WRUP: This weekend, we’re playing Diddy Kong Racing 2, the Blackthorne remaster, and more!

Hello and happy April! We’re lucky in that the start of the month and WRUP — What aRe yoU Playing? — both fall on the same day this month. So, in honor of the start of April, I’ve asked the Blizzard Watch crew to include a little something extra in their answers — see if you can figure it out! (It’s fairly obvious.)

Mitch “Mitch” Mitchell

• Elden Ring
• Diddy Kong Racing 2
• Kirby and the Forgotten Land
• Mass Effect 3

I’m going to be spending this weekend (probably) finishing up Elden Ring, after having spent over 100 hours to get to where I am now. When I’m not doing that, it’ll be the usual Kirby/Mass Effect pairing, assuming my GF and I end up finding the time for those. We keep saying we’ll play ME3 and then life gets in the way.

I’ll also be playing the top secret alpha of Diddy Kong Racing 2, the long-awaited sequel to the N64 classic that was overshadowed by Mario Kart. It’s truly impressive how they’ve managed to keep the feel of the old game while still innovating on the power-ups and overworld! This is definitely the sequel worth waiting 25 years for!

Christian “Kalcheus” Thoma

• What We Do in the Shadows
• Granma’s Hand
• Thirsty Sword Lesbians
• Wanderhome
• Donkey Kong 3 Country

Taking a break from catching up on Disney animated films to watch What We Do in the Shadows, whose third season got nominated for a Nebula award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation. I’m halfway through the first season and am enjoying it immensely and I have to say Colin is my favorite of the vampires simply because he feels like something out of my own life.

After finishing Coyote & Crow last weekend I’m now reading through the 3 other TTRPG Nebula nominations for Game Writing: Granma’s Hand, Thirsty Sword Lesbians, and Wanderhome.

The home office is getting organized this weekend, so I’m not going to have the opportunity to play many games (or do any miniature painting). That said, I can cart around my Switch and so I’m going to be enjoying the first new Donkey Kong 3 game in almost 40 years: Donkey Kong 3 Country! Like the original, you play as Stanley the Bugman — not Mario the Plumber — and have to get Donkey Kong out of your greenhouse while fighting off bees and wasps and other stinging nasties. The new version has a real RPG aspect, letting you upgrade your equipment as you work your way from location to location. There’s rumors that the final level has you actually teaming up with Donkey Kong to fight the villainous Queen Wasp, but surely that’s a lie.

Joe Perez

• Elden Ring
• Have a Nice Death

I have begun working on my most ambitious project to date as of last night. My entry for next years Golden-Demon US competition. I have a plan in place, and the models to start working on, so now I begin my year long journey in pursuit of one of the most coveted painting awards in the hobby.

Besides that I will be playing some more Have a Nice Death, as well as Elden Ring. That game just keeps on going and going and going. Never ending. and I keep finding new ways to … explore. Yeah we’ll call it that. Also I am re-reading the official release of the Sylvanas novel as it’s always good to read the final version.

Ted Atchley

• Sam and Max Hit the Road
• Nintendo Switch Online Classic library
• SWTOR

We upgraded my son’s Nintendo Switch Online to Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack. While this was mostly to get the new DLC Mario Kart tracks, he’s now experiencing Nintendo 64 and SEGA for the first time. It’s crazy to me how much he loves all these old games. The pixelated graphics don’t bother him at all. His favorites so far are F-Zero X, Star Fox 64 and Paper Mario.

In SWTOR, my friend couldn’t make our gaming night due to some sportsball thing. Something about madness. I blame N’Zoth. Anyway, I made a new Chiss Bounty Hunter Sniper to see the Bounty Hunter story. The Sniper class is so much fun, but I’ve been told the class isn’t desirable in end game content. You have to use a global cooldown to root yourself to use your hardest hitting abilities. Why am I always drawn to classes that are terrible at the end game?

