Blizzard Watch Weekly: Once more into the breach

Ironwood Studios pushed a huge update to Pacific Drive earlier this week, so I’m happy to report that Mel’s back, baby. There’s a new set of maps called Expeditions, and a new trader who has cool stuff for sale. I’ve played through a few, and in typical Pacific Drive fashion, just as soon as I’ve worked out a strategy everything goes completely haywire and out of control and I simultaneously love and hate it.

While I wait for my battery to charge back up in this windstorm, let’s see what happened this week, and what we have to look forward to next week, and some stuff you may have missed.

What happened this week?

• World of Warcraft Trading Post rollover April 1
• Nintendo Switch 2 Direct April 2
• This week’s Hearthstone Tavern Brawl: Tinyfin Mode! Brawl (Standard, deck provided)
• Active Twitch Drop campaigns
• Epic Games Store free game of the week: Cat Quest 2

It was April Fools’ Day Tuesday, and our favorite joke other than our own was one from the World of Warcraft social media channels. The joke was eh, okay, we guess, but we mostly liked it because it reminded us of our favorite unhinged upcoming indie, Building Relationships, where you play as a house, and you try to date other houses. Also, since April Fools’ Day is April 1, this means there’s a new set of Trading Post swag to buy with your hard-earned tendies.

But, believe it or not, Rextroy soloing Rik Reverb, a current tier boss in Liberation of Undermine, wasn’t an April Fools’ Day prank. Just Rextroy bein Rextroy. Speaking of the true endgame, we wrote an article this week on getting transmog quickly and easily from Nerub-ar Palace.

Also thoroughly not joking was the ZeniMax Workers United union, which voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike. And if that makes you need a bit of a palate cleanser, here’s our weekly cute post, featuring otters.

What’s Happening Next Week (and beyond)

• WoW Classic Season of Discovery phase 8 begins April 8
• Diablo 4 season 7 end and season 8 start April 28
• Nintendo Switch 2 releases June 5

In an unspecified future time — whenever patch 11.1.5 releases, give or take — we’ll be seeing a return to Horrific Visions. They’ll be different from the experience back in BfA, with additional story beats and new scenarios.

In specified future dates news, Nintendo announced that the Switch 2 will officially release June 5, 2025, with preorders opening April 8. Also of note, games for the system have inspired sticker shock among some consumers, with the few games announced having a price tag above $70, and Mario Kart World going for $80. But if you do have a spare $60 laying around, you could buy Arthas in Warcraft Rumble (or one of these other random things).

If you’re looking for something new to do this weekend, we have our usual slate of new and interesting video games to check out. This week we also reported on a huge charity bundle of over 400 TTRPGs (and supplemental material) available for a minimum of $5, set to benefit several trans rights charities in Ohio.

This week’s podcasts

• Blizzard Watch Podcast: Warcraft Rumble is cute, and other April Fools’ Day pranks
• Lore Watch Podcast: Crucial source material
• Tavern Watch Podcast: Are TTRPGs taking a turn away from crunchy to bring us more narrative-focused one-shots?

For our own April Fools’ Day joke, under the guise of exploring “lore” and “source material,” we recorded — or I should say I recorded because nobody else should be blamed for it — a full audiobook reading of all the Steamy Romance Novels currently in WoW. It took far longer than I thought it would but when I start a bit, I commit. I hope you uh, enjoyed it.

On the Blizzard Watch podcast this week, Cory joined our hosts to talk about Warcraft Rumble, and whether or not it is quote-unquote cute. Plus, some of our hosts are rather over the whole concept of April Fools.

This week’s Tavern Watch was a discussion episode, and there was a lot to touch on, from our own upcoming Pigeons 11 campaign to the Nebula Award nominated Yazeba’s Bed and Breakfast.