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Nahias - Massive Darkness 2: Hellscape

Pesren — Tue, 13 Oct 2026 01:05:47 +0000

Having two more legs only gained 'em +1 Movement, but that rate works well for my homebrew hero "Cedric the Centipede"... it's Nahias!
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Here's the WIP Collage:
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Definitely not one I was excited to get going on! The Massive Darkness hero minis are a real mixed bag like that, and this one was tough due to the size, amount of stuff, and fairly banal "armor + leather straps everywhere" design. But we're here, so let's talk about it!
Noteworthy paints used: One Scale color I don't go to very often is Huldra Blue, a very dark & rich blue, mainly because the coverage isn't amazing, which is rarely something I want from a dark/shaded tone. However, here it worked great to blend back the blue-to-black areas of the horse-body, which is something I'll certainly remember in the future. PA Khaki gets a nod, as I love using various PA highlights, and this one that skews yellow-ish is nice for wooden/leather components. Finally, AP Leather Brown deserves a mention... it's a pretty boring brown color certainly, but it works quite well for a leather triad when used over AP SP Hardened Leather.
Challenges: A lot on this one! Motivation to start was something, since I knew this would be a pretty daunting one... these "medium large but full of details" minis can sometimes be the most complex, as most huge minis don't have as many elements. There's some pretty rough mold lines on the model, leading it to look like there was a big facial scar on the early end, and one leather scabbard on top of the model looks particularly bad. The hair was a bit annoying too as there's a lot of it, but the definition is very fine and has some odd angles when trying to avoid the horse-body.
Things I'm proud of: I think I captured this pretty well! I got the snake sigil on the shield done well enough, and was pleased when I got the eye spot on it as well. The TMM is attractive, the horse definition is good, and I really like that there's a clear highlighted-area tracing from the cheek all the way down to the hoof. This model's got some real presence now, and I'm proud of that because I wasn't stoked to do a mostly leather & armor hero after I'd done so for Sir Ronen already.

Man these Massive Darkness heroes are really something. I've got three left to go... one that I'm eager to do, and two that I'm not. The two I'm not are an ugly berserker guy, and Berko, a tiger-striped Shaman that I remember drove Dr. Eric Tanglebones mad when he painted it many years ago. But if nothing else, they sure have some presence to a lot of 'em! Kaylee & Ryff are on my recent shelf and man those are some nice looking hero models~

Boy speaking of MD, I haven't heard a peep out of CMON on the MD2 expansion... their tracker says Q3 2027 and that's a tough one to believe. Even God of War is supposedly ahead of that one, and that one is very low priority for them. Certainly hope it arrives one day though, as it would be nice to tackle the various enemies & bosses again with my practice/skill level where it is now. I've only got like... 4 bosses/elites that I'm actually still proud of from that game, rather than just "this was good for my skill level at that time". Like, as many of the big bosses have shelf-worthy designs, only those 4 are actually on display.

Video Gaming of late: Nioh 2
Well, I finished Nioh 2! Still adored the experience despite a few minor annoyances (to wit: slipping to your immediate death into small puddles of water is obnoxiously easy, and I was bummed that some armor is literally too heavy for any build to wear it without penalties so severe they're not worth the pain). Ultimately went with a heavy-damage & tanking Axe build that really came into its own late-game, often handling what should have been tough bosses pretty reasonably.

I also really enjoyed that late game, I felt strong enough that I could mess around with different magic/ninjutsu to find other strategies/interactions I hadn't considered. Like popping Rage on the Axe for huge damage, but using Catwalking/Sneak to just casually walk behind foes & sneak-attack them for obscene damage.

Ultimately will miss playing that one for a while! There's an extremely robust postgame experience I'm told, but I have a backlog of some -very- good RPGs that will take me forever to finish as-is, so now's not the time to do one of those massive New Game+ campaigns like this one offers. I'll always have the option to come back to it!

Today's Metal recommendation: "Lethe" by Draconian
It brings me no joy to report that Draconian's latest album just straight up did not land with me. The Italian doom/goth/'beauty and the beast' band is one I've enjoyed a lot in their history, but it turns out I really liked the recent albums and got used to the female lead singer they had at the time. For the latest, they brought back their original singer and while fans were excited about that... I'm not feeling it at all. I don't know if it's just her voice aging, or they're trying something new, but the style doesn't land for me.

