Avengers ROM

[Shiryu]

So true ! ;D

[Engage]

For those of you with either the ROM or a good collection of Volume One, check out the letters pages from issues 79 and 80. I don't want to get into to much detail and thoughts in this post, but lets just say that the discussion is not exactly what you would find in a comic today. Can you see two issues letter pages given over to one letter and a thoughtful, direct reply from the writer nowadays?

This is why I own the ROM.

[dlw66]

Let's jumpstart this thread again with a wish list: If DC were going to begin this procedure of scanning entire runs of books (and keep in mind, they were years behind Marvel in launching their Showcase Presents line of affordable B&W reprints), what are the first 2-3 titles you'd like to own, or what concepts would make good ideas?

ROMs I would like to own include the Legion of Super-Heroes (I have all of the Archive Editions published so far, but want to fill in some missing issues from the late 70's-the reboot in the early 90's), Teen Titans, and JLA.

I think DC could do a neat marketing job by separating out Batman from Detective (or Superman from Action) and doing separate ROMs with all of the back-up stories from those titles.

[sharkar]

engage said:

For those of you with either the ROM or a good collection of Volume One, check out the letters pages from issues 79 and 80. I don't want to get into to much detail and thoughts in this post, but lets just say that the discussion is not exactly what you would find in a comic today. Can you see two issues letter pages given over to one letter and a thoughtful, direct reply from the writer nowadays?

This is why I own the ROM.

Ah, you're probably referring to a particularly incisive letter that was penned in response to the Roy Thomas Sons of the Serpent issues #73 and #74. IIRC, that letter contained many provocative points and in the next issue Roy responded.

Engage, I agree with you 100%. As a reader back then, I can confirm that the Marvel letter columns contained many intelligent letters that elicited equally intelligent responses from Marvel (along with a joke or two). I remember reading letter after letter from readers about physics and biology (FF's powers), scientific theories explaning Atlanteans' blue skin and how they breathe underwater (Sub-Mariner), explorations of Norse and other cultures' myths (Thor, natch), mutations and societal prejudice (X-Men), and as for the Avengers, almost everything under the sun, as the book comprised a variety of heroes and themes. I was a kid then so many of the letters were over my head, but they forced me to think and inspired me to expand my horizons and read more about science, mythology, history, etc.

It was clear that those Marvel stories spoke to adults. As an old-time Marvel reader, I find today's letters unbelievably simple-minded ("Juggernaut has a cool costume!") but I guess that's the type of audience Marvel wants to cater to these days.

[von Bek]

sharkar said:

It was clear that those Marvel stories spoke to adults. As an old-time Marvel reader, I find today's letters unbelievably simple-minded ("Juggernaut has a cool costume!") but I guess that's the type of audience Marvel wants to cater to these days.

One could read the Bronze Age Marvel comics as just adventure stories or try to look 'between' the lines and see the ideas the writers (specially Thomas, Englehart and Starlin) were trying to present.

[Tana Nile]

I got a great Christmas gift: this Avengers DVD-ROM! I have only been able to look at it briefly, but it looks very well done. Now I can finally read the Crossing and find out why you guys hate it so much!!

[dlw66]

Treat yourself instead to the stuff of good memories, my dear!

I hinted that I'd like the revamped Spidey DVD-ROM, but didn't get it .

[Tana Nile]

OK, so I read the Crossing. Wow. That was just so awful...I hate to say it, but even the current Avengers is more tolerable than that crap. Wow.

And what was with all the vertical two page spreads? Man, hard to look at even on my laptop!!

[dlw66]

Getting ready to purchase the Amazing Spider-Man DVD-ROM with some kick-back from Uncle Sam .

For those of you still walking the fence on these products: the ASM disc has 575 comics on it, and amazon.com is selling it for $45 (free S&H). That breaks down to around 8 cents per issue. The Essentials, which are only B&W and only story pages break down to about 60 cents per issue. The Masterworks series, with the same drawbacks as the Essentials except for color stories, give you 10 stories at approximately $5/issue.

Reminder -- the ROMs are complete scans of every comic. All ads, letters pages, Bullpen Bulletins, pin-ups, etc. are included!

