05 November 2009

Designing Superheroes for Fun and Profit

Today I’m highlighting two sites devoted to the important enterprise of superhero design.

I was delighted to find a pointer to The Superest, an ongoing game of rock-paper-scissors with superheroes. Start anywhere (such as that link above), and move down to see who that hero has been designed to vanquish, up to see who was invented to beat that hero.

Thus, for example, the Cord Marshal, with power over extension cords, can defeat General Contractor, but he falls to Midwife, “snipping cords of all shapes and sizes.” And she in turn meets her match in… Well, you’ll have to explore. It really is the Superest.

In addition, months back the Graphic Novel Reporter offered a link to The Hero Factory, a site that allows visitors to design their own superhero by plugging in variables about gender, hair, facial features, uniform colors, weapons, and so on.

The site doesn’t offer a choice of body shape. Which may, with superheroes, be the whole point.

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