Make Community, and Warcraft
===

[00:00:00] Butters (South Park): I don't play World of Warcraft 

[00:00:02] Cartman (South Park): Butters, you said you're on your computer all the time.

[00:00:04] Butters (South Park): Yeah, but I'm playing Hello Kitty Island Adventure 

[00:00:07] Cartman (South Park): Butters, go buy World of Warcraft. Install it on your computer [00:00:10] and join the online sensation before we all murder you. 

[00:00:12] Butters (South Park): Oh, oh, all right. All right then.[00:00:20] 

[00:00:21] Jae: Hello and welcome back to Crossed Wires. I am Jae, and today I am joined by my co-host who is again [00:00:30] confirming that Squad Cast is indeed Steam Deck certified. Hey James, how are you? 

[00:00:36] James: Uh, I'm good. Yeah, this, this works great on deck. [00:00:40] Honestly, this is the second time we've done a session. The only challenge this time is that I do currently look like I'm recording from like one of us outdoor scenes in total [00:00:50] recall.

[00:00:50] Like, get your butt to Mars. 

[00:00:53] Jae: Yes. 

[00:00:54] James: Okay. This webcam is junk. Seriously, it's a [00:01:00] Logitech C 270 . I think I, I got it for free when I bought something else. Uh, I bought a capture carpet that didn't end up working. And yeah, so, um, [00:01:10] because I was an idiot and didn't bring a really nice camera, but Jae spent all the time bringing over from the US for me because it was too much work to, of course, I realized [00:01:20] it wasn't too, oh, j just shoot me Jae

[00:01:22] that's what we just need to do. Okay. 

[00:01:24] Jae: Okay. Okay. Um, I, I'll, I'll, I'll be over soon. 

[00:01:27] James: Thanks . 

[00:01:29] Yeah, I'm doing good. [00:01:30] I'm, I'm doing good. Enjoying um, enjoying time with the family for Christmas. We should, we should say close as we record this, it's well for you and our guest. It's for [00:01:40] 22nd of December for me.

[00:01:42] It is the 23rd of December. So by the time this comes out, I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas or, uh, whatever holidays you happen [00:01:50] to celebrate and, and in fact, a wonderful new year. 

[00:01:53] Jae: And, and also for the guest that is that we have here a Happy Winter Veil because we, for [00:02:00] this Winter Vale episode, welcome Berzerker. 

[00:02:02] Berzerker: So, uh, happy to be here with the J and J connection. Uh, you know, 

[00:02:06] James: oh, no, don't, don't, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's not, [00:02:10] that's not sticking up. That makes it sound like a seventies pop group. No. 

[00:02:14] Berzerker: Yes, yes. You're gonna make 

[00:02:17] Jae: We're the J in J connection. . [00:02:20] 

[00:02:20] Berzerker: There it is. I knew I came here for a reason better than Abba. You already shot out of a Cannon . 

[00:02:26] Jae: Take a chance, take a chance on me. Okay. [00:02:30] Sorry, James. 

[00:02:31] Berzerker: They're gonna make a movie about you with Meryl Streep in it. It's gonna be amazing. 

[00:02:35] James: Oh, I, no, Meryl Streep is absolutely playing Jae I love that. And, and for me, [00:02:40] I, I want, I don't know, 

[00:02:41] Berzerker: Pierce Brosnan come on. What are you doing?

[00:02:44] James: Pierce Brosnan? Oh, no, no, no. Will Arnett Will Arnett 

[00:02:48] Berzerker: Will Arnett [00:02:50] 

[00:02:50] James: for some, for some rand no, no, no, no, no. Michael Cera. 

[00:02:53] Jae: Ooh, 

[00:02:54] James: I, 

[00:02:54] Jae: yeah, 

[00:02:55] James: I dunno. Michael Cera 

[00:02:57] Berzerker: A young Michael Kane. 

[00:02:58] James: Ooh, [00:03:00] okay. Yeah, I could, I You were only supposed to blow the blinking doors off. 

[00:03:06] Berzerker: Beautiful. I knew I came here for a reason today.

[00:03:08] Jae: Absolutely. Well, and and, [00:03:10] and the first thing you came here for is to tell us who are you and what do you do? 

[00:03:14] Berzerker: Yes. Well, uh, yes. Thank you for having me on this show. I am one of [00:03:20] the millions. And millions. How the Rockies say of players of the wonderful game world of Warcraft? And beyond [00:03:30] that, uh, somebody who's played now for almost its entire duration.

[00:03:34] It's, uh, coming up on 20 years, couple years shy, but, uh, 

[00:03:36] James: Wow. 

[00:03:37] Berzerker: For, uh, ooh, [00:03:40] 16 of those years. Getting close to that, uh, at this point. But I also host a podcast like every other middle-aged white guy in America, . Gotta have a podcast. [00:03:50] So I've got. And, uh, I've been running that for, uh, about seven years now, and it is called Unshackled Fury.

[00:03:58] So, uh, it's, it's, uh, [00:04:00] told from the, the perspective of myself, sort of a, a battle worn warrior, although it's not just about warriors stuff, if you know the game, it's about [00:04:10] kind of everything. I, somebody once described the show back to me as a cross between like a news network and like Howard Stern, like a shock jock, kind of thing 

[00:04:19] it's [00:04:20] a little bit of everything. Nothing's off the table. Sometimes you talk about the game, sometimes you talk about the people around the game. Sometimes you talk about community boo booo stuff going on in the background. [00:04:30] It's, it's anything and everything, frankly that I just find of interest, uh, mostly to myself.

[00:04:35] Uh, but, uh, I've been putting that show out for, uh, 119 [00:04:40] episodes over seven years. So it's a, it's a, it's a labor of love. I don't do this. You know, every week or every day or anything like that. It's kind of a collection of my thoughts over a couple of weeks [00:04:50] time and then off we go. And, uh, I've been doing it ever since, uh, ooh, 2015.

[00:04:55] Yeah. And I'm finally Jae, I think I'm finally starting to get somewhere. I got, uh, [00:05:00] recently, uh, I got recently a chance to interview the game director himself, Ian Hazzikostas. 

[00:05:05] Jae: Oh my gosh! 

[00:05:06] Berzerker: Uh, I got to sit in on a group interview with him and I got to [00:05:10] ask him a couple of questions, including the question I've always wanted to ask him if I ever got the chance.

[00:05:14] So, yeah, very excited and, uh, been been having a great [00:05:20] 2022, uh, the, the real world aside and, uh, spreading the love of World of Warcraft. And if, uh, no better time than now because baby, we are rolling high on a [00:05:30] new expansion that I think people across the spectrum are loving as they should because Dragonflight is, is shaping up to be [00:05:40] the best expansion of all time. 

[00:05:42] And I say that as somebody who thinks Wrath of the Lich King is the best of all time, uh, and nostalgically. So it'll probably always be [00:05:50] my king, but, uh, it's, it's a new era for Warcraft and really happy to see so many people return, so many new faces coming on [00:06:00] board.

[00:06:00] The the game really is, uh, entering what we're calling sort of a third era, kind of a different philosophical look, uh, at, at the whole, uh, kitten caboodle that it involves. [00:06:10] So I'm happy to be here and, and talk about that. And anything else you got on deck, I'm just, frankly, I'm just happy to see Jae 

[00:06:15] Jae: Oh, 

[00:06:16] Berzerker: that, that's, that's, that's my, my big thing here.

[00:06:18] Jae and I have been friends, [00:06:20] uh, for a number of years, over many iterations of, of different shows and different eras, and, uh, always been there and, and truly [00:06:30] one of the finest people I've ever known has some of the best energy, uh, of anyone I've ever known. And I'll tell you what, the world of Warcraft community is the [00:06:40] lesser for Jae's absence, but happy to see her out here spreading a good word and doing her thing because, uh, she is, she is truly one of the most phenomenal people [00:06:50] I've ever met.

[00:06:50] One of the strongest people I've ever met. Um, and so it's just, it's just a blast for me to be here and, uh, and have a nice little chat. 

[00:06:58] Jae: Thank you, Berserker. And, 

[00:06:59] James: And [00:07:00] how much of our podcast budget did you spend on that? Jae? Getting Berserker 

[00:07:04] Jae: Maybe about 3000. 

[00:07:06] James: Okay. That's our budget gone for the year, then told you before 

[00:07:09] Berzerker: [00:07:10] The check did clear the check clear before I got it.

[00:07:12] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh yeah. 

[00:07:13] Jae: And I made sure it was in Bitcoins, cuz I know he . 

[00:07:15] Berzerker: Thank you. Yes, thank you. Yes, Bitcoin. Of course. You know, [00:07:20] that's, that, that's how we roll now. 

[00:07:21] James: About, about wonderfully stable currency. Yeah. 

[00:07:24] Jae: Yes. 

[00:07:25] Berzerker: The whole planning on my own retirement is all 

[00:07:28] Jae: Well now it's worth about, about a [00:07:30] dollar Berzerker. I'm so sorry.

[00:07:31] Berzerker: Oh, well guess I'm gonna have to show up to work. 

[00:07:35] Jae: And Berzerker, it means a lot like I've met you in Water Warcraft and through podcasting and I've, [00:07:40] I've had you on my, on my former podcast and 

[00:07:42] Berzerker: mm. 

[00:07:43] Jae: I have to say, I, I, do you remember if I met you? No, I think we, we, we did not cross paths at BlizzCon 2019.

[00:07:49] Berzerker: [00:07:50] No, no. That is the one, one of the few true laments. Uh, I've had a lot of fun times at the BlizzCons that I've been to, but, uh, you and I did [00:08:00] not, uh, physically come face to face, unfortunately. 

[00:08:03] Jae: No. I, I, I, I, Ali was surprised at how tall I was because Ali's um, was like, Ali's looking around for [00:08:10] this, like, like sh seriously was looking around for a short person.

[00:08:13] All of a sudden. I, I'm over here and she's like, Oh hi, at the time of Frazley, hi . 

[00:08:19] Berzerker: [00:08:20] Hello up there. 

[00:08:20] Jae: So one thing that I wanted to kind of like real quickly go over is the term MMORPGs. 

[00:08:26] Berzerker: Yes. 

[00:08:26] Jae: So for those who don't know, massively multiplayer [00:08:30] online roleplaying game, and that can take a variety of forms.

[00:08:33] Berzerker: Mm-hmm. 

[00:08:34] Jae: But one of the biggest aspects of it that makes it an interesting game is you [00:08:40] are there playing this game, but at the same time, you have other people who are also playing the same game as you. So you may be like over in the fields of [00:08:50] Elwynn Forest trying to take down the Defias Brotherhood, but all of a sudden, out, out of the corner, Berzerker comes rushing through and, and, uh, takes the mob that you're [00:09:00] going for.

[00:09:00] But this is back in classic and stuff like that. Cuz because I know Berserker would always steal mobs in classic. 

