“Zero Hour” is also the title of one of my favourite Star Trek episodes.

This “Zero Hour” isn’t quite as good as that “Zero Hour,” but it’s still another strong showing from Continuum.

Eschewing the pulse-pounding action of the last few episodes, “Zero Hour” focuses more on big reveals and evolving the characters’ relationships.

Kiera and Brad’s trust is frayed almost to the breaking point following the death of Lucas, and as evidence mounts that his comrades from the future are planning something terrible, their time as allies might be coming to an end.

Alec, meanwhile, is torn with doubt. He’s terrified that every choice he makes could spawn a new dark future. When the fate of the world, of time itself, rests on your shoulders, how can you ever be sure of anything? Is the future written, or can it be changed, and if so, should it?

As he struggles with these issues, Jason reveals what he already told Emily: that Emily was not his mother. Over Jason’s objections, Alec insists on tracking down and meeting the woman his future self married.

What follows is history’s weirdest — and for Jason, most awkward — family reunion ever. Adds a little levity to what has otherwise been a pretty grim season.

In the end, though, meeting the mother of his son does little to dispel Alec’s doubts. Aid, instead, comes from an unexpected source: Curtis.

Kellogg is burdened with doubts. With the minions of his future self still refusing to offer any answers, he must take matters into his own hands, and he comes to discover there is no one Mathew Kellogg won’t screw over — not even Mathew Kellogg.

Although “Zero Hour” lacked anything that would fit the traditional definition of action, I still found it quite exciting, and the hour flew by.

We got a lot of important revelations in this episode, and it went a long way towards both setting the stage for Continuum’s conclusion and fleshing out the backstory of the series to date. Many questions have been answered.

Also, dat paradox.

I also greatly enjoyed Alec’s arc. In the end, it’s always been about him, and his agonizing over the consequences of his choices gets to the very heart of what Continuum is about.

This is, I think, one of the best things about speculative fiction: the ability to take something we all identify with, and turn it up to eleven.

We’ve all doubted ourselves. We’ve all worried that our choices might prove wrong, that our plans might fail, that we may come to ruin despite our best efforts. How much worse, then, to have the weight of all space-time on your shoulders? To know that the future of the human race is in your hands, and that you already failed once?

Fantastic.

Kellogg’s humbling was also great to see. One wonders if there’s anyone left willing to save him. He’s been pretty good at burning his bridges.

My one complaint about this episode — and season four in general, really — is that I’m not digging the continued tension between Kiera and Brad. It feels like a waste of all their development from last season, and it’s all getting a bit soap opera for my taste.

My weird random thought of the night: I wonder who does the cooking for these big dinners with Kiera, Alec, and Liber8? I can’t see Alec being much of a cook. Kiera’s probably used to robots doing all her cooking, or something. Julian probably only knows how to make gluten-free crap. I’m not sure Jason is allowed near sharp things.

Maybe Garza? Wasn’t she running a restaurant at some point?

Anyway.

Overall rating: 7.8/10

The cover for Magician’s End declares it to be the final book in Raymond E. Feist’s Riftwar Cycle, the very last book set in Midkemia. This came as rather a surprise to me — this series has basically been going forever, and I didn’t really expect there to ever be an end.

I’m still not entirely convinced Feist won’t start churning out prequels and spin-offs or even just more sequels in a few years.

But let’s assume for the sake of argument this is in fact the end. And to be fair, it does provide a pretty conclusive end to most of the main arcs and does an admirable job of wrapping up one of the most bloated and unwieldy fantasy series in existence.

No small task, either. This series started in the early 1980s. It has sprawled across nearly thirty novels. It’s lost its groove, got it back again, lost it again, got it back again, kind of lost it again, kind of got it back… The weight of expectation for a conclusion is rather crushing.

By necessity, this review will continue some spoilers.

As is tradition for Midkemia books, the story is split between vast, cosmic conflict involving the characters who have been there from the start — Pug, Miranda, Nakor, Tomas, and Macros — and a far more mundane story that seems pretty much irrelevant. In this case, it’s a civil war in the Kingdom of the Isles starring Hal, whom I still couldn’t tell you anything about.

Normally I enjoy the incredibly in-depth examinations of the abstracts of magic and the fundamentals of this imaginary universe, but this time Pug and Company’s story ended up treading into the realm of “trying too hard.” I suppose this was inevitable when you have to keep one-upping yourself over this many books.

This does have the side effect of making Hal’s otherwise dull story a little more interesting — it is at least a welcome counterpoint to the somewhat ponderous meditations on the true nature of reality.

My biggest complaint, though, is how it tends to abandon or under-serve previously established storylines.

Most notably, most of the Riftwar Cycle has painted all the bad stuff happening in Midkemia as being the work of the imprisoned god of evil, generally referred to only as the Nameless One. Magician’s End just sort of brushes that idea off and instead paints the Dread as the hand behind all that’s gone wrong. I like the Dread, but the last minute change of direction for the entire plot of the series is incredibly jarring.

I was incredibly excited when the first book of the Chaoswar series introduced another reborn Dragon Lord — and not just any Dragon Lord, but the most wicked Valheru of all, Draken-Korin — but he’s hardly a footnote in the story. There’s some side-arc with the Dark Elf chieftain introduced in the last book, but it plays such a small role in the story I have to wonder why it was included at all.

But to be fair, I suppose some loose ends was inevitable with a series this vast.

And in favour of Magician’s End, the actual ending it provides is quite satisfying. It’s got a lot of tragedy, but there’s also a lot of hope for the future. It hits that perfect bittersweet balance I like.

Similarly, there’s room for more sequels — not every problem everywhere has been solved — but it also feels conclusive enough to be satisfying should there be no more books in the series.

Considering all the stumbles this series has had over the years decades, and considering the massive weight of history and expectation pressing down on it, Magician’s End does a fairly admirable job, though it remains a book with significant flaws.

Overall rating: 7.3/10

One of the most interesting and underutilized types of plot, in my opinion, is having a protagonist’s plans fail.

I don’t mean just a setback. I mean an utter, spectacular, catastrophic failure. To have all of their carefully laid schemes come crashing down around them.

As Continuum’s second to last episode begins, Kiera has developed a risky but complete plan to end the threat presented by Kellogg’s future soldiers and get home to her own time. Alec has done the math, and it should work. She just has to rely on Brad and Kellogg holding up their ends of the bargain.

Maybe it’s not surprising that placing her faith in such people doesn’t end well.

Failure is definitely the theme of this episode. Failure of plans, of efforts, of aspiration. But also personal failure, as well. Failure of the characters to be their better selves.

I was so disappointed by the actions of several characters in this episode. Just craven, selfish, irresponsible behaviour all around.

The really ironic thing is that the people who came out of this mess looking the most heroic are Travis and Dillon, which almost makes you wonder if this is Opposite Day. But really it just shows how far the others have fallen.

To be fair, Alec and Carlos still managed to stay true to their principles, for the most part.

I’m not complaining. All of these actions made sense in the context of the characters’ various arcs, it made for good drama, and one of the things I like about Continuum is that it’s a very morally gray show. Often, the “good guys” are no better than the people they oppose.

At this point, though, at least one character has definitely crossed the Rubicon, and I can only look forward to their inevitable (hopefully grizzly) demise.

Another major theme of “The Desperate Hours” is once again throwing doubt on whether Kiera can get home, or if the timeline she came from even still exists in any form.

I’m quite glad of this. It never made much sense to me that Kiera could take her home’s preservation for granted when much of last season was devoted to making clear that her timeline was gone, and her letting go of it. Admittedly, Continuum’s rules regarding time travel are not terribly well explained, but Brad’s very existence seems to show that Kiera’s home is long gone.

I will also say again that I hope Kiera does not ultimately make it home. It would waste a lot of the character development she’s gone through to do date, it wouldn’t make much logical sense, and honestly I don’t think Kiera deserves a perfect shiny happy ending.

Kiera isn’t a very good person. She’s not a monster, but she’s no hero, either — and “The Desperate Hours” proves that quite conclusively. I don’t necessarily want to see Kiera suffer, but I don’t want her to get everything she wants, either.

She just doesn’t deserve it.

My one significant complaint with this episode would be that we see nothing of Curtis or the Traveler, and considering how important they theoretically are and how close we are to the end, I was expecting them to have a role to play.

Overall rating: 8.1/10

Have you ever thought to yourself, “Gee, you know what would make a great story? Harry Potter crossed with the movie Snatch.”

I’m guessing probably not. Unless you’re author Sam Munson, in which case you’ve not only had that thought (or something similar) but written and published it as a book.

And yes, the title really is The War Against the Assholes.

It’s one part teen drama, one part black comedy, one part gang war, one part urban fantasy, and one part… I don’t even know.

The story follows Michael Wood, a jockish teenager attending a fancy Catholic school in New York. An encounter with a strange boy named Hob ushers Michael into a gang of rogue magicians.

They live in defiance of the secret magical hierarchy that has reigned over the world for centuries. These individuals are properly referred to them as theurgists, but Hob refers to them as assholes, and the name sort of sticks. To be fair, it’s not an inaccurate descriptive.

Above I compared The War Against the Assholes to Harry Potter, and there is definitely a resemblance. There is a lot of teen drama and coming of age themes here, albeit presented in a deliberately crude and often borderline twisted manner. The conflict between Michael’s gang and the “assholes” also sometimes seemed to amount to a contest between rival high schools, albeit a deadly one.

So basically Harry Potter with much more sex, drugs, booze, and violence.

It also reminded me of the Black Company novels in some ways. There’s that same deadpan, sardonic mannerism to the writing, the same twisted sense of humour.

As the Black Company comparison might imply, the prose is one of the strong points of The War Against the Assholes. Yet it’s also a weakness.

Specifically, the dialogue is handled in an unusual manner, and it’s quite disruptive. Instead of each line being its own paragraph, or spaced out any other way, the dialogue is just jammed into the middle of paragraphs, with lines from different characters coming back to back often with inadequate clues as to who’s saying what. It’s very confusing, and it gets tiresome.

I suspect this was a conscious decision on the author’s part. The book is told in first person perspective, and Mike is, by his own admission, not terribly bright. But intentionally writing the book poorly in some ways, while an admirable effort towards verisimilitude, still does more harm than good.

Since we’re on the subject, Mike just isn’t that compelling of a character. He’s ultimately little more than slow-witted thug, and his main virtues as a member of the magical revolution is that he is both very capable of and very willing to hurt people when the situation calls for it.

By far the biggest flaw of The War Against the Assholes is that its main character is also its least interesting character by a wide margin. I would have much preferred a book from the perspective of, say, Hob, or Alabama the gun-toting sorceress.

There are some other issues, too. The story flows oddly, with the most climactic events happening about halfway through and the story just sort of slowly petering out after that. The ending is also quite underwhelming and doesn’t provide closure to much of anything. Normally I’d say this is just leaving room for a sequel, and admittedly that remains the most likely scenario, but the whole of the book is just so odd I wouldn’t be shocked if it turns out that really is it.

That said, the book still has many strengths. It’s funny, it keeps you guessing, it’s extremely original, and aside from the dialogue issue, the prose is very clever and a joy to read.

Something else that impressed is that despite the book’s irreverent attitude and real world setting it still manages to evoke the sense of awe and wondrous beauty that lies at the heart of the fantasy genre. I can’t call out specifics without getting into spoiler territory, but there are scenes in this book that left me genuinely awestruck.

The War Against the Assholes is not a book that I would recommend to everyone. Its graphic subject matter and relentless oddness would definitely turn off more than a few people. But I enjoyed it, and it deserves major credit for being different.

Overall rating: 7.7/10 Abracadabra, bitches.

And so we come to the end. After just six episodes, the fourth season of Continuum has concluded, and with it one of the best science fiction television series of recent memory — perhaps of all time.

The stage is set for a final showdown at the warehouse where Kellogg’s future soldiers are planning to open a portal to their own time. The Vancouver Police Department, led by Carlos and (surprisingly) Dillon, alongside Piron’s security forces plan to crush them in a pincers movement, while Kiera and Alec attempt to infiltrate the facility in the hopes of sending Kiera home.

Meanwhile, Kellogg plans yet another double cross, and along the way proves himself even more gross than we thought.

Considering all the build-up around this epic final clash and Continuum’s penchant for frequent and spectacular fight scenes, “Final Hour” isn’t as action-packed as you might expect. Oh, there’s more than a few bullets and explosions, but there’s also quite a lot of time given to tearful farewells and waxing philosophical about the implications of time travel.

To be honest, it felt like a case of telling and not showing. The entire series has been a thesis on the personal and ethical implications of time travel. We didn’t need any more.

And as much as it pains me to say it, that’s not the only way “Final Hour” didn’t quite meet my expectations. It’s an episode that seems filled with missed opportunities.

The Traveler’s storyline, for instance, doesn’t ultimately amount to much, and honestly I don’t understand its resolution at all.

Similarly, Garza is just sort of there and doesn’t really do anything. This is very disappointing, because Garza is awesome, and I spent the whole episode expecting her to do something crazy and throw everything into chaos.

The list goes on. I would have liked to have seen Emily be involved somehow. Her plot was just sort of left hanging. I want to know what Jason wrote in that note.

I don’t like how things wound up with Brad, either. It doesn’t feel right after his ruthless backstabbing in the last episode.

There were some high notes, though.

I actually rather liked Dillon getting some redemption in the end. At first I thought it was too sudden and didn’t fit with his character, but thinking about it, it makes sense from a thematic perspective.

Dillon was always a kind of metaphor for the trajectory of the world. As time went on, he became more and more corrupt, a forebear of the totalitarianism of Kiera’s time. Having him break free of that darkness is a good way to illustrate the changing course of the timeline. He’s a microcosm of the entire arc of Continuum.

And I did truly love the very end. It was powerful, emotional, and incredibly satisfying, if rather bittersweet. I’m very glad they found a way to provide a positive outcome without giving Kiera a perfect shiny happy ending. Very well done.

So in the end, “Final Hour” wasn’t all I was hoping for from the conclusion of Continuum, but it wasn’t exactly bad, either, and I’ve certainly seen far more disastrous ends to sci-fi shows. I’m looking at you, Battlestar Galactica.

For all its faults, “Final Hour” cannot tarnish the incredible legacy of Continuum, and it serves as an effective, if uneven, conclusion to the truly brilliant arc of the series. When you consider where the show started, and how much the characters and the mythos grew and evolved in that time, it’s awe-inspiring.

Overall rating: 7.5/10

I’m sad to see Continuum end, but I am very grateful that it had the chance to end on its own terms, and that we were able to see such an incredible story come to its conclusion.

Farewell, Continuum. You were a shining example of science fiction at its very best.

It won’t seem that way to readers, but this post is in some ways the first after a long hiatus from blogging. Now, I have been doing my TV reviews, but those pretty much write themselves, and aside from them, I haven’t been written any new posts in months, instead relying on the backlog I gave myself while looking for apartments/moving.

(Incidentally, I am very happy to be back in Toronto.)

I wandered what my first new topic should be after such a long break, and I decided it would be best to go back to basics: a nice long ramble about Warcraft.

I’ve noticed something odd in the WoW community as of late. People everywhere seem overcome with nostalgia for Mists of Pandaria. An expansion that was loathed at the time is now being almost universally hailed as one of the best periods of the game’s long lifespan.

Some might not find this surprising. There’s a common perception that every WoW expansion is hated when it’s current, and then becomes viewed with rose-coloured glasses after the fact. I don’t like this argument, because it’s a bit of a cop-out and mainly serves to shut down discussion or deflect criticisms of the game, but there’s definitely some truth to it. The prevailing opinions on an expansion do tend to improve after it’s gone.

But never this thoroughly, or this fast. Warlords of Draenor is not yet a year old, yet already Mists is being roundly hailed as second only to Wrath of the Lich King, which is nowadays generally viewed as when the game peaked, despite being regarded as the Spawn of Satan for many years after its release.

I’m not immune, either. Lately I find myself missing Pandaria, badly. I still have my hearthstones set the shrines, and sometimes I’ll fly out across the Vale, or up to Kun-Lai and just be overcome by nostalgia. The other day I hopped on my monk (who is still 90 because I’m sick of Draenor) and did some scenarios purely for the nostalgia value.

But yet none of these good feelings were to be found when MoP was the current content. It faced at least as much disdain from the supremely negative WoW community as any other expansion, if not more, and I was certainly none too happy with the state of the game at the time, as long-time readers will remember.

So what happened?

The wonders of Pandaria:

In my case, I actually saw this coming somewhat, though I didn’t expect my turnaround on MoP to happen this soon or be this dramatic. But I did often have the sense that I’d feel a lot better about Mists of Pandaria after the fact.

See, I had a lot of complaints about MoP, but they were all gameplay related. The daily grind, the tedium of Timeless Isle, the devaluing of valor and justice points.

Yet the content of the expansion, its story, and its setting were stellar. As I’ve always said, Mists of Pandaria kind of sucked, but Pandaria was amazing.

As time goes on, I forget the unpleasant gameplay, and all that’s left is a fantastic story.

Make no mistake, for all its myriad flaws, Pandaria was a fantastic adventure from beginning to end. It was probably the best told story in WoW’s history. Not best overall — I’d still give that to Wrath, but it has the advantage of more interesting subject matter — but best executed.

MoP, more than any other expansion, told a cohesive story, with each event flowing into the next organically. The Thunder King was kind of an odd detour, but aside from that, the entire story from the discovery of Pandaria to the Siege of Orgrimmar was one big arc that spanned the entirety of Azeroth and the full spectrum of human emotion — rage and sorrow, hope and joy, humour and tranquility. Its pacing and its flow were impeccable.

The world-building was also excellent in MoP. Blizzard essentially started from scratch with Pandaria, but they created an incredibly intricate and exotic world full of new cultures and history that still managed to fit perfectly into the greater Warcraft mythos.

All this is exactly the sort of thing that earns my love, so perhaps it’s not surprising I now miss Pandaria as much as I do. But most people don’t care about story as much as me, which leads me to wonder why there’s so much nostalgia for MoP throughout the community.

One could write it off as being blinded by nostalgia, and there’s bound to be at least some of that going around, but I don’t think that’s all.

Compare and contrast:

Ultimately I think this sudden wave of panda-love may have less to do with MoP itself, and more to do with Warlords of Draenor.

Warlords of Draenor is, by a wide margin, the smallest expansion World of Warcraft has ever received. By comparison, MoP was enormous.

Say what you about MoP, but the one thing you could never say about it was that it lacked ambition. It offered a huge selection of new features, and it cranked out four major content patches over its lifecycle. I’ve heard some describe MoP as “the golden age of content,” and there’s definitely a lot of truth to that, as it offered content in copious quantity and (mostly) high quality — though it does lose points for the lack of post-launch dungeons.

By comparison, WoD offered only one new feature, garrisons, and only one content patch. Tanaan Jungle was originally slated to be a launch zone and was delayed, so really WoD’s only post launch content additions were a single raid and the garrison shipyard. And let’s not forget that WoD removed a lot from the game, too, to the point where the game has probably been made worse by it — something that has not been true of any other expansion to date, in my opinion.

The difference in scale and ambition between Mists of Pandaria and Warlords of Draenor is cavernous. In light of that, it’s no wonder that MoP is suddenly being viewed much more highly.

