Up next in 10
Cory joined us for this week's show, and by coincidence there was also a Heroes of the Storm patch the day they recorded. What are the odds? Not very good, if you ask Cory. There was also a new Hearthstone Battlegrounds season to discuss. We're all very much looking forward to next week, when patch 11.2 finally releases, and we learn more about what Xal'atath has cooking. The Race for World First also already has our attention. We'll miss Void Storage, though.
Plus, this week we had a lot of time for listener questions, so don't forget to send those in. Sometimes we have a ton going on so we don't get to them, but they're always fun to answer. You can address them to [email protected] or ask them in the #queue-and-podcast-questions channel on our Discord server.
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Show More Show Less View Video Transcript
0:00
[Music]
0:10
Hello everybody and welcome to the Blizzard Watch podcast where we talk about Blizzard Entertainment and its many games and then sometimes some other
0:17
games, you know, if we feel like it and maybe something else. You don't know. You don't you're not the boss of us. You
0:23
don't We were not puppets dancing to your tune. Oh, we kind of would be though. I mean, you know, depending. Uh
0:29
anyway, with me this week are my fantastic co-hosts Liz Harper and Joe Perez and our special guest Corey M.
0:37
Corey. So yeah. Um everybody say hi again.
0:44
Do you know our transcript? Our transcript tool is gonna say Corey M Corey for the entire transcript. I'm
0:50
gonna have to fix all of that. I guess I should ask if you know what the M stands for first. Magnificent.
0:57
Ah, see that's what I was going to say. You and me, Matt. We're on the same wavelength here. Yeah, we're both self agrandizing
1:03
maniacs who live in it. Uh, anyway, I mean, that's typical for Edmonton, really. If you or indeed the entire
1:10
province of Alberta, if you look at our government anyway, right? Uh, patch 11.2 for World of Warcraft is
1:17
next Tuesday. Uh, unless you're listening to this after it came out, in which case it was last Tuesday.
1:24
Um, but yeah, patch 11.2, we're already there. That can't be right. Surely 11.0.
1:31
Yeah, that is what it feels like. That's what it feels like. No, but now we're not. Now we're in the far future of 11.2.
1:38
Uh, and that will be going live on August the 5th. So, yeah, it's a certain number of days away.
1:45
And, uh, we've already got the I'm going to mention this one before that previous one. We got the world first race thing
1:52
sort of getting off to the ground even though they don't even have a place to be rating yet. Um,
1:58
Methods got their 12 person casting deck line up which is like
2:03
12 people just who are going to be casting. Yeahuring who are going to be who are going to be hanging out and talking
2:10
about what's going on. And I, you know, I I did cast for uh Big Dumb Guild one
2:17
raid tier before they stopped raiding entirely, which was really sad. But uh
2:22
you know, there's a lot of downtime to fill when they're on their like 70th
2:27
pull of the same boss and you're like, "Okay, they've what do I say now?"
2:34
So it there's a skill set. There's a skill set there. It is not easy. It's a
2:40
very fine line of telling new viewers the same information that old viewers have gotten for the last 70 polls, but
2:46
also making it entertaining for old viewers and offing to new viewers. And um if you
2:53
think you can thread that needle, oh boy, I encourage you to apply to both Method Echo, Liquid, and anyone else who
2:59
may or may not be streaming the race. Also, I should mention since you mentioned Liquid, um Liquid also is
3:05
like, "Yeah, we're in this race with a trailer. They made a trailer." Yeah, it's a good
3:10
trailer. It is a good trailer. It's very topical and of the moment, too. Uh, do you
3:15
remember the TV show King of the Hill? Yes. Well, I do remember that TV show. It's back.
3:20
It's back. Not even in Pog form. It's back. Just for realies. Uh,
3:26
near you. Yeah. Uh they uh there's a new season of King of the Hill coming and wouldn't you
3:32
know it, Liquid made a little King of the Hill inspired uh video to go with their announcement
3:39
of the race to world first coverage, which surprises no one since they were the winners of the last one. It would
3:46
make all the sense in the world for them to keep doing it. And uh they're going to keep doing it. We're gonna see more
3:51
liquid coverage as they try and go and stop Demensius from destroying all of
3:56
Azeroth, which seems like hopefully. Hopefully. I mean, uh, we haven't heard anything from Ekko yet.
4:04
So, we've heard from two of the big guilds, but not Ekko. And of course, I'm always interested in kind of the smaller
4:11
guilds who are working their way up there or who are probably probably not
4:16
going to have a first place finish, but might show up in the top 10. There are lots of guilds competing for these spots. There are lots of Asian guilds
4:24
that have been coming up like guilds in China. They haven't been back in World of Warcraft for very long, but are up
4:31
there and competing and up in the top five even though they have like a they're like 3 days behind, two days or
4:38
three days. So, it's it's a very I I really enjoy watching the race to world
4:44
first. And out of everyone who streams, I think Liquid has really extremely high
4:50
production values. And they've got the funniest trailers, guys. That's all I can say. Their their trailers are always
4:56
fun. They've hired somebody who is a videography background and a content
5:01
creation background, and it shows because their their stuff is always really polished
5:07
looking. And even the stuff that isn't super polished is unpolished in a way that says care and attention is being
5:13
thought of at the very least. It's a difference between a chair that just looks janky and one that's rustic.
5:18
Yes, exactly. Yeah, it's a fine line, but it's there. Yeah. Also should mention the new
5:24
Whispers of Caresh series is on YouTube, which is short uh audio logs. Basically, the one I've listened to, which is the
5:31
only one they currently have, is just, you know, someone explaining what happened the day that Caresh got ripped
5:36
into little pieces. It's sort of like a slice of life diary thing about the end of their world. So, I'm looking forward
5:43
to seeing what the other ones are like. Uh, Liz, yeah, I heard you talking as we're Yeah, as we're recording this,
5:49
there's only one of them. So, I'm I'm curious where they're going from here because they It does say this is part
5:54
one. So, yeah, I'm interested in what the next ones are. Is it just going to be a
6:00
bunch of perspectives on the destruction of Caresh? Is it going to be about what life was like on Caresh? Where are we
6:06
going with this? But, uh, you know, it's an interesting little bit of lore for you. Well, I'm interested in it because
6:12
I'd like to see how they move on from like they've had the in previous expansions, they've had the very I
6:19
wouldn't want to say slick, but I can't think of a better word for it. The the like kind of stop motion animation
6:24
experiences that they were doing the visual thing. Yeah. Yeah. And now they've moved into this
6:29
kind of like audio log thing. And it makes me wonder if they're trying to do bite-sized audio books.
6:36
It feels a little like that's where they're going. We have seen audio content from them from them before where
6:41
Oh yeah, absolutely. Like they've done like the the war thing, the thousand-y year war
6:46
thing was on audio like an audio drama. Yeah, I think there was one with too.
6:53
We just had one. We just had one with the uh the stuff with the uh the arath with the lore walker
6:58
and the lore walkers and the the lore walk lore walker isn't uh Locust Walker.
