Mind Control Comics Forum

It's that time of the year again! You get seven votes to pick your favorite titles for 2016. Comments below, as usual... and thanks!

(Note: Because the two Fantasy World issues were pretty much different stories, we're listing them as different titles here.)

I'm happy to vote for The Hidden Knowledge again. I skipped it last year, since it had meandered a bit, but this year its single issue got things back on track. I'm not such a fan of "nice guy" MC so I like that Daffyd is taking charge again. That kind of reflects through my other choices as well: comics that have strong plots but don't get bogged down, and where the controller lets his id run loose.

Honorable mentions to Drains and Toytime, both of which I'd be happy to see again.

Can I also vote for chrysalis pls?

Only as a write-in! It didn't have any issues in 2016.

+1

Can I give 7 votes to Beautiful Creatures? :)

I would also vote for Chrysalis, and for the Roll Playing extra: Loaded Dice #1 (hopefully there will be a #2, ....)

The Inheritance (4)
The Hidden Knowledge (3)

Hidden Knowledge and the Ring Cycle are my top two.

I put in for The Inheritance, The Persuader, and Free Trade Zone too.

If it counts I'd like to use my last two votes to double up on Hidden Knowledge and Ring Cycle!

And, yeah, Chrysalis.

Chrysalis is by far my favorite

Didn't see an entry for Free Cable, but would have made it my 7th vote. It was one of the titles I skipped over originally, but caught up with after the last issue came out. It has a lot of fun with its fairly strict formula.

I'm using my last two for Chrysalis and Roll Playing as well.

Fairly cheeky but those were among my favourite titles I read in 2016   ;)

Hidden Knowledge and Beyond Rubies were both excellent in their content this year - which I think has stayed pretty consistent for me.

Miss Thursday, tho, was one I read again just recently. That was a damn good single issue. HMB on that art certainly never hurts.

Regardless of how the vote shakes out, though, one thing that I just have to throw my hat in the ring for is running less titles simultaneously but updating them more frequently. I know that not everybody likes the same stuff, but storylines and plots that resolve in a decent amount of irl time would be good. Perhaps try to break comics into major groupings/subgenres and maintain one of each at a certain time? If you had 8 comics going at any given time, they'd each get updated every other month - that would probably be fairly ideal. Dunno how that would work with art schedules/payment though.

Well, I'm glad so see CONFUSED was so popular but I'm puzzled to see it doing better than THE HIDDEN KNOWLEDGE...

It would be wrong of me to use this occasion to say about some of your series "Please don't bother ever doing any of these ever again" wouldn't it?

"My people and I have come to an agreement which satisfied us both. They are to say what they please, and I am to do what I please." -- Frederick the Great

I would have also included the Chrysalis...not on your list.

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Loaded Dice on ther somewhere?

Tough choice!  I mainly chose new ones that I hope to see continued.  I expect to continue seeing new issues of Hidden Knowledge (although it doesn't get updated near enough), SJI, Audiophilia, Bigger and those others that have been on the site for years now.

Honorable mentions to Con'Fused (Apparently finished for now), High Fantasy, Like Old Times, Unknown Pleasures and Wedding Photographer.

I am utterly shocked by how low the count for Waiting Room is and how high the count for Roll Playing is.

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I'd much rather the voting was broken down into on-going series favorites or a combination of completed series and one-shots. Especially if you're going to use the data to decide which to continue producing and which to slow or stop. And for some one-shots, voting for them might make you try to continue them and for some, I might have liked the one story but not enough for it to start again. Series that have just had one issue for are hard to judge. Since they will continue there are times when not enough has happened to say whether I really like the direction it is going in so rarely would I vote for a series that's starting. Most of those I would vote for to continue since they obviously haven't gotten to the good part yet.

I sort of understand why you don't allow us to peek at the results before we vote and modify them after we vote but I'd rather have both of those options myself. After all, the following is true...

