Quick question-Have you ever created characters based on family and/or friends?
Yeah, actually. Psycho Sam was originally based on one of my best high school friends, who's also named Sam. Back around 2000, when this story was a movie script I wrote called Dark Relic, I had intended for my friend to play a fictionalized version of himself. However, the movie never ended up getting made. Years later, when Jessica and I decided to resurrect the story and turn it into a badass comic book, we kept the character of Psycho Sam, but changed him up to fit the '80s setting and so that he'd resemble my buddy less.
And of course, Dude Shinobi is based on me. But I'm sure that's obvious to everyone as he's pretty much an exact clone.