No hand holding critique + Sub ( comics )

Zak 2023-04-19 07:13:07 UTC #24

Ohhhh, Nah man. You said Cupcake lol

I know ALL bout Cuphead. lol

Also, totally. Just because the forums went down for a few days. I thought you might've not seen the message. My bad!

Nabel-Mabel 2023-04-20 06:45:05 UTC #25

Yo Zak! Just finished reading all of JetX !

Even before really reading the story i told you i could feel the Sonic inspiration but even the story is heavily inspired by sonic hahaha! Even the title is a reference to Sonic X.

Is it a bad thing? I don't think so because it's obviously super self aware! I can tell you're just having fun while doing this without taking it too seriously! But seriously enough to want to make readers enjoy a good time ^^
And to that my answer is yes your comics is entertaining!

I had a couple of problem with the pacing of the first 2 chapters ( especially the first) but chapter 3, 4 and 5 had good pacing! Things at the very beginning were happening so fast but you calmed down afterwards so that's good! I think it's because you've started to enter the " i'm not in control of the story anymore" phase in chapter 3, where you just let the story dictate itself and the characters move " on their own", if you understand what i'm saying.

The paneling also started getting better in chapter 3. You sometimes cram things way too much and it becomes difficult to read when there are multiple panels in a single page and that pages has action! Having multiple panels is not a problem when it's just dialogue, but when you have for example someone throwing a 5 meter rock in a very small panel that is 1/20 of the whole page, it's feels very anti-climatic! Drawings are here to serve the story, so when you want readers to be like " wow! he did that!" you also have to wow us with a big panel so we understand the weight/power of something! Here are two examples of very good pages you've done:

Use this type of paneling for big moments and the small ones for other moments and it will make a huge difference! Your fight's choreography are really good too it's a shame they are so small sometimes!

I'm liking the cast so far! The villain is for some reason by far the most fleshed out character hahahah i feel like he is your favorite! I also like the girl, my favorite page of your comics was when she was having a flashback on the right side and the present was happening on the left, very impactful composition. Can't wait to know more about her! Sword dude is cool too! It's weird but my least favorite character is Jet xD We don't know anything about him in already 5 chapters, like why is he so fast and why doesn't he age? I'm sure the answers to this will come later on.

A small gripe i have (but don't take this one too much into consideration, this is super subjective): It's too bad that you had such a badass design for the enemy robot ( he looked like the marauder armor from Ratchet: Deadlock! Epic!) but it's the mad scientist talking through him! If he was sentient it would have been sooo badass! Like a sort of dark edgy character ( like Shadow ) but maybe you're saving that for another character with an even more badass appearance? Who knows!

Anyway, i hope this helps ! It was cool reading JetX! Hope you'll do the same with my comics !! We actually start both our stories the same you'll see! That's lowkey a cool coincidence.

Zak 2023-04-20 13:14:55 UTC #26

Hey there! Thanks for the comment! Sorry its taken me a bit. I just needed some time to process whatcha said and to reply accordingly.

First two chapters, First mostly. Was written and drawn up a few years prior. Gaining more experience since then uploading it I'm glad to hear that I have improved on the pacing but yes. It is diffidently to the point of "I have lost control of it" Which is most certainly not a bad thing. So I totally get what you mean lol.

Probably why it hasn't done as well as I hoped since it sounds more like a hurdle than anything else. lol

I understand where you are coming from with the paneling. Its just something if I had to pick to improve about my art its most certainly that AND anatomy.

In terms of the actiony big panels Ill keep those in mind for when it comes to action sequences. I draw traditionally on A4 paper so it gets hard to gauge panelling sometimes when I do multiple thumbnails of the same page over and over again ^^;
But thanks for pointing it out however, I would have never EVER picked up on that!

I see what you did there, flatter me with three examples instead of the two you mention haha.

Before I get into the characters; I want to ask because this is more of an question than anything else. But I was wondering, given your opinions on what you thought of the characters. What would you like me to focus on next in terms of fleshing them out?

Because how I see it, is that I personally feel like Ive setted it up to introduce more to the characters themselves and to be more open to writing about other ideas after this arc/season finishes up in two more chapters. And in terms of having problems prioritizing what to focus on next is an issue myself that I am facing when writing up more. So not to be too nosy but if I could get some critiques about that, that would be fantastic.

