Every so often someone emails me to complain about the direction of the comic. "I liked it better when you were doing ingame comics". "Do a comic about something other than WoW". "Yadda yadda yadda". "Blah blah blah". **rolls his eyes and makes the talking sign with his hand**

The WoW one was the most recent. And by way of suggesting a new game, I was linked to The Endless Forest. I went with an open mind but what I found left me sputtering. In the Endless Forest, you are a deer. And that's it. You're a deer in a forest with a mysterious ruin, a pond, and you can only communicate with the other players deer through sounds and gestures. There's nothing to do. No goals. No quests. Just deer. Some have symbols over their heads since deer don't have names.

So... since I expect the very reason for complaining about WoW comics and thus linking me to the Endless Forest was so that I would comment on the game. I feel my obligation has been fulfilled. It's not a game for me. I'm more interested in playing a game than just being social. This game wasn't really designed for me. It was designed for people who want to socialize in a new and interesting way. So, if your curiosity is piqued, I encourage you to go and try it out.

Now, in closing, I'd like to tell you what I told him in regards to how I handle the creation of the comic.

From my perspective, by asking me no to do WoW comics, he's essentially asking me to produce comics that appeal specifically to him. But, I play host to 30 some odd thousand people per day and each one of them would like the comic to cater to their specific desires. And, since those desires often contradict each other, the ONLY person I can cater to with unwavering success is myself. Put simply, since I can't please everyone it's easiest to endeavor only to please myself. Hope that all makes sense.

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Today's Pimpage: Woody is wearing an "Everybody Loves A Yeti" shirt and Ted is wearing a "Black Hole Escape" shirt from Threadless.Com. Ted is Talking about the game The Endless Forest.

Good answer Woody I have enjoyed pretty much every comic that you have made over the years, even the few that have made me go "WTF" I don't get it. Keep doing what your doing, why try and fix what's not broken.

As a side note, have you seen they are making a ZORK MMO?

Makes perfect sense. Even though I am one of the crowd that detests WoW. So those comics don't really appeal, or make much sense to me. I do enjoy your gaming news comics more. But deer? Must be for kids.

...isn't there a Ricky Nelson song in there, somewhere...?

Because it's not like, you know, your site started out as an in-game comic site or anything like that. Fippy sez hi.

p.s. What level do you have to be before your Deer turns into an Elk?

Point well noted and will be remembered. By the way, you came up with something far better than I could have thought of. Excellent job.

hah, I used to play that game too. For like a week. The game LOOKED appealing. But as you said, there was nothing to do. There where a few Easter eggs. That I found entertaining to do.

And since your taking suggestions, how about .....

I'm kidding, ya keep doing what ever you want. Always fun to be surprised by what you put up every day.

Originally Posted by brionl:

Because it's not like, you know, your site started out as an in-game comic site or anything like that. Fippy sez hi.

p.s. What level do you have to be before your Deer turns into an Elk?

You have to have played or been registered for a month.

Based purely on the screenshots of the game ( they were not interesting enough to me to read the about the game itself ) I would guess that in the Endless forest, there are no levels, everyone wins and amazing things like butterflies landing on children's noses happen every day!

C'mon now. No need to be so negative is there? Remember the forum rules.

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My site didn't start as an "in-game" comic. Two weeks after GU was released to the public the first Woody & Ted strip was posted. Now just as then, if I'm playing a game it tends to be the focus of the comic. If I'm not playing anything or don't have time to play anything, the comic's focus shifts to gaming news. When nothing else comes to me, I do something completely random.

That's the way it's always been. I think too many people let nostalgia taint their memory.