City of Glass: It Was a Phone Call That Started It by Bill Kartalopoulos @ The Comics Journal
KeinerMachtsBesser.de
Currently Playing
I watch a fair amount of Twitch.tv. It’s my go-to evening entertainment, when I don’t play videogames myself.
Besides the assorted variety streamers I subscribe to, there are some “Magic Online” streamers (mostly AspiringSpike and DemonicTutors), the occasional cryptic crossword one (see my site for more), and lately competitive “Tetris” (CTL & CTM). Their commentators are entertaining and the action is very exciting. Waiting for a longbar to drop to get that tetris in, is pure adrenaline.
Now I won’t start streaming myself. Neither will I begin playing Magic Online (again, because fuck WotC) nor Tetris for that matter (I lack the skills) but some games presented by the variety streamers make me dust off my Steam account, grab my 360 controller and go for it.
I noticed a pattern there. I like to have three games simultaneously in rotation, which differ in genre but mostly differ in length needed to play them.
The shortest at the moment is “Brotato”. It replaced “20 Minutes Till Dawn” and is a game in the vein of “Vampire Survivors”. You shoot monsters, collect XP and/or materials, get better gear, shoot a lot more monsters. So many monsters. Due to the fixed time frame of 20 to 30 minutes, I can easily squeeze in a run (or two, if I fail early enough) between work and other variants of procrastination.
The longest is “Graveyard Keeper”. Closely related to “Stardew Valley” and other work-simulations, I really like the carrot & stick variant in this one (Hail comrade donkey!). There are certain tasks you have to fulfill and they are just out of reach enough that you know what you have to do, but it will take not too much time or effort that it becomes a slog. It will take time, though, which is why I prefer to play it at the end of the day. For most nights in the past week, the motto was, once it’s “Tagesschau”-time I will start digging.
Last but not least, the in-betweener, where I want to play a game with more meat than “Brotato” but not really fuck around for hours like in “Graveyard Keeper”. Metroidvanias and platformers fill this gap perfectly. You play a level or two, progress a bit and feel satisfied. Titles I have enjoyed recently were: “Shovel Knight”, “The Witch & The 66 Mushrooms”, “Axiom Verge”, and “Hollow Knight”. As soon as I finish this sentence, I will return to “The Ramsey”, where I am a hamster with a popcorn-gun.
Amnesia and Abject Terror Are Prerequisites: A Conversation With Ruth Madievsky @ The Rumpus
filthy dreams
I don’t visit museums or art shows that often anymore (i.e. never). I should look into that. But I know that I love reading about those things and filthy dreams does writing about them very well.
For example, last year’s report “The Milk of Dreams vs. Nocturnal Emissions: The Intense Pleasures and Contrasts of the 59th Venice Biennale Arte” from Bradley Wester (don’t miss the companion piece) is the best thing I read in 2022.
They also do the usual feuilleton fare – i.e. media reviews – and have blog-post material like their top ten list of top playlist.
Camp is a theme, which means that there is the occasional picture of John Waters. Don’t be scared!
The Quietus Albums Of The Year So Far Chart 2023 @ The Quietus
First & Last: Japanese Private Press, Vol. 9 @ Aquarium Drunkard
Who’s Out There? & The Comic Journal
Speaking of comics…
To expedite the extension of my blogroll you will get two for the price of one, which is zero if we are being honest, but who’s counting.
Who’s Out There? is a blog with as illustrous categories as “Tentacle Tuesday“, “Do Draw for me Argentina“, or “Basil Wolverton: Brain Bats, Bibles and Barflize“. While they have their topics most entries highlight single artists. They deal with comic’s and related illustrations’ past and let images do most of the talking.
The Comic Journal on the other hand has its focus more on the present and the future. Unless someone died then it’s back to the history books. In contrast to “Who’s Out There?” the magazine is heavy on the text. My favourite feature of theirs is the weekly round-up of links every saturday.
Digital Garden: Webcomics
Growing up I read a lot of comics, making good use of my library card. Besides the occasional horror or fantasy novel I always had time to put one or two DinA4-sized albums of the Belgian/French classics (“Asterix & Obelix”, “Spirou & Fantasio”, “Gaston”, “Lucky Luke”, et al) in my backpack. They also had the American comic strip collections of “Garfield”, “Hagar the Horrible” and of course “Calvin and Hobbes”. I read those, too.
But there were no superheroes. I knew of them, I watched the movies with Christopher Reeve and Michael Keaton, but I never read them. Until “Spawn” got released in Germany. Month after month, I could borrow single issues from a friend, the same that introduced me to “Magic: The Gathering”, although in contrast to the cardgame the superhero comics didn’t do it for me.
It took until I was in my 30s before I – thanks to the internet – read Gaiman’s “Sandman”, finally finished Smith’s “Bone”, discovered Vaughan’s “Saga” and Lemire’s “Black Hammer”, while skipping most of the text in Moore’s “Watchmen”.
For what it’s worth, I also once watched “Fritz the Cat”.
Having said all this these are the webcomics I enjoy(ed) presented in alphabetical order and updated every so often:
Deeply Dave
An animated underwater adventure with music, which gave me strong Flash (Adobe not DC) vibes.
Diesel Sweeties
Pixeled robots and drunks and geeks and Indy-Pete.
Freefall
A space-saga that is funny, started in 1998 and is still going strong.
Go Get a Roomie
Girl who likes to sleep around finds girl who likes to sleep. Sex, depression, the whole shebang.
Oglaf
It starts with a female warlock, who enchanted one of her male underlings so that his cum reports on him when he masturbates.
Questionable Content
Slice of life comic, I once subscribed to. Besides that I have no real recollection about its content.
Red Meat
Discovered via Rotten.com way back in the days. Unrelated strips of unrelated characters that are odd (emphasis on “odd”).
Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Comic strips scientists and philosophers might giggle about.
Spores
Animals on shrooms. Part of False Knees, which you may know from the memes.
The Abominable Charles Christopher
Funny, talkting animals and a Sasquatch on a mission.
The Weekly Roll
Dungeons and Dragons hijinks with a side-splitting funny group of adventurers.
Wulffmorgenthaler
Absurdist strip. It was funnier when it was back on Kaliber 10000.