7:04
Yep. Yes, that guy. Uh yeah, we just had a whole audio book thing from from him and
7:09
read by his voice actor, which is really great. Yeah, those it makes sense because audio is fairly
7:15
like I'm not saying that audio is super super easy, but well-made audio does have a lot of post-prouction and does
7:22
have a director and it does have an actor acting their heart out, but it is going to be easier than animating a
7:29
whole thing on top of having an actor and a director and all that. Mhm. So, it makes sense that we're going to
7:34
see a lot of audio content like that coming from Blizzard uh for promo for
7:39
their events, which is great. And it's it's just always nice to see the content
7:44
that pops up around the game because it shows that they're they're working on
7:49
stuff that isn't necessarily just going to make them money. Like this, it's not a sellable product, but it improves
7:55
their product. is the tangent tangential kind of uh thing that shows up and
8:00
you're like, "Oh, this shows that the company is invested in World of Warcraft." Can I
8:06
more can I can I offer maybe a slightly negative view of it? Sure. Can you uh
8:12
can you will you? I agree with you for the most part, but if that was the case, I would have
8:17
expected it to be slightly longer than like 2 minutes and 30 seconds. like it it's a nice little thing, but I'm
8:24
curious what what its intention is cuz it's not really telling us anything new.
8:30
It doesn't really feel like it's going to be a hype machine cuz we literally have a week left before the next patch
8:36
releases. I mean, will it give us new content? And I kind of would have
8:41
expected, well, I again, how many are there going to be uh on top of it? But I would have expected them to be maybe a
8:47
little bit longer than what we got. And don't get me wrong, what we got was was really clean, really well voice acted,
8:54
and recorded nicely, but it just left me wanting something more substantial. So
9:01
like in in the years past, we would have had a Warbringer. we would have had something that felt, I think, a little
9:07
more substantial and maybe for the beginning of an expansion, but also for something as major of of a story bump as
9:14
going to Caresh's, we absolutely would have in the past would have gotten like a cinematic or something. I mean, I feel like a big thing is the
9:21
Doom of Caresh, which is the Locust Walker story, which is in three YouTube
9:26
videos, which are 45 minutes each. That's a kind of big meaty story about Caresh. Um, we also we have gotten a
9:35
cinematic though it's pretty a pretty short teaser and it's my understanding that it comes directly from the campaign that we'll be seeing that in the
9:42
campaign and it's not a st it's not something purely created for promo. It's part of the campaign. But I I do feel this is
9:48
just a little this is a little extra. I'm curious to see how it evolves because it is different from uh kind of
9:55
promotional story content they've done in the past. Yeah, which is fair. That's all I got. I
10:01
just hope it does well enough that they keep doing more because like anything they do extra outside of the game should
10:06
be supported because hopefully it will keep them creating content like that and bonus content is always a bonus. It's
10:13
gravy. It's lay it on me. Let me see that. Let me We We come to play Blizzard games and World
10:20
of Warcraft because we love the stuff they're doing in it. And if they're doing that stuff in the game and they
10:25
can do stuff like that out of the game, then that's just more stuff that to love. And I don't know if Matt is still
10:31
with us. Yeah, that's what I was wondering with this extreme silence. Well, I mean, you guys were talking. In
10:37
the past, I've been interrupting people and I'm trying not to. Geez. All right. From now on, the second you get going,
10:43
I'm jumping in. Uh I just like I said, I think that the I think it's an interesting approach. Uh it depends on
10:50
how many of them we get. Like as Joe has pointed out, we've got a week. Are they going to put one out a day? But
10:55
honestly, you know what it reminded me of? Um, it reminded me of the the runup
11:01
to Cloverfield because it's it's very much like it's almost like found footage because it's literally like whispers
11:06
from Caresh. It's like you're hearing the thoughts and memories of people who are gone at least in the first one. So,
11:14
we'll see what it ends up being. Uh, it could be really interesting or it could just be, you know, a like a couple
11:21
minutes of sound bites. I I don't know yet, but I do think it's interesting and I am looking forward to seeing where it
11:27
goes next. And that happened. Oh, sorry. I had a problem on my keyboard. Uh, but yeah, I think that we should now talk
11:33
about this thing because it's going to make me upset forever. Uh, Collector's Bounty is over now, but the Shadowlands
11:38
raids aren't dropping loot. Uh, I have not checked on Yogan. I don't I don't know if I'm assuming Aldoir is fine, but
11:45
I I don't know. I have not looked. you really, you know, it's whenever anything changes, it's Yog tends to go weird.
11:52
Whenever anything changes in the game, it's somehow they always break Yogon.
11:57
So, I also have not checked in on our old buddy Yog. Yeah. So, who knows? Who knows?
12:04
In terms of why this is happening, I have no idea. But I do know that it would be really, really bad if it
12:09
continues. Uh, they just got rid of collector's bounties, so now you're getting normal
12:15
drops except Shadowlands where you get nothing. It's like, ah, it Yeah, I don't know. It's not even like
12:21
they accidentally toggled off legacy loot cuz it's not like you're just getting a little loot. It's like you're
12:26
you're not getting anything except, you know, currency and reputation. So, nothing is dropping. That is not how I
12:33
post. It's it's it's a little oddity, but uh maybe hold off on raiding Shadowlands if
12:38
you're raiding Shadowlands for transmog, which I have been collecting some Shadowlands transmog this month. Uh
12:45
maybe wait until you hear that has been fixed. Yeah. Um the corner.
12:51
Yeah. I I also say that I'm really sad that Collector's Bounty is over. Um I quite frankly just thought that should
12:57
have been the new normal. Just leave it on. Yeah, leave it leave it going
13:02
once an expansion's gotten past like it's not the most recent expansion. It's two expansions ago, just do it. You
13:09
know, the any any mount prestige that could be extracted from having the the
13:15
rarest mythic drop mount has already been extracted and all the current mythic raiders are showing off whatever
13:21
they're riding on these days. So, like just let it happen, you know? And and even so, it's not like the drop
13:27
rates were crazy. It's not like everyone was suddenly getting every mount because it was still very low drop rates for
13:34
these guys. Yeah, for in particular, it was mostly for gear that you could actually had a better chance.
13:39
The gear, you know, when they turn on legacy loot, they should just turn on this double loot system from Collector's
13:46
Bounty. That would be great. That would be so fun. You're drowning in loot. I love it. Uh but you know, so right now all we can
13:53
tell you is that Shadowlands raids are not dropping loot. We don't know when that'll be fixed, but hopefully soon.
