Wondering what to do with your upcoming free time? Good thing we have some suggestions for what you should be watching, playing, reading, listening to, etc.

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Ben’s Movie WARNING: Dashcam – Director Rob Savage first caught my attention with his Zoom call horror film, Host, a unique, clever, and genuinely terrifying found footage flick that quickly became my favorite of the sub-genre. I was extremely excited to see Savage’s follow-up, Dashcam, which follows a streamer as she drives around… being a terrible person, and encountering some scary stuff. I’m staying light on the details of said scary stuff because I don’t want to spoil anything, and, more importantly, I have no idea what actually happened. It’s not like I was interested in finding out though, as there was nothing memorable or frightening (aside from the occasional, cheap jumpscare) in Dashcam, other than its “protagonist.” Annie, the movie’s main character, is a horrible human being whose abhorrent personality drags the already subpar experience into nearly unwatchable territory. Do yourself a favor, and avoid Dashcam at all costs, and hold out hope that Savage’s next project proves that Host wasn’t just a fluke.

Lauren’s Video Game Pick: Stray – For those who were wary of playing Stray after the early previews showed a limping kitty exploring a darkened cyberpunk-esque city, good news: though the cat falls to this underground world in an opening that would only be more upsetting had his feline family Mufasa’d him off the ledge, our unnamed protagonist is visibly injured for far less time than we were led to believe he would be. I’m talking seconds. Big ol’ phew. Now we can cat nap, scratch up all the surfaces, hide in all the boxes, rub on all the robot shins, and knock every single bottle, ceramic vase, and bucket of paint off elevated surfaces to our little hearts content – though a huge mistake was made by the developers by not letting us walk through said floor paint and leave little toe bean paw prints all over the world. I may definitely fall on the side of canine companions in the dog vs cat fight – I truly did not know nice cats existed til my 20s – but even I can admit (out of earshot of my beagles) that felines are the far superior choice for a puzzle platformer. The traversal system is simple yet incredibly satisfying as we are able to explore the verticality of locations with ease, and though no puzzles offer any true challenges necessarily, that hardly means there is no sense of accomplishment as the best kitty in all the land as we slowly discover what happened to lead us to this world without humans.

Ben’s Video Game Pick: Zombie Army 4: Dead War DLC missions – I’ve spoken about my adoration for Zombie Army 4 a couple of times before, but I wanted to bring it up again because it has only gotten better with the generous amount of add-on content. Developer Rebellion has been adding new story chapters to the game since launch, to the point that the number of missions have more than doubled, and each one is worthwhile. From storming a vampire-infested castle, to thwarting evil artificial intelligence aboard zeppelins, to fighting off a giant cyborg zombie shark in a lava lake, the game is pure insanity in all the right ways. The scoring and collectables add a high amount of replayability as well, along with the still solid weapon upgrade system. If you enjoyed/loved the base game, then I cannot recommend the DLC missions highly enough.

And again: there’s a giant cyborg zombie shark. What else could one possibly want from a video game?

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So what do you think about these picks? What content did we miss over the past two weeks while we were spending time with these? Be sure to leave a comment below letting us know about everything (both current and simply new to you) you’ve been consuming lately!