Back in time - strips of 2008 and 2009!

We uploaded a new strip this week on Tuesday about the PC online game, Guns ofIcarus. In the accompanying blog, my brother mentions that we've been working on for a while... more so planning than working, I would say. I've never played the game but I've seen my brother play it, and now our oldest brother has joined in to battle other players in the virtual sky. I think it's a cool game, I just play a lot of other games at the moment instead.

With our most recent strip, I found it very challenging to draw. I was even beginning to start hating the damn strip. Once I began to work on the backgrounds and special effects, watching it all come and string together, I began to to really appreciate and enjoy drawing it. I realise now the only thing that really bothered me about drawing this strip were the ships, because they have very intricate, complex designs... but they do look cool. 

When I showed my brother the near completed strip, he sat down to watch me finish the rest off. He was very happy with it and said that it's the best strip I've drawn so far. I'm not sure if I can agree with that, it's a tricky question to ask myself since I like most of my strips. I do like this one a lot myself and I really do appreciate it a lot more when I look at it. Despite how challenging it was, it seriously only took me about three, maybe four hours to draw which is good for me... this isn't including the sketch time though.

Not to sound like an arrogant douche, but after finishing this strip in particular, it's made me realise just how far I've actually come as an artist and in particular, as a cartoonist. There won't be a new strip tonight, instead what I've done is collected old comic strips I have drawn back in 2008 and 2009. It's hard to believe that these things are four to five years old, but it's nice to look at. These old strips make me remember why I want to be a web cartoonist and well, I think it shows in my new work just how bad I'm chasing this. 

Step into my Delorean and let's go, back in time... 

1. "I disagree" - 2008 

This one was kind of having a go at both Break.com and deviantART. Break.com got a new layout ages ago and a lot of people didn't like it and at the same time, so did deviantART. It looks okay now, but deviantART's new layout when it first came out was horrible. Both of 'em look okay now, or maybe I've just gotten used to them. 

2. "Defying physics" - 2008

This is just immature. I look back on it now and I'm laughing in an "Oh this is awkward" kind of way, which isn't a good funny. It was a comic to try and introduce the four characters all at once. With the other two characters, I've yet to use them in my new comics, but I would like to soon. 

3. "The unspeakable" - 2008

This one was back when Blu-Ray and HD-DVD were kinda battling it out, but HD-DVD was clearly losing. A mate of mine kept claiming that HD-DVD was going to win and at the time, it was a very good and realistic argument but in the end, Blu-Ray won. I have no idea what the hell the difference is.  

4. "Waterworks" - 2008

And my immaturity continues to show. The most retarded thing about this strip? I got the idea when I was drunk, taking a piss. Yeah, I know. 

Oh look at that, I finally started using the copyright thingo on the bottom right.

5. "Genetic projection" - 2008

You know, for a hopeful comic that was about geek culture like video games and stuff, this was my first comic that I drew that was actually about a game. I really liked how this one came out too, despite being drawn in low resolution like all of my comics back in the day (tip: draw high resolution, seriously). I always found the character creation in Fallout 3 really dumb, in a funny kind of way. 

6. "Dark side" - 2008

This wasn't a very funny strip at all. Seriously. But I always wanted to draw a conversation taking place over Skype or something while they're gaming. 

7. "Get it?" - 2008

Wow. I feel terrible about this one, but I still laugh at it, which makes me even more terrible. This one was a parody strip having a go at the infamous and very controversial "Loss" miscarriage storyline of the gaming webcomic Ctrl+Alt+Del. Since it's a parody, I tried to replicate Tim Buckley's art style at the time.

I'm not sure why I used an alien chest burster. I was even thinking about making that chest burster a reoccuring character somehow, back in the day.

8. "Still alive" - 2008

Hah! I finally came up with a name for my comic which I've dismissed, nowadays. "n3rdc0r3"

On a serious note, I had no idea at the time that "nerdcore" was actually a genre of music. I was stuck without a name for a long time, but my brother suggested "Reckless Abandon". At first, I didn't really like it but over time it grew on me and I adored the damn name.