13:59
Um, and yeah, that that's basically all we've got to tell you on that one. But it does help us segue into this next
14:05
bit, which is that uh Blizzard has decided that if you've been using void storage to keep items that aren't items
14:11
anymore, they're going to delete them. So, if you if you've got your weird item
14:17
version of say the transmog items that you used to be able to buy on the store, those things were converted into
14:23
collection items because everything is. But if you had kept them in void storage
14:29
and thus still had them, you're not going to have them. They're going to get Yeah. You you used to be able to keep
14:35
certain depreciated items that weren't in the game anymore hidden away in void storage even after Blizzard had just
14:42
gotten rid of them or rolled them into the collections tab or something like that. And uh now when they're doing the
14:47
big bank conversion, going from bags of banks to kind of a warb band style
14:53
tabbed bank, uh yeah, loot and uh loot that you may
15:00
have squirreled away in void storage is going away. Not they're not deleting
15:05
stuff in your void storage, but if it is one of these items that has been depreciated that should that should have
15:12
previously gone away, then it's going away. There's no more there's no more hiding it and it just
15:18
there's no more void storage. So the place you were hiding it isn't going to be there anymore. So it just feels a little I don't know.
15:25
Something about the pose feels that Blizzard made about this just feels a little condescending like hey y all of
15:32
those precious things you've been hiding away in void storage. Hope you don't like those.
15:38
And it is. It's It's kind of a silly thing holding on to little collectible things that you don't need anymore. But
15:45
but also precious word for things of that nature.
15:53
at at this I mean I I I don't think that they need necessarily to delete all them but at
16:00
the same time if it helps save me from my worst packrat tendencies in a video game then
16:07
you know at the end of the day I could take a screenshot of the items in my void storage and that's basically as
16:13
good as having the item in my void storage you know I disagree profoundly it's much worse
16:20
void storage remain sacrosanked so that my my floating key collection could
16:26
remain. Um, I don't actually feel that way, but I do feel I do get why people would be
16:31
annoyed by this because they'd be like, was it really that bad that I had the
16:36
this old key to Sholamance that doesn't work anymore? Like, was it was it really hurting anyone?
16:42
And I like we don't know specifically which items will be going away. Just
16:47
I'm just They've specifically said, you know, very old keys. So that yeah, so
16:52
we don't know. We we know they've mentioned um specific items they mentioned were the like just very old
16:58
keys or the cosmetic helms, jewel of the fire lord, crown of eternal winter, and
17:04
hood of hungering darkness. So those three we we would assume are they're
17:09
mentioning them specifically. So, we assume that those three are things that people have been keeping in void storage
17:14
so that they don't vanish away the way everything else does when it goes into one of your collections. Um, but you
17:22
know, I don't know how many items this is actually going to affect. Again, I can understand people being like, "Was
17:27
this really the thing you had to change?" But keep in mind, this might be because they had to change it because
17:33
they were getting rid of voidtor and they had to have some solution to what happens to these items. I do kind
17:39
of wonder what does this take like a database load on the game? Is this
17:44
perhaps a technical issue that it's like not worth also storing them in this
17:50
second in the second way, you know, now that they're all in the collection tab? Because I used I used to hang on to my
17:56
miniial pet even though he'd been moved into collections. I had it in my in my bank. Of course, he vanished a while
18:03
ago. quite a while ago, but I I held on to him for a long time. Should have put
18:09
him in void storage, but then I'd just be back here. I'd be back here. So,
18:14
mention that right now that if you go into the live game right now and move them from void storage to your
18:19
inventory, they will vanish when you next log in. So, not even waiting for next week.
18:24
They shouldn't because they shouldn't exist in the game. Yeah. So, it's not even a question of
18:29
they probably didn't do anything here. like they didn't change these items.
18:34
They just since they're not going to be in void storage, if you don't go and take them out of void storage, then
18:40
they'll just stop existing when your stuff gets mailed to you when void storage goes away. Uh it's not
18:46
necessarily that they're even doing anything. It's like the systems we have in place will make this happen once void
18:53
storage is no more. Uh so maybe that's what it is. I honestly don't know. I am not an expert on these things and I I do
19:01
not know how they've decided it or how they didn't decide to do anything different. No idea. I just know that
19:08
these things are going away. So, either of you have anything else to say on this one before we move on to Hearthstone
19:13
stuff. No. Oh, I better I better open up my Hearthstone browser tab.
19:18
Yeah, get some water, Liz. Too late for me. Save yourselves. Uh but
19:24
yeah, Hearthstone's coming up next on our roundup of stuff. Uh the new Battleground season was announced. It's
19:30
going to be season 11, which is going to be launching on August 5th. Um in case you're paying attention, they launched
19:37
stuff on August 5th. That date sounds kind of familiar. Why is that? Yeah, I don't know. Something about a
19:43
WoW expansion. Or maybe I maybe I missed it. No. Okay. I I do want to clarify. We're
19:49
not getting the WoW expansion yet because if we were getting the WoW expansion, we'd be getting player housing and I would be so much more
19:56
excited than I am. I mean, I'm pretty excited about Ghost of Crash, but I would be so much more excited. Like,
20:01
that excitement goes to 11, it goes to 12. Yeah. But yeah, you guys understand
20:07
Hearthstone and I don't, so I'm going to just turn it over to you. Uh, so yes, Battlegrounds season 11. I'm
20:14
very excited. Battlegrounds is my favorite Hearthstone game mode. It's going to be themed off of uh the new
20:21
kind of Angoro expansion which we're seeing everywhere. And um so anomalies
20:26
are going away from Battlegrounds. I really like anomalies frankly. They're just little quirks that happen in every
20:32
match and they sort of make every match feel different because every match has its own little thing or some of them
20:39
were more impactful than others and it's good to have you know a change. So, anomalies are out. Quests are back in.
20:45
And quests is just a mechanic where early in the game, you're going to choose a quest which you are going to
20:51
attempt to complete. And once you complete it, say maybe you need to summon in 10 murlocs or you need to play
20:58
10 battlecry cards or something like that. And once you complete it, you get something that should be really great
21:04
and is also going to impact how you play this match. So, it will make every match
21:11
feel different and it'll make every match feel different from season 10 matches. So, it uh there's also a new
21:19
rally keyword which is basically effects that are like things that happen when a
21:24
minion attacks which were in the game but uh not
21:30
not uh consolidated like this. I suppose there's a new bounty keyword that uh is
21:38
it only appears in tier three spells in the pirate lobby. So, it's a pirate
21:44
related card. Anyone can use them, but they're very pirate themed. Uh so, that
21:51
that will be interesting. It seems like it has some synergy with pirates uh with pirate cards. So, that may be
21:57
interesting to see with pirate uh war bands, which I I'm not I'm not an
22:03
expert, but pirates had been feeling a little weak in the meta, but also I'm
22:08
not I'm not a great Battlegrounds player. I have fun with it, but I'm not good at it. So, I I may be totally wrong
22:14
there. Uh there's of course a new tavern pass because any game that has new season has new a new battle pass of some
22:21
kind that you can pay for and uh with lots of angoro style archaeology themed
22:28
skins and some dragons. Dragons are great. I really like dragons. Uh but I
22:34
didn't I didn't buy the last Havern Pass because I wasn't really enthusiastic about any of the skins. So I'll have to look and see what is on this one. Uh
22:42
kind of the monetization in Hearthstone lately has me not not really feeling it. But I got to I got to look at the
22:48
cosmetics when this comes out and see, you know, maybe they're going to have something great. Maybe I can be a land
22:55
shark. That would be pretty cool. I don't know if that's going to happen.