I suspect if WoD had been a larger and more successful expansion, we would not be seeing the sudden outpouring of love for MoP that’s happening. MoP probably still would have ended up being viewed much more positively, but I think it would have taken much longer, and I’m not sure the change in opinion would ever have been so complete.

Although I am cautiously optimistic about Legion right now (emphasis on “cautiously”), it’s still looking a bit anemic compared to past expansions, and one has to wonder if Mists of Pandaria was the last great World of Warcraft expansion — in terms of scope and ambition, if not necessarily quality.

There are those who say that the worst thing about Cataclysm was that it followed Wrath of the Lich King. I think the best thing about Mists of Pandaria may have been that it preceded Warlords of Draenor.

* * *

Patch 6.2.3: The mea culpa:

Of course, just as I’m getting ready to put up this post, Blizzard has a big announcement to make. WoW will soon receive a small content patch, 6.2.3, to tide us over during the (undoubtedly lengthy) wait until Legion, and it’s looking to be the best patch of the expansion to date.

Valor is back.

Holy Hell, did not see that coming.

I really thought valor points were dead and gone. Rare indeed is the time when Blizzard reverses one of their decisions after so long.

Valor will only be used for item upgrades, not buying gear, which isn’t ideal, but it’s a start. The game needs valor. It was the best progression system for non-raiders, and it allowed all content to still have some relevance. Dungeons were pretty much killed by the removal of valor points.

For my part, I have no patience for RNG gearing, and apexis crystals were/are an excruciating grind with mostly underwhelming rewards. Valor was my endgame, and without it, WoD has nothing but a legendary quest and garrison chores to me.

Unfortunately I’m already super burned out on Draenor, and there are a lot of other games I need to find time to play, so I’m not sure how much difference this will make for me, but it’s a step in the right direction. It shows me Blizzard is willing to learn from their mistakes. For the first time since WoD was announced, I feel a little of my faith renewed.

I can only hope they realize what a huge mistake they’ve made and that valor is a launch feature for Legion.

There are some other nice things in 6.2.3, too. Timewalking is being expanded to include some Cataclysm dungeons, as well as some more Wrath and Burning Crusade dungeons, and timewalking bosses will now have a chance to drop an Infinite Drake mount. Shockingly, it’s not just the old Infinite drake model, but a totally new (and awesome) model.

Perhaps even more surprising is that the upcoming Grove Warden moose mount is going to be made temporarily available as a drop from heroic Archimonde.

A store mount available for free? This is unprecedented. I might even overcome my distaste for raiding and get a kill in, because flying moose.

I mean, I am Canadian.

It’s hard not to see 6.2.3 as a giant mea culpa from Blizzard for how much they’ve bungled Warlords of Draenor, but frankly, they needed to do that. I’m glad they’re swallowing their pride and trying to make it right.

I’m way overdue to post a free chapter of Rage of the Old Gods, but some sad news has come up that I do want to cover briefly.

I suppose the title of this post is something of a giveaway, but yes, Defiance has been cancelled after three seasons.

It’s a disappointing piece of news, though not entirely a surprising one. Defiance was never a ratings juggernaut, and its viewership had dropped sharply with the third season. A lot of people criticized the show’s sudden turn toward the darker, so that may have contributed to its failing popularity. It also may have been the result of SyFy playing musical timeslots with it over the last few seasons.

Whatever the reason, Defiance is gone.

This saddens me, but perhaps not as much as you might think considering I’ve been a fan since the start.

The fact is that Defiance has struggled badly to maintain a consistent quality over the years. It had a very weak first season, a very strong second season, and a very mixed third season. I’m badly tempted to blame this on my own pet peeve and say the Omec killed the show, but there’s no way of knowing that.

What upsets me more than the loss of Defiance the show is the loss of Defiance the world. As up and down as the show was, the universe it took place in was fantastically detailed and endlessly fascinating. Defiance had a better eye for detail, a richer backstory, and a greater potential than almost any other setting I’ve ever seen.

Now we’ll never know what the story with the Volge was, or why the Kaziri was on Earth so long ago, or what the cultures of the Sensoth and Liberata or like, or where the Gulanee fit into Votan society…

I will also greatly miss Datak Tarr and Doc Yewll.

Now, Defiance the game still exists, but it’s never been a huge hit, either, and without the show to prop it up, I suspect its days are now also numbered. I should probably make a point to spend time with it while I still can.

One could be optimistic and speculate that the story could continue through the game, with the show’s cast voicing their characters in-game as has already happened a few times, but I doubt the resources or willpower exists for that.

First Continuum, now Defiance. Well, it was nice to have a glut of sci-fi well it lasted.

At least there’s still Dark Matter.

We’re now closing in on the end as we come to the twenty-second chapter of Rage of the Old Gods, the first book of my epic science fantasy trilogy the World Spectrum. In the coming weeks, I will be posting the entire book for free on this blog. If you’re just joining us, you can get caught up with the previous chapters now.

As the Gods’ army nears humanity’s last bastion, the survivors turn to increasingly desperate measures in the hopes of preserving the species, but Leha refuses to abandon her principles. Will humanity’s continued existence come at the cost of its soul? Is surviving the current crisis worth dooming the future?

———————

Chapter twenty-one: Something Higher

The lights danced before Yarnig’s eyes.

Since the battle by the ocean, he had put most of his time and energy into exploring his newfound magical abilities. It helped him keep his mind away from Natoma. Erik had originally urged him to go to Natoma and attempt to win her over, but Yarnig refused to go back on his word to her. He would wait until after the war – if it ever ended. Erik was fascinated by the new abilities he could access with Yarnig’s aid, so he soon forgot to meddle in the emperor’s personal life.

There were many magical abilities, such as Healing, that were so complex as to be out of reach of most wizards. Currently, they were working on another such magical art: illusion.

Most wizards had some ability to bend light – that was how scrying worked – but to create a three-dimensional, believable image of something was extremely difficult. And so they sat in front of Yarnig’s tent, in the hot summer sun, and tried to create images of things that weren’t there.

Yarnig held his hands before him and bit his lip in concentration. In his mind, he wove the strands of light together in a matrix so complex that even he had trouble maintaining it. In the air between him and Erik, the image of a long sword appeared and hovered above the ground. It was blurry, and it flickered oddly.

Yarnig furrowed his brow and forced the energies to cooperate. The image solidified into something indistinguishable from a real sword.

He relaxed slightly, and the image vanished.

Erik and Yarnig’s shoulders slumped in unison.

Sighing, Yarnig opted to take a break, and the ice creature helping them broke the link. Erik tossed him a flask of water, and Yarnig drank greedily of the cool liquid. The weather had been unusually hot lately, though the frequent rains provided moments of relief.

The sound of shovels in the dirt came to them from the outer edge of the camp.

“Maybe we should go back to carving things,” Erik suggested, his breathing heavy.

Yarnig had already shown talent in using magic to carve, shape, and craft items of exquisite detail, an artistic skill that Urannan wizards had been famous for. He had produced a collection of large, flat rocks bearing carvings every bit as intricate and detailed as his sketches had been.

He shook his head. “No, I think I need to keep at the illusion. We’ll get it right.”

Erik let out a breath. “Okay.”

After a few more minutes’ rest, they linked with each other again. Something simpler this time, Yarnig thought. They held out their hands, and a dim brown cloud coalesced between them. Yarnig frowned in concentration, and the cloud coalesced into a perfect replica of the water flask.

Yarnig breathed out slowly, trying to ease his tension without losing concentration. He and Erik decided to try for something harder. The flask dissolved, and in its place, a bottle of brandy, like the ones he had enjoyed at his country home, took its place.

Again, he made himself relax. The image stayed stable.

Yarnig’s brow furrowed in concentration, and the bottle dissolved to reshape itself into the image of the sword. This time, it didn’t vanish.

They experimented with moving the illusory sword, shifting it from vertical to horizontal and back again. Yarnig began to move the sword in a series of cuts and stabs.

The motion of the sword suddenly made him think of Natoma. He tried to push the thought out of his mind, and the image melted away.

He dropped his hands, swearing in his mind. He blushed brightly as he realized that the ice creature could sense his thoughts as well as Erik could.

I’m sorry, he sent to Erik as he tried to reorder his thoughts.

That’s all right, Erik thought, his reply tinged with hints of what he thought Yarnig should do about Natoma.

Yarnig ignored his friend’s opinions. They rested briefly as Yarnig refocused his attention, then returned to their work.

* * *

Near the northern edge of the camp, Leha sat upon a trebuchet and surveyed the camp. It would have been extremely difficult for a normal Barrian to reach her perch, but her enhanced agility had allowed her climb the massive engine easily, and her augmented reflexes allowed her to sit upon the timbers at the crown of its frame without fear of falling.

In the back of her mind, she felt the presence of one of Benefactor’s people. It had created a very minimal link between her and some members of the rearguard so that she could channel Tyzuan energy too them. It was the only way they could hope to reach the camp before the machines did. Leha had grown so used to doing it over the past few days that she barely noticed it. Only a slight, ever present feeling of fatigue reminded her of it.

The air was hot, but a cool wind blew from the mountains. A bank of clouds darkened the sky to the northeast and brought the smell of rain.

Her gaze swept the area. It was the fifth day after the battle by the ocean. In a short time, her people had made remarkable progress in preparing the camp. The clearing of trees was nearly complete, and, at the north end at least, the earthworks, war engines, and other defenses were finished.

When fully complete, the earthworks would encircle the camp in two concentric rings – they were but a pair of crescents at this point. Each ring would have four small gaps for people to move in and out. The gaps in the outer ring were aligned to the points of the compass, and those in the second ring were offset so as to ensure there was no straight, clear path into the camp. Each ring was slightly taller than an average Clan or Tor man, so they significantly outstripped Leha in height. An Automaton would be able to walk over or through them, but they would provide some protection from spells and airborne debris.

To the southwest, the defenses still needed much work. She saw people scurrying about, like ants, in a feverish attempt to prepare that section of the camp.

Just beyond them, smoke from the forges streamed into the sky as Drogin’s people worked to manufacture as much weaponry and armor as they could before the Automatons arrived. Leha had given the order that everyone in the camp was to be armed when the attack came, even those that would not be part of the defense. There was a good chance that the Automatons would breach the defenses and reach the civilians. If that happened, she didn’t want anyone to be without some means of defending themselves.

Limits on time and resources meant that many would be forced to make do with nothing but a few javelins of sharpened wood, but some would be lucky enough to receive crossbows or narviks. Some tools, such as pickaxes, could be used against the machines; those would be given out as well. Even Benefactor, whom she had begged to join the evacuation, and the other remaining ice creatures that weren’t wizards would be given crossbows.

As the days had progressed, the people of the camp had grown increasingly edgy. She saw the worry in their eyes, the fearful way they moved. Tempers had grown short, and arguments and disputes broke out often.

She couldn’t blame them. There was a good chance that the machines would kill them. Many of them had been separated from their families during the evacuation. And for the most part, there was nothing for them to do to make themselves feel useful or to take their mind off the impending attack. Aside from building the earthworks and doing other chores, all they could do was sit and hope Leha and her soldiers would be able to save them. She only wished she could have done better for them.

Her eyes turned back to the north slowly, taking in the camp as a whole. In comparison to the vast wilderness around it, the camp had always seemed tiny, a speck almost swallowed by the forest. But now she realized how large it was. It had housed many thousand people, and it was the size of a small city. It seemed like such a large area to defend.

To the north, a deep, wide trench had been cut in the barren fields. This was the source of the soil and stones the earthworks were made of. The trench was another obstacle the machines would have to avoid.

Farther north, she could see a line, cut by the River Sheen, through the endless trees and beyond that, the dark lump of Yeldar. They had considered moving the camp to the mountain and defending it, but it was too steep and rugged to be made habitable, or defendable, in the amount of time available. She wondered if the Automatons would destroy the First One outpost inside. She hoped they wouldn’t; if its secrets could ever be deciphered, it might have much to teach them.

She felt an ice creature touch her thoughts, but it was not the one connecting her to the retreating army. It was Benefactor. Leha, he said, sounding concerned.

What is it? she sent, wondering what had him so worried.

You must come to the command tent. You will not like it.

She frowned. She leapt off the edge of the trebuchet, cushioning her landing with the energy of Sy’om. Benefactor, what is it?

An image appeared in her mind: a large crowd outside the tent that had replaced the Clan hall as the main meeting area for her and the other leaders. Natoma stood before the crowd, attempting to keep order. Leha heard someone at the fore of throng say, “We want to see Leha. We want to be made like her.”

Her insides chilled, and she groaned. You’re right. I don’t like it.

She sensed Benefactor duck his head sadly.

She set off for the command tent at a steady jog, a damp wind from the northeast blowing at her back. She felt herself break out in a nervous sweat. She had feared something like this might happen. This time, she didn’t think people would be willing to accept her usual explanations about it being too risky. She hoped they would understand her true reasoning. She hoped she was doing the right thing.

Sensing her distress, Eranna and Doga’s minds became more present within the mental link. At the same time, they dismissed the other soldiers Leha had connected to so they wouldn’t sense her thoughts – the ice creature would, but they did not reveal information that their human allies considered private or privileged; for a people that kept no secrets among each other, they were fairly good at keeping those of others.

Leha wordlessly communicated the situation to Doga and Eranna. They sent her their sympathy, though they didn’t agree with her decision not to create more with her abilities. She thanked them.

We’ll break the link so you can concentrate fully, Eranna sent.

We should take a break soon anyway, Doga added.

Leha thanked them again. The link broke, and she felt a moment of relief as she stopped channeling energy to the army.

She arrived at the command tent. A crowd of about twenty people, mostly soldiers, had gathered before it. A few paces behind them, a much larger crowd had gathered and were chattering amongst each other.

Natoma stood in front of the tent, watching over the assembled people with a keen eye. She saw Leha approach and nodded to her. Leha came to stand beside her.

Before she could speak, a tall man – she recognized him as Karn, one of Eranna’s men – detached himself from the smaller group and bowed to her. “Leha, forgive our imposition,” he said, speaking accented Eastenholder. He straightened and gestured to the others in his little group. “We have come to volunteer ourselves. We wish to be changed, as you were.”

She started to speak, but he held up his hand. “We are aware of the risks. We know we could come to harm. But the machines will be here within days. We’ll need every advantage if we are to defend ourselves.” He looked at his comrades. “We’re willing to take our chances if it means we can make a difference.”

They nodded solemnly.

Leha felt her throat tighten. They really did believe in what they said. I hope I’m doing the right thing.

She swallowed, and spoke. “No. It won’t happen.”

Karn frowned, looking confused.

She pressed on, speaking loud enough for the larger crowd to hear. “I have always said that to transform others as I was would be very risky, and that’s true. The Lost One ability to change their venom is not an exact science, and the one who changed me is dead. We don’t know if we can replicate what was done to me.”

She stood tall, trying to appear more certain than she felt. “But that is not the only reason why I have forbid the creation of others like me.”

A murmur ran through the assembled people. Karn’s group exchanged glances.

“In the past, humanity has made many mistakes. We’ve launched pointless wars and committed atrocities against each other. We resurrected the Automatons and brought these current troubles upon ourselves.

“My abilities have the potential to be very destructive. I don’t think that I can trust anyone with that kind of power. I – ”

The crowd erupted. People yelled and booed and shouted. They shook their fists and made angry gestures.

Leha enhanced her voice and shouted to be heard over the tumult. “I wouldn’t trust myself with them, but I didn’t have any choice in the matter!”

Her words did nothing to stem the tide of screams and accusations. The larger crowd grew increasingly unruly, their voices pounding at her.

“Listen to me!” she shouted.

Natoma stepped forward. “She does this because she thinks it is right!” she said, her voice loud and commanding without seeming angry or belligerent. “We all owe our lives to her many times over! You should at least hear her out.”

The crowd quieted somewhat. Many of them seemed uncertain.

Leha felt a surge of gratitude for Natoma’s words. She took a breath and tried again to explain herself. “I understand your feelings. Really, I do. But I have to think about the consequences of this. And I worry what could happen if everyone had the abilities that I do.”

People in the larger group continued to grumble.

“Who are you to do decide that no one is worthy? Are you going to keep us inferior, under your power, like the Old Gods did?” a man yelled to her.

She flushed angrily. “I am nothing like the Old Gods! I don’t do this for me; I do this for the future! Can any of you promise me that no human will ever raise their hands against another again? Can you?” She scanned the throng, her eyes fierce.

She flexed her claws and took a moment to calm down. “I haven’t judged everyone unworthy. As you said, I’m not qualified. So who will judge who has earned it and who hasn’t? How can anyone’s judgment be good enough for them to decide who should wield this kind of power and who shouldn’t?”

The people stayed mostly silent, weighing her words. Some still mumbled to each other or threw her suspicious glances.

Not everyone in the camp had joined the initial gathering, and now others began to arrive to see what the commotion was.

A woman from Karn’s group, a Lost One, came forward and bowed her head. “I understand what you say,” she said. “I will respect your decision.”

Without another word, the Lost One left.

Leha nodded to her dumbly, taken aback by the suddenness of her decision.

“Why not simply give this power to everyone? Things would be equal. No one would have an advantage,” another man from the mob said.

Leha glared at him. “No one had an advantage when every nation had Automatons. That didn’t work out, did it?”

An angry rumble came from the masses.

Karn addressed her. “Leha, I understand your point of view,” he said respectfully. “But isn’t the time to play it safe past? The future is uncertain; right now, we know we need this. Once we’ve survived the machines, we can decide how to proceed.”

“No!” she said.

Natoma glanced at her quickly, seeming surprised at the strength of Leha’s emotions.

Leha shook her head and looked down, trying to rein in her anger.

She tilted her head back up and spoke to all assembled. “If you really disagree with me, if you really think it would be right to give more people these powers, prove me wrong. Stop seeking them! Prove that you can dedicate yourself to something higher than your own survival.

“Maybe there will come a time when I can trust people to wield this kind of power.”

She stared at the throng, her expression resolute, and those in the crowd, save for a few, stared back, appearing equally determined.

Eventually, it became clear to both sides that no resolution would be reached, and the people slowly returned to their lives and duties, continuing to grumble and look upon her with distrust. Their glances and harsh whispers sent an aching sadness through her. She had protected them for more than a year. She had risked her life and sacrificed, and now, it seemed to her, all their trust in her, all their gratitude for what she had done, had been washed away in just a few minutes.

Karn’s group started to dissipate not long after the larger crowd did, but Karn himself did not move. After a few minutes, Leha realized that he did not intend to leave.

“My decision is final, Karn,” she said tiredly, returning her voice to normal.

He stepped towards her. “I understand your point of view. I truly do,” he said. “But I think you need to be willing to accept that you may be wrong. You’re just one person. You can make mistakes. I ask you to reconsider.”

She shook her head. “You don’t understand. You can’t understand.” You don’t have the future of humanity on your shoulders.

He peered into her eyes. “Then make me understand. Get an ice creature to link our minds.”

Leha considered for a moment. “All right,” she said. “We’ll link.”

She closed her eyes and reached out to Benefactor. She conveyed what she needed.

She sensed him duck his head, and her mind began to link with Karn’s.

They started at the basic level of linkage that was normally used, where she sensed his assurance in his own rightness and his calm certainty, but then they progressed to a deeper, more profound link.

He saw her belief in her rightness, and the toll that having responsibility for the human race had taken on her. She, in turn, saw his belief that surviving in the here and now was more important than any undetermined future. She also saw that nothing in her mind surprised him.

