Stolen Pixels #177: Two Gamers on a Couch

By Shamus Posted Tuesday Mar 16, 2010

Filed under: Column 20 comments

You will never guess which comic trope I use in today’s comic.

 


From The Archives:
 

20 thoughts on “Stolen Pixels #177: Two Gamers on a Couch

  1. Josh R says:

    With some MMOs you can actually delete your account.
    The last one I played though, They deleted your access to your account, but could, on a moment’s notice reinstate your character.
    Don’t know if this is a habit of F2P MMOs with a buy shop or just a weird situation

  2. Mark says:

    That’s not two gamers on a couch. That’s one gamer on a couch and the other standing behind it.

    1. droid says:

      We don’t even know if the second one is a gamer. He might just be a lurker who watches real gamers. Such a clever subversion of the form.

  3. Primogenitor says:

    I did not see that last panel coming. Very good!

    1. Meredith says:

      Surprised me into a laugh too. I was so busy wondering what you’d used for her huge controller that I wasn’t looking for an actual punchline about the props. Since there are tvs in HL2, I assume you’re taking yet another jab at webcomics. Still decompressing from the contest, perhaps? :)

      1. Shamus says:

        GM only had 2 TV’s I could use: Teeny tiny, and MASSIVE. The microwave was just the right size, it was just the wrong appliance.

        Her controller is actually a PSP. I found a pack of controllers and consoles, which is what made me decide to do the comic in the first place. I wrote* the joke, shopped around for good apartment locations, picked out some characters, set up the living room, posed everyone.

        Imagine my surprise when I spawned the game controller and found it was the size of a small dog. Arg.

        The PSP was the smallest thing available. It’s only double size.

        * Having a dumb conversation counts as “writing” a joke, which means it qualifies as “work”. Remember this at tax time. Stupid conversations are deductible!

        1. …thhat means I’m rich!

          I got a laugh out of it, too.

        2. jwaddell says:

          The ‘small dog’ controller would have made jokes about the original XBox controller easier though! ( ).

  4. bickerdyke says:

    Update: John isn’t dateless anymore.

    1. Taellosse says:

      As I recall, Jon (I presume we’re talking about the hapless fellow from Garfield comics) never had a problem dating, per se. He went out on dates pretty regularly. His problem was getting SECOND dates (though there were occasionally women he’d date for brief periods. I think he dated Garfield’s vet for a while at one point). Has that changed finally?

      1. Robyrt says:

        Yeah, Jon has a steady girlfriend who is probably supposed to be attractive, but ends up looking like a Bratz doll.

  5. RTBones says:

    Lets see — gamer walks into a room and finds a girl gamer alone on a couch…and he stands BEHIND the couch and TALKS to her?! Where’s the foam coming out of his mouth? Where’s the socially inept stuttering and stumbling over himself trying to get as close to her on that couch as he possibly can without actually making physical contact so as to not scare her away yet still occupy her full attention? Where’s the drool as she describes the intricacies and idiosyncrasies of quest givers and their quests in her favorite MMO?

    Maybe its all in the microwave.

    1. Taellosse says:

      Maybe that’s his sister?

      1. ClearWater says:

        Maybe it’s a guy with manboobs.

  6. Yontan says:

    Really enjoyed this week’s comic. The inner chuckle became an outer chuckle by the last frame, which felt good. :)

  7. I honestly thought the woman on the couch was holding an iPad, which seemed rather….convoluted to me.

    “She’s VPNing through her iPad to play an MMO on her computer, which is actually in her bedroom, but is somehow being displayed on her microwave.”

    Yeah, I’m weird.

    Leslee

  8. Dev Null says:

    A _recovering_ WoW player, huh?

    I think thats a bit like calling someone a recovering alcoholic if they’ve given up booze for smoking. I don’t think serially trading in your addiction for another one counts as recovery, per se…

    (Says the serial addict in the corner.)

  9. Vegedus says:

    You know, even those people who made the very cliché “couch” comics put a lot of work into their comics. I’m not offended or anything, but I don’t think there’s a need to make fun of them any further.

    1. Mari says:

      I don’t think Shamus was so much mocking the creators of such comics as the well-identified trope that ranges freely into cliche territory. If you can’t mock a cliche what’s the point in being a humorist?

  10. Ramsus says:

    I’ve had almost that exact conversation before minus the microwave bit (which was nice btw). I would say I’m a cured ex-Wow player as I haven’t played in years and I can’t imagine them adding anything to game that would get me to play unless they decided that I could play as a dragon (undead optional) and blow up towns and set fire to entire raids (both sides at the same time preferable).

Thanks for joining the discussion. Be nice, don't post angry, and enjoy yourself. This is supposed to be fun. Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked*

You can enclose spoilers in <strike> tags like so:
<strike>Darth Vader is Luke's father!</strike>

You can make things italics like this:
Can you imagine having Darth Vader as your <i>father</i>?

You can make things bold like this:
I'm <b>very</b> glad Darth Vader isn't my father.

You can make links like this:
I'm reading about <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darth_Vader">Darth Vader</a> on Wikipedia!

You can quote someone like this:
Darth Vader said <blockquote>Luke, I am your father.</blockquote>

Leave a Reply to Dev Null Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published.