It’s the Rocket League World Championships – Day 3!
I’ve got my gear and my supplies. Ready to go to cheer on my favourite teams!
This bear is rooting for NRG!
Here we are outside the venue, Palacio Vistalegre. Fun fact – this used to be a bullring! It was about a 40 minute walk from our hotel.
Settling into our seats. We weren’t on the floor but were the first row in the stadium seating.
ANNNND my team WON!! GO NRG! Go jstn., Go GarrettG, Go Turbopolsa!
See, I AM a lucky bear!
Travel time! We’re back on the road and in Spain this week. First stop – Barcelona.
It’s only fitting because Barcelona is a lot like San Francisco both in approximate square footage and size, and we all know I’ve been spending too much time in San Francisco. Barcelona is a hilly costal city that’s actually fairly walkable. It’s the largest city in Catalonia, and the second largest city in Spain by population, but we walked around fine.
We stayed in Eixample, and for being a city from the Roman times, you wouldn’t have been able to tell in this neighbourhood. The streets were clean, the boulevards wide. It also turns out to be where a lot of the nicest restaurants are, which didn’t matter so much to me but did to others. Our hotel, the Alexandra Curio was a short walk from Passeig de Gràcia, one of the main passageways in the area.
Our room came with a European-sized bathroom, but an ample sized voyeur balcony and pillow kingdom. You bet I made myself comfortable in the proper spot.
One can only loiter for so long in the hotel before it was time to get out and about. So out we went. Compared to Las Vegas where it gets bright early, sunrise doesn’t happen till past 8am here. Since I’m a nocturnal bear it didn’t matter, but it did feel strange to see how ‘early morning’ it felt even at 9am.
Barcelona is famous for being home to the architect Antoni Gaudí, known for his, what I call “pretty weird architecture.” Gaudí’s work is part of some Modernista movement that draws inspiration from Gothic and Oriental architecture. For me it just looked weird, and very organic and biological and structures felt like bones and muscles. Gaudí’s work is scattered all across the city, but his most famous work is the still-under-construction Sagrada Família, so that’s where we headed.
Like most large stone buildings, this basilica has taken a long time to build. Ground breaking happened in 1882 and construction is expected to complete by 2026, for the centenary of Gaudí’s death. This means it’ll have taken 144 years to build — which would still be less time than it took to build the Notre Dame Cathedral. Construction sure has sped up since.
La Sagrada Família is not a cathedral, but rather a basilica — something I only just learned. Cathedrals are reserved as the home of a bishop. Basilicas are any place of importance to the Pope. In contrast to the outside which is super ornate — especially the Nativity Facade (the only side Gaudí was alive to see), the inside was a lot more simplistic. I like that.
I learned that the pillars were inspired by tree trunks, and that the different columns were made of different stone to support different heights. The stained glass was also designed deliberately with a deliberate mood shift from warm glows to cool.
And this is the bronze door to the Passion facade. Over 8000 characters have been cast on these doors.
We didn’t get the right kinds of tickets that let us go up the stairs of the Basilica, so with that we were done. We did peek into the basement where we saw the 3D printing workshop where they test out sculptures before carving them out in stone. Definitely more efficient.
Next stop – the Hop on Hop off bus tour.
My impressions? Overrated. Most of the attractions were not viewable from the street. There was little narration. And it was cold. But it was a quick way to see Barcelona since we had limited time.
And that was that.
We’d been listening to an audiobook – Blood, Sweat and Pixels. One of the chapters was dedicated to one of my favourite gaming companies — Blizzard.
So naturally when we were in town for a conference already we decided to pay a business visit to our friend who works there.
And here’s the campus.
I mean, you only had to get through chain linked fences and a security guard to get to this point of the premise.
Rounding the corner brings you to the famous orc statue. You can read about the making of this orc statue on the Blizzard web site.
Naturally I posed in front of it.
Normally the Orc isn’t covered by knitting — it’s only there for Christmas but they’re a little slow. So it’s like we got to see the special spawn!
And here’s the lobby.
After that, we got a tour of Blizzard — including a glimpse of their special operations command room where they can see server stats around the world!
UNfortunately most of the areas were blocked off and closed – even for a VIB like me.
Another time. One day I shall OWN MULTIPLE game companies. Till then I’ll just selfie in front of this one.
This weekend my bud and I decided to sponsor our first game jam event. This fellow that we knew was organizing it, and we all know I’m in full support of more gaming activity in Las Vegas. It was held at the Reflint experience centre.
Here’s us getting set up. Donuts? Check.
Game developers? Check.
Giant banner giving us full credit? Almost check. My name wasn’t on it.