Her jaw hung slack.

He did understand. And he still disagreed.

* * *

There were no more confrontations that day, but the air in the camp remained tense. Whenever Leha went somewhere, conversations would suddenly stop, or people would peer at her suspiciously, or they would avoid looking at her. Sometimes, they offered support for her decision, but those instances were rare.

The debate over whether she was doing the right thing seemed to send fractures through the people of the camp. She had trouble assessing things herself – most people no longer felt comfortable sharing their thoughts with her around – but many Lost Ones and the majority of Benefactor’s people agreed with her, and they funneled information to her.

From what her informants could tell, about half of the people in the camp were convinced she was wrong, and some of these were very vocal. Less than a fifth openly admitted to agreeing with her, though it was suggested that there were some who felt that way but would not say so. The rest were unsure of what stance to take. Many members of the camps for and against her decision had taken it upon themselves to convince others of their beliefs, and that led to a great deal of conflict. Arguments broke out all over the camp. Leha had heard raised voices herself on more than one occasion.

Thankfully, none of the confrontations had turned violent, and everyone was continuing to follow her orders and perform their duties – for now, at least. Things had spiraled out of control so quickly that Leha half-expected open mutiny soon.

Leha deeply regretted the timing of this. Eranna and Doga’s latest reports said that the machines would reach the camp within the next three days. Her people could not afford to be splintered like this so soon before a battle.

Her friends had put a great deal of effort into selling people on her policy. Natoma, especially, had been vocal in her defense of Leha. Leha was told that Drogin refused to let any of the forge workers or technicians speak ill of her while they worked. Even Doga and Eranna, who did not agree with her, had done their best to convince the rearguard – and via the link, those in the camp – that she should be supported for the sake of unity. Doga’s words had gone a long way towards building her support among the Lost Ones.

The efforts of the other leaders did a great deal to shore up support for her, but the camp remained divided. A hard knot of worry settled into Leha’s stomach and stayed there throughout the day.

That evening, as the sun dropped towards the peaks to the west and the heat of the day reduced to a more tolerable balminess, Drogin joined Leha outside her tent. Leha started a fire with wood that steamed from the afternoon rains, and they set a pot of soup over it. The soup was made from mushrooms from the forest and dried meat. It would barely feed the both of them.

They sat on stools to stay above the moist ground, and as they waited for their food to cook, they spoke of the events of the day. Leha would have preferred a more private location, but luckily few people were in the immediate vicinity. Only a few voices drifted from nearby tents.

She unloaded her worries and frustrations onto him, and he did his best to offer support.

“You’ll win them over,” he told her reassuringly. “You’re very good at persuading people.”

She nodded numbly and went on as if she hadn’t heard him.

As time went on, and their soup began to boil, they ran out of things to say, and the conversation died for a time.

“Maybe – maybe you should give in. Let the future be what it will be. Maybe you’re thinking too much; maybe this is too much for you to handle,” he suggested after a few minutes.

She frowned at him, feeling too tired to summon her earlier passion.

“For anyone to handle,” he added quickly.

He sighed and ran a hand through his sandy hair. “I just want to help. I wonder if all this planning and worrying for the future is too much. I understand why you want to keep these powers from spreading, but maybe it is best to do what’s right for the present and face the future when it comes.”

She nodded slowly. “I understand what you’re saying, and I appreciate it. But I have to stick to what I believe in.” She chewed her lip, thinking.

“You said that Tyzu changed me. Maybe you’re right; maybe some of that world’s savagery is now a part of me. But what the Lost Ones did to me imparted me with a piece of Sy’om, as well.

“Do you understand what a different perspective Benefactor’s people have, the way their world has shaped them? They don’t have war, or conflict. Sy’om will not permit it of them; they can only survive together. They think only of what is best for their race as a whole, over the long haul – and they remember their ancestors’ lives as their own, so their perspective of history is so much better than ours.”

She ran her fingers through her hair, mirroring his own use of the old family tic. “Ever since I came back from the other worlds the first time, I can’t bear the thought of our people being divided, of human warring against human again. I certainly won’t do anything that could let us do more harm to each other in the future. Bad enough that we must use weapons at all; my claws and my powers could be worse than an army of Automatons in the wrong hands. I’d sooner we all died now, together, as one people, than see a repeat of what happened to Three Gates.”

Her brother’s eyes were wide, and her cheeks burned as she realized she’d frightened him.

But he placed his hand on hers and said, “I understand.” And she knew he did.

She managed a shaky smile.

Drogin returned an equally fragile smile.

Their served their soup a short while later, and Leha ate it without tasting what little flavor it had.

She retired early, but she didn’t fall asleep for a very long time. She tossed and turned in her bedroll, mulling over the events of the day and trying to come up with some plan to resolve things. She couldn’t help but think of her conversations with Eranna and Lahune, of her mission to save humanity from itself. If they could not stay unified now, when the fate of three worlds depended on it, she didn’t know if they would ever be able to.

Despite her strong belief that she was doing the right thing, a part of her started to wonder if she had been wrong all along, and that part grew louder throughout the night. She had assumed that her way was the only right way, that anyone who understood the pressures on her would agree with it. But her link with Karn had proven that to be false. Now, she didn’t know what to think. Maybe it was unfair of her. Maybe people deserved access to power such as this. There was no guarantee that it would be abused.

Part of her echoed Drogin’s sentiments, saying that the answer was beyond someone such as her. Near midnight, she began to wonder if she should be bothering with any of her efforts to safeguard the future. Trying to bring lasting peace to the entire human race seemed far beyond a simple shopkeeper from Three Gates.

It wasn’t until well after midnight that exhaustion finally claimed her.

———————

Enjoying the story so far? The next chapter will be posted soon, but if you can’t wait, you also have the opportunity buy the full ebook now!

I don’t consider myself an especially skilled or “leet” gamer, yet I have overcome some impressive challenges in my time. I beat both StarCraft II campaigns on brutal. I soloed the Girl Who Kicked the Vampire Nest in The Secret World, pre-nerf, in poorly itemized green gear while coping with game-breaking lag. I soloed the last stage of Jin’do the Godbreaker on my paladin after my entire party died.

Yet in all the years and all the games, I have faced no challenge greater, nothing that intimidated me more, than logging into Life Is Strange to pick up after the end of chapter three.

I heard going in this was a very powerful game. People said to keep a box of tissues handy when you play. Yet as intense and emotionally exhausting as the first two episodes were, I still ended up feeling like things had been exaggerated a bit. “It isn’t that bad,” I thought.

So wrong. I was very wrong.

This game will break your heart. It will burn your soul to ashes. It will crush your dreams and leave you a gibbering, broken shadow of the person you once were.

But wait. I’m getting ahead of myself.

I’ve been interested in Life Is Strange since it was announced. I thought Dontnod’s last game, Remember Me, was excellent, and Life Is Strange had an interesting premise, so even though it wasn’t my usual cup of tea in terms of mechanics, I put it on my “must play” list.

I’m not keen on the episodic format for games, though, so I figured I’d wait until all five episodes were released to start playing it. The fifth and final episode, Polarized, came out yesterday, so I finally got caught up and finished Polarized within hours of its release.

Was a Hell of a ride, to put it mildly.

Life Is Strange follows Maxine Caulfield (Max, as she prefers to be known), a geeky photography student at an elite college in Oregon. Max suffers a terrifying vision of the town being destroyed by a freak storm, and thereafter, she discovers she has the ability to rewind time at will.

It doesn’t take long for her to put her powers to use, as she witnesses the murder of a young woman at the hands of a disturbed fellow student. Max turns back the clock to save her, but this is just the beginning of Max’s temporal odyssey.

The woman she saved turns out to be Chloe Price, Max’s childhood best friend, and the two join forces in the hopes of using Max’s power for good, investigating the twin mysteries of a missing student at Max’s college and the increasingly surreal environmental disasters that are plaguing the town.

Life Is Strange is one of the new breed of narrative-based games, meaning it has almost nothing that could be called “gameplay” aside from some very rare and simple puzzles or stealth segments. It’s basically a movie that requires occasional clicking and gives you some control over the course of the plot.

This isn’t necessarily a complaint, but it’s important to manage expectations. This is a game only in the loosest sense.

Story is always what matters most to me in games, anyway, so it wasn’t too much an issue for me. In some ways it’s even better than the unhappy marriage of thick story and thin gameplay that Bioware tends to peddle.

It’s also a very artsy game. Part of what I liked about Dontnod based on Remember Me is that they very clearly believe in video games as art, but they may have gone a little too far with Life Is Strange.

I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, it’s a breathtakingly powerful and emotional game, and the characters feel real enough to reach out and touch them. On the other, the game often smacks of “trying too hard,” and far too much of Life Is Strange is spent on long, slow, pretentious montages that really don’t add anything.

There’s no better way to spoil art than to try to be artistic, and Life Is Strange does a lot of that. Which it really doesn’t need to, because it’s such an incredibly deep and powerful game without resorting to these affectations.

Also, I found some of the dialogue in the first few episodes a little dodgy. Trying to cram too much Millennial slang in there.

I could also poke some holes in the main villain, who ended up feeling rather odd and artificial, and it was all a bit cheesy compared to the rest of the game. But that ultimately is just a minor tangent to the game’s greater themes of choice and consequence.

I should also offer warning that this game deals with a lot of very dark real world issues, like abuse of girls on college campuses, drug abuse, and the like. Interestingly, the game also includes links to support groups related to some of the issues from the game, which is an interesting idea, though the cynic in me doubts anyone would actually be helped by this.

On the other hand, like Remember Me, Life Is Strange deserves credit for being pretty progressive, focusing on two very well written female characters and also dealing with diverse sexuality in a way that I think is very respectful. If you want a good representation of bisexual characters, I’d definitely recommend Life Is Strange.

The graphics are very stylized, beautiful in some ways but too cartoony in others. The music, well, it’s subjective, but I found it pretty bad. I have terrible taste, though, so don’t listen to me. The voice acting is stellar, though, and I especially need to give praise to Ashly Burch for an absolutely stunning performance as Chloe.

Beyond that… I’m not sure what to say. The downside of a pure story game is that it means there’s very little I can say about the game without getting into major spoiler territories.

What I can say is that this game is brutal. Vicious. Cruel. A major theme of the game is that Max’s changes to time are causing as many problems as they solve, and it just keeps getting worse. When you think you’ve seen the very worst Life Is Strange has to offer and can’t imagine how they could make you feel any worse, they find a way to break your heart all over again.

I’m not even going to limit myself to games. Life Is Strange is the single most emotionally devastating work of fiction I have ever experienced.

It’s probably going to take me days to recover. As the dust settles, I suspect I’ll either accept Life Is Strange as the beautifully, unflinchingly bleak tragedy it is, or come to hate to it for offering nothing but misery and despair. I’m rarely a fan of stories that offer nothing approaching a happy ending — entertainment is supposed to make us feel good, after all, and my real life has enough pain in it.

Still, if you’re going to make a story that’s nothing but pure heartbreak, this would be the way to do it.

Overall rating: …I don’t even know. I can’t.

For all that this is an amateur endeavor, I try to maintain some degree of professionalism on this blog. But this game broke me. I can’t come to any coherent conclusion about Life Is Strange. Go play Remember Me — it’s a great game that probably won’t leave you a mewling puddle on the floor.

All I can say is that Life Is Strange is an incredibly brilliant, well-made game that I deeply wish I had never even heard of.

* * *

It should probably also be noted that, by pure happenstance, many aspects of Life Is Strange hit home for me in ways they probably wouldn’t for the ordinary person. I’m not going to go into detail on a public blog, but yeah, this game really cut deep for me.

We’re now just a couple weeks away from this years BlizzCon, and as has become my tradition, I will now put together a list of what news I expect to see at the convention, as well as what I hope to see.

Warcraft:

Honestly, for all that it’s Blizzard’s flagship franchise, I don’t see there being a lot of big Warcraft news at this year’s convention.

Legion has already been announced. We’ll undoubtedly get a lot more details about its content and features, but I don’t expect anything groundbreaking. There’s always the chance Blizzard held back some major features from the initial announcement, but after Warlords of Draenor, I’m not expecting much ambition from Blizzard where WoW is concerned.

I’d love to hear that demon hunters are going to get a third spec after all, that demonology warlocks won’t be gutted for the sake of a new class, or that rogues will get a ranged option, but the ship seems to have already sailed on all of those.

Something else in the “I’d love to see it but I doubt we will” category is the possibility of HD remakes of the old Warcraft strategy games. If it didn’t happen last year for the franchise’s twentieth anniversary, though, I’m not sure it ever will.

The movie is the one potential source of exciting Warcraft news at BlizzCon, though even it’s not a sure thing. We do know that the first official trailer release will be in November, so there’s a pretty good chance it will be revealed at BlizzCon. However, they do want to market the movie to mainstream audiences more than to hardcore Blizzard fans (which is smart), and my hopes regarding a trailer have been dashed many times before, so you never know.

StarCraft:

StarCraft is something else I don’t expect a lot of big news for at BlizzCon. Legacy of the Void will be launching shortly after the convention, and we already know pretty much everything there is to know about it.

They did say they’re going to talk about what the future holds for StarCraft now that the SC2 trilogy is wrapping up, which is interesting, but I don’t imagine they’ll have a lot of definitive statements on that front.

Blizzard is very good at supporting their games over a very long haul, so I’m sure SC2 will continue to receive patches for balance and technical issues for many years to come. I also wouldn’t be surprised if they expanded on Allied Commanders — or is it just called Co-op Missions now? — a fair bit after launch.

Beyond that, though… I have no idea.

Much as I would happily accept more StarCraft, I’m sort of hoping the RTS team will shift focus to something else for a while. Yes, I want me my Warcraft IV.

Or maybe even something totally unexpected. Mage-clan Wars Diablo RTS? Overwatch spin-off about the Omnic Crisis? A totally new franchise?

There was even talk of them putting out a story-mode for Heroes of the Storm, if you can believe it. Blizzard owns my soul, so I’d play it, but that’s just a bit too ridiculous, methinks.

Diablo:

I would really love to see an expansion announcement for Diablo III at this year’s BlizzCon. It’s certainly around time for one to be due.

However, very surprisingly, that doesn’t look too likely. There’s only one (short) Diablo panel listed on the schedule. If there was to be an expansion announcement, one would expect there would be more Diablo events listed.

It’s not completely outside the realm of possibility that the schedule was made deliberately inaccurate and that more Diablo coverage will appear following an announcement during the opening ceremony, but it doesn’t seem too likely.

This is very confusing. A second expansion to Diablo III is very much expected. The ending to Reaper of Souls was not at all conclusive, and both the base game and the first expansion sold exceptionally well, so it makes both artistic and business sense.

Unless there’s going to be a significantly longer gap between RoS and the second expansion than there was between the base game and RoS, an expansion announcement must come soon, and BlizzCon is the time that makes the most sense.

Most perplexing, and perhaps a little worrying as well.

As for what an expansion might entail, well, you might as well go back and read last year’s post, because I’d just be repeating myself otherwise. I think we’ll get the druid class, though necromancer is also possible, and I have a totally baseless suspicion we’ll end up in Kurast, though I’d love to see Xiansai.

The only thing to add is that some concept art for a druid class was supposedly leaked, so the odds of it being added have gone even higher.

If there’s no expansion announcement, I expect we’ll just hear about the next patch. Expect some new sets and rebalancing of old gear, plus maybe another small zone for adventure mode like the Ruins of Sescheron. My money would be on Skovos Isles. They’ve been foreshadowed, but don’t seem interesting enough to carry a whole expansion.

Overwatch:

I’m not sure what to expect from Overwatch at this year’s BlizzCon. On the one hand, it’s the new hotness, and I can’t see any of the other games having a lot of big news (assuming there is no Diablo expansion announcement), but at the same time, Overwatch’s beta is beginning on October 27th, shortly before BlizzCon, and since that will undoubtedly be a huge infodump, I’m not sure what will be left to reveal at the convention.

At the very least, I imagine we’ll get some new hero reveals. Maybe another map, though their map list already seems pretty big going into beta.

It’s hard to say what else we might learn without knowing what beta will reveal. If we don’t learn what the game’s business model will be by the time beta rolls around, we definitely will at BlizzCon, I think. Free to play is the smart bet, considering they’re already talking about offering custom skins for heroes — microtransactions ahoy!

What I’m hoping to hear about are an optional third person mode, the removal of the ability to swap heroes on the fly in a match, and a story mode, but unfortunately none of those things seem likely. Story mode, in particular, was recently once again stated to not be in the cards, which seems like an enormous waste of potential.

Heroes of the Storm:

That just leaves Heroes.

(Well, there’s also Hearthstone, but I don’t much care about it. It’ll probably get a new single-player adventure, since they had a major expansion not that long ago.)

It’s pretty easy to predict what we’ll get for Heroes: new hero announcements and a new map or two.

As for specifics, it’s already been confirmed they’re working on another StarCraft hero to be released soon. I’m putting my money on Stukov. He’s a fan favourite, and assuming they use his infested version, that’ll be one hero of every StarCraft race released in succession: Morales for Terran, Artanis for Protoss, Stukov for Zerg.

The other major possibility would be Dehaka, who would also fulfill the role of a Zerg hero in this release cadence and who was datamined in a partial state of completion long ago. Dehaka would likely be a warrior, while I see Stukov being a specialist or assassin.

I also think we’re due for news on Zul’jin soon. His model appeared in a trailer at the last BlizzCon, and he’s now the only character from that trailer who isn’t in-game.

There’s also talk of Kel’thuzad being in development, and I’ve heard some rumours they might be adding another classic Blizzard character soon, which probably means Blackthorne.

My guess is that Stukov (or Dehaka) and Zul’jin will be in a high state of completion, with full previews and probably even playable versions at the convention, while any other heroes will only be teased.

As for who I’d like to see, well, Stukov and Zul’jin aren’t bad ideas. Honestly pretty much of all my “must have” heroes are already in the game. Right now the only major oversight in my view would be the lack of Varian Wrynn. I’d also like to see more of Diablo’s archangels and Evils, especially Auriel and Mephisto.

Could also use more Blood Elves. Valeera Sanguinar would be cool, but only if they don’t just make her a generic rogue hero. If Mark of Kathra’Natir isn’t one of her ultimates, I will be sorely disappointed. While we’re on the subject, Meryl Felstorm would be an awesome character to add to Heroes, but he’s so obscure that I doubt it’ll happen.

The new map is anyone’s guess. I still really want a sci-fi map, but they’ve already confirmed there’s no StarCraft map in the works. There was some datamining of a Warcraft map featuring the Horn of Cenarius a ways back, but I’m not sure if that’s something being seriously worked on or just an experiment that was abandoned.

I had the idea recently for a “zombie apocalypse” map similar to StarCraft II’s Outbreak mission, where both teams are periodically assaulted by hordes of hostile minions, but I’m not sure how it’d work in a PvP context.

* * *

Reading it back, it doesn’t look to be a terribly exciting BlizzCon. Well, hopefully I’m wrong, and we’ll get some big, exciting news.

What are you expecting or hoping to see Blizzard reveal in November?

I continue my Netflix binge watch of Once Upon a Time’s third season. After the brilliance of the Peter Pan arc, the series has unfortunately taken a much less interesting turn as the story focuses on Oz and the Wicked Witch it produced.

