I need a lot of help. (Frequently updated)

That's a good story base!
And I think their names are nice. I can think of some stories that had strange names, for example like Avatar the Legend of Aang or Danganronpa. Some of the names sounds pretty weird but acceptable. (Like Pekoyama Peko in Danganronpa 3? There's no such person named that way)
How bad the names are depends on your own opinion.

With that type of setting, you can focus on the action first like something triggers their action and then focus on character development as the story goes on.

The easiest way to start a story comic is to determine what you really want to write or convey to the readers. For example 'becoming stronger, make friends and defeat evil' or 'hate becomes love'.
Sounds cheesy but those two are themes you can find almost anywhere.

Sorry for the long post. Hope it helps!

First off: I knooooooow it's hard to not do it, but please! try to avoid trashtalking so much!! ;u; Every cool and good-looking story starts at this point; I've had plenty of characters who started out as "He's trying to kill so-and-so because ???? <--- figure this out"
It's okay to not magically know everything about your characters while you're developing your story!

My personal advice would be, don't worry about differentiating it from other stories. "People are trapped and know that one of them is a killer" is a tale as old as time and YET, we keep making stories about it, because it's interesting! Focus on just making a story, and as you come up with ideas just.... don't make the exact same story beats as Danganronpa, and you'll be okay. The unique qualities will come from focusing on telling the story that's interesting and rings true to you!

The biggest thing that's needed here seem to be the Things That Happen. So like, Joule wakes up in a........locked house or whatever full of strange people, and they're trying to get out. What happens? Do they try to work together initially? Do they form a plan? What gets in the way of that plan? Are there environmental hazards they're trying to overcome, or is the only real danger the other people who might kill them? And on a larger scale, do they figure out their knowledge is being reset? Do they try to find a way around that? Etcetera etcetera etcetera.
Basically, "what do they try to do, and what gets in their way" can be a building block for building the actual story part.

I'm similar to you in that I'll come up with a strong concept and neat characters but have to work hard to assemble a functioning story. A lot of times when I'm trying to move into the actual Things That Happen I will try to list out the story beats I know -- this usually ends up with a lot of points like this:

-- they decide to work together (why????)
-- they go to ???????? [not sure yet] to find character X
-- SOMETHING HAPPENS (???) and they realise they need to do Y

so don't be discouraged if you try this and it has lots of holes, or important things you clearly haven't worked out yet -- that's the whole point! When you start laying out the actual beats of the story that forces you to move away from the concept and into the nitty gritty of "okay but what actually happens in this story" and you'll see a lot more clearly what you need. For me, that gives me a place to start thinking rather than feeling like I need to somehow pull a story out of nothing.

Another idea that helps me:

I don't know why this was so revolutionary to me, but looking at how one Thing That Happens leads into or causes the next Thing That Happens helped me so much with building a plot -- instead of thinking of it as a list, I'm looking at how each action or choice has consequences. It also helps to keep the story from feeling like a bunch of random events!

I COULD PROBABLY GO ON but this is getting a lil long at this point so, feel free to ask questions about specifics or ask me to go more in-depth for something if this sort of stuff is helpful for you, or if I answered entirely the wrong question. xD

I'm gonna give you homework LMAO

Watch (movies):
Nine Dead
Saw 2
The Game
Circle (2015)
Would You Rather

Read (short stories):
Cask of Amontillado
The Masque of the Red Death
The Gold-Bug

These will give you GREAT insight on how mystery works and how versatile it can be! If you prefer anime, watch Gantz or read the manga. I would recommend Mirai Nikki if I didn't hate it so much, but you could see that one, too, to see how a murder mystery game could be played.

I think these titles will give you more ideas on how to develop your story further and not fall into the same tropes we have all seen. I hope I helped you a bit!

What @shazzbaa said:

This? Stuff like this is very literally in the actual working outline of my comic. I've got, and I quote verbatim, "wait, maybe it's better if I did this instead?" notes all over that outline, and it still works!

