Page Commentary No. 267

Gunwild: Those space-train cars probably converted very readily into makeshift domiciles.

Psu: This is a pretty page. And a good moment.

Gunwild: Y'know, I kind of like the "end of a playthrough of Oregon Trail" effect here in the first panel, with a pretty sun and a lush valley full of promise. Like, sure it's a whole different status quo for these entertainment robots. But to their "young" minds, making the best of a frontier is what everyday life is supposed to be about.

Psu: Also what you said about space-train cars, pretty sure that's how early settlements start. They break down the wagons and turn them into shelter. And by the way, I was definitely thinking about the ending to Oregon Trail. But this lush Valley has those overgrown weeds of an ancient city. Anyway, may I point out one little detail I'm really happy with in the bottom two panels? The fifth panel in the background, you can see this person looking for someone. And well... they find each other just in time for the last panel. I wanted to add something a little more "real" than having everyone running their show routines. To really emphasize that they have something more to them than you might expect.

Gunwild: Yeah, I do like the joke of them sort of falling back into their patterns at first, but only to say "Well, these are the ingredients they have to start with, so expect this to stay a bit of a wild west show atmosphere." But y'know, like it says in the Lone Ranger Creed, we ought to make the most of what equipment we have. I'm glad we didn't end off talking about them with that joke though, or it would've sort of implied they were right back at square one through and through, which would not be awesome.

Psu: It's also nice that the "Outlaws" in this setting aren't really that bad. I imagine that it was intentional on the park's part to have the "dangerous outlaws" played by a staff of actors.

Gunwild: In a show with everything but Yul Brynner! Anyhow, I didn't realize until now that Cassiopeia's visible leaning against the train car wall in panels one and three. That's neat.

Psu: She kinda knew she wasn't the main character here. In fact I really like to think of this page as the real inspiration for Cassiopeia starting to do things to try and help other people. So she must've had a lot to think about.

Gunwild: Yeah, that was what I was hoping to imply, I mean she's not a bad guy but she's certainly impressed with Zeke's attitude.

Psu: Just wait till she sees his abs.

Brellom: :3c

Brellom: You know what IS bad though? This first panel reminds me of Anthem, which I still haven't beat. It's me, I'm bad.

Psu: I admit, besides Oregon Trail I was also thinking about Minecraft. Probably it's that feeling of looking at a wilderness with lots of potential.

Brellom: I can see Minecraft looking like this with a shader on. And the render distance goin' real far back. I worked on this page too, but I almost didn't notice because of how airbrush heavy the shading is. But I can see it in a few spots here and there. I'm always a fan of these warm, rustic scenes in the comic.

Psu: I think I just had to rein in the colors for the characters especially in the bottom panel. It's not that they're all supposed to be wearing similarly colored clothes, but the lighting evened everything out between them and I didn't want to make the page too jarring visually. You don't always want the crowd to be wearing tons of different colors. For a moment like this it was good to make them all seem like part of one warm community.

Gunwild: So warm they needed to start making ice cream.

Brellom: You also don't want a bunch of randos drawing the spotlight away from Tapper Mario.

Psu: So many video game references in this page...