“Witch Hunt”:

This is one of those “not quite filler but not terribly eventful” episodes necessary to establish the plot.

In the Enchanted Forest’s past, Regina infiltrates her castle to confront the Wicked Witch, whose proper name turns out to be Zelena, while in the present, Emma and Regina join forces in an attempt to uncover who cursed the town.

Shipping intensifies.

Also apparently flying monkeys operate under werewolf rules.

After how awesome Pan was, I thus far find myself severely underwhelmed with Zelena. She hates Regina based on arbitrary and largely nonsensical reasons, so she cursed everyone with a half-baked curse that doesn’t even seem to have accomplished much as of now. It feels terribly contrived.

The actress is hamming it up a bit, too. Although to be fair I’m not sure how you could not ham the Wicked Witch of the West.

The only thing I’m enjoying about this arc so far is Regina. Her torment over the situation with Henry is palpable, and it’s nice to finally see on the side of the guys, hopefully for real this time. She’s managing to carry an otherwise mediocre series of episodes.

Overall rating: 7/10

“The Tower”:

Okay, this one is just filler.

Both past and present plots are more or less carbon copies of each other, save that one is about Rapunzel and David and the other is just David. The theme is facing one’s fear, and this being fantasy, that means literally.

It’s not a particularly interesting story, and it feels largely disconnected from the rest of the story. The only significant revelation is that Zelena has stolen David’s courage, or a symbol thereof, for some reason.

Supposedly Zelena’s enemy is Regina, but right now all she’s done in Storybrook is insinuate herself into Snow and David’s life. It’s very confusing.

Overall rating: 6/10

“Quiet Minds”:

In this episode, the common thread in both timelines is the search for Rumpelstiltskin.

In Storybrook, Emma and Charming comb the woods for him, but they soon find that something is terribly wrong with Rumpel. Beyond the usual.

Back in the Enchanted Forest, Baelfire and Belle seek to resurrect Rumpel with the aid of a talking candelabra — because why not — but in his desperation, Baelfire makes the grave mistake of forgetting his father’s most important lesson: All magic comes at a price.

Meanwhile, Regina tries to track down Zelena with the aid of Robin Hood, and things get awkward.

This episode gets points for having a lot of Rumpel and Belle. Aside from that, it’s not especially memorable, though it also doesn’t have a lot of significant flaws.

At this point I’m never trusting a death in Once Upon a Time to last, but Baelfire’s end did have a certain note of finality to it. If that’s the case, I’m not sure how I feel. I have nothing against Baelfire, but he’s also not a character I’m going to miss terribly, and his end did seem a bit sudden and out of the blue.

It also doesn’t work very well as a way to make Zelena more menacing, since it was more due to Baelfire’s own recklessness than anything.

Overall rating: 7.2/10

“It’s Not Easy Being Green”:

This episode serves as Zelena’s origin story, and it has convinced me that I simply don’t like her.

And this isn’t the kind of “don’t like her” that you want and expect from a villain. I liked Pan even when I hated his guts. But Zelena’s just not that interesting.

I don’t know whether to chalk it up to acting, directing, or writing (or, most likely, all of the above), but she just comes across as so cheesy and hammy — even by Once Upon a Time standards — and it takes me right out of the story.

I wish I had more to say about this episode, but that’s pretty much the only feeling it left me with. I suppose I could also nitpick about how Oz appears to be another pseudo-Medieval setting when it should be more along the lines of steampunk, and I will say that Regina was quite entertainingly badass this time around.

But yeah, just not feeling Zelena. It’s especially disappointing after how awesome Pan was.

Overall rating: 6.9/10

“The Jolly Roger”:

Well, here’s a first: a Hook episode that doesn’t suck.

Even more impressive is that the other key characters here are Emma and Ariel, who are also not my favourites, but yet I still enjoyed “The Jolly Roger.”

In both timelines, Ariel seeks Hook’s aid in finding her prince, who is apparently always missing. In the Enchanted Forest, he’s been taken prisoner by Blackbeard the pirate, who has also absconded with Hook’s ship. In Storybrook, things take a darker turn still.

As this is going on, Regina once again attempts to hone Emma’s magical talent. The nice thing about Emma/Regina arcs is that Regina is awesome enough to compensate for how dull Emma is, and that holds true here, as well. Regina has some, shall we say, unconventional teaching methods, and that’s more than entertaining enough to compensate for Emma’s continued dullness.

But I digress. The real star here is Hook, and for once, that’s not a bad thing.

This is mainly because the show has stopped pretending he’s a good guy. There’s still an attempt to show him trying to do the right thing, but he fails — miserably — and that’s a lot more believable.

I’m perfectly willing to accept that there is some good in Hook so long as they also acknowledge that it’s not enough to overpower his more craven and selfish sensibilities.

Not only does “The Jolly Roger” at last acknowledge that Hook really isn’t a good guy, he also ends up having a pretty miserable time of things, which also pleases me.

I really don’t like him.

I expect this return to sanity in regards to Hook’s character probably won’t last, but I might as well enjoy while it does.

My only major complaint with this episode is the very tacky and totally unnecessary (though mercifully brief) sub-plot in which Charming attempts to convince Henry he can be just as cool as Hook. Just… no.

Overall rating: 7.5/10

I’m not normally very keen on horror games, or horror in general, really. But as anyone who reads this blog knows, I adore The Secret World, so I absolutely had to buy its spin-off, The Park, as soon as pre-orders went live, and I played through it within hours of its release on Steam.

I have a lot of love for the Secret World setting, and for the bits of written by Joel Bylos (who helmed The Park) in particular, so I went in with very high expectations.

The Park is far better than I expected.

The Park is another narrative focused game, meaning it has little to no “gameplay” in the traditional sense. It’s another game to be derogatorily referred to as a walking simulator, but while that isn’t necessarily my normal cup of tea in gaming, it works well here.

It could be considered a prequel to The Secret World, but only in the very loose sense that it takes place in the same setting, uses a familiar location (the Atlantic Island Park), and takes place before the events of TSW. There are many references to TSW in The Park, but they’re subtle, and you do not need any knowledge of TSW to enjoy The Park. They are very much separate entities — they simply exist in the same universe.

In The Park, you play as Lorraine, a troubled widow whose son Callum becomes lost in the theme park after dark. As she delves deeper into the park’s twisted underbelly, nightmare and reality intertwine, and the story of Lorraine’s life and her struggles as a parent unfold.

As in TSW, the ambiance in The Park is stellar. The music is subtle, just noticeable enough to help communicate the rising tension and dread of the game. The graphics are excellent, hauntingly beautiful and chillingly eerie.

Most impressive of all are the ambient sound effects. There were moments when the wind blowing through the foliage sounded so real I actually felt the chill even sitting in my computer chair.

What’s most interesting to me about The Park is that it really isn’t what I’d expect from a horror game. There are few jump scares (that are good enough to seriously threaten your sleep), but honestly, it’s not a terribly frightening game. Creepy, yes, but not exceptionally scary. It’s not even possible to die or lose.

What The Park excels at is character and emotion. The park is ultimately just a backdrop for a story of tragedy, depression, and the dark side of parenthood. In a game set in a haunted theme park designed to harvest the lives of the innocent, the true horror comes from struggles all too mundane, and the demons that can lurk in a person’s heart.

The Park may not be frightening in the traditional sense, but it can be profoundly disturbing.

At no point along the way does The Park’s storytelling falter, either. Its pacing is impeccable. The voice acting is top notch. The slow slide from ordinary life to surreal horror is masterfully executed.

It’s amazing to me that Funcom never even intended to release this game to the public up until about two or three months ago. It’s just something they threw together to learn the Unreal engine. And it’s absolutely brilliant.

The only thing that could be considered a negative about The Park is that it is extremely short. A full completionist play-through will take two hours at most.

Yet even there, I struggle to fault it. It’s short, but it’s an incredible ride while it lasts, and it doesn’t feel at all rushed or incomplete. It’s exactly as long as it needs to be.

If you’re a fan of The Secret World, you’ll love The Park — think Tyler Freeborn with a better emotional hook. If you’re not a fan of The Secret World, you’ll love The Park — it’s a beautifully twisted piece of interactive fiction.

Overall rating: 9.6/10 A brief but masterful experience.

While I’m on the subject, I will also mention that The Park features some swag for TSW players. Specifically, a killer chipmunk costume (which I hate, and you will too once you play The Park) and some very high level neck talismans. The jury seems to be out on how good these talismans are — half the people are saying their unusual procs make them useless, while the rest are claiming the talismans are overpowered to the point of being game-breaking.

For those who don’t currently play TSW, The Park also gives you the option of a seven day free trial. Which you should take, because TSW is awesome, and don’t you want to learn more about the Atlantic Island Park after all that?

Samhain 2015: The Seven Silences and more

On the same day as The Park’s released, The Secret World released its latest Halloween event.

This year’s new mission is The Seven Silences. It’s a good mission, though not quite on the same level as the last two events.

A bee has died. The story is that they managed to commit suicide, and it’s up to the player to travel across the world and through the world of nightmares to discover how an immortal can die.

The mystery of how exactly you can kill one of Gaia’s immortal chosen — which we always knew to be possible but supremely difficult — has been around for a long time, so it’s an interesting plot with a lot of significance to TSW’s greater mythos, though it does ultimately raise as many questions as it answers.

The ambiance is also once again absolutely top notch. I never cease to be amazed by Funcom’s ability to create the most surreal and unnerving environments — places as awe-inspiring as they are dreadful.

However, the mission is a lot longer than it needs to be, and the travel time in particular is a real drag. There are also several stages that can become quite frustrating if you fail at any point — and you probably will — due to the need to repeat the entire stage and, again, long travel time.

So it’s a decent story-arc, but it’s not on the same level as The Broadcast by any stretch of the imagination.

It’s also worth noting that you require access to Kaidan to complete the mission, so this is the first holiday mission to be completely inaccessible to new players, even if they get high level help.

However, I’m still loving Halloween in TSW. Between the new mission and the return of all the past events, there’s an almost overwhelming amount of stuff to do, and the whole event is just a joy. There’s nothing else quite like it in gaming.

Oh, sure, lots of MMOs have events, but none of them can match the quality of content or the sheer festival air that permeates TSW in Halloween. Even an antisocial curmudgeon like myself cannot help but be caught up in the wonderful sense of community and celebration it cultivates.

I’ve even put aside being a spiteful hermit for the moment, sharing my loot bags with lowbies in Kingsmouth and offering to carry lower level players through the content from time to time.

I guess my point is: Halloween in The Secret World is awesome.

I don’t like doing purely negative posts, as a rule. I tend to be a believer in the principle that if you can’t say anything nice, you shouldn’t say anything at all. Even my endless rants about World of Warcraft are born from a deep love for the game and the desire to not see it squander its potential.

Yet I think the topic of why I am not currently playing Guild Wars 2’s first expansion, Heart of Thorns, and why I may never play it is an interesting story to tell. It is a tale of how a studio can burn through its entire supply of good will and turn away a former fan.

I want to be clear that I’m not seeking to bash GW2, and I still think it’s a solid game in a lot of ways. I merely wish to chart the course that took me from enthusiastic fanboy to indifferent ex-player. There is no venom behind this post; only morbid interest.

The backstory:

I want to start by detailing my history with GW2. Longtime readers of this blog will already know all of this and can safely skip to the next section of the post, but for anyone just joining us, I’d like to lay out the context.

GW2 was a rare case of my being swept up in pre-launch hype. The latest in a long line of supposedly messianic saviours of the MMORPG genre, I actually believed that GW2 could be the revolution it hoped to be.

I got into a late beta weekend, and was blown away. I bought the game shortly after launch, and I played it heavily for several weeks, reaching max level on my Norn thief main. I had many good things to say about the game on this blog, and I had some really good times.

What I most appreciated about GW2 was how laid back and casual (for lack of a better term) it felt. Log in, go wherever you want, and find tons of cool stuff to do. It was a beautiful world full of endless exploration, and I never felt pressured into any particular style of play as I so often do in WoW.

However, by the time the Karka invasion rolled around, the luster had started to fade fast. Several irritants had begun to get under my skin, such an excess of crowd control in high level zones and the extremely punishing mechanic of contested waypoints. Around this time, I also became heavily distracted by other games, such as The Secret World (which, as well know, has stolen my heart now and forever).

However, the biggest factor that made me drift away from GW2 was its story. To be invested in a game long term, I need to care about its plot and setting, and to be blunt, the story in Guild Wars 2 is every kind of suck imaginable. I give them points for a diverse cast with some LGBT characters, but that’s only kind thing I can say about the story and lore of GW2.

Thus, I drifted away, but with plans to return. Let us now chronicle how that return never came to pass.

The Living Story:

The Living Story seemed like a cool idea at first, and I can’t entirely fault ArenaNet for embarking on this noble yet flawed experiment. I do respect their willingness to try new things.

The idea of a living, evolving world is, at a visceral level, very appealing. The idea that content comes and goes over the weeks, reflecting an evolving virtual reality, feels like a very welcome concession to verisimilitude. It offers an alternative to the stale and static design of most themepark MMOs.

However, it quickly became clear that the Living Story concept did not fit at all in a game like GW2.

Guild Wars 2 was designed to the casual player’s dream. You didn’t need to pay a subscription, and it didn’t have the traditional gear treadmill, so you could come and go as you please without worrying about falling behind.

The Living Story ran exactly counter to that. With nearly all new content being time-limited, anyone who wanted to keep up with the story faced arguably an even greater pressure to log in regularly than provided by subscription games.

It also put the focus squarely on the one thing ArenaNet can’t do well: story.

I tried returning to the game once or twice during the Living Story, but I felt utterly lost as to what was going on, furthering heightening my disconnect from the game’s story and sending my motivation to keep playing even lower.

These visits to Tyria also showed me that GW2 was drifting away from its original design vision in terms of gameplay. Ascended gear provided a disturbingly swift reversal of the promise of “no gear grind,” and the public events were becoming increasingly long, difficult, and mechanically complex. This seemed an attempt to silence all those critics who (not entirely without reason) called the gameplay of GW2 mindless, but neither the critics nor the developers seem to understand that such simplicity was a core part of the game’s appeal.

I came away declaring that GW2 was “a great game that is totally ignorant of its own strengths,” and that seems increasingly true all the time.

Heart of Thorns:

When Guild Wars 2 announced it was finally getting an expansion, I thought the time for my long-awaited return to Tyria had at last come. An expansion offered an opportunity to change direction for the better, and at the least, I figured having a lot of new land to explore would keep me interested for a few weeks, even if I ultimately wandered off again.

As the weeks went by, my hype level slowly rose, and I gave serious thought to pre-ordering. The concept of elite specializations interested me greatly — more playstyle options within a class is always good — and the new revenant class sounded (still sounds) very cool. I also quite liked the idea of masteries — horizontal progression is always good.

I even logged in for the first time in months and played for a couple hours. I initially wanted to check out the new (new) Lion’s Arch, but that somehow turned into doing an event chain in the Shiverpeaks, and on the whole I had a pretty good time.

Then they dropped the R word.

I might as well be a cartoon insect for how well I react to the word “raid,” especially where Guild Wars 2 is concerned.

Did anyone — anywhere, ever — want raids in Guild Wars 2? I never heard anyone express a desire for such. Everyone seems to agree that GW2’s organized group content is a trainwreck, and I really don’t understand why ArenaNet thinks adding more players to the formula will fix that.

Still, I could have lived it if raids were an optional side feature you could ignore, but they revealed raids would be a crucial part of the story going forward. This has always been what I resent most about the traditional raiding model — locking crucial story behind the MMO genre’s most exclusive content — and it pretty much kills the last hope of my ever becoming invested in GW2’s story.

Perhaps more importantly, it signals a further shift away from the “do what you feel like” philosophy that was once the core selling feature of GW2. Suddenly it’s just another themepark forcing everyone down a single, narrow path.

It doesn’t end with raids. I had been under the impression that elite specializations would be akin to new talent choices or classes as implemented in other MMO expansions. That is, they’re available immediately after logging or at most after a minimal amount of leveling-like content.

But reading various comments and blog posts on the expansion, I learned that elite specializations actually require a fairly lengthy and not at all solo-friendly grind. This would be a baffling decision in any game, but it seems especially out of place in GW2. Though to be fair ArenaNet is already planning changes on this front.

Masteries, also, are being reported to be less a new form of horizontal progression and more a way of gating content beyond a series of lengthy grinds.

Stepping back, Guild Wars 2 now seems almost unrecognizable as the game that once captured my attention. The poster child for casual MMO gaming has done a near total 180 and now seems to be just another rigid, grind-focused themepark.

And that’s how they lost me.

* * *

Now, I can’t guarantee I’ll never come back to Guild Wars 2. We live in a world where I’m seriously considering getting into Star Wars: The Old Republic once I have a bit less on my gaming plate, so clearly miracles do happen.

But right now my motivation around GW2 is at an all-time low, and I see almost nothing left of the open-ended philosophy I once loved in the current incarnation of the game.

The game has had an amazing journey. Unfortunately, for me, it’s been a journey in entirely the wrong direction.

As has become my tradition, I will now offer my collected thoughts on the most recent World of Warcraft expansion as it winds to an end.

Do I even need to say this will be a giant rant?

Out of left field:

I think it’s safe to say that the announcement of alternate universe Draenor as the setting for an expansion pack was a surprise to everyone, and probably not a pleasant surprise for most.

Warlords of Draenor has been, from beginning to end, a bizarre and borderline nonsensical tangent that has contributed little of value to the ongoing story of the Warcraft universe.

I’ve chosen to simply write it off as akin to, say, the Simpsons Halloween episodes — a what if scenario with no bearing on the “real” story. Of course, this also makes the expansion feel very pointless and severely hampered my motivation to keep playing… but it’s the only way to maintain my sanity as a lore fan.

It’s not even an interesting what if scenario, either. The Iron Horde are not at all compelling as villains. They have no depth or personality, and they are soundly defeated at every turn, so they never feel like a threat.

I’ve long railed against the idea that Blizzard favours the Horde, but I will grant WoD is a clear example of the Alliance getting the short end of the stick. It’s basically an Orc expansion, and what little Alliance storyline does exist is dominated by the Draenei, and Yrel.

It’s no secret I hold a very low opinion of the Draenei, but at first, WoD seemed to be turning that around. They were actually being treated as real people with flaws and internal conflicts, and I quite enjoyed the Rangaari, Maraad, and Maladaar. But then Yrel happened.

Yrel is a strong contender for worst character in the Warcraft universe, and the embodiment of everything wrong with the Draenei. She’s a shiny perfect hero archetype with no depth or personality whatsoever, and the game is constantly hailing her as a born hero and saviour despite the fact she never actually does anything.

The one and only time we see Yrel actually take command, she leads her people into a blindingly obvious trap. This might have been a good opportunity to add some nuance to her character, but neither the game nor Yrel itself acknowledges her failure, and the game just keeps on treating her as the most perfectest saviour of all Draenor.

And the entire story revolves around her. Other, far more interesting characters are pushed to the side or killed off outright just to make room for the rise of this Maryest of Sues.

That said, it’s not a great expansion to be a Horde lore fan, either. It mostly amounts to a giant character assassination of many iconic Horde characters, and the Orc race as a whole, and any non-Orc Horde races have been completely forgotten.

