News

Changes on Melfka.com

NewsENIf you’re visiting the Polish version of my website, you might have noticed there haven’t been any blog updates since the beginning of 2016, while the English version posts kept being published.

I’ve made a decision to cease the translation of the posts into Polish, as it often messed up my schedule and resulted in a rushed translation which I wasn’t fully satisfied with. And since most of my visitors chose the English version, maintaining the Polish version of the blog seemed a bit pointless.

The Polish version of the website will still have all my publishing/releases information available, in the new tab called “News” (also available in English for those who’d rather skip my personal rants), and the personal blog posts will be in English only, and on a separate subpage. (more…)

2 Comments
March 28, 2016
As a Side Note

A to Z Challenge: Theme Reveal

A2Z-BADGE_[2016]I’ve known about A to Z Challenge for a couple of years now, but I never got around to joining it. Mostly because I never considered myself a blogger, and my posting schedule is still at best “shaky”, with merely a post a week (or even less). But, as you can guess, this year is different and I’ll be doing my best to post 26 posts throughout April (Sundays excluded, everybody needs a bit of rest!), each related to one letter of the alphabet.

And today is the challenges day for theme reveal. (more…)

36 Comments
March 21, 2016
Gaming Writer's Saturday

Gaming Writer’s Saturday: Shadowrun Hong Kong

1With all the positive impressions I’ve had about Shadowrun Returns and Shadowrun: Dragonfall, it was certain I’d play the newest installment of the acclaimed cRPG series. As the Kickstarter campaign hit stretch goal after stretch goal, I expected the game to be even better and more exciting than the previous parts, yet I hope the developers would manage to keep what was the best in the previous games: Shadowrun’s mood, interesting characters and engaging story. Did they succeed? (more…)

7 Comments
March 12, 2016
A Month of Writing / On Writing

A Month of Writing – February 2016

MoW-ENAs you might know, February was the month of a big move for me. Busy with wrapping up various official things, packing my belongings, and cleaning my apartment, I didn’t have time and energy to write much, and not only I didn’t manage to write every day, but also didn’t meet my goal of the average 1000 words a day. Have I failed this month’s 365k Club challenge?

No.

I’d rather say February was quite a success for me. (more…)

11 Comments
March 7, 2016
Personal Rants

Of The Endings

8 yearsin IrelandFor the last several weeks I’ve been quite literally sorting out my life. My one bedroom apartment, full of things I needed, loved, or forgot I have, became a game of choice. Items went into boxes, trash bags, or into hands of my friends. I sorted them as necessities that would stay with me till the very end, and as things that could be shipped early, to await for my arrival in the new place. I found old notes for stories and rediscovered some of the earrings I haven’t worn for a while. I made decisions of what I need, and what can be bought again if necessary. And my brain constantly re-listed the things I still needed to do before leaving Ireland “forever”.

For the last several weeks I swung in a triangle of stress, excitement, and nostalgia. (more…)

12 Comments
February 22, 2016
As a Side Note / Personal Rants

When Things Pile Up

When Things Pile UpIt think happens to most of us. We make ambitious plans, we jump on a chance that came unexpected or we simply feel we should be doing more in our lives. Tasks pile upon tasks, obligations we took upon ourselves take our breathing space, and we suddenly stop, overwhelmed by it all, unable to find a way through the chaos we brought upon ourselves. (more…)

10 Comments
February 1, 2016
On Writing

7 Reasons to Write Short Stories

7 reasons to write Short StoriesI have a confession to make: I like short stories. I like to read them, those morsels of distant worlds, bite-sized and perfect for lunchtime and commuting. I like to write them too as they help me experiment with my style and explore all those tiny bits of ideas that wouldn’t suffice to become a basis of a novel. But for some reason many writers I talk to them online neither writes them or considers them worth the effort. Sure, one can’t make much money by writing short stories only, but there are still reasons to stop outlining that sixth novel in the series and instead tell a story in less than 7000 words. (more…)

11 Comments
January 25, 2016
Gaming Writer's Saturday

Gaming Writer’s Saturday: NEO Scavenger

1I’m not particularly happy with how young adult so called “dystopias” distort the post-apocalyptic genre (and the Huxley and Orwell dystopia in the first place), but that’s a rant for another time. Needless to say, I prefer the mood set by Fallout 2 (and Fallout 3 too), even if not fully realistic, surely more gritty and pos-tapocalyptic than the “youngsters against oppressing faction” we get in books and movies nowadays.

That’s why NEO Scavenger caught my attention. I’ve never heard about the game, but the reviews promised a survival game, and I got hooked when I’ve learned they didn’t just mean slaughtering endless waves of mutated animals and raiders. In fact, when playing the game, you’ll more often find yourself frantically trying to run away from a famished dog than tryingto take it down. Because fights mean wounds and wounds in post-apocalyptic world can kill you faster than you can say “young adult dystopia”. (more…)

0 Comments
January 16, 2016
On Writing

7 Pieces of Advice for 365k Club Participants

7 Pieces of AdviceThe first year of 365k Club has not only been a wonderful adventure for me, but also allowed me to learn a lot about myself and my writing process. When I signed up, I expected myself to fall miserably, maybe even drop out after the first month, but to my surprise, I stayed, writing my 1000 words every day. But I know exactly how intimidating the 365k Club may feel in the beginning: so many words to be written and so many days in the year. It’s not NaNoWriMo where one can plan a month devoted to writing. It’s a real challenge, because we need to build our writing habit around our daily lives. We need to incorporate it into the daily routines, family life, day job… It’s much harder than telling friends and family we’ll be unavailable for November. (more…)

6 Comments
January 4, 2016