There's at least one song on the album that I was really starting to enjoy, then she belts out a loud verse and it's just super off-putting to me x_x Such a bummer. Would never have assumed that a stalwart band like that would put out a dud for me, while a 'standard' metalcore band like Future Palace is putting out an incredibly good new album instead. She's not the only issue though, as some songs just feel like they're lacking hooks to me.

Anywho, "Lethe" is the one song I'm buying off the album because it's still got the haunting/beautiful style of song I'm used to from them, and not-at-all-coincidentally, features her singing the least. In a previous blog I recommended "Sleepwalkers" which was from the prior album, and I stand by that one as a great recommend for the band.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy! =D

Healing Cat - Grimcoven

Pesren — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 02:40:39 +0000

by Pes !

You can blink at it to both establish trust, and expose yourself to being pounced upon... it's the Healing Cat!
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Here's the WIP Collage:
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What a fun model this was! Thematically appropriate timing for October as well, I really love this one. This feels like a pretty inspired design from the sculptors... shame the CDMD Animal Allies are comparatively anemic compared to a model like this. Anywho, onto the blog~

Noteworthy paints used: I hadn't tried AP's Ash Grey much as a source of light grey, but I gave it a shot here since I wanted the gravestone to look lighter in contrast to a gray kitty. It worked pretty well! And naturally for highlights it did the trick too. Though all of these animals have the Grimcoven "lament" that's supposed to be crimson, I'm trying to do a themed color for each one (minus the Lament-free sheep), so that was a nice excuse for the purple-to-pink triad I love so much, and using PA's wonderful Dark Hot Pink color. Finally will give AP SP Burnt Moss a nod... a black-green color that's not particularly pleasant, but frequently a choice for me whenever I want a dark greenish base to things, like the ground beneath.
Challenges: Even though the model is a good size, those eyes are still teeny-tiny, so painting cat eyes was easily the hardest thing to do here. Second thing was oddly enough the fancy cross-shaped gap in the tombstone, simply because getting the brush in carefully to hit all the elements and not leave anything exposed took multiple passes! Other than that, this one went pretty smoothly, only needing some touch-ups to make sure some blends looked natural.
Things I'm proud of: I'm really happy about this one. Rather than doing an OSL effect on the tail, since it was a "Healing" Cat, I decided to make it look like its tail was creating a healing energy, rejuvenating the tree, ground beneath it, and making the eyes of the skull glow a similar color. Other people do OSL way better than me anyway, so this felt like a fun exercise. Beyond that, the drama of the lighting on the "light" side is nice and intense, he reads well as a kitty, and I'll never get tired of the purple-to-pink triad. This is a home run for me!

So with all of that happy stuff said, unfortunately I'm always going to have a negative connotation when I see this model... I was working on it when some jackasses set a fire on the mountain less than a mile away from us >_> So we had a bit of a panic in the night, had to go talk to some firemen to confirm we weren't in danger, then proceeded to have an awful sleep with a glowing orange light of fire & smoke above our house. Everything's fine now, but it happened while I was partway through this model, and when I'd re-re-rested later, finishing this (angrily) was the first thing I did in the morning.

Realistically it's the kind of thing that can technically happen regardless of where you live, but it's pretty maddening that so many people are stupid about burning things when there's various wildfires all throughout the northwest.

Though it does remind me of one funny-ish aspect... when we were getting home insurance for the house, they clarified one amusing aspect: the only time they won't insure homes is when there's an active wildfire within a few kilometers of your house. It makes perfect sense why, but it gave the funny mental image of someone panic-calling the home insurance company to get fire insurance while sweating from a blaze a few feet away X) Like, them trying to pretend they're not hot/coughing and playing it cool~

Also random, but we did a bit of board gaming! There's still lots of little things to do here and family visits coming soon, so our routines haven't yet integrated frequent board gaming, but our second game at the new home was Maglev Metro~ I really love that game; it's very relaxing and satisfying to build your route, while trying to coordinate with other players. Those acrylic tiles for your metro lines are just a delight. I was quite excited to play this one eventually when I unboxed it, so yay!

Video Gaming of late: Nioh 2
Years ago I'd played Nioh 2 during a Playstation+ subscription where it was free, only to lose access to the game when they'd taken it out of the PS+ library x_x I loved it at the time but never came back to it because of life & other games. Finally in Canada I came upon a used copy and have been loving it still. Pretty close to the end now; it was amazing how much of it was memorable that many years on from my initial half-playthrough. Just a deligthful mix of action, RPG elements, and tons of cool lore. I don't know how soon I'll look to play Nioh 3 as I have an existing backlog as is, but it's certainly something I'll make time for in the future!

