If artists for the mainstream comics world can crank out a page of pencils a day, he damn well ought to be able to get a page penciled, inked, and up on the web at least three times a week.
Megatokyo isn't even inked, so it makes it that much less acceptable. Though, from what I understand from Webcomics Weekly, having a successful webcomic requires a lot of time cultivating your community in addition to actually creating.
Well,in that case, just go back three pages, and you're all caught up.
Also - The rolling in money thing is an old joke, from back when Piro was one of the first webcomic artists actually making enough money to not have another job, and actually do well enough at it that he wasn't living out of a hovel, and eating nothing but bugs and instant ramen. Back then, it was pretty much him, Howard Taylor, and that's about it. I don't think even Gabe and Tycho were fully self employed, at that point - at best, it was Tycho supporting Gabe, while gabe worked only on the comic.
Megatokyo was great at a certain point in my life: When I was a no-nothing, alone, scared loser with the clothes on my back and a daunting change in my life ahead of me. Maybe the comic was better back then, maybe I was just stupider and with worse standards, but Megatokyo captured a certain moment for me: that moment when it felt like it was me vs. the world, and the world was going to win. For that year or so, Megatokyo was the best thing ever. I don't know if I changed and left it behind, or it changed and left me behind, but that spark just isn't there any more. Maybe it never was, and I just imagined it.
I don't know - I still read it, and It sometimes has a good moment here and there, but it's just not consistently good like, say, Schlock Mercenary or PennyArcade are.
I don't know - I still read it, and It sometimes has a good moment here and there, but it's just not consistently good like, say, Schlock Mercenary or PennyArcade are.
I don't know - I still read it, and It sometimes has a good moment here and there, but it's just not consistently good like, say, Schlock Mercenary or PennyArcade are.
It was good enough early on. Once Largo got flanderized into what he is now, the manga lost a lot.
I was picking comics of the same-ish age on purpose. XKCD is consistently good, but it's also been around a much shorter time.
It was good enough early on. Once Largo got flanderized into what he is now, the manga lost a lot.
Absolutely - Piro is trying to re-introduce some depth to the character with the whole Dating-the-ex-idol storyline, but really, he's just a sucky character writer. Piro in the comic is and always has been an idealised self insert, and the rest are cookie cutter Manga archetypes. Largo doesn't fit with that, so he has trouble giving him any depth beyond goofy, geeky slapstick antics.
I don't understand why people care so much about slow update schedules. I read some comics that come out every day, some that come out three days, some come out once a week, some who knows when. I just check each one every day, and if it never updates, who cares? As long as it's good when it does come out, then I'll keep checking it. Granted, if a comic is actually done, done done, then stop checking. When it comes to comics, quality is what matters, not quantity.
For example, awhile back I read Booster Gold Showcase. It's a gigantic book containing many many comic issues. It's also so incredibly painfully corny. I gave it away at a swap table at Recess, and I saw it again on the same swap table months later. I would rather have a single Perry Bible Fellowship strip than that entire book.
I don't understand why people care so much about slow update schedules. I read some comics that come out every day, some that come out three days, some come out once a week, some who knows when. I just check each one every day, and if it never updates, who cares? As long as it's good when it does come out, then I'll keep checking it. Granted, if a comic is actually done, done done, then stop checking. When it comes to comics, quality is what matters, not quantity.
Normally I don't care about update schedule that much, but when it's something like Megatokyo, slowly coming updates are no good. These days Megatokyo is all about the story, and one page doesn't really mean anything in there. Many other webcomics at least give you something every time, joke or at least enough story to it to go forward, but single page of Megatokyo is just single page of a comic, it might have cool art, or funny joke, or it might not, it's just a part of bigger picture. And following that bigger picture gets kinda hard when webcomic updates once to twice per month.
The problem that I had with Megatokyo when I stopped reading it was just that. Let's say there is three different story arcs going on same time, A, B and C. First we get one or two months A (about three pages) then two pages of B (month), then some C (two months) then we are back to A, that you have already forgotten since you have been seeing B and C for last three months. The way how the story of Megatokyo is being told, doesn't work as a webcomic for me.
For example, awhile back I read Booster Gold Showcase. It's a gigantic book containing many many comic issues. It's also so incredibly painfully corny. I gave it away at a swap table at Recess, and I saw it again on the same swap table months later. I would rather have a single Perry Bible Fellowship strip than that entire book.
That's different, though - you already had read the entire story and had it right there in one volume. You weren't waiting multiple weeks at a time for a page to be produced so you could read it. If it's a one-off, self-contained webcomic, like most PBF strips, then a long wait between strips isn't as big of a deal. It won't earn the artist any new fans or repeat page views while he's not producing new content, but you know that you're not missing out on any of the storyline in the interim wait. As Apsup said, if a webcomic is all about the story (and especially if there are multiple plot lines running at the same time) then massive waits between content release dates do the reader no good because they'll get so lost that they either have to step back through the last couple months worth of strips or they just say "to hell with it" and give up on the strip entirely. It'd be like if you and Rym were only doing one mega-episode a week and had been doing that on a regular schedule, but then suddenly dropped off the face of the earth for a month at a time and the release of the show became sporadic. The existing fanbase would probably stick around but you wouldn't be gaining yourselves any new fans at a great rate because the people expecting new content would get bored with waiting and write you off as a pair of flakes that can't deliver with the goods.
I don't think MT was ever really about the story. The story of MT was always this very deus ex machina whatever happens happens thing. I think the thing that MegaTokyo did early on was the thing that Penny Arcade still does. It created characters that were just very relatable, and then put them in goofy situations we would like to be in. You can see moments of your friendship with other people in Megatokyo. IT was bad, but in this totally silly, goofy, nifty way that WORKED.
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Also - The rolling in money thing is an old joke, from back when Piro was one of the first webcomic artists actually making enough money to not have another job, and actually do well enough at it that he wasn't living out of a hovel, and eating nothing but bugs and instant ramen. Back then, it was pretty much him, Howard Taylor, and that's about it. I don't think even Gabe and Tycho were fully self employed, at that point - at best, it was Tycho supporting Gabe, while gabe worked only on the comic.
The rest of the FRC told me not to, so I listened.
Tech; Agreed. I left around when Largo was fixing ex idol tsundere's computer or something. The update schedule is just too slow.
For example, awhile back I read Booster Gold Showcase. It's a gigantic book containing many many comic issues. It's also so incredibly painfully corny. I gave it away at a swap table at Recess, and I saw it again on the same swap table months later. I would rather have a single Perry Bible Fellowship strip than that entire book.
The problem that I had with Megatokyo when I stopped reading it was just that. Let's say there is three different story arcs going on same time, A, B and C. First we get one or two months A (about three pages) then two pages of B (month), then some C (two months) then we are back to A, that you have already forgotten since you have been seeing B and C for last three months. The way how the story of Megatokyo is being told, doesn't work as a webcomic for me.
And then Piro decided to be a stupid emo kid.