Life Meter edited by Dave Roman

I'm guessing that most people reading this are between 20 and 45, and if that's the case most of you have played video games on a fairly regular basis at some point in your life. If you're male you almost certainly grew up with them. Yes, that may be a sweeping generalization, I'm just speaking of all the male friends I have. This book is a collection of short pieces about video games, so that long winded intro was to tell those of you who have never played video games that you will be utterly lost reading this comic. It even dealt with any concerns I've had about anthologies, as all the pages are numbered, there's a table of contents and it even lists the video games on which these pieces are based. Hey, I'm practically an expert on old video games and even I needed the occasional hint. Stories in here include a day in the life ofFrogger (by Dan Abdo), Debbie Huey's take on the obsession of Toad from the Mario games, Faith Erin Hicks has a continuing series about a horny fangirl who is hiding out from zombies, Dave Roman shows us what's inside the Moto Bug (in one of those pieces that flew right over my head), Jamie Dee Galey shows us the dangers of shaking trees, Phil McAndrew has a piece on Pac-Man commiseration, and Lea Hernandez tells us all about Mickey's ghetto booty from Kingdom Hearts II. There are also full page (or half page) comics about various assorted video gamesthat'll be better left as a surprise, but I have to mention the highlight of the comic: Jacob Chabot's piece on Burger Time. I don't think you even need to have played the game to love this strip, as we are treated to an origin story of the chef from Burger Time and shown that a man with a spatula and a salt shaker can, in fact, be a bad ass. If you don't have some love in your heart for video games this comic probably won't do a thing for you, but if you do it's hard not to love it.