The New Avatar

Cinni · Post by **Cinni** » Tue Sep 14, 2004 11:10 am

Is it just me, or is Allan's new avatar hot?

Ahem. Er, I've been following Umlaut House for around two years now, and it's consistently been one of my very favorite strips. It was through these forums that I found one of my other favorites(EGS), and i've been forum-lurking for some time.

Anyway, here's a random sack of praise for Allan, his ending strip, and his new strips, in whatever order they should appear.

Cinni

DetailBear · Post by **DetailBear** » Tue Sep 14, 2004 3:19 pm

Welcome. As you are a new member to the forums (even if you've been lurking), I would like to give you two things as official welcomer:

The Virtual Volair Plushie, and a big HUG.

Welcome to the forums, Cinni!

Allan_ecker · Post by **Allan_ecker** » Tue Sep 14, 2004 4:10 pm

Welcome aboard! Glad to see I helped someone else find the joy that is El Goonish Shive; that comic is the buh-ZOM.

Thanks for the compliments, too!

I'm really hoping to have the forum become more active over the next few months; the finale should draw a few old faces back and hopefully the action/adventure series that follow will pull in a few new ones.

Cyril_Dran · Post by **Cyril_Dran** » Wed Sep 15, 2004 9:39 am

allan_ecker wrote:Welcome aboard! Glad to see I helped someone else find the joy that is El Goonish Shive; that comic is the buh-ZOM.

.... Well, I had a witty joke about pronunciation errors and bosoms here, but it fell through before I could finish writing it...

Cinni · Post by **Cinni** » Wed Sep 15, 2004 5:23 pm

Awww! Hugs and a Virtual Volair plushie! Ah, the joy that is warm fuzzies. *

I'm touched! Just mind where you put your hands.

Cinni
--
I expect the Spanish Inquisition.

* Hm. Accidentally typoed 'warm fizzies' first time I wrote that. Sounds like room-temperatue cola. Ew. I'll take hugs and plushies over that any day.

DetailBear · Post by **DetailBear** » Tue Sep 21, 2004 3:10 pm

I finally figured out what bothers me about the new avatar: No Pupils! It's like you've moved to Jack's universe.

Allan_ecker · Post by **Allan_ecker** » Wed Sep 22, 2004 3:24 pm

The lack of pupils was originally meant to be a kind of Batman-esque mask; I am the "Masked Retriever" after all.

Ultimately, I stuck with the design as shown because it looked "cool".

As previously stated, I hope that use of this character in juxtaposition with my typically long-winded expository nature will pull the interpretation of this set of lines away from Jack's unblinking examination of suffering and towards Scott McCloud's use of pupil-less cartoons to reduce the level individual-specific content in a character design.

And if you haven't already, visit scottmccloud.com. "I Can't Stop Thinking" is a collection of some VERY clearly-thought and well-designed essays in comic format concerning the future of internet comics.

RandomScribe · Post by **RandomScribe** » Wed Sep 22, 2004 4:09 pm

I like the new avatar... although he can be a bit scary when doing his trademark big-eye/squinty-eye expression. But that's part of what makes him cool. ^^

*scampers off to read that site, because Scott McCloud is just that cool*

Maximuscoolman · Post by **Maximuscoolman** » Thu Sep 23, 2004 11:16 am

RandomScribe wrote:I like the new avatar... although he can be a bit scary when doing his trademark big-eye/squinty-eye expression. But that's part of what makes him cool. ^^

*scampers off to read that site, because Scott McCloud is just that cool*

Him?

RandomScribe · Post by **RandomScribe** » Thu Sep 23, 2004 4:41 pm

Um, her? It? Them? >.>

*flees*

Maximuscoolman · Post by **Maximuscoolman** » Fri Sep 24, 2004 12:36 pm

RandomScribe wrote:Um, her? It? Them? >.>

*flees*

Well it looks more female than male to me, but as a guess, I'd say Allan didn't intend the Masked Retriever to have a gender.

