Blastin' Until The Cows Come Home - Earthworm Jim crawls back out of the dirt! (EWJ'S SECOND 160-page comic now on Kickstarter!)

[PsychoJosh]

Doug said he'll try voicing him for now, and if he doesn't feel up to doing it, they'll talk to Dan.

I am morbidly curious as to how two decades of zombie simpsons will have altered Dan's Jim.

 

[PsychoJosh]

Welp, it happened.

EWJ indiegogo broke half a million... and on Doug's birthday, no less.

 

[BonafideFella]

I can’t say I have much personal attachment to Earthworm Jim or his series, but I’m definitely aware of his mascot status.

I’m also a Doug Tennapel fan (I’ve read his graphic novels and they are fantastic pieces of cartooning) so any of his work represented in Smash would be magnificent. Sign me up as a supporter, if you please!

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

Wouldn't you know it, Jim has love in Japan! At least according to this art I came across by surprise.

Spoiler

https://twitter.com/cello_us/status/1150402200910254080

 

[PsychoJosh]

The comic campaign is over and it made nearly 3 quarter of a million dollars.

It's still available for preorder even now, although keep in mind shipping costs are gonna be brutal because he has to cover the international shipping without losing money on every sale.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/earthworm-jim-the-comic-book-is-still-available/x/6612807#/

Also I found this really cool ad for EWJ3D. Kind of appropriate.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

Speaking of comics, Doug's also involved with a comic project called Doomkicker.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/doomkicker#/

Also, I can't help but keep that darned Smash hashtag in the back of my mind, if it was a mistake, it's such a weird one to make...

 

[Ridrool64]

So here's a Classic Route.... and then I noticed there's no White Incineroar... Let's call it "Till the Cows Come Home!" Assume everybody has the optimal palette.

Stage 1 - King Dedede @ New Pork City
Stage 2 - Incineroar @ Norfair
Stage 3 - Squirtle @ Great Bay (we don't have an underwater stage? Closest thing I could think of.)
Stage 4 - Wario @ Balloon Fight (probably the hardest one to do)
Level 5 - King K. Rool w/ Diddy Kong @ Frigate Orpheon
Stage 6 - Falco @ Lylat Cruise
Stage 7 - Bonus Game
Stage 8 - Boss: Dracula

I wonder how difficult it'll be to figure out? (I had to leave a stage out because that one doesn't have a boss.)

 

[Oddball]

It's not bad, but a Earthworm Jim route really needs Doneky Kong in it.

https://fictionalcrossover.fandom.com/wiki/Donkey_Kong_X_Earthworm_Jim

 

[Ridrool64]

Well he could replace Diddy Kong as K. Rool's assistant for Level 5, but Diddy still works because it was his game that had Earthworm Jim's blaster. Having Donkey in there separately would break the theme I was going with.

Spoiler: By the way, if you haven't figured it out.

Dedede = Chunk (New Junk City), Incineroar = Evil the Cat (What the Heck?), Squirtle = Bob the Killer Goldfish (Down the Tubes/Tube Race), Wario = Major Mucus (Snot a Problem), K. Rool + Diddy/Donkey Kong = Professor Monkey-for-a-Head (Level 5), Falco = Psy-crow/Psy-Crow (Andy Asteroids), the Bonus Game could be seen as the equivalent of For Pete's Sake, and Dracula = Queen Slug-for-a-Butt. The progression of Earthworm Jim 1.

 

[PsychoJosh]

Duck Hunt could be used as a Peter Puppy substitute. Since the enemies in For Pete's Sake are aliens I think they could be represented by Olimar or Ridley.

 

[Morgana J. Cat]

Can't believe I forgot about Earthworm Jim, he would be such a wacky and funny character to play as, and I am sure that our groovy worm would fit perfectly in the style of Smash Brothers and believe me, I don't say this about every western cartoon mascot.

Is he that much of a long shot, tho?? Not too aware if he had any games released in the past few years.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

Can't believe I forgot about Earthworm Jim, he would be such a wacky and funny character to play as, and I am sure that our groovy worm would fit perfectly in the style of Smash Brothers and believe me, I don't say this about every western cartoon mascot.

Is he that much of a long shot, tho?? Not too aware if he had any games released in the past few years.

He basically had a whole lot of nothing besides some ports here and there, until the EWJ3 and Intellivision Amico announcement.

If he were to be considered for the series, it'd take a miracle.

 

[Morgana J. Cat]

He basically had a whole lot of nothing besides some ports here and there, until the EWJ3 and Intellivision Amico announcement.

If he were to be considered for the series, it'd take a miracle.

Oh well at least he had a few of his games ported into Nintendo consoles. And I guess that Banjo-Kazooie basically proves that relevancy isn't that much of an issue anymore.

