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Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Mon May 18, 2020 5:35 pm
by Eraden
Well, I am going to go out on a limb and call this a story. A very entertaining story. One that I have been fortunate enough to have obtained one or two hard copy volumes of from my local comic book store just before the Covid thing hit. Is there any chance that a full hard copy set will be issued and if so, would it be available through a big distributor like Amazon? I would pay serious coin for a complete hard copy set (I have always preferred having an actual book in my hands as opposed to a computer (call me old fashioned)). I will be retiring in a few weeks, after 33 years of service at the National Research Council of Canada, so I will have plenty of time on my hands and it would be nice to go back and reread the entire series. A nice comfy chair, a stack of Megatokyo, and I am a happy camper.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Mon May 18, 2020 5:49 pm
by paarfi
Eraden wrote:
Mon May 18, 2020 5:35 pm
Is there any chance that a full hard copy set will be issued and if so, would it be available through a big distributor like Amazon?
You can still find the original books 1-6 in places, but they're all out of print now so they can be harder to come by. A few years ago, Dark Horse reissued them as two large omnibus books that have everything in books 1-6 plus a few extras. The omnibi are in print and available on Amazon and plenty of other book-buying places, and can also serve as a weapon or industrial doorstop if required. Fred is "close" to the end of chapter 12, which should finish the comics needed for book 7. With cleanup and publisher time, I'm guessing and hoping we might see that maybe late 2021 or early 2022.
Eraden wrote:
Mon May 18, 2020 5:35 pm
I will be retiring in a few weeks, after 33 years of service at the National Research Council of Canada
Fantastic. Congratulations.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Mon May 18, 2020 6:51 pm
by jkhartl
Eraden wrote:
Mon May 18, 2020 5:35 pm
would it be available through a big distributor like Amazon?
Make sure to check used book stores like "half-priced books". A few years ago I picked up an original volume one. (I.C. Entertainment)

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Tue May 19, 2020 6:10 pm
by Roamer
Technetium wrote:
Sun May 17, 2020 11:28 pm
I have been following this comic since a long time ago and I intend to continue to do so, but I have to warn that this post is going to be very critical of the story right now.

I don't care about these two characters.

When you tell a story, you have main characters, secondary characters (not the main focus but have direct link to a main character and can rarely become a temporary focus of the story), and tertiary characters (characters who aren't important except to fill in gaps, we don't need to know anything about them beyond their brief interactions with main and secondary characters).

Neither of the characters in this panel are important and we don't need this kind of exposition on them. Basically there has been nobody important in the comic for the past 6 or 7 panels at least. What is this comic even about anymore? I don't know. I just can't follow where this is going right now and it seems really aimless. I'm holding out hope that this comic will one day get back to the actual story involving Piro, Largo, Kimiko, Erika, and Miho.
Everthing Fred has done in MT points to their being no unimportant characters. Anyone who gets named has the potential to be critical to the story at some point. Take a look at Sayuri; any other story, she'd be a throwaway character. Here? Well, now that Erika's decided to force them to restart her show, it's pretty clear that she's going to be key in making that happen and making it good. Along with Yaku, Mumu-chan, and of course Piro and Kimiko.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Tue May 19, 2020 7:07 pm
by Teddy-Werebear
The squarish streetlights are making me think of toasting marshmallows over a camp fire...

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Tue May 19, 2020 8:12 pm
by cidjen
I'll say,

That this new guy and his troubles, suddenly made me remember a character that wasn't herself for a while.

Under that sort of Influence, I wrote that forgettable piece of crap of a dialogue between Chokee and Masamichi.

Now this comic actually made one more piece of puzzle fall in: what if that guy's fiancee/sweetheart is the tomboy lizard girl that gets in trouble at her side job, and is offline and unable to return to human form until a magical girl frees her from the zombie curse...

In other words, what if he's with The Zilla Girl? And he doesn't even know she's been cured..... Somebody stop him!

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Tue May 19, 2020 10:19 pm
by Liminaut
I have some completely unjustified speculation.