So Alliance got the worst of it, but this was not a good expansion for either faction’s story.

There are only a few highlights in this otherwise dull expansion.

One is Frostfire Ridge, which had an absolutely fantastic storyline. I loved how they fleshed out the Frostwolf culture, Durotan was excellent throughout, and while pretty much everyone is a bit burnt out on Orcs by now, this story was a great reminder of how awesome Orcs can be at their best.

I also had a lot of fun uncovering the history and mythology of the Arrakoa in Spires of Arak, and Reshad is a character I have a lot of love for. The story was over too quickly and inconclusively, though.

Flying:

I’ll be blunt: Trying to remove flight was one of the stupidest things Blizzard has ever done.

I reject all of the arguments made against flying; I find them utterly spurious in the context of the game’s reality. I do not believe flight has any negative impact on WoW. However, even if I did accept the criticisms of flight to be accurate, trying to remove it would still be a terrible idea.

Flight has been a core feature of World of Warcraft for a large majority of its lifespan. Flying mounts have long served as the ultimate prestige reward in the game, requiring major grinds or even real money purchases in some cases. There was no way that trying to take away flying was not going to make everyone lose their minds, and rightfully so.

One must also make mention of how badly Blizzard mishandled their communications on the issue. We as fans spent months getting conflicting answers and waffling ambiguity, and it ended up coming across as severe incompetence at best and deliberate dishonesty at worst. It’s amazing a company as big and successful as Blizzard could mishandle its PR so badly.

Of course, Blizzard finally backed down and put flying back in, but of course, it had to come with another poison pill.

I do not agree with the idea that the Pathfinder achievement is a “good compromise.” We had a good compromise for years: you can’t fly while leveling, but it unlocks at max level. That was a good system that satisfies both sides of the argument.

The Pathfinder achievement is yet more grind for grind’s sake, and it comes across as spitefulness on behalf of the developers over the players not sharing their grand vision.

And now the mess is starting all over again, as we can’t get a clear answer on how or when flight will be available in Legion.

I, for one, will not buy the new expansion until flight is in the game.

Garrisons:

Garrisons have gotten a lot of hate, not entirely undeserved, but personally I enjoyed them. I enjoy having a little of the game world to call my own, and collecting and upgrading followers was an enjoyable — if somewhat grindy — minigame.

I think garrisons do deserve a lot of credit for solving the problem that plagues most player housing systems: a lack of tangible gameplay. I’ve never much cared about player housing because there’s nothing to do there once you’ve built a home to your liking. With crafting integration and follower missions, garrisons offered a reason to keep coming back even after construction was complete.

However, garrisons do suffer from two crippling problems.

One is that they lack almost all personalization. Even the ability to choose the location of your garrison was scrapped pre-launch, and now there’s almost nothing you can do to make a garrison feel yours. So while garrisons lack the fatal flaw of most player housing systems, they also lack the main virtue.

The other is that garrisons are completely unavoidable. It’s all but impossible to reach level cap without building one’s garrison as you go. In theory, you could mostly ignore it at level cap, but no one in their right mind would do so, as garrisons are one of the must ludicrously rewarding activities in the game’s history. You can make thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of gold per week just putting the bare minimum of effort into follower missions, and that’s just scratching the surface of what garrisons offer.

This is the same mistake Blizzard just keeps making over and over again: forcing everyone into a narrow band of content whether they like it or not. In Cataclysm, it was raids. In Pandaria, it was daily quests. In Draenor, it’s garrisons. I wonder what narrow niche of gameplay Legion will make us all hate?

Garrisons should have been designed as a deep but optional side activity, like pet battles. As that, they would have worked brilliantly.

One other major disappointment is that Blizzard is planning to abandon the garrison feature after WoD. It seems tragic to me that a feature with so much potential is simply being thrown in the trash can, rather than iterated on and improved. Garrisons aren’t an amazing feature now, but they easily could be if Blizzard was willing to put in the effort.

Oh, and let’s not even talk about how excruciatingly unfun the shipyard is.

An empty shell:

Even if all the other issues hadn’t been a factor, WoD would still be an underwhelming expansion based purely on how small and unambitious it was.

There simply wasn’t much to do. Scenarios were inexplicable abandoned, as were most daily quests. This left apexis grinding as the only significant content outside of raids and dungeons, and that was simply soul-crushing. I actually like the idea of filling a progress bar through a variety of activities, but they were tuned so badly. One percent completion per mob kill makes me die a little inside. And what do you get in the end? Merely a pittance of apexis crystals.

WoD also repeated one of the worst mistakes of Pandaria by not adding any new five man dungeons after launch. Timewalking and mythic dungeons are both welcome features, but they’re no substitute for new dungeons.

In fact, WoD added hardly anything at all after launch. We got only one content patch worthy of the name, and Tanaan had been intended as a launch zone before being delayed, so really the only new content we got all expansion was a single raid and the garrison shipyard.

But by far the worst mistake of WoD’s endgame was the removal of valor and justice points.

I have no interest in RNG gearing. I am not motivated by the slim chance of getting a drop that may or may not be useful. If I wanted to gamble, I’d go to a casino. Grinding out points has been my endgame since I started playing. Without it, my motivation to keep playing after leveling is pretty much nonexistent.

This is another one of those cases where Blizzard is telling us what we’re supposed to find fun. They said that going to a vendor to buy gear wasn’t exciting. I guess I imagined all those years of looking forward to rushing off to the vendors to buy a shiny new upgrade. Certainly that was more exciting than killing the same boss for months only to have your shoulders still not drop.

Now Blizzard is planning a patch to re-implement valor, if only for item upgrades. It would be very tempting — and probably accurate — to call this too little too late, but at least it’s a step in the right direction. I can only hope valor will be a launch feature for Legion, as a way to buy gear and not just upgrade it.

We could also talk about how the Raid Finder’s rewards were gutted as a further attempt to remind those outside of raiding guilds that we are second class citizens in Blizzard’s eyes, or how important story moments were locked behind mythic-only phases, or how the legendary quest repeated the endless grinding of Pandaria’s without its excellent storytelling and single-player challenges, or how the nerfs to casting while moving have sucked much of the fun out of ranged classes, but this post is already dragging on too long.

WoW’s development has always been a case of two steps forward and one step back. Every expansion has made big mistakes. But Warlords of Draenor is the first expansion to do more harm than good. For the first time, I wish I could turn back the clock to an earlier period of the game.

WoD didn’t expand or improve the game. It contracted it and made it less fun, in ways I’m not sure it will ever recover from. Not because the problems are unfixable, but because I don’t think Blizzard is even interested in trying.

Overall rating: 3.1/10

I don’t normally get caught up in hype. I may get excited when it comes to upcoming games, but it’s usually based on my own opinion of whether or not it looks interesting, not communal buzz or marketing.

I don’t often get caught up in hype, but when I do, I usually regret it, and that’s true of Sword Coast Legends.

That’s not to say it’s a bad game. But I could probably have found a better use for the money I spent on it.

The game:

For those unaware,  Sword Coast Legends is meant as a throwback to classic CRPGs, taking place in Dungeons and Dragons’ omnipresent Forgotten Realms setting. A lot of its hype in the gaming community came from its dungeon master mode and player content creation tools, but this review will mainly focus on its story mode and core mechanics, for reasons I will get to in a bit.

Sword Coast Legends is pretty much what you’d expect from an old school-inspired RPG… which mostly means it has really crummy combat. It’s a lot like the combat of the first two Dragon Age games, and long-time readers know that’s not a compliment coming from me. Mostly it’s a lot of sitting around and watching your party auto-attack while you wait on cooldowns to refresh.

This can be mitigated by acquiring cooldown reduction gear, but that’s a double-edged sword for the game. The end result is that you never want anything other than cooldown reduction gear — it vastly outstrips any other stat.

To be fair, though, I didn’t hate the combat in Sword Coast Legends as much as I did in, say, Dragon Age: Origins. If only because the top-down camera creates a different expectation of pacing for me than over the shoulder does. Playing a ranger also helped — they’re a ridiculously versatile class that always has something to do.

Something I found refreshing compared to most other RPGs these days is that classes in Sword Coast legends are quite versatile and can be built a lot of different ways. This also opens up a little more freedom for party composition. For example, I didn’t need a rogue in my party, because I trained my ranger to pick locks and disarm traps.

I really loved the ranger class in this game.

On the downside, unlike pretty much every RPG I’ve played in the last… ten years, at least, party members will not gain XP or otherwise match your level unless you’re actively bringing them adventuring with you. Since leveling is very slow in this game, that means you pretty much have to pick a single party composition and stick with it the whole through.

Which is even more problematic because there are points in the story where you can lose companions (yes, plural) permanently, often with no warning and no way to prevent it.

I also did not care for the fact that a full play through of the story mode, completing every side quest and fully exploring every map, will still leave a few levels short of the cap.

One thing I did really like, though, is that Sword Coast Legends often offers multiple ways to solve problems beyond simply killing things. Characters with a high strength score can attempt to intimidate enemies, or force certain locks, while a high charisma will allow you to persuade NPCs to a variety of ends. This is certainly a refreshing change of pace, and it makes the game feel a lot more detailed than the average RPG.

I also liked that, unlike pretty much every other game I’ve ever played with systems like this, upgrading your non-combat skills doesn’t seem to hamper your fighting prowess too much.

The story:

The storyline of Sword Coast Legends would be best be described as a mixed bag.

Its greatest strength is its characters. Nearly all of the party members are fleshed out, interesting, and likable — if often bizarre and quirky. They’re not quite Bioware-quality, but I definitely got attached to my little crew of oddballs after a while.

The voice acting is also pretty good. Not the best I’ve heard, but good enough to sell the characters.

You have a few choices to make over the course of the story, but most of them don’t have a lot of impact. It’s better than nothing, though.

The main storyline, though, is at best adequate. It’s a pretty cliche “bad monsters want to destroy the world, you are the chosen one” affair. It’s mostly pretty predictable, and there just isn’t much that’s memorable about it.

There were also several storytelling decisions made near the end that I did not like at all. One twist, in particular, in addition to being very frustrating to me as a player, could be considered borderline offensive. I’m sure the writers didn’t mean any harm, but they really should have thought things through, given the context of real world history and culture.

So, on the whole, it makes for a somewhat underwhelming experience from a story perspective.

It also didn’t help that the last boss fight bugged out for me badly, causing all my companions’ AI to stop functioning. That did not make for a good time.

The toolset:

As of this writing, I haven’t done anything in Sword Coast Legends other than the story mode. I never had much interest in playing as a dungeon master, and my lukewarm feelings on the game mechanics have put a damper on any desire I might have had to play content made by other players — though it could still happen at some point.

I was fairly interested in the campaign creation tools, but I quickly discovered that they are currently severely limited in what they can do. I recall games from the nineties having more powerful content creation tools.

To the developers’ credit, they have released a fairly detailed timeline of planned improvements, and it sounds like the content creation toolset will soon be much more robust, but as of right now, there’s not much to it. If I do any campaign-building, it will be after those changes are made.

* * *

Overall rating: 6.7/10 Not a bad game, but not a particularly memorable one, either.

BlizzCon is upon us once again, bringing a tidal wave of news and reveals for Blizzard’s many franchises. I don’t wish to waste any time, so let’s get to it!

The Warcraft trailer:

The biggest reveal coming out of this BlizzCon was the first full-length trailer for the upcoming Warcraft film.

It’s everything I ever dreamed of.

Seriously, this trailer fills me with such overwhelming childish glee you’re lucky I can still spell, let alone type anything coherent about it. I love, love, love it.

I can’t even words. It’s wonderful.

I will say that I love how it’s clearly telling the stories of both the humans and Orcs and giving an even shake to both. This doesn’t look to be a story with black and white morality at all, and that is exactly as it should be.

If I may allow myself one small complaint, it appears that Draka will be pulling a “Moses among the reeds” with Thrall, and while I have long argued that Thrall is Orcish Moses, that’s a little too on the nose for my taste.

Still, on the whole, this trailer is mind-blowing.

StarCraft mission packs coming soon:

The one real surprise from this BlizzCon so far is the announcement that StarCraft 2’s story content will not end with Legacy of the Void’s campaign. Starting next year, Blizzard will be releasing a series of DLC mission packs to flesh out the story of the StarCraft universe. The first one, Nova: Covert Ops, already has a cinematic teaser.

More story, and Nova’s involved? I’m sold.

Again, I have little to say beyond the fact that I’m happy.

I just hope the packs aren’t too expensive. I mean, Blizzard owns my soul, so I’ll pretty much pay whatever they ask, but… Three missions with SC2’s pacing will probably take at most ninety minutes to finish, so any more than $10 would be a stretch.

There’s also word of some other new additions coming after Legacy of the Void, including new commanders for the co-op missions, the long-awaited Abathur announcer pack, and the option for players to sell the content they’ve made through the Arcade.

Quite impressed by how much Blizzard plans for a “finished” game.

World of Warcraft: Legion cinematic and details

As if the movie trailer wasn’t enough badassery, they also showed the opening cinematic for Legion.

As regular readers know, I’m feeling really bitter about WoW right now. My love/hate relationship has little love left in it after WoD.

But this cinematic blew me away. This is probably the best cinematic for WoW yet, and that’s saying something. It’s epic, it’s emotional, it’s intense. It’s everything a cinematic should be.

One does get the impression that Blizzard may be planning to kill off Varian, which has been speculated for a while. My initial reaction to the idea was nerd rage, as Blizzard has a terrible habit of killing off their most interesting characters.

However, the more I think about it, the more I think it might be okay. Varian has had an amazing character arc over the years, and if this is to be his end, then it’s a worthy one.

In other news, Blizzard’s website has been updated with previews of the artifact weapons for all classes. The biggest piece of news here is that combat rogues no longer exist; the specialization is now called “outlaw.”

I am curious what other changes are due for the spec. Hopefully it can recapture some of its former glory. I do like that its artifact weapons are swords, though they also seem to be one of the few artifacts without a particularly lore-rich backstory. And I’ll try not to be too bitter that rogues didn’t get a ranged spec.

Speaking of artifacts, I love all the backstories Blizzard has come up with for them. Some pretty interesting lore in some of those, especially about the Titans’ servants. I feel a grave risk that my alt addiction may flair out of control as I try to experience as many artifact quests as possible.

Something interesting that’s just being revealed as I write this is that there is no set leveling path through the new zones. All zones scale to your level (somehow), with the only exception that the city of Suramar is always max-level only. Dungeons will also be scaled this way. Interesting idea. Not a massive change, but could make things a bit more interesting for alts.

Speaking of new zones, they all look incredibly beautiful, and all the lore seems to be about Elves, Vrykul, and Tauren, which is music to my ears.

They seem to be taking a lot of cues from Diablo for the endgame this time. There’s a new mission system that seems like a combination of traditional daily quests, D3’s adventure mode, and TSW’s new challenge system. Seems like a good idea — the emphasis seems to be on choice, which is desperately needed. We’ll see how it shakes out.

Challenge dungeons are also being converted to something like D3’s Nephalem Rifts. Failing to beat the timer is not, well, a failure — instead beating the timer simply allows you to upgrade a keystone, unlocking progressively more challenging (and rewarding) version of the dungeon, infinitely.

More emphasis on dungeons is welcome, and this sounds great for those with regular groups to run with, but I’m not sure how much it means for the rest of unwashed masses.

I am still a bit disappointed we’ve not gotten any really huge announcements, like a free to play transition or factions merging, but despite myself, I find my cautious optimism for Legion slowly becoming less cautious and more optimism.

The bad news is that Legion is not due until “summer,” which manages to be quite disappointing but not even remotely surprising. Welcome to a year of Hellfire Citadel.

Heroes of the Storm: The arena and more

The big news for Heroes is a new game mode, the arena. This seems to be an attempt to “bottle” the epic team fights that spring up around map objectives. Short, semi-randomized contests over objectives similar to those seen on the standard maps. Best two out of three wins.

Some variety is good, I suppose. Personally I think I’ll prefer the more traditional game format, but I’m sure arena will have many fans.

A new map was also revealed, Towers of Doom. This ghastly map is part of the Raven Court universe, and promises some very unique mechanics. Cores cannot be attacked directly, only destroyed by map objectives, and there was talk of being able to take over enemy towns rather than simply destroying them, though what this means in practice is unclear.

I like this. The map looks beautiful, and it sounds like a refreshing change of pace from all the “summon a golem” maps we’ve seen lately.

There were also several new heroes announced: Genn Greymane, Cho’gall, and Lunara.

Cho’gall is by far the most mechanically unique. Taking a page from a former WoW April Fools joke, Cho’gall will actually require two players to control, one for each head.

I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, that’s brilliantly original, and I can only stand in awe of Blizzard’s sheer gall (no pun intended). On the other hand, Cho’gall is a character I love, and this pretty much guarantees I will never, ever play him. So that makes me sad.

Cho’gall’s release will also be unique. For the first few months, only BlizzCon attendees and virtual ticket buyers will have access to him, but players who don’t have him can unlock him by playing with those who do. He is intended to spread across the playerbase like a virus.

It’s worth noting Cho’gall will eventually go up for sale normally, but not for several months.

The other two heroes, Genn and a dryad named Lunara, are not at all what I was expecting to see, but both look very, very cool. Genn appears to be able to fight as both a melee and ranged character by swapping between his Worgen and human forms, and while we don’t know much about Lunara yet, I love her aesthetics. I like that they’re going for the wilder, more dangerous version of the dryads. I mean, I love Mylune, but…

We also have confirmation that Overwatch’s Tracer will be coming to the Nexus in the future. Which brings me to…

Overwatch: Pre-sales and new heroes

Overwatch’s announcements began with an absolutely awesome trailer detailing not only all the heroes revealed over the past year, but also three new additions: Mei-ling Zhou, Hana “D.Va” Song, and Genji. All of these were teased beforehand, but now we have the details.

In a bizarre crossover, D.Va is a pro StarCraft player who now fights for her country aboard a combat mech. She can switch between mech and human forms, making for what appears to be some truly interesting gameplay.

She also shouts “Nerf this” when using her ultimate, which is awesome. I will be very disappointed if she doesn’t say “GG” after a kill.

Mei looks the most appealing to me. She’s a climate scientist who uses a freeze ray to trap enemies and erect ice barriers. After D.Va was announced, I figured Overwatch had hit max cuteness, but Mei is a contender for history’s most huggable video game character (sorry, Tali). She’s adorable.

Genji is a cybernetic ninja with a very interesting backstory that connects to Hanzo, Mercy, and Zenyatta. I am, however, a little disappointed that he is still primarily a ranged fighter and uses his sword only sparingly.

I am continually impressed by the incredibly colourful and inventive character design for Overwatch, and for how intensely likable Blizzard can make these characters with just a few paragraphs of backstory.

This also shows Overwatch’s commitment to diversity continuing. All three new characters are Asian, and two are female. The IDIC feels continue.

The big surprise was that Overwatch will not, in fact, be free to play, but will require a box purchase (pre-orders are open now).

I am less than thrilled with this. While there is much about Overwatch that appeals to me, I’m not big on shooters and even less fond of competitive play, so I’m definitely not spending money on it unless I have a chance to try it first. Unless I’m lucky enough to get a beta invite, I might not be able to play Overwatch for a very long time.

I was also disappointed to hear no news of a story mode, an option to not have to switch heroes in-match, or third person perspective.