As for the critiques on the characters themselves, Malicious is very prominent as being the first, or rather. Main bad guy. He is very fun to write and act out, But mostly because I want to give him some mysteriousness to his actual backstory for readers but also write about his hatred towards Jet and focus more on that. Katrinas whole segment and such was really really fun to do too, in regards to the page you are referencing. I have an entire story arc dedicated to her so I know what Im doing with that.

As for Jet, Yeah I know. Ive been kinda bad with that these 5 chapters. ^^; I mostly wanted to try and use it for pushing the characters current limits and seeing what happens from there and just get them to break the status quo with the established first chapters by the end.

Going into that, Yeah my question still stands. After reading it all. And by the sounds of things; enjoyed it. (Thank you it means a whole lot to me that you managed to get through it all!) What do you think as both as a fellow creator and reader what should I focus on prioritizing?

As for your extra points. Had a quick squizz at your story. Will diffidently be reading it as I immediately saw the similarities! lol
And as for Biomech. I really REALLY considered it BUT I have big plans for more to do with those. Think of it as a Silver Sonic compared to a Metal Sonic, if you are up to date with your Sonic Lore haha.

Thank you so much! And please, feel free to DM me if you need to. I would LOVE to dissect this further as its very VERY educational!

Nabel-Mabel 2023-04-21 05:14:52 UTC #27

Hello Frenci !

Just read chapter 1 and 2 of your comics! I'm right now reading episode 18!
You have such a unique style! It's the kind of art style you find in european short films with the colored line and the textures! Very nice. Your characters and backgrounds are nice to look at, i never was bothered by anything graphically honestly, the art is conveying the tone of the story very nicely ( it has a sweet touch that sometimes contrast with the more tense moments, which makes them more impactful).

I love the way you handle the speech bubbles when something menacing is happening ( that melting effect).
Honestly i only have one little thing that bothers me with your art, it's that you don't play a lot with the Z axis in your compositions. The backgrounds always have a 2D feel to them, i know it's easier to draw like this, but it makes it the overall episodes feel flat when you don't use a lot of camera variations ( like shots from the air, the ground, tilting the camera,etc). The use of 2 point perspective could help elevate your art a lot ! Of course it's already good as it is but if you want to make it look even more pro, that's my advice!

Other than that i love your story. It's good that you explained that this was a project that was supposed to only last one chapter because i would have told you the pacing was far too fast but reading the contraints that you had, i perfectly understand why it is the way it is. Chapter 2's pacing is very good though because now you spaced your story into 12 parts and that gives you time to flesh out the world, setting and characters more!

My favorite scene is the rabbit sending a laser ( good forshadowing!!) and the chicken characters are dope!
Your story has a big Narnia vibe, it's really cool.

I hope this helps !

Nabel-Mabel 2023-04-21 05:18:58 UTC #28

Sure i'd love to talk to you about anything! Honestly my advice would be to follow your gut and just have fun, coz at the end of the day we do this to have fun and it's a way to kind of escape reality in a sense. Always try to think about what a young version of you would have liked to read! I always liked badass action and weird comedy so that's why i do that in my comics! Become your own number one fan basically!

Zak 2023-04-21 05:25:58 UTC #29

Yeah, that's a given. I'm more or less wanting to improve my writing and story telling skills. That's why all the 20Q to be fair haha.

Ill give drop you a DM, or unless you have like a discord or something to make messaging easier, That's if you are not opposed to discussing further with it? ^^;

XiuLyn_12 2023-04-21 07:19:58 UTC #30

Why did I find this out now?

I would love to hear critique/feedback from you. I want to improve as an artist and author. So if this is still available, I'd love to hear from you!

You can read my latest story, "Bitter Taste," here:

Nabel-Mabel 2023-04-22 07:40:32 UTC #31

Hello Stargazer!