[dlw66]

For those of you who don't own any of the ROMs but would like to see some of the old Bullpen Bulletins pages, click on the link below:

costa.lunarpages.com/bp/bullpen.html

[Shiryu]

Did you got the ASM dvd, Doug ?

[dlw66]

Not yet -- I'm still waiting on my income tax return from the gov't, as opposed to buying it on credit!

[Shiryu]

Fair. Hope that doesn't take too long, governments tend to be very quick in taking money and very slow in giving it back

[dlw66]

How true, how true...

I hope to have it in-hand within two weeks, and I'll post a review asap!!

[ozbot]

BTW, the Ghost Rider DVD Rom is out now, too. I definately want to buy it, sort of for the old-school stuff that I've never read, but actually more for the idea that I want to support his format so I can get what I really want: Captain America, Hulk, and Iron Man DVD roms!

[dlw66]

I received the Amazing Spider-Man DVD-ROM in the mail yesterday -- $45 from amazon.com, no postage and handling. Comes out to about equal with other internet sites offering it for $39.

The contents of this disk are:

Amazing Fantasy #15
Amazing Spider-Man #1-531 (note: the title rebooted with a #1 at what should have been #442)
Annuals #1-28, and 1996-2001
Bios: only a 4-page spread on Spider-Man
What's Next page: Coming in 2007 -- Iron Man, Incredible Hulk, Daredevil, and Captain America

I haven't had too much time to look it over. My primary goal last night was to make sure it worked correctly, and it did. For some of the Silver Age books, the copies that were scanned were pretty banged up -- I found this to be a little odd, but then if I had a beautiful copy of a very early issue, I'm not sure I'd lend it out to some office boy to make copies!

Of course the drawback to the ASM book comes in the late 1980's and on -- the dreaded crossover. For those 12-issue arcs, keep in mind that you'll only get 25-33% of the story on this DVD-ROM. There are no Spectacular Spider-Man, Web of Spider-Man, Spider-Man, etc. issues on this disk. That cuts into Kraven's Last Hunt, among other things. Thankfully, it also means the reader only has to bear a fraction of the Clone Saga .

EDIT: In regard to the Bio section on each of these DVD-ROMs, it is a nice touch to have some "handbook" type entries. I don't know if space on the disk was a consideration, but to have been able to include the recently-released character-specific handbooks would have been great. Of course, including some of the crossovers would have been even better . End EDIT

Overall, a nice looking package and very easy to use. I now have the Avengers, FF, and this. I plan to buy the X-Men disk, although it is a low priority for me. Some of the offerings allegedly coming in this year are more attractive.

[Shiryu]

Cool ! I'll be on the lookout for it. It's a pity that they didn't include at least the crossover issues of the other titles, but perhaps it would have been too many to fit in the disc. The 4 page Spidey's bio sounds rather useless if you have all the issues there, but whatever ^^

Is the format PDF like Avengers and FF ?

PS: I'd also recommend the Cap DVD whenever it comes out, I can tell it's worth it ;D

PPS: So I assume you've got your tax return, good to know they arrive eventually

[dlw66]

Yes, it's PDF files.

There is a program from International Microcomputer Software, Inc. called "PDF to Word" that allows the user to easily convert the files to a .doc. Not sure if that would be of benefit to you??

And by the way, I didn't mention it, but this is the new Spidey collection on one DVD-ROM. The previous edition was on 11 cd-roms. This is one disk, so it's much nicer!

[The Night Phantom]

dlw66 said:

And by the way, I didn't mention it, but this is the new Spidey collection on one DVD-ROM. The previous edition was on 11 cd-roms. This is one disk, so it's much nicer!

I recently received the Avengers DVD-ROM as a gift (Amazon.com Wish Lists do work! ;D ). I like it, but one gripe I have about it and the ASM CD-ROM collection is the interface organizing the issues by year instead of by issue number. While there are exceptions, if I am looking for a particular issue, I’m more likely to know (or have a good idea of) its number than its year of publication. This is more vexing with the ASM CD-ROM since, if you guessed wrong, you might have some disc-swapping to do. To combat this problem, I made myself a handy chart showing which discs contain which issues. And out of the goodness of my little heart, I’ll share it with all of you:

CD#	Years	Issues
1	1962–1966	#1–43 (plus Amazing Fantasy #15)
2	1967–1970	#44–91
3	1971–1974	#92–139
4	1975–1978	#140–187
5	1979–1982	#188–235
6	1983–1986	#236–283
7	1987–1989	#284–327
8	1990–1992	#328–371
9	1993–1996	#372–418
10	1997–2000	#419–24 (465)
11	2001–2003	#25 (466)–500

“Where are the annuals?” you ask. On the DVD-ROM. What’s the upgrade pricing?