This strip is about the 2008 release of Mirror's Edge. It wasn't a great game and it wasn't a bad game either. It had good new, fresh ideas but unfortunately it wasn't well executed. I remember having so much fun drawing this strip. I tried to replicate the style of Mirror's Edge, first drawn from a first person perspective, then using bright, clean colours similar to that of the actual game. The title of the strip itself comes from the theme song of Mirror's Edge, "StillAlive"... not Portal. Absolutely beautiful song, by the way. 

9. "I love me some A.I" - 2008

I swear I could have come up with a better title for the strip than "I love me some A.I". It's bloody terrible. 

This strip is based off an actual situation that happened to me in Fallout 3, which I am willing to bet has happened to other people as well. With Star Paladin Cross of the Brotherhood of Steel, she loves to run around with her damn power hammer. I ordered her to use a gun instead for ranged combat. So we find that giant behemoth super mutant that's trapped in the cage. After disabling the power, Star Paladin Cross decides it's a good idea to put her gun away, get out her hammer, then charge inside the cage at the behemoth.

I can still feel the rage dwelling within me. 

10. "If only" - 2008

This one wasn't very funny either. It was more or less an experiment to draw a comic strip with a different panel layout and also experiment with lighting and shadow.

The idea came to me while I was in a lecture back in one of my classes at university. Don't ask.

I have no idea why the second panel has changed text... What a n00b. 

11. "Stop and stare" - 2008 

I used to work in retail years ago at JB Hi-Fi (like Australia's version of Best Buy) as a video game salesman... fitting right?

While at work, the song Stop and Stare came on over the shop. I heard this guy walk past and say to his mate "Ugh! I fucking hate this stupid song so much!"

I just thought it'd be funny if someone heard him, got offended and decided to do something about it.

12. "Bring in the guns" - 2009

This is one of my favourite strips I've ever done, which I am considering redoing in high definition. I found it strange that a lot of web comics out there made a strip about Resident Evil 5, but they all dived into the controversy the game caused with its apparent racism. I thought it'd be a good idea to make fun of Chris' newly acquired gigantic arms instead because seriously, that's hilariously awesome. He's so awesome that he punches boulders! He really does it!

When I drew this strip, I got in touch with Roger Craig Smith via e-mail, the actual voice actor of Chris Redfield for Resident Evil 5. I sent him this comic strip in my e-mail and he thought it was hilarious.

That felt awesome. 

13. "Results may vary" - 2009

I was a massive fan of DragonBall Z as a kid. Hell I still like it, that Battle of the Gods animated movie coming soon? I so want to see that.

The DragonBall live action movie that was released a few years ago? What the hell were they thinking?

The idea of this comic seriously came to me when I woke up at 4 AM one night, the first thing I did was grab my art book, scribbled down this idea then threw the book back down on the floor and went back to sleep. I woke up, saw the idea and thought to myself,

 "The fuck?" 

14. "Gentleman's midnight critique" - 2009

This one was inspired by Penny Arcade, how Gabe and Tycho are often suddenly the hosts of their own show, like Tycho's "It's toodamn late".

I tried to watch this movie at my friend's house. I couldn't do it. It was just that bad. I had to stop otherwise someone would have died, and it wouldn't have been me. 

15. "Budokai" - 2009

Yup. It's a fart joke.

Yup. It's about DragonBall Z again.

Doesn't get much better than that, does it?

With this one, I tried to hand draw the speech bubbles but... my god they look fucking terrible. 

16. "In your dreams" - 2009

Again this was another strip to kind of introduce all the characters together. Not at the same time, but in the strip, just suggesting what they dream about. With the girl, I wanted her to be a sort of... goth/emo wannabe character who harbours a secret obsession for the Pokemon games. I wanted to explore that and I may do so again in the future.

But this strip is really creepy. 

17. "Payback" - 2009

Yup. This strip is just plain weird... My maturity level embarrasses me sometimes. Sometimes.  

18. "Detection" - 2011

Whoops! I lied. Turns out we have one comic strip from 2011. Wow. What a way to make a comeback Craig. This one is of L.A. Noire and how a lot of NPCs really do lack a poker face when they're trying to lie.

I lied again. One more drawing! This was drawn back in 2009 as a sort of promotional art for my comic, featuring the four main characters. I call this piece "The circle of friendship". 

