Welp, it can’t be helped. I am not playing Batman: Arkham Knight today. The game hit stores and Steam only yesterday, and surely millions of you fair readers are playing right now. But not me. Not Sean Ian Mills. Not the Henchman-4-Hire. I…I have no excuse! Unless you count money as an excuse. That counts, right?

This should be me right now!

I love the Arkham games. When Arkham City was released while I was on vacation, I bought it while still on vacation and played it at my friend’s house! The List of Six I wrote on Easter Eggs in Arkham City almost single-handedly kept this blog afloat with page views through the early years! But now I’ve got nothing. I don’t own a Playstation 4, I don’t own an X-Box One, and I wasn’t able to afford all of the expensive computer upgrades in time.

I’m not playing Batman: Arkham Knight this week. So you might be asking, what the heck else could I possibly be doing? Join me after the jump to find out!

6. Breathing a sigh of relief

Apparently it’s something like this

Apparently Arkham Knight is a mess on the PC, so maybe I’m dodged a bullet. All the early reviews across the Internet were for the PS4 and X-Bone consoles, praising the game. But as soon as Arkham Knight unlocked on Steam, it’s been flooded with negative reviews. Check out that screenshot: Mostly negative reviews! Out of ### reviews! There are problems with framerate caps, lag, stuttering, and all other complex computery things. It’s pretty clear to all those Steam players that Rocksteady has released a broken PC port. That’s terrible.

So maybe I should relax a little, because if I had managed to upgrade my PC in time, I’d be one of those poor people. I’d have spent all that money only to play a broken game! Now in the time it takes me to upgrade, I’m sure Rocksteady will put out all sorts of patches and fixes. Here’s hoping!

5. Playing…BLANK…instead!

I could pay for World of Warcraft again?

I got nothing! I’m not really playing any other games at the moment to fill the void! My friend and I recently completed world domination in Total War: Rome II. And I recently came off a replay of State of Decay. But nothing else has come along to keep me gaming! There are tons of new games out right now, but nothing in my gaming arsenal can handle those new titles. So either I dive back into some classic game like State of Decay or Grand Theft Auto V, or I’m out of luck. My friend Alyssa and I recently downloaded a Witcher board game to play online, but that’s only going to sustain me for so long!

4. Baking Experiments

Behold, in all their glory!

I’ve always liked baking. It’s something of a hobby, I suppose. I had a get together with friends this past weekend, and I tried making Fruity Pebbles Cookies for the first time ever! I found the recipe online, and my friends said they were delicious! So that might be a new product in my baking arsenal. I also made them my family’s legendary pistachio bundt cake, which was another hit. So there’s that. I also snagged a seasonal package of watermelon-flavored cupcake mix. I’m going to bust that out on my family for the Fourth of July, see what they think. Yes, baking will keep me busy, delicious, delicious baking!

3. Watching Orange is the New Black

Stella is not that great

Seriously, I like this show. The third season is pretty good so far. After this, I’m gonna try and catch up on Game of Thrones. I missed a couple episodes at the end.

2. Making comics

My comic! I helped make this!

Did you hear that my comic book Kickstarter was a huge success? We raised over $8,000, way above our goal, and we’re going to produce the first three issues of Gamer Girl & Vixen this fall! I couldn’t be more excited! I’m going to become a published comic book writer! And beyond that, I’m also sending in a couple pitches to the open submissions at Oni Press. There are probably thousands of writers sending pitches — perhaps even some of you — and I know it’s a long shot, but it’s still be a lot of fun to solidify my ideas and put these pitches together. I sent my first one in last night. And if/when they don’t get picked by Oni, nothing can stop me from producing them on my own.

I’m also putting a lot of thought into what my next project is going to be after Gamer Girl & Vixen. I’ve learned so much about self-publishing comics that there’s no stopping me from making more. This blog has been begging for a regular comic for awhile now. I’ll keep you all in the loop when I figure out what I’m going to do next!

1. Figuring out how to play Batman: Arkham Knight!

I could do this! I could so do this!

OK, so I definitely think I’m going to upgrade my PC instead of investing in a console. I’m getting older, and theoretically, video games aren’t going to be as important to me a few years down the line. So why pay $400 for an X-Box One just so I can play a few games now when I could spend that $400 on improvements to my PC and play games for years? I don’t know about you, but I’m on my computer all the time when I’m home. Improving the quality of the computer would benefit everything I do, while buying a new console would just replace the X-Box 360 that I don’t play all that much anyway.

So we’re agreed, I’m upgrading my PC. But what does that mean? I’ve probably got to get a new processor. I’ve got an i3 right now, and Arkham Knight recommends an i7. So that’s a big upgrade. I’m probably also going to need a new mother board to go with the new processor. And I’m definitely going to need a new graphics card, something from Nvidia this time, probably in the 900 series. Why get a 700 series when I’m going to need the 900 in a few years anyway?

A new graphics card is going to need a new power supply too, so definitely gotta grab one of those. If I knew anything about computers, I could probably do all of this myself. But I know nothing! So I’m going to have to get somebody to install all the new components for me. And I’m probably going to buy them all from Best Buy anyway, because their financing involves zero interest for, like, 12 months with big purchases.

Oh man, that’s a lot of steps…and a lot of money…all to play one game?! Well, there’s also Witcher 3, and I’ve been dying to play Dead Rising 3, and then Fallout 4 comes out in November…

Looks like it’s time to sell a kidney! For Batman!

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