23:01
I'm I'm just making stuff up. Don't expect to go into Hearthstone and be able to be a land shark in the battlegrounds.
23:07
You know, Hearthstone Battlegrounds is pretty weird. Its themes can be really weird. Hero skins can be weird.
23:13
If you absolutely need to be a land shark, uh Marvel Rivals has you covered. So yeah, I know. I know. So I I am looking
23:22
forward to it next week. Uh and am I going to play It's like I got to pick.
23:27
Do I play Warcraft 11.2? Do I play Hearthstone? You know, that may be
23:32
chosen for me because I am predicting we'll probably have some Warcraft downtime on Tuesday. Maybe. Plus, I
23:38
mean, you've got like a phone or a tablet or something. You can just play while while waiting. Do I?
23:44
I'm assuming. Are you sure? I don't know. Yeah, I do. I do. I do play.
23:50
I I usually play Hearthstone on my tablet. I think it plays great on the tablet. And, you know, I'm going to I'm
23:56
going to bait Cory a little bit here because Blizzard made such a big deal about Warcraft Rumble being their first
24:02
mobile game, but I've played Hearthstone on tablet since the beginning. and it
24:08
runs great. So that's It feels better to play on my tablet than it does to play
24:13
on my computer. Just, you know, you tap the screen, you drag and drop cards, it just it's a very smooth experience. So
24:20
wow, that sounds just like playing Warcraft Rumble except you're dragging and dropping units. Really?
24:27
To me, Warcraft Rumble is basically the anthem of of Blizzard.
24:32
Except, you know, not not it's not. And that's the kind of thing like that's a huge slam on Warcraft Rumble out of
24:38
nowhere. But Warcraft Rumble is still vaguely Warcraftish. Anthem was just not what
24:45
people were expecting from Boware. Yeah. So sad. I mean half of that was a really good
24:50
game and the other half was the other half. But now we are going to move on I think
24:56
because we've still got to talk about Diablo I having its March of the Goblins event and what's going on with this is
25:02
kind of interesting. Um, you want to explain this list or you just want me to read the thing you wrote and then you can talk?
25:08
Yeah, you get it. You can you can read it. It's a little confusing. So, basically, March of the Goblins is
25:15
the whole thing where you you various treasure goblins. You kill them, you get more loot, that sort of thing. Everyone knows what to do with treasure goblins.
25:21
And always be hitting goblins. I mean, that's I learned I learned that one from you. I learned that one from you, Matt.
25:27
It's a very I learned it from watching you, Matt. Also, you did. I wasn't ashamed of it.
25:34
There are also different kinds There are also different kinds of treasure goblins that will spawn that drop different things. It's more treasure goblins is
25:41
always good. But however, apparently this time around when you kill the goblins, it tells you to go to the goblin shrine in Kiovashad,
25:48
which there is no goblin shrine in Kyovashad. Uh yeah, there's supposed to be the event kind of revolves around goblin
25:56
stuff in Kiovashad for extra rewards and things of that nature. and the shrine just they started the event but they
26:04
didn't turn on the shrine I guess. So yeah, if you are doing this event that you get ready for lots of you know
26:12
you the princess is in another castle. Um, it's like I I don't know if there are
26:18
actually increased treasure goblin spawns is the event because you get a
26:24
popup when you log into Diablo I saying, "Hey, treasure goblin event. Go to Kiovashod."
26:30
And uh I don't know if there the spawn rate increases there and just the stuff
26:36
you're supposed to interact with isn't there. But uh yes, it's Diablo I does
26:41
have a little bit of a history of rolling out events that are maybe a little buggy a little bit. So this is a
26:50
this is disappointing, but reading it I'm like I'm not shocked and appalled.
26:57
I'm kind of like, well, yeah, that tracks. But regardless, uh, as a person who
27:03
likes Goblins, I'm happy they brought it back. I wish they had brought it back in a way that worked. That would have been
27:08
nice. Do we have a time frame on the event running? Uh, it starts
27:13
Yeah, it's through. It's live now. Y and it runs to August 5th. Another a
27:18
weirdly familiar date. Um, yeah, but they have said uh they have said
27:23
that if they can't get this fixed quickly, they will probably extend the event. So, that is something.
27:29
Yeah, cuz technically speaking, the event is sort of not actually happening until such time as this thing shows up.
27:35
Um, until the statue shows up, there's not really much you can do. It's a little awkward,
27:40
but all right. Uh, this next little bit is for Corey, I guess, based on new patch notes just for Corey. Um, heroes
27:46
of a storm. New patch notes for Corey. Corey, do things with the patch notes. It's not even my birthday and they gave
27:52
me patch notes. It's so nice of them. It was very funny because this morning I said, "Hey, Liz, do you want another
27:57
buddy for the podcast?" And Liz was like, "Oh, sure, I guess." And then not an hour and a half later, Heroes of the
28:04
Storm live patch went live. So, they're live in game right now as we speak. And
28:10
I'm pretty sure the last time I was on the podcast, I talked about them. uh the the initial ones that were popping up on
28:17
the PTR. They made some changes to knockbacks and they made some changes to Allarak who's gotten a little stronger
28:24
and you know the the typical things we've seen from Blizzard in terms of Heroes of Storm patches which is great.
28:30
The janitor and the classic games team that are keeping Heroes of Storm alive
28:35
are, you know, they're doing some good work and they're keeping it balanced and they're they're adjusting things and
28:40
bringing it closer to a state of perfection. at least as far as any game could be considered perfect, which I
28:46
would argue that Heroes of the Storm could be, but that's my own personal bias. U who knew I Nothing I've done up
28:54
leading up to this moment has ever indicated anything like that. No, what didn't make it onto the PTR and what was
29:00
a surprise day was that they're bringing back one of the events. Uh, the Nexommania 2, which originally ran in
29:07
the faroff heyday of 2020ish or 20 I don't remember the exact dates, but it's
29:13
been a while, was their second crack at the luchador inspired Heroes of the
29:19
Storm skins. And there was quests during it where you could choose to support
29:24
either the luchador Malganis or the luchador Lely skins and you would get a
29:29
couple of icons and stuff for it, but you could only choose one of them. And now it's back and you could choose the
29:35
other one. It just took 5 years in maintenance mode. So if you're really sad about missing out
29:40
on a spray and a portrait for the hero you didn't choose, now is your opportunity. But it is nice to see it
29:47
come back. and for people who didn't play initially to get another crack at the fun luchador style wrestling
29:54
announcer and you know it's just always fun to see the game having fun because
29:59
those Mexican wrestling skins were so good all of their skins are so good but they you know they're colorful they're
30:06
fun it it's just a fun I've said the word fun so many times it's going to lose meaning but it's a fun way to
30:12
celebrate the game and to have a a new take on the
30:18
universe and who knows if the maintenance mode hadn't happened if they were still supporting it as a live game.
30:25
We could have been on Nexameania 5 by now. Also, Meridan's knock going.
