That's really interesting. All five take place directly in and around Asterix' village. My favorite Asterices, on the contrary, always were heavy on travel and sported road movie characteristics.

Astérix en Hispanie, Le Tour de Gaule d’Astérix, Astérix et le Chaudron, Astérix en Corse, and the surprisingly dark Astérix et les Goths, those were more of my go-to adventures.

Though yeah, of course I've read them in German. ;)

Yes, I realised it as I was typing the list. Goscinny and Uderzo were careful to alternate adventures in and out the village, and a lot of excellent ones take place away (en Corse, en Hispanie, chez les Bretons, chez Cléopâtre...). But, with time, I came to appreciate more the albums that were politically, ideologically loaded, and those are often the ones which topic is simply "happening" (in the village), whereas expeditions abroad were often their own subject. When you send Asterix in America, America becomes the main topic itself. When you stay in the village, the plot had to stem from elsewhere, and is often a "social" matter that touches me more, adding a layer of cynicism and a touch of bitterness.

And I really like the village and its population. I miss Abraracourcix (and his carriers), Ordralfabetix, Assurancetourix, Agecanonix and Panoramix when it's just Obelix and Asterix away. Even though one of the occasionally accompanies them...



i know that one: read it in Dutch nice quote, reminds me of this quote from a very popular game


"Go For The Eyes Boo"

https://youtu.be/X8lLruVR2zQ

They are usually as discreet as they are deep or heartbreaking. In "The Mansions of the Gods", the Gauls manage to protect their forest against a huge commercial architectural complex (promoted by a double-page leaflet that reminds me of the double-page touristic prospectus middle in Tintin's "Ottokar scepter"). They eventually destroy the construction and re-grow the trees, but at the end, as they stand contemplatively in front of the ruins, Asterix asks "O Druid Getafix, do you think we can always stop the course of events as we have just done ?". The druids answers "Of course not, Asterix". And adds in the next panel "But we still have time, plenty of time". That is so melancholic, for anyone in the 20th/21st century with a bit of ecological sensitivity.

Another kind of vertigo happens in the end of "The Great Crossing", as Asterix and Obelix come back from their grand accidental adventure in the Americas. Getafix wonders where they got lost, and Asterix dismissively mentions "some kind of island, over there", showing the horizon. In the next panel, Getafix is shown scrutinizing the west, thoughful, mumbling "Over there... A kind of island... well well well...". He's the only one realising the oddity and significance of it, sensing a mystery that would change the world 1500 years afterwards. But it's just one short frame, it's implicit, it's not heavy-handed. It's just passing by. But I find it striking, and deep. Suddenly grounding the "what if" story in a historical perspective through the least naive character.

Lots of little moments like that. Getafix coming back from an annual conference, mentionning that druid Statistix offered interesting insights on the future of their profession.

But again, you also have whole albums hammering on that stuff. Like "Obelix and Co" on economics, social-fabric-shattering individual profit, speculation and consumering... driven by a caricature of young Jacques Chirac. Ah, lots to say, on the underlying worldviews in those comics. Peyo and Delporte's Smurfs, in their first ten albums, were also interestingly loaded with social satire, in a somewhat similar way. Thanks to having a village's micro-society as a character in itself.

But yes, you could arge that both Tintin and Asterix are more grounded in reality than each other. Asterix by anchoring itself in genuine contemporary politics and societal issues, through its cartoonish fantasy caricature. Tintin by aiming at realism in terms of graphics and characters. Both relate to reality in very different ways, thematically or stylistically. In that sense, Goscinny belongs more to the "Marcinelle school" of the Journal de Spirou (more about laidback, absurdist, and poetic fantasy) than to the "Brussels school" of the Journal de Tintin (more about respectability and realistic educative traditionnal art), even though he's been hired by "Tintin" to compensate this image of seriousness (and later ended up doing his own stuff with the "Pilote" journal, developing more adult humour). Different worlds, different sensitivities. I love them all. And I love the history of french/belgian comics from the 40s to the 80s. So filled with completely opposed ways of being awesome.

Hergé's realism allows for very impactful humour, because it's very relatable. Goscinny's absurdism (or, elsewhere, Delporte's militant poetry) is served better by Uderzo's incredible art - his over-expressive bodily attitudes are unmatched, not even Gotlib get close (and Greg, or Turk/DeGroot push it too far beyond materiality - Uderzo still makes you feel the weight of his drawings). But when it comes to physical humour, no surprise, I still consider Franquin the best.

Franquin is the best at everything.

I had absolutely no idea this was coming. Blimey and I spent a good part of last year figuring out how to run the original 2005 version on Windows 10! Regardless this is an easy buy for me. Fun game although the original 2003 game is better. I hope that gets a remaster because that's the one I enjoyed the most. Hopefully they haven't lost the source code.

And please let the third game be good.

I think i played one of the asterix games as a kid, cant remember wich.
I did read some of the commics though.
Almost want to buy the whole comic set again if it exist somewhere...
I doubt it exist in norwegian but perhaps in english.

Annyway , wishlisted

Edit : ouch, it was kind of expensive to buy 36 volumes : https://www.amazon.co.uk/Asterix-Paperbacks-Brand-Books-Collection/dp/9351951235/ref=sr_1_16?ie=UTF8&qid=1543744496&sr=8-16&keywords=asterix+books
maybe cheaper on ebay.

Man I really do want to like this game, because it's exactly the same kind of stupid, brainless(and not too difficult) kind of game I've been missing since my childhood, and the writing is on point. But holy heck that enemy type that's supposed to be a parody of Super Mario with the water jet backpack is annoying beyond all reason and makes fights with the larger crowds tougher than they need to be. I have no complaints otherwise. The camera is one of THOSE old school types that always wants to re-center itself despite your commands from the right stick, but it's not exactly totally stupid and frustrating either.

This game apparently also released in boxed version which I would prefer over pure digital. It is also almost the same price. So I'd like to ask a question:

What version is on the disc? Will I be stuck with the Steam version? Or does the boxed version work without any DRM at all?