Today's Metal recommendation: "Avalon" by Allt
Allt is one of those odd heavy bands that feels like they sometimes go in very odd directions (rap came out of nowhere on this new album), but I tend to love them. They're one of my favorite "wearing headphones" bands because the depth of sound is so good and intense with them. Despite my affinity for them, their new album was a rough first listen or two for me. The vocalist made some changes to how he sings at times, and there was one song "Nevermind" I hated so much that it was negatively coloring my opinion of the full album.

However, like a good Weezer album, it's grown on me after several listens, and I had them on while painting this model. Avalon is a really intense song that grabbed me early on and has become a favorite, particularly as it has one of the most intense and emotional outros in recent memory. They've always had the ability to add some very interesting and heavy sonic soundscapes into songs, and I'm glad they didn't lose that despite some odd/interesting new choices on the album. Avalon is now up there with Aquila as being one of my absolute favorite "headphones on" song for intensity/beauty.

I also mention Weezer just for fun reasons... during the wildfire panic and after we settled back in, an Allt song came on that made me want to listen to them, followed by one of the happiest/bounciest Weezer songs on my playlist X) I had to skip past that and say "Not right now, Weezer" - that just wasn't the right mood for "do we need to evacuate?!"

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy! =D

Jarek IV - Odalin: Dungeons of Doom

Pesren — Mon, 05 Oct 2026 18:51:26 +0000

by Pes !

Son and heir to King Akud's thron-.. wait, then why isn't his name Akud IV?... It's Jarek IV!
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Here's the WIP Collage:
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An interesting one here... once again an Odalin model is "good, but.." and it has a lot of motion in it, but that makes it a big harder to sensibly do Pes-style highlight/shading. Onto the blog~
Noteworthy paints used: Some real favorites get a mention here today. PA Dark Ivory is such a nice color to have on hand for warm blending, or for slightly gentler highlights than light grey or white. Here it was frequently used for highlights and occasionally for blends. AP SP Bony Matter is a favorite, a subtle brown that can either tint things or just add some great brown-toned shading. Finally AK Grim Brown gets a nod as it's the darkest brown I own, which is nice for a sandy model like this that called for "dark brown lining" rather than my usual blacklining.
Challenges: Definitely some tough angles here... the big majestic cape also has some not-so-majestic tough areas to reach on the side. The card art didn't quite match the model, leading to some confusion when I'd see an element that was missing on one or the other. I don't know if it's the color scheme, or the pose of the model, or some combination thereof, but I really had trouble landing on the extreme highlights in a way that made sense. Finally, a fair amount of corrections were necessary here, partly due to imperfections, and partly because "foldy fabric" sections are tough to get clean-looking, particularly in small areas.
Things I'm proud of: I don't know if this is a "Pes!" brand model per se, but it's a nice looking one at least. I think I overall did well matching the colors, getting the details well-represented, and working past some of the oddities on the model. And I do like the TMM I did on it. Not a favorite, but it will look nice on the shelf for sure~

So hm, these Odalin minis... quite the mixed bag. On the one hand, this is a pretty nice model! Dramatic, full of motion, and the details are all pretty well-represented, even the very subtle patterns on some of the fabric. But like I implied above, it doesn't match the character's art in multiple ways, which I'm not used to in the board game space. Then while most of the things are good, there's some nonsensical things: he's supposed to have layered shoulder armor, and instead the model has these big angular shoulder-pad armor chunks? I did my best to disguise that with shading, but it's weird. It's also just generally rude of them to have a character with facial hair and not reflect that on the model X)

Also the Odalin stuff has a very "sandy" theme to its minis; while I appreciated that this character had a bit of blue/purple, if too many of these continue to have a standard tan/bone Arabian Nights theme to it, then I'm definitely going to have to go off-script in the future. The team behind Odalin already had to send out replacement minis for several models, and now they're talking about doing a full re-do of several heroes in the game... made available to backers of a future game, of course!

So, continued mixed feelings with this company and these models. But if nothing else, this is a pretty nice one for the shelf!