The New Guy (does he have a name yet? Japanese for New Guy is Atarashī otoko) is under a similar constrainment curse as Megumi. Them falling in love will break each other's curse, resulting in an *extremely* interesting morning after.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Tue May 19, 2020 11:01 pm
by Rapierman
piro wrote:
Mon May 18, 2020 3:22 pm
Also, ive said it before, i do not believe in ANY of the tennents of 'story telling'. Not a single one (i dont even know most of them :P) This has all jsut been a brain dump for 20 years, nothing more. I don't believe in 'main characters' and 'sub characters' and 'side stories'. Everything and everyone is important. a 'story' is just about where you might be focusing at the moment, that's all.
Beware. Fred trolls....






.....a lot. :P

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Wed May 20, 2020 11:08 am
by Ningen 2
Also tennents -> tenets, although I suspect many of you knew that.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Thu May 21, 2020 5:40 pm
by NinjaDefenestrator
This has all jsut been a brain dump for 20 years, nothing more. I don't believe in 'main characters' and 'sub characters' and 'side stories'. Everything and everyone is important. a 'story' is just about where you might be focusing at the moment, that's all.
This changes my perspective on the comic quite a lot. The idea that there’s no real overarching storyline, just a series of connected vignettes, finally makes sense to me now. Going with the flow, not really sure what’s going to happen more than a few comics from now, the story just...telling itself as things happen.

No telling if Piro and Miho will ever come back to each other. No real idea of how Sight will be produced or how Kimiko will bring Kotone to life. No clue how Yuki and Chewtoy or Erika and Largo are going to get into trouble next. It’s all unanswered questions until Fred decides to revisit them and see what they’re up to. There’s no endgame.

Strange adjustment in thinking after twenty years (jesus) of wondering “but when will we see them again and advance the main plot?” But I can get behind that, I think. That is, if it’s not a troll. I don’t believe it is.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Thu May 21, 2020 5:44 pm
by Technetium
darrin wrote:
Mon May 18, 2020 3:54 pm
But Megumi has been in since the beginning
I actually didn't realize that was the same person. :lol: I actually just can't keep track of who these characters are lately. I don't know who the other one is in the bar, aside from her have a tail meaning she's related to Miho's friend who owns the club and is in the hospital currently. I forget the name of that person. There was another woman back at the scene with Ping and Junko and I don't know who she is either.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Thu May 21, 2020 5:50 pm
by NinjaDefenestrator
Technetium wrote:
Thu May 21, 2020 5:44 pm
darrin wrote:
Mon May 18, 2020 3:54 pm
But Megumi has been in since the beginning
I actually didn't realize that was the same person. :lol: I actually just can't keep track of who these characters are lately. I don't know who the other one is in the bar, aside from her have a tail meaning she's related to Miho's friend who owns the club and is in the hospital currently. I forget the name of that person. There was another woman back at the scene with Ping and Junko and I don't know who she is either.
Girl in the bar is Ashe, one of Megumi’s and Komugiko’s (the one in the hospital) cousins who works at the love hotel. Mugi doesn’t own the hotel- she’s just a member of the family that does.

Woman back at the hotel with Ping and Junko is Megumi’s grandmother. Not sure if she’s Mugi’s grandma or great-aunt, but I’m pretty sure they’re related.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Fri May 22, 2020 6:32 am
by Roamer
Technetium wrote:
Thu May 21, 2020 5:44 pm
darrin wrote:
Mon May 18, 2020 3:54 pm
But Megumi has been in since the beginning
I actually didn't realize that was the same person. :lol: I actually just can't keep track of who these characters are lately. I don't know who the other one is in the bar, aside from her have a tail meaning she's related to Miho's friend who owns the club and is in the hospital currently. I forget the name of that person. There was another woman back at the scene with Ping and Junko and I don't know who she is either.
This gives me an idea for an infographic with all the characters and their relative frequency within each plotline/chapter, along with their relationships with others and how they shift over time. I needed an interesting project for learning PowerBI anyway...