[00:09:05] Berzerker: Oh, of course, of course. 

[00:09:07] Jae: This the, the idea that you're playing this game that is not [00:09:10] just a single player experience, but with other people and then say, Hey, you need to group up with this person for this quest.

[00:09:16] Then in that group you may start a party and [00:09:20] you can get probably guess I would be the jokester, I'd be the punster and I'd be punting a lot in, in the group chat. But you start talking to people through it. If you get along with them, you can add 'em to your friends list. So that's, [00:09:30] that's kind of the, I would say the, uh, TLDR of of MMORPGs is that it's a game with other players where you are not by yourself, and a lot of [00:09:40] regards.

[00:09:40] That can be amazing. Like word work after to me appealed because you log into this game and you can go anywhere with almost [00:09:50] no load screens. The, and the only reason they have low screens are like different continents. We can go almost anywhere. And I just love the idea of you're exploring this world, but then other people out there who may be doing things, someone may, [00:10:00] maybe I overhear gathering herbs for, for alchemy.

[00:10:03] Someone may be over here, getting meat from boars for, for cooking. You're doing all these things in this quest. [00:10:10] I mean, we need, when you need to, to group up with somebody, take out on say that, that, that Kobold at the end of the cave, you're like, okay, I'm gonna group up with them. And then you may either [00:10:20] continue questing, I requested with the dwarf down in Dun Morough

[00:10:23] and then they logged off and I never saw 'em again. But it was just cool to be, to be doing that. And it's an experience that you don't get a lot [00:10:30] like first person shooters, like kinda like Overwatch or Fortnite, while you may be with other people, the aim there is killing the other player in a lot of, a lot of regards.

[00:10:39] But [00:10:40] here the aim is you're at adventuring with them. There is player versus player combat sometimes, but a lot of it is you're talking with other people. Or you may join up with a guild or you may [00:10:50] join a raid team and that. I think what makes them interesting. Am I missing anything, Berzerker or James, do you have any questions?

[00:10:56] Berzerker: As want to hear James's questions. Ha, as you know. 

[00:10:59] James: [00:11:00] Oh, okay. So I did say I, so look, I know of World of Warcraft, I have seen people play it. I think I've seen Jae play it maybe once. 

[00:11:09] Jae: At least [00:11:10] once. 

[00:11:10] James: You see, I do remember. Going to visit a friend once I, the entire time I was where he was just playing World of Warcraft.

[00:11:18] And I'll be really honest, that kind [00:11:20] of put me off the game a little bit because I made all this effort to go and see his friend . Uh, you know, um, there is a certain episode of South Park. [00:11:30] 

[00:11:30] Jae: Yes. 

[00:11:31] James: Which, we watched recently again. 

[00:11:34] Berzerker: That's what got me to play the game. 

[00:11:36] James: Oh, okay. Wow. 

[00:11:38] Berzerker: I didn't even, I didn't even know [00:11:40] really that much about World of Warcraft and it wasn't until the Make Love Not Warcraft episode that, uh, I told my wife.

[00:11:47] Uh, ah, maybe I'll [00:11:50] try this 10 day trial. She's like, dude, didn't we just watch this episode? Wasn't that an entire warning not to do this? And I was like, oh, he's fine. 10 days, no problem. And that was, [00:12:00] um, February of 2007. 

[00:12:03] Jae: Wow. Okay. 

[00:12:04] James: Okay. So yeah, so 

[00:12:06] Berzerker: That 10 day trial is going real long. 

[00:12:09] James: [00:12:10] So, I mean, one question do you have is correct me if I'm wrong, just to this, so World of Warcraft, it, it is derived from the universe, that Warcraft [00:12:20] is.

[00:12:20] Berzerker: Yes, yes. 

[00:12:22] James: And I've played, I, I have played Warcraft, I think once. Uh, and this is by, this is by Blizzard who [00:12:30] are now, again, correct me if I'm wrong, part of Activision, which 

[00:12:34] Berzerker: Yes. 

[00:12:35] James: Brings its own fun. This challenges. Yeah. Yeah. I [00:12:40] can hear the moaning. I can hear them moaning going on. Now look, ju just again, MMORPGs.

[00:12:46] I've heard of other games like Star Trek Online [00:12:50] is another very popular and, but this is a very different sort of game. Obviously there's not starships involved. Can you just answer one more question? 

[00:12:58] Jae: But there are aliens. Just a fun [00:13:00] lore 

[00:13:00] James: Oh. 

[00:13:00] Jae: teaser. There are aliens and, and spaceships. 

[00:13:02] James: Okay. 

[00:13:02] Jae: But 

[00:13:03] Berzerker: It's true.

[00:13:03] James: So can you explain, cause obviously as you said, you can go around and do all these things. You can, you know, do alchemy. You can get [00:13:10] gather food, you can get your herbs. What's a quest? 

[00:13:13] Berzerker: A quest can encompass many things, but it is typically a task that is assigned by. [00:13:20] Someone that wants you or needs you to do something and then you accept that task in exchange for, it could be [00:13:30] currency, it could be in exchange for a piece of gear that your character needs to wear.

[00:13:36] Um, you know, or some other type of reward [00:13:40] that is hopefully useful to your character in some way. And those quests can vary from ver, you know, little small tasks where, Hey, I need you to [00:13:50] go collect six things in this area over here cuz I'm baking a pie. Okay, cool. I need you to kill ragner, roast the fire Lord, [00:14:00] uh, because he's wreaking havoc from the elemental plane of fire.

[00:14:05] And I'll give you this necklace as a reward, right? It's got [00:14:10] some stuff on it. 

[00:14:11] James: So very similar to, to missions in, in other games or, you know, I mean, I guess in instant, uh, of course now, I'm gonna [00:14:20] show, look, I love my gaming, but Quest is like, uh, Zelda is in RPG, just not online. Is that, am I right about that one?

[00:14:29] Berzerker: Like, [00:14:30] like old school Zelda? 

[00:14:31] James: Well, well, Breath of the Wild. 

[00:14:33] Jae: Yeah, because it has, it has inventory management, it has objectives. Um, there are some MMORPGs that [00:14:40] do or, or at the time did not have questing, but just had killing, like EverQuest, one of his biggest things was just killing, killing, uh, mobs over and over for experience [00:14:50] gain.

[00:14:50] One of the, one of the, the biggest things that, that World Warcraft was starting to change in the industry was they added a storyline and questing versus just killing things. I, I, [00:15:00] I actually interviewed John John States of the WoW Dev Diary, the book that came out a while back, and he said it was interesting how world work out changed that [00:15:10] focus to actually doing quest in addition to everything else.

[00:15:13] James: Okay. That makes a lot more sense and I, I think my thing will always, confused me with, particularly [00:15:20] with World of Warcraft, is this levels thing. 

[00:15:22] Berzerker: Mm-hmm. 

[00:15:23] James: And I assume that is just building up your character so that you have more skills, more abilities. You can maybe [00:15:30] hang in a fight a little bit longer.

[00:15:32] Berzerker: Mm-hmm. 

[00:15:32] James: Or have certain, because again, trying to understand this, like the, so again, referenceing that the South Park [00:15:40] episode. 

[00:15:40] Berzerker: Mm-hmm. 

[00:15:41] James: You know, where, where they talk about, oh, use your enchanted casting thing and, and that's based on your character and is that right? 

[00:15:49] Berzerker: Yeah. Like the [00:15:50] concept of. Yeah, like it's an rpg, right?

[00:15:52] So the idea of playing into the story, like pretending like, you know, this is your character, your character's going through these adventures, [00:16:00] and as they go through these adventures, they become more experienced, right? So you are able to harness your energy or your power or these abilities or whatever they are.[00:16:10] 

[00:16:10] And as you go up, yeah, you'll learn new things along the way. And so where you start off in one area, You know, pretty low level, easier to manage situations. [00:16:20] Well now you're growing in level. You're growing in skills. So now let's take on some tougher challenges. Let's go over now to this other area where maybe there's some more serious stuff going on, some bigger [00:16:30] things going on that now your character might be able to handle a little bit easier or, or have a better fighting chance at doing something.

[00:16:37] One of the things within that, that World [00:16:40] of Warcraft does so well, and I think one of the reasons why it has been so popular over the years is because you're not just going kind of from here to here to here just because there's a story, there's a [00:16:50] narrative, very wide ranging. Uh, in some ways it's, it's a little, uh, a little unwieldy, uh, but there is a very [00:17:00] rich, deep story.

[00:17:01] You mentioned Warcraft earlier about the franchise, right? There was the original Warcraft works in humans. Warcraft Two, Warcraft Three. Warcraft Three is where a [00:17:10] lot of World of Warcraft comes from. A lot of the story of World of Warcraft comes from, although now we're moving finally away from that.

[00:17:17] They've made a, they've made a big point to say that Shadowlands, the [00:17:20] previous expansion was kind of the last page of that book in, uh, in the whole Warcraft saga. Now we're gonna kind of move on a little bit. From some of those stories, but that's kind of the [00:17:30] general idea, right? As you start off as a level one, whatever, in some area where the stakes are pretty low.

[00:17:36] And then as you level up, as you get to max level, you know, whatever that [00:17:40] is, 60, 70, it's been as high as like, I think 120 at one time or one 10, it was pretty high. Um, they, they've done little squishes to make it a little more manageable. You know, you're able to take on challenges all the way up to [00:17:50] what we, you know, what we have as an end game in World of Warcraft where there are raids, which are usually.

[00:17:57] Up to, you know, we've been up to 40 people [00:18:00] at one time, as low as 10 people at one time. And now the, the size of the group required to do the task is, is, is a little more malleable Now. They, they've made that a little [00:18:10] friendlier. Uh, but it takes that group of people with different skills and different abilities to be able to, you know, take down these dragons or take down this dude over here.[00:18:20] 

[00:18:20] Somebody's getting wild in the back over here and causing elemental problem. You know, all kinds of things that revolve around the story. Going back to the story, all right, there's some big challenge that needs to be [00:18:30] met. And so for some people that's, that's the central. Thing that you do, you level your character, you get to the end game, and then you raid with your RAID [00:18:40] team.

[00:18:40] You know, a dedicated group of people that you play with to take down these challenges because they design these challenges. Blizzard does to be hard enough that it, it takes time to [00:18:50] do, you know, practice and have the ability to get past these challenges. And typically there's, you know, anywhere from eight to 12 to even 15 of these [00:19:00] challenges in a raid in one centralized kind of location where these things happen.

[00:19:04] And so for some people, that's the game that they want to play. For other people, it's, they want to do pet [00:19:10] battling because you can collect pets and then you can battle trainers and other people. And for some people it's the PVP element that Jae mentioned where, you know, you're in Battlegrounds [00:19:20] and you're fighting against other players.

