Off TopicNov 11, 2022 6:00 pm CT

WRUP: We’re revisiting Wakanda, leveling up, and exploring nature this weekend

This weekend is absolutely packed with things to do… so packed, in fact, that Mitch ran out of time to write WRUP! Amongst our weekend plans are visiting Wakanda with Wakanda Forever, leveling alts in the levelpalooza that is pre-expansion World of Warcraft, checking out the new hotness that is God of War: Ragnarök, and playing a small mountain of older games, because why play the latest games when we have a pile of favorites sitting on our (virtual) shelves?

So let’s get into What aRe yoU Playing for the team this weekend… and then you can join in and tell us what you’re playing to help us find all the games and shows we’re missing out on.

Anna Washenko

These days, I’m doing a lot of trading the controller back and forth with my husband. We’ve been jointly playing a dancer/astrologian in Final Fantasy XIV for several months and are still gradually working through some of the older expansions. Right now we’re getting into the thick of the Shadowbringers story and I’m enjoying it quite a bit. We also decided to boot up Triangle Strategy for the first time last weekend, which is letting me flex my strategic battle skills honed from Fire Emblem Three Houses. One of these days I clearly need to give a go at Final Fantasy Tactics since I’m digging so many homages to it.

Andrew Powers

This is apparently the time of year for vacation, for I will be out of town, and out of the country, beginning this weekend and through the next weekend. I will be going on a Disney Cruise to the Caribbean, stopping in Jamaica and St. Thomas, two places I’ve never been. In the meantime, between these islands, I will be eating, a lot, seeing shows, and generally just relaxing. Not exactly fun in the sun, as I burn, but shade, or indoors, or wherever there is food but no bright light.

However, this article is what to play or watch, so I will have recommendations. First, keeping with the Disney theme, I cannot get enough of the board game Villainous. It is an imbalanced, well-done game, with a lot of expansions that really change how it is played. If you haven’t played it, find someone who has it and pick your favorite Disney villain (that they have, not all are there), and try to do what they couldn’t. Then, for TV, the fourth and final season of Manifest is out on Netflix. It’s one of those good bad shows… or bad good shows, I don’t know. A cross between Lost and any bad crime drama, with overacting and forced mystery… it somehow comes out entertaining. I haven’t started the new season yet, and probably won’t until after vacation. Also, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever comes out this weekend, hopefully they’ll play that on the ship, because I’ll be missing the release.

Christian “Kalcheus” Thoma

God of War: Ragnarök

I’d say something, but I’m too busy prepping to play God of War: Ragnarök.

Cory Taylor

Horizon Forbidden West has eaten up most of my free gaming time, what little I have! Anything not spent playing Horizon has been spent playing ARAM in Heroes of the Storm! Remember HoTS? It’s back, in ARAM form!

For some reason though, Mitch still refuses to play it with me…

Elizabeth Harper

World of Warcraft
Dishonored 1/2

I have been all in on alt leveling in WoW, which moves at an extremely rapid pace with the Winds of Wisdom and anniversary event buffs — that’s before you even get to the Darkmoon Faire and all the other leveling buffs you can potentially get. I finished leveling a Warlock last week, and enjoyed it quite a lot. Right now I’m alternating between a Warrior, Hunter, and Priest, and the Warrior is by far my favorite. There’s just a simple joy in smashing something with giant swords (I’m sure Matt will back me up on this), and the Fury Warrior I’m leveling has very good self-healing to sustain itself for limited downtime. Also I really enjoy using Heroic Leap and Charge to avoid fall damage.

I’ve also been on-again-off-again replaying Dishonored. I finished the first game a few weeks ago and started the second, but have been toying with the idea of going back to the first game to do some achievements, like a no powers run. I’ve done all but one achievement in Dishonored 2, one that requires you to use possession on a chain of creatures in quick succession… that one seems tough, but it feels like I need to do it because it’s the only one left. Since it seems simple to stream on the PS5, I’ve thought about streaming it, too, but haven’t taken the time to set it up.

I have a whole pile of newer games on my to play list, but no — instead I’m playing games that are a decade (or more) old. Par for the course.

