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Bad decisions make good stories. And I always have a good story.

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Tag: A Song of Ice and Fire

What’s easy, what’s right and what’s best

Recently started (and finished) playing Game of Thrones (literally playing the video game by Telltale). It’s very good but also one of the hardest decision-making games (where your choices affect the storyline) I’ve ever played.

They really spared no expense and I love the attention to detail The characters resemble the ones in the show to a tee and they are apparently voiced by the same cast, which explains the accuracy. Even the soundtrack and opening credits are the same.

The storyline is canon and set during the War of the Five Kings. You play different characters of House Forrester of Ironrath aka Stark bannermen, though references to the Starks (who have fallen) are minimal and you don’t see them at all.

Game of Thrones being Game of Thrones, the game is just as brutal, shocking and graphic. It opens with the freaking Red Wedding, for goodness sake. Yup, way to grab attention.

Should have known better that any characters I like will end up dying, but I get attached to them and am left in shock when they get killed off ? Oh hey what’s new.

For instance, there was a very handsome knight called Arthur Glenhill who commanded an army and was supposed to help one of your POV characters…

He ended up being tortured and gutted by Ramsay Snow (using a photo from when he was still conscious and alive because his death is bloody graphic even for computer effects. Imagine him being slashed and stabbed a few more times, passing out and then being gutted while people watched his intestines fall out. Welcome to Game of Thrones):

Sadly, of the five POV characters I got to play, one was stabbed in throat by Ramsay Snow, one was ambushed and slain in battle, one was badly injured after staging a failed ambush, and one was beheaded ???

This is the only one of my characters (Gared) who was alive and well by the end of all six game episodes. Mainly because he was sent to the Wall and fighting whitewalkers lol. Also the most handsome character to me.

Does anything else thinks Asher looks like Chris Pratt though???

Anyway, I realised that I am not cut out to be a Player in the game of thrones at all because my choices are always too honourable. I tried keeping all the promises that I’d made, protecting my friends’ secrets even when they could endanger me, choosing to help my friends instead of sacrificing them to stay alive.

Somehow I just can’t be cruel like Cersei or cunning like Littlefinger…

Actually my female POV character (the one who was beheaded) could have stayed alive. The choices were to get beheaded for murdering a Lannister guard (yup I did it lol) or to accept a traitor’s help aka marry him thus making him Lord of Ironrath.

In return, he will name a 10-year-old coal boy, who’s also your friend and has been helping you the whole time, as the one who committed the murder. Meaning the boy’s head will be on the chopping block instead.

I just couldn’t do it (even though it’s just a game) so I chose to die. My last words were “Iron from ice” aka House Forrester’s motto ? Surprisingly, more than 75% of players made the same choice I did so there is still hope for humanity.

Clearly I learned nothing from Ned Stark. Most honourable man in Westeros who got killed within the first season of the show. However, I’m not sure if I’d still be as kind and always wanting to do right if these scenarios happened in real life and survival instincts kick in.

Hardest choice in the game for me was when I had to pick which Forrester brother to sacrifice. Only one could escape while the other stayed behind to fend off their enemies.

Actually I didn’t even make a decision for this one because I was still weighing my options, considering who would be more useful. I took so long that the game decided for me. So Asher lived while Rodrick died. Either way it sucks.

I thought I felt bad for the Starks but the Forresters had it no better ? Basically, keeping in true essence with the whole A Song of Ice and Fire universe… everyone dies.

I really hate it when I think I’m doing the right thing and somebody dies anyway. It happened so many times. And I fucked up quite a bit too cos while some deaths were inevitable, there were other events that could have been different.

E.g. I failed to secure a betrothal, accidentally killed a Brother of the Night’s Watch, got fired by Margaery and was left with zero protection etc.

It made me think about how, just like in life, what you think is the right thing to do might not always be the best decision. And the best decision is not always the easiest. Somehow or other, someone always gets hurt. Nothing is ever simple. But every mistake is also a lesson.

