Real Life (webcomic)

Real Life is an American webcomic drawn and authored by Maelyn Dean that began on November 15, 1999. After having not been updated since December 10, 2015, the comic continued on September 10, 2018. It stopped updating again from July 16, 2019, and recommenced on June 15, 2020. The comic is loosely based around the lives of fictionalized versions of Dean and her friends, including verbatim conversations, as well as fictional aspects including time travel and mecha combat. Characters regularly break the fourth wall. "Real Life" focuses on humor related to video games and science fiction, and references internet memes.
Development.
"Real Life" launched in 1999 and became part of Keenspot shortly after. Mae switched to the Blank Label Comics collective in 2005 before going solo again in February 2010. The "Real Life" website is currently self-hosted by Mae.
Year one of "Real Life" was published as a paperback by Starline Multimedia Inc. in 2004, and a second book published by Lulu was released in 2008. A German translation of some portions of the webcomic has been made available on the website's archive.
Reception.
Maelyn Dean won the "Outstanding Reality Comic" category of the Web Cartoonist's Choice Awards four times: in 2001, 2003 (when her webcomic tied with "Nowhere Girl"), 2004, and 2005 (when her webcomic tied with "The Devil's Panties").