 

[PsychoJosh]

It's either down to relevancy or popularity these days. They don't give obscure characters a chance anymore like they did in the Melee days. Thankfully, Jim has the fortune of being a fairly popular character, which at least gives him a chance. He is FAR from unknown, and certainly not unprofitable, as the kickstarter for his brand new comic has just surpassed 3 quarter million.

I'm sure his new outing on the Amico is going to enjoy that kind of success as well, since the price seems to be within impulse buy range for a lot of people ($130 for the console and $8 for the game). I'd say if he was ever going to get into Smash, now is the time. His chances right now are better than they've ever been.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

It's either down to relevancy or popularity these days. They don't give obscure characters a chance anymore like they did in the Melee days. Thankfully, Jim has the fortune of being a fairly popular character, which at least gives him a chance. He is FAR from unknown, and certainly not unprofitable, as the kickstarter for his brand new comic has just surpassed 3 quarter million.

I'm sure his new outing on the Amico is going to enjoy that kind of success as well, since the price seems to be within impulse buy range for a lot of people ($130 for the console and $8 for the game). I'd say if he was ever going to get into Smash, now is the time. His chances right now are better than they've ever been.

Yeah, for sure. Though I do want to be sure the Amico is actually playable, wouldn't want to see an Ouya case happen. And I don't care if people have to call him a cereal mascot to make him happen.

Also, it's Indiegogo, not Kickstarter.

 

[PsychoJosh]

Yeah I tend to use "kickstarter" as a catch-all for crowdfunding pages. Honest mistake.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

Yoo, big name fan artist recently did our wormy friend.

Spoiler

Smash commission for @Johny_Olde pic.twitter.com/W94BKJOZmQ

— NinN (@NinNakajima) August 25, 2019

 

[PsychoJosh]

Awesome.

I've been thinking that it'd be pretty hard to capture Jim's features in 3D, a lot of stretching and squishing would need to be involved. His eyeballs are egg-shaped ovals resting on his face that seem to alter their shape and angle depending on his expressions. They'd need to be very close together as well as his mouth which initially appears to be too big for his face. He'd be a challenging character to animate for sure, but I'd love to see them try.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

It does help that according to what we heard in regards to Banjo's transition into Smash, the original staffers had some degree of involvement (between a composer and the character designer). So it stands to reason that if Jim ever got picked, Dave Perry would collaborate with the Smash staff to help on animating.

 

[PsychoJosh]

Well, with Season 2 and possibly more seasons happening, maybe Jim's chances have gone up, since they can talk to Interplay and Intellivision after the fact.

Come on. I gotta get SOMEONE I want in Smash. Those next 6 characters can't all be anime swordsmen. Might as well be Jim.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

Well, Terry doesn't use a sword, that's a start.

In any case, the only possible proof/clue we got so far is that Instagram hashtag slip-up. We'll have to see if it amounts to something...

Edit: And the Genesis Mini is done proper justice!

http://www.nintendolife.com/news/20...drive_mini_finally_does_segas_history_justice

 

[Oddball]

Awesome.

I've been thinking that it'd be pretty hard to capture Jim's features in 3D, a lot of stretching and squishing would need to be involved. His eyeballs are egg-shaped ovals resting on his face that seem to alter their shape and angle depending on his expressions. They'd need to be very close together as well as his mouth which initially appears to be too big for his face. He'd be a challenging character to animate for sure, but I'd love to see them try.

They've managed to do a good job keeping his ridiculous proportions when they made action figures of the guy.

 

[PsychoJosh]

I suppose, although I think those ones look kind of lumpy and off-model. When I refer to the difficulty of capturing him in 3D I mainly refer to his animations which, because of his design, naturally use a ton of squash and stretch - possibly way more than any other Smash fighter. As an example, just his blinking HUD sprite has a ton of movement in it. He would definitely be an animation challenge, especially if they didn't want his floppy worm head to look stiff. Possibly get some APEX physics in there just to get the tail end of his head to move around.

Also, I regret not having posted about it, but the EWJ comic is finally finished the inking process, and it's printing and shipping soon! Everyone who backed it is getting it by Christmas. Sadly I wasn't able to buy another copy as a Christmas present for a family member but apparently Doug'll be making extra prints of the EWJ comic in his next campaign for Bigfoot Bill 2.

Overall it closed out at around $800k, or if you want to look at it another way, he made over $1 million Canadian.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

I hope my sis did place an order like I asked her to, I'm aiming for both the comic and the making-of book.

 

[PsychoJosh]

Doug's been uploading these behind-the-scenes looks at the printing process on his channel. From the preview we can glean a few more story details.

Princess WHN is no longer the Queen's sister, but now her daughter! Also they blow up a planet full of ponies, pegasi and unicorns that talk and apply glitter to each other. Hmm...

