Justifiably Concerned
SO I guess Christopher C. Livingston’s nefarious plan worked out pretty well. By posting a comment on Fleen and linking to his comic, he managed to devour my allotted studying time this evening and also compelled me to write this post about him.
(Note: Writing Fleen posts is also not considered studying.)
So Concerned is a video game screen shot comic. I know, I know. The phrase isn’t exactly synonymous with quality web comic production, but Chris could be on to something here. First of all, he’s using Half Life 2, which is a pretty darn versatile game engine. Each panel of the comic is composed in the same way as any comic. Chris manipulates the world, right down to the facial expressions, to show us exactly what he wants us to see. This isn’t just some kid pressing print-screen while playing Diablo and then entering “funny�? speech bubbles.
Secondly, the writing is actually pretty funny. At first it seems like there is going to be a lot of lame Half Life jokes, but instead the strip winds up poking fun at the game in a lot of fairly original, but more importantly, entertaining ways. The drawback to this is, obviously, that it won’t make a lot of sense to you if you haven’t played Half Life 2. lets face it though, it isn’t the only web comic out there dedicated to a particular game/hobby/lifestyle. I mean come on, Librarians even have their own web comic now.
As game engines get more sophisticated, I think the potential for this sort of comic will increase, and although things like concerned and Flintlock’s Guide are entertaining, it would be nice to see something of this ilk that could appeal to a wider audience. That said, if you played through Half Life 2 and enjoyed it, Chris Livingston has bound to have at least one strip in there that will make you laugh.
“I mean come on, Librarians even have their own web comic now.”
Unshelved has been around for at least four years. That hardly makes it a new comic by webcomic standards.
By Christopher B. Wright on 05.23.06 9:15 pm
I’ve never played Half-Life, and “Concerned” is one of my favorite webcomics. It’s all about the writing, people. Go Livingston, go!
By Paul Southworth on 05.23.06 9:24 pm
Ummm…
By Jeff Lowrey on 05.23.06 10:07 pm
Concerned also uses some custom mods and skins not from the game, and I think the artist made those skins/mods. If so, there’s actually quite a bit of “new” art in there…
By Wingie on 05.23.06 11:04 pm
I should mention I didn’t make any of the custom skins or models you see in the comic — others made them for me. The G-Mod community is very strong and helpful, and if you need something special made, all you really have to do is ask. They’re cool like that.
Also, as Jeff points out, my comic was covered on Fleen a while back, but heck, I ain’t complaining. Thanks for the post.
By Chris on 05.24.06 11:24 am
By Brad Hawkins on 05.24.06 11:38 am
Hey, could I get away with the same thing? I wanna burn your study time, too.
‘Course with my comic, it’ll only burn about twelve minutes.
By spinn on 05.24.06 12:21 pm
Oops. My extreme HTML skills strike again. What I meant to say was:
How about reading them? Can we get away with that?
By Brad Hawkins on 05.24.06 5:35 pm
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