My thoughts on No Man's Sky

I got a PS4 last night and I love it. It's great. It's so much better than my Xbox One and has amazing games. If I had to rank the 3 current machines I would rank them PS4, Wii U and then the X Box. I've had a lot of fun with my X Box but the PS4 is just so simple and fun to use and they have some great games. I've been playing No Man's Sky this past week whenever I can find five minutes to myself. A lot of people are complaining about this game online and saying that it was a big disappointment. I've had some mixed thoughts about it but have decided that I like it. But it is not for everyone. It all depends on what you like in your games.

A lot of people say it hasn't got content. I disagree. It does. You just have to find it. What I find unique about this game is that it hasn't got a plot or a character. You could be a man, a woman, black, white, whatever you want. You're just a person with a back pack and a ship. And I think that's great. At first I wasn't that sure about the lack of plot but I've realized since then it IS there is will just reveal itself to me slowly as I unlock more of the game. And that intrigues me. I've just unlocked a space cannon and I'm about to get my hyper drive and I'm psyched.

I've been playing Xenoblade Chronicles X on the Wii U for months now and it's the polar opposite of No Man's Sky. It is about 100% more detailed. The world of Mira is astonishing. It's the biggest world I've ever played in. It's beautiful and creative and insane. I have spent hours exploring it and then there are all the different animals and monsters and things to collect and stuff to do. I've put in over 120 hours in this game and I still have not finished. XCX is frustrating and addictive as hell but it's also too difficult. Part of the thing that has kept me going back to it has been the determination to figure out WHAT THE HELL I AM SUPPOSED TO BE DOING. The more I figured out how the game worked the more I wanted to play more because it got a little bit easier...until I upped a level and it got hard again. But sometimes that difficulty frustrated me. I want to play and achieve goals every single time. It's incredibly maddening to instead lose my skell and then have to spend the new few tries scraping together more money to get another one.

What I like about No Man's Sky is that it is a lot simpler and easier to achieve little goals. I don't find myself grunting in frustration and wanting to storm out of the room like I do with XCX. Part of the fun for No Man's Sky for me is the quiet exploring of the worlds and finding new things to collect. It's a bit like Animal Crossing in space. There's no skill involved. It's a good way to unwind. Kind of like having a bath. The game might not be as colourful or inventive as XCX but it does what it does well. It can be fun to play difficult and frustrating games because when you pass that level you were stuck on for so long you want to jump up and punch the air in celebration. But it can also be fun to play a game that is so simple you can just sit down and heave a happy, relaxed sigh and have some fun.

Writing is a lot like dating

I know how the world of publishing works. People are very busy. Editors don't have the time to respond to every single letter and email. I get it. But at the same time...man does it suck sometimes. I feel like I'm in the dating world again. I find myself obsessively checking my email account multiple times a day hoping for an email. And when it doesn't come I feel so dejected. I wonder how long do I have to wait until silence means no. It's so frustrating. You get so tempted to write an email to them and ask "Hey? remember me? did you like that story?" but I refuse to do that because I think it is unprofessional. Sometimes silence means rejection. As a writer you just have to deal with it. You have to be professional. Yes, you wasted all that time writing and researching that article, that's true. But at least it was fun writing it, right? At least you almost got that bite of that apple, right? It doesn't stop it from being frustrating. But I think that writers should act in a certain way. Don't be the writer who writes a snarky reply to a critique. Don't be the writer who argues with an editor. And DON'T be the writer who won't accept when they've been rejected. I wish they could find five minutes to write me a quick letter saying "Not for us, thanks" because at least then I know and can stop wondering and move the hell on. But alas the publishing world doesn't always work that way.

