Hello again! I finally got time for an update, which is a pretty big one today; moreso reiterating things from the past updates, and announcing a couple of things about my schedule going through November. Let’s dive in!
Yeah you probably knew this Hiatus was coming
I am officially announcing from now until November 4th (Around Election Day in the US), I will go on hiatus for SFG and slow down review requests almost to a halt. “But wait, you already announced a cutback, how is this different?” You might say, and that’d be fairly correct. But working on my Truxton and Geppy-X reviews with the month I had in August made me realize that as things get waaaaay busier for me the following months, I cannot reliably work on reviews in a timely manner any more. Very short things (Ratalaika reissue tier) I might be able to do, so I could still reach out for retro reissues/compilations, but there were plenty of games in August/Sept I planned to cover at the start of the year that I had to pull out of and completely skip requesting code for.
Aggelos II? Nada. Culdcept Saturn Tribute? Sorry. Trails 2nd Chapter? (since we covered the OG back in the day) Absolutely not. I do not have the time to comfortably do them and I do not want to create a second tier of the Legacy Queue. Clock Tower is already getting into dangerous territory, but that at least will be covered before the end of the year.. I’d hope something like Truxton Extreme was still in my “timely manner” boundaries, but alas, even that made me pretty darn crunched to get it out and polished in the way I liked; I still have to upload the photos to polish it up, by the way, but they should be added to the review by Monday. Not to mention the fact a few things from last year got a bit lost in the mix, and I think I’d still rather focus on the queue I do have than request all of the games from the tidal wave that is the Fall 2026 Gaming Schedule, and then drown being unable to write about any of em.
Why? Because working a day job, going to community meetings at least once a week, and increasingly needing to focus on postcards/phone banks//neighbor to neighbor/door knocking or whatever I can do for my state is gonna be more critical. I’m sorry guys, but we’re at the point where if you’re considering sitting out of the midterms as an American eligible to vote, you are making a horrible mistake, in my opinion. Vote democrat locally at the bare minimum no matter what. Your state house/senate need your help, even in a red state this can make a huge difference, and in my state in particular the choice is easy; either stick with a party that’s ruled my state for a decade, only now being lead by a MAHA grifter exploiting legit fears on the cancer water crisis we have in Iowa, or elect the other party to start turning the boat from the glacier we’ll crash into if we keep on this current path. Dunno about you, but I’d like to keep writing for SFG and not get and die of Colon Cancer in the next few years, so this is a fight for life for me.
I cannot fucking stress enough how important local politics is, especially if they’re the guardrail stopping the most heinous shit from being done. They’re often how anti LGBT legislation gets tested and pushed out the door, and the past year and a half of my noob involvement in my community has taught me a lot I took for granted/did not know before then. You too, may think it’s easy to just ignore it all or that it means nothing, until you end up in a situation like me where your state gets de-regulated to the point cancer rates explode and your own life may be at risk. It’s time to buckle up, so if you’re a fellow American, I strongly recommend you get out the vote however you can. Hell, if you’re upset about a certain industry move about preservation, fighting for digital rights is a good idea, and a way to do that is… get involved in local politics and bug your reps. Yep, it’s all connected, but obviously YMMV depending on locale.
So is it gonna be a wasteland for two months?
Not exactly. I still wanna cover Evercade things, I still have some opinion articles i wanna write, and I still am even planning to review the SN Operator very shortly (Finally came in the other day!). Small things like Jalecolle stuff I might write to get something out in a week, and of course, the review queue, legacy or non legacy. I don’t have any ETAs or timings anymore, just that stuff will be done when it gets done, because as of now my September is swamped, and I’m only just a huge newbie at this and haven’t even done close to the level of outreach that my friends have done for years now.
Nevertheless, I do like this site, and me wanting to keep writing for it is literally why I’m involved the way I am; I want to be around to keep writing, and if I can use my skills from here to do good in the outside world, then I’m gonna do my best damn it. I floated the idea of interviewing political content creators/ candidates on this site and tying it back to gaming somehow, but I decided against that mainly to keep my site in general from getting too deep in the weeds, and to save that route for later if it becomes an absolute emergency. (ie; something blatantly tied to the gaming industry as a whole becomes national political news somehow, and I can contact someone I know here for a statement on such if needbe) I largely do want this to be the fun retro reissue review site written by a goofball fox lover; I truly do. Alas, two years ago was a wakeup call for me to Touch Grass and help my community, and I’m hoping those efforts pay off in the next two months. I hope you understand why I’d be more dedicated to those efforts for the time being. Still, even if some weeks may have no content, I promise to keep the stuff I do get out interesting!
Conclusion
That’s about it, really. I didn’t have much to talk about here that I haven’t before, but officially announcing the hiatus helps me draw a line in the sand and put this site in the backburner for a few months. Not enough to leave SFG completely abandoned, but enough that I can focus on my weekends being community focused without much shame. I still hope to keep you entertained as I work away on the site when I can, and I promise post November (especially if things go well and Rob Sand/Chris Jones win here) I’ll be back to my normal action for at least a year and a half.
Until next time… And fellow Americans, get involved with your local indivisible or whatnot if you can!