148-491: Homestar Runner is an American comedy animated web series and website created by Mike and Matt Chapman, known collectively as The Brothers Chaps . The series centers on the adventures of a large and diverse cast of characters , headed by the titular character, Homestar Runner . It uses a blend of surreal humor , self-parody, satire, and references to popular culture , in particular video games , classic television , and popular music . Homestar Runner originated in 1996 as
296-488: A thrash metal / sludge metal style); rapper Peacey P, with a rapping style resembling that of Snoop Dogg ; and the self-absorbed R&B artist Tenerence Love, a parody of Barry White and such artists. Beyond cartoons, Homestar Runner offers a variety of online games. Early games such as the Homestar Soundboard , "Homestar Talker", and Lite-Brite emulator "Astro-Lite 2600" are basic web toys featuring
444-718: A "Lethal Ladies" programming block, but spent most of her time online, appearing in 100 webisodes. As broadband bandwidth began to increase in speed and availability, delivering high-quality video over the Internet became a reality. In the early 2000s, the Japanese anime industry began broadcasting original net animation (ONA), a type of original video animation (OVA) series, on the Internet. Early examples of ONA series include Infinite Ryvius: Illusion (2000), Ajimu (2001), and Mahou Yuugi (2001). In 2003, The Spot executive producer and head writer Stewart St. John revived
592-425: A "few dozen" T-shirts by 2001. Mike moved back to New York in mid-2001 and he and Matt started crafting the first Strong Bad Email some kinda robot , intending this to be a weekly feature. The Strong Bad Email series proved very popular, generating significant interest in the site; when the brothers were late in publishing a new Strong Bad Email, they received angry emails asking where the new short was, which Matt said
740-654: A 20% speedup if played in an NTSC console. To mostly correct this issue, a switch can be added to place the Super NES PPU into a 60 Hz mode supported by most newer PAL televisions. Later games will detect this setting and refuse to run, requiring the switch to be thrown only after the check completes. All models of the Super NES control deck are predominantly gray, of slightly different shades. The original North American version, designed by Nintendo of America industrial designer Lance Barr (who previously redesigned
888-424: A 40-point scale and allocating marketing resources accordingly. Each region performed separate evaluations. Nintendo of America also maintained a policy that, among other things, limited the amount of violence in the games on its systems. The surprise arcade hit Mortal Kombat (1992), a gory fighting game with huge splashes of blood and graphically violent fatality moves , was heavily censored by Nintendo. Because
1036-455: A Homestar Runner Flash animation called "The System is Down" in a browser window. The Brothers Chaps have partnered up with rock band They Might Be Giants and supplied animation for a music video of their song " Experimental Film ". The creators of Homestar Runner spent time with the band and wrote songs that have been released on the website as "Puppet Jam", a spin-off of "Puppet Stuff", where Puppet Homestar sings with TMBG. TMBG also wrote
1184-551: A Strong Bad Email short and a life-sized replica of Tom Servo from Mystery Science Theater 3000 producer Jim Mallon on the same day. They also reflected on how Homestar Runner had been a common point of reference over which newly formed couples bonded and how Joss Whedon incorporated references to Homestar Runner into his television shows Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel as further signs of success. Through 2010, Homestar Runner remained financially viable for
1332-496: A book written by Mike Chapman and Craig Zobel , intended as a parody of children's literature . While learning Macromedia Flash , Mike and his brother Matt expanded the concept into a website, which was launched on New Year's Day 2000 . While the site originally centered on the title character, the Strong Bad Email cartoon skits quickly became the site's most popular and prominent feature, with Strong Bad , initially
1480-457: A built-in CD-ROM drive that never made it past the prototype phase. The Philips project was canceled without a prototype but Philips retained the contractual right to develop games based on Nintendo franchises, which it published for its CD-i multimedia console. As part of the overall plan for the Super NES, rather than include an expensive CPU that would still become obsolete in a few years,
1628-565: A bundle with Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island ; it was subsequently released in Japan on March 27, 1998, where it retailed for ¥7,800. Nintendo marketed it as an entry-level gamer's system for consumers who were apprehensive about the higher price of newer systems such as the Nintendo 64 . Nintendo also introduced a slightly altered controller for it, with the console's logo replaced by an embossed Nintendo logo. The ABS plastic used in
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#17327877781941776-649: A certain amount of time depending on game credits. Manufacturing of this model was discontinued in 1992. A cost-reduced version of the console, referred to as the New-Style Super NES (model SNS-101) in North America and as the Super Famicom Jr. in Japan, was released late in the platform's lifespan; designed by Barr, it incorporates design elements from both the original North American and Japanese/European console models but in
1924-750: A couple of times over the years." Homestar Runner 's popularity, coupled with its positive critical response, has led to the website receiving widespread coverage. Homestar Runner has been featured in Wired , National Review , Entertainment Weekly , Total Gamer , G4 , and NPR 's All Things Considered . A review published in National Review characterized the site's humor as having "the innocence of slapstick with sharp satire of American popular culture" — humor that "tends to be cultural, not political." The site-generated music has enjoyed surprising popularity, such that two songs, "Trogdor" by
