Cast list?

[Panthera Tigris]

I'm relatively new here. Sometimes it's difficult to tell who's who. Is there a cast list somewhere? Or at least the major players?

[Obbl]

There is currently no "official" cast page, but there is a Housepets! Wiki which kept the original material and has kept up with all the events of the comic. Hope that helps

[Gbr23]

In a previous forum topic I wrote this:

I want to point out something that have been on my mind since this version of the website got out, and I think that for new readers not having a CAST page could really affect their experience. For a lot of us not having a Cast page doesn’t affect much, since we’re familiarized with the characters but I think that for someone who’s starting to read the comic, not having an index of the characters could be an issue.

Now, I know that HP! cast is big, there are a lot of characters and making it would require A LOT of time and thought, so I get why a Cast page isn’t a priority for Rick.

I think it should be a priority

[Gameb18oy]

It be interesting to see what Rick would have to say about the characters now, a lot of characters would have to be updated though

[Nathan Kerbonaut]

I agree, a cast page would be nice. The wiki is the only centralized place with character info. You'd have to read a lot of comics and draw your own conclusion to get the same info straight from the source

[NHWestoN]

The list of characters - from Peanut to "Actor Dog" - is now up to 130. Many of the portraits are dated in terms of their artistic depictions. Some (Dallas, for example) have no narrative description or very basic and dated. On the other hand, someone does a good job of keeping the story arcs and art up-to-date.

[Amazee Dayzee]

Last time I checked it was Super Star that was running the Wiki but he is also trying to put together the game and busy being sent to another dimension (ie banned) so I can see why it would fall a bit behind.

[Panthera Tigris]

There is currently no "official" cast page, but there is a Housepets! Wiki which kept the original material and has kept up with all the events of the comic. Hope that helps

Thanks. Will have a look.

[NHWestoN]

Banned? Sounds like a migration tag for an endangered species.

[Buster]

Last time I checked it was Super Star that was running the Wiki but he is also trying to put together the game and busy being sent to another dimension (ie banned) so I can see why it would fall a bit behind.

Banned? Sounds like a migration tag for an endangered species.

considering what that term actually means to most forumers, probably best not to reference rocky's rescripts out of context like that. it might make folks think star actually got the boot.

[NHWestoN]

Well, this was a long off-topic wander.... any of this help, panthera?

[D-Rock]

Last time I checked it was Super Star that was running the Wiki but he is also trying to put together the game and busy being sent to another dimension (ie banned) so I can see why it would fall a bit behind.

Banned? Sounds like a migration tag for an endangered species.

considering what that term actually means to most forumers, probably best not to reference rocky's rescripts out of context like that. it might make folks think star actually got the boot.

Thank you.

[Cesco]

A new page about the cast would be needed, at least, with quick info about the main characters. Here's a backup of the old official Cast page, which was part of the previous website design and was not updated since years.

[Amazee Dayzee]

I think that was the list that was made when the comic FIRST came out after Rick started it and it never received any update.

[fenrirblack]

If one were to make a cast page like that, the best option would just to do the important characters instead of all 130.

[NHWestoN]

... another approach, Fen, might be to cut this list down to those who had appeared only in the last five years.

[Champion Wallace]

I think that was the list that was made when the comic FIRST came out after Rick started it and it never received any update.

That's not entirely accurate. From what I gathered while the cast page was chronically out of date, it wasn't static. This is what it looked like what the comic first came out (three sentences each for Peanut and Grape). The last time it was updated was around July 9, 2010. When I first read through the archives I used the tags to keep track of who's who, but that has downsides like knowing whether or not there exists relatively resent strips with King or Joel partly gives away how that saga ends. I would imagine how useful it would be to have a Xenoblade Chronicles-style affinity chart showing characters' relationships to each other with a slider for different points in the comic to make it spoiler-free, but I realize it wouldn't really be practical to show relations like that.

If one were to make a cast page like that, the best option would just to do the important characters instead of all 130.

Is that because of ease of making it or ease of using it. Either way, I think the problem takes care of itself because there isn't much to write about for characters that aren't important because we don't know much about them. If you forgot who Delusional Steve was when you got to Better In My Head, it should only take a few lines of text to remind you about him.

... another approach, Fen, might be to cut this list down to those who had appeared only in the last five years.

As Gbr23 pointed out, a cast page would be used more by new people. If we're choosing characters like that it would be better to select characters that appeared in the first five years then the last because after reading 750+ strips you should have a better understanding of the cast then when you're going through those, especially if you're taking breaks going through the archive

Aside from all that, I thing the most important thing to include in a revamped cast page is to make it dynamic, aka there should be multiple copies with information established up to different points in the comic. That should solve the conflict of usefulness vs giving stuff away. For example, It's important to know Max is Grape's boyfriend for Hope of the Pridelands, but you wouldn't want to know that before you've read n-ple Date. Implementing this wouldn't be as much work as it looks like because most things could be copy and pasted from one to the next.

[D-Rock]

It's surprisingly hard to condense a characters traits to only a few sentences.

Maybe a new cast page could have sub-pages; pet dogs, pet cats, misc. pets, ferals, zoo animals, humans, things like that.

[Champion Wallace]

The 130 number is rather intimidating, but some of them like Actor Dog and Karo we don't know more than a few sentences worth. I was saying not to feel like each character needs a lot written about them; just write as much as each one deserves to get their character traits and relationships across.

I don't know if it's a coincidence, but the Characters page of the wiki sorts like you suggested, by species (though even that isn't comprehensive; there isn't any information for characters like Cory or Gambit or Mr. London).

[Gameb18oy]

I have a suggestion, but it would depend on if Rick wanted to do it. You could add a cast list to the books, only talking about the characters who are relevant for more than one strip, and only going over information that has been gone over in past comics. Anyone else think that’s a smart move?

[fenrirblack]

I mean it's not like a cast page is uncommon. Housepets is like the only webcomic that doesn't have a character sheet. If you want a reference on how to make one or what it should look like here are a few examples.

http://www.sdamned.com/cast

http://twokinds.keenspot.com/characters/ (database error, omg that is so bad but good for Tom for doing that)

http://www.savestatecomic.com/cast/

[Amazee Dayzee]

I'm pretty sure he knows how to do one but it might not be a priority.

[fenrirblack]

I’m sure he does but I like to share.

[NHWestoN]

Mom always taught us to share ... except for kleenex, as I remember.

[Amazee Dayzee]

I share those. Just not after I blow my nose on them.