Chapter 25 – Page 1
New DLC! New Random Avatars!
SPIN THE WHEEEEEEEEEEEEL
Annotations Every Day - Written by T Campbell & Flo Kahn - Illustrated by John & Jason Waltrip
Guilded Age
The Saga of the Working Class Adventurer – New comics every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday!
BUT I DONT WANNA BE ONE CENT APPLES! xD
Well… you’re apples. Bob’s your uncle.
yea, realized that when i posed on the 29th page o the last chapter a few moments ago, stealing the idea of punny last names.. :3 ah well, no more stern looking elf chairman, cheap apples for all!
…except for you, whomever you are. yes, you.
..ok, i GUESS you can have one.
…RAMBLE!
Apples are nutritious and versatile! Cheap apples for all, indeed!
Even crabapples? O_o
I can’t help but recall hearing coworkers earlier today talking about using an apple as an improvised hash pipe…
Also, I mentioned how I wish I had thought of that back in college.
Hey, I have that car (sans hatchback).
I love this strip; it reveals so much in so little!
Yet the trace of that Focus is really.. annoying. Not in a product placement way so much as an art way, if that makes sense. And this comic has such amazing art!
Also confusingly, the interior is the awesome Focus ST which is super sporty and turbocharged, but the hubs are from the bells and whistles Titanium package.
http://www.ford.com/cars/focus/
Assuming that’s even possible, I’d say minimally the driver is: quiet, modest, and low key on the outside; but spare no expense ready-to-go on the inside. :D
I don’t think you can get those seats in the standard Focus. I think they’re only available in the ST.
That’s why the rims puzzle me. I don’t think you can get the seats (also notice the ST’s dash top gauges) with the Titanium rims. The ST has its own rims: that odd snowflake pattern.
Notice the front too: those pillars on the lower front grill are flat black on the ST.
I’m guessing they just went with two VERY different stock Focus pictures for reference. Which is sad, really. Why pic a particular car and then not get it right?
This is what the exterior should look like:
http://www.dieselstation.com/pics/Ford-Focus-ST-2012-car-picture.jpg
Or, another possibility, this is supposed to be like unto our world, but slightly different. Thus, the car is recognisably a focus, but not any particular focus.
or maybe they didnt want to like, get sued or something…
The drawing and the photo look the same to me. I mean, I can see the differences you point out, but if you didn’t, I could look at them for ten minutes trying to find any differences and not see them.
Of course, I’m not a car person. I don’t know what a Focus looks like. I see the drawing and just think “smallish modernish car”. It doesn’t even occur to me that it might be based on a specific real car. Cars all look the same to me.
On an unrelated note, allow me to nitpick about HR’s computer equipment and operating system.
It seems Carol pretty much lives out of her car, so she might’ve paid a wad of extra cash to get it fitted out the way she wanted. She probably wanted the sporty interior, so she wouldn’t have to worry about stains on fabric seats, and she probably wanted the fancy rims, so that from the outside, it would look like the car of a business professional.
She could’ve even had a custom shop “pimp” her ride, if Ford wouldn’t give her what she wanted… form on the outside, function on the inside.
Of course, the our world reason is most likely that the artists went with whatever looked best when converted to sepia. (They’re not selling the car. They’re selling the comic)
Remember that Guilded Age is a work of fiction – it’s only because we see brands we know in the “real” world (Redbox, Dunkin’ Donuts) that we expect everything else to be realistic. But as the artists have artistic license to give the CEO of an MMO magic powers, so too may a Ford Focus have the interior of an ST.
I think this strip is deliberately jarring. They hit us with a bunch of things we instantly recognize from “real life” and I think that “stuck in the middle” quality is a big part of Carol’s character.
My feeling was that the clash between exterior and exterior of the car was an artistic accident, since it runs counter to that purpose. If they wanted to use artistic license here, it would have been Duncan’s Doughnuts, or any number of other fuzzy things. They went for hard reality, a slice of IRL, and even did so by tracing, so I think the nitpick is fair.
(Also, the Focus is common; the ST and Titanium are not. Assuming they picked rarer variants of a common car on purpose, what does this say about Carol?)
EDIT: Exterior -> Interior
I think you’re all losing… Focus.
Guys, obviously Carol got out of her Focus ST, and is walking past someone else’s Focus Titanium in the last panel.
Titanium star. :D
Or, the reason she’s running late is that, somewhere in the city, a Titanium package Focus is sitting on concrete blocks. ;) She was concerned about her suit being sweaty.
A Ford Focus? So much for aiming high and hitting low… Shoulda gotten a Mazda3 ^-^ Same body, better electronics, same price, better gas mileage, better looks…
But I guess that fits her position as harried and careless executive! ^-^
Poor Carol is fraying at the edges.
Agreed.
But it does beg the question of what she’s getting out of it…
Although I’d understand if it was simply a good salary at a supposedly “normal” job that went haywire because the boss has crazy (but magically substantiated) dreams of godhood in a supposedly fantastic (but magically substantiated) world.
In short, she applied for a normal job but it came with lots of stuff that wasn’t in the job description.
Well, she gets what any evil chancellor head underling gets. If her boss kicks the bucket, she gets to usurp an entire universe.
But jobs also come with perks not listed in the job offer. One of her perks just happened to be all the other magical universes that didn’t make the final grade are now in her apartment.
I guess she will have a shock when the cultists invade them!
I was thinking more of Jail.
