You know, last weekend’s marathon would have been so much easier if I’d had some of the options that are available to me this week.

A friend got me access into the Overwatch closed beta on Wednesday, which has shown a lot of promise in the limited time I’ve had to play.

It’s a lot like Team Fortress, but rather than specific classes like “Spy” or “Engineer” or “Sniper,” there are archetypes like “Offense,” “Tank,” and “Support.”   Each character in Overwatch falls under these headings, and each has different abilities to play their role differently.

Now I normally play healers in games like these (in most games, actually), so I naturally gravitated toward “Mercy” as my first character.

And she’s been fun, although she suffers from the same problems as the Medic in Team Fortress.  First, you’re very squishy, and second, the person you’re healing never pays attention to you.  They just go charging blindly forward, believing themselves immortal because they have a pocket healer.  The enemy sees this and simply waits for them to go past, then kills you both from behind.

For Defense, I’ve been enjoying playing Bastion.

Basically a robot that can turn into an immobile turret and deal a TON of damage.  The trick is finding just the right spot to transform and waylay people.

And finally, I like Winston the tank for obvious reasons:

I’m awful at him though.  He has a super leap thing that pins enemies if you land on them…and I don’t think I’ve hit anyone with it yet.

I’ve played a little of the damage dealer archetype, but not enough to get a handle on a hero I particularly like.  So far, though, it’s been Pharah.

Although admittedly that’s only because she uses a rocket launcher, and I loved playing the Soldier from TF2.

Anyway, the game’s been fun.

But more than anything I’m loving playing games with a crew again.  These past two weekends have been a reminder of just how much I enjoy doing that, whether IRL, or online with headphones and a mic.

Oh, and there’s another little game that came out on Tuesday that you might’ve heard of…

Yes, I’m playing Fallout as well.

I’m still pretty early in the story, having only played about 3 hours, but this genre of game really isn’t my forte.  I know it’s sacrilegious for a gamer to say this, but I didn’t care for Skyrim, or GTA, or any of the earlier Fallouts, or Witcher.
I understand the appeal, and I know that I should like them…  But for whatever reason they just don’t speak to me.  (I feel the same way about Radiohead.)

Anyway, I’m already kinda irritated that some of the console stuff made it over to the PC version.  (Seriously Bethesda, allow more keybind options please…I’m not using a controller.)  But I’m still going to give it a chance, if only because I paid full price for it.

And finally, Commander 2015 was released today.  And imagine my crushing disappointment when I checked the Magic Online store, ready to pick up a couple decks, and found that it will NOT BE SOLD online.
No, I have to play in their goddamn Legendary Cube (and win…a lot), in order to have a VERY SMALL CHANCE to open the cards I want for my deck in their prize packs.

*sigh*

I’m trying to give you my money, WotC…and you won’t take it.

Okay, I’ve bored you all with my gaming gobbledygook for long enough.

See you Monday.

j.s.