30:31
Yeah. And people heard that you like punching people really far with Meridan and they were like, "Well, I guess we can do that more for you."
30:36
Well, they're they're making the knockback's duration less as well because I think it's part of the whole knockback adjustment anyway. My god, my
30:44
voice is dying right during the podcast. This isn't. But yeah, actually these are pretty substantial changes for a game that's
30:51
been in maintenance mode since like 2021, right? Yeah. I think that the acknowledgement
30:58
of the classic games team as being the people in charge of keeping Heroes of the Storm active means that maybe we're
31:05
going to see more bigger changes because obviously there's a bigger team involved. But who knows? Uh, as always,
31:13
uh, with the merger, with the additional funding that may or may not be present, with the fact that anytime there's a
31:20
patch or anything like that, there's enough people that pop up that make me say, "Hey, you know what? This game's
31:25
got a shot of coming back. The the community has stayed there. At times, if you look on Twitch, you can see more
31:31
people streaming Heroes of the Storm than Diablo I." So, that's not nothing.
31:36
I mean, does that is that saying something about Heroes of the Storm or something about Diablo I? That's the
31:41
real question. Both. I would say that's fair. Fair. I as always I think the problem with
31:47
Diablo I 4 is it's way more fun to play it than to watch someone else play it. So there is that.
31:52
Yeah, I I agree. It is not something I'm particularly interested in watching somebody. Uh that's the thing with a lot of streaming. It's like some things I'm
31:59
really fun to watch stream. Like I think it's fun to watch raids and stuff because you know that they're sometimes
32:05
doing like world first type stuff and you're like wow I've never seen anything like this. He and I play all the time. Uh, but watching somebody play Diablo of
32:13
any kind, Diablo 2, three, four, the original I'd watch just to see how they managed to get it to run, right? But,
32:21
um, everything else is like, "Yeah, okay, great. You're you're playing a a a druid in Diablo 2. Congrats. Uh, I'm
32:28
gonna go do something else with my life." But you're Barry, you're a wolf. Oh, you're back to bear again.
32:34
Good job. Good job. You're still fuzzy. Oh, but yeah. So, that's cool. We got the
32:41
patch notes for heroes for just for Corey and it's not even his birthday. Um, when it is your birthday, please let
32:47
us know if they release any patch notes. I cannot wait. I I assume that it's definitely going to be the case that
32:53
they will just, you know, that's that's the day they're going to announce Heroes of Storm coming back. I So, Mark your calendars October 19.
33:00
Fingers crossed. I just want to hug. I I want to hug things real bad because I feel so bad when it that doesn't happen. But
33:07
well, if it doesn't happen this year, maybe it'll happen next year. And if it doesn't happen next year, there's always the year after that.
33:12
Yeah. Until such time as we're we're old and dead. Still be Heroes of the Storm
33:17
is coming back and so am I as a zombie. Um, I feel like I know it's the theopium
33:25
that runs through my veins when it comes to Heroes of Storm, but at this point I feel infinitely more it like it's
33:31
infinitely more likely that Heroes of Storm makes a resurgence than Warcraft Rumble does, despite the fact
33:38
trying to run a Yeah, there's there's people trying to run a a petition right
33:43
now to save Warcraft Rumble. And I I get where they're coming from. I understand the appeal of or the the the drive to
33:51
try and save something that you really like, but there's just no way. I I hate to be the bearer of bad news there, but
33:58
they there's nobody left on that team. They're not just going to say, "Oh, actually guys, your petition hit a million signatures. We're going to bring
34:04
it back where you're all rehired." I just I can't see that happening. No, me neither. But to move on to
34:10
another little bit of news here because it kind of touches upon a different situation where a bunch of people getting mad about something may have actually worked. Um, Microsoft has
34:17
decided they're not going to be trying to get you to pay $80 for a new um, The Outer Wilds, Outer Worlds 2.
34:24
Go ahead. At least not every new game necessarily.
34:30
Well, they'll they'll obviously still be doing things where you can buy this edition of the game where you can get a
34:35
special hat and it's an extra $50. Um, so they're going to keep doing that. I
34:40
mean, no one's no one's stopping anybody from doing multiple deluxe and exclusive versions of games, but um they basically
34:49
have said, "Yeah, you guys really freaked out about the $80 thing." So, uh
34:54
yeah, we're going to we're going to they're going to rethink that, and in the meantime, The Outer Worlds 2 is just going to be $70. And if you already paid
35:00
for it at 80, we're going to like we're going to credit you the 10 bucks. Although, I'm not sure what that means.
35:06
Like, do we get 10 bucks back? Well, yeah, but you get it in in Microsoft bucks. So, I get to spend I I do not know. Uh, so there is still a
35:15
premium edition for $99. So, uh, it is $70 base edition, premium edition, $99,
35:22
or it's come. It's a day one game pass release, which I I feel is a little odd.
35:27
It kind of Do you pre-order it or do you get it on Game Pass? Because if you already subscribe to Game Pass, that's
35:34
that's pretty tempting to just say, hm, Game Pass. Great. Okay. Well, see that's the thing with for me
35:41
like I buy games that I liked when I've played them on Game Pass. Yeah. Um but I do still check them out on Game
35:48
Pass first. Like both Avoued and Doom the Dark Ages. I played them on Game
35:53
Pass for like a month before I actually spent money on them. You know, I feel like it for one thing, I'm spending
35:59
money every month on Game Pass. I might as well get something out of it. Uh but also true. But also it's it's a really great way to
36:05
preview things. Mhm. Yeah. Uh, one thing about the $99
36:11
version, which it sounds like a lot of money, but it will include DLC for two
36:17
future. It will bundle in the two future DLCs. And The Outer Worlds one had some
36:24
really fantastic DLCs that cost uh 10 or $15 each. So, if you are know you're
36:30
going to be invested and want to play the DLCs, this is actually, you know, you're just paying for it up front instead of paying for it later. So, it
36:36
depends on how you feel about that. It also includes the Moonman's Corporate Appreciation Premium Prize Pack. I don't
36:43
know what that is, but I kind of want to know. I really hope it gives you a nice Moonman bobblehead for your spaceship in
36:50
game. No, that'd be cool. Are you mocking the power of the Moonman?
36:56
I don't know. I want that. Let me put a bobblehead on my desk. His His head is bobble. His head is
37:02
perfect and proud. I'm sorry. It's a perfect It's a perfect beautiful
37:08
sphere. Uhhuh. Yeah. I still remember when I first played the when I first played the first one and I went to that one space station splash
37:15
ship. Martin. It's Martin. I'm I'm a little worried. I'm a little worried about what's happened to Martin by this game.
37:22
There's some changes happening. I'm worried about him. It's a different uh It's a different um system, isn't it? like you're not at the
37:28
same system as the previous one, but you are still dealing with Spacer's Choice and Anti Cleo who have merge who
37:36
they have merged. There's been a corporate merger and so it's Spacer's Choice and Anti Cleo are
37:42
like what? Auntie's Choice come to I believe it's Auntie's Choice. So they they've come together into one mega
37:48
corporation. I still want to know what happened to Martin. I feel bad for that guy. I feel so bad. I hope he managed to
37:54
escape and live a happy life. That seems unlikely, but I hope I hope. Poor
38:00
Martin. I just I feel so bad. I feel so bad for that guy. Well, I mean, you should.