My articles are little depressing

I've been writing some articles about my childhood and I've noticed that they tend to be a little depressing. I don't mean to write such depressing stuff! I'm just writing about my life and experiences and to be honest the years I spent in school were just not good. But that's normal. Being a kid is hard. Kids are assholes and school is hard. It was just double hard for me because I have learning disabilities I had no idea about on top of being bullied. But I think kids today have it a lot more worse than I had it. When I was a kid I always loved coming home because I felt free at home. I could be myself. The bullies could not reach me. I could unwind and relax and try and cheer myself up.

I am so, so glad I did not grow up in the era of social media. I'm not that much of a dinosaur - we did have computers growing up and mobile phones - but this was the late 90s early 00's so it was a lot different to what we have now. If social media had been around I shudder to think what it might have been like for me. I probably would have been trolled online, on facebook and youtube, whatever you name it. And that peace I got when I came home would have evaporated. I would have been miserable all the god damn time.

They say you should "write what you know" and I'm doing that with my articles I am writing about my experiences growing up. I think I have a unique story to tell. I hate that my schooling years were so miserable and I didn't enjoy them much but things DID improve. When I was in high school I met my best friend for life and a few years out of high school I met my husband. I think my experiences in school - both good and bad - helped to shape me into the person I became. I think bullying is total fucking shit but it's not something you can get rid of in schools. People will always be jerks to the weak and the vulnerable. The best thing you can do to help kids is to teach them the best way to cope with bullying and to not let it affect them and to learn the right way to respond.

I think being bullied and socially isolated helped to turn me into a writer. I was lonely and sad so I escaped into writing and reading. I'm grateful for that. When I discovered writing it gave me a much needed confidence boost and gave me something to focus on. I wish the bullying hadn't have happened and that I'd been happier as a kid but I am very happy now. I might have hated school but that doesn't mean my entire childhood was terrible. I had a wonderful loving family and was perfectly happy and content at home. It was only at school I was miserable.

My last semester of university is a little insane

I started university in 2009 and have been studying part time ever since. I am finally in my final semester. I thought I was going to miss studying. It has provided a wonderful distraction for me and given me something to do. But I'm glad I am finishing and am looking forward to putting down my pen and reference book and not writing another essay for a very long time! I want to move on with my life and live my life and try and forge some sort of writing career for myself because right now at this point in my life writing is keeping me happy. I'm so glad I decided to step back from fiction writing and expand into other areas of writing because - holy shit! I've suddenly had SO much success with writing articles and it's just getting better and better. I am building a port folio and getting that wonderful, sweet experience. My goal is to be able to do this full time eventually and to be one of those people who wakes up every day happy to be doing something that gives them joy.

But...this last semester. My god. It's a little...intense. I have two essays to write, a play, a short story, and an exam. Oh and about eight novels to read. I've gotten through one and it was pretty good. I tried to get into two others and it was like having my fingernails pulled off one by one. Why...are some literature books...so badly written? I spent my childhood learning the craft of writing and throwing myself onto the sacrificial alter stone of critique and letting people tear me apart. I learnt how to take criticism with a smile and a nod an curt "Thank you for your time" and I willingly read grammar books in my spare time to learn how to write better.

So it annoys me after I spent so long to learn the rules that some writers take a big steaming crap on the rules and call it art and not only do they get published their books get made into frigging' films as well. I know art is subjective and what someone thinks is crap another person might think is the best thing since sliced bread. But I wonder sometimes what the hell is wrong with agents and publishers? I expect books to follow a predictable formula. I want to know WHO the main character is and WHAT is going on and WHAT the goal of the plot is all within the first few pages. What I don't want to read is pages and pages of incoherent ramblings that read like the crazed manifesto of a drug addict. It's just so exhausting. I wade through pages and pages of crap and try to think "Who the hell is the main character? what is going on? WHAT IS HAPPENING?"

It's fine to be creative and break the rules from time to time. Someone said to me once "Learn the rules, then learn how to break them" and it's true. The "rules" in writing are really suggestions. You can throw them out the window but it's risky as hell and you have to be damn good at what you are doing. Obviously, these books are not for me. It's going to be a long semester.