[00:19:21] And for some people it's collecting mounts and, uh, transmogs. So, you know, you can make your gear look like all kinds of different stuff. There's all these different [00:19:30] perspectives within World of Warcraft. It's such a big game and has such a deep. That it allows for that kind of thing to occur where you [00:19:40] have people that are very dedicated to their one portion.

[00:19:43] And it's part of, I think, what keeps so many people involved, because there are so many things that you can do. The [00:19:50] gameplay itself is very smooth. It's, you know, it's not the highest quality graphics, uh, you know, as somebody who's played way too much cyberpunk 

[00:19:59] Jae: Yes [00:20:00] 

[00:20:00] Berzerker: You know, you know, a game where it, it, it is graphically, it's just, it's mind blowing.

[00:20:05] And now we're getting into real engine, uh, unreal Engine 5 where stuff's gonna look even more [00:20:10] real than it ever looked. You know, that's not World of Warcraft. It's, it, it is cartoony to a point, but everything is very smooth. It plays in a way that your brain, [00:20:20] I find just clicks so well with it. When you, when you press a button and something happens, it's that feedback that you get with the sound and the sight and [00:20:30] the reaction.

[00:20:30] It's just, there's something very special about it. And then you go from like kind of one thing to the next thing, to the next thing. And before you know it, it's been six months and no one's seen you and you haven't taken a shower. And you're like, [00:20:40] where have you been? What's going, I've been playing World of Warcraft.

[00:20:42] It's this amazing game and I can do all these things. So it is, it is so. Huge in [00:20:50] scope. Um, and I, and I think that always being online, that's the other portion of it, right, is all of the other people. So it's not just you doing these things, there's literally [00:21:00] millions of other people in your, in your, uh, put together, like on servers where you'll have, you know, several thousands of people will all be kind of together on one server and you'll interact with those people.

[00:21:09] [00:21:10] And so, like Jae mentioned, you're doing a question, you need help ensemble, maybe there's some other people doing it, and then there's something over here. Well, I need help with that. Let's do that thing over there too. So there are plenty of things that you can do [00:21:20] solo. I'm somebody who kind of prefers to do the solo gig quite a bit, but it's built on community at the end of the day to do all the things that you [00:21:30] want to do after a certain point.

[00:21:31] It's built on community and that ultimately is what makes World of Warcraft so special is the community itself and more specifically the [00:21:40] community that you find. For yourself 

[00:21:43] James: And be before, because we are gonna talk about our community. I'm sure Jae I, I've seen Jae's show notes. One, one question, but I think is [00:21:50] important to ask from an accessibility point of view.

[00:21:52] I mean, obviously what with it been at its base, an older game, what, what sort of [00:22:00] hardware does it require? What it run on? You know, how, how accessible is it maybe for different groups of gamers? Because traditionally I've always seen it as a PC game. 

[00:22:09] Berzerker: It is a [00:22:10] PC game. They, there, there are hints and whispers and things all the time about it potentially coming to a console, uh, with the [00:22:20] purchase by. Uh, Microsoft, uh 

[00:22:23] James: Oh, Activision. Yeah, of course. 

[00:22:25] Berzerker: Yes. They are attempting to finalize that purchase sometime in the [00:22:30] next year. It's meeting some regulatory hurdles, but there are a lot of whispers and rumors that potentially you're looking at it being reported over to a console at some [00:22:40] point. Not being a game designer and just knowing how complicated the game is on pc, I don't know how you rearrange that to make it [00:22:50] workable on a console, but that's why other people get paid big bucks to figure that out.

[00:22:54] So it is a PC game, however, it does not require some [00:23:00] kind of world beating, you know, 40, 90 GPU in a, in a, you know, some threadripper something, something. It, it's not like that. It, it is [00:23:10] really a game that is designed to be as accessible as possible in the PC arena, where you can always turn down settings and do different things.

[00:23:19] But, [00:23:20] uh, if you look at the minimum specs to play the game, it's, it's not very high. And in fact, I have an older computer sitting right next to me that I have rigged up for my [00:23:30] son to be able to play a few blizzard games and this and this computer. It is, 12 years old at this point and it'll run it just fine.

[00:23:38] James: Okay, that's good. And what about [00:23:40] pricing? Cuz obviously with this being an on, this isn't just a pay once game. What's for pricing like for a World of Warcraft account? Cause I, I, again, you know, I go back and I seem to [00:23:50] remember, you know, seeing, um, YouTube videos of pair of kids reacting to a parent's cutting off a World Warcraft account.

[00:23:59] Jae: Oh, you're probably [00:24:00] thinking of WoW Outrage 1 video I used to, I think I, I can think of 

[00:24:04] James: It's for one big one who kept the kid who came in smashing up his room. Am I thinking of [00:24:10] the correct one? 

[00:24:12] Berzerker: I remember that one. I remember that well. Uh, yeah, it is, it is unique still in its ability to be able to pull in [00:24:20] a subscription.

[00:24:20] So the base game, which is rolled into whatever, typically the latest expansion is you do have to purchase that. So, [00:24:30] like for myself, been around forever, I, I've had to pay for every expansion as it's come along, and those prices have varied over time. They add a lot of digital deluxe items, so [00:24:40] extra in-game, you know, little bits and bobs if you're into that kind of stuff.

[00:24:44] And, you know, it'll range from anywhere from 50, 60 all the way up to like a hundred dollars, depending on how [00:24:50] much you're willing to pay. Plus, a subscription for every month, and I believe it's about 15 bucks a month right now. But there's also a one month, I think a three month, a six [00:25:00] month. And right now they're doing a year subscription and there is a certain amount of price break up to a point depending on whether or not you want to [00:25:10] do any of those bundles.

[00:25:10] So if you're in a position to be able to do that, it is, it is pretty nice to be able to, you know, save some money kind of in the long run. But there is, there is a [00:25:20] running cost to play World of Warcraft, which is often why you'll see kind of a boom and bust cycle in terms of the player base where around an [00:25:30] expansion, whew.

[00:25:31] Numbers will swell and things are going on. And then once you know, a certain segment of the player base is consumed the content that they want to see, they'll [00:25:40] let the subscription lapse and they'll move on to whatever else they'll do. And you'll see those numbers fall. But for that, I do believe that we get a well-funded and well run [00:25:50] game, which I appreciate. 

[00:25:52] James: No, thank you. That's really, thank you. Er, that's really helpful information to understand and put, put this into context because you know, again, [00:26:00] and, and in a way I would say that from what I'm hearing, world of Warcraft, because it's endured so long, to be honest, I didn't even know until Jae said, Hey, let's have Berzerker on the [00:26:10] show to talk about World of Warcraft,

[00:26:11] I was like, that game's still around? Like the fact that it's endured and that it's been well funded. Cuz that [00:26:20] is possibly one of the problems with free to play or pay to, yeah, pay to play games where unless people are buying them, uh, and [00:26:30] paying for those items but aren't getting funded and at some point those service gets shut down.

[00:26:34] Jae: Yeah. Like City of Heroes is a game that I I to this day longingly, miss and like same Star Wars [00:26:40] Galaxies, those are two games that are MMORPGs. No longer here. I mean, they're, they're here in the emulation realm and I may have to look into those because, uh, any, these City of Heroes got [00:26:50] the, uh, grace from the, uh, developers to continue it.

[00:26:53] But yeah, it, it, it is definitely one of the things that, like you put all this all this time cuz one thing about the World Warcraft and a lot of [00:27:00] games and World Warcraft has done a lot recently to, lessen in this, but they are a time sink and they are built to keep people playing. And that is one of the things that, like you [00:27:10] can buy a, a $60 game play through it in like 10, 12, 15 hours or, or more depending on how, how long it is.

[00:27:17] But World of Warcraft, you have to [00:27:20] keep playing to progress and, and there's an intentional, you're, you're gonna spend time with us. It's, it's why, it's why sometimes people do leave is that time grind. 

[00:27:28] Berzerker: It can be quite a bit. That's [00:27:30] true. 

[00:27:30] Jae: One of the things that I want to talk about, I'm going first start, start with some of the, the, the bad sides and then go into some of the really positives.

[00:27:36] Berzerker: Mm-hmm.

[00:27:37] Jae: I would say definitely one thing about World of Warcraft and [00:27:40] MMORPGs is that that addictive nature, I think a lot of us can talk about. You remember that person and like even James mentioned, uh, his friend who just played World [00:27:50] Warcraft the entire time, and I'll admit I've been that friend too. A friend comes over and I was just playing, so I've been that friend too.

[00:27:56] But like there is that, that that ability like, like [00:28:00] you will just play a game nowadays that I don't do that anymore. Nowadays. I'm like, if, if, if I'm gonna, I make, I take time for, for, for, for, for friends and all that. But, and it is definitely very addictive [00:28:10] and, and it's, it's by design. Um, there is a lot of research I've done where they actually have people who are psychologists hired by the [00:28:20] companies to know how can we make the game more addictive so they know like, like what are some of the things we can get.

[00:28:25] Try to get you to keep you going. And that is one thing about, about games. I've, I've [00:28:30] done some people who have like, definitely stopped going to work to play this game or like, called off work. And like I, I, I know one, um, one person I, [00:28:40] I remember, I'm not gonna go to too much detail, basically had, um, had, was, was given a choice of their relationship with their wife or the game [00:28:50] at the time that they chose the game.

[00:28:51] And they told me it was one of the worst decisions they ever made. But that, that is part of the, part of, one of the, one of the negative [00:29:00] downsides of MMORPGs is how addictive it can be. 

[00:29:03] Berzerker: Yeah. You know, obviously when it comes to addiction, the nature of addiction, you know, there's [00:29:10] a. Lot can that can be said about that.

[00:29:13] You know, for me personally, coming from a family of addicts and even [00:29:20] recognizing those traits in myself, right? It is a game that is very well built when it comes to that sort of [00:29:30] mini dopamine dump feedback loop. 

[00:29:33] Jae: Yes. 

[00:29:34] Berzerker: Where it doesn't require a whole lot of effort. Like sometimes it's a big thing, but [00:29:40] there are just lots of little things, little quests, little things now, especially nowadays, little treasures you can find, little areas that you can discover, like all these little [00:29:50] things that give your brain that little pop and you know, you do it over and over and over and over and over again.

[00:29:58] Right. And you can [00:30:00] lose all kinds of time. When I first started playing, it was before I had, you know, any kids of my own, and it was just my wife and I, I lost weekends, you know, [00:30:10] whole days. I, I mean you, it's dark out. How did that happen? You know, it just, that is, I think an experience that I would hazard to guess.

[00:30:19] I've no numbers to [00:30:20] back this up, but I would hazard to guess that a majority of Warcraft players have experienced that. At one time or another, probably earlier on when first [00:30:30] discovering the game. And it can trigger that kind of behavioral pattern. And so if you are somebody I think that is [00:30:40] prone to falling into that trap world of Warcraft can can be that vice.

