Golden Sun on Nintendo Switch!

It may not be the remakes of the originals or sequel to Dark Dawn, but this is the next best thing, for now the Game Boy Advance games Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age are making their debuts on the Nintendo Switch system, available for everyone with a Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack membership.

The Golden Sun series is, in my mind, the pinnacle of handheld RPG games, and not only because it was the first I ever played. Indeed, the game has a very special place in my heart and memories. When I was little I loved watching my older cousin playing video games as a rule, but my earliest recollections of such is of Golden Sun. We were all staying at our maternal grandparents house and he was always the first one up, and often I was the second; so I would tiptoe through that silent house, downstairs, through the dining room and kitchen to the Family Room where he would invariably be sitting with a Gameboy Advance in hand. I was lucky, for I joined him playing through the first dungeon, Sol Sanctum, and when I asked were he was he said "the Temple of the Sun," which is what I called the game for years afterwards. But even then, knowing next to nothing about the game, I was invested in it, for Kraden was my favorite character and him getting kidnapped mightily offended my young mind. I also loved watching him (my cousin) find and use the various Djinn and their Summons.

Eventually I was gifted the games and, with the Prima Official Strategy Guide in hand, I began playing myself. And fell in love. There is no other way to describe it, for the story was so utterly unique, personable, and gripping, all coupled and augmented by a brilliant role-playing-based battle system and puzzles which so inventive, brilliant and complex that even with the strategy guide I stumbled, occasionally having to ask my parents for help. Ask my mother about Air's Rock in Golden Sun: The Lost Age and she will remember how it took all we had not to get lost. Frankly, I could go on and on, for even now, with many and more games under my belt, I still rank Golden Sun as the crown jewel. I laughed and cried with the characters, for it was like a favorite book that just kept getting better and, to this day and despite never having played through it again, I still remember all characters' names and most of the conversations. I will not breathe a word more about the storyline, though, so as not to rob others of the chance to enter into the world of Weyard as I did, free of foreknowledge and ready for an epic adventure.

And yet, after two phenomenal games, no new ones came out until I was in high school - Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, which follows the children of the original heroes and was a solid game in its own right. But no new Golden Sun titles have come out since. Frankly, I still do not understand why nearly a decade passed between the first two games and Dark Dawn, much less why Nintendo has seemingly dropped the ball so completely since, because if we accept as true the aphorism that it is folly to change a winning game then it is doubly so for stopping one. Golden Sun still has a large and devoted fandom, and we want to see our dear friends again (and finally get a chance to fight Alex.)

Hence I take the release of the originals on Nintendo Switch as a sign of hope that, at long last, attention is finally being given to this greatest of games. That if enough new people play and love it then a sequel (and/or remakes) will finally come out.

Quote of the month

"You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope." - Thomas Merton

My father and I just finished All Our Hidden Gifts by Caroline O'Donoghue

My father and I just finished All Our Hidden Gifts by Caroline O'Donoghue.

They say the fault is not in our stars but in ourselves, and this book certainly certainly proves it when young Maeve of St. Bernadette’s Catholic school accidentally draws The Housekeeper card from a tarot deck. A card which does not exist from a deck that follows her, a card which grants her impulsive wish for her ex–best friend Lily to vanish. But as the Church's power wanes in Ireland the true evil is revealed to be something far more human, yet still wrapped tightly around olden magics. A puzzle which Maeve, her new friend Fi, and gender-fluid budding boyfriend who also happens to be Lily's brother fortunately have just enough wits and confidence in who they really are to unravel. A sharply contemporary book, this story proves that while one can seldom control the cards life deals you, how you play your hand is up to you.

Max Guild and Cape

Today I accomplished one of those rare decades long goals, that being reaching at least level 99 in every RuneScape Skill and thus earning the right to wear the Max Cape and enter the Max Guild in Prifddinas (city of the elves and the capital city of Tirannwn). I have reached and posted similar goals before – such as when I earned the combat-related Five Capes of Accomplishment – but getting to 99 in all Skills a dream of every Scaper.

I am wearing the red cape, which is naturally the Max Cape,
and am standing in the Max Guild.

A dream we can relive for, truth me told, I first earned Max Cape and Guild entry early last summer. Why did I not post about it then? Because I knew that RuneScape's newest Skill, Necromancy, was about to come out; hence my, and indeed every Maxed Scaper's time as such, was going to end when it did. Which means, as you can see from the images, that today I finally reached level 99 in Necromancy and re-earned by place as a Max Cape wearer and Guild member.

Content Writing Opportunities? Sure, why not.

Point of order, I was again told
not to smile for this photo.

Want to see your own writing published online? I am listening. In short, I have gotten some emails addressed to "the Stars Uncounted team" asking about Content Writing and I respond by saying that the team consists of me, myself, and I, and that all one of us is willing to post your content. The only rule is that such a Guest Post would have to be within the context of the blog – meaning that it must relate to the Fantasy genre or be about self-publishing Fantasy. If you are interested, feel free to send me one for approval. The first such post was the Beginners Guide to Exploring Fantasy Books by StickerYou. 

Just remember that any and all Guest Posts must adhere to the high moral spirit of my mostly humble blog. This does not mean that I have to agree with everything you say; it merely must be well-written and thought-out.

I am in my working life a teacher, a school librarian to be exact, and for my Survey of Literature for Children and Young Adults and Emerging Technologies for Libraries online classes at Salem State University I was tasked to make a blog. Deeming Stars Uncounted not a good fit, since the classes obviously involve more than Fantasy, I created:

Shelves Unfettered - A place for librarians and young literati

Of a more academic nature than Stars Uncounted, its literary focus is, I think, enough to warrant me mentioning it here. What becomes of it following my time at Salem I cannot say but, until that time, it might be worth a look.

Stars Uncounted. Seas Uncharted. Shelves Unfettered. There is almost an echo in here.

My father and I just finished Sorcery of Thorns by Margaret Rogerson

My father and I just finished Sorcery of Thorns by Margaret Rogerson.

Though several reviews – and very credible reviewers – compared it to Diana Wynne Jones' works, we did not see it; and we should know having read them all. But the real shock is less the Jones comparison so much as that it was not compared to Jonathan Stroud's Bartimaeus Sequence. Set in a rich Victorian-based world where old books of magic are no less and arguably much more dangerous than post-Reform sorcerers, apprentice librarian and sorcerer-hater Elisabeth Scrivener unravels a centuries old conspiracy that threatens not only the Austermeer’s Great Libraries but literally everything else as well. With help from one somewhat traumatized and very wry sorcerer Nathaniel Thorn and his unfailingly polite demon servant of course. Nothing against School Library Journal, or Margaret Rogerson herself for that matter, but claiming Sorcery of Thorns makes Rogerson the heir of Jones is a fundamental mischaracterization. Say rather, again and quite accurately, that Sorcery of Thorns is the heir of the Bartimaeus Sequence. I mean come on: Nathaniel, political plots, and summoned demons. Seriously.

Farewell for now Elisabeth, Nathaniel, and Silas. I will be seeing you again in the sequel whether or not Dad agrees with it.