So that's it... eighteen comic strips from 2008 and 2009, with one from 2011 as well as one promotional drawing from 2009. My style is relatively the same for the most part, but the style at the very least has improved over time, as has the quality of the work. I used to work at low resolution and purely digital, meaning I used my old Wacom Intuous3 graphics tablet and just draw straight into Photoshop. I used to draw low resolution because it was a bit quicker and easier but also, I didn't even consider the idea of printing nor did I know about the benefits of high resolution.

Nowadays I sketch the strips onto pre-made A4 panel print outs first before scanning it up onto my computer in Photoshop where I use my Wacom Cintiq graphics tablet to digitally ink and colour the strip. Strips today are drawn at high resolution, just in case I want to print them but also they just end up looking a lot nicer than low res drawings.

It's kinda nice to look back at all these old strips.. I hope you got a chuckle or two checking out some of my old works. We'll have a new strip up next week.

Have a great weekend everyone! 

-Cr33g (Craig)

"What a view"

This strip has been on the back burner for a while now, as it was accurately predicted to be a lot of work, artistically, for my brother, whose dark alchemy has finally provided us with this offering.

Guns of Icarus Online is an extremely pretty indie game, maybe it’s too pretty. If people are too busy sight-seeing to actually play it - it has the potential to become problematic. I got into Guns of Icarus Online (GoIO) a while ago – and wrote this strip after my initial impressions of the game, so it is a tad old, but I still find it amusing. I am also one of the few people who play it at the moment, which sucks because it’s so much fun. So you’re forgiven for never having heard of this game and I’d be surprised if you had. Thankfully, the community is steadily growing, and the game has recently been on the receiving end of a good deal of exposure, including a booth at PAX East, and publicity on websites such as Destructoid. They also have a kickstarter where they’re trying to establish aspects of a more persistent world, and at the time of writing they’re set to break their first milestone.

You can currently get it on steam and it recently went on sale where you could get it for a hot five damn dollars. There’s a pretty decent likelihood of the occurrence of future sales, so it’s worth keeping an eye on this gem. So what’s the game about? It’s a post-apocalyptic, steam punk setting based around combat involving air ships.

Air ships, people. Air. Ships. Ships, in the air. That alone is almost worth the price of admission, but it gets better. The game revolves around team based “naval” battles where each ship that partakes in the splendor is crewed by individual players. Four players to a ship, each with differing responsibilities, from the pilot, often the one in charge, to the gunner, who y’know, guns, and the engineer, who cleans up after everyone and keeps the ol’ gal in the air. Within this premise is where you will probably derive all of the fun, but also pretty much all of the potential frustration. Squad/team based gameplay that is reliant on tight coordination between individuals has been around for a while, usually made easier through third party software like team speak but more recently implemented within games themselves. It takes games that ordinarily might just be a mess of people running in circles hurling memes at each other in the text chat, like in most first person shooters and mmo’s, and gives it a bit more direction – almost like a purpose. It just feels like an entirely different game experience when you take out the silent gameplay and introduce active vocal input from other friendly players (douchebags with microphones are a different story and maybe a different post). It feels a bit less lonely, too.

Communication and coordination is becoming such a staple now that it’s almost expected in games. So much so that a lot of newer games that revolve around a more focused version of team gameplay like MOBAs – Defense of the Ancients (Dota), Heroes of Newerth (Hon), League of legends (…LoL), and yeah, other games like Guns of Icarus Online depend on it to get any sort of enjoyment from them at all. I’m not even talking about winning, as a more organized team will always beat a team of random players. I’m just talking about “fun” in general. This elusive “fun” can escape pretty quickly in games like Dota, when one or two guys in a team of four, a whopping ¼ to ½ of the team has the potential to wreck the entire thing. Not at all by being trolls, but by refusing to engage in active communication, doing their own thing, or even sight-seeing.  The impact of this is pretty big in small team based games like these, where one person can hurt the experience of at least 3 other people. A teammate that I play GoIO with said it pretty well when we first got into the game, it isn’t when people are new or bad that’s the problem, it’s when they don’t listen and participate in the game they are supposed to be currently playing. In these games, communication and teamwork is the entire point.

There’s a pretty big, and awesome community movement to actively teach the game to new people and to encourage positive teamwork and communication known as “Training Days”, which is a really great thing that is virtually unheard of in these kinds of games. Mostly, new players either endure the weaponised vitriol from the more intolerant veteran players, or are shouted down enough that they just give up on a game, which is something that smaller communities like this can’t afford. So it’s great to see such a welcoming player base for a game this competitive. It almost doesn’t make sense.

