Found Documents

Only one comment on the latest strip.

tl;dr

Ermmm... sorry, Dave, but I sorta gotta call shenanigans here. From the beginning I've liked the additional information available about the society and technology available as side bars, but I honestly don't think it worked when presented as the main story line, and for two different reasons.

First, it's, well, it's a bit of an infodump. The narrative stopped completely, and instead we were presented with a load of backstory in the form of a dense packet of prose.

It's kind of like watching a movie about Gettysburg and having it stop for five minutes so Shelby Foote can explain how Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin caused a massive increase in worldwide demand for cotton, and that demand created some of the conditions that led to the Civil War. And now, back to Pickett's Charge, already in progress.

Second, well, this is a graphic medium, and your audience expects a graphic presentation. Expecting a graphic presentation and getting dense lines of text is like flipping the page on a Stephen King novel and discovering that he has decided to present the events of the next chapter through interpretive dance. It's... disconcerting.

Or, to put it briefly, I think it was a neat experiment that didn't quite work out :)

Rimshot's right about this being a graphic medium, but I'm a reader--of course I read it! I don't think one page is too long, either.

Well, I thought it was an excellent method of filling in backstory (although I didn't realise where the idea came from). Admittedly, when the documents comprises the entire strip for that week, it can be disappointing that the plot hasn't moved on, but I certainly think they're an essential part of making this a full story.

Is the podcast still planned, or are a number of documents going to be used to fill in all the gaps?

Yep! The podcast is still planned: I'm just letting questions filter in for a bit. :)

I would also like to say that I like the found documents as well. For one, this document answers the question, "Were there any black sheep in the Cruz family?"

All the found documents help flesh out the whole backstory to the world you've created and really give it depth. I hope you do a few more throughout.

One question: The Drive book contains a page of transmissions from Orla O'Malley to the Emperor and various other places in the Empire. That doesn't appear on the site at all. Is that a "book exclusive?" Are there going to be more book exclusives, or was the page an oversight that will be posted to the new Drive site once complete?

If that was a book exclusive, will there be more?