Critical Miss

Pokémon

Are you in the mood for a self-indulgent essay about webcomic writing? Of course you are.

As a rule, I don't like doing strips about Pokémon; it just seems too easy. Comedy relies on shared cultural experience, and very few games have entered the popular consciousness in the way Pokémon has.

One of the more common complaints leveled at gaming webcomics, is that the strips tend to be exclusive; you've either played the game in question, or you're not going to get the joke. Now this isn't necessarily true; a lot of webcomics use a particular game as a setting, rather than a subject, or they present the joke in such a way that people who haven't played the game will get it - if you've ever wondered why gaming webcomics tend to have an initial, often two-person, panel that explains the joke setup in simple terms, this is why - but it's a common enough misconception. Everyone speaks Pokémon however; they understand the rules. I could make hundreds of Pokémon jokes, safe in the knowledge that 99% of my readership will "get" them, and I won't have to deal with angry readers calling me an elitist.

That being said, I can easily see myself falling into the trap of busting out a Pokémon joke every time I'm struggling for ideas, and that wouldn't bode well for the strip as a whole. I'm not knocking the strips that do cover the usual suspects like Pokémon, TF2, Portal, Zelda, Mario, Mass Effect, etc. on a regular basis, Awkward Zombie is one of my favourites in fact, I just don't think that's for us. I wouldn't trust myself with what is essentially a 'free hits' button. On that note; Skyrim, Skyrim, Boobies, Minecraft, Skyrim.