Blizzard Watch Weekly: There’s no news because we’re all busy gaming

Well, not really since we do take occasional breaks from gaming to write, but the past week has really been dominated by The War Within’s launch. Most of us here at Blizzard Watch have been binging our way through the latest expansion, and we’ve written a ton of guides along the way.

If you haven’t jumped into the game yourself — or if you’ve been playing so much that you can’t keep up with what else is going on in gaming — here’s a rundown of what’s happening this week and what’s coming up next week.

New this week

• World of Warcraft: The War Within officially launched, and though we’ve seen plenty of bugs (does anyone know if the Auction House is working again?) and a couple of unexpected morning maintenance periods, the overall launch has gone pretty smoothly and we haven’t had any serious gameplay issues, even though unfortunately Blizzard has decided we’re leveling too quickly and increased the power of mobs to make things a little more challenging. We have lots of guides to help you tackle the new expansion, but these are the ones that  I think are most helpful:
  • How to get around Dornogal, a huge city with every possible amenity
  • How to unlock portals around Khaz Algar to get around more quickly
  • How to run Bountiful Delves, the extra rewarding version of this new solo-friendly content
  • How to get a couple of new bags (particularly to help out those WoW Remix alts)
  • How to unlock Steady Flight (for everyone who doesn’t enjoy Skyriding)
• Diablo 4 is going to play like a brand new game in Vessel of Hatred. The game’s level cap will drop to 60 when the expansion launches (50 will be the maximum level in the base game, with another 10 levels in the expansion) with an updated leveling experience and four new difficulty tiers to unlock. Paragon points will no longer be tied to character level, but will an account-wide progression system —though on seasonal realms you’ll have to start from scratch — similar to Diablo 3’s. Earning 10 levels through Vessel of Hatred also means 10 more skill points, so we’re getting new and revamped class abilities. Also Runewords are back, which could be met with skepticism or joy, depending on your perspective.
• In tabletop news, D&D Direct announced a slim lineup of new Dungeons & Dragons books for 2025, but had a big focus on the company’s video game-like virtual tabletop, which is starting closed beta soon. You can sign up now if you want to check it out. But if you’re looking for something new to play, we really like the Shadowdark TTRPG, which racked up quite a few rewards at GenCon this year.
• New rewards from Twitch and Discord. Twitch is offering the Ghastly Charger ghost horse as a drop through September 26, while Discord rewards you for streaming on the platform with a baby Ogre pet (that you either adopt or kidnap, depending on how you look at it), available through September 8.

Happening next week

Next week looks to be on the quiet side, though it could just be that my calendar is lulling me into a false sense of complacency. On the Warcraft front, everything is waiting for September 10 when Season 1 starts, so everyone still has this whole week to level and gear to be ready on launch day.

• September 4 – 11: Diablo 4 2.0 PTR will give us a chance to test out all of the game’s big changes — but not the expansion itself. It will be available for PC Battle.net players only and give you the chance to try out the new leveling experience as well as Runewords and other end-game content.
• Baldur’s Gate 3 Patch 7, which the developers have said is arriving “next week” without a concrete time. The latest patch for BG3 includes mod support, new cinematics for player characters who are just plain evil, and the usual assortment of bug fixes and minor improvements.

This week’s podcasts

• Blizzard Watch Podcast: Was Blizzard right to nerf leveling with The War Within launch?
• Lore Watch Podcast: Our first impressions of The War Within, looking at how the expansion’s story is shaping up. It’s free of major spoilers, so if even if you haven’t finished the campaign you can listen without worry.

What to play this weekend

If you aren’t playing The War Within with us, you still have options. Star Wars Outlaws released this week to a lot of thoroughly okay reviews, earning a 76 on Metacritic. Jason Schreier pointed out that Ubisoft gave reviewers just a week to play the game and put their impressions into words, and it’s the sort of game that benefits from exploration — so you may not make the most of it by rushing through it, as reviewers did.

But if a big-budget Star Wars game doesn’t suit you, we have some more indie titles that may be more to your taste… though somehow three out of four of our game recommendations this week involve you playing an adorable animal. Two of those adorable animals are already in the afterlife, so you really can’t make their situation any worse (probably). Here are our game recommendations to play… or maybe wishlist… this weekend.