{"id":189354,"date":"2024-08-23T20:00:19","date_gmt":"2024-08-24T01:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/?p=189354"},"modified":"2024-08-23T20:34:56","modified_gmt":"2024-08-24T01:34:56","slug":"blizzard-watch-weekly-logging-war-within-gaming-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/23\/blizzard-watch-weekly-logging-war-within-gaming-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Blizzard Watch Weekly: Logging on to The War Within and more in gaming news"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s a busy week in Blizzard games \u2014 and in games in general. Practically every game in the Blizzard stable has something new this week, and Gamescom has brought a mountain of trailers and announcements to our eager eyes. Frankly, I can barely keep up, and I&#8217;m sure I&#8217;ve missed plenty of Gamescom events in the middle of all the excitement.<\/p>\n<p>But to help <em>you<\/em> stay on top of the latest, here are the highlights from Blizzard (and beyond) from the last week.<\/p>\n<h2>New this week<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/22\/warcraft-war-within-early-access-date\/\"><strong><em>World of Warcraft: The War Within<\/em> is now available in early access<\/strong><\/a> for players who pre-ordered the Epic edition. This pseudo-launch went smoothly, so hopefully next week&#8217;s actual launch will go just as smoothly. The first hurdle to any new expansion, however, is <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/22\/get-started-war-within\/\">knowing where to go to start the expansion quest chain<\/a> \u2014 which can be a little confusing due to a minor launch day bug.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/06\/hearthstone-battlegrounds-trinkets\/\"><strong><em>Hearthstone<\/em> Battlegrounds Season 8 just launched<\/strong><\/a>, adding a <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/23\/hero-skins-hearthstone-battlegrounds-season-8\/\">new selection of crazy hero skins<\/a> and shaking up gameplay with <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/20\/lesser-greater-trinkets-hearthstone-battlegrounds-season-8\/\">trinkets you can buy<\/a> at various turns to completely change the flow of the game. This feels like a new take on quests, which I also enjoyed a lot.<\/li>\n<li><strong><em>Diablo 4<\/em> spills details on <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/22\/mercenaries-diablo-4-vessel-hatred\/\">Mercenaries<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/21\/diablo-4-dark-citadel\/\">The Dark Citadel<\/a>. <\/strong>I&#8217;m happy to hear that <em>D4<\/em> Mercenaries will be very much like <em>D3<\/em> Mercenaries, with their own unique characters and quests. The Dark Citadel is a cooperative PVE dungeon Blizzard has teased before, but until now we didn&#8217;t even know its name. It seems like a mini-raid that requires a small party to complete challenges and puzzles.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/14\/overwatch-2-season-12-august-20\/\"><strong><em>Overwatch 2<\/em> Season 12 started<\/strong><\/a>, introducing new support hero Juno, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=zMZAkF7ZFwc\">an adorable Martian<\/a>. There are, as always, new skins to collect this season, including Widowmaker Sylvanas \u2014 and a Juno trailer that ended <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=44vfe7D6GkQ\">with a shot of Frostmourne<\/a>\u00a0suggests we could see more <em>Warcraft<\/em> crossovers coming soon. Alongside the launch, there&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/21\/twitch-drops-blizzard\/\">a Twitch drop for the epic Sojourn Barista skin<\/a> that costs nothing but your time \u2014 it&#8217;s available through the 30th, so act fast.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/news.blizzard.com\/en-us\/warcraftrumble\/24124915\/updated-aug-15-keep-enemies-at-bay-with-dryad-in-season-8\"><strong><em>Warcraft Rumble<\/em> Season 8 started<\/strong><\/a>, bringing a new Dryad mini to the game&#8230; but frankly <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/14\/velma-dinkley-joining-warcraft-rumble-season-8-blizzard-watch-examines-evidence\/\">we&#8217;re still up on conspiracy theories<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/05\/28\/diablo-2-resurrected-ladder-season-8-start\/\"><strong><em>Diablo 2: Resurrected<\/em> Ladder Season 8 started<\/strong><\/a>, and though we don&#8217;t talk about <em>D2R<\/em> much the ladder seasons are always an exciting time to play and experiencing the rush of leveling to max alongside all of your friends.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Happening next week<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><em>The War Within<\/em> finally arrives, with a global launch on August 26 at 3pm pacific.\u00a0<\/strong>We have <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/21\/surviving-wow-war-within-launch\/\">some tips on how to look after yourself during those long launch day game sessions<\/a>&#8230; or, well, we have a shrimp offering surprisingly sage advice. And it&#8217;s no surprise there&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/21\/twitch-drops-blizzard\/\">a new <em>WoW<\/em> Twitch Drop<\/a> to celebrate the launch: starting Monday you can get the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wowhead.com\/npc=185621\/watcher-of-the-huntress\">Watcher of the Huntress pet<\/a>, a somewhat menacing green owl.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Another <em>Diablo 4<\/em> Campfire Chat<\/strong> will presumably give us even more details on the game&#8217;s expansion, due out on October 8. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.twitch.tv\/diablo\">Catch it streaming on Twitch<\/a> Thursday, August 29, at 11am pacific.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Ending soon<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/06\/20\/radiant-echoes-prepatch-event\/\"><strong><em>The War Within<\/em> pre-patch event, Radiant Echoes<\/strong><\/a>, ends on August 26 before launch. If you want to buy the mount, the pets, or any of the transmog gear, you only have a few more days to do so.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>This week\u2019s podcasts<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Blizzard Watch Podcast: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/23\/490-war-within-early-access\/\"><em>The War Within<\/em> early access anticipation<\/a>, because when we were recording on Tuesday we were only <em>anticipating<\/em> early access, whereas now we are <em>playing<\/em> early access. Also included in this episode you can hear me plaintively complaining that I don&#8217;t want to go back to turbo-hell when Matt suggests <em>WoW Remix: Shadowlands.