RandomScribe · Post by **RandomScribe** » Fri Sep 24, 2004 2:00 pm

Ah. Well, I wasn't sure either, so I just decided to use male pronouns as a default. ^^; ("It" just sounds too impersonal...)

*pokes Allan* Just what is the preferred pronoun set for the Masked Retriever, anyway?

--RS

Cyril_Dran · Post by **Cyril_Dran** » Fri Sep 24, 2004 6:36 pm

Allan has aready referred to the Masked Retriever as a male, I believe. But, like any red blooded american, I'm not gonna check my sources. That way, someone can come along and prove me horribly wrong. Cuz it's more fun that way.

Allan_ecker · Post by **Allan_ecker** » Fri Sep 24, 2004 7:32 pm

Uh, if you were to look -down there- you would see that the Masked Retriever is as physically male as myself, except perhaps without the testosterone overload that is currently causing my hair to migrate from my head to my back, arms and legs. However, like me, the gender identity, the "soul sex" if you will, of both is fairly ambiguous. On the Gender Test at emode.com I score a 51/49 split, falling just -barely- on the female side of the line. I really think I'd be equally baffled by either body, and while the female anatomy is a nice place to visit, I wouldn't want to pay the heavy price to live there.

(Besides, it just makes it that much more special when I do get to visit!)

Randyg · Post by **Randyg** » Fri Sep 24, 2004 7:48 pm

hmm. I just tried taking their gender test, and was rather disappointed with it... mostly because on _EVERY_SINGLE_ question, none of the answers were right. And that's assuming the questions were situations there was even a remote chance I'd ever consider. I really doubt there were more than one or two questions on that entire test where I agreed with the answer I picked...

And it nicely answered with "fuck, you're 37% feminine". Have I mentioned that I never, ever give a valid name for these things? :)

--Randy

EDIT: Looking at other tests on their site, I see they're all just as bad as the gender test... very few of the answers I'm forced to pick actually agree with my answer to the question. I declare their tests to suck. :)

Maximuscoolman · Post by **Maximuscoolman** » Sat Sep 25, 2004 2:29 am

I must have missed where Allan said the Masked Retriever was male, sorry

.

Richard, you're 53% feminine

But as randyg said, it wasn't the greatest test ever, and a lot of the questions I couldn't choose an answer that was very close to what I would have liked to say.
At least there was an "i don't know" answer for the Gilligan's island question, I have no idea what Gilligan's island is, I remember some refference to it Galaxy Quest (amazing) but it was hardly detailed.

RandomScribe · Post by **RandomScribe** » Sat Sep 25, 2004 7:41 am

"Those poor people!"

And I really don't think that those tests were meant to be valid at all... they're just supposed to be good for a laugh. *shrugs* (I'd take it myself, but I'd really rather not give out all the personal information they require at the start of the test. ^^; )

--RS

Maximuscoolman · Post by **Maximuscoolman** » Sat Sep 25, 2004 9:41 am

Actually, they are supposed to be accurate, you can buy a report written by certified psychologists based on your results.

Randyg · Post by **Randyg** » Sat Sep 25, 2004 4:58 pm

RandomScribe wrote:(I'd take it myself, but I'd really rather not give out all the personal information they require at the start of the test. ^^; )

--RS

They don't verify it... If you didn't guess from the way it gave me my results, the name I entered was "fuck off" :)

you do _not_ need to provide a valid email address either... every field can be random and it still lets you in.

One of the more disgusting things with some of their tests is that many of the questions are obvious market research, and not related to the test. Questions about products, services, etc... and some of them are really sneaky, such as one question, in the middle of the test, asking if you would be interested in offers for some product or another.

--Randy

Randyg · Post by **Randyg** » Sat Sep 25, 2004 5:00 pm

maximuscoolman wrote:Actually, they are supposed to be accurate, you can buy a report written by certified psychologists based on your results.

Which I suspect is total bull... If you notice, it says "Your report is available NOW". as in, computer generated. as in, vague generalizations, possibly written by a psychologist, but completely and totally irrelevant. Especially when they're being generated from questions where you disagree with the answers you're forced to pick.

--Randy