Busy times lately... some new "winter prep" things that are unique to living up north now, big/complicated things like finally getting our phone numbers/plans changed, getting all of our financial arrangements set up, and of course lots of family time. Our home in Virginia's on the market now, but the market is quite slow and we're getting into colder seasons. But I have a right to be frustrated about that, because the House-prep contractors that "take two weeks" to do their job of course took a month & a half instead, completely missing the chance of getting the home ready before the school year started in earnest. Boo~ But oh well, it'll eventually sell and just stop being a thing we have to be concerned about.

Video Gaming of late: Brotato
We know we'll have to move on from this game eventually, particularly because we play it on my Switch 1, and I need to start using the Switch 2 soon. So we're doing our best to just do as many silly/fun repeat-runs of fun combos or favorite characters. Yesterday we did two of our favorite characters, Renegade for me (spams with big quantities of weaker ranged hits) and Curious for her (gets bonuses for unique items and hates duplicates). That one was a blast!

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy! =D

Leviathan - Kingdom Rush: Elemental Uprising

Pesren — Wed, 30 Sep 2026 18:56:43 +0000

by Pes !

Cresting the waves and leading us all to our graves, it's Leviathan!
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Apologies but no Process collage this time for reasons I'll explain later. Instead, another overhead shot so I can show more of my light-to-dark & lining work:
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Kind of a bizarre model and one I put off working on for ages, but omg I love this thing to pieces now and it's become a favorite, so that's a nice surprise. Onto the blog~
Noteworthy paints used: PA Dark Jade is a beautiful deep blue-green that I'm thrilled to use when I have an excuse... I swear my cheat code to loving PA paints is whenever "Dark" is in the description X) Anywho, that was the base coat! AP Pharaoh Guard is a lovely teal that worked great for layering here. Finally, Musou Black gets a crucial nod as there's a loooot of it used to outline things and give him that cartoon effect.
Challenges: Many! Motivation was a big one originally, as he's just so big, but flat, and smooth. Getting details to pop on him was an exercise in tedium, particularly when it came to black-lining every single one of his little bumps. I had one of those "argh!" moments when I finally thought I was done blacklining, only to realize I'd missed one side of his upper-fins X) This is a model that begs for an airbrush, but I don't have one, and getting things to look smooth took lots of palette-blending. Getting my light-to-dark effect here is pretty onerous given the size and wanting to make sure the model still looks good in most angles. Finally, just the sheer amount of details... I eventually had to tell myself to stop trying to make more corrections here and there, as it always felt like there were more little mistakes I could find.
Things I'm proud of: This is a model I wasn't remotely excited to tackle... in fact, the reason I have no progress pics is because I did the base coat of this guy months ago, well before our big move. Meaning, this is the only paint job where I started in one country, and finished in another! Tidbits aside, I now adore this model! To some degree, even these photos don't feel like they capture how cool it looks in person. Hopefully I can do an end-year collage that will include it there to help sell it. Anywho, the cartoony vibe feels like it was captured well, the light/dark side effect is nice, and it comes close to feeling like it used an airbrush to accomplish it. What a nice turnaround this was!

Anywho, very stoked at this result, and though I'm happy to get back to painting, there are a -lot- of impending family visits in October that are going to eat into painting time for a bit. I'll hope to resume this pace soon, but my father-in-law is at our home now for a bit. This is a good thing, mind you... he's awesome and was a huge help with our moving arrangements & some generous house-warming gifts. We've tackled a lot of DIY/home-improvement projects already too... he loves figuring out things around the house, so that's great!

Video Gaming of late: Brotato
It's going to be hard to break ourselves out of playing Brotato together as a nightly routine because it's been such an easy game to do a run of together at nighttime. There are a lot of thematically fun/silly characters in Brotato, but one favorite is "Old", who due to his bad vision, shrinks the size of the map. But very amusingly, if both players pick Old, the map shrinks to a comically small "postage stamp"-sized map, which really messes with how the game is supposed to work. Very dumb, and very fun! "Double Old" is forever going to be one of my favorite ways to play it.

Today's Metal recommendation: "Wolves of the Sea" by Alestorm
Well I already included an Alestorm reference above, so how about we mention this. Alestorm has been doing Scottish Pirate metal for uh... probably too long now? But it's fun and dumb when you're in the mood for it... Ren and I frequently reference lyrics from Alestorm songs like "Wenches and Mead" to each other, for instance. Anywho, long discography be damned, the best way to experience them is with occasional silly catchy tunes like Wolves of the Sea or Keelhauled.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy! =D

Amir Sesay - Cthulhu: DMD - Fear of the Unknown (KS)

Pesren — Fri, 25 Sep 2026 04:02:05 +0000

by Pes !