Well still, it’s nice to see this type of activity happening in Las Vegas. I might do it again.
This weekend, we went to LA to check out the Rocket League World Championships. I was there to cheer on my favourite teams in my bud’s current favourite game – Rocket League. Rocket League is one of the smaller e-sports games, but how can you not like rocket cars that fly and kick balls?
The RLCS World Championships of 2017 was held at the Wiltern Theatre.
There was a healthy crowd cheering on all the teams. I cheered right along. Go Rogue! Go Leftovers!
I must say it was definitely one of the more satisfying weekends. It is anytime I can combine gaming with work research! Bud! Make me an esports team!
My paws smack with deft, swift and deadly accuracy. I steathily sneak where no bear has gone before. I soar through the air like a sharp blade of steel. It’s like I’m a bear ninja.
Pokin found this site, On Camera Audiences, which lets you get tickets to see shows as an audience member for free, and today, I’m waiting in line to watch other ninjas at work – American Ninjas in the American Ninja Warrior finale.
We tried to do this last year too, but got in too late, so this time we weren’t taking chances. It wasn’t even dark yet and here we were in line with a bunch of other people.
Bit by by, we inched towards the front line. Check out this banner! It could be me competing!
After about an hour of waiting, they finally let us in. They gave us some souvenir wristbands and a security band. Even though you can get tickets in shifts, when you’re in you’re in, and they don’t keep track of who’s still supposed to be there. So if you end up getting tickets, try not to get the last shift of the day as you might not get in.
Our group was there for the last section of stage 1. Cool! We get to see the contestants finish!
And so we sat.
And waited.
And sat.
And realized that being stage 4 meant that you really didn’t get to see a lot of action.
Oh! Today is filming day for team Ninja Warrior?
Make that really not a lot of action, given that there were only four teams.
Three hours later, well after it got fully dark, we tiredly filtered out of the stadium, having only seen the stunt guys test run the course plus a couple of the actual contestants that made it this far.
I bet I would have wowed the crowd if it were ME doing the course.
Maybe another year.
At least I can say I got to see other ninjas at work.
And hey! Maybe I ended up on TV!
The LAST time we were in Hong Kong, we had the misfortune of coming during Chinese New Year.
For what was supposed to be an auspicious time of the year, they decided to screw over the bear and close all the cool shops. Meaning I couldn’t go to any of the electronics shops all.
This time around, things were open so I got to go to an electronics market. We went to 168 Market in Wanchai.
To be honest, I didn’t know what to expect. I thought it’d be like a cool live version of Amazon.com?
It ended up being stall after stall of these tiny shops selling random things like cell phone cases and more cell phone cases. There were three labyrinth floors of stores, each run by owners that may or may not be present. We even passed a store with stacks of games that I looked at wistfully.
Games. I played those once.
First more bears. Then a bunny. A bot. Now Bees.
I don’t need bees. Bees in the house means that my bud has to take care of them which means less time to game with me.
Well bees didn’t get the memo. They lived in the house before we came, and have been unwanted guests ever since.
The latest invasion happened in the roof. So my bud got a bee suit and tried to smoke them out
He asked if I wanted to help. And get honey all over my paws? And give Pokin an excuse to force me to take a bath?
NO Thanks. I’ll watch from the ground.
Smoke those bees out quick though! Gaming doesn’t wait for anybody or any bee.
So my bud’s sister’s expecting a kid. Naturally being the generous bear I am, I made my bud go find him a fitting gift.
What gift is more fitting than a onsie with my face on it?
So we went to gift it to his sister.
Look at the size of that belly! It’s bigger than I am!
Ok kid, just hurry on out so uncle Sumi can teach you a thing or two about the priorities of life.
Like the importance of gaming for starters.
So PoOn came to town and Nicholas started talking about his favourite station, the Santa Fe station where he goes to indulge in gluttinous overeating at their ridiculously cheap local’s buffet.
“Has Sumi been there yet?” PoOn asked.
Exactly the right question. Why HAVEN’T I been there yet when it’s my bud’s favourite station?
So it was settled. We were going to Nicholas’ favourite station and I was coming.
Well the buffet was just O.K. Not really much in the way of foods I like, but everyone else seemed to like it fine.
Then it was time for BUFFALO! One of Nicholas’ favourite games at the Station Casino is the Buffalo Slots machine. Because it says BUFFALO!! There was a bears one too but somehow that wasn’t as interesting. Probably because I wasn’t in it.
So we sat down and started gaming. Time to bust out my lucky bear skillz!
And I won! You know it!!!! This game is easy. I should play it more often! Then Nicholas wouldn’t have to raid my bear box as often.