentions I had. Anyway, Devil May Cry 5 is still accessible to newcomers and worth playing even if you don't master it, and it's often available for under 10 bucks on Steam, so check it out if you're in the mood for a beat 'em up. Also, the Netflix series is pretty good.

Halo Campaign Evolved: Has any company mishandled a franchise as bad as Microsoft has mishandled Halo? After the initial positive reception of Halo Infinite degraded into negative territory due to 343 Industries inability to manage the live-service portion of the game, Microsoft reset things again, renaming the studio to Halo Studios and switching to the Unreal Engine, which powers this remaster. This is a game that's been remastered at least twice, once with the Anniversary Edition facelift and second with the original game's integration into the excellent Master Chief Collection. We probably didn't need a third remaster, even if Campaign Evolved is much more faithful to the look of the original game than the Anniversary Edition was. Coupled with a wasted console generation that's squandered years chasing the impossible dream of a profitable Game Pass, and Microsoft's recent layoffs that decimated talented studios like id Software, it's easy to see how the general mood around Campaign Evolved deteriorated, despite the fact that the game is great. I had a hell of a lot of fun exploring the ring and battling the Covenant. Although I'm generally not much of a fan of the Unreal Engine, it's put to good use here, with its ray-traced lighting and nanite texture technology. At a certain point in the game, the formerly barren Forerunner structures become overgrown with the Flood's disgusting organic matter, and it's suitably atmospheric. The Library is much improved from its original maze-like incarnation, and enemies show behaviors from other Halos, like the suicidal grunt grenade rush or Elites who'll kick you off your Ghost if they get too close. However, on Heroic, it's pretty tough, due less to the enemy AI, which I felt was worse than in the original game, and more to the sheer number of Covenant and Flood who'll rush you, sometimes endlessly. There are certainly some choke points that could use more balancing. It was also a huge missed opportunity to not include multiplayer other than online co-op. And why, Microsoft, do I have to log into my Microsoft account every fucking time I play a single-player game? I'm sure there are tons of people who didn't buy it just because of the forced log-in aspect. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I love Halo, and Campaign Evolved is a great single-player first person shooter, but Microsoft just can't return the franchise to its former glory, mostly because it's an AI-obsessed tech company unconcerned with making art or even just pleasing its customers.

Doom: Dark Ages Revelations DLC: You know a developer that's at the top of their game and who has released banger after banger for the past ten years? That's right, id Software, who were just rewarded for their excellence by having half of their studio laid off as Microsoft "restructures" X Box. Man, those fuckers. Revelations is basically the swan song of the last ten years of Doom, and at least id goes out with a bang. After the events of the previous game, the Doom Slayer gets his ass handed to him and is banished to hell, where he must undergo trials to get his chance to escape. At least, I guess that's what the story is saying; who gives a shit about the story in a Doom game? Let me rip and tear! Revelations adds the Spear, which is probably the coolest weapon and tool in the entire series. Functioning as a grapple hook, parry method, and weapon, you can switch between the Spear and the Shield, but you'll find that the Spear is where it's at: Revelations is much harder than the base game, and you'll need to be flying around those arenas if you want to survive. If you thought Dark Ages was too easy compared to Eternal, than you'll love Revelations. It's brutal on Ultra-Violence, and big fights take some strategy and planning to survive. I'm really digging it even as it beats my ass. Definitely give it a shot.  

New Music: I'm Angry At You

 

A buddy of mine lent me his Fooly Cooly DVDs, and I finally got around to watching them, only to get in a heated argument with my son over how to spell a word. Thus, this song was born, its chord progression inspired by the menu music of Fooly Cooly, which I'm assuming was done by the Pillows, a favorite group of mine and perhaps the reason I made it through two episodes of Fooly Cooly, which is just a little too out there for me.