In short, get a headset (or turn your volume up), and the game, it’s not perfect but man, it’s pretty damn good.

-Morblitz

"A Dark World"

This comic strip is about the dark and terrifying world of online dating. Tread forth if you dare. Prepare yourself.

Nah. It's not that bad, really. I've known people to jump on board the online dating scene and have been successful from it, and I'm happy for them. Last year I decided to give it a go too after a bit of convincing and although I was not successful and ended up deleting the account, that's okay. I gave it a go. I did meet some nice people, but er... I did meet some... well, not nice people. You'll get that.

Bring a sword just in case. Or a pointy stick if you can't acquire the former.

Speaking of swords, I ended up buying and downloading Minecraft for PC, although I am about three years late to the building and smashing party, I think I'm bloody well addicted to the damn fucking game. I like to think I'm a creative person, so I love it when a game offers you freedom and creativity and Minecraft nails this perfectly. The massive, randomly generated world to explore, seek out new locations and treasures and survive the terrors of the night and the underground, while being able to manipulate the world around you by destroying every part of the environment and replacing it with your own creations. It's great fun and as bad as it sounds, time seriously flies when I play Minecraft. I've still yet to try multiplayer and so far I've only tried out the survival mode, I've surprised myself that I have yet to try the free creation mode.

I think everyone likes to be creative when they get the chance. Being creative is fun. There is something satisfying about "creating" something, whether it be with your bare hands or by digital means. It could be a model, a sculpture, a drawing, a painting, taking the right photo or even writing something. Even if someone isn't exactly the artistic type or feels they aren't really creative to begin with, I can imagine with confidence that anyone will have fun in creating something in Minecraft. There really is something satisfying about making something, then looking at the creation either proudly or with amused shame and thinking to yourself, "I made this". I know a few people who aren't that great at drawing and they'll say it, but they clearly have fun trying to draw and I love to see what they come up with regardless.

I'll admit, without reading any tutorials or anything, Minecraft was a bit of a tricky learning curve, but man thank God for the Minecraft Wiki Page. Aw yeah.

Injustice: Gods Among Us is out next week for all consoles. I don't think I'll pick up the game right away, I'll most likely wait for a review or two before making a decision. From what I've seen in the demo, the game was pretty fun to play and had some new ideas. My biggest issue with the demo was the sound was quite weak. I really had to turn up the volume on my TV, not quite sure why that is but hopefully the sound is better in the final comic.

While we try and have this comic updated twice a week aiming at Tuesdays and Thursdays, we most likely won't be bringing a comic this Thursday. Hopefully next week we'll have two comics, but we will have at least one for sure.

Until then, have a good one!

-Cr33g (Craig)

[ Edit/Update ]

Megaman was one of my favourite video game franchises as a kid. I loved the original Megaman games on the Nintendo and I absolutely adored the Mega Man X franchise. Those were among the best video games I've ever played when I was a kid.

"Reboots" as they're so commonly referred are a bit of a popular thing nowadays in both gaming and films. Taking an old movie or game and putting a new, modern twist into it as a brand new storyline. I've got nothing against reboots, in fact I think most of them are great. I'm always interested to see new ideas and a story told from the perspective of another with games and stories I like. Look at Batman Begins, Casino Royale and the new Tomb Raider to name a few.

I've always wanted to see a reboot on the Megaman franchise, perhaps turned into a third or first person shooter with similar ideas from the past mixed with new but modern ideas. Well... it turns out they were doing one, but then it got cancelled.

According to various sources on the Interwebz, "Maverick Hunter" was in the works to be a reboot of the Megaman franchise, in particular Megaman X. Maverick Hunter was intended to be a first person shooter with some third person elements from the makers of the critically acclaimed Metroid: Prime series. On top of that, Megaman's new design, with a new realistic twist on his X-Buster arm cannon, was from the minds who designed the Iron Man armour of the new Iron Man films. The game was in development up until 2010 where it was unfortunately cancelled.

This really is a sad day in gaming. I am honestly a bit biased in saying this as I am a fan of the Megaman games, but this would have seriously made an awesome game.