I don’t get it. Blizzard created this amazingly deep new setting with brilliantly original characters, and they don’t want to use it for anything but an arena where people shoot each other. They put so much effort into these excellent character designs — including optional skins — but you can’t even look at your own character. Why anyone would spend money on a skin you can’t even see yourself is beyond me.

It seems terribly wasteful. There’s so much potential in Overwatch, and the trailers always get me so pumped, but the reality of the game just seems very underwhelming right now. I don’t understand Blizzard’s reasoning.

* * *

There’s more news — like a new zone for Diablo III — but this post is already running long, and more announcements are bound to come, so I’ll save it for tomorrow’s post.

In the meantime, comment and let me know your thoughts on this year’s BlizzCon!

The second day of BlizzCon 2015 is coming to a close, and while the big reveals were reserved for yesterday, there’s still more than a few interesting tidbits to discuss.

Overwatch story panel: Comics, cartoons, and diversity

The thing I was most interested in on day two of BlizzCon was the “World of Overwatch” panel that promised more information on storytelling in the world of Overwatch. We’re in this odd limbo where Blizzard has created this incredibly rich and colourful world for this game, but yet have no intention of actually telling any story within the game itself.

Unfortunately, that hasn’t changed, but the panel does offer some hope for us story fans.

So far, the plans for expanding Overwatch’s story seem twofold: a series of comics, including a graphic novel and shorter pieces, and some animated shorts to flesh out the backstory of various characters.

It seems like the animated shorts will be around the same quality as the announcement cinematic, which is pretty cool. Also, baby Winston appears to be ridiculously adorable. Knowing what we know about Winston already, that particular short is bound to be a tear-jerker.

The comics… Well, I’ll probably read them. Comic books and graphic novels aren’t my favourite thing in the world, but considering how much inspiration Overwatch takes from super heroes, it makes sense.

Both these seem like good things to have. The animated shorts, in particular, will undoubtedly be awesome, given the quality of Blizzard’s usual cinematics and things like the Burdens of Shaohao.

But none of this is a “meal” from a story perspective. I want something I can really sink my teeth into. I really do not understand Blizzard’s reticence to add a story mode, or campaign, or something.

Interestingly, Activision-Blizzard has recently launched a film and television division. Right now all the planned adaptations are of non-Blizzard games, but perhaps that oft-requested Overwatch Saturday morning cartoon isn’t outside the realm of possibility.

The other interesting tidbit from the panel concerned Blizzard’s ongoing push for inclusiveness with Overwatch. Someone asked if any of the characters are gay, and the answer was an unequivocal, “Yes.” Metzen even added that there is more than one gay character on the line-up.

We don’t know who yet; Blizzard wants to reveal that organically as part of the story. I think this is wise, as it helps prevent stereotyping anyone as “the gay character.”

Of course, this inevitably leads to rampant speculation.

It has been noted that Tracer and Widowmaker, as well as Soldier: 76 and Reaper, have special rivalries with one another, and this has of course led to lots of theories about one or both pairings being some sort of “jilted lover” scenario. Plus Tracer/Widowmaker was already a thing pretty much from the moment the game was announced. Make sure you have safe search on if you Google that.

I find both scenarios a tad predictable myself. Plus Tracer/Widowmaker seems more like the sort of thing rooted in “fantasies” than anything. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but I’m not sure it’s a good basis for canon storylines.

It’s also worth noting that it took less than 24 hours for Mei/D.Va to be a thing. Though that one I really don’t get. They don’t seem to have any common ground or chemistry at all, aside from both being super kawaii. Tracer/D.Va… that I could see.

Personally, my choices for gay characters would be Tracer, because it would be daring to pick the game’s most iconic character, or any of the real macho manly men — like McCree, Reinhardt, or Soldier: 76 — because it would be deliciously non-stereotypical.

I just really hope it’s not Zarya. Way too stereotypical.

Diablo: Patch 2.4

Depending on your perspective, BlizzCon 2015 is really good or really bad for Diablo fans.

Really good because another big, ambitious patch is coming with some significant content. They’re adding not one, not two, but three new areas to the world. The Eternal Woods are an offshoot of the Ruins of Sescheron added last patch, the Royal Quarters are an expansion of Leoric’s Manor in act one, and there’s a large new zone in act five called Greyhollow Island.

Although I’m not generally a fan of D3’s graphics (to put it mildly), the Ruins of Sescheron are incredibly beautiful, and I’m very happy to see more from that tileset. Greyhollow Island also looks like something of a feast for the eyes, though I wouldn’t exactly call it pretty.

The major new feature of patch 2.4 is set dungeons. These are non-randomized class-specific dungeons that are only unlocked when you complete a six-piece class set, and feature challenges tailored to that set’s power.

That’s… odd.

I have no idea what the numbers are on the people with full class sets, but I can’t imagine it’s terribly high. I’ve played a lot of Diablo III, and I still only have four pieces of Tal Rasha’s.

So it’s a cool idea, but it seems spectacularly niche.

There’s also a bevy of quality of life improvements and the usual new items and revamped sets.

It seems like a great patch… but it’s still just a patch, and that’s why it’s also bad news.

I love that Blizzard is adding so much free content basically out of the kindness of their hearts, but I want an expansion. I want a continuation of the main storyline. I want new classes. Big patches are good, but they’re not enough.

WoW: New transmog system, class changes, and more

Day two of BlizzCon also saw a great deal of new information about Legion and its systems.

The biggest news to me is the new transmogrification system. You will no longer need to keep old items; you can simply unlock an appearance and keep it forever, like in Diablo III.

When you log into Legion, the appearances of every item in your inventory, your bank, and your void storage, and every single reward from every quest you have ever done will be unlocked.

Nice.

Transmog is also becoming more of a wardrobe system. You will be able to store multiple looks and swap between them easily, perhaps even tying them to specific specializations. A look will also memorize hidden items, such as helms, cloaks, and shoulders.

Finally, transmog will now also include tabards, shirts, and weapon enchants.

This is all just lovely. As a fan of cosmetic customization, I can only offer my whole-hearted approval. This certainly helps solve my issue of “too many cool outfits and not enough gear sets to use them on.”

Another thing that excited me was the preview of artifact weapons. I really love how epic and story-driven the quests to acquire them seem to be, though this does once again make me worry my alt addiction may surge wildly out of control. I also like how artifacts will be something you can upgrade through virtually any kind of content, which should make for a less restrictive endgame.

On the downside, it seems like artifacts won’t be around forever. Blizzard really needs to stop creating expansion-only features; it’s a terrible idea on so many levels.

A big shocker, though not in a bad way, is that dual spec is going away. Spec is now something you change as easily as swapping a stance, and any character can easily access all specializations for their class. Looks like I’m finally giving fistweaving a try! This also means there are more artifact quests I can do.

The many major class overhauls were also touched on, though there are still more questions than answers. The death knight rune system is being greatly simplified — I wonder if I’ll finally be able to enjoy that class now? I always loved DKs in terms of lore and aesthetics, but could never quite get into the gameplay.

Subtlety rogues are also getting an interesting-sounding revamp. Shadow dance is now a passive that triggers throughout combat, putting you into stealth and opening up new shadow-themed abilities. That seems really cool, but I do wonder how it’ll work when soloing. Currently when you vanish, mobs evade and regain all health. It’d be really damn annoying to have no control over that.

It’s also confirmed that demonology is losing metamorphosis and becoming a more pet-focused spec. This reads to me as, “Demonology has been removed.” This is profoundly disappointing — I have no intention of playing fel beast mastery.

In other bad news, flying is confirmed to not be in at launch for Legion. Which also means that despite my growing excitement for Legion, I probably won’t be there at launch, either. We’ll see how I feel.

The final stand-out for me was mention of when Turalyon and Alleria appear. One gets the impression it’ll in post-launch content, and they said, “The way you view WoW will change.” The optimist in me says this will mean the end of the Alliance/Horde conflict and the beginning of the Army of the Light. The cynic in me says this will be some random nonsensical twist for the lore that doesn’t change much for the game. The realist in my says it won’t be either of those things and is being overhyped.

There’s a lot of other news — including profession revamps and class hall info, as well some info on Heroes of the Storm — but that’s what stood out to me, and I don’t want to make this post too bloated.

* * *

On the whole, I’m pretty happy with this BlizzCon. It may not have had a lot of surprises or huge reveals, and I am disappointed by the lack of a Diablo expansion, but there’s a lot of good stuff to be found.

The Warcraft trailer was outstanding, and flight and demonology issues aside, I really like what I’m hearing from Legion. Despite myself, I find my excitement for the expansion growing.

I’m also quite glad that StarCraft seems to have a bright future, and while I regret the lack of an expansion for Diablo, at least it hasn’t been forgotten. Heroes is chugging along nicely.

Overwatch I feel torn on. Everything I learn makes me more in love with the Overwatch world and its characters — it’s hitting my IDIC feels something fierce — but the more I think about it, the less appealing Overwatch the game seems. I really don’t get this massive disconnect between the world-building and character development and the game design.

How about you? What are your thoughts on this year’s BlizzCon and its news?

We now come to the twenty-third chapter of Rage of the Old Gods, the first book of my epic science fantasy trilogy the World Spectrum. In the coming weeks, I will be posting the entire book for free on this blog. If you’re just joining us, you can get caught up with the previous chapters now.

The final clash between Gods and humans is days away, but first, there is another conflict that must be resolved. Leha cannot lead a divided army. They must determine their course: to embrace hope, or pragmatism; to fight for the now, or for the future; to save themselves, or save humanity.

———————

Chapter twenty-one: For Humanity

The next day, Leha awoke not long after dawn, her eyes feeling tired and gritty and her muscles feeling weak. The weather was hot and sticky, and its oppressiveness made her feel trapped. She ate her breakfast without tasting it and then asked around those loyal to her to see if anything had changed.

Nothing had.

Leha wracked her mind for some solution to this deadlock, but she thought of nothing. She still worried about what the consequences of passing on her powers might be, but she didn’t think anything else would settle this.

Needing to talk to someone, she crossed the camp – ignoring the looks and whispers that followed her – and found Benefactor in his tent. Pelts and plant fiber rugs from Sy’om covered the ground in the tent – there were no other furnishings or decorations – and it had a vague earthy smell that reminded her of the caves he’d come from.

His crossbow and set a of custom-made armor rested against one wall. Leha hoped he would not have to use them. He wanted to, but she had convinced him to stay off the front lines. She unburdened herself to the alien, often speaking even though he read it all from her mind.

I understand why the others feel as they do, but I understand you and your stance as well, he said when she had finished. His voice had never regained its old sparkle and verve after the machine attacks on Sy’om.

He turned his head at an odd sideways angle. The eye facing Leha was unfocused. It is true the future will not matter if we lose this battle. He looked at her and quirked his head. But it is also true that these decisions should not be made without great thought.

He rubbed the fur on his oblong head and glanced up. This world is very hot.

He turned back to her. I cannot say what is right. My people never harm each other. We feel others’ pain as our own. Among my kind, this would be no concern. But humans are very different. Your history shows that you must be cautious in giving yourselves new weapons that could be used against your own kind.

She nodded sadly. She briefly thought of trying to give her powers to some of Benefactor’s people, but there was no way of knowing what effect the venom would have on so alien a creature.

He set his jaw. I wish I could help, Leha.

She sighed. “That’s all right.” She stood and gave him an understanding smile.

He returned the gesture by baring his black teeth.

She left, still tormented by her indecision.

The rearguard returned just after noon. They reported that the Automatons were not far behind them, and that they would likely arrive some time the next day. Leha felt ready to scream with frustration. The machines were a day away, and she didn’t even know if she could count on people to follow her orders.

Eranna and Doga met with her briefly to offer their support and sympathy, then left to try and shore up support for her.

Before he left, Doga said, “Do not blame the people who disagree with you too harshly. They’re doing what they think is best.”

She thanked him, but in truth, his words only worsened her feelings of uncertainty. She knew he was right, but she wished he wasn’t. It would be easier to think of all those against her as greedy and selfish.

She paced randomly around her tent for what felt like hours, trying to decide what she should do. She considered getting an ice creature to link her to Lahune, who had evacuated to Tyzu, but she didn’t think he would have anything to say that had not already been said. All the arguments had been laid out; she needed to find a way to resolve them.

Every time she felt ready to acquiesce and allow others to be given her powers, something inside her stopped her from doing it. It felt wrong. She felt like she should reach for the idealistic solution, the moral solution. But part of her worried that the idealistic solution would turn out to be the wrong. Perhaps, with so much on the line, practicality should reign supreme.

Time passed slowly, and her frustration and indecision grew to almost unbearable levels. She had to take action, she knew. Time was running out.

At last, she came to the conclusion that she had to listen to her conscience. She had to pick the choice that she would be able to live with – or die with. She would stand by her principles; there would be no others like her.

Immediately, doubt and misgivings assailed her, but she forced them away. A decision had to be made.

Next, she turned her mind to finding a solution to the deadlock that had gripped the camp. She had to try to convince the people of her way of thinking. She had to address them; she had to win them over. In truth, there were no other options.

With the aid of Benefactor and his people, she spread the word that she would make her case one last time. A vast assembly began to take shape in the center of the camp. While her people came together, she sat in the close, sticky confines of her tent and planned what she would say. She thought back to her books and tried to put together the most elegant wording for her address.

It took nearly an hour for the assembly to come together. Virtually everyone in the camp attended; only those who could not possibly leave their work in preparing the camp’s defenses were absent. Leha took some hope from the fact that people were still willing to hear what she had to say.

When all the preparations had been made, she departed her tent and made her way through the nearly silent camp, circling around to come at the crowd from the west, the only direction it didn’t extend in.

She reached the center of the camp and found Doga, Eranna, Drogin, Benefactor, and Natoma waiting for her by a stack of crates, the stage she would speak from. She greeted them quickly, and they offered her their support and encouragement. She thanked them.

The five others went to stand before the crates. Leha took a deep breath, and scaled her makeshift stage. She didn’t know what she would do if this failed. Perhaps she would give in after all. She hoped with all her being that that would not be the outcome.

The crowd stretched out in front of her like a giant carpet of people. The rows between the tents were packed, and the hum of voices washed over her like waves from the ocean. As she took her position, the crowd focused their eyes on her, and the hum quieted somewhat. She felt the weight of their attention bombard her. It reminded her of the Watcher.

At the base of the crates, in a small open space between her and the crowd, her companions had formed themselves into a crescent. Benefactor stood directly beneath her, Eranna and Doga formed the wing to her left, and Drogin and Natoma stood to the right. All wore expressions of calm determination.

Leha enhanced her voice and lungs to allow herself to be heard by all who had come to see her.

“You all know why this assembly has been gathered,” she began, her voice cutting cleanly through the moist air. “Many of you – most of you – believe that I should grant to others the same powers and abilities that I have. I understand why you want this, and while I don’t believe that it would be the right thing to do, I don’t know if it can be called wrong, either.

“The machines are coming to destroy us, and we will need every advantage if we are to survive. I won’t deny that having more people with my abilities would be an advantage.

“But there are other things that need to be considered.”

She paused, letting her words sink in. Her heart pounded fiercely, and she felt surprised that her voice hadn’t faltered yet.

She turned her head slowly, taking in the whole of the assembly. “How many of you will go into battle tomorrow, believing that we will fail? Is that the attitude we should have? Or should we face the Automatons with the belief that victory is possible, that it is within our grasp if we fight hard enough for it?”

The crowd murmured uncertainly.

“We have to believe that we can win. Otherwise, we might as well give in to the machines right now. And if we will fight with the belief that we can come out of this war alive, then we must also plan for the future.”

She paused again as the crowd hummed to itself.

She fought to hide the fear she felt and spoke with all the strength she could muster. “I ask you all, whom are we trying to save? Are we trying to save ourselves, or are we trying to save the human race?”

The people chattered more loudly. She thought she was having an impact, but she couldn’t be sure.

“If it is the latter, then we must consider the future. We must consider the consequences of our actions. We cannot make decisions simply for today; we must make decisions that won’t bring us and our descendants harm later on. We have to fight for everyone in the north and everyone on the other worlds. We have to fight for every man, woman, and child who will ever be born.”

Now, the people had grown silent. They watched her with rapt attention. Her nerves tingled nervously.

“If we fight for all humanity, yes, we have to fight for ourselves as well. If we fail, humanity fails. But if we fight for humanity, we also to have fight for the future, and we have to make certain that none – none – of our actions can damage that future.”

She counted to ten, hoping desperately that this would work. Within the crowd, some groups muttered to each other intensely while others stayed deathly silent.

She reached ten, and fixed her eyes upon the assembled masses. “So I ask you, whom are we fighting for? Do we fight for ourselves, or for humanity?”

Patches of people scattered throughout the throng answered her. “For humanity!” they cried.

It was just a small number, but a moment later, their sentiment spread. Thousands of voices joined together, calling out, “For humanity!”

The words washed over Leha like the first rain after a long drought. She drank them in, joy warming her like the first rays of sun after a long night. Not everyone had added their voice, but a majority had, enough had. She had convinced them.

A brilliant smile lit up her youthful face. She raised her right hand into the air. “For humanity!” she echoed.

Her supporters in the crowd cheered and shouted, raising their fists above their heads.

She let their adulation wash over her. She leapt off the crates and joined her friends, who clapped and smiled. Benefactor brayed and radiated pride and happiness. Drogin grinned and hugged her. He said something, but she lost his words amid the tumult. It didn’t matter; his tone told what she needed to know: he was proud of her. When her brother released her, Natoma hugged her as well, and Doga slapped her on the back and congratulated her. Eranna was more subdued, but even she clapped and added her congratulations.

Leha grinned and waved at her people, hoping to show some of the gratitude she felt.

* * *

That night, Leha, Doga, Drogin, Eranna, Natoma, and Benefactor gathered in the command tent to make their final plans for the defense of the camp. The sun had set, and they stood in the preternatural light of two Clan lanterns. The air had cooled, and the humidity had changed from oppressive to refreshing. The air smelled of moist grass.

They looked over a roughly drawn map of the camp, searching for any weakness in the defenses, and they went over their plans, making sure there were no problems.

They were discovering flaws in their plan to delay the Automatons at the River Sheen. They had no way of knowing where the machines would attempt to cross, so they could not set up any of the war engines or fixed defenses they were building around the camp. They could try and use the First One crystal to lure them, but there was no guarantee they would once again fall for it.

They tried to come up with something to improve their chances at the river, but they failed, so they decided to move on to other matters for the time being.

Leha leaned on the table. “How are we doing on the feedback machines? Will they be ready in time?” she asked Drogin.

He nodded. He had dark circles under his eyes, and his hair was disheveled. “One’s ready now, and the other will be finished by sunrise.”

“Good,” Leha said.

She began to discuss the earthworks with Doga and Eranna. The workers were putting the finishing touches on them.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Drogin’s eyes widen. He began to scribble calculations in a margin of the map.

“What is it?” she asked.

He looked up. “Feedback. We can destroy the barrier machine the same way we destroy the Wizard-Automatons. We overload it. It’s already pushed to the limit; it won’t take much.”

They all turned their attention to Drogin.

Leha furrowed her brow, straightening. “How would that work? I thought their power was spread out; don’t the feedback machines need a focused spell to hijack?”