\u00a0<\/em><\/li>\n<li><strong>Lore Watch Podcast:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/21\/lore-watch-podcast-332-world-soul-saga-lore\/\">How will the Worldsoul Saga address <em>WoW\u2019s<\/em> long running storylines?<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>What to play this weekend<\/h2>\n<p>A lot of us are playing <em>The War Within<\/em> early access this weekend, but there are plenty of other games out there, including some great new releases. I just picked up <a href=\"https:\/\/store.steampowered.com\/app\/1791590\/Sunset_Hills\/\"><em>Sunset Hills<\/em><\/a>, which is at a slight discount in celebration of its release, but I&#8217;m also playing <em>TWW<\/em> this weekend and I&#8217;m not actually sure when I&#8217;ll have time to get to it.<\/p>\n<p>But Chris has some <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/23\/play-weekend-instead-world-warcrafts-war-within-early-access\/\">other great game recommendations<\/a> to help you avoid FOMO if you aren&#8217;t in early access, including <em>Tactical Breach Wizards<\/em>, a game I cannot figure out how to describe so I will just leave you with the trailer to judge it for yourself.<\/p>\n<div class=\"arve\" data-mode=\"normal\" data-oembed=\"1\" data-provider=\"youtube\" id=\"arve-youtube-uggxx4j-7zg66dfc40fcda0e050649228\" style=\"max-width:900px;\">\n<span class=\"arve-inner\"><br \/>\n<span class=\"arve-embed arve-embed--has-aspect-ratio\" style=\"aspect-ratio: 500 \/ 281\"><br \/>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen class=\"arve-iframe fitvidsignore\" data-arve=\"arve-youtube-uggxx4j-7zg66dfc40fcda0e050649228\" data-src-no-ap=\"https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/ugGxX4J-7zg?feature=oembed&amp;iv_load_policy=3&amp;modestbranding=1&amp;rel=0&amp;autohide=1&amp;playsinline=0&amp;autoplay=0\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"505.8\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-presentation allow-popups allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/ugGxX4J-7zg?feature=oembed&#038;iv_load_policy=3&#038;modestbranding=1&#038;rel=0&#038;autohide=1&#038;playsinline=0&#038;autoplay=0\" width=\"900\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n<p><\/span><br \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\">{\"@context\":\"http:\\\/\\\/schema.org\\\/\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/blizzardwatch.com\\\/2024\\\/08\\\/23\\\/blizzard-watch-weekly-logging-war-within-gaming-news\\\/#arve-youtube-uggxx4j-7zg66dfc40fcda0e050649228\",\"type\":\"VideoObject\",\"embedURL\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\\\/embed\\\/ugGxX4J-7zg?feature=oembed&iv_load_policy=3&modestbranding=1&rel=0&autohide=1&playsinline=0&autoplay=0\"}<\/script>\n<\/div>\n<p>And if that doesn&#8217;t strike your fancy, <em>Diablo 4<\/em> seems like it&#8217;s desperately trying to hold our attention lately. The game is currently <a href=\"https:\/\/store.steampowered.com\/agecheck\/app\/2344520\/\">free to play to level 20 on Steam<\/a> if you want to try it for the first time (it&#8217;s also available on Xbox Game Pass if you&#8217;re a subscriber). If you&#8217;re an old hat at the game, Blizzard really seems to be trying to pull you back,\u00a0with the <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/19\/speed-level-diablo-4-mothers-blessing\/\">super-leveling Mother&#8217;s Blessing buff<\/a> running for a few more days, followed by <a href=\"https:\/\/news.blizzard.com\/en-us\/diablo4\/24121369\/gilded-grandeur-awaits-march-of-the-goblins-returns\">the March of the Goblins<\/a> next week.<\/p>\n<p>I don&#8217;t think that&#8217;s enough to grab me away from everything else there is to play, but <em>D4<\/em> is a great game and with the improvements the team has made to leveling and loot, the game is a lot smoother than it was at launch. It&#8217;s a good time to check it out.<\/p>\n<p>If you&#8217;re more interested in gaming news than games themselves, you could also spend the weekend <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/20\/gamescom-opening-night-live-starts-soon-latest-xbox-means-latest-blizzard-heres-watch\/\">catching up on Gamescom<\/a>, which was packed with new trailers. Xbox had a daily stream (which included Blizzard games) and Opening Night Live was typically packed with trailers. But if you just watch one thing, watch <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/22\/date-everything-best-game\/\">this <em>Date Everything!<\/em> trailer<\/a>. (If you just watch <em>two<\/em> things, also watch <a href=\"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/2024\/08\/21\/secret-level-show\/\">this <em>Secret Level<\/em> trailer<\/a>.)<\/p>\n<p>But that&#8217;s all for this very busy week. Next week<em> The War Within<\/em> gets its full launch so I imagine even more of us will be diving into Khaz Algar, and the newly opened Heroic dungeons and higher-level Delves. I&#8217;ll see you back here next week to talk about it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s a busy week in Blizzard games \u2014 and in games in general. Practically every game in the Blizzard stable has something new this week, and Gamescom has brought a mountain of trailers and announcements to our eager eyes. Frankly, I can barely keep up, and I&#8217;m sure I&#8217;ve missed plenty of Gamescom events in&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":188555,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[77963],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[8931,51465,8181,8902,10290,24303,10176,27588,51662,24097,8929],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189354"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=189354"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189354\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":189364,"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/189354\/revisions\/189364"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/188555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=189354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=189354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=189354"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blizzardwatch.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=189354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}