-Cr33g (Craig)

Artwork and games!

While I don't exactly have a "schedule" per say, I like to try and upload a comic on either Tuesday or Thursday, sometimes both if I'm lucky, but I drew this last night and decided to upload it today. The original sketch was done on a tiny post it note, but I threw it onto my computer to reconstruct it as a high resolution drawing in colour. It's a cartoon version of me and how I often dream about drawing comics. 

Since our last blog entry wasn't exactly a blog entry, we'll compensate for that right here in this blog entry. Oh yes. Oh yeah. Let's talk about nerdy shit. Like games. 

I picked up Tomb Raider for the PS3 back in February. I thought it was an amazing game. It was so much fun to play. The cover system feels so natural and fluid, melee combat is brutal, raiding tombs and finding treasures is fun. All of Lara's weapons are upgraded over time to be better and more bad arse, while Lara too also levels up and acquires new abilities and skills. It is a really fun game to play. The story line is okay, I really appreciate the new, re-imagined "a survivor is born" Lara Croft, but some of the game's story is a bit contradicting. So Lara and her friends are stuck on an island with a bunch of crazy cultist types who are trapped there too, they're horrible, violent people and Lara is forced to kill another human being herself in order to survive. It's a powerful and emotional scene, but as soon as Lara gets a weapon she becomes a one man (or woman) army and the more brutal Lara is with her enemies, the more experience points she receives. This kind of game play mechanism kinda defeats the purpose of the emotional side of things... but it's fun. Real fun. Apparently though if I got Tomb Raider on the PC, then I could have enjoyed having Lara Croft with super realistic mad flowy hair. Maybe she's born with it? 

Far Cry 3 is a little bit similar to Tomb Raider, but I should say it in vice versa really. You and your mates on an island with a bunch of psycho violent pirates, you as Jason Brody escapes and ends up having to do terrible things to rescue his friends. Lara is similar to Jason, originally a completely innocent noob, who then picks up a weapon and begins to kill in order to survive, becoming a bad arse in the process. Far Cry 3 approaches the concept a bit differently, but it's similar. Other than that, Far Cry 3 is amazing too. It looks awesome, you can go anywhere like any free roaming sandbox, there's a lot to do and the freedom you're given to approach missions is absolutely amazing. Far Cry 3 is a game that is guaranteed to give you lots of fun. 

I seem to be only going on about games that involve running around with guns, because that's exactly what you do in Crysis 3, albeit you do it in a real cool awesome high tech muscle power suit thing. For the most part, Crysis 3 is pretty fun. I don't follow the story line at all because the game's plot doesn't capture my interest very well. Using the stealth powers of the suit is pretty cool and while the game isn't as free roaming as it used to be, it still does offer a decent degree of freedom. That new predator bow weapon is awesome to use, a little too awesome though. It seems like a completely broken weapon. Yeah it's fun to use but seriously it kills almost everything in one hit and then it has arrow types, like grenade and electrical. I've heard of some players refusing to use the bow because it makes things too easy but uh, it's still sweet. Graphically as expected, Crysis 3 is mind blowing and running it on a PC will require some serious hardware. I don't know how Crysis 3 looks on the consoles but I'm gonna guess it'll look pretty good, but probably not as awesome as PC. 

You've probably heard by now, but last year Disney had acquired game developing company LucasArts. Well, sadly Disney has decided to shut down LucasArt and lay off all of its employees. As much as I love Disney, I was completely stunned by this decision and even felt really sad about it. LucasArts was a great developer responsible for the Star Wars gaming franchise and even some real old school adventure games back in the day. It wasn't uncommon to hear that LucasArts wasn't doing too well, but we were all holding out for their upcoming dark, third person shooter Star Wars: 1313. Disney has announced that Star Wars: 1313 has been put on "halt" so who knows, maybe this game will see the light of day through the hands of another developer, but will it be as good as LucasArt's original work? Will it be completely changed? Or maybe it won't come out at all? 