[00:30:45] I would argue it it's better than the, a few others have come across. But at [00:30:50] the same time it can also be a very destructive and you see things like this where people can't control themselves and they do choose the game over their relationships or [00:31:00] you know, I've known people that got fired from jobs or that like got kicked outta school.

[00:31:04] I mean, yeah, it's wild that this happens, but it's just, it's so good in its [00:31:10] feedback reward loop. And I'm not saying that that's negative, I'm just saying it's so good in that, that if you are, I think prone to that kind of behavior, world of Warcraft can, can [00:31:20] be a bit of a challenge in that regard. 

[00:31:23] Jae: Yeah, I, I remember when I was, uh, 16, my parents were like, Jae, you need to stop playing this game because, [00:31:30] you are literally going into your room around five or 6:00 PM We are not seeing you till 1:00 AM. You need to stop this. And that's, that's [00:31:40] why I, I left Warcraft for a while.

[00:31:40] I was like, yeah. Because I would be, I'd be ready in Molten Core where, so James, this is gonna, you're gonna love this.

[00:31:48] James: I will understand this. Go on. [00:31:50] 

[00:31:50] Jae: I was, I was, I was raiding, uh, in a 40 person group against Ragnaros. And literally the only thing I had to [00:32:00] do was I had to heal five people.

[00:32:02] That was, that was my entire job the entire night was these five people in this one raid party. I had to raid them. And you're doing that for hours and [00:32:10] hours and hours and hours as they're just unloading all of the spells into the main boss. And obviously they've, they've modified where they've added more [00:32:20] diversity to the mechanics from that, cuz they're no longer just, um, I would say sponges for, for damage.

[00:32:27] But yeah, I would do that for hours and hours and [00:32:30] hours and hours every day for a while. And I was like, I need to stop. 

[00:32:35] I need to leave. So yeah, there is that . 

[00:32:38] James: But I mean, let, let's be [00:32:40] very honest, that's not unique to World, the Warcraft. It's not unique to MMORPGs. No, I know. You know, miss modern age games like Fortnite [00:32:50] games, like even Minecraft, me and Jae are huge Minecraft fans.

[00:32:54] Berzerker: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 

[00:32:55] James: But Minecraft can be up. Oh, just one more block. One more, one more [00:33:00] layer, one more mining trick . Oh yes. Yep. You know? Yes, yes. And I will admit, there's been times where I was meant to be chatting with Jae you know, to catch up on stuff. [00:33:10] And I've been, uh, playing Hardspace: Shipbreaker, and Jae... 

[00:33:15] Jae: I open up Steam Chat to see that you were playing the game.

[00:33:17] James: She's like, she's like, you're playing [00:33:20] Shipbreaker. I'm like, yeah, 

[00:33:21] Berzerker: Busted. 

[00:33:22] James: Busted, busted. I, I mean, and it is, look, game addiction is you, you know. Um, so a point of recording [00:33:30] this episode. The episode, but it's just gone out. on Monday of this week was our chat with Andrew Keates director and [00:33:40] wonderful chap, uh, and huge Star Trek nerd.

[00:33:42] But one of the things he talked about is social media addiction and 

[00:33:46] Berzerker: mm-hmm. 

[00:33:47] James: I think there is an element where game, I, I [00:33:50] mean, I might be wrong, but I think game addiction does actually get some recognition as a genuine thing. There are, I don't wanna say treatments [00:34:00] because I'm not sure whether or not there is help available for gaming addiction.

[00:34:04] I think more so than say, social media, actually, you know what, there is even social media addiction [00:34:10] help now. Um, 

[00:34:11] Jae: yeah. 

[00:34:11] James: But it's not unity. But I think when you've got a game as a immense and world building as World of Warcraft, I think it makes sense. I mean, look, you know, that [00:34:20] whole South Park, every episode, as much as we joke about it, definitely did a good job of highlighting the potential issues.

[00:34:26] Uh, you're not gonna turn into [00:34:30] thoseoverstated caricatures of a World of Warcraft player that we saw a boys turn into. And I can't do a good car, so I'm not going to 

[00:34:39] Berzerker: [00:34:40] Mom. Bathroom. Oh my little sweetie. 

[00:34:46] James: Cartman's mom, such [00:34:50] an enabler. Um, 

[00:34:53] Berzerker: That's my boy. 

[00:34:54] Jae: The sword of unbeatable or whatever. . 

[00:34:58] James: Jae, [00:35:00] your impersonations of cartoon characters are not, um, they're not very good. lois. Lois? Lois? 

[00:35:09] No. [00:35:10] Mine aren't either. Alright. Right. Alright. So Jae, I think you, you, gosh, look, I, I'm just, I'm just sat here amazed [00:35:20] at this.

[00:35:20] Berzerker: I totally derailed the show. 

[00:35:22] James: Oh yeah. No, I love this. I love this one. Getting into this deep discussion of, of games and, and picking and, you know, cultures around [00:35:30] games. I, I have one question, which I know Jae's in the show notes. I, I, we, we talked about negatives, but there are some positive things and from a tech standpoint, games like [00:35:40] World of Warcraft, I think it's fair to say probably, it really pushed forward what we would consider VoIP and Team Chat 

[00:35:47] Jae: yes.

[00:35:48] James: technologies. 

[00:35:49] Berzerker: Oh yeah. 

[00:35:49] James: Tell [00:35:50] me a little bit about how that whole communication element played into it. Like, because it wasn't just tech speech, you know? I know, I remember TeamSpeak, uh, you know, uh, [00:36:00] Cartman, AFK. 

[00:36:03] Jae: Uh, so, so yeah, there was definitely the, like when, when people started getting into raids and dungeons, they [00:36:10] realized that they needed the ability to communicate without having to re to take, take time to type. So like, you're, you're typing and you're doing all these, all these like [00:36:20] spells and macros and, and, and attacks and, and formations.

[00:36:23] So then they started looking at some of the, the technology that was available, like TeamSpeak, Ventrillo, [00:36:30] Mumble, and looking at that and the real time feedback that, that, that, that you had allowed it allowed you to, to stay in [00:36:40] touch. But the, the biggest problem was, at least back then, you had the inaccessibility of say, like the ability to, if someone needed a [00:36:50] mic or head or headset, cuz a lot of people didn't have headsets that have mics weren't able to to speak.

[00:36:55] Or I sometimes if you're, if you're in a, a house with other people, you don't wanna be too [00:37:00] loud. Be like, More Dots. More Dots. There's a whole meme about that . But yeah, it definitely did, oh yeah. Um, push those [00:37:10] software because all of a sudden they, they started to see more people using that software. And I think, uh, the, the one interesting thing, They'd be using voice chat and forums.

[00:37:19] Then [00:37:20] around, I would say early, like the late 2010s Discord was like, what if we were to take voice chat but combine it with something like [00:37:30] Slack or forums into a way to not only have the voice chat, but also have text chat around that, that cuz when you're outta the game, the Guild chat [00:37:40] doesn't persist out of the game.

[00:37:41] So a lot, so guilds, um, who had forums were, were, were, were moving there. And it's, it's interesting now, like used to the, like, log in [00:37:50] to voice chat or your, or your guild chat and talk to people now. You can talk to people any, anywhere. No matter, no matter where you are. And it can persist outside of the game itself.

[00:37:59] But it [00:38:00] is interesting, yeah, that the MMORPGs and FPS cultures progressed. What we have Berserker did, did I miss anything in there?

[00:38:08] Berzerker: It's so different [00:38:10] now. And that's, part of what's bonkers to me is when we first started playing, I had no concept of any of this stuff or, and then, yeah, when I joined my first rAID [00:38:20] team and they're like, oh, well we gotta get on Ventrillo

[00:38:23] What's Ventrillo well, you know, we have to be able to talk to each other. We talk to each other. I didn't even, I didn't even [00:38:30] know what I was getting myself into. I just knew I wanted to do it. That's it. And so like, all right, well you need a, a microphone. Okay. And sort of the Jae's point there, there is [00:38:40] a little bit of a barrier to entry there when it comes to equipment and, you know, a certain amount of accessibility there.

[00:38:46] And I, I think one of the [00:38:50] benefits to the proliferation of this technology is that that barrier has gotten cheaper where. Is it the best mic and headset combo at [00:39:00] 10 bucks? I mean, you're not gonna be recording voiceovers for Entertainment Tonight, but you can certainly jump onto Discord and talk to your team to get through a fight.

[00:39:08] Right. And so I [00:39:10] think that that has also kind of had the benefit of making the required equipment cheaper, uh, than it used to be. And also easier to find. I feel like there's more of it now than there ever [00:39:20] used to be in the past. You know, there was a time just kind of also in terms of tech and I, I'd have to look at the exact number, but there was a time when World of Warcraft was young that [00:39:30] like a third of all internet traffic was World of Warcraft servers.

[00:39:34] I it was, it was just, Lights out, how much, how big [00:39:40] the game was, uh, in, in perspective to how things used to be. But yeah, the, the, the, the graduation away from forums and over to Discord, [00:39:50] Discord, Discord is king, able to combine all of these things that we did separately and now into one simple to use centrally [00:40:00] located platform.

[00:40:01] Uh, what a, what a boon that has been. And man, I wish I had been on the ground floor to get in on some financing on [00:40:10] that deal, cuz it is, it is. It's unbelievable. And you know, with all of the headaches, with Twitter and everything else, everybody's looking for the next big thing. And I always think [00:40:20] about discord where like, gosh, we used to be on all these different.

[00:40:23] How do you get better than that? I'm not really sure. Cuz it does video, it does audio, it does written [00:40:30] format. You can post pictures and videos and it's kind of an all in one situation now. So my guess is some billionaire idiot will buy it and crash it, and then we'll have to start over. [00:40:40] But, you know, that's another, that's another story. We don't have to go 

[00:40:42] James: No, no, no. I, I'm with you, I just hope that doesn't happen. But I mean, look, you know, uh, okay, I, I, Jae, maybe by the time this episode comes up, we will have [00:40:50] launched publicly launched our Discord. So that is happening. We are 

[00:40:54] Berzerker: All right. 

[00:40:55] James: We are having a Discord server for, for the sh uh, for our, you know, for our little [00:41:00] content Empire.

[00:41:01] Empire? 

[00:41:01] No, that's a word, empire. 

[00:41:03] Jae: Because I mean, we, we have live streams. I've, I've been doing some, uh, some live test streams and by the, and by the time this is out, we will have, we will [00:41:10] both be, uh, streaming on regular schedules. So, yeah, there's a lot of cool things and, 

[00:41:13] Berzerker: Ooh, breaking news. 

[00:41:14] James: But forums, you know, the discussion, like we are, we have already, and we're [00:41:20] working on automation on this.

[00:41:21] When a new episode comes out, we post in the episode like a discussion forum for that. And you, you know, that is Discord [00:41:30] keeps getting better, you know? Yeah. And one big thing is it does not require, I remember trying to help people with firewall [00:41:40] configs. Oh, for TeamSpeak and Ventrillo because Oh yeah, they used to need it now.