Not everyone works well with a rigidly planned outline, and a lot of the time, you'll discover that your characters grow and change and become something more while you're actually telling the story - and that's fine. You're doing a webcomic! It's in the nature of them to change a bit as they go. : )

Regarding your specific questions, point by point:

I have no idea why you picked the names you picked, but here goes: The first thing that stands out to me is that Mcglyde and Yalka - who are supposed to be brothers - have names that don't feel connected? "Mcglyde" sounds like a surname, for example, while "Yalka" doesn't. Do they have a family name?

I like that the android is named Joule, because "joule" is a unit of force used to measure electricity!

Out of the whole list, I think the names are fine and easy to remember - the only one that trips me up a bit is "Vyryse", because looking at I haven't the first idea of how to pronunce it. Why-rice? Why-rye-ze? Why-rye-s? Virri-ze?

If all else fails, behindthename.com2 is your friend. Dig through and find something that fits!

Start simple and build from there. You want to tell a story about a bunch of people stuck in a murderous time-loop constructed by some evil mastermind. The reader doesn't need to know everything about the premise from the start, and honestly, neither do you at this point; you can stick those "figure it out later" notes all over your stuff and let it wait for a bit.

A few things you might wanna get started on right now, though, is a.) figuring out the big building blocks of the story. WHY did the Undertaker trap these people where they are? You seem to have a few options here - changing people through psychological experiment (but why? is the Undertaker trying to produce a specific kind of person?), solving the fiendish puzzle (maybe the Undertaker is just a bored, sadistic trickster-god of some sort, using this timeloop to amuse itself?), or Eric's interdimentional travel.

I feel like if you want to keep Eric around (and you don't have to! it's okay to have a small cast!), you're gonna want to figure out where he's from, and why he's here. Did he already know who the mastermind was? If so, how? Did the Undertaker do something in his dimension too? Is the Undertaker an interdimensional threat?

Basically, brainstorming a story is asking yourself a series of questions - most of them being "why?" and "what if?" - and trying to get the answers to line up. It also helps to focus and try not to let everything run away from you! You've got a big old cast here, which means you're trying to develop a lot of things at once. That might be part of why it feels so messy and overwhelming right now!

My advice is to take it step by step. You say Joule is your main character! So, what's he all about? Why is he the main character? What's his personality like, what does he act like, why is he there? You've got a connection between him and Cosmo already; she wants to use him to get out of this sick game, and is faking a happy personality on the outside. That's great! Two of your characters are connected! In fact, four of them are connected in two pairs, since you've got a pair of brothers as well!

Now the task is to connect them to the rest of the task. It doesn't need to be something that happened before the story starts; it could be something you say "okay, during this story, I want these characters to establish a connection" and work towards it. Maybe Mcglyde, who is used to protecting Yalka, decides to protect Quo because she seems to be shy, and he interprets that as her being weak. Quo is a sleeper agent/split personality, so maybe she goes along with this, happy for protection, but beneath it there's the threat of the killer personality - and voilá, you've got a potential conflict! If the killer personality wakes up, Quo might attack Mcglyde, and we as readers will be upset, because we thought they were friends. Also, Yalka might get jealous of his brother protecting someone other than him, and that means there's potential conflict between Yalka and Quo.

And so on. Place one puzzle piece down, and then try to connect it to another, and another - and piece by piece, you assemble something that works!

If it feels overwhelming, consider trimming your cast down. Does your story NEED Eric? Or Kasulaia? Trimming them out and focusing on the remaining characters might help you get this on the right track. You don't have to, but it might be easier to simplify a bit. You can always add more complexity once you feel more confident in your story!

One thing that can really help here when you're doing mysteries is at least have the goals and methods in mind. Start from the event backwards. Figure out the who, what, where, when and why of the actual problem.

Why is the time loop happening?
Who are the people involved and their importance of being stuck in the loop?
What does the bad guy hope to gain?
Why does the time loop change and is heavily altered each time? Is that from outside interference? Part of the plan? Some kind of karmic pendulum at work - like time is trying to break free from this artificial loop?

These are important questions to ask for your story and can really help you with the tent pole logic of the story and everything can be mostly off the cuff outside of these important facts and moments.

Good luck!

