Thirty One – Zesix

There is a meme going around on social media (on my feed, anyway) about devoting a year of your life to “disappear” and work on things solely for yourself. While that was not my intention at the start of this year, it is inevitably what I did.

I don’t feel comfortable discussing the specifics of the skills I started learning this year, but I want to acknowledge the beginning of my thirties is when I started them. None of them are illegal, but they are life-changing in a multitude of ways and I would prefer only those close to me to know.

Figure Skating

Not the cleanest, but I did land my first single salchow this year.

I didn’t skate much in 2023, although I did keep up with ballet, working out with a personal trainer, and off-ice lessons. Most of my free time went into studying and practicing the new skills. Since it often takes more than a year to become proficient at something, it is unlikely I will seriously return to figure skating next year other than the occasional skate.

The other main reason I skated less is because I started having lower back problems. I also might have developed a herniated disc in my spine. The best alleviation I have found for these so far are daily exercises and sleeping with my feet propped up on a pillow. However, I suspect these issues are actually caused by my mattress. I sleep on a Signature Sleep Memory Foam mattress (medium-firm), and I believe it may not be providing enough support for my hips, causing them to sink. This is probably why I wake up with a tight lower back. I have done research online and as of the time of writing, I have ordered a Sleep on Latex Mattress Topper (firm) and will report next year with the results.

Digital Creations

Similar to last year, I only have two projects in development. One is my primary focus while the other is only slowly being worked on as a pipe dream. I mentioned last year that I would announce the primary game’s name this year, but the project has been progressing slowly and is not ready yet.

Unnamed Warships Deckbuilding Roguelike

My team spent most of this year working on fine-tuning the animations and art direction in a separate project while developing the mechanics in the actual game project using placeholder assets. Here are some highlights:

Zems

My primary focus this year has been the warships deckbuilder above. However, the team I hired to revamp the UI / UX for Zems has still been at work this year. The main change is that we’ve moved from Photoshop to Figma, and I even took an online course on Figma personally since it has now become the modern standard for UI / UX / Wireframing.

The three work items I mentioned last year still stand.

Magic: the Gathering

I only finished one new deck this year, though it is my favorite one yet: Hofri Ghostforge Aristocrats Reanimator.

I also worked on two other deck ideas this year (Vadrok Spellslinger and Rakdos Creature Storm), but ultimately discarded them:

Vadrok, Apex of Thunder either wins out of nowhere or doesn’t play the game. Polarizing decks are not fun.
Rakdos, Lord of Riots had inconsistency issues and I did not want to run too many tutors.

I have started another deck that shows promise (Mishra, Eminent One), but I have not finished the testing process yet. A fan also recently asked me to update and make videos for my Sefris Dungeons Midrange Reanimator list, so that is one of my goals next year too.

Health & Fitness

My outside-the-rink workouts are still the same as last year and the year before. I still do the following each week:

Ballet private lesson
Work out with a personal trainer
Off-ice conditioning with a skating coach
Dance lessons with my girlfriend (we started with East Coast Swing but now include Rumba and Waltz)

I still sleep on the same pillow and cook my meals using the cast-iron skillet. My girlfriend enjoys eating out, so this year we also tried a number of new restaurants in Austin. My favorite “new discovery” this year is Tokyo Sushi and Ramen.

I am still convinced the massage gun is one of the greatest modern creations. My Ekrin B37S still holds a full charge after two years.

Entertainment Favorites

Show

We watched one show this year (Battlestar Galactica) and we didn’t finish it due to the writing of season 4, so I have no favorite this time.

Movie

I watched 38 new movies this year:

I normally don’t choose the first movie in a two-part series, but this movie stands well enough on its own to be my favorite this year:

If you’ve read my blog before, you likely know the first movie was my top choice 4 years ago. This in-between movie deserves equal praise, especially considering good sequels are difficult to produce. Thankfully, Sony is keeping most of the original production team together for this series, so I expect good reception for the next movie as well.

Book

I read 11 books this year, but I will not list them publicly since many of them relate to skills I want to keep private.