38:06
Meanwhile, lives in hell. Meanwhile, half the people out there who have played The Outer Worlds are like, "What
38:12
are you even talking about, Liz? I'm getting slightly obsessed over tiny tiny
38:18
side characters." He was a He was the guy at the store. He was the guy at the Spacers Choice store
38:24
with the big moon helmet on. That's that's who she's talking. Yeah. Yeah. And uh you could you could
38:29
continue talking to him. He had some interesting and horrifying slightly horrifying things to say because that's
38:36
the game. That's the game. It is interesting that one of the one of the
38:41
first games they Microsoft pushed at this new higher price point was
38:48
the most anti- capitalist game that you were likely to find on any major platform. I cannot think of another game
38:56
that is just this ridiculously anti- capitalist.
39:01
That I guess that's kind of that's kind of the joke. You're kind of in on the joke. I don't know.
39:06
Yeah. It's it's sort of like take all the anti- capitalism of Cyberpunk 2077 and then also make it like ironic and
39:13
Victorian and and but but you don't dial back on it in any way. I this is it's
39:20
like this is it's over-the-top satire of corporate life. See, in The Outer
39:26
Worlds, it's funny. In Cyberpunk 2077, it's depressing.
39:32
It can be both. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it you're it can be it can be funny and depressing. But
39:37
the the the time when you're trying to figure out if the schism is actually alive or just really good at at trying
39:44
to get people to buy sodas, that's funny and heartbreaking. that quest that quest is messed up. But at this point, we are
39:51
going to move on to the site news because we want to get to some questions. And so, Liz, I'm turning to
39:56
you now. Please do the thing. Okay, I'm going to I'm going to speedrun this because uh I also want to get to
40:01
some questions. I want to say thank you to all of our supporters on Patreon. You guys are what makes us able to make
40:08
these podcasts, makes able to keep a site running. And I did talk a little bit about in the pre-show, if you are if
40:15
you are Patreon supporters, you get to listen to our exclusive Blizzard Watch podcast pre-show. Uh we talked a little
40:21
about how AI has been impacting just uh independent media and sites in the form
40:27
of significantly reduced traffic because when you see those AI summaries at the top of a search page, uh they may or may
40:35
not site a source. And even if they do site a source, people rarely click
40:40
through them. It's like uh people click through them at about half the rate. So
40:47
that is that does hit sites pretty hard and it makes Patreon more important than
40:53
ever because it allows our fans to directly support us instead of us supporting ourselves with advertising
40:59
which relies on a lot of people coming and visiting the site at a time when we have fewer people visiting the site. We
41:05
are not going anywhere. We are still here but our Patreon support is a little low. It's about $500 less than we would
41:12
like. I know you hear me say this every week. Uh, and you probably think, uh, yeah, but you said that last week and
41:19
you're still here. It's still fine. Uh, which is which is true. We're hanging in here. We are supported by Patreon. We
41:26
have ads on the site. We have ads on our podcast. All of that combines to keep us doing all right. But, uh, we would be a
41:33
lot more stable. We would be doing better if we had that extra $500 a month. If you are able to support us
41:40
financially, that really helps because it's you guys out there who keeps the site going. And uh if you support us at
41:48
$3 a month, you get early access to all of our podcasts. That's Blizzard watch talking about the latest Blizzard and
41:53
gaming news, Tavern Watch, which we have TTRPG live plays, and also uh monthly uh
42:02
tabletop news, which those are I think those have been really good. Uh, and of course, lore watch. That does seem to be
42:09
everyone's favorite. Uh, chaos and randomness and all of your weird lore
42:15
questions answered. So, you get all those early and ads free if you support us at $5 a month. You get that, but also
42:20
you get adsree access to the website. And, uh, all of you get uh a better
42:26
chance of getting your questions answered on this show or in the queue. So, if you can't support us financially,
42:32
please do. If you can't, I totally understand. If you uh read our content,
42:37
you listen to these podcast, that helps. If you share our content on social media or anywhere else, that really helps us.
42:45
And uh we are on every social media network that we can stand to be on, and
42:52
some we can't stand to be on, but we're on anyway. We are Blizzard on Instagram, threads, Twitter, Facebook, and
42:58
Mastadon. On Masttodon, we're at gamepad.club. We are blizzardwatch.com on blue sky and
43:05
blizzardwatch podcasts on YouTube. You can follow us at any of these for the latest news. Uh video any of these video
43:13
channels will have clips from our podcast which
43:18
usually me picking out the most randomness and out ofplace comment in the podcast and putting in a little
43:25
video clip just for you guys. So uh follow us on any of these. share our
43:30
content really helps out even if you can't support us financially and just everyone here listening. Thanks so much.
43:38
Thank you. And thank you to Liz for doing the site news for us. Um here come some questions. Wow, we actually got
43:44
some and we're going to do some of them right now. Uh first one is from Azeroom. She is a Patreon supporter. She asks,
43:51
"Assuming it was possible, which of your co-hosts andor cohorts would you trust as your interior decorator for player
43:57
housing?" Um, Joe, none of you. I don't trust any of you.
44:05
Yeah, that's fair. Don't trust me. I mean, if anyone says they trust me, th
44:12
those people need help. Possibly they're being held hostage and they're saying this. Yeah.
44:17
Trigger. And I want to make this perfectly clear. It's not because I don't like you guys. I love you. You're family. But I am so
44:25
particular about how I do my like housing or build stuff that if anybody
44:31
touches it, I will go nutso. Like that's just how this is. Like if I I'll post
44:39
pictures of it at some point, but like you could ask some of our guild mates like how I am with like building in
44:45
Minecraft. Now extrapolate that to player housing and how precious I hold my character. Ain't none of y'all
44:50
touching my space. Sorry. [Laughter] Corey, you have any anyone you can think
44:56
of that you'd let do this for you? I don't know. Does anyone promise to make it all spooky and voidy as much as
45:02
possible? That's Mitch. I can do that. I Yeah, I definitely trust Mitch.
45:10
Give me your Give me your theme of choice and I will execute it.
45:15
There might be there might be a few pink flamingos in your yard. Well, they are the
45:20
just Voidiest of birds. Tasteful and voidy. Pink flamingos.
45:27
Definitely voidy. Well, I mean, Liz or Liz, I was going to say Liz or Matt, you got to answer. I I think this uh this trust fall
45:35
exercise actually depends on how much I actually have to trust someone. Like,
45:42
does my house have a save state that I can go back to? Like, can you save like
45:48
house templates? Like, okay, today, you know, for Halloween, I'm going to put on like this Halloween design that I made
45:54
and then after Halloween, I'm going to go back to whatever I think is my normal design. You know, can I do things like
46:01
that? If you can have like a save state or you can save your house layout as as
46:07
a template or something you can flip around, then yeah, it would be really fun to do things like, okay, your
46:14
craziest guildmate gets to design your house this week, but not if I would have to go back and painstakingly rebuild
46:22
everything because my my furniture is going to be perfectly aligned in a particular way that only makes sense to
46:27
me, but it's going to be perfect. And if someone messes that up and I cannot go
46:33
back, I will I don't know what I'll do, but I won't be happy. I will not.