 

[SuperSonicFlyer]

Doug's been uploading these behind-the-scenes looks at the printing process on his channel. From the preview we can glean a few more story details.

Princess WHN is no longer the Queen's sister, but now her daughter! Also they blow up a planet full of ponies, pegasi and unicorns that talk and apply glitter to each other. Hmm...

Looks like it's a gain and a one point score for My Little Pony haters, if I do say so, myself.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

Doug's been uploading these behind-the-scenes looks at the printing process on his channel. From the preview we can glean a few more story details.

Princess WHN is no longer the Queen's sister, but now her daughter! Also they blow up a planet full of ponies, pegasi and unicorns that talk and apply glitter to each other. Hmm...

Well, that's quite a shift. Final Fantasy IX's Garnet being raised by Queen Brahne looks downright normal compared to this. What supreme genes PWHN has.

 

[PsychoJosh]

Well it makes sense you know, given their titles. Queen and princess imply that one is the mother of the other, it doesn't really follow that they'd be sisters from that because otherwise they'd both be queens or both be princesses. Then again given the plot of the cartoon it's more complicated than that and maybe they just retained WHN's princess title for convenience.

 

[Ben Holt]

As a 90s kid, I'd love to see Earthworm Jim in Smash.
Personally, I think that after we get all our NES superstars (Ryu Hayabusa, Bill Rizer, Jason & Sofia of Blaster Master, Billy + Jimmy a la Ice Climbers, and Rash), we could start getting our 16 bit era characters like Earthworm Jim and Ristar.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

As a 90s kid, I'd love to see Earthworm Jim in Smash.
Personally, I think that after we get all our NES superstars (Ryu Hayabusa, Bill Rizer, Jason & Sofia of Blaster Master, Billy + Jimmy a la Ice Climbers, and Rash), we could start getting our 16 bit era characters like Earthworm Jim and Ristar.

Well, that depends.

While Jason as a concept's been around for decades, he's now used by the currently indie-centric Inti Creates, so I have no idea how much he'd be prioritised, especially since they have their own mascot (Gunvolt).
We could get another character owned by Konami, but Bill may not necessarily be a guarantee, seeing how Bomberman and Goemon got seemingly deconfirmed right out of the gate.
Lee brothers seem possible, but Kunio could be prioritised over them.
Rash seems pretty likely, but that's all on whether Rare/Microsoft want more than one character in one go.

In any case, I don't think they'd necessarily include characters from console eras in a chronological order, I mean we just got N64 darlings, for Pete's sake.

 

[PsychoJosh]

As a 90s kid, I'd love to see Earthworm Jim in Smash.
Personally, I think that after we get all our NES superstars (Ryu Hayabusa, Bill Rizer, Jason & Sofia of Blaster Master, Billy + Jimmy a la Ice Climbers, and Rash), we could start getting our 16 bit era characters like Earthworm Jim and Ristar.

We already have all the NES superstars we need and none of those characters strike me as superstars in any way. Enough is enough.

I'll be honest, personally I'm sick of NES nostalgia and I really wish people would move on from praising that system. The SNES is just better in every way and it's time for it to have its time in the spotlight. SNES is the era where so many new genres were invented and existing ones were perfected. It was the dawn of so many things we take for granted in games today - a wide, nearly unlimited spectrum of colors, high-fidelity animation and CD-quality sound design, 3D gameplay and design, and games that can express tons of personality without being limited by hardware. Jim represents the strength of the 16 bit era and I really think it's time to get some SNES love. Especially since we've been getting nothing but NES stuff since Melee. The only remaining NES characters I could make a case for are Mach Rider and Takamaru.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

Meanwhile, people still laugh at Geno fans over his current spirit status, even though the circumstances surrounding SMRPG content (especially the lack of the Mii costume) are quite unusual.

That said, let's not start a feud (of many on this board) over this. We haven't got any NES-based first-parties as newcomers so far this time (besides Mario and Metroid regulars), and some of the newcomers hail from the SNES/TG16 era.

Whether more NES characters show up or not are entirely Sakurai's call. He's not one to fill arbitrary quotas that fans claim.

 

[PsychoJosh]

Smash Ultimate barely got any non-DLC newcomers but that was obviously a deliberate choice to sell more DLC. But every time they pick a "retro" newcomer it's always someone from the NES and never from the SNES because for some reason they've put it in their heads that the NES is the only thing people are nostalgic for.

Ever since Melee the majority of the newcomers have been NES-era (Ice Climbers, Marth/Roy, Pit & Palutena, ROB, Little Mac, Pac-Man, Duck Hunt, Megaman, Simon Belmont and now Dragon Quest). Meanwhile what has the SNES/16-bit era got? Very little in comparison. Diddy Kong, Sonic, K. Rool. The Street Fighter guys don't count since SF debuted in 87, technically making it an NES-era game. SNES is the console that always seems to get skipped over and I'm honestly tired of it.

