Turn off the Lights

Cyber Monday: Dark Horse Digital

Welcome to another Cyber Monday where we look at the digital comic market. This week we’re taking a look at an entire service as Dark Horse comics launched its own app and browser viewer this week. Right off the bat I have to say that it’s refreshing to see that they haven’t gone with Comixology to house their goods. I think it’s a smart move since digital comics are now big enough to support themselves.  I wouldn’t be surprised if other companies do this once their contracts are up with Comixology.

Dark Horse did a lot a things right with their digital service. First off they have a ton of free comics that you’d actually want to read. I’ve never checked out the Fray from Joss Whedon before and was happy to see that the first issue was free to read. For those who haven’t read Umbrella Academy they have the zero issue for the first series and the first issue of the second series Apocalypse Suite also for free. Both series are written by My Chemical Romance front man Gerald Way and are surprisingly good. Other free books that I highly recommend are Grendel: Behold the Devil and Criminal Macabre; both are some of the best books I’ve read from Dark Horse.

The next thing they did right was having a competent browser store. I don’t want to name names, but one of the big two has less than a marvelous service. Dark Horse not only makes it easy to navigate they make the book easy to read by keeping with the format that I prefer where it zooms in on the each panel and you just click your way through the issue. Of course if you want to view the full page they make it easy to bounce between the two views.

What people probably want to know about the most is the pricing and selection. They’ve have books that are priced pretty low at .99 cents and other priced at $1.99 which is typically the very new books like Axe Cop: Bad Guy Earth. They also have great bundles for the miniseries priced usually at $4.99 to $5.99. That’s a great deal considering if it was a trade paperback you’re looking at $10 to $12 minimum.

So what do we recommend checking out from Dark Horse? Well I’ve missed out on a lot of B.P.R. D. over the years so that’s what I’ve been checking that out. In fact you’ll even get a couple of reviews from it. Personally I think this is the most polished digital service on the market and can’t wait to see what Dark Horse adds next. They’ve got a great library that I’m dying to read and collect. They may be one of the last big companies to join the market, but they certainly made sure they did it right.

Comments

Meet the Author

User not found.

Follow Us