Comic for Thursday November 13th, 2003

"Every Beginning Must Have An Ending" Wednesday - November 12th, 2003

Okay for those of you that haven't been kept up to date by reading the forums, NS is back up on it's primary hosting site. Everything should be properly linked and all images should be in place. If there is anything that looks out of place, please drop me a line at River@ninja-spirit.com.

I don't really have much to say in the way of real life except that all my free time is currently being sucked up by the new WWE Smackdown game. Rob graciously let me borrow it and I haven't played much of anything else besides that. While previous Smackdown games had suffered in terms of gameplay and most notably season mode. The newest Smackdown plays much better then its predecessors and the Season Mode is about as close as you can get to watching real WWE wrestlin. I haven't watched wrestlin in quite some time, but I still enjoy playing the games and seeing some of the wrestlers in action.

Actually all wrestling games eventually devolve into being the next closest thing to having a Fighting Spirit video game. So my new aim now that I've played through an entire season using Misaki Yuki, is to create a season composing of only Fighting Spirit fighters. I'm amazed at how well they come out and so far I've gotten Jennie, Markus, Wild Bill, Tomas, and Omega.

I tell you as much work as Fighting Spirit was, I will ALWAYS remember and think fondly of the times I ran it. I don't think I can say that enough and I've probably mentioned this fact here many a times. I'll be sure to repeat it again too...

Phrew.... Eight a half months after I posted the very first comic of Ninja Spirit, I can now place the period mark on Chapter One. The length of Chapter One fluctuated anywhere from 6 months to a year and a half. In the end, I think it came out well. I think some things could have gone into more detail, but for the most part the comic paced along nicely. I got in a lot of things that I wanted to. Maybe one day in a future Omake, I'll post the deleted scenes for Chapter One.

I tell ya one thing, I'm having as much fun drawing Ninja Spirit now as I did waaaaay back then. I mean sure, it hasn't been one year yet, but I've only not posted a comic for a week in that whole span and I think I've done a good job of making sure the comic was up on time. It was late maybe two or three times I think. I mean as far as traffic goes, this site grows in hits monthly and I can only hope that any new readers enjoy what they find and that the old readers can now start having the story and, just as importantly, the characters grow on them.

So in that spirit, I want to thank a few people. First, I'd like to thank The Kelly for putting up with me constantly drawing and working on the comic and sometimes not having as much time as we'd like to. She colored the first month of strips and still provides some valuable feedback and ideas. I also wanna thank George for stepping up and being the moderator for the NS forum, providing software needs, and great feedback. I also don't wanna forget that fool Joe because if for anything else he was the one I started this whole crazy comic thing with way back in 5th or 6th grade. Dave's also key even though he never writes or calls anymore since he moved to New Joisey. Rob's been both helpful and detrimental, but I appreciated every anime and game he's allowed me to see and plat along the way. Oh and the guy's a Photoshop and Illustrator freakazoid who I manage to gleam some knowledge off of occasionally when I can. Speaking of fans, there's the number one fan Ashleigh. She's given tons of good advice and this site looks like it does in part to her input. Plus all the other webcomics out there that inspire and drive me to become better in our trade.

I think I should add that the last panel of Chapter One is very much true in real life. Joe really can't finish a Garbage Plate despite his almost psychotic obsessive compulsive love for food. And he usually does bring up the fact that if a Garbage Plate were pasta, he'd have no problems finishing it. To which we simply point and laugh at his lame excuses. I will say this, I'm truly gonna miss being able to do that. In fact I'm gonna miss a lot of things when his roodie poo ass moves to New Zealand in two months to go to school. And despite all the ripping I do on this fool, you won't EVER find a more straight up, honest, no bullshit, all around good guy around.

It still doesn't change the fact he can't finish a plate. Sad, but true.

Well as far as where will the comic go in Chapter Two? I'll tell you that we'll see some sports, we'll see some romance, we'll even see some teen angst!!! While I can't make any guarantees, Chapter Two will have a super ultra mega surprise that is sure to leave you all wondering if I've gone mad. (I have.)

So thanks for reading. Sit back. Relax. Ninja Spirit will return right after these few days we affectionately call a weekend.

Vote for Ninja Spirit!!

River raises his paw in thanks.