10 Exciting Book Releases in 2019

Happy 2nd week of 2019, my friends! Sorry that this post is a little later than I intended it to be; I've had this same cold since before Christmas and its been kicking my butt XP But I was finally able to finish researching and ranking books being released in 2019 that I am the most excited for, and I can't wait to share my top 10 list with all of you 😊

#1: I Love You So Mochi by Sarah Kuhn!
Pub Date: 28/05/19. Genre: YA Fiction

Any book taking place - fully or in-part - in modern-day Japan will always rank high on my TBR list 💝 If the title alone didn't already sell me (I'll be honest, I love the title, it's both punny and adorable!), then the premise certainly did: Kimi Nakamura loves designing clothes for her and her friends, but her mother is upset that Kimi is spending her time on "distractions" instead of working on her fine arts portfolio for college. She gets the chance to escape from her life and her mother's expectations when her grandparents invite her to stay with them in Kyoto for Spring Break. And the guy that she meets in Japan and ultimately falls for is a med student who works as a mascot who wears a mochi costume 😆 What's not to love?

#2: Normal People by Sally Rooney!

Pub Date: 16/04/19. Genre: Adult Fiction/New Adult Fiction

I already reeeeeeally wish that this book was out now, because I'm really anxious to read it! I immediately fell in love with the title, but I really liked the idea about a book surrounding two people that are polar opposites, both regarding their personalities and their in-school popularity, but who are friends behind the scenes that reunite a year later when they're both away at a college in Dublin, where their social statuses are reversed from where they were in high school.

MewnBase - From The Gaming Enthusiast

It's strange that with all the time I spent playing video games in 2018, it's been longer than a hot minute since I've written any video game-centric posts. Luckily I've been kicking off this next year of video games right with this early-access title that is enjoyable, easy to play, and incredibly adorable. Ladies and iggles, may I introduce to you, MewnBase!

I came across this game while browsing on the Steam store recently, looking for games that were still fairly-priced despite the Winter Steam Sale being over. This game has been in development since 2016 and has recently become available on Steam Early Access, whereas it was originally available exclusively on Itch.io. It's being developed by a single developer named Steve Ford, aka Cairn4. He's also the solo developer on the game Pombie Zong and has worked on other titles such as Glitch's Trip and Zombie Scrapper.

So, back to the awesomeness that is MewnBase: It's described by Cairn4 as "A Space-Cat Survival and Base-Building Game" and it fits right into my wheelhouse of favourite games; simulation, crafting, base-building, indie, resource collecting & management, casual gameplay, and also there's the obvious adorbs factor 😸💕

These pictures are from an earlier stage in this game's development; the graphics are still the same, aka equally adorable, but the UI has been updated to be more functional and easier to read & understand at a glance

The game has a great tutorial to teach players about the basic controls and mechanics of the game, although I did find there was a small period of time between the end of the tutorial and when I figured out exactly what I was supposed to do in order to progress with the game's technology tree. So while I feel the tutorial could possibly be a bit longer, perhaps lasting up until the moment that a player finishes analysing their first artifact, which earns technology points, but otherwise this game is very easy to grasp even for the most casual of players.

There isn't currently much in the way of a story arc for this game, but quite frankly at this point it doesn't need one in order to enjoy the game; you play as a space-cat who works to survive on a deserted planet by building a base that will provide your space suit with power and oxygen, you collect resources out in the world while finding and analysing various artifacts (which turn out to be super-cute cat-related items) which gives you tech points, which give the player access to other buildings that improve your base as well as other areas of gameplay.

Aside from the tutorial (which you can continue playing for up to a total of 15 in-game days), there are two play-modes available at this time - a basic mission mode which require you to survive on the planet for a set number of days, which increases each time you complete a mission, as well as an endless mode where you can take your time and work on unlocking every node on the technology tree.

10 Exciting TV & Anime Releases in 2019

Happy New Year, Folks!

Typically I would try to make my 1st post of the year have something to do with my goals and resolutions for the coming year, or at least the coming month, but I've decided to instead jump-start a new series of posts that I'm calling Listers Gotta List. This series won't be scheduled for a certain day each week, and will instead pop up whenever the opportunity arises. For my first series of list-style posts, I'm going to be focusing on some new releases due in 2019 that I'm anticipating the most. It's been far too long since I've had the chance to gush about some of my favourite fandoms, and I can't remember the last time I was able to discuss upcoming fandoms that I'm sure I'll be on the band wagon for.

This first post will be focusing on TV shows and anime that will be gracing us this year. I'd like to note here that I am also including pre-existing shows that are releasing a new season this year, not just TV or anime premiers. This list was really fun to make, and I'm actually surprised just how many animes made it onto the list! Suppose I have A Geeky Gal and her 30 Days of Anime challenge to thank for that  Without further ado, let's get into the list!

#1: All-New Fruits Basket Anime!!!!!!!!
Can you tell just how excited I am for this?! 😍

I was first alerted to the fact that the original company behind the first Fruits Basket anime, Funimation, was doing a new anime series more closely based on the manga series by one of my BFF's Melissa, who posted an article about it onto my FB page. A couple months later, she sent me a link to this video on Twitter, and I basically screamed with delight - yep, out loud and everything, my boyfriend gave me quite the strange look 😅

Fruits Basket was one of the first manga series that I ever became invested in. A friend of mine from grade school had first told me about it, and on my first day of high school when I didn't feel like venturing into the cafeteria for lunch I decided to check out the library, and right across from the entrance was the manga section! I picked up the first volume of Fruits Basket, finished it over lunch, and then proceeded to check out volumes 2-4 from the library (I was only allowed to take out 3 books at a time), and that evening after school I ended up watching the majority of the English dub anime on YouTube.

The creation of this new anime series is basically all I could ever want in life. Sure, I always treasured the original anime series, but it was only 13 episodes long and basically only covered volumes 1-6 of the manga, with a few episodes taken from chapters in the 7th and 8th volumes. There was so much more happening in the manga, and I continued to hope that one day we might get a second season or some form of continuation of the story on the silver screen. Of course, with the way they changed details about Akito in the original anime, it would have been impossible to follow the manga series exactly.

But they'll be re-doing the entire anime from scratch, with an even better quality of animation than what was available when the original was produced, and it is a dream come true for me. I sincerely hope that once the English dub gets made that they'll try and cast as many of the original voice actors as possible (Tohro Honda's voice is just so perfect in my mind), or at least find voice actors that come as close to the original as possible.

#2: Game of Thrones Final Season!

Yes yes yes, it's finally happening!!! The fans have waited a long time for the conclusion to our favourite high-fantasy HBO series, and the 8th and final season will be airing sometime in April 2019 if I'm not mistaken. I couldn't resist using this image of the remaining Stark children smiling together and looking like a happy family - since it will probably be the only example of smiling or happiness we'll see from them once the show starts 😂 (Minor spoilers below, for those who haven't seen the 7th season of GoT, or who haven't watched any of the show at all and don't want even the tiniest spoilers)

Of course I love the action and adventure and excitement that every Game of Thrones episode has to offer, but if I had to pick 1 single thing that I am the most excited about, it would have to be the hopes of seeing a happy, smile-filled reunion when John returns to Winterfel and sees Arya and Bran alive and well. Arya and John were very close before John left for The Wall, and I really hope that we'll get to see some of that in the final season, even if it's only for a brief moment. I know that one of my favourite moments last season was when Sansa made it to The Wall and John ran right over to hug his half-sister 💓 I really love the family feels in this show! And yes, believe it or not, I am more excited about potentially getting that reunion scene than I am to see what the future holds for John and Dani, which I'm sure will surprise all of you.