I just finished reading all your story in a single sitting! I had a good time honestly, the pacing was fast ( but not too fast ) and to the point! which made the reading quite enjoyable ( i didn't force myself ! I genuinely wanted to keep reading ).
I can tell that you're someone with a lot of culture!! Having been in France, Prague and i know about falafel and samusa so seeing all of this in your comic made me happy!
Your strongest point is that you know how to give character's personnalities! Your main chara talks in a funny way with little french expressions and you add small things like the fact she likes mille feuille! Not a lot of authors think about this sort of thing, but it's very important and it's what makes the characters relatable or at the very least likable!
There are a couple of things that i think you should be mindful of ( i'm not gonna talk about the art because i can tell you are still at a very early stage and that will come naturally in the futur) :

This one is the most important: you never have any civilians in your comics in places where normally they should be. For example every time characters are in a train, we only see the them and no one else. When they fight, no one is hearing anything or running away. They even fight in an airport, destroy a wall and fight in front of it with explosions and all and then they hear the announcement like nothing happened ( if they can hear the announcement then people inside can hear the fight no? I know it's not supposed to be realistic but this took me out of the story because everything else seems kind of realistic, like the way your characters talk )
We understand that the gargoyle girl wants to find love. But we don't know why with a human specifically? Do gargoyles can't fall in love with each other? This is confusing because they seem to have both males and females, so why go to humans?
I don't know anything about LGBT culture so sometimes i am lost. For example when you show the flags, you assume people know what it means but i don't so i feel like i'm missing some informations about the characters. If you can explain it a bit more it would help readers like me.
At two moments you have big exposition dumps with just dialogue, i'm a lazy person i kind of feel like skipping them whenever i see them hahaha Comics and novels are different and made for different types of person, comic readers have way shorter attention spam, having big texts can make the story hard to follow.

Keep up the good work, you have a solid story, interesting and endearing characters that elevates your story even if the art isn't on a standard level yet

TheDoublekey 2023-04-22 08:11:12 UTC #32

Wow, I'm very glad I found this thread! I've been looking around for some critique for quite some time now and I wasn't able to get any on other forums.

Anyway, I'd really appreciate to hear your genuine feedback on my manga/webcomic "Age I- Age of Darkness". If you could read it in its entirety I'd be really greatful, as I've never got a "full review" in the past, but you can stop at any point in the story if you feel like it.

I'm currently in the process of completely remaking the first arc of the story (I'll be rebooting the comic very soon), hence why I'm craving for a complete review/critique.Thanks in advance!

moontokkym 2023-04-22 10:10:08 UTC #33

Hi! I've been reading through this and your critiques are really good and in depth, if you have time I'd love if you could give some feedback on my comic so far. Chapter 1 is coming to a close in May and I really want to up the quality for chapters 2 and 3.

2 important things to note:

it's a comic in page format because it's main form is intended to be in print, so scroll is sometimes not ideal (longer chapter parts with multiple pages per chapter are available on webtoon though if you want under the same name and cover art, I saw that's easier for you to read in one of your comments).
I'm mindful of font size now for the pages currently coming out and I'm in the process of retroactively updating the font sizes of previous pages in both languages. I'm going to take time to replace the pages where it's difficult to read once the chapter closes in May, I'm sorry for the inconvenience and please do not give yourself eyestrain if it is too small.

My comic is sci-fi dystopia set in France in 2415. The sky is barren, destroyed by pollution from the War, it hasn't rained for over a decade. Khay is one of the youngest to remember storms. While scraping by in a refugee shanti town they meet Alice, a strange child with alien-like eyes on the run from the police. Helping her escape with her secrets will prove to be the first step in blowing the cover on a government conspiracy on a massive scale.

Here's my story:
https://tapas.io/series/Petrichor

KevinReijnders 2023-04-22 10:24:47 UTC #34

Interested in what you have to say.

WhoDrew 2023-04-22 11:59:30 UTC #35

Just subscribed to your comic @Nabel-Mabel

It looks like it could be a fun read,

Be as brutal as you can with my comic,

I'm already in the progress in improving the quality of my work there and pushing towards further growth as well as potential expansions,

So any feedback that can help is always appreciated,

DON'T EVER HOLD BACK DUDE

Nabel-Mabel 2023-04-23 08:41:25 UTC #36

Yo simplykit!

You got an epic comic over here! I've read until they defeat the giant snake girl and the ninja accept to bring the MC with them ( something like 45 episodes ).
The first thing i have to adress isn't in your comics but in your story synopsis! It's way too long and basically spoils everything before we even read. Try to make it shorter because not a lot of people with read all of that. The other problem with the synopsis is that you tell things in it that aren't even in your comics like how the world fought in a great battle against demons in the past. That should be in the comics!

