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XenoCam Archives
The XenoCam started as an excuse to cameo other comic characters; the
idea was that the Unknown Benefactors had surveilliance drones that
reached outside of the comic strip into alien dimensions and the like.
Then I decided that that broke the 4th wall a little too much, and
left it as a visual gag in the strip.
After that, I found SOLDIER
(well, the creator pointed it out to me on IRC), and I decided to use
the XenoCam motif to highlight comics that were slightly alien,
either in content or style.
I haven't been perfect about this in the past, but henceforth, I will
only mark alien comics with "XenoCam." The others will simply be
highlighted links. Those will pass into the Links page, while the
XenoCam targets will end up here.
The original XenoCam target, and, true to the name, one of the most
alien sets of comics on the web. David Schumacher's ATP Productions
houses a wide variety of works, and all are produced with normal
computer equipment (e.g. mouse-drawn). As of Feb 28, 2001, the
flagship strip, Project Zebula,
will terminate, and the subsidiary strips will take the forefront. Of
these, SOLDIER will probably be
the new flagship, though it barely qualifies as a comic--it's more of
a series of graphic essays on life, mind, and death. It's
introspective almost to the point of total solipsism, but it's an
interesting experiment, and one well worth checking out.
Note that SOLDIER has absolutely no relation to Cloud's former unit
from Final Fantasy 7: go read RPG World if you're looking
for that.
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Although they're definitely alien, I don't typically like "anti-humor"
comics like Pokey the Penguin. Slackers and Losers is carved from
that mold, but makes just enough sense to be worth reading
through. As you may have noticed from the image link above, S&L is
not actually drawn. However, instead of resorting to stick figures or
cut-and-pasted mouse-drawn characters, it uses modified Mega Man
sprites. The overall effect is one of watching cutscenes unfold from
some half-remembered video game from your childhood.
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Ancient Messages,
by Katherine Nelson. This strip was brought to my attention by gwalla
on the WS forum, who described it as a "Lovecraftian Webcomic." Well,
I looked at it and it is indeed packed with implacable eldritch
forces, cursed bloodlines, magic, horror, and mystery. Whether this
makes it Lovecraftian or not was a topic of debate in the forum.
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Mark Shallows' Adventurers! and Ian J's
RPG World share the
XenoCam this time around, because their themes are identical. Both of
them are parodies of console-style RPGs, and both derive most of their
humor from the quirks of these games ("Hey look! I found a Rune Sword
in the shower!")
Beyond this, however, these are very distinct comics. (They were
anyway. Ian hadn't heard of Adventurers! when he developed RPG
World.) Adventurers! parodies a longer tradition of games (if you
actually recall the line "You spoony bard!" you simply must
read Adventurers) and as a result has the disjointed, vague feel that
a lot of early RPGs had. RPG World on the other hand is parodying the
later games, especially Final Fantasy 7. It's much newer, but it
looks like it's going to try to have a continuing plot, as opposed to
just a recurring villain.
All in all, this produces a very nice "alien world" effect, or should.
If it doesn't, you really need to put down the controller and
go outside for awhile. There aren't any wandering monsters. Honest.
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Dan Jaaren's Life of Riley is the fifth XenoCam. Read about it here.
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XenoCam #6 is Damonk's "Framed!!!", but my commentary thereupon is too lengthy to cram in a sidebar. Read it here.
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