The block brings us back down to three episodes, only two of which I still make mention of, and only one of which I still play with any sense of regularity. Fun times go!

Episode 46: Ragnarok 2
BOOOOOORRRIIIIIIIING! Holy SHIT, is this weak ass pile of trash still around? If generic was made into a video game, it would be Ragnarok 2. Nothing about the game works. It’s not a good Ragnarok sequel. It’s not a good World MMO, it’s not a good anything. It’s pretty, I’ll give it that, and ONLY that, but my god I was never so bored in my life playing through a game than I was with that one. How this dung-heap even had a honeymoon period that lasted more than a week is beyond me. Do not even think about playing this game. It’s everything wrong with the Korean Grinder, wrapped up in a weeaboo package, leeching off the name of its beloved predecessor. My thumb still hurts thinking about it, and if I end up with carpal tunnel in the future, I’m positive it started here. Avoid at all costs.
Recommended?: God NO.

Episode 47: Firefall
Oh. Oh this.. This was a thing. Since it’s early onset of commenters screaming “OMG REVIEW FIREFALL BEST GAME I EVER PLAYED 10/10 GOTY” when the stupid thing was in PRE-ALPHA, I have had a hate/love/hate/meh relationship with Firefall. I could never tell what it was trying to be. Are we being serious, or wacky? We going to lament the loss of Earth, and attempt to regain our foothold, or dance around a torch, wearing tiki-masks and then go play soccer? Firefall was clearly a game with no initial direction, and despite its original sandbox attempt, which I felt it was just getting right, it was everything that was happening behind the scenes that started to unravel the whole thing. The CEO was bat-shit loony. Screaming at employees and throwing literal tantrums, until the point he has to issue out “safewords”. Undoing months of coding work based on a whim. Cutting and removing PvP entirely because people didn’t immediately take to it. Hiring B-List celebrities to host and promote shows about the game. Spending over a hundred thousand dollars on cinema quality camera equipment to film MEME videos. THE FUCKING BUS.
I mention all of this because you really could feel the impact of his frivolity as you played the game, and once they finally dropped the cash-bleeding dead weight, Firefall finally started to settle in… The major issue is that instead of mending the wounds left by Captain Nutpants, they steered several things in the opposite direction, making the game one of the more stifling linear games in an open world, by adding levels and level restrictions, standard loot drop instead of basing everything off the crafting system, and basically cutting out the features that made the game fun and unique in the first place. The kind of things that would make you ask, “Did you see that? On SIN? Some kind of weather effect?!”
I think the Kern Era, but still pre-coo-coo-nannering of Kern had Firefall going in the right direction, and it was easily the peak point of the game for me. Still, it’s amazing how quickly it went from “This is pretty damned cool!” to “Why the fuck is everything so broken?!” in the span of a single patch, showing just how toxic his directions and influences really were. The game is clearly better off without him, but it’s merely just “ok” now.
Nyan Cat Glider is still pretty cool, though.
Recommended?: YES.

Episode 48: War Thunder
When I said I still played this, I didn’t mean “the mode available when I reviewed this.” More like, “the mode I covered in the Backtrack“. I still far prefer the planes, and love when I can soar into the skies during a tank battle, but the ground combat is easily the most fun in a good squad. Granted, our regular playing of this game has slowed significantly as we focus more on MMO Grinder episodes, and take occasional breaks for HotS, but this is really the more interesting, solid war game, with a slightly less poisoned community. If only they’d do something about that stupid shrapnel and low-graphics exploit. They won’t, will they? Well, I guess there’s always the upcoming Armored Warfare… Wait, that’s by My.com? Russia, would you like to explain yourselves? (ETA: Then it came to my attention that Gaijin was being pretty shitty on Steam, lying about prices to get into the Summer Sale, and abused copyright to get a YouTube video taken down when it highlighted this misbehavior. Life, why must you make me hate the things I tolerate?)
Recommended?: YES…ish now.