The QueueAug 16, 2023 12:00 pm CT

The Queue: Break Glass, Release The Kraken

Sorry, y’all, there was a Mitch emergency (I’m sure you saw the Mitch Signal) and so, the emergency Queue host protocol dictates that I step in and provide you with a Queue. You guys like tentacles, right?

JALAMENOS

All the original cast from the movie? Sign me up!

I discovered this new Scott Pilgrim Netflix series by reading the Queue and seeing Jalamenos’ comment but it’s from today so a lot of you might not have, and so, here it is again in today’s Queue. I found the movie to be surprisingly good, and Brie Larson’s rendition of Black Sheep is one of my go to writing songs.

DOMEHAMMER

Decided to level my balance druid, the class just feels feels weak. I had to fix my talents cause I was so pathetically weak I was almost dying with every pull, now I can safely kill mobs but I just don’t feel strong at all.

I hope you’re not leveling it out of some sense of obligation. Life is too short and there are so many demands on our time, playing a game and not enjoying it is simply not acceptable to me. If Balance isn’t feeling right, maybe try Feral or Guardian. But not Resto, come on, it’s so 2005.

That’s a joke, Resto players. I have no idea how Resto is right now.

ROXXII THE SMOLDERING

For the second week in a row we didn’t raid because we didn’t have enough people. I think a lot of our raid is vacationing. So I leveled my gnomes instead. I got my lock to 60 and will sit her there for now. My mage completed Wetlands and got to level 26. Not sure where I want to go next. Might swap to Highmountain once I hit 30.

I mean, you could always play a Murder Elf in Baldur’s Gate 3.

Despite all the people being really obnoxious on YouTube about how BG3 means that all other games will be destroyed in fire, it is really good. I love playing D4 after BG3, the sheer difference makes my brain hum. Both are good, both are very different, I recommend both.

AMBULANCE ROBOTS

After taking a couple characters through all the races so I could buy all the things, I have opinions.

Durotar Tour and Un’Goro Crater Circuit can both die in a pit, for completely different reasons. Durotar Tour likes to put tiny tree branches in just the right spot to bring a one ton dragon going Mach 8 to an absolute complete stop, and the Un’Goro Crater Circuit is tuned… super high. Like, wtf.

Conversely, you need free gold races? Razorfen Roundabout takes into account the tight turns and gives you plenty of time to hit things, careen wildly into the ground, and still make comfortably under time. I hit the ground once on one character, made it back into the air, built momentum back up, still hit gold on advanced. XD

I’m happy to find out there’s a race that someone as terrible at Dragonriding as I am can potentially finish.

CAPTAIN CAKEWALK, EMBER KITTY!

Me: I’ll download BG3 and then bed!

Steam and my internet: *500~ KB/s*

Me: :D

DANG IT!

Look, I don’t have a sponsorship deal with GOG, so me telling you that I got it over there and it was pretty reasonable in terms of download speed may or may not be of any help to you. Still, I did, and it was.

MUSEDMOOSE

Q4tMitchQueue: if the lore-suggested fifth Old God appears soon, what could it do to tear you away from your devotion to Yogg-Saron?

Based on this documentary evidence I’ve found, it would use its arms. (As far as I know, they have both tentacles and arms. Those things raking the deck of that ship are arms, they have suckers all along their length.) Potentially it might use stop motion animation or even CGI, depending on what kind of feel we’re going for.

Regardless, it would likely tear people away from others with brute force. That’s my guess, anyway.

SHUANNA_PATENTPENDING

I somehow stumbled upon a supercut of BfA cinematics and since I didn’t have anything better to do I watched them. Dudes and dudettes – that’s one dark expansion, just saying (I haven’t played since Legion so it came as bit of a shock tbh). There’s a lot of PTSD in pretty much every main character, almost everyone comes close to dying and poor old Grumpy Gramps definitely dies. I mean Saurfang Sr – a likeable orc, all things considered. It’s like the devs hired Shakespeare and he handed them a treatment of Hamlet with ideas from Hurt Locker and Platoon.

Besides gameplay, was BfA really that dark? The story, I mean? That’s harsh if true. The prequel was Legion which was like Woody Allen having a really bad day while dabbling with black magic, then followed Shadowlands which seems to me be like Ingemar Bergman on a Woody Allen day, all doom and gloom?

No wonder they tried to lighten things up with dragons … Uhm, did they succeed?

(If WoW will continue down this mental disorder path for all heroes I used to somehow like, I’m not sure if I want to resub tbh. I’ve got enough demons to battle.)

I would argue that it certainly had dark moments, and my feelings on the whole Let’s burn Teldrassil and kill thousands of innocent victims to make Sylvanas look even more like a bad guy part of it are well known by this point. Honestly, if the expansion hadn’t suddenly veered into Exeunt, pursued by an Old God at the end, I probably would have like it more — the psychological trauma and horrors of war angle of the expansion was something WoW and Warcraft in general often glosses over.

Even looking back over the whole of the Warcraft setting, there are a lot of moments that never really get the weight they deserve. One of the things I like about Dragonflight is how it explores all that trauma and darkness without wallowing in it. The whole deal with Nordormu and the Fractures in Time focuses on hope while not shying away from how awful it is to feel like you have none and your fate is preordained, for example.

But yeah, I’m never going to forget Jaina’s whole journey in BFA. I still remember her Are you the bomb this time moment and honestly get the shivers from it, and seeing Saurfang use Varian’s sword — even splitting it in half to surprise Sylvanas — even I, Alliance apologist that I am, felt the old Orc earned his heroes death in that scene.