Weekly Update - 86 (Patreon)

I want to include some art here, but we're sitting in the airport waiting for our flight home and that is currently a challenge.

So... I was talking this week to my friend who owns Fenris Publishing, and it sounds like with the comics I have currently, it might be a good time to compile the first 120 pages into a book.

Almost scared to ask... but... d-do any of you want a God Slayers volume 1? I've been thinking about maybe doing some merch and a book would probably be the first item. I'd probably have to make some bonus content and clean up the early pages to make it worth, but it's definitely something we could do in the non-far future.


Comic this week? I'll be honest, it isn't looking good. I hate to skip two weeks in a row but I'd rather that than stay up for the next 48 hours and put out a rushed page I won't be proud of.

Drawing: Page 121

Playing: Something. Maybe Rimworld, but art and home chores is first priority once we get home.


Ramble:
Walking around Reno this weekend, I noticed how every square inch of everything is covered in slot machines. Slot machines that are almost all unoccupied. It feels like such a waste of space.

When I was younger, I remember going into casinos with my dad and seeing most slot machines in-use. People were always playing slots. Now I look around and see most of them empty.

My husband sat down at one and lost 100 bucks to it in about 30 seconds... And I kinda realized, I think, why no one seems to play slot machines any more. As video games go, they are very poorly designed. There is no discovery because they intentionally obfuscate what is going on so you can't figure out how to win or lose, there's no way to optimize your gameplay or get better at the game. And the achievement, which would be allegedly winning anything at all, never happens, (or if it does, it's a "machine malfunction" so they don't have to pay it out)

Our generation and those that have come after it have been exposed to many excellent and many terrible games in our lives. The good ones cost us, usually, about sixty bucks for a solid 10-50 hour experience. When i look around at all the empty slot machines that few people of my generation are interested in, it isn't hard to see why a slot machine would be a colossal waste of time and money compared to something like a mobile gacha game, which actually plays into the elements that make a game seem like it is fun (even when it is not).

Slot machines don't even try to be fun. They capitalize on old, outdated psychological triggers that used to be a lot better at drawing people in and holding them captivated. They flash pictures of nude women or cute furries or other things, lights and sounds and colors and some of the newer ones even like to pretend like they are a game, but any gamer can see right through all that because we are numb to it. We have been taught, trained, and desensitized to such tactics by the games we've been playing since we were old enough to hold an ipad. Entertainment is a constantly evolving thing, the things that thrill us are ever-changing and slot machines have not evolved.

My friends and I love to play craps. We can be at a table for an hour, laughing and throwing dice and cheering and booing while the casino brings us free drinks, and win or lose, it feels like a way better use of our time. I'm sure the casino makes far less money from a craps table than the 200 dollars an hour that any given slot machine sucks up when anyone is actually playing it, but it makes for a much better experience and makes me much more likely to keep coming back again and again to risk my money in return for a fun and happy evening.

I guess my point is, throw slot machines in the trash because they are garbage and that is where they belong, and replace them all with craps tables. :P

Also Konami should go back to making real games.

Anyway, plane time, see you all again soon!