July 2025 Summary

All the media I read, listened, watched and enjoyed during the month of July 2025

Anyway, what better way to start #Blaugust2025 than how I always start a month with. A monthly summary!

I have to admit I am a little scared of starting this one, but at the same time, it shouldn’t be too bad. It feels like I have had great experiences, but with overall less things. More quality, less quantity, I guess.

July was a period with a lot of changes, my sister went to study to another city, and my parents made a lot of trips for health reasons. I ended up staying home alone for quite a bit and that gave me a lot of time to focus on games a lot more than previous months. I also did a lot of outside activities, like playing ping pong and the like, I should maybe add a section for that kinda stuff, including going to the gym and the like, not this time though.

Podcasts

Mostly the same as ever!

Welcome To Night Vale for 16 hours. Repeated episodes for sleep and such.
Into The Aether for 11 hours. The PSPrequel bonus episode, all the Any% episodes and all the regular episodes.
Sir Khan for 6.4 hours. Some Warhammer 40K lore episodes about the solar system and ultramarines.
Alice Isn’t Dead for 6 hours. Listened to the last episodes of season 1, lots of intrigue and developments I didn’t see coming.
Stuff You Should Know for 5 hours, just catching up to the backlog, I liked the episode about the Yeti!
Eye of the Duck for 5 hours. I listened to a couple of episodes, notably the one for The Blob.

Movies

Grave of the Fireflies - There is not a lot I can say about this movie. The state of mind I had while watching it play out was just absolute awe. I could not speak or move, in anticipation of what would obviously happen. The story of a boy and his little sister trying to get as World War II is about to end. I stayed put as the credits rolled, as I thought how far we’ve made it as a species, and how far behind we still are, in so many ways. This one is a must-watch, at least once in a lifetime.
The Blob (1958) - This old flick is something I started on a whim as I listened to the Eye of the Duck episode for it and thought it would be fun. And you know? It’s not too bad for a late 50s B-Movie. It’s short, althought it still has some pacing issues, but it’s nice to have in the background while working on something else and just paying attention from time to time.
F1 - My sister wanted to watch this so we did, with a couple of other friends into Formula 1. I was the odd one out here who didn’t recognize half the cameos and stuff. I still liked the movie though, it was really inmersive and well produced. It really felt like an Apple product.

Manga

Blue Lock - Up to chapter 313. The one I read the most this time around, it had been a pretty long time, so I had a lot of chapters to go through. I actually wasn’t into it at first, I thought I was over it and was about to drop it. But I pushed through and that hype and emotion got to me again. The amazing art and framing, the raw adrenaline of every move and the tactics and ideas developed not only by Isagi but the rest of the cast and opponents are honestly still incredible. I ended up catching up, which means I got to the final match of the Neo-Egoist league, and now transitioned into the U-20 World Cup!
Kingdom - Up to chapter 845, catching up to the translations available. Another one that I hadn’t read in months. It still is an incredible work of art. This arc focused on the battle to conquer Han, one of the 7 Warring States. Eisen, King of Qin, finally takes the first step towards unifying China. This was one of the most thrilling arcs in a while, as the strategy was all about minimizing the losses and avoiding bloodshed as much as possible, and the conflict between talent and experience. The political side was also very interesting, as Tou, one of Qin’s Six Great General shows the nature of war to the royal family of Han, trying to get them to surrender before it’s too late. After 840+ chapters, Kingdom still rules. I am going to let it simmer again for a while, thankfully the arc concluded before I ran out of chapters!
How to Grill Our Love - Up to chapter 93. Kinda stopped early in the month, but I’ll eventually return to it.
Hunter x Hunter - Up to chapter 396. Since it’s on hiatus, I’d rather wait for now, it’s been amazing so far though.
DanDaDan - Up to chapter 200. Another ongoing one, There’s a few chapters available now but I had stopped because I caught up.
My Wife is from a Thousand Years Ago - up to chapter 250. Suddenly returned to this one, it’s a chinese webtoon, not manga, a pretty funny romcom though.