2072-675: A desktop computer or mobile device, such as Snes9x . To compete with the popular Family Computer in Japan, NEC Home Electronics launched the PC Engine in 1987, and Sega followed suit with the Mega Drive in 1988. The two platforms were later launched in North America in 1989 as the TurboGrafx-16 and the Sega Genesis respectively. Both systems were built on 16-bit architectures and offered improved graphics and sound over
2220-484: A home run with savings here!" And so there was this player named Mark Lemke , and they said something like "All star second baseman for the Braves". And our friend [James] knows nothing about sports, and so he would always do his old-timey radio impression of this guy, and not knowing any positions in baseball or whatever, he would just be like, "homestar runner for the Braves". And we were just like, "Homestar Runner? That's
2368-781: A mixture of chemicals is applied to the case and exposed to UV light. Super NES games are distributed on ROM cartridges , officially referred to as Game Pak in most Western regions, and as Cassette ( カセット , Kasetto ) in Japan and parts of Latin America. Though the Super NES can address 128 Mbit, only 117.75 Mbit are actually available for cartridge use. A fairly normal mapping could easily address up to 95 Mbit of ROM data (48 Mbit at FastROM speed) with 8 Mbit of battery-backed RAM. Most available memory access controllers only support mappings of up to 32 Mbit. The largest games released ( Tales of Phantasia and Star Ocean ) contain 48 Mbit of ROM data, and
2516-615: A much larger library of games, and a lower price point, it only represented an estimated 60% of the American 16-bit console market in June 1992, and neither console could maintain a definitive lead for several years. Donkey Kong Country is said to have helped establish the Super NES's market prominence in the latter years of the 16-bit generation, and for a time, maintain against the PlayStation and Saturn . According to Nintendo,
2664-471: A network via a dial-up modem to compete against other players around the country . Nintendo attempted partnerships with Sony and then Philips , to develop CD-ROM -based peripheral prototypes for the console to compete with the TurboGrafx-CD and Sega CD . Sony produced the PlayStation (a brand name the company would use for their later independently produced console ), a Super NES console with
2812-516: A new Internet studio, EQAL, and produced a spin-off from lonelygirl15 entitled " LG15: The Resistance ". Mainstream press began to provide coverage. In the UK, KateModern ended its run on Bebo . That site also hosted a six-month-long reality/travel show, The Gap Year , produced by Endemol UK, who also made Kirill , a drama for MSN . During MipCom, in October 2008, MySpace announced plans for
2960-478: A new original series created by Craig Brewer that brought together the indie music world and new media expansion. Joss Whedon created, produced and self-financed Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog starring Neil Patrick Harris and Felicia Day . Big Fantastic wrote and produced Foreign Body , a mystery web series that served as a prequel to Robin Cook 's novel of the same name. Beckett and Goodfried founded
3108-505: A palette of 32,768 colors. The PPU is clocked by the same signal as the CPU and generates a pixel every two or four cycles. The S-SMP audio subsystem consisted of a 16-bit digital signal processor (DSP) to sequence the mix samples, an 8-bit SPC700 CPU to drive the DSP and 64 KB of dedicated PSRAM . It was designed by Ken Kutaragi and produced by Sony and is completely independent from
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#17327877781943256-486: A platform game featuring 3D models and textures pre-rendered on Silicon Graphics workstations. With its detailed graphics, fluid animation, and high-quality music, Donkey Kong Country rivals the aesthetic quality of games that were being released on newer 32-bit CD-based consoles. In the last 45 days of 1994, 6.1 million copies were sold, making it the fastest-selling video game in history to that date. This game conveyed that early 32-bit systems had little to offer over
3404-480: A second series and indicated that it was in talks with cable network Foxtel to distribute their first series on network television. Additionally MySpace spoke of their plans to produce versions of the MySpace Road Tour in other countries. The emerging potential for success in web video caught the attention of top entertainment executives in America, including former Disney executive and current head of
3552-401: A series of video interviews featuring actors and directors like Guillermo del Toro , Santiago Segura , Álex de la Iglesia , and Keanu Reeves , which were distributed through his own website. lonelygirl15 , California Heaven , " The Burg ", and SamHas7Friends also gained popularity during this time, acquiring audiences in the millions. lonelygirl15 was so successful that it secured
3700-420: A short song to himself while booting up his computer to check fan emails. Starting a reply, he typically mocks the sender's name, spelling, and grammar, and rarely answers questions directly. While early episodes focused mostly on Strong Bad sitting at the computer with occasional cutaways, the cutaways would become more elaborate over time, allowing for more complex story lines to develop, growing tangentially from
3848-466: A slanted joke about such old-style cartoons. 20X6 (pronounced "twenty exty-six"), a parody of the Mega Man and EarthBound games' "year 200X", originated from Strong Bad Email #57, japanese cartoon , an email asking Strong Bad what he would look like if he were in a Japanese anime . The main character, Stinkoman, is an anime version of Strong Bad with blue hair , a shiny body and robot boots. He
