/GU… COMICS COMES TO A CLOSE [Author: Tick]
Yeah, we’re doing a lot of EQ stuff today. Some of it’s even been positive. What IS the world coming to?
What was the inspiration for /GU… ?
Anyone that plays the game knows that /gu is the abbreviated command line the lets you speak to people in your guild, and ultimately that was the inspiration for the comic strip, all the wierd and funny stuff that happened in guild chat day in and day out. I was maintaining the guild’s website at the time, and illustrated a few of the jokes to put on the site for guild members to see. And that’s where it all started… a little bitty guild site.
Did you expect it to become as popular as it did?
Absolutely not. The strip was only meant to be seen by guild members. Then I thought I’d share them with the EQ community, if they were interested. So I sent email to the guys at EQAnswers (it was big at the time) and asked them if they’d put a link to the strips in a brief news article. The response was almost immediate, they contacted me and said “News link? How about we host you and put you infront of everyone?” I jumped at it.
So, GameFan/EQAnswers was hosting me and the traffic was rolling in. Then… GameFan went down. I thought GU was going with it, but I decided to ask Everlore if they might be interested in picking me up as an affiliate. They said yes and had been hosting GU since October 2000.
The strip really took off when Tim over at Evercrest linked to GU. The daily visitors were steadily climbing, links started popping up everywhere, guild message boards were putting in GU images left and right. Everything just kind of came together and meshed and GU was a success. Of course I never really realized that. I was just having fun, you know? It sank in when I saw the stats for the first time.
Why are you closing up shop?
Well, it’s a number of things really. But the main reason would have to be lack of time. I used to have the time to really develop an idea; work with it until it was written just right and got to the point in the shortest amount of time, that’s what made GU funny… rapid delivery. Now, the humor is a bit strained. The ideas don’t flow as freely, and what I come up with isn’t hammered out entirely before I HAVE to sit down to draw it. Basically, the strip just wasn’t what it used to be. So I decided it was time to bow out gracefully. Leave people with the memory of a great strip not the bad taste of forced humor.
Will the comics archive still be available?
Everlore is kindly hosting it a bit longer, giving me time to sell off the last of the GU Coloring Books as keepsakes. There may be a short period of downtime, but I’m working with some people now to host the GU archives a couple of months down the road here.
Do you still play EQ?
Yup, I still play and no matter what anyone says **cough cough** I still enjoy the game. EverQuest is phenomenal in my book and where it still has some flaws and some issues, it’s a rather nice alternative to vegging out on the couch, scarfin’ chips, and watching the Stupidity Enhancement Device.
Woody, you gave us a lot of laughs. The Tick salutes you.