My favorite book each year is the one that influenced me the most. This year I have chosen Factfulness. Similar to Thinking, Fast & Slow, which is the best book I have ever read on thinking and mental models, Factfulness challenges us to rethink the ways we view the world in order to have a more data-backed understanding when most of social media seems to focus on emphasizing statistical outliers.

Song

Czechia’s Eurovision 2023 entry, performed by Vesna, blew me away when I first heard it. Featuring four languages throughout the song, it is about promoting peace among European nations.

Video Game

I played 12 new video games this year:

It was tough for me to choose between Red Dead Redemption 2 and Wasteland 3, but ultimately I decided the best game for me this year was indeed Wasteland 3:

Similar to board games, I’m a fan of video games that allow me to try new ideas and builds. Whenever I find myself doing research or thinking about a game outside of play, that is a sign to me of a great depth. I like deep games the most, so even though Red Dead Redemption 2 did make me cry, it did not make me think deeply about my decisions in the way Wasteland 3 did.

Other honorable mentions are Ori and the Will of the Wisps for sheer production value (though I still believe the first game was superior) and Roguebook for also having build depth and replayability.

Board Game

I played 26 new board games this year:

Mind MGMT
Dune Imperium: Immortality (expansion)
Crossing Fates
Kinghill
The Princess Bride Adventure Book Game
Mare Nostrum: Empires
Moonrakers
Tyrants of the Underdark
The Scepter of Zavandor
Can’t Stop
Cat in the Box
Creature Comforts
Nemesis
Dune
Gravwell
Tortuga
Space Base: The Mysteries of Terra Proxima (expansion)
Nemesis: Lockdown
Lords of Ragnarok
Whitechapel 1888
Fangs
Twilight Imperium 4th Edition
Waking Shards
Kemet: Seth (expansion)
Hollywood 1947
Hive Pocket

The best new board game I played this year is Twilight Imperium 4th Edition (TI4):

Board games that leave me thinking of possible new strategies and factions I want to play are the kind I like most. Unfortunately, I did not play TI4 with the right playgroup – they later decided they want to play mainly 4-player games of TI4, whereas the game is best with 6. Usually when this happens, it means the playgroup is not the right target audience for the game. Still, TI4 is the game that has persisted in my mind the longest after my first two plays, and I hope to find a better playgroup (or just play online) next year.

In the difficult-to-find “good 2-player games” realm, my girlfriend and I especially enjoy Kinghill:

Lastly, I want to mention Crossing Fates, a game by a relatively unknown designer in China. While I would not classify the game as great, it does have the most innovative new mechanic that I experienced this year:

Crossing Fates is a deckbuilder where you can play cards on top of each other (in addition to next to each other) to create combos.

Travel

We traveled to three main places this year: Laguna Woods (California), Albuquerque (New Mexico), and Houston (Texas). The Houston trip was for a Khalid / Ed Sheeran concert at NRG stadium, and the Albuquerque trip was a last-minute “see the grandparents” before Christmas, so I will only showcase Laguna Woods here.

I didn’t grow up near a beach, so “going to the beach” is not something I feel a lot of excitement for. However, Laguna Beach is the best beach I’ve visited so far.

We also visited Soka University, which has a beautiful campus:

Quarter-Life Revelations

“The things I once imagined would be my greatest achievements were only the first steps toward a future I can only begin to fathom.”
—Jace Beleren

In each year of this blog, I’ve talked about the changes I have made to my lifestyle. As a result, my posts have also generally gotten longer over time. This is the first year where some sections are intentionally reduced or outright missing.

I majored in sociology from the university (Berkeley) that was ranked #1 in the world at the time for the field. Did I major in the most useless field, or the most eye-opening?

The values upheld by a society are those that, like a living organism, allow it to thrive and continue to exist. These values are perpetuated by families, communities, religions, and institutions that comprise the structure of the society. The older I get, the more I realize everything I was told to aspire to (like being good at school or at my job) has funneled me in the direction of being a more efficient cog in the machine of a capitalist society. Considering how many “successful” people in my generation have depression, I am convinced that achieving a success you only think you believe in makes you hollow.

This is the first year where I experienced things that are “too good to be true” happen repeatedly in my life. I am intentionally being vague here. If I am able to scale things up next year or in the next few years, maybe I can finally break out of this contraption I find myself in.