FIRST, there is an unusually large number of dog droppings at the entrance to the wooded path and up to the first trail fork. Signage needs to be updated in order to remind people that groundskeeping policies are still in effect and you need to pick up after your dogs.
SECOND, it is abundantly clear that the woman in unit 15 has built a tunnel that she is using to dispose of a truly atrocious amount of orange soda. It is unclear why she is disposing of so much orange soda. It really does not even pretend to make sense. All the same, there is a huge orange soda lake past the first fork.
THIRD, the Wood-Watcher remains encamped within a chrysalis of bone and leaves deep within the woods, and although I seek to evade his gaze, ever do my steps turn to behold this darkness. His mind reaches out and sees the me I fear, and as I gaze herein my mind recoils at the idea that I cannot be sure this is not the real me. That I have not constructed a delusion wherein I walk the woods, but in truth I sit and he is merely the part of my brain that remains grounded and sane.
FOURTH, printed copies of What Are You Playing litter large portions of the children’s play area.
FIFTH, why is the children’s play area in the middle of the woods and why does it contain so many badgers? This is generally a poor idea. It’s not accidental, the equipment is clean and the signage is proud about how many angry badgers are living there. Please explain and address this development.
Bonus question: What’s an easy challenge in video games that you have a hard time with?
​Andrew Ross (@dengarsw): Getting in some Splatoon 3 time for Big Run and maybe more Side Order DLC because I want to unlock some of the gear associated with it but oof, single-player content.
The only “easy” challenge in video games that I can think of struggling with are very specific: math questions in Jackbox’s Trivia Murder Party series. It uses a weird font so the minus symbol looks like an equals, so 5-2 looks like 5=2 and I assume I’m trying to solve for X but there’s no more equation and that makes zero sense but, oh my God, there’s a three which means I’ve again forgotten about the font issue and lost a ton of time and will end up being the next murder victim. As I said, very specific struggle for me.
Brianna Royce (@nbrianna, blog): I’m not going to have a huge amount of time to play this weekend, but I’ll at least be in Star Wars Galaxies Legends and maybe some City of Heroes. In Star Wars Galaxies, I’ve been slowly rebuilding my droid-crafting mini-empire and honestly really enjoying it. Food sales have picked up too, which is encouraging! The latest update really seems to have perked up the population.
As for game challenges, I’ve always had a hard time with the kind of jumping where you have to get to speed and then time your jumps perfectly – do we have a name for this? If I have time to think and get into position, I usually do OK in jumping puzzles, but running jumps just never feel intuitive to me.
Chris Neal (@wolfyseyes, blog): This weekend I will be saying goodbye to my brother, so as you might anticipate, I’m not going to have any gaming time.
Bonus: I generally am tragically awful at jumping puzzles, especially in MMOs. Most of the time it’s down to lack of skill, but there’s also the fact that most of the time these kinds of games aren’t really meant for precision platforming.
Eliot Lefebvre (@Eliot_Lefebvre, blog): Gonna be playing some CoH, some Final Fantasy XIV, and whatever else might momentarily distract me in a somewhat positive fashion. It’s been an awful week even by the exceedingly low standards I’ve had for the past few weeks.
I really hate parry mechanics in video games. Don’t know why, but whenever a game is entirely built around a precise blocking/parrying mechanic, I am not going to have a lot of fun with it.
Sam Kash (@thesamkash): Some Harry Potter Magic Awakened and some other random games. I have half a mind to keep playing Ravendawn so I think I really might just do it. Although the CRSED: FOAD going back to it’s roots has me intrigued as well. Offline I started to play Bloodstained since it arrived on Game Pass. It’s not great, but I’m enjoying it.
Bonus: Likely just any FPS gaming. I’m just so bad and my best reasoning is that I just didn’t play them growing up at all. I was all into JRPGs and platformers.
Pierre, patron: I’m still playing Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden and Persona 3 Reload, two great games. I’m really enjoying each of them even if I don’t have enough gaming time available and am progressing quite slow in their stories. I’m in a MMO hiatus again, probably because MMOs are time consuming and not really compatible with my gaming pace. I admire Justin and his self-organization dedicating and planning specific periods of time each month for MMOs and for solo gaming, but my schedule is not steady enough to do the same.
Bonus question: I have many friends who are able to game for hours – 8, 10, even 15 hours in a row, some of them streaming their gaming sessions. Seems like an easy challenge, as video games are supposed to be entertaining. I cannot do that; after 2-3 hours in a row gaming, even if I have more free time, I have to do something else. Go for a run, read a book, watch a movie. The maximum duration I had was 8 hours for the launch of a new game I was really hyped for, but that’s very rare. And you MOP readers, what are you up to this weekend?
Every Saturday, join the Massively OP community and staff for What Are You Playing, our roundup of what MMORPGs and other games we’re hoping to play this weekend (with a bonus question or two for our amusement). Tell us what you’re up to! Go off-topic! And don’t forget to have fun!