He nodded. “Yes, they do. But we won’t use a feedback machine,” he said excitedly. “Barrier machines have a very basic intelligence. They’re set to funnel energy through themselves to smooth out the magical currents and eliminate jumping points. They have a set amount of energy that they channel; this one’s been set to channel as much as it safely can.”

He gestured animatedly. “We’ll change it. We’ll set it to channel more than it can handle.”

“How is that possible?” Eranna said, looking as confused as Leha felt.

“One concern technicians like me had back when we used Automatons was that someone else would take them over. That’s why we keyed them to specific control amulets; that’s part of why we insulated them with lead. It probably couldn’t have happened; their minds are very strong, we know now.

“But barrier machines are different. Their minds are weak, meant to be controlled. And they don’t have any of the safeguards against hijacking that Automatons do. I saw that when I first studied them. I didn’t think it mattered at the time. To control them, you have to be close, and when you’re close, you can just destroy them.”

Natoma folded her arms. “So you’re saying that our technicians will be able to overload it if they get close enough?”

Drogin nodded. “We’d probably need the help of some wizards, but yes.”

“But if we can get in that close, couldn’t we just destroy it? How does this change things?” Leha asked, still trying to recover from her brother’s jargon. She’d always had trouble understanding him when talked about his work.

“A barrier machine can channel far more energy than any Wizard-Automaton – probably even more than the Machine King,” he said, still talking fast. “If it overloads, the explosion will be enormous. They’ll be keeping it well behind their front lines, but if we time it right, the explosion has the potential to destroy their army as well as the machine.”

“Won’t their lead armor protect them?” Doga said.

“What’s to stop the blast from destroying the camp, too?” Leha asked.

Drogin answered Doga first. “If this explosion is as big as I think it will be, their armor won’t make a difference. The lead will be the only thing left.” He turned to Leha. “We’ll have to time it perfectly. It will depend on where they keep the barrier machine. But I doubt it would be able to reach the camp, and if our army is in danger, we should be able to pull them back in time.”

He sobered. “It’s a risk. But if it works, we could cripple or even destroy their army with one strike.”

Leha bit her lip. “What about the team that sets it to overload? Won’t they be killed?”

Drogin shook his head. “Once we make the changes, there’s no way the machine will be able to perform its purpose. They’ll be able to jump out.”

“If that’s the case, we might be able to evacuate more of the noncombatants,” Doga said.

Eranna agreed. “The wizards will probably have their hands full, but we might be able to save some.”

Leha studied the map on the table, hardly listening to Eranna and the Lost One. She weighed the risks and potential rewards of Drogin’s plan.

“We might be able to make this part of our plan to hold the river,” Natoma suggested. “If we hold it until the overload begins, then retreat, they might be trapped on the other side of the river.”

Leha nodded, though she had her doubts. There was too much uncertainty in this plan. She folded her arms and thought.

“Leha?” Drogin prompted after a moment.

“I’m thinking,” she said.

“I’m not sure that we have many options. In a fair fight, we’re no match for the Automatons,” he offered.

“Even if it doesn’t destroy all of them, we can send away more of the civilians,” Doga reminded her.

Leha nodded absently.

I think we should try it, Benefactor broadcast. We must take chances if we are to destroy the Automatons. His psychic voice had a hard edge to it.

Leha looked at him, feeling faintly surprised.

“All right,” she said. “We’ll try it.”

Doga and Natoma nodded. Benefactor ducked his head. Drogin scribbled more calculations.

“How are we going to get to it? We can’t jump there,” Eranna said.

Natoma glanced up. “Yarnig could slip through. He’s been practicing illusions. He should be able to conceal a small group.” There was something odd in her eyes when she spoke of Yarnig, but Leha soon forgot it amid her other concerns.

“Very well,” Leha said.

The conversation began to turn to other matters. Leha continued to think of Drogin’s plan for a moment, wishing he had thought of it before the attack on Tallatzan. They would have been able to destroy the ziggurat in a fraction of the time and with a fraction of the effort.

She looked to her brother. “Could any barrier machine be overloaded in this way?” she asked Drogin.

He peeked up from his calculations. “I don’t see why not.”

The gears of the Leha’s mind leapt into action. “Would the resulting explosion be enough to destroy a ziggurat?”

He straightened. “I imagine so. Why?”

A tingle of excitement ran up Leha’s spine. “Once the nearer one overloads, we’ll be able jump again. We could send teams to the ziggurats and overload their barrier machines. If we win this battle, most of their forces will be crushed. If we also destroy their cities, they’ll never be able to recover.”

The others glanced at each other.

“Wouldn’t it be better to wait until after the battle, after we’ve recovered somewhat?” Doga said.

She shook her head. “The machines don’t adapt easily, but they’re not stupid. Once they know what we can do to their barrier machines, they’ll put in safeguards to stop us. We have to do it all in one go.”

She took a breath and shifted her weight. “We’ll have to use fighters and wizards that we can’t afford to lose, I know. But this is too a good of an opportunity to pass up. We can annihilate the Automaton infrastructure with a single strike.”

“I agree,” Natoma said. “This has too much potential for us to not try.”

After a moment, the others added their agreement. Leha smiled a little. She began to feel hope for the coming battle.

They spent another half-hour working out the final details of their plans, and then they realized they had nothing left to say. The meeting broke up, and they, with the exception of Drogin, went to their respective sleeping places. Leha’s brother would stay up and oversee the final preparations of their weaponry and defenses. Leha wished she could take some of the load off him, but she had no knowledge of the technician’s art.

Sleep did not come to her immediately. She lay in her tent, listening to the sounds of night, and went over all the plans again in her head, searching for some flaw she’d overlooked. She didn’t find any.

She worried about what would happen the next day. She thought of all that could go wrong. But she also felt hope. Hope for victory, hope that the Automatons would know defeat, hope for a world without war.

A world without war. For so long, it had seemed an impossible, unattainable goal. To think that it was so close made her ache with longing.

As the night wore on, she thought of her worries for that future, of her desire to keep the human race united and at peace. She still didn’t know of any permanent resolution for that problem.

The recent dissent within the camp had created doubt within her, but the fact that she had won the people over gave her great hope. They could devote themselves to the future. They could choose what was right over what was best for themselves.

* * *

The moment Leha woke enough to realize what day it was, a feeling that was neither excitement nor nervousness tingled through her body.

This was it. Today would bring about the end of the war. She had no doubt of that. Either her army would fail, and the peoples of three worlds with it, or the Automatons, the Old Gods, would once again know defeat at the hands of their own creations.

There was something oddly calming in that knowledge. She no longer had to worry about the future, about the weeks and months down the road. All that mattered was what happened on this day.

The camp was quiet – almost tranquil. Virtually all the preparations had been made. Their weapons were ready; their defenses were complete. People spoke little. There was nothing left to say.

The weather was as hot as the day before, but the humidity was not as oppressive. The sun shone brightly, seeming oblivious to the storm that would soon rock the camp.

In the midmorning, Leha took a walk along the top of the inner earthwork, studying the defenses. Trebuchets and catapults thrust their arms into the air from just behind the earthworks. Their ropes swayed slightly in a breeze that carried hardly any of the mountains’ cool. Out on the cleared fields, the trench to the north yawned, and though she could not see them, Leha knew that the wards Breena had designed peppered the ground. They were keyed to activate in the presence of lead, so there was no chance of Leha’s people setting them off.

Within the camp, nearly half of the tents had been taken down and stowed so that the machines would have less targets to set afire. Water was being stockpiled for the fires that did arise. Drogin’s feedback weapons had been completed, and they rested at the eastern and western edges of the camp, behind the earthworks. Each had been mounted to a hovering cart constructed from the remnants of the Clan hall. The carts would allow the machines to stay mobile – unfortunately, they were too awkward to bring to the river. A pair of reindeer would pull each of them. The carts were covered in lead plating salvaged from the armor of Automatons to shield them from magical attacks.

All through the camp and across the earthworks, salvaged chunks of Automaton armor had been made into stationary shields; civilians and soldiers alike could use them to take cover from the machines’ magic.

All the preparations had been made. Waiting was all that remained.

The next day, Leha awoke not long after dawn, her eyes feeling tired and gritty and her muscles feeling weak. The weather was hot and sticky, and its oppressiveness made her feel trapped. She ate her breakfast without tasting it and then asked around those loyal to her to see if anything had changed.

Nothing had.

Leha wracked her mind for some solution to this deadlock, but she thought of nothing. She still worried about what the consequences of passing on her powers might be, but she didn’t think anything else would settle this.

Needing to talk to someone, she crossed the camp – ignoring the looks and whispers that followed her – and found Benefactor in his tent. Pelts and plant fiber rugs from Sy’om covered the ground in the tent – there were no other furnishings or decorations – and it had a vague earthy smell that reminded her of the caves he’d come from.

His crossbow and set a of custom-made armor rested against one wall. Leha hoped he would not have to use them. He wanted to, but she had convinced him to stay off the front lines. She unburdened herself to the alien, often speaking even though he read it all from her mind.

I understand why the others feel as they do, but I understand you and your stance as well, he said when she had finished. His voice had never regained its old sparkle and verve after the machine attacks on Sy’om.

He turned his head at an odd sideways angle. The eye facing Leha was unfocused. It is true the future will not matter if we lose this battle. He looked at her and quirked his head. But it is also true that these decisions should not be made without great thought.

He rubbed the fur on his oblong head and glanced up. This world is very hot.

He turned back to her. I cannot say what is right. My people never harm each other. We feel others’ pain as our own. Among my kind, this would be no concern. But humans are very different. Your history shows that you must be cautious in giving yourselves new weapons that could be used against your own kind.

She nodded sadly. She briefly thought of trying to give her powers to some of Benefactor’s people, but there was no way of knowing what effect the venom would have on so alien a creature.

He set his jaw. I wish I could help, Leha.

She sighed. “That’s all right.” She stood and gave him an understanding smile.

He returned the gesture by baring his black teeth.

She left, still tormented by her indecision.

The rearguard returned just after noon. They reported that the Automatons were not far behind them, and that they would likely arrive some time the next day. Leha felt ready to scream with frustration. The machines were a day away, and she didn’t even know if she could count on people to follow her orders.

Eranna and Doga met with her briefly to offer their support and sympathy, then left to try and shore up support for her.

Before he left, Doga said, “Do not blame the people who disagree with you too harshly. They’re doing what they think is best.”

She thanked him, but in truth, his words only worsened her feelings of uncertainty. She knew he was right, but she wished he wasn’t. It would be easier to think of all those against her as greedy and selfish.

She paced randomly around her tent for what felt like hours, trying to decide what she should do. She considered getting an ice creature to link her to Lahune, who had evacuated to Tyzu, but she didn’t think he would have anything to say that had not already been said. All the arguments had been laid out; she needed to find a way to resolve them.

Every time she felt ready to acquiesce and allow others to be given her powers, something inside her stopped her from doing it. It felt wrong. She felt like she should reach for the idealistic solution, the moral solution. But part of her worried that the idealistic solution would turn out to be the wrong. Perhaps, with so much on the line, practicality should reign supreme.

Time passed slowly, and her frustration and indecision grew to almost unbearable levels. She had to take action, she knew. Time was running out.

At last, she came to the conclusion that she had to listen to her conscience. She had to pick the choice that she would be able to live with – or die with. She would stand by her principles; there would be no others like her.

Immediately, doubt and misgivings assailed her, but she forced them away. A decision had to be made.

Next, she turned her mind to finding a solution to the deadlock that had gripped the camp. She had to try to convince the people of her way of thinking. She had to address them; she had to win them over. In truth, there were no other options.

With the aid of Benefactor and his people, she spread the word that she would make her case one last time. A vast assembly began to take shape in the center of the camp. While her people came together, she sat in the close, sticky confines of her tent and planned what she would say. She thought back to her books and tried to put together the most elegant wording for her address.

It took nearly an hour for the assembly to come together. Virtually everyone in the camp attended; only those who could not possibly leave their work in preparing the camp’s defenses were absent. Leha took some hope from the fact that people were still willing to hear what she had to say.

When all the preparations had been made, she departed her tent and made her way through the nearly silent camp, circling around to come at the crowd from the west, the only direction it didn’t extend in.

She reached the center of the camp and found Doga, Eranna, Drogin, Benefactor, and Natoma waiting for her by a stack of crates, the stage she would speak from. She greeted them quickly, and they offered her their support and encouragement. She thanked them.

The five others went to stand before the crates. Leha took a deep breath, and scaled her makeshift stage. She didn’t know what she would do if this failed. Perhaps she would give in after all. She hoped with all her being that that would not be the outcome.

The crowd stretched out in front of her like a giant carpet of people. The rows between the tents were packed, and the hum of voices washed over her like waves from the ocean. As she took her position, the crowd focused their eyes on her, and the hum quieted somewhat. She felt the weight of their attention bombard her. It reminded her of the Watcher.

At the base of the crates, in a small open space between her and the crowd, her companions had formed themselves into a crescent. Benefactor stood directly beneath her, Eranna and Doga formed the wing to her left, and Drogin and Natoma stood to the right. All wore expressions of calm determination.

Leha enhanced her voice and lungs to allow herself to be heard by all who had come to see her.

“You all know why this assembly has been gathered,” she began, her voice cutting cleanly through the moist air. “Many of you – most of you – believe that I should grant to others the same powers and abilities that I have. I understand why you want this, and while I don’t believe that it would be the right thing to do, I don’t know if it can be called wrong, either.

“The machines are coming to destroy us, and we will need every advantage if we are to survive. I won’t deny that having more people with my abilities would be an advantage.

“But there are other things that need to be considered.”

She paused, letting her words sink in. Her heart pounded fiercely, and she felt surprised that her voice hadn’t faltered yet.

She turned her head slowly, taking in the whole of the assembly. “How many of you will go into battle tomorrow, believing that we will fail? Is that the attitude we should have? Or should we face the Automatons with the belief that victory is possible, that it is within our grasp if we fight hard enough for it?”

The crowd murmured uncertainly.

“We have to believe that we can win. Otherwise, we might as well give in to the machines right now. And if we will fight with the belief that we can come out of this war alive, then we must also plan for the future.”

She paused again as the crowd hummed to itself.

She fought to hide the fear she felt and spoke with all the strength she could muster. “I ask you all, whom are we trying to save? Are we trying to save ourselves, or are we trying to save the human race?”

The people chattered more loudly. She thought she was having an impact, but she couldn’t be sure.

“If it is the latter, then we must consider the future. We must consider the consequences of our actions. We cannot make decisions simply for today; we must make decisions that won’t bring us and our descendants harm later on. We have to fight for everyone in the north and everyone on the other worlds. We have to fight for every man, woman, and child who will ever be born.”

Now, the people had grown silent. They watched her with rapt attention. Her nerves tingled nervously.

“If we fight for all humanity, yes, we have to fight for ourselves as well. If we fail, humanity fails. But if we fight for humanity, we also to have fight for the future, and we have to make certain that none – none – of our actions can damage that future.”

She counted to ten, hoping desperately that this would work. Within the crowd, some groups muttered to each other intensely while others stayed deathly silent.

She reached ten, and fixed her eyes upon the assembled masses. “So I ask you, whom are we fighting for? Do we fight for ourselves, or for humanity?”

Patches of people scattered throughout the throng answered her. “For humanity!” they cried.

It was just a small number, but a moment later, their sentiment spread. Thousands of voices joined together, calling out, “For humanity!”

The words washed over Leha like the first rain after a long drought. She drank them in, joy warming her like the first rays of sun after a long night. Not everyone had added their voice, but a majority had, enough had. She had convinced them.

A brilliant smile lit up her youthful face. She raised her right hand into the air. “For humanity!” she echoed.

Her supporters in the crowd cheered and shouted, raising their fists above their heads.

She let their adulation wash over her. She leapt off the crates and joined her friends, who clapped and smiled. Benefactor brayed and radiated pride and happiness. Drogin grinned and hugged her. He said something, but she lost his words amid the tumult. It didn’t matter; his tone told what she needed to know: he was proud of her. When her brother released her, Natoma hugged her as well, and Doga slapped her on the back and congratulated her. Eranna was more subdued, but even she clapped and added her congratulations.

Leha grinned and waved at her people, hoping to show some of the gratitude she felt.

* * *

That night, Leha, Doga, Drogin, Eranna, Natoma, and Benefactor gathered in the command tent to make their final plans for the defense of the camp. The sun had set, and they stood in the preternatural light of two Clan lanterns. The air had cooled, and the humidity had changed from oppressive to refreshing. The air smelled of moist grass.

They looked over a roughly drawn map of the camp, searching for any weakness in the defenses, and they went over their plans, making sure there were no problems.

They were discovering flaws in their plan to delay the Automatons at the River Sheen. They had no way of knowing where the machines would attempt to cross, so they could not set up any of the war engines or fixed defenses they were building around the camp. They could try and use the First One crystal to lure them, but there was no guarantee they would once again fall for it.

They tried to come up with something to improve their chances at the river, but they failed, so they decided to move on to other matters for the time being.

Leha leaned on the table. “How are we doing on the feedback machines? Will they be ready in time?” she asked Drogin.

He nodded. He had dark circles under his eyes, and his hair was disheveled. “One’s ready now, and the other will be finished by sunrise.”

“Good,” Leha said.

She began to discuss the earthworks with Doga and Eranna. The workers were putting the finishing touches on them.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Drogin’s eyes widen. He began to scribble calculations in a margin of the map.

“What is it?” she asked.

He looked up. “Feedback. We can destroy the barrier machine the same way we destroy the Wizard-Automatons. We overload it. It’s already pushed to the limit; it won’t take much.”

They all turned their attention to Drogin.

Leha furrowed her brow, straightening. “How would that work? I thought their power was spread out; don’t the feedback machines need a focused spell to hijack?”

He nodded. “Yes, they do. But we won’t use a feedback machine,” he said excitedly. “Barrier machines have a very basic intelligence. They’re set to funnel energy through themselves to smooth out the magical currents and eliminate jumping points. They have a set amount of energy that they channel; this one’s been set to channel as much as it safely can.”

He gestured animatedly. “We’ll change it. We’ll set it to channel more than it can handle.”

“How is that possible?” Eranna said, looking as confused as Leha felt.

“One concern technicians like me had back when we used Automatons was that someone else would take them over. That’s why we keyed them to specific control amulets; that’s part of why we insulated them with lead. It probably couldn’t have happened; their minds are very strong, we know now.

“But barrier machines are different. Their minds are weak, meant to be controlled. And they don’t have any of the safeguards against hijacking that Automatons do. I saw that when I first studied them. I didn’t think it mattered at the time. To control them, you have to be close, and when you’re close, you can just destroy them.”

Natoma folded her arms. “So you’re saying that our technicians will be able to overload it if they get close enough?”

Drogin nodded. “We’d probably need the help of some wizards, but yes.”

“But if we can get in that close, couldn’t we just destroy it? How does this change things?” Leha asked, still trying to recover from her brother’s jargon. She’d always had trouble understanding him when talked about his work.

“A barrier machine can channel far more energy than any Wizard-Automaton – probably even more than the Machine King,” he said, still talking fast. “If it overloads, the explosion will be enormous. They’ll be keeping it well behind their front lines, but if we time it right, the explosion has the potential to destroy their army as well as the machine.”

“Won’t their lead armor protect them?” Doga said.

