The Queue: FEVer Dreams

Okay, so if anyone else had Fallout 4 getting a new story DLC featuring original Nora and Nate actors Courtenay Taylor and Brian T. Delaney reprising their roles created by modding legends Kinggath Creations (I loved At Hell’s Gate, btw) and available on practically every platform the game is on… well, that makes one of us. Sure, this week (tomorrow!) will be Fallout day and we did see a teaser for this last year, but I still didn’t see a fully voiced with all new dialogue DLC with the original Nora and Nate actors just dropping like this.

What’s wild about this DLC (which, in all fairness, is basically an extended quest and not a full fledged expansion sized DLC like Far Harbor or Nuka World) is not just getting the original voice actors back, but seeing a third party developer’s work be so incorporated into the game by Bethesda.

In as far as the story of Fallout 4 can even be canonized, this is a canonical original story focusing on the Sole Survivor and the trauma they go through losing their entire lives, watching their world die, seeing their husband/wife murdered and their baby kidnapped, and quite frankly it should have been material the original game should have covered on release. The fact that the writing is as strong as it actually is feels nothing short of astonishing.

Especially considering the game debuted eleven years ago. Does this mean we’re going to get more drops of story for Fallout 4 just sort of dropped on us every Fallout day from now until the next Fallout game? I wouldn’t bet money on it, but considering that they shadowdropped an entire Elder Scrolls remaster on us who knows anymore?

No one asked me, but what the hey, while I’m here:

My in no particular order favorite stories told in a raid:

• Zul-Gurub — One of the first raids to really just cap a whole zone’s story, ZG is where several dungeons (including Zul’Ferrak and the Sunken Temple) and stories from the whole of Stranglethorn Vale tied together, with questing all over Azeroth in the process. And it was the first raid to introduce us to the Zandalar, who would go on to be the major new addition to the Horde in Battle for Azeroth.
• Blackwing Lair — “No, I must fight this!” Is it a complex story? Not really. But it’s a showcase for how comically evil some of the Black Dragonflight could be, with Nefarian as a srandout. And man, if you were wondering just how far ol’Neffy could go, seeing dragon corpses chained to the walls and gigantic blood centrifuges definitely solved that question.
• Ulduar — Ulduar is pretty self explanatory, and it does a great job at giving your a sense for the stakes and the threat of the Old Gods. To be honest, it kind of eclipsed Icecrown Citadel for me.
• The Siege of Orgrimmar — Look, yes, it went on way too long. It could have done with a few bosses trimmed. But in terms of showing you just how big Garrosh Hellscream’s plan to conquer the Alliance and secure Azeroth as a homeland for the Orcs really was. seeing that massive complex under Orgrimmar really was did that for me. The first time I saw the entirety of Ragefire basically erased just for Garrosh to store all of his stolen Pandaren artifacts, giant dinosaurs, and forbidden explosives was kind of eerie for me.
• Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope — I started a Night Elf main in Legion, and then Battle for Azeroth made it really hard to enjoy playing them. So I personally fond the story of Amirdrassil the first bright spot of hope I’d seen in three expansions (the whole of Battle for Azeroth, Shadowlands and then most of Dragonflight)
• Molten Core — I got an orange hammer in it in 2005 and I still have it. There. That’s the story that raid told me.

Next week.

Yes, it’s a strange time when games that swore up and down they wouldn’t be getting new updates are getting new updates around the release of the next season of their popular Anime/live action TV show tie in.

It’s so weird, y’all. We live in a time when a game can release six years ago or more, have essentially finished their development cycle, and then just keep going indefinitely. Unless you’re Diablo 4, anyway.

In my experience only if the only question you allow people to ask is “How do I get my Italian grandmother to fight with my Italian great-grandmother about soup so hard that they attack each other with gardening tools’.

A woman tried to end her daughter’s life with a hand rake like a pruned Ninja.

Slashfic.

Interpret that however you will. I regret nothing.

You sure did.

I had to go look up Hydrox to remember that they were technically first. I am fighting desperately to not use a meme here.

I failed.

Okay, that’s the Queue for today. Next week I’m getting some random story DLC.