The Armageddonquest Kickstarter Project is Live!
From the press release:
The Armageddonquest Kickstarter Project is Live! (Link)
From the creator, Ronald Russell Roach:
Hey, folx. My name is Ron Roach, and Armageddonquest is my 900-page b&w graphic novel, which I spent 20 years writing and drawing. It’s a classic tale done in a pretty oddball style: it chronicles the life of the Anti-Christ from birth to Armageddon, but in comix form. And in this story, the Anti-Christ is the good guy.
AQ saw its first few chapters published by Starhead Comix in the 1980′s before the whole story was spotted, snatched up, and published in three 300-page volumes by Sirius Comics between 1996-1998. Unfortunately, this was smack in the middle of the comic industry’s implosion during the mid-to-late 90′s - Armageddonquest was largely overlooked, and has since faded into obscurity. Tragic, I know.
Now I’m hoping to achieve something I’ve always wanted to do: put the whole thing into a single giant-sized volume. This new edition will sport a new cover by GØDLAND’s Thomas Scioli (p/i) and Bill Crabtree (c), who did a pretty bang-up job capturing the story in a single image (see below):
This new edition will be professionally designed by Ronnie Casson whose work can be seen on the gorgeous CAT-EYE BOY Volumes 1-2 from Viz Manga Group. Printing will be done by Malloy in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Malloy handled the nearly 1400-page BONE: THE ONE VOLUME EDITION, so they’re more than qualified to print a high quality 900-page edition of AQ!
THE GOAL
If we can raise a minimum of $8500 we can reprint the first 1/3rd of AQ in this new edition, make it a “Volume 1 (of 3)” kind of thing. But if we can achieve the wild goal of raising $17,000 we can fit the whole 900-page monstrosity, plus bonus material, into a single “One Volume Edition” a la BONE - the way it was always meant to be read. Either way, my hat’s off to anyone who helps us achieve even a stepping stone toward putting these comix back into readers’ hands, whatever the page count.
THE REWARDS
We’ve spent a long time putting together some neat stuff to give everyone. For starters, anyone to contributes the lowest amount of $5 will get the whole 900-page work in CBZ & PDF form (you’ll get access to both, your choice).
After that we’ve got digital copies of never before published AQ comics and illustrated prose stories (see below for sample illustrations). Also physical copies of the new edition at the $25 mark, and then digital copies of my entire comix library (a lifetime of work!) - that’s over 700 pages of completed comix at the $50 mark.
Special Android OS User Package
Alternately, for those with Android-powered smart phones or tablets, we’re offering the entire 900-pages of the Armageddonquest saga in 20 individual chapters, custom adapted by ROBOT COMICS (who did the incredible Scott Pilgrim’s Precious Little App).
These adaptations will never be officially released on the Android market - they are exclusively for backers of this project alone. These adaptations use the most advance mobile comics software to date, combining frame-by-frame animation, transition effects, and vibration to create the most immersive digital comic reading experience I’ve ever encountered (no lie). These comics and all their SFX will be supported by Robot Comics’ free Droid Comic Viewer app - the most popular Android comic viewer in the world.
Here’s a video trailer to show everyone how the Android version looks in action (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo3fdVDtH6I):
Other incentives include:
- Original b&w sketches
- Original cover art
- You’ll get drawn into the main stroy of AQ, organically between the current chapters, and in a way integral to the evolution of the main character. This will be minimum of 8 pages, PLUS you’ll get to keep all the original art from this. Neat, eh?
Read the First Chapters of Armageddonquest For Free
The guys at Killing the Grizzly are still offering the first 300 pages of Armageddonquest in CBZ format. These can be read with ComicRack (PC) or LongBox Digital (PC/Mac).
And now I’ll leave you with the valiant few who have spurned the masses and said nice things about AQ:
Praise For Armageddonquest
ARMAGEDDONQUEST squirms and thrashes in a crawlspace it dug out with its bare talons, partway between the early graphic novel and classic “outsider” art. It’s the comics version of the demon-haunted work of the young Daniel Johnston, raw, passionate, demented, electric.
–Warren Ellis (Transmetropolitan, Planetary)
A completely overlooked trilogy of graphic novels about the Antichrist. Drawn by Roach over a 20-year period on anything from typing paper to napkins to worse, from what I understand, it’s brilliant. Printed before its time; the right publisher could make a nice killing on its quirkiness. (While Googling, I found it’s now a webcomic. Still needs a reprinting, though)
–TOM SPURGEON, ComicsReporter.com
I welcome those of you lucky enough to be discovering AQ for the first time. In 1993 there were just two issues available, covering about 160 pages of the story. The print runs were humble and the book was very hard to find. I was jealous of Starhead [Comics] for publishing such an important new comic. Believe the hype. You have never, ever seen a comic like AQ.
–ROBB HORAN, publisher, SIRIUS
Wow, that looks crazy, and perhaps awesome. At first glance it reminds me a bit of Jack Katz’s First Kingdom, a fully-realized epic fantasy story with outsider art appeal. [But] outsider art seems like an unfair way to characterize this book. It’s actually very accomplished…The artwork reminds me of Tezuka and something about it, maybe the lettering, makes me think of Ditko.”
-TOM SCIOLI (GØDLAND)
Preview Pages
About Killing the Grizzly
Killing the Grizzly is a traditional Literary Agency specializing in graphic works, as well as a production studio interested in crowd funding, interactive marketing, community engagement, and transmedia promotion.
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