Petz Vet on GBA

I remember having one of those "___-in-one" collection of Game Boy Advance when I was younger, which were almost always bootleg cartridges. One of those had a really cute, simulation, veterinarian game, Petz Vet. Now, I happened to replay the game for nostalgia's sake.

The game itself is pretty long. It runs for two years in game time. It has plenty of mini-games, some presented to you before you progress. You play a female character studying to become a vet at New Yorkie Animal Hospital. There are plenty of characters to interact with, some you could even romance. The game also has elements from the visual-novel genre, with dialogue and action choices affecting your stats and romance progression. The story is a typical slice-of-life. I think that it could actually translate well into a 2-cour anime. It even felt that it went way longer than it needed to be. But like any good anime, you forgive its downtimes and feel sad when the journey's over.

Fun fact about the game: it's actually a sequel to a GBA game that never released outside of Japan. There seems to be more follow-ups too, although I haven't played them. 

Quick book reviews: The Courate to be Disliked, its follow-up, and some others

The Courage to Be Disliked: How to Free Yourself, Change your Life and Achieve Real Happiness and The Courage to Be Happy: Discover the Power of Positive Psychology and Choose Happiness Every Day are two of my favorite books. While it's been some time since I read these, I can still feel their impact. These came at a right time in my life. In the first book, there was emphasis on the feelings of inferiority and interpersonal relationships, stemming from Adlerian psychology and many influences. The second book delves deeper to explain the cliché, “Love yourself.” The messages of both books were delivered using the socratic method, where an old man and a young man are arguing about their perspectives. This, obviously, was influenced by Socrates. In turn, both books have concepts not far from Stoicism, which had similar influences. These two books changed my perspective -- my mind is the sole factor for how I feel. I shouldn't think of a hierarchy among myself and the people I interact with. The books say it well: we are all the same but different. (If I remember these books correctly. If I'm wrong, I'll correct myself.)

 

Speaking of Stoicism... The Courage books led me to buy and read Marcus Aurelius' Meditations, which was also a great experience. Some of his writings I don't fully understand, but the philosopher king's words are profound years later.  The mind is the ruler of the soul. Some passages of Meditations are mentioned in The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living with Ryan's (the author) interpretation. Although simplified, I think The Daily Stoic is a good enough supplement to Meditations.

I think that a similar concept to keeping a rational mind is present in The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure, another good read. In its first chapters, it quoted the old adage, “Prepare the child for the road, not the road for the child.” This, at least to me, meant that, again, having a strong, rational mind is good.

 

Conveni Dream on the 3DS -- good for an afternoon

Conveni Dream on the 3DS is a simulation management game where the player handles a convenience store. I've played plenty of similar games, mostly by Kairosoft, so I was excited to try this one. The game gives you a small store at the start. The player gets to hire 3 people to handle the cashier, cleaning, and stocking. On the side of merchandises, there are plenty to sell, targeting different demographics. At the start, wisely choosing stock to maximize sales was fun.

The game opens up to the player as they progress. The store can be expanded, have more shelves, refrigerators, displays, events, and more clerks. While all that is going on, the game has quests! Among these, some are related to the length of your playthrough, the number of items you sell, and the amount of money you have. The game also has disruptive customers, those who are complaining and those who are drunk.

The gameplay loop of Conveni Dream is simple. You put items for sale, customers buy them, and you profit. You use the money to expand the store and its merchandise selection, you attract more customers, and more profit comes in. This simple gameplay is also the game's fault. The game fails to keep you involved after you acquire good staff and a steady profit, leaving you a quasi-idle game. Still, the game's fun enough to play on a rainy afternoon. 

Persevere to succeed? Hmm, let me think about that.

It's been a couple of years since I read Angela Duckworth's Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. One of my takeaways from the book was that grit was every thing needed to be successful. Honestly, the book hadn't impacted as I initially expected it, but her concept of grit had stayed in my mind.

A few months back, I read another book, Hear's the Thing: Lessons on Listening, Life, and Love by Alan Cody. While it did not specifically mention grit, it did have similar concepts of passion and perseverance. If I recall correctly, Alan had a passion for country music, and he made himself the success story he is today from the ground-up. Another book, 48 Days to the Work and Life You Love: Find It -- Or Create It, has similar concepts lightly discussed. It explained that some people lacked contentment in their work because their work did not align with their vocation. (Again, that is if I recalled it correctly.) Vocation, as the book described it, I interpreted as something very similar to passion.

Those were good books, and the self-help business contribute good to society, I like to believe. Although they reach a wide audience worldwide, their applicability still depends on the user. I don't think I wasted my time reading them, but I wonder about their use case. At this point, I'd like to point out that the latter two books don't specifically sell the idea of grit, passion, or perseverance.

