Friday, May 24– 2:00 PM

I’ve been playing some Super Metroid lately on the Wii U VC, and I couldn’t help noticing a few odd similarities with another beloved Nintendo series (not even including the Buzzy Beetles in Maridia).  Today’s comic is less of a gag and more of something that I just kind of like thinking about sometimes with games; these sorts of “what if” scenarios that imply some pretty heavy stuff.

Heck, even if this isn’t the case, a game where you explore the decaying ruins of the Mushroom Kingdom would make a pretty atmospheric Metroid title!

P.S. This comic is a little late because I was enjoying birthday festivities yesterday.

-By Matthew

Tuesday, May 21 — 10:00 AM

Dhalsim has always been my favorite street fighter.  I’ll never forget the day I was in the arcades as a kid, and some other player challenged me to a game of SF2.  He picked Ryu and naturally, I chose Dhalsim (because he was clearly the best), and proceeded to button-mash my way to a flawless victory.  From that point on, Dhalsim’s long arms have served me well, and masked my complete lack of skill at SF.  Same reason I use Donatello in the Turtles games, and Kilik in Soul Calibur.

Tomorrow is my birthday!  Whee!  I’m not taking any time off the comic, though–gotta keep it going, gotta stay alert.  Right now, the plan is to have all Kickstarter rewards done by the end of the month, so for those of you still waiting for your digital stuff, you should be receiving them shortly.  I just sent out another load of books, too.

-By Matthew

Friday, May 17 — 12:00 AM

Sorry, Addie, but you’re probably not a front-runner for Smash 4.  I think it’d be cool–an artist-type would be pretty refreshing–but if the Kirby series is getting another character, it’d likely be Bandana Dee (and if they’re getting an artist, it’s presumably Bowser Jr.).  Still fun to draw these guys again.

In completely unrelated news, I just watched the series finale of The Office, one of my favorite shows.  I’m gonna miss it bad.

-By Matthew

Between Snake, Mega Man, long-lost Smash brethren Ness, and now Sonic, it’s been Brawl in the Extended Family lately.  Gotta keep the variety going!

I started getting pretty delirious when doing these.  People have been joking around about Sonic’s bizarre eyes (eye?) for some time now, and I wanted to get in on the nutty fun.  I almost made this three separate updates, which would’ve been nice for saving me some time, but I think they compliment each other well.  No charge!

-By Matthew

Friday, May 10 — 6:00 PM

This morning I awoke at 6 AM to loud, persistent thunder, and with that came a lengthy power outage.  Sorry about the delay, but this strip was supposed to be up 8 hours ago!

More Mega Man today!  I just like the guy.

Those of you who’ve contributed to the creation of the BitF book should now have received some of your digital rewards via a message on Kickstarter.  Go check them out if you haven’t yet!

-By Matthew

Tuesday, May 7 — 11:00 AM

Today’s comic is my personal dedication to the ever-passionate EarthBound community for their years and years of effort!  Between the starmen.net PK Call-Ins and petitions, Tomato and his team translating Mother 3 (and making a full guide to it), and the thousands of fan works over the years, this community never gave up.  It seems that, of all things, Miiverse was the key to tipping the scales, as we’re finally getting EarthBound on the Virtual Console!  While it’s no translated trilogy, it’s a significant victory, and one that’ll allow a whole new generation of gamers to finally experience this quirky and lovable series.

Hope this one wasn’t too treacly for some of you, but this is a franchise that’s long been near and dear to my heart.  And I listened to Smiles & Tears while writing it, so I’d suggest doing the same while reading it.

On the note of me thanking people, I’d also like to express my gratitude towards a great number of you who’ve willingly chipped in more than they had to for shipping the books.  The full story is here, but to keep it brief, I greatly underestimated shipping costs for international orders, and asked if anyone would like to contribute more (although I’d still send the goods either way).  The response has been terrific so far, with people going beyond the call of duty and making generous contributions.  I’m going to have to make another bonus image or something for you guys.

So thanks to you BitF fans and thanks to you EarthBound fans!  It’s all about feelin’ good this Tuesday!

-By Matthew

Friday, May 3 — 12:00 AM

This comic idea came to mind soon after the upside-down Thwomp comic (10 strips ago!) but I didn’t want to have two similarly-themed comics so close.  There’s something about Thwomps that’s just funny to me, I suppose.

As many of our readers were quick to point out, this month marks five years of Brawl in the Family!  That’s a pretty neat milestone, although admittedly, I wish I could devote something to it at this time.  It crept up on me in the midst of all the book orders and Kickstarter rewards…although I suppose having a book of the first 200 strips is still a cool way to mark such an occasion!  Thank you to well-wishers on the forums and to all of you readers for the past five years!

-By Matthew

Tuesday, April 30 — 12:00 AM

Behold!  The quickest comic ever!

I fear that some of you may be irritated at the lack of visual panache in today’s strip, but I think there’s something to be said for telling a joke with a mere three lines.  BitF has often gone for minimalism, after all.

In other news, Kickstarter backers should start to receive their digital packages this week.  We’re still putting those things together, but most tiers (outside of the highest few) should see some stuff very soon.  Thanks for your patience!  And if you’d like, let me know what you think of the book in the forum thread about it.

See you guys Friday, where I’ll attempt to tell a joke with two lines.

(I’m kidding)

-By Matthew

Friday, April 26 — 11:00 AM

Link’s new ability in the upcoming 3DS Link to the Past-inspired Zelda game is rather cool from a gameplay standpoint…and more importantly, is ripe for parodying.  Who knew walking on walls would be so dangerous?

Hopefully Eario can humpty dumpty that mess so Hyrule isn’t forever doomed.

Some of you have gotten your books already!  If there’s a problem, please send me a message via Kickstarter (or email if you don’t have a Kickstarter, but the former is preferred so I can keep them in one place) and I’ll do my best to fix it.  Between getting the international orders labeled and paid for, and the continuing progress on digital rewards, I’ve still been quite busy over the past few weeks.  Thanks for your continuing patience!

-By Matthew

Tuesday, April 23 — 9:00 AM

Before I say anything else, I have to say this first:

…

YES.  YES.  YES.  FINALLY, EARTHBOUND IS COMING TO THE VC!!  THANK YOU, NINTENDO!!

(whew.  Take a week off and the whole world changes.)

Today’s comic involves all the crud Luigi liberally vacuums up mixing with the few valuables in there.  I imagine he’s the one who has to sort through it all–E. Gadd’s far too busy for that!

It’s been a madcap week for sure, and a much busier one than normal.  For all the details on the progress of the Brawl in the Family book, you can check out my Kickstarter update here, but we certainly got them in and are spending a great deal of time getting all the packages together.

Speaking of Kickstarter, a couple friends of mine who helped program the Tadpole Treble demo from last year have started one of their own.  It’s a modern-day homage to the Genesis classic Road Rash, and it’s coming along nicely!  If you’d like to see it come to fruition, don’t be shy about making a pledge–I’m sure they’d appreciate it!

It’s good to be back once again, but I’ve still got a lot of boxes to go and more comics to draw, so I’ve gotta run.  See you Friday!

-By Matthew