46:39
So, I feel it's kind of interesting that I mean, I already knew Joe was going to say what he said, and I'm not I'm not
46:44
surprised at what Liz or Corey have said, but I would let anybody do whatever they wanted. One very simple
46:51
reason. I'm gonna mess it up anyway. Um, as soon as you I if anything, if say I
46:58
don't know, we'll pick someone who isn't here. so they don't feel picked on. Um, if if Liz 2 came to me with like an idea
47:06
and wanted to do something with my player housing, I'd be like, "Sure, go for it." And then if I didn't like it,
47:12
I'd be like, "Well, thank you very much." And I would just immediately trash it. And I wouldn't care. It just it's just me. Uh, I am not I am the
47:21
opposite of really particular about it. In fact, I don't know that I'm going to
47:27
do anything for player housing except for set it up so that I have it. Like I I will maybe, and I say this as the guy
47:35
who builds like ludicrously over-the-top structures in in Fallout and other games
47:41
where I'm doing this, I feel like I can't allow that in WoW.
47:47
And I say this also knowing full well that I'm lying. Like I think I I think I
47:53
mean this this thing I'm saying. I think I mean it. But I know I'm lying. I know
47:58
that I'm gonna build like an entire building that is just a shrine to Ashcandi. It's just going to be Ashcandi
48:04
everything everywhere as much as I can do. If I can put that sword on the wall, the sword's going to be on every wall.
48:10
It it just I know me. I I I am not stable. I I I can't be trusted with this
48:17
kind of thing. I'm gonna take it too far. I'm gonna do crazy things. So yeah,
48:22
I I'm just gonna say if somebody has an idea, I'm gonna let them try it out because that way I'm distracting myself
48:29
from my own mania. So that's my answer. And as everybody I I thought I heard something there.
48:35
One thing that I think would be cool is if you could go and like decorate someone's house and have a
48:42
surprise party or leave things on your neighbor's lawn. like, "Okay, I'm going to leave a package in your mailbox or
48:49
I'm going to, you know, quietly add a flamingo to your yard because it looked
48:54
like it really needed a flamingo." So, and I know housing is going to have, you
49:00
know, levels of permission about who can come and go, but it would be it would be neat if you could do things like that
49:06
obviously with the owner's permission for uh for for those of us who would go
49:13
insane if anyone touched our stuff. I mean, you know, if you could mail people like say this bonecovered skull
49:19
throne, they don't have to put the bone covered skull throne in their house, but I here it is. But you know it if you had
49:26
a bonecovered skull thrown I mean what are you going to do? Are you just going to leave it in your mailbox? No way.
49:31
No. Sure. That'd be rude. That was a gift. But um now moving on to another question
49:37
here. This one is from Sarah who not only a patron also you know writes for us. So uh podcast question. What is your
49:45
favorite in-game activity during content ls? Do you find something to do within WoW? If so what? Or do you play other
49:51
things? spend time away from the commu the computer/C console doing something else entirely. So, go ahead. Uh, who's
49:59
going to answer this one first? I'm going to say I guess it'll be me for once. Um, okay. I I have things I don't like like
50:06
fishing. Like I will not do fishing. Uh, but for me, I have a pretty stable uh retinue of stuff I do whether or not
50:13
we're in a content l. I do transmog farming. I do bunch of quests. I see if
50:19
any friends are up for any dungeon or raid activities. I do play games other than WoW more
50:26
frequently during LOLs or, you know, when I when I'm playing WoW, but I I
50:32
we're not going to be doing anything this week because it's the 16th month of of Siege of Ormar.
50:38
Um, you know, I did play other games more at that time. um for that matter a lot of times Diablo is my game to play
50:45
whilst I'm in a content low um or you know just in general. Uh I do I do think
50:51
though I I'm lying if I don't just say transmon because that's that's been my big I'm bored. I'm going to go punch
50:58
Agamagon in the face or Agramar or whatever his name is until he gives me his weird sword. Uh just that's what I
51:06
do. I I do transmog stuff. So who's next? I I really I really have to second
51:11
you, Matt, in that transmog. I'm gonna farm transmog, but I'm also much more
51:16
likely to play other games. So, um, you know, I can drift. But, uh, a
51:24
third thing on the third hand here, I am also currently playing Mist of Pandaria
51:30
Classic, which just rolled out a new expansion. Yeah. Well, I'm okay. I
51:37
we talked about it last week. That's why that's interesting. I'm playing in quotation marks in that I
51:44
have a level 80 character and I decided well, you know, before I I I need to go through cataclysm levels and then I need
51:50
to go into Pantaria levels. And you know, before I do that, I should really have professions leveled up to that level. So, what I've what I have done so
51:58
far is go back to vanilla zones and pick flowers and fish and level cooking and
52:08
all of that, which is a a ridiculous way to spend my time. I don't understand why
52:14
I'm doing it, but I've been doing it. I feel like I need to do it. I But that is
52:19
that also does suggest a level of commitment to continuing to play this game. And uh uh so yeah, WoW itself
52:28
offers a lot of variety even if there's a content lull in retail. Okay, well you
52:34
have the classic progression realms. Okay, you've got the classic classic realms. Okay, you have the season of discovery realms. You have the
52:40
anniversary realms which are going through the content roll out again. So there is so much to do within WoW these
52:47
days. And WoW itself, retail WoW rolls out content at such a fast pace that you may be like, "Okay, well, there's a
52:54
content law, but I haven't completely finished this thing from the last patch, so I'll work on that." There's just
52:59
there's so much to do. There is a cornucopia of content that is World of Warcraft. Yeah. So, it also feels like there haven't been
53:06
content ls this the last couple of expansions. I mean, it's been very good at keeping
53:11
that going. Mhm. It's about two months two months between patches. So, there's a downtime,
53:18
but it's not very long. Okay. Um, both Cory and Joe, you guys can still talk. I mean, a lot of it is
53:24
a lot of it is farming transmog. Uh, a lot of it is actually leveling alts. So,
53:31
like this, I wouldn't even call it a content l, but we hit ahead of the
53:36
curve. And when we did that, I started working on my paladin, mostly because I
53:42
wanted to do something that wasn't my shaman. Uh it's one of the ways that I kind of keep uh the shaman fresh for me.
53:50
Uh or at least how I stay appreciative of it as my main that I've been playing for almost 20 years at this point. Uh so
53:59
I I do a lot of stuff like that and I'll actually hit the raid. I'll actually hit the raids and I'll actually do uh content like keys or or
54:07
things like that to you know get acclimated with it. I also feel it gives me an appreciation for what the uh DPS
54:14
or in particular melee has to deal with because quite honestly terrible.