His fingernails gain 1mm in length every time he breaks someone's heart, it's Amir Sesay!
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This is probably the 2nd most difficult of the CDMD Season 3-4 investigators, and I'm glad I saved him for now, as this feels like an awesome result for a fairly unpleasant-looking fella.
Here's the WIP Collage:
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Onto the blog!
Noteworthy paints used: AP SP Dark Wood remains a high-tier choice for me in the standard speedpaint line, particularly with 2.0 which largely fixed the coffee-staining. A dark but rich brown is nearly impossible to find with acrylics, and this does the job for me constantly, or as a good mix-in with other colors to do toned wood-grains. Amir's... outfit? is an extremely unusual pale orange-yellow-brown color that of course I don't have on hand, so I layered up with the yellow-brown of AP Desert Yellow to get the result. Amir has a very sickly/ashy color of black skin, but my PA Black Brown had to get thrown away because it dried up (and I didn't use it much anyway), resulting in me instead doing some brown layering with AK German Grey to solve that problem.
Challenges: A lot on this one! Painting his facd-paint patterns/tattoos is tough, getting different colors on his beads takes a bit of work, the TMM/NMM hybrid on his weapon took some effort, his outfit's color was bizarre and unusual in this space, and finding a way to do Pes-style highlights is pretty tough with all his mops of wispy hair. Well-designed though it may be, this was a tough one for sure!
Things I'm proud of: I think this is a very well-realized version of his design, and hopefully the fact that I got his face paint & eyes done properly will impress some folks. The different design/colors of this one should make it stand out quite well on the table! Also fortunate that though this was tough, I didn't really "agonize" over any one part, though I certainly had plenty of touch-ups to do along the way.

So this isn't the absolute hardest CDMD investigator... that (dis)honor will still go to Salvador Dali, who's apparently wearing a matching set of cross-hatched pinstripe suit & pants (which of course is not actually on the mold). I'm legitimately saving him for last, as I don't know if I'm remotely capable of that as a painter. Otherwise, Amir here is probably the toughest one of those left, and it feels really good that I'm capable of this result on smaller models these days.

Video Gaming of late: Brotato
I'm extremely close to having us finish Difficulty 5 no-restart runs on every single character in both stages. That's an absurd thing to accomplish, but we're almost done! Fortunately the game continues to be a blast even with silly runs that Ren and I do together.

It can definitely be frustrating at tier 5 Difficulty when certain bosses are just a death knell for your build, and "shop RNG" can really make or break certain runs. Despite that, still love it, and still can't quit it!

Today's Metal recommendation: "Sleepwalkers" by Draconian
Draconian's arguably my favorite Beauty & the Beast styled metal bands and when I gave a first listen to their newest album before our move... eh?~ It didn't really land with me. I'll need to give it another listen for sure, because it could have just been the busy headspace I was in, or maybe I'd just gotten really used to their prior female lead singer.

In the meantime, Sleepwalkers from their last album is still brilliant and beautiful~

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy! =D

A Random Thing: This is so amusing to me that I just want to put it out into the world... it's going to be long and needs a lot of context, but it's amazing and I must document it.. One of the funniest things to me about the internet and its longevity is the very weird scenario you can run into where something you did decades ago still gets feedback/engagement as though it's part of the modern internet.

Like, imagine if someone picks up a yellow, faded 1950s newspaper, reads something they don't like, and seriously tries to write to the editor as a result X) But that kind of thing -does- happen on the internet, which amuses me to no end. Gamefaqs is a very helpful video game guide/review website that's barely changed since its inception when I was a child, and I still have the same account I used when I was a teenager.

I did a small amount of guide-writing back in the day, and wrote multiple reviews as well. Most of those get barely any notice or traction today, because they were for old games that very few people care about/interact with anymore. There are two typical exceptions to that rule for me personally though:

#1 is a guide that a buddy and I wrote in college for Legend of Mana. The two of us figured out ideal ways to build your world map in that game, and because Legend of Mana gets re-released every now and again, or just has its devoted fan base, at least once a year I get feedback on that guide. It's 99% positive and it's really charming how kind & appreciative people have been about something I worked hard on like 25 years ago.

