After taking a gap year, Audrey is entering her second year on staff for The Central Trend. In her free time, you can find her reading, practicing music for Jazz Ensemble, or just playing games with her friends.
Favorite color: Cobalt
Favorite story type: Columns, reviews, and editorials
Favorite song: “Fly Me To The Moon” by Frank Sinatra
As I am sitting at my screen, my room is lit by two sole pale lights. One is the ceiling fan that drives me mad with its lack of hue, and the other a blank Google doc: an essay I haven’t written. That’s...
When I was younger, I had all these little ideas about who I would be when I grew up—of who I wanted to be when I got older and where I thought I’d be going
Though here I am today, with eighteen...
The first Sonic the Hedgehog movie is, to this day, one of the best video game movies—at least I believe it is. I’m not trying to say that’s a very prestigious title; I mean, what competition does...
Games have shaped my life in amazing ways. From changing who I am and how I act, to just building the bonds between me and my friends, they have shaped me.
I grew up with what my brothers did. So when...
Sometimes finding a deeper meaning is hard. A hidden message or lesson I can learn from the world around me is sometimes not there. The amount of games from which I either have learned something from or...
Honestly, this past year has been a mess, and nothing about it makes sense anymore. I always thought I knew who I was, who I was going to be, but 2021 had a different plan for me.
Going into the year,...
To grow distant. To watch the things you love leave you. To deal with the loss of what you once had. It hurts. To see friends grow distant. To know that the bond you shared is suddenly gone and you don’t...
Some of my favorite games are those that have been removed from the developer's hands. Games that have intense modding scenes tend to spark the most creativity. To me, Minecraft comes to mind. So many...
Nobody Saves the World is a game that sounds like its world is doomed. With Nobody in charge of saving it, the calamity has grown restless and seeks to cause death all around.
It just happens that Nobody...
The silent and subtle push and influence we have on the world is all around us all the time. In the same vein, the world pushes back—it influences us just as silently. Strangers we might never meet again...
To escape reality, I’d go to some far extremes. I have always sought a world better than our own. One in which I could help. One in which my problems weren’t getting out of bed and trying to feel happy,...
There used to be nights where the time that passed around me was obsolete until the morning’s light was blinding me. So immersed in the worlds I chose over ours, that nothing was there to take me away.
Those...
Opinions expressed in editorials on The Central Trend are the view of the individual writer and are not the opinion of the entire staff of The Central Trend or the Forest Hills Central staff or administration.
For...
Jem - for always being there for me
Thank you for being there for me in my darkest times. You never fail to brighten my mood and make my days bearable. I wish we could hang out more often, but I still...
Tod Howard, the creator of Skyrim, has done it again. He has released even more content for his dying horse of a game.
Skyrim is an open-world RPG in which you mainly walk around empty fields and fight...
If you asked band director Laura Zilhaver about getting a full orchestra together, she’d tell you that COVID-19 made it challenging; however, she is bringing back one of the band’s traditions that...
It always feels impossible until it’s done.
Hobbies are inconceivably intriguing to me. You might like reading or sports, but for me, it’s video games. I can spend hours sitting in the same chair...
Baldur’s Gate Three is the best D&D video game, but it can’t compare to the original.
If you didn’t know, I am a fan of the famous tabletop roleplaying game, or TTRPG, D&D. Baldur’s...
Atmosphere: one of my favorite tools in media. It makes the viewer uncomfortable through music choice, visuals, and more that they sometimes don't even notice. If I had to pick only one game series that...
One of the things I look forward to is the announcement of new content for one of my favorite games, whether, in the form of DLC (downloadable content) locked behind a paywall or just a simple update,...
I’ve always liked block games. To be honest, who doesn’t like Minecraft? That’s not what I'm talking about though. This is the other block game that is my most played game ever.
Let’s set the...
I grew up on a lot of different video games, but one prevalent franchise from my childhood was Sonic. I would play the original Sonic Adventure—not the Sonic Adventure 2 though—Sonic Unleashed for...
Minecraft is a game that almost everyone knows.
With it being the most purchased game in history with two-hundred thirty-eight million copies sold, you can expect it to have a large community of people...
What made you decide to join Improv?
"I joined the Improv team because I saw the show last year, and it looked like a lot of fun. Also, [senior] Benji Zorn reached out to me and told me that he thought...
Aliens: Fireteam Elite is a great game, but it's only sometimes a good representation of Aliens.
The game takes place in the world of Aliens, which should be obvious enough, and the main story takes...
Paper Mario the Thousand Year Door (TTYD) is one of my favorite games. Good thing my Wii can no longer read the disc right? Fortunately, emulation is a great tool for those who run into this problem, want...
Beauty is a standard many try to live up to, yet many fail to meet. Media shares this quality with us.
Directors don’t make movies or plays for money. Composers don’t write songs for money. Developers...
One hundred eighty.
That number alone is quite small, but when you add six zeroes to the end, you get the number of copies of Minecraft that have been sold.
It would not be an understatement to call...
Atrocious.
The only word necessary to describe how I felt about the original Sonic design. Luckily Paramount, the studio behind Sonic The Hedgehog, redesigned the model to one worthy of praise. Yet,...
Bang, crash, clang.
Sound plays a huge role in my life, but it is even more predominant in video games.
Music carries a mood and silence as well as an atmosphere. Sound design makes the largest impact...
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate has been out for just over a year. In this time it has gone through seven major updates, five of which added new characters, all of which are supposed to feel unique.
The...
Psychology: the study of the mind.
Psychology has always been interesting to me.
Psychology is a way to look into the mind, mine or others.
One aspect of my life that has always been intertwined...
Freshman Serena Thiede is an athlete and a performer. She has dipped her hands in several different sports: dance, soccer, track, and golf, which is her favorite.
Serena started her golf career due...
People scare me.
New people and old acquaintances alike scare me. I am horrible at interacting with people, so I fear I’ll, in some unholy fashion, completely break any relations I have with people.
I...
I have issues with time management, so when a game I have been really looking forward to comes out, I have a difficult time putting it down.
On January 17, Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore, a JRPG,...
Orchestra director Andrew Pool loves teaching all the kids he gets to teach, from Central Woodlands all the way to the high school.
Teaching at three schools as a full-time job might seem like a negative...
The Wii U was a failed console, but it walked so the Nintendo Switch could run. One of my favorite games that came out on the Nintendo Switch is Shovel Knight.
Even though the game came out nearly...
There is a 1.3 percent chance that someone dies in a car crash. Not to sound pessimistic, but one would have to be pretty lucky to have that happen.
Luck is defined as success or failure based on chance...
Monsters that are at least thrice your height, are able to kill you with ease, and are immaculately satisfactory to take down.
There is a game that I have been highly anticipating for release...
At four am, I look like a decrepit, unwrapped mummy with hair. I feel exhausted—like I could pass out, but I don’t. I work on my article of the month paper for my Honors English 10 class that is due...
To say that deep down, I’m a sap for romantics is an understatement. So when I heard of a modern remake of Lady and the Tramp, I was ecstatic.
The film is a mix of real actors and CGI, computer-generated...
FHC’s new Model UN teacher Trevor Riley cares for the political engagement of his students. He believes that students should be more engaged in political activities. He believes that the younger generations...
I’ve never had many friends. I only have one or two real, close friends at any given moment, so I spend much of my time online.
Most days I perform the same routine: wake up, make facades for conversations...
The falling snow was illuminated by the Barnes and Noble’s lights which masked the deceptively large building known as the Cheesecake Factory. I got out of my mom’s car and stared up at the horizon...