I didn't vote for issues I know to be site favorites even if they are my own favorites. Series like Beyond Rubies, By the Book, Con'Fused, Hidden Knowledge, the Inheritance, Saint James Infirmary, Ring Cycle and Roll Playing I figured didn't need a vote so I didn't bother even though I'd be really upset if they were completed prematurely or not published at all this year. Of the three completed series this year, I liked all three and would have liked all three to continue. Yet I voted for the Pool of Doctor Viagari as I thought it completed way too soon where the others did run 6 issues. Obviously, the other two are Occurrence and Con'Fused. All three were good enough to continue yet we did talk about the fact that so many things are running that updates are too far apart.

I mentioned that I wouldn't use my votes for one shots. I'd go a step further and say the number of one shots produced each year should be reduced until more on going series come to a conclusion. Of the 9 one shots for this year, plus all of the member bonuses, the work is excellent and the story is usually hot and too the point. At times, I think most could easily be series as you did with Ring Cycle. Yet every time a one shot hits the calendar it means that one series will take longer to eventually conclude. On the other hand, I'll mention that I'm disappointed that SoFix was a One Shot and not a series and I'm surprised that no one has voted for it yet.

As you can see, I would have voted for most of them given the chance. Very little of what is presented on this site is ever bad.

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Well, I think the best way to think of it is that they are one of many factors. I could get endlessly complex with the poll methodology, but after a while, it becomes a tangle and hard for people to figure out how to vote.

The factors (in no particular order) that go into the decision are:

• What I find hot at the moment I sit down to write the script or look at the submission.
• Who is available among the artists and what they're good at drawing.
• The feedback on the Forum on the various issues.
• The polls.

If I'm already feeling marginal about a title, a strongly low poll result is definitely going to be a factor. Similarly, if I feel marginal about a title but it gets a lot of up-votes, that'll for sure cause me to take a second look at it.

So, if you are voting tactically, giving your votes to something that you think you like but not many other people do, even if it wouldn't be in your top seven otherwise, is a pretty reasonable approach.

One of the things to notice about this is that it is so tough because there is such an incredible amount of excellent material.  Whew!

Okay, how could I possibly screw that up?  I didn't understand how to vote multiple times for the same comic.  On the plus side, the only vote that I managed to cast was for my favorite comic on the site SJI

There are over a dozen worth of votes but besides

1. SJI, they include

2. Waiting Room
3. Like Old Times
4. The Inheritance
5. Canadian Girlfriend
6. EM 3 and
7. Enchanted Summer.

And there are several others.

Roll Playing is getting a lot of support.  By the Book and Audiophilia are consistently excellent.

The Eye deserves a shot.  It's one of only two comics with female controllers on the site.  The art is good and it deserves a shot to spread its wings.

Faerie Tail is also developing well.  So, there are a BUNCH of these that are great and deserve votes and I'm very excited to see them in the new year and beyond.

Stories which are in early development shouldn't and can't really compete with stories that are in full swing.  For example: I didn't pick Beautiful Creatures. Not because it doesn't look like it's going to be a great story, but because not much has really happened yet. In contrast, Roll Playing and Con 'Fused were both in full swing, had back stories in place, and lots to propel them when new issues came out. I picked both of them--they had great issues this year. I'm waiting to see some development in other stories as well.  I'll reiterate my earlier posts here: I'd rather see periodic updates of fewer stories, driving them to conclusions, than year-or-more gaps open up in existing story lines... especially if said story lines are going to require several updates to complete.

Both Hidden Knowledge and SJI seemed to flog around looking for a plot for awhile; both are beginning to move towards something again, so I'm looking forward to seeing these develop in 2017.

Travel Plans.

Give Roll Playing a write-in from me. After reading it, I see why it's the highest rated comic atm. Shits funny as all hell. That beholder is absolute top tier. d20 out of 10.

Waiting Room is pretty standard story. Not bad, but there's not much unique to it. Roll Playing is something different. Plus the theme of Roll Playing probably got it at least a few votes from this crowd.

I LOVE Waiting Room, mainly as Dr Laurel was controlling woman long before she herself was taken control of. The fact that there has only been a small gap between issues is encouraging as I hope that more comes more often to finish or continue the story.