#2 is a review I wrote for a godawful, terrible Yu-Gi-Oh game on the PS1. At a time when some good game boy Yu-Gi-Oh games started to come out, the PS game is comparatively atrocious; just a failure on every level. However, people can still find enjoyment in the insane grind/randomness/CPU-cheating and the purity before Yu-Gi-Oh got as complicated and bloated as it is now. As a result, this one is closer to 60/40 on people who agree with me (again, me from 25 years ago), or actually love the game and feel the need to defend it from young-me.

Anyway, I'm writing all of this to say I just got the BEST feedback I've ever gotten on #2 there, so much so that I actually laughed out loud reading it this morning. The Feedback was Negative, and it said "I don't need you telling me whether I should buy or rent a game. That's not the purpose of a review." XD Oh man, I just laughed again getting the quote to copy/paste. I love so much about this... to wit, I had to of course go back and open my review to find out what he (let's be honest, it's definitely a he) was talking about, and in a very long review -after- I've talked about the game and given it a score, I then had a sub-section mentioning whether to Rent or Buy the game; the modern equivalent of a "what's the value proposition in paying for a new/used game?"

So, of the many reasons it's amazing feedback and I had to talk about it today:
a) It completely passes over pages of detailed criticisms of a very divisive game entirely. This is the equivalent of reading an entire book and then being upset at the jacket on the back.
b) "Renting" as a concept is a relic of a time that doesn't even exist anymore. Why would you care about something that doesn't exist?! Like, skip over it, buddy X)
c) "I don't need you telling me" is incredible wording. Hey pal, you know I wrote this 25 years ago to put on the internet, and it's not me "telling you" anything? I don't know you, it's possible you didn't even exist when I wrote it! I love that so much.
d) He's also apparently a purist when it comes to the concept of reviews... like, literary/film criticism does exist and may be divorced from any assumption of value/purchase, but the absolute majority of any "review" on the internet is ostensibly to guide the reader toward making an informed purchase. He saw that one section that came -after- the review and decided that was just a heinous derliction of duty for me as a reviewer (oh sorry, me as someone writing to him personally).
e) Since he doesn't need me telling him things... I can only hope to one day understand what he -does- need in life, instead? I hope you find it, you crazy kook~

Anyway, 'found it all hilarious. And on a personal note, I -extremely- stand by my decision at the time to talk about the value in Renting/Buying... most people on the internet at the time were young with limited funds, and games in those days could have insane ranges of "value". RPGs/Action Adventures that ate up dozens of hours of time, and completely garbage games that were fully beatable in less than an hour. My brother once was allowed to choose any game from a Toys R Us, and a relative paid like $55 USD (in 1991!) to buy Toki, a piss-easy platformer game that was fully beatable on your first try in like 20 minutes. I STILL remember that because money matters when choosing how to spend it.

Gaming magazines in those days almost never acknowledged pricing and those considerations as they got games for free! And nowadays I more frequently see reviewers making note of situations where a game's cost doesn't justify the amount of content. which is massively appreciated. So it turns out I was actually on the vanguard of an important movement at the time, and what I mean to say is, 'Hey guy that didn't like my review that I wrote specifically for him 25 years ago? You're welcome, actually =)'

Okay, that's enough. If you actually read all that, I hope you enjoyed it~ Gave Ren a good laugh about it today too! Just 'gotta put amazing things like that out into the world sometimes.

Dum Dum Dugan - Marvel Zombies (KS)

Pesren — Mon, 21 Sep 2026 19:21:50 +0000

by Pes !

The name is only slightly more intimidating than "Lollipop Louie" or "Stupid Stupid Stephen" - it's Dum Dum Dugan!
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Here's the WIP Collage:
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Apparently I've not done a bystander since January, so "straps in", we're onto the blog!
Noteworthy paints used: AP Barbarian Flesh is one of those colors that looks slightly too rosy for me in the bottle/swatch, but when gently applied over my base coat, comes together pretty well! I'm trying to get out of the habit of near-exclusively using Scale's skin tones, so we'll see how I feel about AP & PA for those as I play with them more. My beloved AP SP Occultist Cloak (neutral-creamy dark-grey) got some use here for the outfit... this paint is easily one of my most-used & most appreciated whenever a Speedpaint base coat starts a dark color. Finally, my AP Fanatic set's range of blue colors is quite good, and here it was Thunderous Blue (Flat/Muted Blue) that helped me build up the color on his outfit.
Challenges: This one wasn't too bad! Lots of straps certainly, and facial details are tough as usual... but beyond that, the stance was pretty open, the model came out pretty well from the mold, and the ground components were on the simpler end.
Things I'm proud of: There are some definite similarities in the model/colors to Maria Hill, and I'm not sure if it's recency bias, but I prefer this result slightly. Some of it might be that he's leaning to one side so it was easier to make a trail of highlights... so maybe I just like the model better? But anywho, for a bystander model, I'm perfectly happy here with the result! Ren delighted in the results of his curly mustache, so I'll take it!