3996-594: A smaller form factor. Unlike the original console models, the redesigned model is virtually identical across both regions save for the color palette (the North American model receiving purple buttons and the Japanese model receiving grey buttons). The redesign did not receive a release in Europe. Externally, the power and reset buttons were moved to the left-hand side of the console while the cartridge eject button and power LED indicator were omitted. Internally,
4144-453: A smooth curve on the front and no grooves. The physical incompatibility can be overcome with the use of various adapters, or through modification of the console. Internally, a regional lockout chip ( CIC ) within the console and in each cartridge prevents the PAL region games from being played on Japanese or North American consoles and vice versa. The Japanese and North American machines have
4292-458: A special video featuring Homestar and Strong Bad for the 2013 San Diego Comic-Con to introduce a panel regarding the history of W00tstock . Matt, after completing work on Gravity Falls , moved back to Atlanta in 2014 where Mike was living, and the two agreed that they now had the opportunity to return to Homestar Runner on a semi-regular basis. Their first short in nearly four years, posted on April 1, 2014, poked fun at how they had not updated
4440-441: A spin-off of the syndicated television series Weird TV . The web series featured dozens of shorts, comedy sketches, and mini-documentaries produced exclusively for MSN video. The video-sharing site YouTube was launched in early 2005, allowing users to share television programs. YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim said the inspiration for YouTube first came from Janet Jackson 's role in the 2004 Super Bowl incident , when her breast
4588-430: A sponsorship deal with Neutrogena . In 2007, the creators of lonelygirl15 followed up the series' success with KateModern , a series which debuted on social network Bebo , and took place in the same fictional universe as their previous show. Big Fantastic created and produced Prom Queen , which was financed and distributed by Vuguru , and debuted on MySpace . These web serials highlighted interactivity with
Homestar Runner - Misplaced Pages Continue
4736-502: A television series. After a four-year hiatus beginning in 2010, Homestar Runner returned with a new Holiday Toon on April 1, 2014, for April Fools' Day . Afterwards, co-creator Matt Chapman announced plans to give the site semi-regular updates. Since global support for Flash ended on December 31, 2020, homestarrunner.com has maintained a fully functional website through the Flash emulator Ruffle . More cartoons have since been released on
4884-459: A total of $ 1,421,903 (nearly 20 times the goal) and 23,338 backers. In 2022, an expansion pack titled Majicks & 'Mergencies Expando Deck was released, adding new cards and gameplay elements. Extra copies are sold in the website's store. Trogdor!! is described as a cooperative puzzle area control game in which the players work together to burninate all of the game tiles, thatched-roof cottages, and peasants. Every player controls Trogdor, assuming
5032-502: A variety of symptoms including graphics glitches in Mode 7, a black screen on power-on, or improperly reading the controllers. The first revision 5A22 has a fatal bug in the DMA controller that can crash games; this was corrected in subsequent revisions. The console contains 128 KB of general-purpose "work" RAM, which is separate from the 64 KB dedicated to the video subsystem and
5180-447: A weekly cartoon, and believed that, creatively, they needed a break. The success of Homestar Runner led to Matt and Mike getting writing jobs for television animated series Yo Gabba Gabba! , Gravity Falls , The Aquabats! Super Show! , and Wander Over Yonder . During this hiatus, the brothers released a small number of Homestar Runner cartoons, including ones for 2010's April Fools' Day and Decemberween holidays. They also made
5328-404: A wider range of creators to develop web series. As well, since web series are made available online, instead of being aired at a single preset time to specific regions, they enable producers to reach a potentially global audience who can access the shows 24 hours a day and seven days a week, at the time of their choosing. Moreover, in the 2010s, the rising affordability of tablets and smartphones and
5476-494: A year. Rogers Media will help fund and distribute Vuguru's upcoming productions, solidifying a connection between traditional media and new media such as web series. Web series can be distributed directly from the producers' websites, through streaming services or via online video sharing websites . The Webby Awards , established in 1996 by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences (IADAS), and
5624-677: Is a 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan and South Korea, 1991 in North America, 1992 in Europe and Oceania and 1993 in South America. In Japan, it is called the Super Famicom ( SFC ). In South Korea, it is called the Super Comboy and was distributed by Hyundai Electronics . The system was released in Brazil on August 30, 1993, by Playtronic . In Russia and CIS ,
5772-431: Is a Mega Man -style platform game featuring the characters and world of anime parody 20X6 . Nine levels were added to the game over the course of 2005, while the tenth and final level was not released until December 2020, days before Flash would no longer be supported by browsers. The Thy Dungeonman series are parodies of text adventure games originating from Strong Bad Email #94, video games . In each game, your goal
5920-612: Is a satellite modem attached to the Super Famicom's expansion port and connected to the St.GIGA satellite radio station from April 23, 1995, to June 30, 2000. Satellaview subscribers could download gaming news and specially designed games, which were frequently either remakes of or sequels to older Famicom games, and released in installments. In the United States, the relatively short-lived XBAND allowed users to connect to