Now for the comic itself:

Your art ranges from above average to sometimes very cool. This was my favorite panel thus far, it's very badass:

The premise is simple and i like the violence. Your comic is also very funny, i laughed a couple of time. This was the funniest scene :

Be careful of small inconsistencies in your drawings. For example the four heroes head change a lot from the first panel to the second ( example: one character who was missing an eye, suddenly it's back in the next panel).
And most importantly: you have to find a consistency in your art style. What i mean by that, is that your comics feels like it's drawn by 2 persons (maybe it is? I would guess that no because it's not something you see everyday). Like for example this scene:

These are drastically different styles. It gives your comic a big bipolar feel hahaha.

You also color specific things in a scene but i don't understand why. When it's blood and everything is grey except for the red of the blood, it works!! Because it helps accentuate the violence. But when you color a random tree far in the background, in makes no sense that it's the only thing that's colored because it's not something that is important to the story. If anything, it gives the impression that you're not confident that your line art alone is sufficient, so you try to compensate by randomly adding color. But your art line is good, in fact i prefer when by far when you only use whites and greys.
Like for example in this scene, why are some character's hair colored and some not? They are all random NPCs, it would have been smarter to color the big sword dude because he is the main focus.

For characters, that's where you nail it the most! My favorite is the ninja/thief, he steals every scene (no pun intended), he's also mega badass. The raptor is also excellent and super original!! This duo is the highland of the comic and it's too bad they come so late into it. The MC is normal, not bad but nothing particularly attractive neither, she does the job. Also i didn't realize she was a girl until waaay later ( when i read the synopsis after i finished reading your comics, because i just couldn't start with that massive text dumb lmaooo).

So in conclusion:

+: Cool characters
+: Good action and violence
+: Good comedy
+: Some badass panels
- : The exposition is not in the comic but in the synopsis
-: Inconsistent style and coloring

Nabel-Mabel 2023-04-24 09:24:42 UTC #37

Hello XiuLyun!

I'd like to start by giving you context about me so you understand my critique:
i am what you would call a boyish boy, like the type of boy who likes fights, doing pranks, basically being up to no good when i'm with friends and very allergic to lovy-dovy things xD I am incapable of understanding "love" the way it's portrayed in these kind of stories. So with that out of the way, i will tell you what i think ! This should be entertaining lol

I have read your first story, coping with heartbreak ! Your manga gives me big Nana vibes ( the manga) ! Your MC is like Nana ( the happy one) and the male characters are very feminine looking. But you push the feminine side too much for me, at the very beginning it took me a while to understand that it was her boyfriend, until i saw he's full body. And the second boyfriend looks a lot like the first one, if they both become bald it would be impossible to decipher them.

For backgrounds, what you did is original. Having photorealistic BGs with drawings is something i've seen before but not too often. You have to be careful with this though! Because it will create problems not only in your comic, but also in your real life artist career.
In mangas like Gantz, the author uses photographs for backgrounds a lot of times like you did, but the difference is that his characters are so detailed, that they blend with the realistic photos a lot better. If you really don't want to draw BGs, you have to add more details to your characters in order for the two things to fuse.
Also what i ment by it will cause you problems in real life, is that if you keep going the easy route, you will never be able to do backgrounds for real, it's better to be bad at first but keep training rather than being lazy ( because in 1,2,5 or 10 years maybe you'll become very good at backgrounds if you practice them!).

I liked the ending to your story, i'm happy that the two characters can be together and that the douche ex got slapped. I don't know what's gonna happen next but like i said, i'm really not into love stories because i like shonen fighting stories! I'm a boy and it clearly isn't meant for me! So keep doing what you're doing and don't try to change things to appeal to everyone, you have something good that get be even better if you work on your backgrounds!!

diannamu 2023-04-24 09:50:31 UTC #38

Hi!
If you feel like reading a ROMANTIC story but with action and lots of plot twist, I recommend you read COMA!

THANK YOU!!!!

ENG

SPANISH

Nabel-Mabel 2023-04-25 01:01:58 UTC #39

Yo Doublekey!

Wow your comic dates to 2020! That means a lot of what i'm going to say, you probably already figured out by now since 4 years have passed and you're (i would assume) a waaay better artist now. Actually your comic reminds me of the comics i used to make when i was in highschool!! I used to draw kind of like you but instead of the Araki style, i was using the Akira Toriyama style and then the Tite Kubo style!

