Inventory Full, Spring Training, and 2018 March Mammal Madness

Daily Ramble 163: Inventory Full, Spring Training, and 2018 March Mammal Madness

It’s that time of year again…March is almost upon us and everyone starts to look at making their bracket picks. This year’s March Mammale Madness is just around the corner and I’m really looking forward to it. The brackets aren’t even announced yet but they have listed the divisions and I’m itching to start making my picks. It’s also the time of year for Spring Training and my Angels are starting spring games. Of course they started out with a loss but I’m excited and think this’ll be a great season for them. They’re gonna make it to the playoffs again, I’m sure. Finally I take a trip to the 5th degree and visit Inventory Full and it’s fun to see what Bhagpuss has to discuss these days.

March Mammal Madness

It’s that time of year again where we start getting prepared for the great 2018 March Mammal Madness and I am really excited this year. I’m getting ready a bit earlier than last year so I can do my research before I make my bracket picks…the brackets haven’t even been released yet, but they did announce the 4 divisions that’ll be facing off against each other.

From the looks of things the organizers are really mixing things up this year as there’s a whole division that doesn’t have a single mammal in it. Huh? I guess some non-mammal got ahold of the bracket computers and is setting things up.

In any case, the other 3 divisions are the Urban Jungle, Antecessors, and Great Adaptations. And with critters that aren’t even cuddly mammals involved in the fight this year I can expect the battle locations will play an even more important role in determining the outcome. Nonetheless, I’m looking forward to the games…they’ve gotta be more exciting than these Winter Olympics.

The full listing for the opening round will be released on March 1st over at Mammals Suck…Milk! but they’re getting things ramped up already.

Inventory Full

Bhagpuss over at Inventory Full has been another blogger I’ve followed for a few years. Located in the 5th degree on this trip, I’m once again sure he’s much closer to my site if I traveled all the links…I’m just too lazy to follow ALL connections though.

In any case, he’s got quite a diversity of thoughts over there about all kinds of games and stuff. One post that really drew my attention was one in which he talked about Transvision Vamp. For the longest time I felt like I was the only person on the face of the planet that recalled this band. In fact I actually added a few of their songs to my daily randomized listening playlist and was excited to hear them again. How is it that within a single week, I’ve thought of, listened to, and then saw referenced a band that has pretty much been faded from the public for decades? They were never that big to begin with so I’m even more flummoxed. Bhagpuss goes on in the post to talk about MMOs that at one point were games he was looking forward to, but have since kinda faded from possibility. I think it’s cool and important to remember these games because all forms of creativity, even those that don’t pan out, are still useful for mind exercises.

He also talks about DCUO which is a game I had thought was no longer around…oops, I guess it’s still alive. I suppose with the various superhero genre MMOs that have come and gone I just figured this one was gone too. I’m sure it’s nothing compared to my beloved City of Heroes but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t give it a shot since it’s been able to survive all this time. They have events and scavenger hunts, and I guess even tie things to the real life calendar where there is a Flash appreciation day…who’d have thought. Anyway, I’m gonna have to see about giving this thing a try. Maybe it’ll be worth a few hours of my time from month to month, Bhagpuss seems to think so.

Another post I enjoyed talked about PvP and the fact that there are so few contests in MMOs that don’t revolve around killing. And it’s not just PvP, but PvE and most questing is all about the killing…or delivering the mail. Personally I prefer games like Secret World Legends where you actually have to think about the missions. Mindless killing or focused assault on other players are not the only forms of struggle that can be represented in a video game. Let’s see more games that expand and break away from the tired combat structures and explore new methods of interaction. I mean, at least Eve Online has market based combat and a lot of games try with auction houses, but there are other ways to compete. Even with all the MMOs that have come out recently and are due out this year, I really can’t say that I know of any that make an effort to break away from the standard fighting theme. Perhaps ECO might be a step in that direction where you have a civilization working together to try to stop a meteor from crashing into the planet, but I can’t really say…I haven’t go around to trying that game yet. If that’s the point, that I applaud the game and hope to see more, similar gameplay down the road.

These are just a small sample of the wide variety of games and topics that Bhagpuss covers in his blog and I’m glad Inventory Full is within my Six Degrees.

This has been an installment of my Six Degrees 2018 series in which I take a look at the wonderful blogs that surround Beyond Tannhauser Gate. The blogosphere is large but there are so many friends to be found within Six Degrees.

Spring Training Begins

Today marks the opening of Spring Training games in Florida and Arizona and it kicks off a season I’m looking forward to. Sadly, my team started out on a sour note and lost 9–8. Which actually isn’t too bad, usually they tend to have a better regular season when they don’t do too well during the Spring.

From what I saw though, the offense is much further along in development than the pitching. I actually was able to watch a few innings on the MLB app on my iPad and saw some decent fireworks. In the first inning both the Angels and A’s scored seemingly at will and after a bunch of hits and a HR, the game started out 3–4 in favor of the A’s. Later when I came in at the 8th inning, the Angels roared back and scored 4 runs to make it 8–7 and things looked good for my team. But then a non-roster pitcher came in. He’s kinda like the AAA pitcher in Scoresheet baseball…the one who lofts the ball over the plate hoping the batter will hit it at someone. Well, after a couple walks someone hit it where no one could get to it and the Angels lost 8–9.

No matter, the season is starting and I’m excited to see where things go.