Think I'll need to go on a hunting expedition for the next models to prime shortly! I have a decent array of different games to pick from at this point, but I have nothing currently primed from Odalin, Grimcoven, Avalon etc. Will see what I can scrounge up next~

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy =D

Video Gaming of late: Monster Train 2
We're getting every closer to our eventual-goal of "every clan combination beaten at the highest-difficulty"! Right now we're kind of doing a "revenge tour" where we're replaying the combos where we won, but didn't attempt to beat the bonus superboss. We'll get you yet, gadget!

Fortunately despite our many runs and still finding out new tricks, I haven't had to go back and update my guides in ages. I was pretty accurate at the time I wrote them about the various strategies, which is a nice feeling!

Today's Metal recommendation: "Take Control" by Weezer
Yeah Weezer may not be metal, but the rocking version of Take Control is one of those "may as well be metal" songs that I love to hear when it comes on. So it's metal enough to me! \m/

Havok (X-Factor) - Marvel United: Multiverse (KS)

Pesren — Fri, 18 Sep 2026 18:56:18 +0000

by Pes !

Phew, it wreaks in here... it's Havok!
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Ah~ it's nice to be back painting a United model like this. Per usual, here's my WIP collage:
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1: Base
2: Wash/Gentle shading for definition
3: Color Layering
4: Blacklining and Sentinel metallics
5: Extreme Highlights and touch-ups.
And hey, I found my backdrops too! To the blog!!~
Noteworthy paints used: Flesh tones from Pro acryl are one of the few areas I've not had the best luck with so far, and this is an attempt to use Peach Flesh a bit more and... eh!~ The color is quite good, but the coverage isn't as good as their average paint. However, PA got plenty of high-praise use here with Golden Brown & Dark Orange Brown, which were crucial for getting base tones & shading-blends on the yellows. Finally to try to differentiate his hair versus outfit, I used a variety of brands/colors in Scale's Marduk Yellow, AP's Daemonic Yellow, and PA's Bright Yellow Ochre.
Challenges: Some of these were self-inflicted, as you can see in #1 & #2 pics that I mistook that he had bare parts of his legs/arms and they had a very yellowish tint that needed correcting. Models like this with complex outfits and detail-needing bases are quite fun, but also just take up some time. Also his left eye isn't quite as good as the right... just couldn't get lightning to strike twice on that.
Things I'm proud of: If not for the eye, this feels like some of the best work I can do with a United model of this nature. It looks dynamic, I got the colors right, the highlights feel like they make it come alive... at least for where I am in my painting skillset, this result looks as good as I can imagine it!

Video Gaming of late: Final Fantasy XIV (kinda)
Though we still tend to do some daily FFXIV sessions together, rural internet and some troublesome west-coast routing is having some nights where the game is downright unplayable for us. Fortunate we're in a pretty major "nothing" zone between major patches, but there's always fun for us to be had regardless.

Today's Metal recommendation: "Trophy Hunter" by Within Temptation
Not one of those songs that immediately grabs me, but this one's grown on me a lot. WT's last few albums have been fantastic, and this song is a neat showcase for Sharon's unusual vocal range in this space. My wife and I joke with her extra emphasis she puts on some words, that in the chorus, "you" sounds like "hyYou" as she sells it.

Anywho, great song that I'm starting to now associate with some of our mountain drives here!

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoy =D

Fomorian - Avalon: The Riven Veil

Pesren — Sun, 13 Sep 2026 16:52:32 +0000

by Pes !