Geez, even the Game of Thrones video can provoke so much thought in me. I am on the fifth book and the series is really. really too remarkable for words.

We should all drink up like these 2 ???


Bibliophile

Fangirling post because I have read so many good books recently. Finished Lang Leav’s Memories as well as Milk and Honey by Rupi Kaur today.

george rr martin reader quote

Finished Storm of Swords not long ago and it was so brilliant!! No wonder everyone says it’s the best book in the A Song of Ice and Fire series. Never thought I would be so hooked but the whole new universe that George R.R. Martin has created is simply beyond incredible.

Storm of Swords starts off with the White Walkers attacking The Night’s Watch and there’s my favourite Daenerys in Astapor scene too but it is the second half that is CRAY CRAY.

Red Wedding > Ygritte dies (“We should have stayed in that cave” omg everything sucks) > Barristan reveals himself to Daenerys (really didn’t see this coming cos it was different in the show) > Purple Wedding > Jon battles the wildings > Tyrion’s trial > The Mountain versus The Red Viper > Jon is Lord Commander > Lysa and the Moon Gate > Lady Stoneheart appears

My jaws dropped at the ending. At a lot of scenes actually. Even though I roughly know what will happen from the show, the writing is damn mind-blowing. Love how Needle is re-introduced!!! I didn’t even realise it was Needle at first… then the reveal is like WOOOO.

He wore three blades on his belt, Arya saw; a longsword on his left hip, and on his right a dagger and a slimmer blade, too long to be a dirk and too short to be a sword.

[Paragraphs later]

Arya went to Polliver and knelt in his blood long enough to undo his swordbelt. Hanging beside his dagger was a slimmer blade, too long to be a dirk, too short to be a man’s sword . . . but it felt just right in her hand.

“You remember where the heart is?” the Hound asked.

She nodded. The squire rolled his eyes. “Mercy.”

Needle slipped between his ribs and gave it to him.

aya polliver gif

Off The Map Chelsea Fagan

Read this little book (free on the Kindle store) while in KL to prep myself for my solo trip in Thailand. Loads of great stories and my favourite was from this girl who walked dunno how many kilometres in Africa because she couldn’t pass some border and had to turn all the way back while her friends drove on by themselves.

So she was one of my inspirations who made me go, “If she can do it, why can’t I?”

animal-farm-horz

Also re-read these two classics days ago because I had a sudden animal craving lol. Was introduced to Animal Farm in school and I think out of all the books we had to study for Literature, it’s still the best and my favourite.

Charlotte’s Web was one of the first few books I ever read if I remember correctly. Funnily enough, it wasn’t a purchase. I think someone had given me a whole bag of old books and it was inside. My book cover isn’t the iconic one with the girl but the obscure one above.

Anyway I cried harder this time than I did as a child at the ending wtf. Like full-on sobbing. Why is my adult self so emotional????

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Also re-read this YA novel called ‘The Way I Used To Be’ (life sure has a way of forcing you to grow up) that made me cry on both readings. You can feel how raw and real the emotions are… And also because I feel like I can relate.

Most of that hate, though, I save for me. No matter what anyone else did or didn’t do, it was ultimately me who gave them permission. I’m the one who’s lying. The coward too afraid to just stop pretending.

The plan was to get better, to feel better, by any means. But I don’t feel better, I feel empty, empty and broken, still. And alone. More alone than ever before.

Pain changes people. All that self-loathing, guilt, confusion, secret anger and resentment, wondering why something has to happen and why you are the only one suffering, wishing for anyone to just understand but nobody will ever do, wondering if your feelings are justified, wanting so desperately to forget and to just stop hurting.

Why, surely you didn’t think I just randomly decided to start drinking excessively for no reason? Or that I suddenly started working doubly, triply hard out of nowhere? Haha please. My previous post is only a very tiny fraction of everything that happened.

Ok said too much, back to my Kindle!