Slashdot Mirror
Megatokyo Gets a Visual Novel Game
TheSHAD0W writes "It's been over a decade since Megatokyo was mentioned in a Slashdot story. Fred Gallagher, author of the long-running webcomic, has launched a Kickstarter for a Megatokyo Visual Novel Game. The KS has fared very well, funding its basic goal in less than four hours and covering most of the posted stretch goals in the first twenty-four. Fred also posted a half-joking stretch goal at a half-million dollars to include'"excessively romantic content,' wink wink nudge nudge. He may have been kidding, but there are some indications it might be reached."
It's like his drawing skills never evolved.
I used to read Megatokyo, but when the artist lost his writer years ago, the plot also got lost. Then the updates became so infrequent that it became a joke. Read the Wikipedia entry.
I sadly lost interest in this comic a long time ago around about when his partner left. None of the characters are distinguishable from each other and it's way over the top in meta "humor". I'm sad to say one of the oldest comics I used to read has long since stopped being worth reading and I am most certainly not interested in a "visual novel game" from this author.
After fading into irrelevance (this used to be a webcomic mentioned in the same breath as Penny Arcade back in the day, mind you), he seeks to make the very thing his comic is supposed to be a parody of. Well done, Fred.
http://twokinds.keenspot.com/
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godamnit slashdot we need an "edit post" feature. This isn't 1997 anymore.
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I use to read a ton of Mega Tokyo back six or seven years ago, but I gave just gave up the prospect of a game thing is interesting though mainly in a nostalgic way, so I quite tempted to back this project but I think I'll regret it.
I'm shocked to hear that anyone is still following the inane, plotless mess that was Megatokyo.
-_-;
h8as gotta h8.
Some of the greatest Visual Novels I read were made by a couple of kids in their basement over the span of summer holidays.
Why is a financing campaign needed?
I'm disheartened by the mostly negative comments I'm seeing on Slashdot on this. The comic itself isn't bad. The art, while heavily influenced by manga, is nice and unique and has evolved since he started, which is something you don't see much in anime/manga these days outside of something like One Piece. The story wandered a bit but flows better when you aren't reading the page a month that it now updates.
Yes, Fred and his wife have had health problems preventing frequent updates and I am not going to be his apologist, and no I have not read the comic regularly in years, but I think this project has serious potential. He started the comic with heavy influence from the visual novel genre and this could be the ultimate expression of the comic... he may even have a chance to straighten out some story elements. The ability to look at the same story from more than one character's perspective with different play-throughs and multiple endings sounds great as well.
Also, he has a team of developers working with him, he's not doing it on his own, so they should be able to keep this on track. Also, with any luck, one of the stretch goals will be to hire an art assistant (I mean he's blown through nearly every other early stretch goal in a day, why not?).
But then the plot went "too" weird and hard to follow......... and portions of the website have been and still are "under construction" (characters)...I thought under construction pages went out of fashion 10 years ago?
How hard it is to do a character lineup?
This isn't worth shit unless he gets Largo back.
Kind of a low bar to set for what was once one of the great and widely read webcomics. In comparison, Homestuck pulled in nearly half a million in the first day for its game's Kickstarter, and ended up totaling $2.5 million by the end.
This is simply the difference between a comic that updates constantly, often multiple times a day, and a comic that updates maybe once a month and even then with mostly filler that seems to take just as much effort to draw as the main comic.
I first would like to introduce myself. My internet presence is largely chemiclord, but my real life name is Thomas Knapp. You will see my name in the credits of the kickstarter page as a writer and path developer for the upcoming MegaTokyo Visual Novel project; along with many other names of very talented people. This actually isn't my first foray into the MegaTokyo world. Before Fred's health took a veer off course, I was working with him on his Endgames game world. I'll have a good chunk of my hand in this project as well, primarily handling alternate paths and the secondary characters. But to make a meandering point on target, Fred isn't doing this alone, and with the help of the team he's put together, we have all confidence that we can produce and deliver this game promptly and with the highest quality we can muster. No stretch goal needed there. :-p
with the addition that upon hearing that it was all just a marketing ploy to begin with that happened to net some cash.
I think moved to a lot of other webcomics. Strangecandy for a while, Nukees (which lead to Schlock Mercenary!), sluggy freelance, elfonlyinn (now deceased sadly!), sinfest (also now on dark horse's label!), Checkboard Nightmare/Starslip Crisis, Indavo (wrapped up a few years back), and Dominic Deegan (wrapped in May!).
Pretty much all of these comics were better than Megatokyo, and at least *HALF* of them had much better update schedules. DD 5 days a week and Schlock 7 then 5 for a while and now back to 7. That's a level of passion Fred always lacked, and is why I jumped to reading many of these other comics over his. Additionally, unlike him, they might have a day or two where they miss, but overall the plots have had more consistency and kept me waiting for the next release.
On the off chance anybody here IS still reading MT, consider looking into the alternatives, they might just tide you over until you no longer when the next MT update will be :)
that even if he *DID* get Rodney back that it wouldn't be the same comic it was back in the post-bubble era.
What made Megatokyo great was stuff that's been over and done with for 10 years. I mean shit *E3*. Who says more than a 'MEH' in relation to it? Nevermind that everybody seems to consider PAX the hot shit now (Hey Fred, you lost the war buddy, and while they were ALSO half-assing webcomics they managed to do some social commentary and get a Convention put together! What else have you done recently?!?!)
And yeah I could bash myself for similiar things, but the difference is I haven't been running what was once a hugely hyped webcomic that's faded into obscurity due to the co-creator not actually having any *PASSION* for it. Seriously dude, maybe it's time to look into another job!
> "a Megatokyo Visual Novel Game
Is that like an action MMO on a console? Because apparently that's the only thing anyone wants to buy anymore, according to big game companies.
A new D&D and Marvel online "action MMO" came out this week. Action MMO! Obviously if it isn't an action MMO it must suck.
I assume game designers got together a few years back and sang a Beatles song:
All we are sayyyyyyyyyy-ing
Is give Action MMOs a chance.
All we are sayyyyyyyyyy-ing
Is give Action MMOs a chance.
Shake that butt.
Baby got Action MMO.
Hey, I just met you
This is crazy.
Here's my action MMO
Play it daily.
Action MMO for president! I'll bet Barney Fife would play Action MMOs all day long!
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
It WAS one of the greats, readership has dropped off over the years; and it's kind of outdated in it's subject matter.
Even before the health issues, the comic would get an update once a month.
I've done a Kickstarter and watched quite a few Kickstarters. One thing I have learnt is that you should NEVER trust Kicktraq's projections in the first week or so; it is ALWAYS overestimating by a hell of a lot. It doesn't matter if you're a little campaign with a goal of $2400 or a big one with a goal of $700,000. You will get a tiny fraction of what Kicktraq estimates in the first few days.
egypt urnash minimal art.
I still haz the tshirt.
andy
His health issues have been around his whole life - just getting worse recently, relatively speaking.
It's pretty hard to draw constantly when your heart simply isn't pushing enough blood.
Updated infrequently doesn't matter when you read it in huge chunks.
As a one man band starting off without decades of experience behind him you cannot expect something to come out as frequently as "Girl Genius".
In a visual novel context you might want to avoid abbreviating Kickstarter.
Piro knocked out Largo, and it happened : http://megatokyo.com/strip/51
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