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Fri May 22, 2020 11:55 am
by darrin
Roamer wrote:
Fri May 22, 2020 6:32 am
This gives me an idea for an infographic with all the characters and their relative frequency within each plotline/chapter, along with their relationships with others and how they shift over time. I needed an interesting project for learning PowerBI anyway...
I always wished this included MegaTokyo.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Fri May 22, 2020 4:34 pm
by Roamer
darrin wrote:
Fri May 22, 2020 11:55 am
Roamer wrote:
Fri May 22, 2020 6:32 am
This gives me an idea for an infographic with all the characters and their relative frequency within each plotline/chapter, along with their relationships with others and how they shift over time. I needed an interesting project for learning PowerBI anyway...
I always wished this included MegaTokyo.
Fun idea, but with 34 people on the cast page doing it like that with all the scene jumps (and MG's jumping into and out of scenes) would make it too small to actually read. The MT story makes the LOTR movies look straightforward.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Fri May 22, 2020 5:30 pm
by cidjen
Roamer wrote:
Fri May 22, 2020 4:34 pm

Fun idea, but with 34 people on the cast page doing it like that with all the scene jumps (and MG's jumping into and out of scenes) would make it too small to actually read. The MT story makes the LOTR movies look straightforward.
No one said it /has/ to be linear or in 2D only ;)

EDIT: scratch that, it HAS to be linear ;) but the diagram won't be all /that/ complicated as you think ;)

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Fri May 22, 2020 6:46 pm
by jkhartl
You do realize that the character lists have not been updated for about 4 years which in story time was the beginning of the chapter.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Sat May 23, 2020 5:06 am
by louisxiv
Is it possible to direct the search ninjas to list who appears in a comic page, rather than which pages a character appears in?

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Sat May 23, 2020 5:51 am
by Roamer
jkhartl wrote:
Fri May 22, 2020 6:46 pm
You do realize that the character lists have not been updated for about 4 years which in story time was the beginning of the chapter.
Yup. Not sure if Fred has anyone to help with that, but it might make a nice project for someone.
louisxiv wrote:
Sat May 23, 2020 5:06 am
Is it possible to direct the search ninjas to list who appears in a comic page, rather than which pages a character appears in?
I wish. Unless someone's already done it, figuring out exactly who appears when in each comic, and doublechecking the timeline of the comic versus the timeline in MT itself, is going to be the painful part. I'm hesitant to ask Fred, because while I'm sure he's got something of that sort, I'm also pretty sure it probably contains information not yet intended for public release. Nothing obvious, probably, but liner notes and such that will reveal stuff The World Is Not Ready To Know. You know, like the truth about UFOs, and if Teddy is actually right about Miho.
cidjen wrote:
Fri May 22, 2020 5:30 pm
Roamer wrote:
Fri May 22, 2020 4:34 pm

Fun idea, but with 34 people on the cast page doing it like that with all the scene jumps (and MG's jumping into and out of scenes) would make it too small to actually read. The MT story makes the LOTR movies look straightforward.
No one said it /has/ to be linear or in 2D only ;)

EDIT: scratch that, it HAS to be linear ;) but the diagram won't be all /that/ complicated as you think ;)
Depends on the level of detail. Mwah-ha-ha!

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Sat May 23, 2020 6:34 am
by louisxiv
Roamer wrote:
Sat May 23, 2020 5:51 am

louisxiv wrote:
Sat May 23, 2020 5:06 am
Is it possible to direct the search ninjas to list who appears in a comic page, rather than which pages a character appears in?
I wish. Unless someone's already done it, figuring out exactly who appears when in each comic, and doublechecking the timeline of the comic versus the timeline in MT itself, is going to be the painful part. I'm hesitant to ask Fred, because while I'm sure he's got something of that sort, I'm also pretty sure it probably contains information not yet intended for public release. Nothing obvious, probably, but liner notes and such that will reveal stuff The World Is Not Ready To Know. You know, like the truth about UFOs, and if Teddy is actually right about Miho.
Hmm. Thinking about this it should be easy* to extract the pages the main characters appear on from the regular search and sort it into an overall by-page list.

