Start of Darkness

[Flame_Drake]

For those of you who don't read the wonderful front page:

Giant in the Playground is proud to announce our fourth OOTS book, The Order of the Stick: Start of Darkness. The thematic companion to On the Origin of PCs, Start of Darkness tells the twisted tale of the villains: Xykon, Redcloak, and the Monster in the Darkness. Every page of this book is all-new, and never has been (and never will be) posted online; this is a print-exclusive. Weighing in at 112 pages, this book is 55% longer than our last black-and-white book and retails for only a few dollars more.

I'm sold!

Drake

[The Giant]

Heh, you beat me to posting a thread in this forum...guess I'll just sticky this one.

[HomerHT]

OMG!

Words do not come to me.

Awesomeness. Sheer awesomeness.

[Fale]

I agree. I will be buying this one. Looks good.

[Hart av Srednak]

Cranyon drawings included

[Eldhrin]

New book! Crayons! I'm not sure I can cope with any more of this.

* goes to lie down and wait until it ships *

[phoenixineohp]

WOW! He's been secretly increasing the awesomeness for us! I had no idea! And with all the double and triple strips we have been getting... This is amazing! Good job Giant!

[Bag_of_Holding]

Oh my gosh!! I have to get it! Go !!

[KennyRules]

Im..crying..this is beatiful..*sniff*


Seriousely, this is beyond awesome.
Entire new book about and above all ?
Biggest evilgasm I've ever had.

[starburst98]

wait a sec, what if it shows what really is?!?!

[Baru]

Probably not.
If I see this on the shelf of my local comic store, I'm buying it.

[The Giant]

wait a sec, what if it shows what really is?!?!

I'll go ahead and say there is not a definitive answer. There is, however, the story of how first met , from which several theories about what the is can be conclusively eliminated as impossible.

[Baru]

Hunh.
Will the goblin cleric 'Ted' be in this book?

[overtenemy]

Everyone pre-order GOGOGOGOGOGO!

[Darkxarth]

I'm freakin' psyched! Now I just need to buy On the Origins of PCs and Dungeon Crawlin' Fools and Start of Darkness to complete my collection! But seriously, I need to buy them... in case the Internet is destroyed and I need my OotS fix. Seriously.

[Icewalker]

Yeah. I haven't actually bought any of the books so far, but I was seriously considering buying On the Origins of PCs, but haven't (yet!) but this....I'm pretty sure I'm buying this soon as I can find it. Redclooooak!

I'm still kind of skeptical on black and white, I would expect it'd take some flavor out of it, but who knows, I haven't read em, I could be totally wrong. I look forward to finding out.

Got one question: what are the shipping costs of APE? If very low, I think I'd probably just get it from there instead.

[oball]

May 15? Best birthday present ever!

[Charity322]

Looks cool!

Was curious, will the book tell us anything about the origins of the Linear Guild as well.

[The Giant]

Looks cool!

Was curious, will the book tell us anything about the origins of the Linear Guild as well.

No, no Linear Guild in this book. Just Xykon, Redcloak, the Monster in the Darkness, demon cockroaches, and a new character.

Oh, and Lirian and Dorukan, too.

EDIT: And a big dose of Eugene Greenhilt, too.

[Icewalker]

Ooooh new character. Is it the goblin with the eyepatch? Or the paladin?

[Jazzvader]

Im..crying..this is beatiful..*sniff*


Seriousely, this is beyond awesome.
Entire new book about and above all ?
Biggest evilgasm I've ever had.

AWESOME!! Totally!! Completely AWESOME!!!

[CockroachTeaParty]

Ah... I've been waiting for this one. Good news, good news. Tragically, I won't be living anywhere stable in May... I'll have to wait until June to get my filthy mits on it. Blast...

[kpenguin]

Totally awesome! A book staring everyone's favorite Dark Half-of-Six! One little quibble though: what's with the title? I mean, it doesn't seem to stand for anything or have any sort of joke in it. Its just... bland.

[factotum]

Totally awesome! A book staring everyone's favorite Dark Half-of-Six! One little quibble though: what's with the title? I mean, it doesn't seem to stand for anything or have any sort of joke in it. Its just... bland.

Try the novel "Heart of Darkness" by Joseph Conrad--seems pretty clear it's a pun on that.

[Hazelnut]

This is great news, I'll be ordering this along with the newly reprinted Dungeon Crawlin' Fools. Yay!

I am pretty surprised though Rich, I knew you were working on the next book but I'd assumed it was the next collection of OOTS webcomic strips to follow on from Blues. It's lovely surprise to have this announced but I'm curious as to when you think you'll be releasing the followup to Blues? (It may sound cheap, but I want to pay as few $20 airmail fees as possible without having to wait forever to get these great books)

Lastly, I have to ask, were you tempted to number this book OOTS-1 ?

[The Giant]

Two issues with the order form:

1. A cosmetic one: the character "?" renders as ń -- the page is restricted to Windows1252 characters and fails to deal with anything else. Sure, I can write "n" and have it delivered ok, but imagine a poor schmuck from Russia who tries to write his address...

2. The form requires a State/Province for non-US addresses. I'm not sure how that address verification thingy will work if I put some made-up trash in that field. I didn't check it yet as my card good for international use is at home, but I somehow don't see that going fine.

You should direct both of these comments to the APE Games people; I have no control over the order form, and I don't think they will ever see this thread. There should be contact info on the APE Games webpage, but if there's not, try [email protected] and explain your problem to them.

I am pretty surprised though Rich, I knew you were working on the next book but I'd assumed it was the next collection of OOTS webcomic strips to follow on from Blues. It's lovely surprise to have this announced but I'm curious as to when you think you'll be releasing the followup to Blues? (It may sound cheap, but I want to pay as few $20 airmail fees as possible without having to wait forever to get these great books)

The next compilation book will not arrive until the Fall, probably September. Since it will include the entirety of the war sequence, we haven't even gotten to the stopping point for the content, much less had time to work up bonus material.

Lastly, I have to ask, were you tempted to number this book OOTS-1 ?

The book actually IS numbered -1 on the spine, so it can be shelved before "On The Origin of PCs" for numerical order goodness.

[Aiani]

Woooo! I am was very happy to read that news post. Can't wait to read about Xykon, Mitd and especially Redcloak. This made my work night less boring.

[Moral Wiz]

Also, for the guy who didn't get it

Start
of
Darkness

or, SoD

[Caractacus]

Rats! I thought I was going to be the one to explain about Joseph Conrad...

Nice pun!

Thanks, Rich! You bring a consistent level of relief to our everyday lives. Hope you remember to have a life yourself sometime...

P.S. I have to say that I really appreciated 'On the Origin of PCs' - I think being able to work with the material as a whole instead of a strip at a time really lets Rich have more creative freedom. He's not locked in to what he just did and can go back to change/add/remove things. Some really nice lines there, too...

I am REALLY looking forward to a SoDing good read!

[Baalzebub]

By the Nine Hells! I have to buy SoD!! I think I just had an evilgasm...