Recently rewatched Tombstone (1993) because I found out my husband had never seen it. Val Kilmer as Doc Holliday is absolutely brilliant and heartbreaking. He should’ve had an Oscar.
“I’m your huckleberry” is a classic line. It appeared, along with many other references to movie and TV Westerns, in the WESTWARD video games. I spent many happy hours playing those games back in the 2000s.
~ J.L. Hilton
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Today I played DEATH AND TAXES, a 2020 indie game similar to Papers Please, where players take on the role of the Grim Reaper in a bureaucratic afterlife.
DEATH AND TAXES has a branching narrative with loads of dialog options and multiple endings. Gameplay revolves around choosing who lives and who dies from the files that appear on your desk, and then having conversations with your boss Fate. Player choices determine whether you save the world or condemn it to damnation.
Developed and published by Placeholder Gameworks, a small Estonia-based Indie game company. I played the free Steam demo for Windows PC, but the game is also available for Mac, Linux and Switch.
UPDATE: I bought and played the full game with my husband over the course of the following week after posting this. Unique story, several hours of entertainment, very replayable. It’s not really a two-player game, but we had a good time discussing and making the moral choices together.
After the heartbreaking cancellation of FIREFLY (2002) and the release of its companion movie SERENITY (2005), I spent many years making jewelry for cosplayers and fans known as Browncoats.
Bracelet inspired by Saffron’s in the Firefly episode “Trash”
I founded the annual Raleigh Can’t Stop the Serenity charity event in 2006 and was either coordinator, emcee, committee member, local sponsor or global supporter, until covid-19 put the kibash on large gatherings in 2020.
I also donated so many pieces of jewelry to fundraisers and raffles locally and around the world, I’ve lost count.
When I sold or donated Firefly-inspired pieces, I would rubber stamp the boxes or tags with planetary “postmarks,” as if the item had passed through several hands before finally reaching its destination on the edge of the ‘Verse.
I also purchased a Chinese coin stamp at a craft store, had a stamp made with the pinyin characters for “serenity,” and I created an “Alliance inspector 28” stamp using a template on the manufacturer’s website. You can see all of those in the photos.
These are all of the graphics I created, which I used when I ordered the custom made rubber stamps. Free use is granted for personal projects (things you aren’t going to sell). For any commercial use, please contact me.
~ J.L. Hilton
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APICO is a casual-sim game about collecting, breeding and maintaining bees. It features farm building, crafting and resource gathering, similar to Terraria or Stardew Valley, but there are no enemies to fight and even the bees won’t sting you!
Beekeeping is one of my favorite things in Stardew Valley, and APICO takes that to new levels. Build different types of hives. Gather honey, wax and other bee products. Plant flowers that give the bees different boosts. Crossbreed bees for new species. Build and paint structures. Collect and read magazines. Rehabilitate dwindling bee populations.
Interactions with other island inhabitants are limited in the free demo, but I suspect the full game will include more characters and more story development, and possibly a way to build boats and leave the island to visit other locations.
A release date for the full game is TBA other than sometime in 2022.
APICO is being developed by TNgineers, a team of two brothers who were inspired by their love of old Minecraft mods, casual, and crafting games. The publisher is Whitethorn Games, who also published Teacup, Calico, and my favorite of 2021 Wytchwood.
TNgineers hopes to promote bee conservation and will be donating a portion of APICO sales towards national and international beekeeping charities, according to their website.
At times it is difficult to see the value of my work as an author, artist and content creator. With the world so full of cruelty, ignorance, injustice and pain, the thought of writing a story, making jewelry or livestreaming a video game feels self-centered and indulgent.
I occasionally receive comments on my YouTube channel asking why I bother to make videos when I have so few views or subscribers. These comments echo the voice inside of my head that asks, “What’s the point of it all?”
This spectre of melancholy nihilism judges creativity to be a kind of privileged hubris, pursued by a lucky few who have time to build sand castles while storms rage and tides lash unrelenting upon the beaches of our lives.
But there’s a bible verse that says, “Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms” (1 Peter 4:10). And while I’m not one for seeking solace in organized religion, I do believe there’s a valuable lesson in this passage.
Whichever gods you may or may not believe in, we all have gifts, and by the grace of human evolution or the Creator, or both, we have those gifts for the purpose of helping each other.
For many years, I had panic attacks, anxiety disorder, insomnia, and health issues. In the midst of sadness, despair and pain, I realized how very, very much it meant to me when someone made me smile, or when something gave me a reason to get up in the morning and get through the day.
I am so grateful to others who embraced their gifts and shared them with me. One laugh is a treasure worth more than jewels to someone who feels no cheer. A glimmer of hope is as precious as gold to someone hopeless.
My gifts do not bring me riches or fame but they are valuable if they can bring a smile to someone’s face, if they can help someone see a little bit of light in the dark or feel a little less sad and lonely. Those gifts are true magic and I shouldn’t doubt them.
This year, I want to believe in the value of happiness. I want to thank the people whose gifts make my life worth living, and remember that I, too, have a responsibility to share the gifts with which I’ve been blessed.
~ J.L. Hilton
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