[00:41:45] Oh no, you just, you don't need to open. And he put, look [00:41:50] what? 

[00:41:51] Jae: And now Discord works on Xbox too. So I mean, and I, and I believe, unless I'm wrong, um, I believe it also works on PlayStation as well. I mean, the, so like, they're bridging the [00:42:00] gap on a lot of, a lot of these areas. So it's, it's incredible this one unifying platform.

[00:42:07] I mean, and how many, how many servers are that you can [00:42:10] have for a myriad of, of topics. 

[00:42:12] James: One, one thing on accessibility that I, I think Berzerker made a really good point about for technology to do audio calls is getting a lot [00:42:20] cheaper. Because look, if you don't have a mic and maybe you're playing World of Warcraft on, and Jae, we need to look into this possible for you, but you know you're playing the Steam Deck.

[00:42:29] [00:42:30] Well, you might just plug in your iPhone or your Wired headset or you might use your phone. Not this phone. 

[00:42:39] Jae: No, [00:42:40] not that one. 

[00:42:42] Berzerker: Look at that baby.

[00:42:43] James: Isn't that beautiful, except... for our listeners. 

[00:42:45] Berzerker: Oh my god! 

[00:42:47] James: For our listeners. Uh, in fact, Jae, you want to take [00:42:50] another SquadShot? And I'll 

[00:42:51] Jae: Yes, absolutely. 

[00:42:52] James: And I'll put this into the episode, cause I think this is probably a current phone around the time of World of Warcraft. 

[00:42:59] Jae: [00:43:00] Yes, because back then World of Warcraft was playable on dial-up.

[00:43:01] James: But, but, but the point being.. Oh, isn't that brilliant? Um, but point being that, you know, you can now run Discord on your phone. You could have your game on your [00:43:10] device and just have your AirPods in or your, you know, cheap headset in and be chatting.

[00:43:16] I think it's, I think it's wonderful. I, I really do. So, go on Jae, you were [00:43:20] gonna, I, I do apologize. I've derailed your, your show notes a little bit. 

[00:43:23] Jae: Oh, no, no, you were all good. And, um, and then in fact, I, I've, I've got a good segway.. So, so do trust me on this one. I, I, I know I, I wanna also [00:43:30] mention that there has been a change. I, there's actually a guild, I think it's called, I think Dauntless, if I'm remembering right, actually is a guild [00:43:40] of, of deaf individuals who have all, 

[00:43:42] Berzerker: Oh yeah. 

[00:43:43] Jae: Were able to do amazing raids without voice chat. And they were able to do 

[00:43:48] James: Oh, that's awesome. Doing ta [00:43:50] like, like, like they, they had technology and, and things to be able to make it work.

[00:43:54] And there are like raid markers, but they, they used a bunch of things. They were all coordinating this huge raid. I [00:44:00] do wanna also use voice chat to bring up the toxic side. One aspect that a lot of people may not. Think about is as a trans woman, [00:44:10] if I speak up in voice chat because my voice is not what, what some people would, would consider feminine.

[00:44:17] it would be the, the I may get misgendered or I may get made [00:44:20] fun of. I've also heard of a lot of, a lot of women who, who get harassed or they, or, you know, I, I like, there are a lot of people who, who don't wanna go on voice [00:44:30] chat and there, and there's a, and there's a lot of regards where voice chat being required for things.

[00:44:34] In my opinion is, is a bad design that, that you shouldn't have to use voice chat. Sometimes you [00:44:40] do, and I think that goes into part of the toxic community that you can find in, in, in any game. But like World Warcraft, one of the big things, whenever we [00:44:50] get a new player, we're always like, Turn off general chat or turn off trade chat because talk successfuls and for some reason these studios refuse to [00:45:00] moderate those channels.

[00:45:01] And I, and, and, and I that still, but that bugs me because like even on the social media, during my, my tenure doing, uh, [00:45:10] podcasts for World of Warcraft and doing streams and, and stuff like that, I got by my fair share of people that attacked me simply for being a trans woman. And, and I make onto 4chan quite often [00:45:20] because I, because I was a World of Warcraft player and I, I, I still, every once in a while will get like the email that, that someone has referenced me again and there's a picture of me that they always, and it's, there [00:45:30] is that, that toxic nature that that, that you, that you can find out there.

[00:45:34] And, and it's, it's, you can find some of the, some of the best of humanity, but, but you can also [00:45:40] find. Some of the worst of humanity in the game. And, and I think that's, that has a Berzerker, you definitely have done like, on, on, [00:45:50] Unshackled Fury talked a lot about sometimes the, the bad reaction or the people that, that will attack the devs or the people that will do these things.

[00:45:56] Berzerker: Mm-hmm. 

[00:45:57] Jae: What, um, what can you add to this? [00:46:00] 

[00:46:00] Berzerker: Yeah, um, guess I'll touch on a couple points. It's probably a good thing I can't, uh, use my usual blue language, which by the way, if you ever [00:46:10] check out Unshackled Fury, it is an uncensored show. So my language here is definitely moderated, uh, to a certain degree. And, and, uh, I do, it's probably a good thing because, you know, I [00:46:20] have seen. Plenty of things out there that I'm certainly not proud of when it comes to the world of Warcraft community. I have, and I'm not saying this to pat [00:46:30] myself on the back, but I, I have found myself in positions of defending Jae or defending others because, you know, I,

[00:46:38] I have to learn too, [00:46:40] right? Like the upbringing that I had, I'm a, you know, little class straight white guy. You know, I mean, there, there is a certain amount of mentality and privilege that comes with [00:46:50] that. And I think as you know, the world expands and changes and grows. Like, you gotta try to move with that too.

[00:46:55] And, you know, Jae has been somebody who's taught me quite a lot, which I really appreciate, and [00:47:00] I feel part of the need, uh, my responsibility is to pass on, you know, pass on what you have learned, right? That is, that is very much, you know, a charge that I feel. And so I have [00:47:10] found myself in, uh, you know, conversations that I wish I hadn't had to have, but we did, because, There is an element of, you know, when I worked at [00:47:20] another job dealing on the phone with people, you know, telephone tough guys, and now it's keyboard warriors, or whatever you wanna call it.

[00:47:25] It's, it's that veil of anonymity that, that people feel, this security blanket [00:47:30] and the ability to act in a way that I guarantee you that 99 out of a hundred people would never say to your face because they're [00:47:40] cowards. Right? Certainly not gonna say it to me. Cause I guarantee you most people see me in person, they go, oh, nevermind, I'm not gonna say that.

[00:47:46] You know, and, you know, same with Jae. I think even just [00:47:50] by height alone would be intimidating. You know what? I did not say that thing. I'm gonna rethink my ways and, uh, I'm gonna dedicate myself to a new cause. There are those elements [00:48:00] out there and it is really unfortunate and it, it, I think, behooves those of us that see that to try to do better and to push back against that.

[00:48:09] And [00:48:10] whether that's, you know, throwing those people out of your guild or off your raid team or booting 'em out of dungeon runs or whatever it is, which is hard because when you are in those groups, you often [00:48:20] find toxic people that again, feel the need to act a fool because they think they can, because nobody knows who they are.

[00:48:28] And so you, you [00:48:30] know, when you feel like there's no consequences, you really show people who you are. And a lot of times it's, unfortunately people are trash and there's nothing you can do about that other than. Keep them out of the community [00:48:40] that's closer to you and, uh, you know, try to call them out and to try to shine light in that darkness.

[00:48:46] It's something I've tried to do on my podcast, you know, for whatever reach it has, [00:48:50] it has some kind of reach. And so I've tried to tell people like, listen, you know, you, you gotta act right. If you're upset about something, there's a right way to handle that and there is a wrong way to handle [00:49:00] that. You're attacking somebody because of the way that they look.

[00:49:03] Hey, you probably wanna rethink that one. Listen, I'm guilty of it all the time and you know, I gotta think about it too, like, you know, was that the [00:49:10] smartest, nicest thing? No, I probably wasn't. I have a dark soul. It's a black heart, but you know, I gotta find ways to grow and get light in there. Just like the Grinch did.

[00:49:18] You know, it's the holiday season. Gotta throw that in [00:49:20] there, you know, as for the moderation, I think, to be fair, I'm just gonna, this is devil's advocate time here. I think it is incredibly difficult to [00:49:30] physically monitor millions of communications. With, you know, the staff that they have. I mean, in order to [00:49:40] actually appropriately moderate all the chat, all the messages, all the stuff, they would need to hire an army of tech [00:49:50] support to do that.

[00:49:50] And I just don't think that they will ever make that a priority because it's money they can spend elsewhere, keep for themselves because they're, I better watch my language, [00:50:00] uh, because they're people who just don't value those things. And so you end up with, sometimes it's automation, right? They try to automate these things and it's, it's a bit of hit or miss, but it [00:50:10] is definitely something that they could do better on because even myself, again, somebody who has the least to fear, In all of these situations, Overwatch is [00:50:20] a great example.

[00:50:20] Never have voice on, I'll hardly ever play it. There's a lot of these kinds of situations I avoid because I don't wanna have to deal with the people because as soon as something goes sideways [00:50:30] or as soon as you don't do something that they want you to do and the way they want you to do it, screaming and yelling and throwing a tantrum.

[00:50:36] And that is the kind of behavior I think that turns off a lot of new [00:50:40] players. So to the kind of, the point of all of this is that new players coming in, you run that first dungeon, which is a a five, a five person group, will run through a dungeon typically, [00:50:50] and you'll get people that are gearing up their alts, which they're not their main characters, right?

[00:50:54] They're alternate characters and they just wanna run through as fast as possible, run through as fast as possible, or they're pushing to get [00:51:00] gear for something and they just want to get it done and get it, get it, get done. People have to learn how to do this stuff. And so it takes time to learn how to do this stuff, but they don't have the patience and so they just start [00:51:10] yelling and kicking people outta groups and, and so you get this reputation within that community of it being hostile.

[00:51:17] And it does unfortunately happen way [00:51:20] more often than it should. That being said, I do feel like in recent years there has been a lot more attention within the community that we need to do a better job of policing [00:51:30] ourselves. Cuz as I said, I don't think Activision Blizzard will ever dedicate the resources necessary to do it the way that would meet all of our satisfaction.

[00:51:38] So it's kind of [00:51:40] up to us. And, you know, I'm not above a little vigilante justice from time to time and you know, if I see something, I'll say something because I feel like I can, and I feel safe enough that I can do that. [00:51:50] Uh, because I know that there's also people that don't feel like they can and they don't feel safe to be able to say something.

[00:51:55] And again, those of us that think that are positioned to be able to do it, we have to do it. I mean, it just, [00:52:00] it's one of our moral imperative, um, because we have to clean this stuff up because at its core world of Warcraft, to me, is one of the. Experiences I've ever had [00:52:10] as a, as a community. The game, the game is great.

[00:52:12] I love the game, don't get me wrong, but I've made friendships I never thought I would made. I've been with the same guild now for [00:52:20] almost 10 years. That's wild to me. I never thought I'd find a group of people online, most of whom I've never met in person. I've only met a handful of [00:52:30] these people in person at a couple of BlizzCons.

[00:52:32] Most of them. They could walk past me on the street. I would've no idea who they are, right? But we're there. We support each other. We've been there [00:52:40] through life and deaths and marriages and divorces, and babies and bankruptcies and, all kinds of stuff. And that to me [00:52:50] is what you're trying to get to across the board.

[00:52:51] You want everybody to have that experience, but when you have, you know, undesirable elements, it makes that more difficult. So yeah, it's, it's out there [00:53:00] and it, it's upon us all to try to try to help clean that up. 

[00:53:04] Jae: Yeah. And I think it's definitely a, like the, the anonymity is a, is is [00:53:10] a, is a huge part cuz people will say things that they don't wanna say.

[00:53:12] But I will also say to, to, to flip it around too, the smaller that I, I've gone in, in, in the World of Warcraft [00:53:20] community, like say the, the podcaster community or the, uh, creator community or the, the, the, the Twitch streamer community, or even like my own guild or my groups that I, I, [00:53:30] I've met, I have met so many amazing people in World Warcraft.

[00:53:33] Even though there's that, that huge level of toxic, at least on the reputation. There's so many great people I've met. Like again, [00:53:40] I bet you, I, I, I went to BlizzCon, met, met some friends there. 

[00:53:43] Berzerker: Mm-hmm. 

[00:53:43] Jae: Um, I'm still talking with, with, with, with one of my former Guild members. Uh, Cara, I'm still talking to her all the time.

[00:53:49] Berzerker: Mm-hmm.

[00:53:49] Jae: And there is [00:53:50] that, that level, like I got, I got to meet people that I never would've met before I got to meet. One of my, uh, uh, best friends is, is, is Sascz. And he, and [00:54:00] he's, and he, and he's a trans man and I met him through the World of Warcraft. And that was a, I just happened to meet him one day in the podcast community, started talking with him [00:54:10] and we built a, a friendship, and, and that is, that's the, I don't think I would've ever met some of the people I've met in my circles, but because of it, [00:54:20] I'm a better person. I'm a, I am able, I'm able to, like, I've changed, changed my, per my perspectives. I mean, one of, one of the coolest things was, uh, [00:54:30] was joining this podcast.

[00:54:31] I, I became friends with, uh, James on a niche hosting Slack channel. And, and, and see. It's, and, and I [00:54:40] think, like if you look at, I, I, if I were even like to look at the, the podcasting community itself, that can be a very toxic community. Oh yeah. If you go to r/podcasting on Reddit. [00:54:50] Oh my gosh. But then you find, 

[00:54:52] Berzerker: oh yeah.

[00:54:52] Jae: The smaller niche community. And I think that's the, that's one of the, uh, the, the, the, the keys. If anybody's going into an MMORPG, [00:55:00] one of the keys I would say is look for the smaller communities. Look for people that you actually are enjoying talk to, talking to, see if they may have a guild. Don't, don't just accept the first guild invite that [00:55:10] that will be coming across your 

[00:55:12] Berzerker: Yeah, don't do that.

[00:55:13] Jae: No, cuz that's, it's gonna probably be a very toxic guild with probably No, no, no moderation, no policies. But look, 

[00:55:19] Berzerker: You end up in [00:55:20] Goldshire Inn with no clothes on . We don't wanna do that. Don't do that. I mean, do that if you want to do that. I'm just saying be careful. That's it. 

[00:55:27] Jae: James, there's a whole thing you will never understand [00:55:30] about Goldshire, 

[00:55:30] Berzerker: Moonguard, baby. That's where the action's at. But you know, that's where, that's the after dark show. We'll say that, 

[00:55:36] James: Honestly, I, I'm worried, I'm worried. 

[00:55:39] Jae: I will [00:55:40] explain some of this stuff I saw in Goldshire. 

[00:55:41] James: Please do, please do one day. 

[00:55:42] Jae: But like, that's, that's, that's where like again, I was just somebody that was logging into World of Warcraft from [00:55:50] someplace in Ohio and I got to meet so many amazing friends and I, I actually got the opportunity to, to go to BlizzCon 2019 and see people in real life.

[00:55:57] But it was just, that was the, the, the, [00:56:00] the cool aspect of World of Warcraft after the fact that I, I met friends. Berzerker, I'm still talking to you now. And we met. 

[00:56:07] Berzerker: Yeah. 

[00:56:08] Jae: We didn't actually meet in games. We, we've met in [00:56:10] the, the community around the game though. I think we are in the sa we, we were in the same guild at one point, but yeah, but I still, we, 

[00:56:15] Berzerker: we were.

[00:56:16] Jae: Yeah, I, I, I met you through that, and I think 

[00:56:18] Berzerker: mm-hmm. 

[00:56:19] Jae: [00:56:20] That's the, the, the, the one of the coolest things I will ever, ever, ever take away from it is these people that you log into every day. Like, I'll, I would log into a game. Into World Warcraft, talk to guild, be like, Hey, [00:56:30] how's everyone doing? And you would like talk back and the night I would like do puns and all that.

[00:56:33] And then I get ignored by some people who didn't want puns . Cause they've been adding to their block list . 

[00:56:38] James: Wait, wait. [00:56:40] It's was an option to ignore your puns? 

[00:56:42] Jae: Yes. 

[00:56:43] James: Oh. 

[00:56:44] Jae: Cause they ignore everything else about me, but yeah, you can. 

[00:56:46] Berzerker: Is that what's gonna get you to play? My goodness. Boy, that was [00:56:50] weird hook. 

[00:56:50] James: No.

[00:56:50] Berzerker: Alright. Oh, no. 

[00:56:52] Jae: James, I need help with this kobold. James, james 

[00:56:57] Berzerker: There it is. Oh, Jae's right though. And, and I do [00:57:00] want to, I do want to kind of just put a, a finer point on, on one thing she said is that above all else, and I, and I put this top five experiences in my [00:57:10] life, is going to the first BlizzCon that I ever went to.

[00:57:12] Oh yes. I, I went to another one after that and it was great. Don't get me wrong, but all of the BS aside. The [00:57:20] community feeling that I felt, oh yeah. At a BlizzCon with everybody with, you know, tens of thousands of people, 20,000 people there. It is unlike [00:57:30] any feeling or emotion or vibe I have ever felt anywhere else and my whole life.

[00:57:35] And it was nothing but awesome. And I know that there, you know, listen a convention with that many people, there's [00:57:40] stuff that happens that goes sideways and you know that, that, that's just humanity being human. Overall, I've never experienced anything as wonderful and positive [00:57:50] and inclusive as that environment.

[00:57:52] And it, it is something that you can't replicate in my mind and anything that I've ever done. And if there's like one big [00:58:00] thing that like I would advocate is getting into the community just to go to one, just to go to one. Even if you only go to one. Cuz it's not cheap to get to these things. The tickets are expensive, they're hard to get.[00:58:10] 

[00:58:10] You gotta get to LA or Anaheim. It's a whole, it's a whole thing, but the, it's worth it. It's even just to do it that one time, just, just to be with the people and to be [00:58:20] around it and, and it's, it's incredible. It's almost indescribable. It's incredible. Um, and then one other thing just about sort of community and the connections, and again, this is not, [00:58:30] this is not meant to pat myself on the back or toot my own horn, but I just, I kind of want to give you a train of events here.

[00:58:35] So Jae plays World of Warcraft. I play World of Warcraft. [00:58:40] We through a series of, you know, events in the universe, we come across each other's paths. We become friends, we get to know each other. We have podcasts and we do these [00:58:50] things. And Jae's got her own life adventure that she's going through. And, and kind of as a, as a side to that, I'm learning a lot of things that I never knew.

[00:58:58] The things that I have [00:59:00] learned from Jae, who I met because of Warcraft, has influenced policy in the state of California. I have the ability through my [00:59:10] job. To have a hand in a few things. Not a lot, but a few. And I have been part of discussions that have helped shape the policy in the state of California and the [00:59:20] things that I have said has been a direct result of the conversations that I have had with Jae and the things that Jae has taught me.

[00:59:26] So it's great to talk about community and it's great to do [00:59:30] all these other things that we do for the sake of like a game, but there have been times when there have been real. Differences in the world because of these relationships and how they [00:59:40] came about through World of Warcraft and, and it's just one small example of literally millions of others that are out there in the world.

[00:59:46] But it's, again, it's one of the things that makes it so special is all of the [00:59:50] other things that happen because of the connections that we make. In this game, 

[00:59:55] James: I, I can see Jae obviously getting Jae's very emotional by this, [01:00:00] which is awesome. And, and I, I think it's one of the things that really stands out to me is that if community's done right in a game and you have that genuine love and, [01:00:10] and you can affect real life things, you know, you can make sure each should is okay.

[01:00:13] You know, I know there have been times where I've had a really rough day and I've reached out to Discord [01:00:20] communities, you know, even just for a bit of a, you know, a bit of a chat and people have lifted my spirits. You know, there's, there's times where the SquadPod, you know, the [01:00:30] SquadCast community have, have done that.

[01:00:32] And I'm so grateful for outside of, you know, of communities and it is great to rally around that and get in a game and look, you know, [01:00:40] I am sure that lots of content creators got their start. In World of Warcraft, Jae, you, you know, a lot of your podcasting was because of that. Yeah. And [01:00:50] now you are host co-hosting and, you know, producing our streams on a we'll, we'll see about relatively successful.

[01:00:57] But, you know, I'd like to think a decent podcast. You [01:01:00] know, we've, we've. Decent values and great guests, of course. 

[01:01:05] Berzerker: Oh yeah. Well, yeah. Trying to hold it. My head 

[01:01:08] Jae: And I, I [01:01:10] want to like mention like, I've not met so many people who have met their, their partners through World of Warcraft. That's pretty incredible.

[01:01:18] Berzerker: Yes. 

[01:01:18] Jae: Um, one of [01:01:20] my, uh, one, one of the one I can mention is, uh, JenEricLive. They're an amazing streamer couple and what's cool? 

[01:01:26] Berzerker: Oh yeah. 

[01:01:27] Jae: They met in World Warcraft, not realizing that [01:01:30] they only lived right down the street from each other. 

[01:01:32] James: Wow. 

[01:01:32] Jae: In Texas. Yeah. It was one of those, like, they just started like playing together and then they, and then they got married after that.

[01:01:38] But it was like, it's, it's [01:01:40] just, it's cool. Some of those relationships that, that, that meet. And Berzerker, it means a lot like that. Like I've been able to have some impact just from [01:01:50] gaming and, and like, I. I will say I, because of some of my, my podcasting and some of my streams, I don't wanna go into too much detail, but I have saved lives from some of the [01:02:00] people I've talked with.

[01:02:01] And I just wanna say that like it's, I've always, I've always tried to be the very, I've always tried to look into small communities and things. I've always tried to look at, even if I can't affect the bigger [01:02:10] community, how can I affect my community? How can I, as a streamer, I always was like, I want my community to be good.

[01:02:16] I want my community to be positive, not toxic positive, but, [01:02:20] but a, I want to be doing good, having real conversations if we need to, but standing up for the right things. And I think that's the, it's made [01:02:30] me more confident. If you had seen me before, I, I started doing some of the, the podcasting. I was very shy.

[01:02:37] I was not so outspoken, not [01:02:40] so extroverted. So I'm a different person than I was even before. And last things before we like wrap it up. I wanted to say like two, like there are [01:02:50] so many community events, somebody charity events. DesMephisto has raised so much dang money for the Autistic [01:03:00] Self-Advocacy Network.

[01:03:00] It is unbelievable. And it's all because like, like he'll stream a game or he'll do like a charity event and raised all this money and like bring brand partners together. Dravvie has [01:03:10] done the, the Gnome run, which raises money for breast cancer awareness. Oh yeah. And also the, uh, the troll run, which raises money for the, for the, uh, Trevor Project.

[01:03:19] Berzerker: Mm-hmm. 

[01:03:19] Um, [01:03:20] and, and the, uh, Troll Run is when I first came out as well because I saw, I was realizing who I was in 2020. I went on and I was, I was terrified, but I went on that run and saw [01:03:30] all these other individuals and the, the, uh, the talk even in my own little guild, cuz we would all make, make a, a troll character at level one into a, a [01:03:40] run to, to from the, uh, troll starting zone to boot to the town of Booty Bay.

[01:03:45] And the chat that was in there was like, okay, I am not [01:03:50] alone in how I feel. I'm not alone in who I am. I'm not, even though my family may have some differing opinions on stuff, there are people that are like me. And [01:04:00] that's that, that, that type of connection I came out. Publicly after this, after that event.

[01:04:05] And it's just finding people that are, that are, that are like you and, [01:04:10] and finding people that like, that help you see things differently. That is, I think, one of the, one of the, the powers of these small communities that, so I just, I could speak so [01:04:20] forever about this, but I have always been about the, the community.

[01:04:23] Like I've interviewed so many people in World of Warcraft on my, on my former podcast, getting to know them, getting to know what, what [01:04:30] makes them tick. Getting to know like, like what they, what they do. And like I have, I have still, I have so many friends. Berzerker is one of them again, that I have talked to on that podcast.

[01:04:38] And we're, we're still friends. And [01:04:40] that's, that's why I, and yeah. BlizzCon 2019. I, again, I don't wanna ramble. I just, it was so amazing being there. 

[01:04:47] Mm-hmm. 

[01:04:47] Jae: At one point I was like, for the [01:04:50] Alliance and everyone going RAHHHH. Can I just tell you one final thing? And then I, then I'll, I'll give this back to, to James.

[01:04:56] I was in the hotel, I was in that check into my hotel the first night of BlizzCon. [01:05:00] This, these, the, these two, these two men are walking around with a Horde thing. I'm like, for the alliance, and I'm like running this way, not realizing that the elevators are this [01:05:10] way. So I've run back out, like, I gotta go this way.

[01:05:14] James: I have to admit, hearing of a very positive things about the community built around World Warcraft. Really [01:05:20] does, you know, I, I'm not gonna say I'm gonna start, go out and start playing this game. I might do, 

[01:05:26] Berzerker: I got a referral for you. 

[01:05:27] James: Oh. 

[01:05:28] Jae: No, no. I'm giving you my referral code. [01:05:30] I'll fight you Berzerker! 

[01:05:31] James: Don't, don't fight. You two. Don't fight . 

[01:05:35] Berzerker: Come on, James. We wanna fight over you, why are you stopping? 

[01:05:37] Jae: Hey James, I'll, I'll teach you World of Warcraft, if, if you, if [01:05:40] you, if you do my code, I'll teach all the finer points. 

[01:05:43] James: What I don't like now is the look for Jae's giving me on webcam. . All right guys. , 

[01:05:49] Jae: [01:05:50] Join us. Join. 

[01:05:51] James: So, Jae, Jae isn't expecting this, but I think, uh, we should, [01:06:00] there are people who know about this.

[01:06:01] I think we should probably open up to to you, our listeners. Me and Jae aren't just co-hosts. Me and Jae have been dating [01:06:10] for about, what, nine months? Eight, nine months now? 

[01:06:12] Jae: Eight, nine months, depending on my math, but yeah. Yeah. 

[01:06:14] James: Well, your maths is, math is terrible, but 

[01:06:17] Jae: It is!

[01:06:19] James: [01:06:20] Uh, yeah. So, yeah, it just goes to show you we, we are incredibly happy.

[01:06:25] Berzerker: Yeah. 

[01:06:26] Jae: Yeah. And we get along so well. Even, even if I annoy you sometimes, [01:06:30] 

[01:06:30] James: Oh, you do. And I'm sure I annoy you as well. Um, 

[01:06:34] Jae: Maybe... 

[01:06:34] James: Maybe... Maybe... 

[01:06:37] Berzerker: Well, and you know, if, if you don't mind, I'm, I'm [01:06:40] gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna Bogart this deal here. I just wanna say, as somebody who's been a friend of of Jae's for a number of years, I have not seen her this happy 

[01:06:49] James: Aw.

[01:06:49] Berzerker: [01:06:50] In a long, long time. And, you know, again, sort of bearing witness to the journey that's been happening. I [01:07:00] am so incredibly happy to see. How happy Jae is. And it, it, it's part of the reason why I'm so jazzed to be here with the [01:07:10] both of you, just to kind of see you both together and, you know, kind of see how, uh, you both are.

[01:07:15] It's, it, it really, it, it, it fills my heart up and, [01:07:20] and, you know, there's, there's a lot of really awful stuff. Life will beat you down and not care. And finding people that you connect with and finding [01:07:30] love is so, so, so important. I've been blessed to have been in a, in a long term relationship, since the nineties.

[01:07:38] Um, I've, I've married my [01:07:40] high school sweetheart and, you know, I've been, I've been very lucky in that regard and I know how lucky I am every day when I go to bed. And I, [01:07:50] I have that love in my heart and I know that's returned. And to see that for Jae has been heartwarming. So I just wanna say thank you to James, uh, [01:08:00] for, for being there and for helping my girl out and, and for being, you know, support and to return her love.

[01:08:07] Cause if anybody out there deserves it, it's [01:08:10] her. Um, 

[01:08:11] James: A hundred percent. 

[01:08:12] Berzerker: It's really great. And, and thank you for letting me watch this unfold. I I really appreciate that. So now that I've done, uh, stealing the thunder here, I'm gonna turn [01:08:20] this over to Jae. 

[01:08:21] Jae: And I just wanted to, I just wanna say listeners, it, it's true.

[01:08:24] And like, uh, James is my best friend and I've, I met him on a, on a, on a [01:08:30] slack channel for our podcast host. Yeah. Which, uh, one of the podcasts on, that I was doing on that host was a, we're working on podcast, believe it or not, so, and yeah, I, I just, I started to [01:08:40] get, to get to know James and Yeah, it's that, it's that community that you, you never know who you're gonna meet.

[01:08:44] You never know, like that, that bond you're gonna build and you never, and then the one day you're like, wait a second, [01:08:50] I really, really love this person. Not just as a friend, but, and then you fly out ly enough to England, [01:09:00] and you're like, what am I doing by myself? 

[01:09:06] James: I, I will say I was not prepared for how tall Jae actually [01:09:10] is.

[01:09:11] Berzerker: Nobody is. I, I, I don't, I'm not even prepared. I know. 

[01:09:16] James: I I, I'm only five foot eight Jae's a lot taller than me. 

[01:09:19] Berzerker: [01:09:20] Oh.

[01:09:20] James: I, I i, we, I mean we definitely got some interesting looks on, uh, on, on trains. Um, we, we, we might, and I, I I [01:09:30] think it might have been a conservative, uh, Mp. Um, we, we think we know who it was. Yeah. 

[01:09:36] Jae: Oh yes, cuz I remember we were cuddling watching Friend's on the train [01:09:40] and there's couple staring at us.

[01:09:41] James: Oh, we've got death Stairs, we got absolute death stares. 

[01:09:44] So yeah, look, 

[01:09:45] Berzerker: They're just jealous cuz you got somebody who can get the jars off the top shelf. . I mean that's, that's what it [01:09:50] is. 

[01:09:50] James: It is very handy. It's like, Hey Jae, can you reach that cup? Yep. See, see I don't use that couple in six months cause I can't get here. 

[01:09:59] Berzerker: [01:10:00] Forgot it was even up there. 

[01:10:01] James: Yeah, it, it is brilliant. And look, you know, look, we've made this really clear, uh, on, on our show. We want to hear from all of you, but. Just [01:10:10] wanna be really clear, there's no room for hate in our comments or in our emails.

[01:10:14] You have a problem with our relationship. You can, you can do one. Quite frankly, I really don't care. [01:10:20] Send us hate mail, it will get deleted. Um, uh, we're not entertaining, we're really happy. This, this podcast, these streams, we [01:10:30] are, Crossed Wires is awesome. I'm really, really proud of the work we are doing. I'm so proud to have Jae as my co-host and my partner, so yeah.

[01:10:39] [01:10:40] Um, and whatever consequences of making this announcement on my podcast for our, I will deal with. 

[01:10:45] Jae: And I just wanna, I wanna say thank you again, James, for bringing me on on the [01:10:50] show. And like, I, I, I love that like I get to, to podcast with you and, and, and talk with, with, with, uh, great guests and like I, and like, and spend the rest of our [01:11:00] life with you.

[01:11:00] It's just, it's, it's amazing and we get to stream. And now that you got rid of the GoXLR, you won't have to hear me doing like my autotune singing that I did. You remember this? 

[01:11:09] James: I'm so [01:11:10] glad about that. Look, if, if I could do nothing else in Jae's life, it's bring her decent audio and video gear and, you know, all of this stuff. Anyway. [01:11:20] 

[01:11:20] Jae: Oh, no, no. I'm sorry. Didn't mean to cut you off. 

[01:11:21] James: No, no, no, it's fine. I'm just thinking if there's anything we need to do. 

[01:11:25] Jae: I think we covered a lot of it. So, Bezier. Yes. So, so after, after James [01:11:30] made me, uh, cry over, over all this. He's so sweet. After, after all that, I just wanna say Berzerker, thank you for coming on again.

