Subnormality–The Webcomic that demands your reading.
Its feels like aeons since I have written anything at Prohack. Actually, I got busy with my side projects, job & some pretty shitty sticky situations (I am looking at your CitiBank) .
Life was crawling ahead & first time in my life I truly felt helpless against the greater powers acting, but that’s an another story for some other time. Life at Orange has been good, has technology , scenarios & responsibilities that actually empower you. So far so good, lets see how it goes ahead.
Nevertheless, its not my life I have come to discuss today here, its something about a webcomic I read too much. I have always been a fan of webcomics, be it the all time classic "User Friendly" or the new ones (well they are fairly old by internet standards but still..) xkcd,The Oatmeal , Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal , Penny Arcade , Cyanide & Happiness , Awkward Zombie , Brawl in the Family ,Hijinks Ensue , Dualing Analogs , Dinosaur Comics , JL8 & some pretty cool others (read:too tired to type); they have been a part & parcel of my life since the time I became a netizen.
Be it sublime humour, philosophy , video games or just anything, I believe web comics as a medium ace anything contemporary. Then in & around ~2008 I came across Subnormality, A comic within the umbrella of Viruscomix which are described as "Comix with too many words since 2007" by author Winston Rowntree, & I was blown away by its content. I was instantly hooked & 5 years later, I am a fan.
It has been satirical, practical , intricately detailed , heart-warming , absurd, carefully drawn, full of easter eggs & pop culture references & caters to a very specific audience who have the patience to handle ~1500 - 2000 word texts inside speech bubbles just for the sake of reading a webcomic. But once you see through the veil, trust me, its one hell of a gem that demands a reading.
Just in case its not your cup of tea, you can go through Abnormality which I believe is a fork of Subnormality created to cater Cracked.com & is equally good.
Also, Winston's other comix at Viruscomix are “Sector 41” (a nod to Akademgorodok/Zheleznogorsk), "Things they Dont tell you (but should)" which are a must read.
Just in case you want to test the waters before getting addicted to awesome webcomics by Winston Rowntree, you can read
- Monstrous Discrepancies
- Understanding Nuclear Weapons
- Seven Reasons
- The Closer you get
- Video Game Design
- Logo Design primer
- The Stupid Planet
for a start. Meanwhile, I am reading Zanadu again.. :)