First of all, minor thing: Your prologue is a manga and the rest is a manwha so in your reboot try to keep with one style because if someone for example doesn't want to read a manga format, he will assume the rest is like your first page and vice versa.

Secondly, since like i told you you remind me of me, i have some good tips that will help you just like they helped me.

First of all, your characters are too stiff, they feel like they're compressed by a ROADO ROLLAAAAA and not in a 3D space. Here's for example a random panel i screenshot with a couple of advice ( i didn't tackle the background but let's just focus on character's for now or else this will be too long)

Construction is KEY in making characters believable! If you apply solid fundations from the start, your character will feel alive and not feel like those old medieval church paintings in full 2D.

And finally, you need to make sure the readers can understand perfectly what is going on in your story. Since the two main brothers in chapter 1 are so much alike, i had difficulty understanding who is who when they were talking. They look exactly the same almost! You have to make them more different in your reboot, because this is probably your biggest problem in my opinion. I only read chapter 1 because of that, because my head started to hurt trying to understand every time who is talking, i shouldn't have to do detective work to understand, it should be fluid like water. It's not just because your chara look the same, it's also because you tend to make them face the same direction when they are talking, i swear i thought the brother was talking to himself in the kitchen at first. Here's how to fix this:

This is your normal panels:

This is my fixing:

But it's still not good because they are clones, their hair color is the exact same hue of grey and even the bandage on the forehead is exactly the same !

Like this it's waaay better, readers will read it with no difficulty:

I looked at chapter 7, you still have this problem of the two characters looking alike ( but in the cover that problem doesn't exist because they have different hair color). A good technique is to draw your characters bald and see if people can differentiate them. You must not rely on just hairstyle.

That's for the drawing aspect.

For story, i can tell this is heavily inspired by Jojo part 1 ( wryy). That's cool, it's good to have inspiration. But if you remember correctly, it took 2 volumes of almost 200 pages each to reach the point where the manior collapses when Dio becomes a vampire and fights against his brother. For you, it only took a chapter, so the pacing is going at LIGHTSPEED. You have to slow it down in your reboot, because we don't know anything about the personnality of your characters, about their settings, about their daily lifestyles, family dynamics, etc. And we are instantly in the action without caring for them. You instead use narration to tell key things! But remember this sentence: Show don't tell. Comics are not novels. You use way too much narration, this should happen in front of our eyes, not said by a narrator ( or at least not in this extend). If you transformed those texts into drawings, i think you would have solved all the problems i've listed above about your story. Set the premise correctly, make us legit care about the characters. Action is cool, everyone likes action. But action become 100x better when you understand who is fighting and why. That's when we relate!

I hope this will help you for your reboot!! I have no doubt it will be way better and if you apply everything i said, it will be excellent

Nabel-Mabel 2023-04-25 01:24:08 UTC #40

IMPORTANT:

A little head's up:
I will 100% critique the 4 comics that were send to me that i still haven't read ( probably one a day ), but after that any further links send to me i'll critique only if a get a critique too. It takes a lot of time to read, take notes and even do manipulations of photoshop for everyone while also working and drawing my own comics. I only got one person who critiqued my comics thus far, and the point of this topic was for me to get critics too.
Anyway, let's keep grinding!

Stargazer31 2023-04-25 02:12:24 UTC #41

Thanks for your feedback! I'll try to add more civilians and less infodumping in the future

TheDoublekey 2023-04-25 09:59:49 UTC #42

Thank you very much for the feedback! I'm grateful that you took your time to analyze and dissect my comic, as getting new critiques has been increasingly difficult for me. Anyway, I had no doubt you'd be able to point out my main source of inspiration for the story, seeing how you're a fan of manga as well!

The similarity between the two brothers has always been a major problem with my comic and one of the most frequent complaints from my readers. I've tried to make them more and more distinct every chapter by making their individual characteristics more prominent. Frederick's chin has become more squared, while Nigel's is rounder. Nigel's lower lip is a semicircle, etc.
In the remake, I decided to make Nigel's hair white, in order to make the two even more distinct and I gave them different clothes.