Who updates the search database? Might a one-off request to extract its content as, say, a csv to build a by-page character index, be possible I wonder?

* for certain values of easy, natch.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Sat May 23, 2020 8:41 am
by paarfi
The search ninjas work off of the transcripts, which I maintain.

You can search for a character's appearances by putting a colon after their name in teh search box. After that, I don't think it would be that hard to copy those results to excel. Maybe use the LEFT() function to reduce what you pasted down to just the comic numbers. Then you could make another list of all the comic numbers, and use the COUNTIF() method to see if that comic number is in the list of comic appearances that you pasted it. That should get you what you're asking for, if I'm understanding right. Should only take a few minutes of work if one of y'all is comfortable enough with excel.

I also am the one who updated the character page. I'll update it again sometime, but probably not real soon.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Sat May 23, 2020 4:51 pm
by cidjen
Yay,

Someone well versed in some script language, could probably create the script to draw this kind of infographic automatically from the transcripts... Scrollable, zoomable... Probably would need some metadata to be added to know how to group them and add location and keyframe info and to know which word is a character name. but. Boy. It. Would. Be. Amazing.

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Sat May 23, 2020 6:01 pm
by louisxiv
cidjen wrote:
Sat May 23, 2020 4:51 pm
Yay,

Someone well versed in some script language, could probably create the script to draw this kind of infographic automatically from the transcripts... Scrollable, zoomable... Probably would need some metadata to be added to know how to group them and add location and keyframe info and to know which word is a character name. but. Boy. It. Would. Be. Amazing.
Well I dunno about infographics, but character YYY on page XXX lists would be easy, particularly with access to the transcripts, even with my level of scripting. I’m sure MT has a wide enough audience to have better programming ninjas than me... I am a bit boggled that it is beyond the search nijnas’ abilities to report who appears on a particular page, though I guess it just wasn’t thought of at the time.

The sort of thing I’d do, maybe, would be based on the style of index pages I did for Misfile, Wapsi and (ongoing) Gunnerkrigg Court Index. The search ninjas though do a much better job for most searching needs, except for that who appears on which page thing.

<casual>It would be interesting to see how the search ninjas work...</casual>

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Sun May 24, 2020 1:45 am
by darrin
louisxiv wrote:
Sat May 23, 2020 6:01 pm
I am a bit boggled that it is beyond the search nijnas’ abilities to report who appears on a particular page, though I guess it just wasn’t thought of at the time.
Well, as paarfi points out, this info is already available via the transcripts, like this.

But if you're looking for something a little more automated than just manually pulling up a given transcript -- and from the surrounding discussion of MS Excel and scripting tools I'm betting that's the case -- then I posted something over in Fan Works that I hope might be a start. (A bit more than paarfi's "a few minutes" I'm afraid but a) there was a lot of housework my wife wanted done today as well and b) I'm no paarfi :oops:.)

Re: [1577] cheating

Posted: Sun May 24, 2020 3:35 am
by louisxiv
darrin wrote:
Sun May 24, 2020 1:45 am
louisxiv wrote:
Sat May 23, 2020 6:01 pm
I am a bit boggled that it is beyond the search nijnas’ abilities to report who appears on a particular page, though I guess it just wasn’t thought of at the time.
Well, as paarfi points out, this info is already available via the transcripts, like this.

But if you're looking for something a little more automated than just manually pulling up a given transcript -- and from the surrounding discussion of MS Excel and scripting tools I'm betting that's the case -- then I posted something over in Fan Works that I hope might be a start. (A bit more than paarfi's "a few minutes" I'm afraid but a) there was a lot of housework my wife wanted done today as well and b) I'm no paarfi :oops:.)
Oh that's excellent. Thanks, and thanks to Paarfi for the transcripts in the first place.

Yes, it is getting a character list for a page is interesting for all sorts of reasons, but the basic transcript is distracting because of the dialogue text.