6068-446: Is always looking for a fight, asking various characters he interacts with to engage him in a "challenge" ("Are you asking for a challenge?"). There is also a game, Stinkoman 20X6 , which is heavily based on the Mega Man series. Cheat Commandos is a parody of G.I. Joe that features a cast of characters that are the same species as The Cheat. Most are based on G.I. Joe characters, or characters from other 1980s cartoons. The cartoon
Homestar Runner - Misplaced Pages Continue
6216-514: Is an adventure game featuring Rather Dashing, a young peasant in short pants. After he finds his cottage burned to the ground, he vows to kill the destroyer of his cottage, Trogdor. The game uses a system that is a near-replica of Sierra Entertainment 's Adventure Game Interpreter , used in King's Quest , Space Quest and several other early Sierra titles. This system is something like text adventure games yet it has simple visuals. Stinkoman 20X6
6364-449: Is constantly advertising its products in the cartoons by such methods as referring to the areas they are in as "playsets", a convoy truck as an "action figure storage vehicle", and by ending each cartoon with the phrase "Buy all our playsets and toys!", sung in a patriotic way. It also parodies the G.I. Joe cartoons' use of public service announcements , referring to nonsensical things like "peer-2-teen choice behaviors". Some cartoons feature
6512-589: Is on future Nintendo systems since the Nintendo DS . Several peripherals add to the functionality of the Super NES. Some are required by certain games, such as the Super Scope light gun , and the Super NES Mouse for a point and click interface. Various third-parties, under license from Nintendo, released multitap adapters connecting up to five controllers into a single console, starting with
6660-464: Is to "get ye flask". Though the game purports to be set in the medieval era, the text is actually rendered in mock Early Modern English , in the style of William Shakespeare . Thy Dungeonman has two sequels: Thy Dungeonman II , which expands on the features of the original game and can only be found on the Videlectrix site, and Thy Dungeonman III which adds basic graphics and can be found on
6808-629: Is usually just a picture of the answering machine, sometimes there are short animated segments featuring the characters. As of April 1, 2016, there are 17 Marzipan's Answering Machines. These are live action shorts in which the regular characters are depicted by puppets. These may be skits , or musical performances with They Might Be Giants . Many Puppet Stuff videos feature the characters interacting with children, often related to The Brothers Chaps . One spin-off series, "Biz Cas Fri", depicts Homestar and Strong Bad's interactions from his office cubicle at work. The first Biz Cas Fri video arguably first coined
6956-511: The 8-bit NES. It took several years for Sega's system to become successful. Nintendo executives were in no rush to design a new system, but they reconsidered when they began to see their dominance in the market slipping. Bill Mensch , the co-creator of the 8-bit MOS Technology 6502 microprocessor and founder of the Western Design Center (WDC), gave Ricoh the exclusive right to supply 8-bit and 16-bit WDC microprocessors for
7104-475: The Indie Series Awards , established in 2009 by We Love Soaps, recognize independently produced comedy, drama, and reality TV entertainment created for the web. In 2009, the International Academy of Web Television (IAWTV) was founded with the mission to support and recognize artistic and technological achievements in the digital entertainment industry. It administered the selection of winners for
7252-633: The Interactive Digital Software Association and the Entertainment Software Rating Board and the inclusion of ratings on all video games. With these ratings in place, Nintendo decided its censorship policies were no longer needed. While other companies were moving on to 32-bit systems , Rare and Nintendo proved that the Super NES was still a strong contender in the market. In November 1994, Rare released Donkey Kong Country ,
7400-635: The Internet (i.e. World Wide Web ), which first emerged in the late 1990s and became more prominent in the early 2000s. A single instance of a web series program can be called an episode or a webisode . The scale of a web series is small and a typical episode can be anywhere from three to fifteen minutes in length. Web series are distributed online on video sharing websites and apps , such as YouTube , Vimeo and TikTok , and can be watched on devices such as smartphones , tablets , desktops , laptops, and Smart TVs (or television sets connected to
7548-694: The Life Fitness Entertainment System (an exercise bike controller with built-in monitoring software), the TeeV Golf golf club, and the Justifier (a revolver-shaped light gun made by Konami for Lethal Enforcers ). Though Nintendo never released an adapter for playing NES games on the Super NES, the Super Game Boy adapter cartridge allows games designed for Nintendo's portable Game Boy system to be played on
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#17327877781947696-816: The PAL region versions of the console use the Japanese Super Famicom design, except for labeling and the length of the joypad leads. The Playtronic Super NES in Brazil, although PAL-M , uses the North American design. Both the NES and Super NES were released in Brazil in 1993 by Playtronic, a joint venture between the toy company Estrela and consumer electronics company Gradiente . The Super NES and Super Famicom launched with few games, but these games were well received. In Japan, only two games were initially available: Super Mario World and F-Zero . Bombuzal