Books

Nemesis Games - There are a couple of reasons to justify how I’ve only read 19 chapters so far. It is the only book I’ve started this month, the fifth book in The Expanse series by James S.A. Corey, and it has been quite great! This one focuses on the crew of the Rocinante, as they get split up during some downtime as their ship needs repairs. However, a conspiracy unfolds where everyone will end up involved in one way or another, and the tension has been rising since then! I haven’t even finished the first half of the book though, so I am eager to know more.

Anime

Death Note - I have been watching like one chapter every week or so, it’s going slowly but it works well. I watched like 3 episodes, and since I completed the manga, I know what’s coming. It has been cool to experience the sountrack, voices and of course, the story itself in animated form.

I am actually listening to the Latino dub, and it’s really good, I really like dub work in my language, although sometimes it feels weird to recognize some voices. There’s a random cop here that has the same voice actor as Goku himself, which is funny.

Games

There have been months where I play a lot more games than this one, however, the amount of time dedicated to each has been much bigger than before. A lot of progress was made.

The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy is the one impulse purchase I had for a videogame released this year. I justified it by noting the studio behind it was pretty much bankrupt right now, and since I heard this game was great, I decided to just get it, and, on a whim, I decided to just play it.

That was a grave mistake. This is the first game I’ve ever played that has managed to grip me completely for 40+ hours in only two weeks. This visual novel/mario party/tactics rpg has been actually really, really intriguing. I already reached credits on it. But this is one of those where the credits only make where the game actually begins! I definitely plan to continue this journy. The game has 100 different endings, and I plan to at least get a few of them.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild would have been on top—maybe I would have completed it already— if only Last Defense Academy hadn’t showed up. I played a bunch of it, reclaimed the two Divine Beasts I was still missing, and found a couple of memories. I also retrieved the Master Sword and completed some of the Korok Trials.

Of course, the best thing remains just exploring around in the world and finding secrets. I went back to the starting area for a while and have found some shrines I totally missed during the early game, it was kind of awesome to just fly through early enemies and the like. I also discovered a cheese to complete the Tests of Strength without breaking a sweat, which was pretty cool.

Hades also saw quite a bit of progress, as I played a bunch of it early in the month, managing to defeat Hades twice and progress the story further. I will probably return to it at some point after beating THL:LDA, or switch around between these games depending on my mood. I really enjoy the characters here, and the challenge of these new runs has been interesting. The bow remains my preferred weapon, but maybe I should switch it up some day.

Hollow Knight… I think I will beat in August as well, I literally just have to try the final boss. I’ve only battled against it once, but I failed and decided to fill up my percentage a litte more. I did a bit of the DLC and got more collectibles and charms. I have reached 100% of progression (out of 112%) and I think I’m ready to call it a day and reach credits at last. For now, it’s still ongoing.

Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade was pretty much abandoned since June, but I picked it up again late in the month after listening to the Into The Aether podcast talking about the franchise in a couple of recent episodes. I only did Chapter 29x where I bought some supplies and weapons, and I also started Chapter 30. I’m currently halfway through the battle, and I think I’ll finally reach credits pretty soon. Maybe I’ll check Hector’s side of the story, which will be another set of chapters with a higher difficulty, or maybe I’ll just try Sacred Stone or Three Houses.

Some other games I played, mostly for couch gaming would be Portal 2, which I played with a friend who wanted me to try it out, I still don’t play the solo campaign though. I also played Worms W.M.D for a 5-player battle, and the usual Super Smash Bros and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe.

Device Usage

This was definitely a weird month when it comes to device usage. I mostly stuck to my phone and my Nintendo Switch this time.

Laptop Usage

I barely used my computer this time around, many of my blogposts I published from my phone, and when I got home, I mostly stuck to playing on my Switch instead. Only 41 hours total.