[dlw66]

I agree that it would be handy to have issues categorized as you have done. I think it's nice to know when they were published, but let's face it -- if you want the first appearance of the Rhino, you're thinking "Hmmm... maybe early #40's?", not what year it was published.

No annuals on the original Spidey package?? That is unfortunate. You know, I would consider sending the company that makes these things some consmer-friendly suggestions, but I am just not sure who the contact people would be? Marvel, the Gitcorp company who does the scanning, the distributor??? These are great things, but it wouldn't take much to greatly enhance them! Perhaps even if the editorial staff who compiles the Essential volumes had some input with these, it would greatly improve the content of the disks.

[Shiryu]

That's interesting... 11 cd roms = 7.7 GB (700MBx11), but the DVD is only 4.7 GB, so where's the extra stuff ? Or is it dual layer ?

I know the pdf to word programs, but they would only complicate things. However, making a cbr file for Comic Display software is quite easy with winrar, so I guess I'll do it that way around when I get my hands on the dvd.

[The Night Phantom]

dlw66 said:

I agree that it would be handy to have issues categorized as you have done. I think it's nice to know when they were published, but let's face it -- if you want the first appearance of the Rhino, you're thinking "Hmmm... maybe early #40's?", not what year it was published.

I suppose the year-by-year conceit might go hand-in-hand with the product names: 40 Years of the Amazing Spider-Man, 40 Years of the Avengers, 44 Years of the Fantastic Four, etc.—they want to make sure we are getting our years’ worth! Still, the makers could easily give us the best of both worlds by doing things like adding “#20–31” under the “1965”.

No annuals on the original Spidey package??

And we liked it that way!

[dlw66]

nightphantom said:

dlw66 said:

I agree that it would be handy to have issues categorized as you have done. I think it's nice to know when they were published, but let's face it -- if you want the first appearance of the Rhino, you're thinking "Hmmm... maybe early #40's?", not what year it was published.

I suppose the year-by-year conceit might go hand-in-hand with the product names: 40 Years of the Amazing Spider-Man, 40 Years of the Avengers, 44 Years of the Fantastic Four, etc.—they want to make sure we are getting our years’ worth! Still, the makers could easily give us the best of both worlds by doing things like adding “#20–31” under the “1965”.

Yes, small concession on their part. I do find a "contact us" or "technical support" button on the main screen, but I am sure it is truly for tech. help only. I really don't see any way to send an e-mail with some "helpful hints". If it's true that there will be four more DVD-ROMs coming out in '07, it would be nice if they "fixed them up" a bit more to our liking!!

[Nutcase65]

I am getting mine tomorrow and I can't wait.

[Nutcase65]

Fianlly got mine. There are a lot of issues in the early years I've never even seen referenced so I'm like a kid in a freakin' candy store here.

[dlw66]

They are great, aren't they?? Despite the drawbacks that we've long discussed, these little discs are tremendous resources!

Of the collections that gitcorp has announced for 2007, I will buy Cap, IM, Thor, and DD. I am not a big Hulk fan, so will put that one off. I may eventually purchase it for the Tales to Astonish run, Trimpe's 70's run, and McFarlane's run in the 80's. I also don't own the X-Men disc -- for me that title just lacks outside the Thomas/Adams era and the Claremont/Cockrum/Byrne era.

[Nutcase65]

I look forward to the release of the Iron Man collection.

[Shiryu]

Does DC have a CD/DVD edition of their most famous characters ? It would be nice having a Batman DVD

[Nutcase65]

They migh, but so-far the only DC collections I've seen are those scanned collections.

[dlw66]

DC is not in this market to the best of my knowledge. It took them about 5 years to follow Marvel into the B&W reprint market with their "Showcase Presents" volumes!