Steve Conley on his Middle Age Kickstarter campaign

by Mike Rhode

Former NoVA resident Steve Conley is still in our hearts (and our pocketbooks) so we reached out to hear a bit more about his newest Kickstarter campaign to fund a hardcover collection of his The Middle Age webcomic.

What's The Middle Age?

The Middle Age is a fantasy, humor webcomic about a middle-aged knight stuck with a cursed, sarcastic sword and on a quest to rescue his love from dragons. The story launched in 2016 and has been lucky enough to receive ‘Best Webcomic’ nominations in both the San Diego Comic-Con International’s Eisner Awards and the Baltimore Comic-Con’s Ringo Awards.

Is the story open-ended, or do you have a limit planned for it?

It’s a novel-length story building toward a specific ending but there is has plenty of room to continue afterward. As of now, we’re currently four chapters in to a roughly twelve-chapter story.

You've done previous Kickstarters, including one for your green space monkey character Bloop - do they get less stressful? Have they all been successful?

Each one has been equally stressful and even though I’ve learned a lot from every campaign, every project has been different enough to create all new stresses. That said, the response to all three Kickstarter projects has been very kind and we’ve managed to reach each goal within 48 hours.

Is Bloop coming back? How about Astounding Space Thrills?

I would love to continue working on those but between The Middle Age and freelance work, I just don’t have the time. I’m hoping that as my Patreon support continues to grow, I’ll be able to afford more time to work on more stories.

Speaking of that, how is Patreon working for you?

I have to say it’s been wonderful.The sixty supporters I have on Patreon really help keep me going. The amount of money raised helps pay a few bills and the emotional support is tremendous. We’re now just 40 supporters shy of doubling the amount of The Middle Age comics I can produce each month. And I believe that having two episodes per week will do wonders for readership and help us just keep building momentum. Slow and steady!