You seem to be on the right path with putting things together now, so I'll just leave you with one final thought:

1.) Six characters is still a bunch, and you can still spend a lot of time building up the relationship between them after you've expanded on their backstories.

2.) You don't actually need to make this a really long story. It's perfectly okay to tell short stories, or mid-length stories! Not everything needs to be epic in scope.

Seconding this! You could make a huge epic story out of the exact same plot with THREE characters if you spent a lot of time developing them -- not just exploring their backstories, but if their relationships with each other develop and change over time.

I mean, in your rough outline for the intro, things get murdery really fast, but they don't have to. The characters don't necessarily know that [AI] is even being honest about a murderer being among them -- what if he's just saying that to make us all kill each other? You could seriously spend a ton of time and exploration on the point before any murders happen, when everyone is suspicious, and scared, and trying to protect themselves and be ready to kill if they have to but also trying not to look like someone who's ready to murder everyone. Heck, the whole first arc of the story could be building up to the point where murders start happening.

That's not saying that's the way it SHOULD be, just that cramming more characters in isn't the only way to expand the story!

To kind of continue on what @joannekwan was saying, I'm a little concerned about the audience being uninterested in a time loop too. I know you said that the characters will have their memories wiped at the beginning of each new loop so no one has any new evidence on the killer, ect, but I'm wondering if there's a way to do this other than I complete memory wipe. Psychologically speaking, if these people always start in the same place given the same information, it is highly likely that they will just do the exact same things over and over again. I feel like the situation either needs to be tweaked each time so at least one character has a reason to act at least slightly differently (in order to change the chain of events) or someone or everyone needs to have some memory of what's going on in order for them to ever figure out who the killer is.. There are definitely ways to keep the time loop interesting and people invested (check out Re:zero for a character's slow break down due to time loops) and I'm interested to see where this goes.

Ok, gotcha, that makes sense

If you can't do digital, then learn. If you want your comic to be popular, then you must do digital. Almost all the popular creators use digital. Unless your handrawn art is exceptional, then digital is the way to go. As for the story, you've thought it out well! One thing to keep in mind is to follow this character formula:

Main character: Must be strong and determined. Probably has 1 or 2 parents missing. At the end of the story he must have changed in some way. Ex. Luke Skywalker, Simba, Batman, Harry Potter.

Sidekick: Every hero needs some help. A sidekick will always try his best to aid the hero in every battle The sidekick is loyal and is very different than the main character. Ex. C3PO R2D2, Timon Pumba, Robin, Hermione Ron.

Wise old dude: Will aid the hero by giving him/her wisdom. The wise old dude doesn't usually participate in fights but helps the hero along the way. The wise dude often dies. Ex. Obi-Wan Kenobi, Rafiki, Alfred, Dumbledore.

Possible girlfriend: (If the main character is a girl, then other way round). The main hero has a girlfriend that helps him to relax and take his mind of the quest. Without her, there would be no parts where the hero relaxes and the hero becomes more and more determined making him cold and heartless. Ex. Leia, Nala, Batgirl, Cho Chang/Ginny Wealsy.

Villain: Ian Fleming, the author of the James Bond series, once said that the hero was only as good as the villain. The villain must be drived by some kind of force. His first book, Goldfinger, features a villain who has a mad desire for gold and that is what motivates him. Your villain must have a motive and the same detrmination as the hero if not more. Ex. Darth Vader (Dark Side), Scar (Royalty), Joker (Madness), Voldemort (Anger?, Weakness)

Nasty Helpers: Of course, the Villain is not alone, the Nasty Helpers are willing to do anything the Villain orders them to. The hero will have to face many of the helpers if not more. Ex. Stormtroopers, Hyenas, Joker's Henchmen/Harley Quinn, Dementors.

Neutrals: Your world should have many characters Star Wars has many different creatures and Harry Potter has lots of Monsters in it too. Get creative with them but remember, they are background noise.

I hope this helped! Phew! This may be my longest post! Use this to make the ultimate comic! Now get creating!

P.S Voldemort is motivated by the delusion of weakness. He thinks by killing Muggles he is killing the weak and is making the world better.