The Queue: What a week, huh?

After a long week, Rutherford and I are really looking forward to some well-earned R&R. Because man, has it been a long week.

This is The Queue, where you ask us questions and we’ll answer right after this nap. Oh, no time for a nap today? Well, let’s go anyway.

I think my favorites are the one that seem acrobatic in their sneakiness. I really enjoy the female Pandaren one and the Blood Elf female one, because they both look like they’re about to soundlessly parkour onto a roof for a better vantage point.

That’s right, it’s time for the Spring Balloon Festival! But no, I don’t want to spend any time with that poaching Hemingway wannabe.

I do find it pretty interesting that they’ve been able to keep that specific set of references in the game as long as they have with nobody pointing out exactly what Hills Like White Elephants is about, though, considering it’s such an incredibly volatile topic even today. I guess when you just make the whole thing about literal elephants people will just take that at face value.

It’s been pretty thoroughly debunked now, but even if the 10,000 hours of practice theory didn’t pan out, I’d think the literal eternity the Brokers have spent in Oribos honing their craft compared to the lifespan of a typical Orc would probably give them a technical edge in any kind of crafting. Yes, there are entities that have natural aptitude, like the Runecarver, but I’d guess that any being you’d assign to a specific crafting task in Oribos would have far surpassed nearly every normal living being on Azeroth by orders of magnitude.

Now that I think of it, in hindsight it seems weird that Orcs and Dwarves are considered the best smiths, and we don’t just make Blood Elves and Night Elves do literally any and all crafting on Azeroth. Of course those races may have raw talent, but in terms of experience it has to be like the difference between 30 year old and a two year old drawing something. Even if the 30 year old sucks at drawing and the 2 year old is a freakin prodigy, the 30 year old’s drawing is going to be objectively better.

The Long Dark. I may have talked about this one here before.

There can be stressful moments if you’re playing on the higher difficulty levels, but on the easiest difficulty wildlife runs away from you instead of trying to attack you, and blizzards rarely last long. After a while you do have to kill animals for meat, but you can even opt to just use bows and arrows instead of guns — the BLAM of a rifle isn’t exactly zen.

I always found the looting phase of the game a really great dopamine treadmill, and then once you get everything looted and in the open, you can establish a base or two for yourself in the abandoned buildings. Arranging the “pantry” is always fun. And then everything beyond that is just wide open skies in a very Bob Ross painterly style. It gives me a taste of the outdoors without actually having to put on real pants.

Also, in the middle of this weird fuel crisis, I have to endorse Truck Sims (either American or Euro). Just you and the open road… and sometimes an AI car that cuts you off.