This week, scientists have reportedly turned giant panda skin cells into stem cells. That sounds dumb. I guess it might involve doing something to help conserve giant pandas? Maybe? Look, giant pandas look cute but these animals have zero interest in boning and reproducing. Do you realize that? At this point we should just kind of accept that giant pandas are a dead end. Like they have come as close as possible to saying that they want to go extinct. What else do we need?
You know what we should be focused on? Thylacines. Let’s clone some thylacines. Thylacines wanted to live! Who doesn’t want thylacines running around? In fact, here’s my plan. Let’s clone thylacines and anyone who doesn’t want to clone thylacines will have the cloned thylacines released in their homes. Within a little while I think everyone will be vocally in support of thylacines! Let’s all read about thylacines for the week, not those stupid pandas.
Bonus question: What’s the franchise (game, movies, books, it doesn’t matter) that you’ve been a fan of the longest?
​Andrew Ross (@dengarsw): If the pup permits, I’ll be hitting Super Mario Party Jamboree pretty hard, with a side of Splatoon 3 and some exercise games (mostly passively for those).
No joke, I’ve been a Batman fan since I could remember. My first favorite non-cartoon show was the old Adam West Batman, first non-drug store toy was a Batman figure, and my first PG-13 movie was a Batman movie (not one of the good ones, sadly, but I was a kid and it was all I had).
Brianna Royce (@nbrianna, blog): I’ll be in Guild Wars 2 this weekend (yes, still), but I’m also planning to check out New World Aeternum on PS5 just to compare it to my fading PC experience. Fun!
I’m boring, but it’s Star Wars. I’m a little tired of it lately, but it’s the longest for me by far. I didn’t see any of them in the theaters, obviously, but my dad and uncle were big fans, so we would watch them on network TV and then on VHS when my brother and I were little. And then I kind of just kept my love alive with comics and RPGs and stupid trading cards (lol) in the dead period after the classic trilogy faded but before the prequels came out.
Chris Neal (@wolfyseyes, blog): As I write this I just hit the level cap in Throne & Liberty, so I’ll be doing a little bit of prodding to see what endgame might look like. At least a little bit, anyway; I don’t want to give away what’s prime CMA poll fodder. So to divert me from that, I might continue some material chases in Elite: Dangerous and do a little casual Final Fantasy XIV.
One of the longest would definitely be the Redwall novels by Brian Jacques. I haven’t read one in years, but I had the full collection when I was a teen and I own the Redwall Cookbook now. Runner-up would be BattleTech, though specifically the MechWarrior games than anything from the TTRPG.
Eliot Lefebvre (@Eliot_Lefebvre, blog): There are a bunch of FFXIV events taking place right now that definitely require some degree of attention (although they’re generally pretty low-key), and aside from that I’ll be tapping around in some single-player stuff in all likelihood. Kinda not sure what at the moment.
There are a lot of things that I’ve been a lifelong fan of, but Transformers is easily the first one. Ironically, my first Transformer wasn’t actually a Transformer, but it still stuck in my head.
Sam Kash (@thesamkash): October is one of the busiest months for me so I’m not going to have a lot of game time still. I’ve only got a couple of weeks left before the Harry Potter: Magic Awakened servers go down so I’ll try to have a little fun in there. I also created a character in Throne & Liberty but I don’t think I’ll get much time in the game.
Bonus: Even though I haven’t really kept up with all the spin offs and comics and stuff the first one that comes to mind are The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I remember being a little kid and just loving everything about them. I wanted to be a ninja turtle when I grow up. Kind of still do. I did miss the Michael Bay films but the latest animated movie was awesome.
Tyler Edwards (blog): Probably gonna be much the same as last weekend. More World of Warcraft, good chance of Heroes of the Storm on the side, small chance of some The Secret World.
Bonus question: Warcraft. I first played Orcs and Humans when I was like four, five tops. And here I am still adventuring in Azeroth thirty years later. I was introduced Star Trek even earlier, but I didn’t really become a fan of it until later, so I’m going to say that doesn’t count.
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!