“What’s to stop the blast from destroying the camp, too?” Leha asked.

Drogin answered Doga first. “If this explosion is as big as I think it will be, their armor won’t make a difference. The lead will be the only thing left.” He turned to Leha. “We’ll have to time it perfectly. It will depend on where they keep the barrier machine. But I doubt it would be able to reach the camp, and if our army is in danger, we should be able to pull them back in time.”

He sobered. “It’s a risk. But if it works, we could cripple or even destroy their army with one strike.”

Leha bit her lip. “What about the team that sets it to overload? Won’t they be killed?”

Drogin shook his head. “Once we make the changes, there’s no way the machine will be able to perform its purpose. They’ll be able to jump out.”

“If that’s the case, we might be able to evacuate more of the noncombatants,” Doga said.

Eranna agreed. “The wizards will probably have their hands full, but we might be able to save some.”

Leha studied the map on the table, hardly listening to Eranna and the Lost One. She weighed the risks and potential rewards of Drogin’s plan.

“We might be able to make this part of our plan to hold the river,” Natoma suggested. “If we hold it until the overload begins, then retreat, they might be trapped on the other side of the river.”

Leha nodded, though she had her doubts. There was too much uncertainty in this plan. She folded her arms and thought.

“Leha?” Drogin prompted after a moment.

“I’m thinking,” she said.

“I’m not sure that we have many options. In a fair fight, we’re no match for the Automatons,” he offered.

“Even if it doesn’t destroy all of them, we can send away more of the civilians,” Doga reminded her.

Leha nodded absently.

I think we should try it, Benefactor broadcast. We must take chances if we are to destroy the Automatons. His psychic voice had a hard edge to it.

Leha looked at him, feeling faintly surprised.

“All right,” she said. “We’ll try it.”

Doga and Natoma nodded. Benefactor ducked his head. Drogin scribbled more calculations.

“How are we going to get to it? We can’t jump there,” Eranna said.

Natoma glanced up. “Yarnig could slip through. He’s been practicing illusions. He should be able to conceal a small group.” There was something odd in her eyes when she spoke of Yarnig, but Leha soon forgot it amid her other concerns.

“Very well,” Leha said.

The conversation began to turn to other matters. Leha continued to think of Drogin’s plan for a moment, wishing he had thought of it before the attack on Tallatzan. They would have been able to destroy the ziggurat in a fraction of the time and with a fraction of the effort.

She looked to her brother. “Could any barrier machine be overloaded in this way?” she asked Drogin.

He peeked up from his calculations. “I don’t see why not.”

The gears of the Leha’s mind leapt into action. “Would the resulting explosion be enough to destroy a ziggurat?”

He straightened. “I imagine so. Why?”

A tingle of excitement ran up Leha’s spine. “Once the nearer one overloads, we’ll be able jump again. We could send teams to the ziggurats and overload their barrier machines. If we win this battle, most of their forces will be crushed. If we also destroy their cities, they’ll never be able to recover.”

The others glanced at each other.

“Wouldn’t it be better to wait until after the battle, after we’ve recovered somewhat?” Doga said.

She shook her head. “The machines don’t adapt easily, but they’re not stupid. Once they know what we can do to their barrier machines, they’ll put in safeguards to stop us. We have to do it all in one go.”

She took a breath and shifted her weight. “We’ll have to use fighters and wizards that we can’t afford to lose, I know. But this is too a good of an opportunity to pass up. We can annihilate the Automaton infrastructure with a single strike.”

“I agree,” Natoma said. “This has too much potential for us to not try.”

After a moment, the others added their agreement. Leha smiled a little. She began to feel hope for the coming battle.

They spent another half-hour working out the final details of their plans, and then they realized they had nothing left to say. The meeting broke up, and they, with the exception of Drogin, went to their respective sleeping places. Leha’s brother would stay up and oversee the final preparations of their weaponry and defenses. Leha wished she could take some of the load off him, but she had no knowledge of the technician’s art.

Sleep did not come to her immediately. She lay in her tent, listening to the sounds of night, and went over all the plans again in her head, searching for some flaw she’d overlooked. She didn’t find any.

She worried about what would happen the next day. She thought of all that could go wrong. But she also felt hope. Hope for victory, hope that the Automatons would know defeat, hope for a world without war.

A world without war. For so long, it had seemed an impossible, unattainable goal. To think that it was so close made her ache with longing.

As the night wore on, she thought of her worries for that future, of her desire to keep the human race united and at peace. She still didn’t know of any permanent resolution for that problem.

The recent dissent within the camp had created doubt within her, but the fact that she had won the people over gave her great hope. They could devote themselves to the future. They could choose what was right over what was best for themselves.

* * *

The moment Leha woke enough to realize what day it was, a feeling that was neither excitement nor nervousness tingled through her body.

This was it. Today would bring about the end of the war. She had no doubt of that. Either her army would fail, and the peoples of three worlds with it, or the Automatons, the Old Gods, would once again know defeat at the hands of their own creations.

There was something oddly calming in that knowledge. She no longer had to worry about the future, about the weeks and months down the road. All that mattered was what happened on this day.

The camp was quiet – almost tranquil. Virtually all the preparations had been made. Their weapons were ready; their defenses were complete. People spoke little. There was nothing left to say.

The weather was as hot as the day before, but the humidity was not as oppressive. The sun shone brightly, seeming oblivious to the storm that would soon rock the camp.

In the midmorning, Leha took a walk along the top of the inner earthwork, studying the defenses. Trebuchets and catapults thrust their arms into the air from just behind the earthworks. Their ropes swayed slightly in a breeze that carried hardly any of the mountains’ cool. Out on the cleared fields, the trench to the north yawned, and though she could not see them, Leha knew that the wards Breena had designed peppered the ground. They were keyed to activate in the presence of lead, so there was no chance of Leha’s people setting them off.

Within the camp, nearly half of the tents had been taken down and stowed so that the machines would have less targets to set afire. Water was being stockpiled for the fires that did arise. Drogin’s feedback weapons had been completed, and they rested at the eastern and western edges of the camp, behind the earthworks. Each had been mounted to a hovering cart constructed from the remnants of the Clan hall. The carts would allow the machines to stay mobile – unfortunately, they were too awkward to bring to the river. A pair of reindeer would pull each of them. The carts were covered in lead plating salvaged from the armor of Automatons to shield them from magical attacks.

All through the camp and across the earthworks, salvaged chunks of Automaton armor had been made into stationary shields; civilians and soldiers alike could use them to take cover from the machines’ magic.

All the preparations had been made. Waiting was all that remained.

———————

Enjoying the story so far? The next chapter will be posted soon, but if you can’t wait, you also have the opportunity buy the full ebook now!

I now reach the end of Once Upon a Time’s third season, and it goes out not with a bang, but a whimper, leaving me to wonder if this show is still worth my time.

“Bleeding Through”:

It’s seance time!

Despite the best efforts of Regina and Robin Hood, Zelena has stolen Regina’s heart, and not in the fun way.* Zelena is now on the brink of victory, but if the people of Storybrooke are to defeat her, they need more information on her plans, and her past.

*(That’s Emma’s job. :P)

To this end, Belle delves into Rumpel’s collection of lore to determine what sort of spell Zelena hopes to cast, and Regina attempts to summon the spirit of Cora to learn the truth of Zelena’s origins. The tale therein shows Cora as close to sympathetic as she’s ever been.

Surprisingly, this also offers the opportunity for Snow and Regina to bond — bet that’s something you never thought you’d see.

I have to admit I’m rather embarrassed it took me this long to realize the significance of Zelena stealing courage, a heart, etcetera.

Thus far this whole Wicked Witch arc has been decidedly underwhelming, but “Bleeding Through” is pretty good, perhaps due to a strong focus on Regina. It was very strange but also very enjoyable to see her and Snow bonding so much, and I really liked Snow’s assessment of Regina as a person at the end.

My complaints with this episode are several but mostly minor. It was entirely too easy for Zelena to track down Regina’s heart, which rather invalidated the ending of last episode. There’s still no explanation of how or why Zelena wound up in Oz — this seems to have taken place before Cora started learning magic.

I also feel the characters judged Ava’s actions with excessive harshness. I mean, I’m not saying what she did wasn’t a little catty, but Cora was lying, and she was clearly only interested in Leopold as a path to wealth and power.

Overall rating: 7.8/10

“A Curious Thing”:

Time is running out to stop Zelena (no pun intended). The people of Storybrooke come to believe they may already know how to defeat her, but lost the memory along with the rest of the year they spent in the Enchanted Forest. To uncover the truth, they’ll need to break the curse (again), but to do that, they need Henry, so first he must recover his own memories.

But Zelena isn’t about to let that happen without a fight, and between that Hook continuing to be really quite awful, Emma and company are going to have a rough ride.

Thankfully, we as television viewers don’t need Henry, so we get to learn the truth via the traditional flashbacks.

This was a pretty enjoyable episode. The pacing is quick but not rushed, there’s a good emotional weight without being too sappy, and it moves the story along quite well. The fact that Zelena didn’t cast the curse is quite an unexpected twist, but it makes perfect sense, and I quite liked Snow’s plan to circumvent the price of the curse. Very clever.

And Hook is having a bad time.

Quite good all around.

Overall rating: 7.9/10

“Kansas”:

And now we’re back to an old problem: Emma and Charming are morons.

Sorry, but there’s just no other word for it at this point. Charming insists that Emma bring Hook when she goes to confront Zelena, even knowing Hook can destroy all of Emma’s power. That’s idiotic.

Then Emma gives Hook mouth to mouth to save him, knowing it will destroy her magic. That’s even dumber. Even if Hook wasn’t a worthless sleazeball, it still wouldn’t be worth sacrificing the whole town to save him, which is essentially what Emma chose to do. Of course, someone stepped in and cleaned up her mess, but she had no way of knowing that was going to happen.

And that brings us to the saving grace of Storybrooke, and this episode: Regina.

With Emma failing miserably in her role as saviour, it’s up to the ex-villain to save the town, and it’s a fantastic culmination of Regina’s redemption arc to date. And once again, Lana Parilla’s gravitas has saved what would otherwise be a truly dreadful episode.

There’s also yet another series of flashbacks, this time dealing with Zelena’s time in Oz and her fateful encounter with a girl named Dorothy, which is… fine, I guess. There’s nothing wrong with it, but I don’t see that it adds much.

Overall rating: 7.1/10

“Snow Drifts”:

All seems well in Storybrooke. But Emma is not content. For reasons that are not entirely clear, she’s planning to abandon Storybrooke and her family and take Henry back to New York, despite the fact that no one wants this, least of all Henry.

Hook is sent to calm her down — because nothing says “voice of reason” like murderous, alcoholic, self-centered pirate — but they spot Zelena’s reactivated time portal, and because Emma has all the wisdom and good sense of a crack-addled chicken, she rushes in to investigate instead of, you know, seeking the help of someone who could actually do something about it.

Inevitably, she and Hook wind up stuck in the past, and promptly destroy the future. It is then their task, with the aid of Rumpelstiltskin, to fix things such that Snow and Charming once again fall in love and everything proceeds as it should.

In case the heaping portion of snark hasn’t given it away yet, I did not particularly enjoy this episode. Once Upon a Time’s two worst characters trying to save the world from their own incompetence just doesn’t make for a particularly compelling plot.

I don’t know what else to say about it, honestly.

Overall rating: 5.9/10

“There’s No Place Like Home” (season finale):

The final episode of Once Upon a Time’s third season is pretty much a continuation of the last one. Which is not a good thing.

Again, we see two incredibly uninteresting and unlikable characters trying to save the world from themselves… and having no real trouble with it, either. They almost effortlessly manage to repair the damage to the timeline. There’s no drama.

Worse still, the episode concludes with Emma finally falling for Hook, a plot twist I find so utterly unpleasant it’s making me give serious thought to giving up on the series altogether. The only thing making Hook’s presence tolerable was Emma’s continued rejection of him.

I cannot withstand a world where Emma/Hook is a thing. I just can’t.

That said, there a few saving graces this time. Not enough to make it a good episode, but enough to make it not a total waste of time.

I did very much like Emma’s confrontation with past-Rumpel near the end. It was a rare case of Emma not sucking. Snow and Charming naming their son after Baelfire was also a very touching moment.

The woman Emma rescued being Maid Marian is also a very good twist. I just hope it doesn’t once again reset Regina’s redemption arc.

Overall rating: 6.4/10

* * *

Months have passed since I originally wrote this post (yeah, dat backlog), and although further seasons of Once Upon a Time have been added to Netflix, I have not watched them. I won’t say it’ll never happen, but I don’t have any particular desire to at the moment.

This series has always been very hit and miss, but its flaws are becoming increasingly difficult to stomach. Emma and Hook are genuinely ruining the show for me. Emma is not an interesting character, and the actress behind her is simply wooden and lifeless. Hook was introduced as an utterly despicable character, and the subsequent ham-fisted and half-assed attempts to make him sympathetic have only made me resent him more.

Furthermore, the Peter Pan arc was so excellent that I just know the series will never be that good again, and part of me thinks it would be better to quit while I’m ahead, so to speak.

I’m still a big Robert Carlyle fan, but Rumpel’s character seems destined to be an unending source of disappointment. It seems unlikely he’ll ever stop relapsing to his evil self, and at this point, I’m not sure he even deserves redemption. It’s not worth getting invested in the character.

That leaves Regina as the one major redeeming feature of the series, but I’m just not sure she’s enough on her own.

It’s been a long time coming.

As StarCraft fans, we waited over ten years for a follow-up to Brood War, and as a Protoss fan, I had to wait even longer for the expansion that would at last put my favourite race in the spotlight.

It’s been a long time coming, but to paraphrase that most quintessential Canadian band, it’s well worth the wait.

The End War:

I enjoyed the first two installments of StarCraft II. Wings of Liberty had some flaws, but mostly it was a strong story that I enjoyed. Heart of the Swarm was somewhat of a disappointment, but even it had many highlights.

Legacy of the Void vastly outstrips both its predecessors. The fact I am a Protoss fan may bias me, but I think there’s a lot more to it than that.

LotV’s campaign begins with the full might of the Daelaam Protoss united at last, ready to retake Aiur from the Zerg and reclaim the pride and tradition of the Firstborn. But in remarkably little time, things go terribly wrong.

Thus begins the End War, the final conflict with the void god Amon. Whereas the last two installments spread themselves thin over many stories that had at best only tangential relationships with one another, LotV focuses entirely on the conflict with Amon, and while it can at times feel a little abrupt or rushed, mostly it does an excellent job of selling the idea of a universe teetering on the brink of destruction.

Over the course of the campaign, Artanis must bring together the disparate tribes of Protoss, some familiar and some new in LotV, to forge an army capable of facing Amon. Something that I’ve liked about the Protoss from the start is that although they are a very alien race, they are also very diverse, with many differing viewpoints and philosophies within their ranks, and LotV builds on that well, further deepening the Protoss culture even as it goes through great changes.

Legacy of the Void is in many ways a story about multiculturalism and the strength it brings. Although its handling is at times somewhat inelegant, I think this is a very noble message to send, and quite relevant in this day and age.

The story doesn’t end with Legacy of the Void’s main campaign, though. There is also an epilogue campaign consisting of three missions that give you the chance to play as each race once more.

Actually, calling it an “epilogue” is perhaps a bit misleading, as it is every bit as epic and intense as the main campaign, and it at last brings a close to all of the story and character arcs that began all the way back in the 90s.

I was sufficiently impressed by that ending that I struggle to think of what to say about it. It was awe-inspiring. It was emotional. Most of all, it was immensely satisfying.

The mechanics of storytelling were also better than ever this time around. Cinematics are as ever a feast for the eyes, and they are both incredibly numerous and more seamlessly integrated than ever before. At times, cinematics even play in the middle of missions, shifting from gameplay to cutscene and back with total smoothness. Very impressive.

That’s not to say the entire campaign was perfect. I can poke some holes here or there.

By far my biggest complaint is how small a role was given to Executor Selendis. Blizzard has spent years dropping hints that she was going to be a big deal in the coming story, but in actuality she appears in only a handful of missions, and then in a relatively small role.

I also had issues with some of the ways the Protoss culture changed over the course of the campaign, including but not limited to the fact they tend to happen a little quickly and/or with poorly explained reasoning.

Still, on the whole, it was definitely the best part of the StarCraft II saga, and possibly the best installment of the franchise to date. Definitely a worthy end.

…Except it’s not the end; story DLC is already on the way, which is now giving me mixed feelings. On the one hand, yay, more StarCraft. On the other, there’s pretty much nowhere to go from here but down.

RTS done right:

From a gameplay perspective, Legacy of the Void’s campaign is also a step up from its predecessors.

Wings of Liberty and Heart of the Swarm had excellent mission design, bringing a breath of fresh air to the sometimes stale RTS genre, but they relied too heavily on missions with some sort of time limit. Every level was a sprint the finish, and it became exhausting after a while.

LotV still has some missions like that, but they’re not as omnipresent. There are a lot more missions that allow you to take your time, plan your strategy, explore the map, and gradually fight your way to victory. There’s still a lot of fresh ideas, but it also brings back some of the long, epic battles of more old school RTS games. It’s the best of both worlds.

I was quite disappointed to not see the return of hero units as seen in Heart of the Swarm, but being able to call upon the abilities of the Spear of Adun is a decent substitute. They’re similar to the god powers of Age of Mythology, but with the advantage of not being limited-use.

I also greatly enjoyed the mechanic for customizing units this time. Instead of upgrades in the traditional sense, each unit has three variations based on the various Protoss factions, each with different advantages. You can swap between different variations between missions, so there’s a lot of encouragement to experiment and tailor your forces to a specific challenge.

If I have a complaint about the campaign’s design, it’s that it takes a little too long to unlock more advanced units and abilities early on. It makes a certain degree of sense from a story perspective, but after two games, I’m kind of over the “slowly build up your forces from nothing” angle. Let’s cut to the chase, shall we?

Multiplayer:

I dipped my toes into competitive play for the first time in years, but I didn’t stay long enough to get a comprehensive view of what Legacy of the Void has brought to the table in that regard.

I will say that I think the economic changes are very good. They cut down on a lot of the tedious downtime at the start of a match and allow you to get to the action more quickly. If anything, they don’t go far enough — there’s still too much economic busywork in this game.

But mainly what I learned is that I’m still terrible at competitive StarCraft II, and still lack the emotional fortitude to deal with the high stress of it all. Especially now that the game is faster than ever.

To their credit, Blizzard has put some effort into opening avenues of multiplayer that are not so intense. Archon mode allows two players to work in tandem, splitting the responsibilities of running a single army. Cool idea, but to me it just sounds like you’d constantly be stepping on each other’s toes. Doesn’t appeal to me.

More interesting to me are the co-op missions, which allow two players to work together against the AI using powerful units and abilities from the campaign. These don’t replicate the campaign experience as well as I was hoping, and I feel they’re best played with a friend, but they’re still pretty fun, even if you’re playing with a stranger.

On the whole, I’d rate co-op missions the most positive addition to SC2’s multiplayer.

* * *

With a stellar campaign and some solid changes to multiplayer, the final installment of the StarCraft II trilogy is also by far the best. This is why I’m such a big Blizzard fan; they may screw up a lot, but when they get it right, they get it right.

Overall rating: 9.5/10 Possibly the best Blizzard game since Warcraft III.