7844-648: The Streamy Awards , (which awards web series content) in 2009 and 2010. Due to the poor reception and execution of the 2010 Streamy Awards, IAWTV decided to halt its production of the award ceremony. The IAWTV followed this decision by forming the IAWTV Awards (which recognize creators, cast, and crew of short form digital series from around the world) in 2012. Super Nintendo Entertainment System The Super Nintendo Entertainment System , commonly shortened to Super Nintendo , Super NES or SNES ,
7992-489: The classic games service on Nintendo Switch Online . All Game Boy games are playable with the Super Game Boy add-on. The Super NES controller design expands on that of the NES, with A, B, X, and Y face buttons in a diamond arrangement, and two shoulder buttons. Lance Barr created its ergonomic design, and he later adapted it in 1993 for the NES-039 "dogbone" controller. The Japanese and PAL region versions incorporated
8140-540: The greatest video games of all time , such as Super Mario World (1990), The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (1991), Final Fantasy VI (1994), Donkey Kong Country (1994), EarthBound (1994), Super Metroid (1994), Chrono Trigger (1995) and Yoshi's Island (1995). Many Super NES games have been rereleased several times, including on the Virtual Console , Super NES Classic Edition , and
8288-522: The 150th Strong Bad Email, alternate universe . Old-Timey cartoons take place in an old-time setting, with most of the characters being Old-Timey counterparts of the Homestar Runner characters. These cartoons are in black and white with a film grain effect and scratchy audio quality. They parody the distinctive style of animated cartoons during the 1920s and 1930s (à la Steamboat Willie ), and can be seen as perhaps deliberately unfunny, to make
8436-410: The 64 KB dedicated to the audio subsystem. The Picture Processing Unit (PPU) consists of two closely tied IC packages. It contains 64 KB of SRAM for video data, 544 bytes of object attribute memory (OAM) for sprite data, and 256 × 15 bits of color generator RAM (CGRAM) for palette data. This CGRAM provisions up to 256 colors, chosen from the 15-bit RGB color space , from
8584-651: The Atlanta indie band Y-O-U along with Matt Chapman on vocals) performed a live show in Atlanta, Georgia, and again on November 8, 2008, opening for indie pop band of Montreal . A college rock band called Sloshy (with the logo stylized in lower case and rotated 180 degrees, with the "o" being a different color, as " ʎɥs o ןs ") was introduced in 2007. Sloshy features songs in the musical vein of Pavement such as "We Don't Really Even Care About You" and "The B-est of B-Sides". Other fictitious artists include Scandinavian death metal parody Taranchula (although performing more in
8732-704: The Burninator (stylized as TROGDOR, the BURNİNATOR ), and performing his heavy metal theme song. Trogdor's popularity saw the character appear on merchandise such as T-shirts, hoodies, and posters, with an extended version of the song appearing on the CD Strong Bad Sings . In 2002, a fictional hair metal band, Limozeen, was introduced as a parody of 1980s bands such as Skid Row , White Lion and Poison ; with songs including "Because, It's Midnite" and "Nite Mamas". On March 17, 2008, "Limozeen" (actually
8880-502: The Famicom to become the NES ), has a boxy design with purple sliding switches and a dark gray eject lever. The loading bay surface is curved, both to invite interaction and to prevent food or drinks from being placed on the console and spilling as with the flat-surfaced NES. The Japanese and European versions are more rounded, with darker gray accents and buttons. All versions incorporate a top-loading slot for game cartridges, although
9028-476: The Genesis as the "cool" console, with games aimed at older audiences, and aggressive advertisements that occasionally attacked the competition. Nintendo scored an early public-relations advantage by securing the first console conversion of Capcom's arcade hit Street Fighter II for Super NES, which took more than a year to make the transition to the Genesis. Though the Genesis had a two-year lead to launch time,
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#17327877781949176-412: The Genesis version allowed for an uncensored version via cheat code, it outsold the censored Super NES version by a ratio of nearly three to one. U.S. Senators Herb Kohl and Joe Lieberman convened a Congressional hearing on December 9, 1993, to investigate the marketing of violent video games to children. Though Nintendo took the high ground with moderate success, the hearings led to the creation of
9324-434: The Genesis. The CPU is a Ricoh 5A22 , a derivative of the 16-bit WDC 65C816 microprocessor. In NTSC regions, its nominal clock speed is 3.58 MHz will slow to either 2.68 MHz or 1.79 MHz when accessing some slower peripherals. This CPU has an 8-bit data bus and two address buses. The 24-bit "Bus A" is designated for general accesses, and the 8-bit "Bus B" can access support chip registers such as
9472-801: The Homestar Runner site. "Ye Flask" and "You can't get ye flask" have become catch-phrases in the Homestar Runner universe, eventually spawning a T-shirt in the Homestar Runner store. In 2007, the website produced Wii versions of some of the games on the site, for the Wii internet browser. When played on the computer, they use the mouse only. Two point-and-click adventure game titles by the Brothers Chaps made in Unity have been released to Steam and Itch.io , Halloween Hide & Seek and Dangeresque: The Roomisode Triungulate , an expanded remake of
9620-415: The Homestar Runner site. In 2004, the Homestar Runner characters were featured in the music video to their song Experimental Film . Additionally, they have performed multiple times with a puppet of Homestar Runner. They have also collaborated on several other shorts, including Strong Bad Email #200, email thunder . In Strong Bad Email #58, dragon , Strong Bad is asked to draw a dragon , creating Trogdor,
