Veteran video game designers The Pickford Bros have released an eBook of the first volume of their weekly webcomic, Plok The Exploding Man, starring the hero of their 1993 SNES game.
At the end of his Super Nintendo game Plok fell asleep in his comfy chair. All of his enemies were defeated, and all of his precious flags were back in place. Twenty years later, he wakes up in a comic strip, not quite sure where he is, what year it is, or why he never got a sequel.
The Pickford Bros, creators of the original Plok video game, have revived their creation in the form of a new web-based comic strip. The webcomic appears in weekly 4-panel episodes on the Plok website every Friday.
The first eBook edition – Volume 1: Awake! – collects together the first 26 episodes, along with five beautifully illustrated character biographies and a brand new cover drawn exclusively for this book, and a nine page ‘sketchbook’ containing notes and layout sketches or pencils from each of the 26 strips, giving a detailed insight into the background and creative process involved in the creation of the comic strip.
“We started publishing the Plok comic strip last summer, and right from the first episode we’ve had a fantastic response from both fans of the original SNES game and new readers of the comic,” said Ste Pickford.
We fit the comic around our gamedev work,” explained John Pickford, “Ste draws the strip in the evenings, and we chat about gags and storylines during the day. It’s a nice change of pace from video game development.”
“And now, a year after we started posting little comics to our website, we’re publishing this, the first volume in book form,” continued Ste, “It feels good!”
Plok: Volume 1: Awake! is available now for Kindle on Amazon
• Buy Plok The Exploding Man: Volume 1: Awake! from amazon.co.uk
• Buy Plok The Exploding Man: Volume 1: Awake! from amazon.com
• The eBook is also available now on iBooks
The founder of downthetubes, which he established in 1998. John works as a comics and magazine editor, writer, and on promotional work for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He is currently editor of Star Trek Explorer, published by Titan – his third tour of duty on the title originally titled Star Trek Magazine.
Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine, Babylon 5 Magazine, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics. He has also edited several comic collections, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”.
He’s the writer of “Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies” for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs” with Dave Hailwood.
Categories: British Comics, Digital Comics, downthetubes Comics News