Tag: Blizzard

What I'm Playing: Mostly iOS Edition

Apple Arcade

  • Various Daylife: Previously described, an RPG life simulator. Slow, tedious, but mildly interesting. Worst title of any game I've heard of. Mediocre.
  • Chu-Chu Universe: Yes, this is another Chu-Chu Rocket, in 3D with shitty controls. I like the slow logic puzzles, but I've played the better version of this game hundreds of hours on the DS (yes, I hear you, two lonely Dreamcast users out there), don't really need a new one. Also, it makes my iPhone 8+ extremely hot along the top-right corner; GPU-heavy with no way to turn that off? Mediocre.
  • What The Golf: Sort of a ripoff of Desert Golfing with a mini-golf course and QWOP or RSSS style physics antics. I'm easily amused by bad physics games, they remind me of Waterful Ring Toss from my childhood. Nice.
  • Sayonara Wild Hearts: Very pretty neon style. Unplayably sluggish movement even at "high" sensitivity setting, forces you to sit through minutes of slow dialogue about hippie tarot bullshit before you can play anything. Deleted after one track. And I like endless runners, so if that's not your thing it'll be even less pleasant. Fail.
  • Inmost: Monochrome pixely, but pretentious starting text "is a moving story of loss and hope, with themes". Incredibly slow, "platformer" but with very little platforming. No dialogue, tap or X does everything so you just have to pixel-hump targets and wait for the action to appear. Fail.

So far this is not a service I'll be renewing. There's nothing here I couldn't get better for that money.

Not Apple Arcade

  • World of Warcraft Classic: I was happy at the start, but rapidly got less so: The sharding is really interfering with gameplay, so I took a break, and then Blizzard decided they'd rather support the totalitarian citizen-murdering dictatorship of the Chinese Communist Party than one streamer calling for the independence of democratic Hong Kong. Just to make my position clear: Free Hong Kong! Break up China! Do not punish people for expressing support for democracy, you evil corporate douchebags. Yeah, they gave him back his prize money, but still banned him. Screw that. Cancelled my sub.
  • Elder Scrolls Online: ZOS has a new combat team this year, and they've ruined my Sorcerer build, even worse nerfs are coming in the next patch, and I don't want to pursue total changes to his skills, gear, and gameplay in hopes of maybe ever clearing content again. I was thinking about ending my ESO+ sub for a while, but then WoW blew up so I'm playing my Khajiit Vampire Mag Necromancer "Mortissa Kamidjanni" as main, and having a fun time again; ZOS haven't nerfed the new class yet, ha ha! (I also have a Stam Warden, who was born nerfed, and a Mag Nightblade which is usually the unnerfed class but I don't like the gameplay for that combo). ESO has four kinds of content: Overworld content, which has quests but combat is trivial and boring; Bosses (world or dungeon), which have no interesting quests, combat can be fun but often needs a group and I hate PUGs; Trading, which is slightly interesting but I'm obscenely rich in-game already; and Housing decoration, which is sort of the endgame when you have millions of gold. So my Necro kitty does some overworld quests to get skill points, mats, and recipes, then switch to my Sorc Elf to do housing. It's something to do. Good but so disappointing compared to what it could be.
  • Mario Kart Tour: It's Mario Kart with gacha-like unlocks. Just as stupidly unfair as ever. Mildly fun if you have no attachment to skill determining who "wins" a race. Recommended age range: 1-7.
  • Mirage Memorial: Big-titty waifu versions of historical and mythical figures (many are men converted to women… King Arthur, Edward "Blackbeard" Teach, etc wtf, but also Lucifer, Athena, etc). Unskippable tutorial with no choices for the entire first chapter, and every time a new feature unlocks. Combat is an auto-idler thing; you CAN turn auto off and hit portraits to activate a random skill, but that's it. Somewhat interesting character level-up system, no character is "useless" but may need a lot of grinding to build up. I did a level grind up to 17 in a couple hours while watching Netflix, got bored out of my skull, turned it off. I'm not saying avoid or delete this, but be aware of what it is, which is nothing.
  • Another Eden: Has had a couple new chapter updates, I intend to get back into this.
  • Last Cloudia: Just launching today, looks very pretty. Here's a beginner's guide

World of Warcraft Classic

This is pretty exciting.

  • I started in original World of Warcraft as a Dwarf Hunter (IIRC, I made a Nelf Rogue first, but that did NOT work for me), determined quickly that I hated Alliance as a bunch of juvenile Nazi-wannabes and switched to the real heroes, The Horde!, played an Undead Mage, didn't progress as much as I'd like due to real life but had fun.
  • Burning Crusade was great, and rather stereotypically I started over with a Blood Elf Warlock (selama ashal'anore!) and maxed out, did some raiding, loved that version of the game. Outland is amazing, that's some of the best content WoW or any game ever made.
  • Lich King was OK but kind of same-y and grindy—why make Dalaran when Shattrath exists and is better? Why are there two indistinguishable forest zones and two indistinguishable undead zones?
  • Cataclysm wrecked everything in the world and in character; it did add some detail to areas that needed it, but it's not worth it.
  • Pandaria had a nice setting and the Monk was a fun class, with beer as a powerup drink!, but letting the Pandas choose their faction made no sense (Goblins in particular, and all the neutral-ish races in general, should've been able to choose, too!), and the higher-level content is trash.
  • Everything after is even worse. After 15 years, what we've learned is that Blizzard can't improve content, only make it worse; everyone good left after Classic and Burning Crusade, and institutionally they aren't able to hire best-of-breed writers or game designers. Restoring Classic is really the only option they have.

So, I've been following this WoW Classic thing a while, since in 2016 when the Nostalrius, RIP and Elysium private servers let me play classic "vanilla" World of Warcraft again; I was frustrated by bugs, and basically couldn't use airships or ships because they'd drop me halfway in an out-of-level zone or the ocean, but it was interesting to have a version of WoW that didn't suck. As previously, I played an Undead Mage; that or Warlock seems most likely when Classic goes live. I am what I am, which is an evil sorcerous corpse.

Crendor and ClassiCast have done excessively exhaustive dialogues of what they want from Classic, which is a super-conservative "No Changes!". I'm much more moderate about this. If they add achievements (added in Lich King), pet battles (added in Pandaria), barbershop (added in Lich King), and use new models (added in Warlords of Draenor), I'd be fine with that; those improve the game without changing any balance. Dungeon/Raid Finder wouldn't bother me, I likely wouldn't use them, since I loathe PUGs (pick-up groups, not tiny inbred dogs), but they're a boon to people in no guild or a small guild that can't organize those things. The actual gameplay should be like the last patch of Classic, or the last patch of Burning Crusade when/if they add that content.

I'd totally be up for getting a "Virtual Ticket" for Blizzcon just to try the demo, except it's $50! That's like, a case of beer and a bottle of whiskey, which is a far more entertaining weekend (please drink more responsibly than me). Minecon on Saturday is free; it's not a real convention anymore (I went to Minecon Vegas back when the audience was much more adult). How the fuck does Blizzard justify $50 for some videos?! So anyway guess I'll just watch Youtubes of the demo when they come out.