9768-432: The Internet with a media streaming device ). They can also be released on social media platforms. Because of the nature of the Internet, a web series may be interactive and immersive. Web series are classified as new media . Web series are different from streaming television series, as the latter is purposed to be watched on streaming platforms such as Netflix , Amazon Prime Video , and Hotstar . Although
9916-664: The Mac operating system after a vote on the Telltale Games website. Strong Bad appears as one of the computer-controlled opponents in Telltale's Poker Night at the Inventory , using the same model from SBCG4AP. Players can unlock in-game card sets and table designs based on Homestar Runner. Additionally, Strong Bad will occasionally bet Dangeresque Too's sunglasses in place of in-game cash; defeating him after doing so will unlock
10064-538: The NES's 61.9 million unit sales, the Super NES remained popular well into the 32-bit era , with 49.1 million units sold worldwide by the time it was discontinued in 2003. It continues to be popular among collectors and retro gamers , with new homebrew games and Nintendo's emulated rereleases, such as on the Virtual Console , the Super NES Classic Edition , Nintendo Switch Online ; as well as several non-console emulators which operate on
10212-422: The PAL region on November 21. The fourth episode, Dangeresque 3: The Criminal Projective , was released on Telltale Games' website and WiiWare in North America on November 17, and in the PAL region on December 5. The fifth and final episode, 8-Bit is Enough , was released to North America on December 15 and in the PAL region on January 2, 2009. In 2010, it was decided that Telltale games would release SBCG4AP for
10360-460: The PC Engine, and relayed Enix 's clarification that it was waiting on sales figures to select either PC Engine or Super Famicom for its next Dragon Quest game. The magazine and Enix both expressed a strong interest in networking as a standard platform feature. The console was demonstrated to the Japanese press on November 21, 1988, and again on July 28, 1989. Designed by Masayuki Uemura ,
10508-537: The Rooster Teeth website, acquiring over 100 million social media views during its run. Rooster Teeth would eventually create RWBY in 2013. In 2004, Salad Fingers was created, which amassed a cult following. Sam Has 7 Friends , which ran in the summer and fall of 2006, was nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award , and was temporarily removed from the Internet when it was acquired by Michael Eisner . In 2004–2005, Spanish producer Pedro Alonso Pablos recorded
10656-747: The Streamys and IAWTV also cover programs on streaming platforms. Most major award ceremonies have also created web series and digital media award categories, including the Emmy Awards and the Canadian Screen Awards . There are also several web series festivals , most notably in Los Angeles and Vancouver . In April 1995, "Global Village Idiots", an episode of the Bloomington, Indiana -based public access program Rox ,
10804-787: The Super Multitap by Hudson Soft in conjunction with the Super Bomberman series. Specialized third-party controllers, such as the AsciiPad and Super Advantage (the successor to the NES Advantage ) by Asciiware, and the Capcom Fighter Power Stick, an arcade-like joystick controller by Capcom designed specifically for Street Fighter II . Unusual controllers include the BatterUP baseball bat,
10952-415: The Super NES incorporates graphics and sound co-processors that perform tiling and simulated 3D effects, a palette of 32,768 colors, and 8-channel ADPCM audio. These base platform features, plus the ability to dramatically extend them all through substantial chip upgrades inside of each cartridge, represent a leap over the 8-bit NES generation and some significant advantages over 16-bit competitors such as
11100-620: The Super NES has unlicensed third-party peripherals, including a new version of the Game Genie cheat cartridge designed for use with Super NES games. Soon after the release of the Super NES, companies began marketing backup devices such as the Super Wildcard, Super Pro Fighter Q, and Game Doctor . These devices create a backup of a cartridge, and can be used to play illicit ROM images or to copy games, violating copyright laws in many jurisdictions. The Japan-only Satellaview
11248-512: The Super NES in North America in 1999, about two years after releasing Kirby's Dream Land 3 (its final second-party game in the US) on November 27, 1997, and one year after releasing Frogger (its final third-party game in the US) in 1998. In Japan, Nintendo continued production of both the Family Computer and the Super Famicom until September 25, 2003, and new games were produced until
11396-483: The Super NES, and proved the market for the more advanced consoles of the near future. According to TRSTS reports, two of the top five bestselling games in the U.S. for December 1996 are Super NES games. In October 1997, Nintendo released a redesigned model of the Super NES (the SNS-101 model referred to as " New-Style Super NES ") in North America for US$ 99 (equivalent to $ 200 in 2023), with some units including
11544-520: The Super NES. The Super Game Boy touts several feature enhancements over the Game Boy, including palette substitution, custom screen borders, and access to the Super NES console's features by specially enhanced Game Boy games. Japan also saw the release of the Super Game Boy 2, which adds a communication port to enable a second Game Boy to connect for multiplayer games. Like the NES before it,
11692-612: The Super Nintendo Entertainment System, a redesigned version of the Super Famicom, in North America for US$ 199 (equivalent to $ 450 in 2023). It began shipping in limited quantities on August 23, 1991, with an official nationwide release date of September 9, 1991. The Super NES was released in the United Kingdom and Ireland in April 1992 for £150 (equivalent to £390 in 2023). Most of
