Comic for Friday, December 11th
Well, not only is this comic on-time for the site… it was on time for Patreon! And monday’s should be up there by end of day. A hell of a thing, this being on schedule (don’t get too used to it… it upsets the natural order of cosmos or something 😉 )
Well, we see another player enter the field. Good thing there is a character list to keep track of them. What? I haven’t updated that in HOW many months? Ah… Hmmm. Uh. Well, I should get on that, shouldn’t I? Update coming soon to a character list near you! 😉
On that note, if you didn’t see the new vote incentive, check it out up to the left by voting, but it’s a limited time offer cause there will be a new one this weekend! 😛 Further, we have a new sketchbook here. Looks suspiciously like the cover-page for a short side story set in the past. Huh. Weird, that… 😛
Though I say that, I haven’t quite decided if that’s what I’m going to be working on. I’ve been been giving some serious consideration to writing an introductory series of pages that set up the world, which to-be-honest would be a bit of a 180 from my current start of “start the story, explain nothing!”, and I think targeted at a different reader group – there are some that prefer as little time spent expositioning as possible, and there are some that love every detail of the world (to balancing and moderation, I say pah! don’t defy my easily labeled categories!). I may compromise and make it a separate “about the world” page (Then I’d have to come up with a new Patreon goal to replace that one – but we’ll manage), overtime and talking to various readers it has seemed that it’s a crowd that would like more detail about the world… and ultimately I’m one of those in what I enjoy, so I will probably start leaning toward providing more mechanical information (how things work in the setting – I mean, I have spools of it as this point) at least outside of the comic in some format.
On an interesting note… I’ve redrawn the first page once more! This interesting lines up to a new version of the first page every six months (roughly), which is a sort of fun-snapshot of progress in art, they can be viewed here, here and here in chronological order. The new page isn’t exactly a work of art, but it’s just a little fun to see them side-by-side imo. Well. Besides the nausea the old art induces in me, but as I choose to intercept that as a sign of progress… here’s to hoping the new art will be just as bad in another year! I suppose that qualifies as my celebration of 1-year of posting this comic 😛
Been a fun ride, and we’ll head just a lil’ stronger into the next year.
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Called it, sorta
Been following the comic for a while and I do find it interesting. But there’s so much complexity and so many names involved that I’m having difficulty following. I sometimes feel confused. And I think my biggest problem is knowing the WHERE.
This page is a good example as it represents an obvious scene change. Where is this? It would help if you printed the location and/or time for scene changes, like they do on some mystery TV series. (The X-Files comes to mind.)
Consider that there are several nations, agencies, corporations, and dimensions involved. These are the major powers, correct?:
IDS
PACT Corporation Alliance
Malsa (the nation)
Avon, Inc
Kor’s World
Obviously, Kor’s World belongs to it’s own dimension. Other than that… Are the rest all part of the same world/dimension? Because, until now, I had suspected otherwise.
Part of my problem may be that these are powers and not locations per se. IDS and PACT are organizations, whereas Avon is a corporation, Malsa is a nation, and Kor’s world is another dimension/world. What nation is Avon’s headquarters located in? Or it is not relevant?
Also, would IDS be the equivalent to the United Nations’ department of Inter-dimensional affairs (if it had such a thing)?
Haha, I very much sympathize with this issue; I did briefly start including location tags on sudden scene swaps, but wasn’t confident that they provided enough information to be helpful; however, the correct approach was probably to fix that issue somehow rather than abandon the tactic. It’s definitely good feedback and something I will attempt to implement; for example, here I could at least do [In a Cluttered Apartment in Malsa] or something.
Considering the generally opacity of the situation, you’ve got a really solid grasp on it so far! That’s a pretty complete list of the players at hand 🙂
Avon is located in Ogasa, the capital city of Arpon (a neighboring country), but have many labs/offices in Malsa; the reason for the later bit will likely come up soon, but I agree that it would be almost impossible to know that using the comic alone. Avon, PACT, Malsa are all part of based on the same world, and we’ve only actually seen one world so far; though the IDS and Kor’s World originate from other places. The only time we’ve seen outside of Malsa is the scene with the Avon board room, way back. Though it had a location tag, I fully sympathize that it would mean nothing without greater context! 😛 (and I’ve stopped since even doing that…)
The IDS is pretty much exactly that, but with the wrinkle of that they are a different world’s United Nation’s equivalent (which makes them less popular in this world 😛 ) which is why they frequently work (through the Corporate Affair’s branch) with PACT. The Criminal Investigations branch of the IDS we’ve seen is their office in Malsa, which is responsible for the region (including Malsa, Arpon, and several other countries).
I think I will try to reintegrate location tags, and actually move forward with providing a “World” section, an in part of that will basically make a “cast page” for the organizations.
I really appreciate the comment, and will do what I can to make clear this up for future! 😉
Sorry for such a long comment, but always happy to clear things up in comments when I can 😐
I wonder who she’s talking about……
Not a Designer Child, but with her looks, she probably doesn’t fit the “lonely nerd” category that Ryn was hoping for. 🙂
Whoa! Just look at all the backgrounds! Either the Surface really was holding you back, or you actually did get to rest and recharge. ^^
Indeed, indeed. Though I would hazard that if her hair wasn’t grown out, she would certainly pass for one… 😉 Makes you wonder exactly HOW long it’s been since she’s been outside… 😐
In the end the surface’s quality of art wasn’t that much lower (imo, besides effects), but it was much slowly to work with, which lowers the amount of total detail that’s viable.
Plus making an utter mess of her apartment (and covering the walls with posters) were both deemed essential to her character introduction… 😛