Does your passion have to be your job? Recently, I have received advice, as well as read online, that a job is just a job. People talk about jobs as if they go to work as soulless robots with the aim to make big money. That mindset works for them. But does it work for me? This is where I agree with 48 Days. Doing work that you dislike is taxing. I've already done that. On the other hand, why would I need to make my passion into my career? And why do I get the message from literature and social media that I'm a failure if I wouldn't? (That last sentence was hyperbole; the range of opinions and literature is sure to be wider than Earth.)

To answer my first question, I need to ask another question. What is success? If I hinge my answer on my personal philosophy, then I say that success is when I become a rational being, contributing to society by performing my role. So, I don't need to have my passion as my job, work, or career. 

I won't discredit the work of the authors. I can definitely apply the concepts they wrote. Yet, a warning: a probable misinterpretation one could read from self-help books is that there are no other definitions of success. We could also end up with the same conclusion from social media, where people curate their stories and the algorithm highlights only the traffic-generating posts. There's a lot more to the nuances of success, self-help business, and social media, but these are just my thoughts.

My next question: How big of a factor of success is perseverance? Common sense tells me that continued effort would contribute to overall progress at least. But intuition says that there are more factors than I can think of now. A certain author, whose name I cannot recall, appeared on the podcast, Something You Should Know. As she described, she had started multiple projects, including businesses, though she only finished a fraction of them. Another guest on the same podcast wrote another book on giving up and its benefits. On one side, perseverance is a key to success. On the other is a question: do I need that success? (Admittedly, I might not be representing the authors and their ideas well. In this case, I recommend you read them yourself.)

What's the big takeaway? Speaking solely about myself, I require a great understanding of my own circumstances and have my own definition of success. Whatever I decide to do, there is a plethora of methods from either side to carve my own. After all, if I keep my rational mind, don't I already win?

 

Replaying Final Fantasy V Advance

5 has to be my lucky number. Like in the Dragon Quest series, the fifth main entry in Final Fantasy is one of my favorites. The story is simple and characters well-rounded. Truthfully, the game does not extend much beyond its initial characterization, but it will still make you feel something during the end credits. Where the game truly excels is its job system, permitting its characters to very customizable builds. By the end of my most recent play through the game, I set Bartz as a magic attacker, Lenna as a support, Krile as a utility (spellblade user), and Faris to maximize physical attack damage per turn with dual wield and rapid fire. Even if I didn't maximize the stats for DPT, the game was still very much enjoyable, albeit grindy.

Short Dragon Quests reviews on the Nintendo DS

Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen

Chapters of the Chosen was the shortest of the DS Dragon Quest games. True to its name, the game's chapters, except the finale, followed different playable characters. One of the game's strengths was its variety of playable characters, making way for many play styles. I went with Hero, Kyril, Maya, and Ragnar as my main party, although I rotated through the benched characters too. After the exposition chapters, the game has a fast pace to the finish line with one of the series' best boss battle. 

Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride

The fifth Dragon Quest game is one of the best video games I played. The story is an epic in three acts, telling the life of the protagonist from childhood to adulthood. The quality of writing and characters is consistent from beginning to end, as is the music. The gameplay can also be seen as a reflection of the narrative. During Hero's childhood, Pankraz, Hero's father, was a prominent party member, doing most of the work. In the second act, there was an emphasis on having monster party members, mirroring the solitude of Hero's journey. And in the third act, Hero was joined by family, friends, and unlikely allies. For the story's sake, I had the whole family fight the final boss fight. Contrary to the melancholic ending of IV, V had a more definitely happy ending. I could still say plenty of positive things about Dragon Quest V, and the game deserves its sustained acclaimed through the years.

Dragon Quest VI: Realms of Revelation

While it seemed that Dragon Quest VI placed its story at a lower priority, the vocation system made this entry shine with as much luster as the preceding ones. I consider my experience with VI as a complete opposite of that of IV. Where I found myself initially bored but completely engaged by the end of IV, the initial hook and wonder of VI were eventually lost when the game opened up. The premise of having two worlds was intriguing, but the linear structure of the story progression erased all of my interest. (I feel Dragon Quest VII avoids this by showing less ambition than Dragon Quests IV and VI in its story premise.)

Overall, among the Zenithian trilogy entries, I'd recommend V the strongest, followed by IV. 

Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies

Dragon Quest IX follows the typical Dragon Quest story template, with emphasis on short, episodic story arcs similar to Dragon Quest VII. With just one main playable character relevant to the story, Hero gets to have a more engaging character arc. Near the end of the story, Hero reverts to a regular human to fight against his superior (which I think is a good symbol to portray how different this entry is compared to its predecessors). I'd say I had a greater time with IX than IV or VI.

Until Death Do Us Part

I think Until Death Do Us Part is one of the more unique seinen manga I've read. The story revolves around a girl with a precognitive ability and a blind swordsman. The focus of the story on fights and the yakuza definitely made the read more interesting than its premise.