Princess Peach- YET AGAIN.

I'll admit- I have a soft spot for the ladies of the Super Mario Bros. universe. I grew up with them and the love's just never faded away, y'know? Anyway, I wanted to draw something to put up on the Art Auction at Otakon this year, and since I only had a month to finish the piece in, it came down to choosing between this pic and an Art Nouveau-style poster advertising Ezel Berbier's card shop in Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. Given that I'd just finished Color Magic, I decided to give Tactics Advance a break for a bit. Besides, drawing Peach is ALWAYS fun.

As you've probably gathered from my gallery, I like drawing smut. Sure, there's the thrill of drawing something considered taboo by many peoples' standards, but there's also a lot to be said for the.... well, not "inappropriateness," but the way a good smut pic will make you look at a character in a different light- in a way you might not have considered before.

'Course, you don't need to draw perverted stuff to get that- just put a character in a context that's different, but still sort of fits! Thus, Peach: Warrior Princess, here.

It's not COMPLETELY out of the blue- there have been three Super Mario-themed RPGs, with a fourth on the way. The first let you use Peach as a playable character, even! Now, if you grew up on Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Dragon Warrior and the 8- and 16-bit Final Fantasies like I did, "RPG" is almost inextricably linked with high fantasy- armor and sword, spellbook and sorcery! That kind of thing! See, it makes sense, don't it?!

Okay, so I just really like drawing armor.

Anyway, I drew this to be printed on a 23"x35" poster, and put it up on the Art Auction at Otakon this year. It sold better than I ever expected it to- I set the minimum bid at $35, and by Saturday afternoon the bid card was full, sending it to the open auction on Sunday, where it sold for $130. Not too shabby at all!