Finally, I tried out the demo of Injustice: Gods Among Us last night, the new DC Comics' fighting game from the makers of the most recent Mortal Kombat. There were only three playable characters, Batman, Wonder Woman and Lex Luthor. Only two stages and only one mode to play, a classic arcade mode where you fight against said available characters and then go toe to toe Doomsday at the end. I think so far it's a fun game, it feels similar to Mortal Kombat but a lot faster and more fluid. While I know and understand that this game is based off a comic franchise, there are a few things that raise my eyebrow. We all know Batman is a pretty strong guy, but how can he possibly throw a combination of punches and kicks at a power suit wearing Lex Luthor, followed by picking up a massive garbage container and smashing Lex in his stupid bald face to send him flying? Don't get me wrong, I thought it was awesome, but it was kind of silly, even for DC. Regardless, it was fun, I look forward to seeing the full version in the next two weeks.

Have a great weekend everyone!

-Cr33g (Craig) 

"Airborn"

Yup. It's a fart joke. Deal with it. :)

-Cr33g (Craig)

"Deviant, indeed"

Our latest strip is about the deviantly deviant art site deviantART.

Now with deviantART I've got a love/hate relationship with that place. On one hand, it's a place where many wonderfully talented artists showcase some brilliant work. Many of them are professional and many of them are hobbyists, while also just being really good at what they do. That's the "love" part. Unfortunately, deviantART is also a site that, well... there's a lot of weird shit there. I'm aware that deviantART has an adult filter tag. Mine is off, because sometimes you do get some genuine "adult" art that is actually good and tasteful... well, my adult filter was off, I should say. It's safely back on now. I strongly recommend it.

I don't understand half of what gets submitted to deviantART. I'll say it again. It has a lot of weird shit. You've got stuff like, drawings of overly obese "furry" characters in little to no clothing, photos of people's feet, MySpace style shots as photography and some pretty much pornographic photos claiming to be "art".

Recently I decided to check out the new submissions page of deviantART, the latest art pieces on the site. Who knows, there might have been something cool there. Something unknown. There are a lot of brilliant artists and brilliant art pieces on that site which don't get much recognition there. Maybe there was something just waiting on the front page for me? Oh yeah. There was something waiting for me all right. I shit you not, I swear to God, the very first picture I saw on the new submissions page was a photo of some dude's dick.

I was stunned. It was just... there. Some dude's wang. Just hanging out.

I looked at the thumb nail, and I said to myself,

"Why would someone take a photo of their dick and throw it up on deviantART?"

Then I thought to myself,

"It's not even a good photo!" 

Seriously, it was a terrible photo. The quality was really bad and grainy, it looked like it had been taken with a mobile phone or something. The lighting was terrible and it was obviously really unplanned. It's like the guy decided to get his iPhone out, pull down his pants and snap a shot of his junk.

I stopped. I then realised something dark, something dreadful about all this...

"I'm critiquing a thumbnail photo of a dick." 

The site was then closed.

I still visit deviantART, albeit with the adult filter now turned on. I do have an account there myself where I upload some of my works, even the comics created by my brother and I. I was hoping deviantART might inspire me to draw again, maybe spark my creativity into a flame, but strangely I've found Penny Arcade's Strip Search reality web show to be doing that for me. If you'd like to check out my page and some of my artworks, you can visit it... RIGHT HERE.

Despite all the amazing talent and skill that lies within deviantART, it's like the Cave of Wonders from Disney's Aladdin, as it speaks, "Find the diamond in the rough", that basically means in order to find something cool on deviantART, you're going to have to dig your way through creepy fetish photography, furries, bad fan art and well, apparently now photos of dicks. Even with the adult filter on, you'll still find some weird shit.

I understand that art is about expression of one's opinion and feelings, but seriously... a dick. Really?

You've been warned and I wish you luck.

-Cr33g (Craig)

"Valentine's Day?"

I guess you could say while this comic is new and fresh, the timing is a little off as the "holiday" of Valentine's Day was well over a month ago as I write this. This strip is loosely based off a real life situation that I was involved in. Trust me when I say, in reality the results were not as creepy as this strip portrays, although it's very understandable to assume that it could be creepy. Like Slender Man creepy. Like I said, trust me, this story isn't creepy. Well, not that creepy anyway. Read on, if you dare.

To put it out there, I have never "celebrated" Valentine's Day. Every time it comes up, I don't have someone to celebrate it with, more importantly I don't exactly see the point of "celebrating" it, even if I was involved with somebody, but that's a typical rant I won't go into.