11840-541: The Tornante Company, Michael Eisner. Torante's Vuguru subdivision partnered with Canadian media conglomerate Rogers Media on October 26, securing plans to produce upwards of 30 new web shows a year. Rogers Media agreed to help fund and distribute Vuguru's upcoming productions, thereby solidifying a connection between old and new media. The rise in popularity of mobile Internet video, along with technological improvements to storage, bandwidth, and bitrates, led to
11988-810: The a cappella band Da Vinci's Notebook to create a theme song for the Old-Timey version of The Cheat, called "Ballad of The Sneak"; the duo later wrote the theme tune for the Stinkoman 20X6 game. Matt Chapman provided guest vocals as Strong Bad on The Aquabats ' "Pink Pants!" from their 2011 album, Hi-Five Soup! . Strong Bad's voice also appears on Shellac 's "Genuine Lulabelle" off the album " Excellent Italian Greyhound " from 2007. Discussing how he and his sibling decide which projects to work on, Mike Chapman said, "We learned how to politely say no to things that were going to affect our lives negatively. If it's going to be fun, if we're going to enjoy doing it, and if
12136-426: The attention of the yakuza criminal organizations, so the devices were shipped at night to avoid robbery. With the Super Famicom quickly outselling its rivals, Nintendo reasserted itself as the leader of the Japanese console market. Nintendo's success was partially due to the retention of most of its key third-party developers, including Capcom , Konami , Tecmo , Square , Koei , and Enix . Nintendo released
12284-417: The audience in addition to the narrative on relatively low budgets. In contrast, the web series Sanctuary , starring actor/producer Amanda Tapping , cost $ 4.3 Million to produce. Both Sanctuary and Prom Queen were nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award . Award-winning producer/director Marshall Herskovitz created Quarterlife , which debuted on MySpace and was later distributed on NBC . In 2009,
12432-464: The back; the redesigned models output composite video only, requiring an external modulator for RF. The Nintendo Super System (NSS) is an arcade system for retail preview of 11 particular Super NES games in the United States, similar to the PlayChoice-10 for NES games. It consists of slightly modified Super NES hardware with a menu interface and 25-inch monitor, that allows gameplay for
12580-498: The best thing we've ever heard!" When Mike and Craig were in a bookstore and made a remark about how "awful" the children's books were, the idea to write their own children's book occurred to them. They spent around two hours designing the look of Homestar Runner, Pom Pom, Strong Bad, and The Cheat, and completed the book within a day. They only printed about five to ten copies to share with friends, and had no intention to publish it. However, they had no idea that their father had sent out
12728-513: The book as a manuscript for submission to about 80 different publishers, but they only got rejection letters back, if anything. The pair began to work on a sequel, Homestar Runner Goes for the Gold , which would have introduced Strong Bad's brothers, Strong Mad and Strong Sad, but was eventually abandoned. They later used the Super NES video game Mario Paint to create the first cartoon featuring
12876-420: The brand for online audiences with a new cast, and created a separate mobile series to air on Sprint PCS Vision-enabled phones. St. John and partner Todd Fisher produced over 2,500 daily videos of the first American mobile phone soap, driving story lines across platforms to the web counterpart, The Spot (2.0). The same year, Microsoft launched MSN Video, which featured the original web series Weird TV 2000 ,
13024-650: The brothers also worked to transfer the older Flash content into video format for archival purposes. Prior to Flash's discontinuation, the Internet Archive included Homestar Runner content in its collection of Flash animations and games. The content is directly viewable in modern browsers through the Ruffle Flash emulator. The Homestar Runner website itself was also updated to use Ruffle, restoring much of its original functionality. Homestar Runner cartoons typically center on Homestar Runner, Strong Bad, and
13172-441: The brothers through sales of related merchandise. Both brothers were married by 2010 and had their children to care for, and they recognized that they would need to find other jobs to support their respective families. When Matt had a second daughter, the two agreed to put the series on hiatus, knowing they would want to come back to it but could not guarantee a time frame. Mike also noted that they had spent nearly ten years delivering
13320-564: The cartoon, such as Secret Collect , StrongBadZone , and Strong Bad's RhinoFeeder , all parodies of early Atari and arcade games, originating in the Strong Bad Email video games . TROGDOR! which previously appeared in the Arcade Game short, features the titular dragon Trogdor the Burninator attempting to burn all the cottages on each stage without being slain by knights. A spin-off of TROGDOR! , called Peasant's Quest ,
13468-418: The casing of some older Super NES and Super Famicom consoles is particularly susceptible to oxidation with exposure to air. This, along with the particularly light color of the original plastic, causes affected consoles to quickly become yellow; if the sections of the casing came from different batches of plastic, a "two-tone" effect results. This issue may be reversed with a method called Retrobrighting , where
13616-404: The character Strong Bad and "Because, It's Midnite" by Limozeen, have been included in the successful Guitar Hero II and Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80s video games, respectively. Web series A web series (also known as webseries , short-form series , and web show ) is a series of short scripted or non-scripted online videos , generally in episodic form , released on
