Hay Fever is a cruel mistress

The sad story of my week.

I'll begin with an apology. There will be no City of Thieves playthrough this week. (In case you hadn't guessed!) The weather has reached sunny proportions as rare as a sighting of a Shiny Pikachu in Viridian Forest. So, like any normal human being, I took to the great outdoors for various escapades and general 'nothingness'. It's great to do nothing occasionally. Unfortunately for me, for the first time in the short history of my existence, the powers that be have decreed that I suffer from Hay Fever. Suffice to say I'm severely pissed off. It's really nice out and I can't venture outside for fear of having stinging eyes and sneezing fits to rival anybody. So thanks to feeling like I've been violently assaulted and abused by various creatures of the night, I hope you'll all forgive me for not putting any worthwhile content up. Looks like that extra playthrough I gave you all at the beginning of this week will turn out to be THE playthrough of this week. Ah well.

However, I can give you some gamebook-related news while I'm here. The Tin leaders and their various minions over at Tin Man Games are on the cusp of releasing a brand new series of interactive gamebooks. The new series is going to be aimed at a different demographic to what the current GA series is; namely Women. This is interesting. The 'books' are set to be a kind of rom-com choose-your-own-adventure with various fantasy themes, starting off with Vampires. I assume starting with those delightful bloodsuckers is to play on the slight success of a series of novels featuring love and Vampires going by the name of a certain time of day. However, I expect like Tin Man's GA series, this is merely a clever PR ploy to hook people in before the series becomes massive and stands on its own. I will probably not be investing in this series but I hope it does well; it looks like an entertaining concept and will undoubtedly have the very best production values. Tin Man Games are a busy bunch at the moment, with the  launch of their Judge Dredd gamebook just around the weekend. This one I will be buying; I confess to knowing next to nothing about the franchise itself, but will be reading up a general background, as it seems frikkin' amazing if I'm being honest. I also took the time to pre-order my signed copy of Blood of the Zombies from Forbidden Planet (No, I still haven't gotten over not being able to actually go in person. Sob.) With that coming out in a weeks time itself, the world of Gamebooks is positively thriving. Fantastic.

Ah, but will they sparkle?

One final note; don't expect City of Thieves too early next week. I'm off to London, as apparently there's some big event on involving various sporting activities. I have been lucky enough to win tickets in the most sought after raffle in history, so will be cheering on team GB in the Rowing from the stands. I will of course be taking hundreds of Hay Fever pills to keep me alive, provided the people at G4S allow me to take them in. If not, I will sneeze on them until they give in. Whatever you're doing over the next week, enjoy the weather while it lasts and don't forget to cheer on team GB in all the sports across the Olympics this next month. If you're one of my foreign readers, cheer on your respective country's athletes instead. (But keep your fingers crossed for the host nation too, it'll give the games a better atmosphere if we win!) Oh, the moral. Always check the pollen count before you go outside on a sunny day. With that, I'm off to get all excited about the opening ceremony. Take care everybody.