April 2025 Channel Update – End of an Era

Hi hi,

It’s been a tad longer than usual since the last one – hope you’ve been well!

Over here there’s been ups and downs, but mostly up! I'm back from my March vacation, cleared up some annoying errands like my stupid taxes,* and things at work are a little better now too. Still hectic, but not crazily so!

* I mentioned in an update last year that I had to fill a million forms to get an error on my taxes fixed - I am still dealing with that this year 🫠

TL;DR

• Finished: Baldur’s Gate 3 (omgggggggg)

• Ongoing: Lost Records, Black Mesa, Scarlet Hollow

• Next Up: Some first looks, first!

Finished Stuff

Baldur’s Gate 3: Somehow we went from “I think I’m 60% done” in the last update to being straight up finished! It’s been a fantastic ride. One of the longest on the channel, and one of the greatest as well. Reformed Monk Wellens will rest and retire in the countryside now… 😴

This was my first exposure to CRPGs too. While the gameplay systems and mechanics were overwhelming at times I still found it tons of fun. That probably means I'll be more receptive to CRPGs from this experience too, though I feel like using BG3 with its massive however many hundred million budget as a measuring stick for everything else in the genre might not be quite fair lol.

As first looks, we had:

Wanderstop: A cozy narrative adventure from the new studio founded by Davey Wreden (The Stanley Parable, The Beginner’s Guide). I liked what I saw but the story being to do with overworking, burnout, etc, was a little uncomfortable to play because for me the very act of playing and recording this game is exactly what the warrior protagonist is doing by fighting. I think this’ll be a better one for people who actually play games for pure recreation…. 💀

Current Stuff

Black Mesa: The winner of the Patreon poll we had in March! (Sorry, I just realized I forgot to update non-voting patrons on the result of this one so you might not have found out until now if you didn't watch the beginning of the first video.) I think I’m inching towards the halfway mark. I don’t play many shooters on the channel but pre-channel-Welonz used to spend ridiculous amounts of time on Team Fortress 2, so Black Mesa feels a bit like returning home.

Lost Records: Bloom & Rage: Tape 2’s begun! I haven’t finished playing it yet but this series should be the focus for the coming week.

Scarlet Hollow Episodes 1-4: An atmospheric horror visual novel by the Slay the Princess devs. It’s not completed yet – I considered just checking out Episode 1 and leaving the rest for later, but one thing after the other and now I’m deep in enough to have looked up whether it’s legal to marry your cousin in Canada (it is 🤣). Very engaging and snappy story as expected from the StP devs. Not totally visible within a single playthrough but the branching and routing stemming from mundane decisions is unbelievably massive. I have the latter half of the Episode 4 to edit through, and then we’ll be on pause for this until Episode 5 releases later this year. (Also: not sure why no one told me about the doomed/unresolved yuri pining in this, I would’ve been on this much faster hahaha. Here’s a heads up for fellow yuri connoisseurs!)

Upcoming Stuff

I expect Scarlet Hollow and Lost Records Tape 2 to wrap up quite soon and I’ll be left with Black Mesa which also isn’t a super duper long game. I don’t have plans for what comes next yet, but I do plan on taking a look at:

• South of Midnight (adventure game by We Happy Few devs)

• Blue Prince (puzzle game that everybody and their dog has been raving about)

• Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (I actually haven’t looked into this at all but also seeing people scream about this)

I'll see what I vibe with from here, and maybe something will extend into a series.

All I got for this time. Appreciate your support as always, and feel free to share with me any comments/questions/suggestions below!

Hope you have a great day, and a lovely Easter weekend!

Welonz