When it comes to the story being told instead of shown it's because I had the dumb idea of adapting my script (which was basically a sort of novel) a liiiiittle too faithfully. However, I've learned my lesson and ever since ch. 4 I tried to avoid narration as much as possible. I agree that things are more engaging when directly shown to the reader! Ever since ch.4 I've also slowed down the pacing considerably, as it was incredibly fast, as you said.

With that being said, I really really hope you'll check out the reboot once it comes out! I'll be giving feedback on your manga very soon, as it seems quite interesting and very polished, so stay tuned for that!

TheDoublekey 2023-04-26 14:29:14 UTC #43

Alright, here's my critique of THE GLADIATORS! Where do I start? This webcomic looks phenomenal in every way possible and I really think it does have a lot of potential. For now I only read the first chapter, as it is fairly long.

First of all, I think the introduction is very well made. It's quite short, yet it provides us with all the information we need to know and it doesn't feel like an excessive infodump. I've noticed a few similarities
between this intro and that of My Hero Academia, so I assume it might've been influenced by it. We later see the protagonist, Laila, finally reach "Despogs", the school of the gifted and that kinda felt reminiscent of Izuku entering UA. I also think the name "gifted" is quite cool.

-ART-

The art is pretty good and consistent throughout the entire chapter. It looks cartoony yet it does have its fair bit of detail and it reminds me of Oda's more cartoony and less realistic style. I love these absurd and extreme expressions you use to convey a sense of comedy and this in particular is what reminded me of One Piece.

The linework is overall very clean and certain panels (such as the one with the bullies transforming) look extremely well done. I especially love the lighting and hatching.

This panel right here is a great example of that. I find it truly masterful and it instantly reminded me of the "Save the Soul Society" panel from Bleach. Nabil's imposing figure along with the dramatic shading marks a great contrast with his actual personality and is what makes the whole thing funny.

The panelling is also quite good and it does its job very well. This other panel just looks MAJESTIC and I love the composition. It helps make the reader feel part of the story, almost like WE are the ones entering this big out of the ordinary school.

-THE GOOD-

One of the aspects I found myself enjoying the most was the humor. Like,my guy Barhouch straight up went Ronaldo mode after the Principal told him he'd get some free cards. I believe the humor is one of the stronger points of the comic.

Nabil's introduction was also super funny. He looked like someone you should be fearing: a true badass, that later turns out just to be a funny weirdo.

Honestly, there are so many references and influences in this manga that it would be impossible for me to list them all. This is why I found it genuinely interesting and fun to read (this part reminded me of Midoriya pointing out how All Might was drawn differently).

It was very very hard for me to find anything bad worth pointing out. It's such a carefully crafted work that it feels professional and very good to read. Everything flows pretty well from panel to panel and the drawings only help compliment that.

-THE BAD-

My only real complaint is the fact that the lettering is not always ideal for small devices like smartphones. Some of the text appears to be quite small and difficult to read, so I believe that might throw off mobile readers. Another small problem might be the fact that the story has to be read as a traditional manga (from right to left) and some readers might not get that at first, but I think you actually did a genius move right there. I'm strongly convinced the first couple of panels make it quite clear. It was a good idea to start vertically and slowly get the reader used to the rtl format.

The reader will intuitively read from right to left from this point on

-STORY-

Now, story-wise I have to say I found it quite good. It's a cool introduction to the narrative and I think it does its job. It introduces our two main characters and it's enough to give us a taste of their personalities. One thing I really appreciate is the contrast between the two. Laila is more laid back and tries to be "the normal one out of the bunch", while Nabil is the cool guy who is also a bit crazy. It looks like they're gonna be a great duo for this adventure! The ending of the chapter makes you wonder what is going to happen next in this insane school (it's almost an asylum, as the title states). How is Laila gonna survive in a classroom like this? It's funny to see that in a such a place she is the odd one out, despite being what you'd call an average person. It makes for a very cool dynamic.

-FINAL VERDICT-

With all of the above being said, I think this is a great start overall. It's quite clear this series is a big love letter to other manga and anime. Everything from the artstyle, to other minor details such as Laila's second name (which immediately makes you think of Evangelion).

I know my critique is mostly praising rather than criticizing, but as I told you it's quite hard to find anything really bad. I'd say it's a solid first chapter all around. I'll gladly be reading the rest of the chapters for sure, since I had a fun time! Overall it feels like a big parody of manga and I love it! Keep up the good work!