13764-494: The character Crack Stuntman, the fictional voice actor for the Cheat Commandos character Gunhaver. The Homestar Runner site frequently features songs and videos within their animated shorts or as stand-alone entities. These are primarily sung and performed either by the characters or by fictitious artists serving as parodies of various genres. Real-life musicians They Might Be Giants have collaborated multiple times with
13912-586: The character Senor Cardgage), Flag Day , Independence Day , Labor Day (occasionally referred to as "Labor Dabor"), Thanksgiving , and Easter . Teen Girl Squad is a crudely drawn comic strip narrated by Strong Bad, using a falsetto voice. The series was a spin off of Strong Bad Email #53, comic , in which Strong Bad is asked to make a comic strip of a girl and her friends. The comic features four archetypal teenage girls, "Cheerleader", "So and So", "What's Her Face" and "The Ugly One", and satirizes high school life, teen movies, and television. Each episode follows
14060-399: The characters, and can now be found on the "Old Games" section of the site. Over time, more recent games have diversified and become more complex, with many being released as products of "Videlectrix", a game company within the world of Homestar Runner and a side project of The Brothers Chaps, spoofing games of the 1980s. Often the games would originate as video games played by the characters in
14208-406: The characters. Around 1999, Mike recognized how popular Flash animation was taking off, and he and his younger brother Matt Chapman started to learn Flash on their own. Looking for something on which to practice, they found inspiration in the old "children's" book. Their initial cartoons were launched on their dedicated website, homestarrunner.com, by 2000. Mike animated the cartoons, Matt provided
14356-627: The company had sold more than 20 million Super NES units in the U.S. According to a 2014 Wedbush Securities report based on NPD sales data , the Super NES outsold the Genesis in the U.S. market by 1.5 million units. During the NES era, Nintendo maintained exclusive control over games released for the system – the company had to approve every game, each third-party developer could only release up to five games per year (but some third parties got around this by using different names, such as Konami's " Ultra Games " brand), those games could not be released on another console within two years, and Nintendo
14504-470: The creators, whose retired parents managed many of the business aspects. The brothers considered the period between 2002–2005 to be their most creative and successful, exploring various different media for the shorts and having a large quantity of merchandise. Matt considered a day in February 2004 to be the highlight of the series, having received a demo tape from They Might Be Giants for a song to use in
14652-415: The designer of the original Famicom, the Super Famicom was released in Japan on Wednesday, November 21, 1990, for ¥25,000 (equivalent to ¥27,804 in 2019). It was an instant success. Nintendo's initial shipment of 300,000 units sold out within hours, and the resulting social disturbance led the Japanese government to ask video game manufacturers to schedule future console releases on weekends. This gained
14800-514: The designing of a web series can be similar to that of a television series their development and production does not entail the same financial investment required for a television series. The popularity of some web series, however, have led to them being optioned for television. As of 2021, a number of awards have been established to celebrate excellence in web series, like the Streamys , Webbys , IAWTV , and Indie Series Awards , although
14948-435: The development of the Super Famicom in the newspaper Kyoto Shimbun . On August 30, 1988, in an interview with TOUCH Magazine , Yamauchi announced the development of Super Mario Bros. 4 , Dragon Quest V , three original games, and he projected sales of 3 million units of the upcoming console. Famicom Hissyoubon magazine speculated that Yamauchi's early announcement was probably made to forestall Christmas shopping for
15096-401: The end project is going to be something we want to have happen, we say yes." In 2003, the site received several million hits a month and almost a thousand emails a day. According to Matt Chapman, the site did no advertising, but grew on word of mouth and endorsements. "Certain bands, like fairly popular bands and stuff would link us on their site and, you know we were Shockwave site of the day
15244-412: The episode number ended in .0 (for example, Marzipan's Answering Machine Version 5.0), but since Marzipan changed to a new answering machine, the number ends in .2 (for example, Marzipan's Answering Machine Version 15.2). In every episode, Strong Bad prank calls Marzipan, badly pretending to be someone else, such as "Detective Everybody", "Safety Dan", and sometimes other characters. Although the animation
15392-427: The erasure of accessibility and affordability barriers. This meant that high-speed broadband and streaming video capabilities for producing and distributing a web series became a feasible alternative to "traditional" series production, which was formerly mostly done for broadcast and cable television. In comparison with traditional TV series production, web series are typically less expensive to produce. This has allowed
15540-733: The first web series festival was established, called the Los Angeles Web Series Festival . In 2008, major television studios began releasing web series, such as the ABC show "Squeegies", the NBC show Gemini Division , and the Bravo show The Malan Show . Warner Bros. relaunched The WB as an online network beginning with their first original web series, " Sorority Forever ", created and produced by Big Fantastic and executive produced by McG . Meanwhile, MTV announced
15688-434: The four colors of the face buttons into the system's logo. The North American version's buttons were colored to match the redesigned console; the X and Y buttons are lavender with concave faces, and the A and B buttons are purple with convex faces. