Sometimes it's fun to hit a scorpion with a club for 38 seconds

Like many others who carry the spiritual stain of prior MMO contact, I've been spending some time in the WoW: Forever beta. After piloting a freshly-minted orc through the introductory quests in the Valley of Trials, I emerged into the wider Durotar scrubland where I soon entered into combat with a hostile scorpion that had strayed too close to the road I was following to Razor Hill.

For the next 38 consecutive seconds, I did nothing but watch my orc slowly bludgeon that scorpion to death with a wooden club. And reader, I say this with full sincerity: Those were 38 seconds of peak gaming.

I haven't just been playing Forever to sample Blizzard's distillation of year one WoW nostalgia. I'v...