The Queue: Just another day in paradise

Spring is here, my dudes. It is time to enjoy warm(er) weather, sunshine, and greenery.

Well, except it’s been nothing but rain this week until today, when the sun snuck out around those chance-of-rain clouds. Still, I’ve been pleased to look out my window this week and see green. And now that the sun’s come out, maybe it’s time to break out the beach umbrella. (Don’t forget the sunscreen; safety first, everybody.)

But for now, let’s Queue.

I don’t think Blizzard will kill off these addons (and I don’t think the goal is to eliminate, but to make the game easier for players that don’t use addons) but I certainly expect them to continue curtailing their power, emphasizing player awareness over addons taking handling fight mechanics. That would likely be Blizzard limiting their access to different kinds of data, something they’ve already been doing, but something I think is likely to continue.

But that doesn’t (in my opinion) mean that these addons will just be gone. There’s space for warnings and timers to help players be more aware of what’s going on, which these are very good at. But I think Blizzard wants something closer to parity in the ability non addon users have compared to the ability addon users have.

In Blue Prince you are building a manor house, day by day, room by room, brick by brick. You accumulate knowledge in the same way: piece by piece, each piece building on the last. The manor resets at the end of the day, but the knowledge doesn’t.

But the knowledge also isn’t something you will immediately and totally know. It unfolds, gradually, as you put the pieces together. There isn’t a single moment that reveals everything. Watching a stream, even a later game stream, wouldn’t spoil the experience (in my opinion), even though you’d learn the facts out of order. You’re still left with a puzzle that needs to be put together. And watching someone streaming the early game would just have you learning alongside them.

I would agree with Kalcheus that you shouldn’t watch speed runners. They will spoil the mechanics of how to get the “end” of the game, and in short order (a glitchless run will roll credits at less than 20 minutes).

I have been enjoying watching Blue Prince streams immensely, in part because the game is nonlinear, with a lot of RNG. Puzzles are not in a fixed order, and I have watched people who have played far less than I have encountering things I’ve never seen. (I myself spoiled the location of something to Anna by accident; she has played twice as many hours as I have and I assumed she knew already.) The beginning of the game does take a certain shape as players fill things out. But there’s a great deal left to chance. Different people will notice different things and focus on different things, and thus realize things in different orders. I think it’s a lot of fun to watch how people think their way through the game.

A lot of people have been playing it recently because it’s buzzy, so if you want to know if you’ll like it or not, check out your favorite streamer and see how the game starts to unfold.

I think this is very much an opinion question. Not everyone is going to agree on what kind of progression system is rewarding (and another player’s perfect will be another player’s easy will be another player’s too hard).

But I do think WoW is a little unfocused just because of its nature: you can raid, you can PVP, you can solo, you can just follow the story, you can only do pet battles. And progression in any of these things isn’t necessarily strictly linear. Sure, you’ll level up in WoW until you reach max level; but that’s where a large part of the game just gets started, with max level story campaigns, zones, dungeons, and raids. There are now follower dungeons and a story mode for raids, where you can run them alongside NPCs to see the story and complete quests, so they’re more accessible even if you aren’t interested in dealing with groups and schedules. Delves are single player or small group content that are a meaningful way to gear up — to whatever level of difficulty you want — with or without other people. The Great Vault offers a weekly bad luck protection, offering a choice of a single piece of loot depending on the content you’ve done in the last week. So players have more access to gearing and story content than they have before, if either are your goal.

The current talent system: I really like it, but that’s not a universal opinion. I like having all of the options and the ability to tweak small things, but there are also a lot of points to spend that feel a little (or a lot) meaningless, and cookie cutters continue to largely drive specs. I like hero specs a lot, but they vary in quality: some of them are amazingly themed (and these are the ones that usually grab my attention), some are less exciting, but all of them add some baseline power. YMMV.

Is this better? Is this good? I don’t know. An MMO doesn’t have a clear-cut end goal, and for your purposes that may remain a problem. Part of that is just its identity.

Do I need a gamified to-do manager? I already have a to-do list and a calendar. Do I need something else? Will this really add value and joy to my life? I’m not convinced. It’s cute, but I’m not convinced.

That’s not a no. But I’m not a yes either.

That’s it for now my gaming compatriots. I hope you survive this Wednesday and into the week beyond. (Weeks and Wednesdays are both tough.) Take care of yourselves and I’ll see you again next week!