[01:11:37] Like thank you for helping talk about this. Like, I wanna talk about, I [01:11:40] wanted to talk about the good and the bad Yeah. Of, of, of, of Warcraft because I, I feel we've not do justice if I just talked about all the good, but I, I wanted to, but I wanted to get a show. [01:11:50] You are a, a, a friendship that has been because of a, of a game.

[01:11:54] I, when I resubscribed to that, to World Warcraft for 15 bucks a month, I [01:12:00] did not realize all the people I would meet. Like, like 

[01:12:03] Berzerker: Mm. 

[01:12:04] Jae: I actually have a, a member of my former podcast community, uh, of my former f podcast, uh, [01:12:10] fan base who has me with my signature right next to Ion Hazzikostas. And I'm like, I think Ion Hazzikostas has more professional qualities than I do.

[01:12:18] Like, like I'm just, I'm [01:12:20] just a podcaster. But yeah, like in the, and again, the, the people that I've gotten to meet, like, I, like, again, I got to meet Ali and I got to meet, uh, I got to see [01:12:30] two of my, two, my, uh, friends enter into a, a, a dating relationship and then they went to BlizzCon and then they got married, or I, I think they got married or they haven't got, but yeah, I got to like, I got to see those things and it's [01:12:40] just, it's really cool to see the cuz one day I saw them getting, being really close and I'm like, and I'm like, I wonder if they're together and then all of a sudden you, you, uh, you hear them announce they're together like, [01:12:50] yes. 

[01:12:51] So, but before we go, can you tell us where people can find you a across the, the interwebs? 

[01:12:57] Berzerker: Sure. Before I do that, I just wanna say how [01:13:00] much I'm honored, uh, to be here, especially when, uh, y'all are announcing, uh, to your listeners, uh, the state of your [01:13:10] relationship. And, and thank you for trusting that I would be somebody you could bring on for that.

[01:13:15] Cause you're right. Um, you know, there's enough hate in this world, and [01:13:20] frankly, if anybody has a problem with anything that was said here today, you can come to me. Yeah, I'll deal with it. Uh, so, you know, have fun with that. But, uh, uh, happy for you [01:13:30] both. Uh, thank you so much for having me. It's, we could, we could, if we could have made this a five hour episode if we wanted to.

[01:13:35] Jae: Cause I know, I, I almost did and I know James was like, no, no, no. So , 

[01:13:39] Berzerker: I know [01:13:40] James gotta go to bed. It's like 4:00 AM over there, sometimes. Don't, 

[01:13:42] James: It's only, it's only 1:30 AM It's fine. 

[01:13:45] Berzerker: It's so late over there. So I, I, I need to be respectful here. But yes, if, uh, [01:13:50] if you are interested. Uh, in checking out, uh, anything that I am doing, uh, you listen to this here, you're like, I wanna listen to what this Berzerker guy is all about, you can check [01:14:00] me out on Twitter. I'm still there at BerzerkerRage. There's no space. Just, uh, two words. Berserker Rage. At Berserker Rage. The, uh, [01:14:10] podcast that I host is called Unshackled Fury. You can find that anywhere you get your podcast. It's all over the place.

[01:14:16] Uh, on Twitter at [01:14:20] Unshackled_Fury. And like I said, it is a, uh, an adult rated show. The warnings right up front, so there should be no surprises, uh, but try [01:14:30] to talk about, uh, anything and everything around the community and the game and gaming and it's kind of all over the place. Um, it's just you know, a running dialogue of what goes on in my [01:14:40] brain, which is a little scary at times, but uh, you know, it is what it is. And, some people seem to enjoy it cuz I still have at least three or four listeners, so we're gonna keep it going , [01:14:50] as long as they're there.

[01:14:51] Jae: I will say, as somebody who's not playing World of Warcraft, it's still one of my favorite podcasts. And like your production quality is top notch and 

[01:14:59] Berzerker: [01:15:00] Oh, thank you. 

[01:15:00] Jae: As I, and I would definitely, I highly recommend Unshackled Fury, like, again, know that, like, don't listen with like, um, without knowing that there is like [01:15:10] cursing and, and all that, but. You will, you will laugh your butt off. You're just gonna have a great time.

[01:15:15] And I think it is a positive force in the, in the Blizzard community. And it's [01:15:20] one of the podcasts that I truly think the Blizzard community needs. So it it be, Berzerker. I, I wanted, I wanted to thank you for what you've done, cuz again, you've, you've been there for me so many [01:15:30] times and your podcast is there for so many people that like, it's, it's awesome.

[01:15:34] So check it out. And even if you're not a World of Warcraft player, you're gonna love it. 

[01:15:37] Berzerker: Thank you. Thank you. That means a lot. And you [01:15:40] know, at the end of the day, I think even as somebody myself who is often kind of lone wolf, McQuaid, you can find your community out there. You are not alone there. There's a lot [01:15:50] of darkness in this world right now and it is very easy to be consumed by it and to think that you are alone, the things that you wrestle with, the challenges that you face, that you [01:16:00] are in it by yourself.

[01:16:01] I'm here to tell you, you are not, there, there are people out there for you. There are resources out for you if, if it gets to that point. But there are communities [01:16:10] out there that can pick you up on your worst days, like you said, and get you through those moments to get you through that next day. Cuz there always is another day, there always is another day, there's [01:16:20] always another sunrise, right?

[01:16:21] No matter what happens. But you can find the community that'll, that'll sort of grease the path and make it easier to get there. And it is. One of the great things about World of Warcraft is there is a community [01:16:30] out, out there for you, whoever you are, and we welcome you. Unless you're a dirt bag and you're trash, then you can go, I don't know.

[01:16:37] Play Fortnite, don't, don't come here. Don't come here cause we'll [01:16:40] throw you out. But, uh, but thank you for having me. 

[01:16:43] Jae: As long as you're not ganking newbies in, in, in, uh, Stranglethorn Vale. 

[01:16:46] Berzerker: That's right. That's right. How dare you. [01:16:50] That's where you can find me. Welcome aboard. Uh, love to have it. And you know, listen, shameless plug time.

[01:16:57] If you do check out Unshackled Fury and you find it is [01:17:00] of any value whatsoever, you know, feel free to throw a brother a a a five star rating. You know, cause, uh, listen, Apple doesn't care, uh, what I do, but they care what you do. [01:17:10] Uh, so you know, and do the same for this show. Come on now. If you're not, if you're not hitting five stars on this, uh, this fun Crossed Wires program, then you, if you, I don't even know what you're doing with your life, do it before you go to the [01:17:20] store.

[01:17:20] That's, that's, there you go. That's it. Tell'em, Berzerker sent you.

[01:17:22] James: I, I will say Apple. Maybe. Time to move away from star ratings for podcast. Why? How about just a lover? How about just a love like [01:17:30] that? Thumbs up should have emoji vs. 

[01:17:32] Berzerker: What is the difference between a 4.5 and a 4.7? I dunno?

[01:17:37] Jae: Well, the, the, the, the difference is like, uh, [01:17:40] for the four.

[01:17:40] For the four point, um, four, they are, um, only delivering you continental breakfast. The 4.7 is they're delivering you breakfast, lunch, and dinner. 

[01:17:49] Berzerker: Which one has the [01:17:50] good sausages? 

[01:17:51] Jae: Ah,

[01:17:52] that's the one I care 

[01:17:53] James: That's the 4 point seven 7 7 7 7 7 7. 

[01:17:57] Berzerker: Ooh. Yeah. Okay. I got a goal [01:18:00] now. There you go. 

[01:18:00] Jae: Uh, and you heard, you, you heard it here first. Uh, folks, if, if you give, um, Unshackled Fury, a a four point A above Berzerker will come directly to your house and give you a, [01:18:10] a, uh, a, a full breakfast, uh, uh, pla. 

[01:18:13] Berzerker: You got all the pork sausage you could ever handle.

[01:18:15] James: I, I don't think, Jae, will you please stop pimping [01:18:20] our guests? like I, I, I'm really worried about like all this, you know, like offering our guest services [01:18:30] out to the public

[01:18:31] I'm, we need to talk about etiquette on this show, you know? 

[01:18:35] No, no. 

[01:18:35] Berzerker: I'll make that 4.8 or 5.0 by the time I leave.[01:18:40] 

[01:18:42] James: No, seriously do go and check up Berzeker's show and look, genuinely, we, we say it in the outro, but you know, if you do like what we're doing, please do go write, [01:18:50] write any podcast. Okay. Genuine message. If you love the podcast you are listening to, they really do value. Those ratings and well reviews. They gen they help [01:19:00] more than you would think.

[01:19:01] They expose the shows, go and do that. You know, we, we encourage people to go and check out good pods and start discussions today. Please do that. Um, and [01:19:10] one thing we don't really put in our outro, which I just want to mention, if you go to our site, at crossedwires.net down at the bottom is actually a couple of affiliate links If you need backup from Backblaze, [01:19:20] if you need hosting by DigitalOcean, or if you wanna start your own podcast and you wanna record it in the most amazing quality, in the easiest way with [01:19:30] SquadCast, go and check us affiliates today.

[01:19:31] Do help us out and we'll have more ways that you can support us soon. Jae over to you. 

[01:19:36] Jae: And I with that Berzerker, can you, [01:19:40] uh, do, can you do your, uh, podcast intro in the cleanest way possible?

[01:19:45] Berzerker: My, my intro or my outro? 

[01:19:47] Jae: Oh, your outro, yeah. Can you do your outro? 

[01:19:49] Berzerker: Oh, okay. [01:19:50] Uh, until next time, keep your swords wet and your banners high, and we'll see you next time.

[01:19:56] Farewell.[01:20:00] 

[01:20:00] James: Thanks for listening to this episode of Cross Wires. We hope you've enjoyed our discussion and we'd love to hear your thoughts. So please drop us an note over to podcast@crossedwires.net. 

[01:20:09] Jae: You can also drop [01:20:10] us a comment on the post, or if you're a GoodPods user, why not start a discussion there too. 

[01:20:15] James: You can also join on new Discord server at crossedwires.net/discord

[01:20:19] We've got [01:20:20] forum channels for each episode and we'd lo to join the discussion there. You can also follow us a Mastodon @crossedwires@masthead.social, and of course, you can find the show show in all the [01:20:30] good podcast apps and all the really bad ones too.

[01:20:32] Jae: If you'd like to check out more of our content and on over to crossedwires.net/youtube for all our videos and keep an eye on our [01:20:40] Twitch channel at crossedwires.net/live for our upcoming streams.

[01:20:44] James: If you like what we heard, please do drop review in your podcast directory of choice. It really [01:20:50] does help spread a word about the show. 

[01:20:51] Jae: And of course, If you can spare even the smallest amount of financial support, we'd be incredibly grateful, and you can support us at [01:21:00] ko-fi.com/crossedwires

[01:21:05] James: Until next time, thanks for listening![01:21:10] [01:21:20]