For you know… knowing holding people in glass tubes.
Didn’t they win the tube thing as a sort of prize? They probably signed a waiver and an NDA; they weren’t kidnapped or strong-armed into anything. If something happens, it was their own fault for not saying “perhaps hooking my brain up to experimental technology and leaving strangers to take care of my comatose body for an indefinite period of time is not the brightest idea.” :P
She went to Dunkin’ Donuts…and didn’t get coffee?
Coffee flavored coffee!
Back in my day the only thing anyone bought at Dunkin’ Donuts was donuts. >:|
Krispy Kreme for donuts, Dunkin’ Donuts for coffee, Starbucks for meeting girls. It has been this way for as long as I can remember.
Seriously, Dunkin’ coffee is better than Starbucks, and WAY cheaper.
And so it is written: thou shalt surely have, for the communing with the nether world, lardflour circles immers’d in hot oil; known to the pagans as “dough-nuts”. These thou must have; the bean-java extract shalt be optional, but addeth indeed to the experience. And the people cried, ‘Yea, why dost thou demand these sweets so devoid of nutrition?”
And the spirit answered: “Donuts … art holy.”
*slow clap*
Focus. Nice.
I wished mine looked that good.
If this is the state Carol’s in than HR must’ve transformed into some sort of fungus by now.
*then
Comment editing should’ve been a stretch goal. /trollface
Ha! +1.
I believe that they installed an expansion pack to rid us of comment editing. Welcome to the Nine Hells of Accountability.
There’s something strangely charming about it to me, though. When every commenter has to walk the tightrope of no-edit commenting, three related effects kick in: people tend to take more care when writing; they tend to be less grammar nazistic after they make mistakes themselves; and because of the second and also somewhat countering the first effect, people tend to be more relaxed about making mistakes and saying (potentially) stupid/silly things. Editability is definitely one of those elements that affects societies in interesting ways. Also, it’s kinda hilarious to have everyone’s stupid say-stuff and typos and all immortalized along with the rest of the comment content. It adds to the entertainment, IMO.
We will see it soon, I guess. But I LOVE the idea of a man-sized, sentient fungus trying to become a god. All hail Fungthulhu!
HR was originally a fungus who transformed into a human.
What’s actually happened is that several other fungi in his office have now also transformed.
That seems like a completely ridiculous suggestion — I’ve seen no evidence that HR has ever been a fun guy …
Congratulations. Carol went from being a prop to a character in three panels. Nice work.
I never really thought of her as a prop so far… this just extrapolated on her character a lot more.
Oh god, please tell me that the vehicle isn’t just a one-off thing and you’ve entered into some sort of deal with Ford where you have to shill their products whenever possible.
I want to see Byron and the crew riding into battle in huge trucks.
I’m not kidding, guys. Make Guilded Age a monster truck rally.
Like https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghANtP1JPPg ?
No, we will not accept any corporate shills! And by the way, drink Sprite! It tastes great and will quench your thirst.
So what if it was product placement? Things don’t stay free to us simply based on principle. Grow up.
I honestly don’t think GA is popular enough to merit a product placement deal from Ford, but if it was, I really wouldn’t blame them. Product placement always seemed like the least intrusive kind of marketing.
Sometimes, I even kind of like it. My sim drives a Focus in the Sims 3, I wish more companies paid EA to put their cars in the game.
They need the “tuck tuck tuck” monster truck cheat code from Age of Empires 3.
Oh gods ! Carol is turning into H.R !
It’s “The Madness” :o
poor Carol, is she tucking in her shirt or clutching the abdominal pain brought on by the stress-and-fast-food-itis?
Yes.
Is it just me, or does Carol look like Kurick the Elf?
Yeah, the lips are especially telling.
What has Carol been hitting with the Focus?(rear driver side)
Some photoshop filters.
Actually, that looks like posterize now that I look closer.
what am i this time?
wow im frigg again hahaha
worse fates exist
Hee. It looks like she got distracted and took a bite out of her copy of 7 Habits instead of her doughnut.
She needs to hit things with a battle axe. Wonderful method of stress relief.
Cool… cool, cool…
Lessee… Dunkin’ Donuts, Redbox, the Ford Focus, … I doubt the 7 habits people are payin’ you, but what are you guys getting for product placement nowadays?
Or did they all contribute to the Kickstarter? ;)
That’s okay, other than the Focus, I don’t think I can buy any of those in the UK. :)
Can’t wait to see our intrepid reporter again!
Oh, hey, it’s the product placement portion of the program. -_-
…and I look super creepy.
Wonderful.
Yaknow, we don’t actually get paid for this. Using famous people, companies, and brands that actually exist is just an artistic choice.
Clearly says Land Raider on the front.
I am kind of glad I read all the comments before saying something because the first thing I wondered when reading them was “what’s a focus” >.>
Yes, I live under a rock, what’s it to ya?
Also, hi again guys! :P
For one horrified moment I thought Carol’s body had been taken over by H.R. there. What a thought
o.e
Missed you, guuuurl.
Maybe it’s because I live in SE Asia and I can count the number of DD stores (not stalls) in my country on one hand but I just read “America RUNS on Dunkin” as “American BUNS on Dunkin” and I’m like “Wait, what?”
What if Arkerra is the real world…
…and Sepia world is the MMO that some people play?
Then we have all lost the game.
Avatar check
Avatar mate
Avatar captive breeding program and educational outreach on the loss of avatar natural habitat.