Matthew Rossi

World of Warcraft
Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance 2/Diablo 3
Persona 5 Royal — just downloaded, haven’t gotten to play it yet
Warhammer 40k Darktide, which isn’t out yet, but as soon as it is, I will download it and then promptly find it hard to find time to play it
Cyberpunk 2077 — look, I can’t help it, okay, this game is neck and neck with Assassin’s Creed Odyssey for my favorite game of the past 10 years and now it has cross-progression play so I can play it in my office, then switch over and play it on the Xbox.
Visage Day by Steve Danuser
Halo TV Series

I like Halo as a story, so Halo the series is a lot more digestible to me than the games have been. Although I am eyeing Halo Infinite over here, and I love watching various videos on YouTube that set Halo scenes from the games to various songs, like this one or this one or even this one. So I’m basically the main audience for a Halo series. Now, it’s not as good as I think it should be, but even so, it’s pretty enjoyable.

Visage Day is just a really solid short story. I like it, and I reread it from time to time. I’m also reading Sylvanas by Christie Golden, but that one is slow going for me because I’m still made about Darnassus.

Everyone keeps telling me Persona 5 is great, so I’m gonna give Royal a shot since I get to play it free. Darktide is a game I’ve been waiting for, so I’m hoping it’ll be great.

WoW is me trying to get enough Warriors to 60 so I can get them through Dragonflight and into farming transmog content. D3 and BGDA2 are my ARPG fixes.

And Cyberpunk 2077 just owns me. I just can’t escape it.

Mitch “Mitch” Mitchell

Pikmin Bloom

This weekend is a longer one for me, as we get Veterans Day off and I used that as an opportunity to plan a weekend trip. Of course, the trip is both in service of not going stir crazy AND celebrating the Anniversary event in Pikmin Bloom. I know I’ve talked about it a little before, but the point of the app is to walk. I mean, you collect things and such too, but you progress via walking. And I need to do a lot of it for the anniversary event.

So that’s my big weekend plan: A trip out of state with some hiking and camping so I can get digital badges on my phone.

Phil Xavier

World of Warcraft
Hearthstone
Persona 5 Royal

I’m playing a ton of WoW lately as I wrap up my final Shadowlands goals — and I’m really close now — combined with the Darkmoon Faire, Anniversary Event, and upcoming pre-expansion event means that WoW is absolutely dominating my gaming time lately.

But I’m also finding some time for the March of the Lich King event on Hearthstone, and for Persona 5 Royal on the Switch. Somehow.

Rob Flanagan

Cities Skylines

Cities Skylines is free this weekend. I already own it but if anyone wants to join my other addiction….

That is my WRUP, building cities.

Ted Atchley

This is going to be a crazy weekend.

My son has discovered Mario Party 2 which came to the Switch recently. He is great at Sneak and Snore, and we are getting the hang of the Looney Lumberjacks and Cake Factory. I measure the score in laughs and smiles, and this game is a big winner. I’m also still enjoying Marvel SNAP. We just got a brand new season with a Wakanda/Black Panther theme since the new Wakanda Forever movie is coming out this weekend.

Speaking of Wakanda Forever, I’m heading out to see it on Saturday. The last two MCU titles have been pretty ‘meh’ for me, but I have high hopes that I’ll enjoy Wakanda Forever. I absolutely loved the first one, and I’m sure we’ll feel the enormous shadow of Chadwick Boseman’s passing throughout. I’m also a huge fan of Ironheart, and I can’t wait to see what angle they take on her story.

On the Star Wars front, Andor episode 10 was a 10/10 episode of TV. Not just Star Wars TV, any TV. Absolutely fantastic. So much rightful praise for Skarsgård and Serkis. The monologue was pure fire. Genevieve O’Reilly crushes her only scene by wordlessly delivering a devastating moment for her character.

I’ve also started a new project for NaNoWriMo which I’m calling Project Paladin until I come up with a better name. I’m currently around 6k words, which is well behind the pace I need to hit 50k by the end of the month, especially with us going on vacation the weekend after Thanksgiving. The good news is I have the day off from my “day job” on Friday which should free up some quality writing time.

And that’s a wrap for this week’s WRUP! But tell us, what are you playing… or watching, or reading, or doing this weekend? After all, we still have game backlogs to fill, so if we’re missing out on a great game you’ve been playing, let us know in the comments!

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