At my current job, my boss asked my work mate and I what we were doing for Valentine's Day. My work mate said he was going to surprise his girlfriend at her work with gifts then take her out for dinner. My boss asked me and was horrified to hear my response, "Nothing".

My boss then set the challenge before me. Well, it wasn't really a challenge, but more attempting to force me. Basically, he ordered that on my lunch break, I go out and buy flowers, roses or whatever, then go and find someone I genuinely think is attractive and give her said flowers. He wanted me to try and score a phone number out of it too. Now, this absolutely horrified me, but when the time came he said to me that I didn't have to do it if I really didn't want to. I just thought what the hell... challenge accepted.

So on my now extended lunch break, I went and tracked down where they were selling flowers and roses and stuff, outside a local supermarket. There was a lot of stock and even more people gunning for those plants. I picked out a single red rose. Nothing too fancy but I thought it was nice. I felt very awkward buying this rose, and I obviously looked like that guy. You know, the weirdo who holds the single rose routine. Yeah, that guy.

I saw a lot of people walking around with flowers, roses, gifts, stuffed animals, you know the typical Valentine's Day gifts. I went to the local outdoor mall and well, there were a lot of people there, heaps, but all of them with partners of sorts. I decided in order to complete this challenge and essentially beat my boss, I was going to try one of the stores. I walked into a book store, saw a cute girl at the counter by herself. "Cool" I thought, "This'll do." I thought it'd be kind of weird to go up with nothing but the rose, so I decided to buy something and then throw the rose at her... which now that I think about it, is probably even weirder. So I approached the counter with a product, and noticed the girl had another older staff member with her. Crap.

"Just this please." I said, putting a copy of a Batman: The Dark Knight graphic novel onto the counter, and then a twenty dollar note along with it.

I was on my way back to my office as I felt like giving up. I had some time to spare, so I dropped by a local pharmacy to look for strapping tape for judo. When I went inside, I saw an absolutely beautiful girl working in the beauty section of the pharmacy, but she was with a customer. I didn't want to look like a creeper and man, I felt like one, so I just left and walked into a nearby electronic store, to gaze upon the gaming shelf that never, ever seems to change or renew its stock. Shortly after, I noticed that customer of the girl walked into the electronic store. So I thought fuck it, I'm doing this.

I approached this girl, nervous as all hell because I hate doing this kind of thing. I said hello, she thought I was a normal customer and that's when I threw it at her,

"I'm on a mission." I just... blatantly say.

"Oh, a mission?" she asks, confused but amused, I think.

"Yeah. My boss is sending me out on my lunch break, to buy a rose for someone, anyone, and give it to them in the spirit of Valentine's Day, and I want you to have it so here." I explain as I hand her the rose.

"Oh, thank you!" 

We had a very brief chat, she asked me a few questions about what I do for work, where I work, etc. Despite the questions, no names were exchanged or any contact details of any sort. She then finally asked,

"Why me?" 

In my head, I was thinking "Oh shit, oh shit oh shit oh fucking shit", I didn't know what to say. I remembered though what my boss told me, so I explained,

"The catch of this challenge was that I had to give the rose to someone who I felt was genuinely a beautiful person." 

The girl's response was something I wasn't expecting. She covered her mouth and made a very loud "AAAAW" sound. I'll admit it was actually really nice to hear, but it had me pretty embarrassed. That noise pretty much caught the attention of other people in the shop.

With that I decided to make my very awkward escape, I said I had to go, wished her a good day and well, left the shop. Simple as that.

When I got back to work, I told my boss that I had completed his challenge. He was happy with the results, but his happiness changed when I revealed that no contact details, not even names were exchanged. He sat there for a while, basically asking "Why?" over and over again.

On one hand, I felt if I tried to ask this person for names, a contact number or something, that would have been a bit weird and creepy. On the other hand, I felt that maybe for this girl, it would have made a better story, to be given a rose in the spirit of Valentine's Day by a stranger, with nothing more to add or say. At least, that's what I thought in my head. Who knows, the girl could have very well thought the situation was hilarious, maybe embarrassing or perhaps down right creepy. As for the latter possibility, I hope that's not the case.

Completing my boss' challenge felt good and at the same time, kinda fun. Would I do it again?

I hope not.

-Cr33g (Craig)