Ctrl Alt Delete

Getting Ninja Turtles vibe from this one.

Don't really know what to think about this new arc. Making them superheroes isn't a very original idea, but let's see if he can makes it work. Ethan is still kind of a moron I see... but he seems to be competent enough. However, giving him infinite lives? Nope. That's just an excuse to draw him suffering horrible deaths with no repercussions whatsoever. Right now, it's fine, I guess it falls under the Comically Invincible Hero trope, but it will become Boring Invincible Hero pretty quickly if that power isn't desactivated one way or the other. At least, the art is nice. Wait and see I guess. I'm willing to give the comic a new chance.

I think it only risks running into Boring Invincible Hero if we're ever meant to take it seriously. Same thing with Lucas's power of making arrows that do stuff, which is ridiculous and nonsensical, but works within the realm of pure comedy.

The general tone of the comic to this point as well as the nature of the conflict - fighting anti-technology technology over the future of video games - doesn't lend itself particularly well to nail-biting edge-of-your-seat suspense.

CAD has done serious drama in the past with these guys, but this particular story doesn't strike me as one of their serious drama bits, and I'm only about half convinced Ethan and Lucas will remain superheroes past the end of this one story.

EDIT: And, as an aside, I consider Ethan's infinite lives power to be a Visual Pun calling out the fact that Ethan, for almost the entirety of the comic's run, was nonsensically indestructible. His superpower is suffering no ill consequences for his stupid, short-sighted, randomly impulsive actions? Yes, yes it is.

edited 18th Nov '14 7:32:37 AM by TobiasDrake

Looks like a new attempt at a serious storyline is going on.

As serious as gamer-themed superheroes battling an internet troll can be, anyway. Ethan and Lucas have settled themselves into a neat little niche that blends a super-silly tone with serious plots. It's kind of perfect for them, given what pre-boot CAD was like.

edited 9th Dec '15 7:34:57 AM by TobiasDrake

I don't know, I feel a bit uncomfortable with it. Maybe it's that for me, now that the troll has gone full Joker, the line has only been crossed once, not twice.

edited 9th Dec '15 8:30:03 AM by Medinoc

I'm expecting a twist. The Sadistic Choice is too straightforward for a trickster archetype.

And frankly I'm not impressed whatsoever by the new "2.0" get up.

I retract one of my previous statements. It's quite obvious in hindsight he hadn't gone full Joker yet.

So he is going the Batman route? Not that I dislike the Joker or anything, but would it be possible to make this more original? What would be a more original supervillain form for a troll? Ideas?

Is there anyway to filter the comics by story arc?

The space opera one seems fun. I like the ships.

I also kinda like the 4-gamers roleplaying sessions.

Man, you know you're getting old when your kids start reading your web comic and have to ask you about all these things you took for granted once. That certainly puts a different spin on "not being old enough to read this".

Is anyone still reading this comic? It's gotten quite a bit better these days.

mostly individual strips, when someone posts on reddit, having stumbled upon it recently, astonished that it evolved beyond B^D

Not by much, mind you, but I'm glad to see he moved beyond that awful sitcom-thing he had going before.

Nah, the difference is clear and noticeable. he's drawing each panel from scratch, and his command of anatomy and composition is far far superior to his B^D days. There's even the occasional exotic camera angle for the Drama

i mean, you would hope that twenty years of progress and experience would count for something

Edited by blkwhtrbbt on Oct 30th 2023 at 9:21:02 AM

Yeah, okay, fair enough. I think I just sorta forgot how bad the earlier days were before reminding myself.

I did NOT read ctrl-alt-del in its days of infamy. I only knew of it through

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And it was only until its more recent comics, which involved satirical takes on shady videogame industry practices, that I really paid even the slightest amount of attention to it.

Edited by blkwhtrbbt on Oct 30th 2023 at 9:26:40 AM

The RPG plot is pretty fun, and the Starcaster one is also pretty interesting.

The problem was never his art, it's his writing. He comes up with decent ideas for jokes, and then kills them every time with Way. Too. Much. Text.

(with one infamous exception)

Edited by shigmiya64 on Oct 31st 2023 at 4:31:45 AM

He seems to be doing better with that, too.

Perhaps I should start keeping an eye on it again.

He seems to be doing better with that, too.

(looks at the current page◊)

(drowns in text)

Granted, coming in in the middle of an... arc (I assume) might be unfair, but it's really funny to be seeing "he's doing better with the walls of text!" and then seeing... that.

Granted the art really has improved by leaps and bounds.

Edited by Larkmarn on Nov 15th 2023 at 1:48:52 PM

This is the middle of a dialogue scene, yes. A much needed one too, if you've been following along.

Uh. At the very least, choose a more readable font. This one feels... cramped. And the italics make it a w f u l.

It's not even that much text, it just feels like it is

Admittedly, needless italics and bold fonts are everywhere in comics. And hey, at least this font is readable, which is something I can't always say about actual mainstream published comics.