I’ve decided to do a bit of Reflection and talk about Recreations for July 2025. It was the first month where I’ve fully felt like I’ve not only read more but also written more. There’s still a part of me getting used to this blog as a space to type whatever kind rests in my mind. A space for me and my mind. Growing up I was in the mindset “if you don’t have anything useful to say or there’s no point in what you’re saying, don’t say anything at all” which means I’m great at small talk now. I’ll probably go into it and be more open about my mind set more sometime in the future. For now, let’s talk about the hobby, projects and other recreational activities I’ve had throughout July!
There’s been a few other books I’ve read that I’ve not yet written about. Mainly more gaming books. The first was Stewpot: Tales from a Fantasy Tavern which is a cozy heavy role play game about being former adventurers running a tavern. Its charming aesthetics and easy flow of the writing had me reading the entire book in one sitting. It’s definitely heavier on the role-play and improving type of game.
I also finished reading the Core Rules for War Cry. A friend introduced me to this skirmish miniature game, and I loved it. It was my favorite that we’ve played from Games Workshop. We might be starting a campaign Arc of our warbands. I’m also positive the game is now pseudo-dead. They aren’t putting on their own product line and are now part of the Spearhead boxes for the Age of Sigmar line. If I had a nickel for every time this friend shows me a cool game and then gets immediately discontinued. I would have two nickels, which isn’t a lot but strange it happened twice. Thankfully I think the community is keeping both respective games alive, Netrunner and War Cry.
I don’t plan to talk about either games in depth till I get to play them more. It’s just how I feel about game reviews or in-depth discussions. I also have some other Tabletop Games that I’m waiting to finish before writing about. One re-visiting Mutant Year Zero as one of my friends has decided to run it for me. The other would be a campaign of Fabula Ultima that I am GMing. The game says it was designed for a campaign that was about 20-50 long. We are currently on session 17, ending what I call Arc 2.
Aside from gaming, my big book to finish throughout year was Robert A. Caro’s biography on Robert Moses, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York. It’s a big tome of a book\. I am 77% of the way in and have now got to the “Loss of power”. Which If I’m honest with myself is pure Schadenfreude. Reading through “Love of Power” and “Lust of Power” made me wanting to see what finally caused Robert Moses’s downfall.
In video gaming, I’ve been playing FANTASY LIFE i: The Girl Who Steals Time which is a fantasy life sim. It reminds me of Rune Factory, albeit it’s simpler with it’s button press gathering, dungeon crawl combat, and a repetitive mechanic for building. The mechanics could get boring, though it all connects to in a way that makes it an enjoyable experience throughout the game. I haven’t finished the main story, though it is such a charming game that I have thought about getting back to it at some point.
I also saw the new Superman movie with a couple of friends. Highly recommend it. I have been feeling burnt out on the superhero craze last couple of years with both Marvel and DC. I did not expect to come out of the movie enjoying as much as I did. I felt like a kid again. Trying hard not to embarrassingly sway my body to the motion of Superman’s flight or fully move up to the edge of my seat for the fight scenes. Mainly I was worried I would hit the stranger next to me in my excitement.
I feel like that’s a good list of the recreations I took part in along with a recommendation or two for the month of July in 2025. I can already tell August will be busy and I’m kind of excited for it. Hopefully I’ll have another post like this then!
A Stray Blog 
Leave a comment