Finally, one of the programmers I work with at my ‘day job’ used to work for EA. His old team is working on a remaster of the LucasArts game, Sam and Max Hit the Road. Besides updating the graphics for today’s best video cards, certain plot points and gags will be updated as well. South of the Border will be added as an additional tourist trap, and the bungee jumping at Mount Rushmore will be replaced by zip lining over Niagara Falls. Finally, instead of a vegetable resembling John Muir, the duo must now find a potato chip resembling Jamie Lee Curtis.

Phil Xavier

• Duck Hunt Remastered
• Triangle Strategy NG+
• Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore
• Pokémon Legends: Arceus

I’ve finished Triangle Strategy, but I’ll keep playing it on New Game+, since there are three whole endings left for me to see, with different story choices to make and characters to recruit along the way.

That said, I’ll play it alongside the two games that I had put on hold to focus exclusively on Triangle Strategy: Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore and Pokémon Legends: Arceus. Time to pick them up from where I left them.

But I’m definitely way more excited about Duck Hunt Remastered. I found an adapter on ShadyDeals Dot Net that lets me hook my original NES gun to my PS4, and it works perfectly so far — can’t believe it only cost me $3! I hope to be able to beat every level on Hard, because doing that unlocks a brand-new mode: Untitled Goose Hunt. Can’t wait!

Andrew Powers

• DC deck builder
• Mario Party After Dark

This weekend is our second monthly game night, that falls on the first Saturday of the month. The game I have been obsessing over is DC deck builder. Pick a favorite DC superhero, one of the Justice League, maybe a Teen Titan, or a Birds of Prey. Gain power from the few cards in your starting deck, use that to buy more cards such as equipment, superpowers, heroes, villains… think, “I know that character from this show or movie!” or wonder, “Who is that?” Then turn to Wikipedia and learn your DC lore. It’s a fun game. I loved collectible card games, but the cost of collecting is too much — I’m looking at you, Hearthstone. This gives you that sense of collecting while you play, but the game is self-contained, you don’t have to buy packs and worry about duplicates. Also, I can be Batman.

Then, at the game night, we’ll all be playing the new video game great for groups — Mario Party After Dark. It’s just Nintendo’s way to reuse the same Mario Party maps again, but this time, they’ve turned it into a drinking game. Landed on a red space? Take a drink. Chance time! Maybe you’ll lose coins, maybe steal a star, or maybe you’ll take a drink. And then the dreaded Bowser space, it’s time to chug, chug, chug! While it’s nice to see Nintendo trying to break away from their overly kid-friendly image, I don’t know how I feel about the tie-in to them promoting their new brand of gin. Especially since it’s Princess Peach flavor.

Matthew Rossi

• Blackthorne remaster
• Horizon Forbidden West
• Cyberpunk 2077,
• DLC for Wrath of the Righteous

Of course the usual suspects — Horizon Forbidden West, Cyberpunk 2077, and the new DLC for Wrath of the Righteous are all on my radar and I’ll be playing at least two of them. Life takes up time, and I have to get in this Blackthorne remaster — it’s an old Super NES classic and I can’t wait to see how it plays modernized to an open world RPG a la The Witcher series. Will this be my Assassin’s Creed Odyssey of 2022? I can only hope.

Liz Patt

• Operation Neptune reboot
• Diablo 3

No blue rose yet, Watchers. I really feel like I’ve been doing this forever. And for those kind kind folks — yes I’ve had people on my island to water my flowers for me. Maybe I should sacrifice a rubber chicken to N’Zoth?

I’m super excited to finally dive into the Operation Neptune reboot with my nephew! The release promises a classic MS DOS performance experience and has been tuned to provide fewer ink pellets based on your graphics card model. Instead of data canisters, you get to collect pieces of garbage that spell out hidden messages from the planet’s new alien overlords.

Finally, I’ve gotta hop onto D3 (ideally this weekend) because there is ONE conquest standing between me and that pet. It shall be mine, darn it!

Aaaaand that’s our WRUP for this week! I hope you all enjoyed our pie-in-the-sky reboot/remaster/remake picks. Sadly, none of them actually exist (yet). Happy April!