54:20
Yeah, quite honestly the melee uh winds up getting the short end of the stick.
54:27
Uh which is and it's nice to know what they have to deal with sometimes or what they have to be on the lookout for. It's
54:32
not perfect, but you know it's fun. And then when that's uh all said and done, I will uh find another uh game uh fill the
54:40
void until the next content is after I'm done with everything. Thanks to Game Pass, there's always something to play. Like even if I'm
54:45
going to play it for two nights, there's no end in sight of things I could try
54:51
out. It's true. So yeah, downtime just becomes like, yeah, I'll farm some things or I'll I would farm things or
54:57
I'll go hunting for invincible because I still don't have invincible or do more keys or level that new character or just
55:05
grind out the remaining content from the events that are that's happening. There's always they're really good at
55:10
giving you just enough time to get the mostly finished and then the new stuff comes out. Yeah. So, um I don't How much time do we
55:19
have, Joe? Uh we got a couple minutes. Okay. I'm going to throw in Riptide's question then. Um, sorry about the
55:25
follow-up question, but that's that's one's going to take a long. You can come back. Riptides asked in Discord. Um,
55:31
question for anything. What would you like to see in Starcraft 3 if it ever got made? Um, more Protos.
55:40
That's what I want. I mean, I I got a limited I got, you know, I I got simple tastes. You want the protos to have more
55:47
libido and to have made lots of more baby protos. I don't really care how we get more
55:53
protos. Like maybe they could spoon themselves. I'm really not interested. Um maybe they just have mediclorans. I I
55:59
don't care. I just want the guys with the laser punch daggers to show up again and and in and have more of a story. I
56:07
was really enamored with their, you know, their I don't want to call it
56:12
expansion. I don't know what else what else to call it with Starcraft 2. Uh when they finally brought the uh the
56:18
Protos back and gave them a big story line, I was happy about that and I would like to see more of that. Quite frankly,
56:23
they're my favorite faction. So yeah. Um going to roll D4 and on four I'll just
56:31
roll again. Okay. Uh two two is Joe.
56:37
Uh, honestly, I'd like to see something that does a little more uh I don't want to say in-depth, but uh one thing that I
56:43
always had in my head for like Starcraft in general is splitting the game into uh
56:49
not two different formats, but uh two different sections where you have almost
56:56
uh the RTS naval battle as the like top down thing. Uh, and then you have a
57:02
skirmish style RTS with smaller units focusing more on hero units and support
57:08
units for the hero unit uh when you make Planet Fall. And I think that that could
57:13
be pretty interesting. I don't know that it'll ever happen, but and and I could talk about this and flush this out fully
57:20
if that's something people want to hear later on. We don't have the time for it now. Uh, but it's just something I think
57:25
about. That sounds kind of familiar. Almost legendary. Like a very brutal legendary
57:30
kind of Well, no. I'd say a lot at least br unlike brutal legend. You know what you
57:35
were getting into and they'd both be RTS's, right? Like it wouldn't be it
57:41
just one would be smaller scale, one would be larger scale. So you'd have your your macro and then your micro. And
57:46
I think that that could be potentially interesting. I think people would not exactly like it for competitive play,
57:52
but I think it would be so they would still keep this the standard for competitive play, but but the story side, you would get the more
57:58
intimate kind of missions that we saw where you control like the Nova Covert Ops and Yeah. more more bespoke, more more
58:05
personality, less less generic, right? Like cuz that's one my one gripe with Starcraft 2 campaign is all of the
58:13
quests on the ground just felt sy like it just felt I'm just repeating the same
58:19
thing over and over again except for when they involved very specifically stuff with like a character and so like
58:25
that stuff felt cool give me more of that. So I guess at the same time I would also really enjoy a brutal legend
58:31
Starcraft style where it's half third person action RPG slasher and half
58:37
Starcraft RTS. So Blizzard, you know, make that happen. Okay. So is that Cory, you have more to
58:44
say on that one or were you done? Oh, I you know I just I really like Blizzard RTS's and if they could make
58:51
more I would be happy. I don't I I don't need them to reinvent the wheel. I don't need them to reinvent the whole you got
58:58
your 15 drones and they're all going to go mine some crystals. Like just give me
59:03
more Starcraft. Okay, then that leaves you, Liz. You know, I'd just like to see what is
59:08
the 2025 version of Starcraft cuz back in the day I like Starcraft more than I
59:14
liked Warcraft. I was really into the sci-fi vibe and you've had instead of
59:20
having the two faction is like one is definitely good and one is definitely bad which you definitely have that
59:25
dichotomy feeling early on in Warcraft, you have three factions and none of them
59:33
is purely evil. Okay, the Zerg is questionable and none of them is purely
59:39
good. And I really liked the how that set up the game and how different each
59:45
faction played. So I just like to How do you approach this in 2025? How is the
59:51
game going to be different? How is it going to play knowing that your gamers
59:56
may be 20 or 30 years older than they were when they first open these games? Are you trying to make something that's
1:00:02
authentic to those early game experience? Are you trying to make something that's modernized and feel and
1:00:09
maybe has some modern conveniences that you might see? Uh I just What's the next
1:00:15
step for Starcraft? What would be the next step if you continued the game? Because it's been a while. It's been a
1:00:21
while and it could evolve in different directions and that would be great if it got the chance. I agree. I just want to agree with Yeah,
1:00:27
I just want to agree with you, Liz, that it is true that in Warcraft 2, orcs and humans when they were just the two factions that the orcs were the good
1:00:33
guys, their alliance was the bad guys. So, thank you for saying being brave enough to say that. That that does track with everything I remember from Warcraft
1:00:39
2. Yeah, they weren't even subtle about it in the Warcraft one and Warcraft and Warcraft 2. They just straight up, you
1:00:45
know, the orcs were evil. That's just what it was. That's why I think in a lot of ways Warcraft 3 changed the the game
1:00:52
so much is because people were finally given a horde that wasn't just you know well we've taken the souls of our
1:00:59
warlocks and jammed them into the corpses of our enemies. It's like yikes. Why'd you do that? I you know I was just
1:01:05
I was vibing you know. But anyway uh at this point I
1:01:11
think we're done unless No, that's pretty much it. Uh, so yeah, we've
1:01:16
already done the the thing about doing site news and then questions is I get confused. I'm like, wait, now I have to do Oh, no. Liz is Liz already did it.
1:01:24
So, uh, instead I will just say thank you to Joe and Liz for being here every week as you always are. You the rocks
1:01:30
that allow this show to proceed. Um, thank you to Corey for showing up and
1:01:35
allowing me to yet again taunt you about Heroes of the Storm. Uh, I I do hope I hope you get it back in
1:01:41
all sincerity. I really do hope you get it back. I don't think you will. Uh but I I hope
1:01:47
right around the corner any minute now. I'm sure some somewhere Colin Hayes my one day my ship will come in as plane.
1:01:53
[Laughter] Any rate uh thank you guys for listening with us. Uh, this has been the Blizz
1:01:59
podcast and we'll be back next week. [Music]
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