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New Release - The Adventures of GamePro Issue 2 (January 1991)


E-Day

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9 hours ago, TOLUST said:

Amazing time capsule right here with GamePro Early 90s 

Yup. 1991. Image Comics was yet to be formed, so all the hot artists were still working for Marvel, but they were superstars and sales were booming.  Jim Lee, Todd McFarlane, Rob *cough* Liefeld...these guys' names on books were moving millions of copies.

And Gamepro...Gamepro had Francis Mao.

giphy.gif

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As much as I loved GamePro when I started reading it  at the start of 1992 (partially because it was the only one of two game magazines I could find in the small towns near our home), I was never a fan of his artwork. Back then if you would ask me for one thing I didn't like about the magazine, it would be his art. While I did appreciate that they used original artwork instead of the standard promotional art like I would often see on other magazines when I would see others on the newsstand, I always wished that the art was better when Francis was the cover artist.

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5 hours ago, TOLUST said:

E-Day, FYI Francis got the job at GamePro after he submitted  a drawing for there monthly reader contest , The Staff was so impressed with his work they offred him a job with Issue #3 ;) The more you know... 

That makes sense.  It's about the quality one would expect from reader art.  And Mao was lucky to land that job, since he certainly wasn't being hired by actual comic book companies.

Meanwhile, in Nintendo Power, some kid called J. Scott Campbell won their reader art contest, but did Nintendo Power offer him a job??!  Hell no.  They're no fools.  Er...

Np-vol6-jscottcampbell.jpg772934._SX1280_QL80_TTD_.jpg

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18 hours ago, TOLUST said:

E-Day, FYI Francis got the job at GamePro after he submitted  a drawing for there monthly reader contest , The Staff was so impressed with his work they offred him a job with Issue #3 ;) The more you know... 

 

I guess that was better (i.e. cheaper) than commissioning original art from proper artists like Marc Ericksen who illustrated the first three of four covers, as well as others.

 

Not all of Francis' cover art was bad; I do like quite a bit of it because it was original and not promo art, but there were some covers that just didn't look great at all. Not to mention some of the stuff inside the magazine.

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11 hours ago, Areala said:

Jeff Campbell sure knows how to draw the ladies, doesn't he? :)

*huggles*
Areala

I guess it depends on your tastes.  He recently got caught up in a Twitter kerfuffle when he came to the defense of another artist whose cheesecake drawing was being attacked by a bunch of SJWs.  They weren't attacking Campbell (at first), but he caught their ire when he pointed out that it was hard to take their criticism seriously when even a statement as asinine as "men are trash and shouldn't be allowed to draw women" (the tweeter's reaction to the artwork in question) received 30,000 likes and 5,000 retweets.  After that they started attacking him and his art as well, going so far as to accuse him of being a pedophile for daring to draw boobs on characters who are supposed to be 15-17 years old (I'm guessing these people are unfamiliar with the physical development cycles of Actual Human Girls).

I'm pretty sure (read: 1000% positive) that none of those people  who were bitching actually buy and read comics in the first place, so I personally consider their opinions to be irrelevant.  As for me, I like Campbell just fine, but I'm more partial to Adam Hughes:

adam hughes.jpeg

or Adam Warren:

Adam Warren.jpg

Amanda Conner is fun as well:

Amanda Conner.jpg

But bringing it back on topic, here we have GamePro's reader art contest winner:

CsfszgdXEAI4fnC.jpgCsfs2dtXYAAxzzW.jpg

And here we have Nintendo Power's reader art contest winner:

e73d1c06e245da2ee0a4f86c69a44725.jpgdangergirl-gijoe-mockonly-j-scott-campbell-548858701.jpg

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Oh, Adam Warren is absolutely my top pick for rendering the female form in all its anime-esque absurdity. Nobody drew Gen13, the Dirty Pair, or the Knight Sabers better. And we all know how I love my Knight Sabers. :)

But yeah, that GamePro cover artwork from the early issues is just...it's very eye-catching, and I certainly couldn't draw better to save my life, and GamePro did well to make it a part of their "brand", if you will, but still. Ouch. 😞

*huggles*
Areala

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10 hours ago, kitsunebi77 said:

After that they started attacking him and his art as well, going so far as to accuse him of being a pedophile for daring to draw boobs on characters who are supposed to be 15-17 years old (I'm guessing these people are unfamiliar with the physical development cycles of Actual Human Girls).

Speaking as someone who was essentially curve-less until just before she turned 17, I still have to say: "*sigh*". :)

*huggles*
Areala

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