Even if you become friends with 'em, they prefer you not call them your chum, it's a Fomorian!
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It's happened, I'm back! If you expected I'd return with some crazy giant monster or something, that will have to wait... starting very small here as I settle into the hobby again. I'm also going to stick to my promise to include the Progress shots, so here:

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Onto the blog~
Noteworthy paints used: Some good showings from Army Painter here, starting with Aqua Alchemy, which gave the nice Seafoam/Teal layer. Since these are undersea creatures with jagged weapons, I decided I wanted the weaponry to look like coral, so I used a bit of Wicked Pink & Alien Purple to get those. Finally PA Dark Grey Blue gets a nod as it was a useful color for blending back the intensity of the Aqua Alchemy layers.
Challenges: Though it's not a 'tiny' model per se, this model is fairly small (evident by the little square base), and features like the teeth & eyes are basically indistinguishable even after a prime and wash, so I essentially painted those on where it seemed correct. The little ridges of its serpent skin were not particularly clean, so I had to correct those with black lines. Finally, without a normal circular base, it wouldn't fit the traditional circular-clamp hobby holders, boo.
Things I'm proud of: You know it's just a relief to see this... I feel like it looks really fun and intense, and this is a fairly difficult feat on a smaller model like this. And crucially, though some aspects of this were tough to do, I didn't feel like I really struggled in particular; just the usual small corrections here and there. It feels like a striking result for a minion/mook/soldier model!

As for the WIP shots, read like a book it's:
1) Base Layer
2) Wash & Deepened Shadows
3) First Layer of colors and start of blending.
4) Extreme highlights and corrections.
With some extra final corrections, touch-ups, and adding the gradient to the water before finishing up.

So hey, I'm back! There's still work around the house, family visits, unpacking etc. to do, so this isn't the beginning of me churning out new art rapidly just yet. But it's a start~ I felt the itch to chip away at this once I'd gotten my new desk setup finished and unpacked enough other stuff to feel like I'd "earned" the time to do so. Feels good, even if it's only a bit at a time for now! Haven't found the backdrops yet, and I haven't figured out what the new photo setup will be, so photos will only be in front of a void for now.

Some good news all around here though. The result I'm very proud of, the desk setup is great and that's without me tweaking anything about it just yet, and with some serious quality of life improvements in the layout, comfort, and... well just about everything is better than my prior "dining room table on a wooden chair" setup. If anyone's curious why I chose this model of all things to start with, it's because I wanted to do another one of my explainer posts for non-painters about improving models. This was far from the best model design to use for the example, but I love doing those posts so I made it happen.

We also got to play our first board game in months, a session of Spirit Island! We stayed with mid-complexity spirits to ease our brains back into that mode, and it was quite nice. Looking forward to more gaming time eventually, but we're still getting used to a new routine that involves more unpacking/housework/local family, so it'll take a while before board gaming is a staple. But there's some beautiful games eyeing me from the Kallax!

Today's Video Game recommendation: Freshly Frosted
I had a lot more time to do video gaming once we landed here without all our other stuff, so for a little while I'll talk about some games I enjoyed. The developer "Quantum Astrophysics Guild" made a puzzle game I really adored several years back called Tumblestone, so when they made another puzzler a couple years back, it was on my radar.

This donut/conveyer belt puzzle game was just fantastic. It made me feel nice and smart/accomplished when I'd figure out the puzzles, and it's one of the most aesthetically pleasing puzzle games I've ever played... when you complete a stage/figure out the solution, you get to see a hypnotic animation of your donut factory humming along. I love it, and haven't really had a puzzle game with such a satisfying result to beating a stage.

I had a tinge of sadness when I finally completed it, but it had tons of content, and some of the later puzzles occasionally broke my brain to figure out, so it will remain a lovely memory.

Today's Metal recommendation: Future Palace - "Deep Blue"
We'll go with a thematic recommend for the Fomorian today. Future Palace is a German poppy metalcore band that I've generally enjoyed over the last several years. The lead singer's voice is either improving with time, they're getting better at using audio effects to boost it, or possibly both! Deep Blue's a nice catchy single from their recent new album, which so far I'd say is their best album to date. Lots of catchy tunes in there, even if I'm never sure they'll surpass the catchiness of Decarabia from the last album.

Either way, it's a good showing from them as they keep finding their voice and improving on their earlier work, which was impassioned but a little raw at the time. Most metal vocalists need some time to grow into the job, and her work has improved a lot, which is nifty~

Wonderful to be back, and I'm happy to have you all here =) Sooo... thanks for reading, hope you enjoy! =D