The NES is the most overrated Nintendo console. Looking back on it I think it had an overwhelming amount of lackluster games and only really pulled ahead because of the novelty of its accessories like ROB and the Zapper. Not that I'm saying the third party NES newcomers are from lackluster games, but we don't need any more NES stuff. We have more than what we need from that era.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

Dude, settle down, we didn't get a single new NES retro character this time so far (especially since those usually come at the very end of a base roster, and yet we just got something more odder ). Nothing indicates that it's what's coming next, people are more concerned about whether we're just getting more third-parties in general, let alone from specific consoles. Especially since the "spirits deconfirm" mindset is so prevalent, which going by that metric would disqualify 98% of NES spirits that aren't from a series that isn't currently in the game.

Hell, we just got someone from the Neo Geo. That's uncharted waters.

Also, whether or not recent first-parties stand any chance at all.

Anyway, I'm off from this thread until actual news happen, I'm getting tired of preconceived notions of what creators think and what will/won't happen next.

 

[PsychoJosh]

Dude, settle down, we didn't get a single new NES retro character this time so far (especially since those usually come at the very end of a base roster, and yet we just got something more odder ).

What are you talking about? Simon, Piranha Plant and Dragon Quest aren't NES characters? Ridley counts as NES as well. Even in a game where the newcomers are a paltry few the NES is still over-represented.

I suppose I am going in a bit hard on the NES but still, that's just because I'm frustrated with the severe lack of SNES representation. Don't get me wrong, the NES was a good system but it wasn't a great one like the SNES was.

 

[PsychoJosh]

So I'm not sure if he's joking around or not, but Doug seems to want to raise money so he can buy the license for Earthworm Jim, and then get him into Smash Ultimate. He's joking about it being a character named "Delicioso Peperami" but I think he's just being coy.

My god, is it happening? Can our dreams come true?

 

[Oddball]

What are you talking about? Simon, Piranha Plant and Dragon Quest aren't NES characters? Ridley counts as NES as well. Even in a game where the newcomers are a paltry few the NES is still over-represented.

No. They really aren't.

Ridley and Piranha Plants may have first appeared on the NES, but they still make regualr apperances in games. That would be like saying Bowser or Link is an NES character.

Dragon Quest heroes are from all points in the series life, with the p1 choice being from the most recent game.

Simon, you might be able to make an argument for being an NES character but eve he has made frequent apperances through various systems.

 

[PsychoJosh]

No. They really aren't.

Ridley and Piranha Plants may have first appeared on the NES, but they still make regualr apperances in games. That would be like saying Bowser or Link is an NES character.

Dragon Quest heroes are from all points in the series life, with the p1 choice being from the most recent game.

Simon, you might be able to make an argument for being an NES character but eve he has made frequent apperances through various systems.

Yes they are. And Bowser and Link ARE NES characters.

What qualifies them as being a given console's characters is the console they ORIGINATE from. Whether or not they've had more recent appearances is completely irrelevant. If your first appearance was on NES then you're an NES generation character. If your first appearance was on Wii U you're a Wii U generation character. And so on. Samus isn't a Nintendo Switch character just because she has an upcoming Switch game.

 

[Oddball]

Yes they are. And Bowser and Link ARE NES characters.

What qualifies them as being a given console's characters is the console they ORIGINATE from. Whether or not they've had more recent appearances is completely irrelevant. If your first appearance was on NES then you're an NES generation character. If your first appearance was on Wii U you're a Wii U generation character. And so on. Samus isn't a Nintendo Switch character just because she has an upcoming Switch game.

I disagree completley. It doesn't matter what system you START on. NES characters are characters that only (or at least mainly) appeared on NES. Ice Climbers, Duck Hunt, guys like that are NES characters. They are FROM the NES and the NES only (give or take a cameo.)

Link, Bowser, these guys aren't tied to a system.

 

[PsychoJosh]

I disagree completley. It doesn't matter what system you START on. NES characters are characters that only (or at least mainly) appeared on NES. Ice Climbers, Duck Hunt, guys like that are NES characters. They are FROM the NES and the NES only (give or take a cameo.)

Link, Bowser, these guys aren't tied to a system.

They're not "tied" to a system, they originated on that system. That's what qualifies them as characters from that system. It doesn't matter that they've had games after the system they debuted on. Your debut system determines what you're counted as. Sakurai uses this categorization method as well.

If we went by your logic then Ice Climbers and Duck Hunt are Switch characters by virtue of them appearing in this very game. Game & Watch also appeared in games for the Game Boy/Color/Advance. It doesn't mean he's a Game Boy character.