I enjoy watching first-person shooters get played more than I actually enjoy playing them. I like to think I'm a good back-seat soldier. If I'm watching you play an FPS and you fail to notice the ten-legged spider chewing your face off, you can count on me to scream and scream until you either shake it off or you're dead.
Half-Life 2 is a game I've long enjoyed watching others play, but only recently decided to tackle for myself. Even though it's my first solo playthrough, the game is mostly old hat. I'm already familiar with the characters, I'm familiar with the scenario, and I'm familiar with the game's classic opening: the grim squeal of the train wheels as they come to rest in the grey hell that is City 17, the whirlwind of trash and papers, the desperate portrait of a dying race, the ensuing hilarity--
Wait, what?
Concerned by Christopher Livingston is a rare instance of a gaming comic that runs with a successful, original plot. Its story intertwines hilariously with the brooding events in Half-Life 2, sparing us yet another Penny Arcade rip-off featuring two couch-surfing gamers discussing the merits of Cheetos dust to absorb hand-sweat from controllers. Also, Livingston (mostly) used in-game models for Concerned's artwork, but the work he put into positioning and modifying said models goes way beyond typical sprite hacks.
Finally, Concerned plots its story, tells it, and ends while it was still funny. No encores, no drawn-out jokes about cake and Companion Cubes.
Concerned's protagonist, Gordon Frohman, is a lovable idiot. The affection you inevitably feel for him is remarkable as well: Homer Simpsons and Peter Griffins aren't in short supply in comics and cartoons, meaning a writer has to work especially hard if he wants anyone to care about his own escaped mental patient. Yet, Frohman is written effortlessly, probably because his eager cheer thrives in spite of the wrecked, occupied city (and cities) he lives in. If you had to sit beside Frohman on a long, rattling bus trip to some alien prison camp, you'd provoke the guard to kill you. Observed from the outside, you just like the guy for being so disastrously helpful and happy. Who else would think of “motivational posters” that feature the phrase, “Being Beaten Hard? Or Hardly Being Beaten?”
Thus, I salute Frohman, Livingston, and Concerned. Even though it means I'll be thinking hard about the origin of each explosive barrel I pass as I play through Half-Life 2.
Related Links:
Now At Your Local Dollar Store: Half-Life
Black Mesa: Source: Oh Right, That Still Exists
Not Quite 4D, But Close: The History of 3D Gaming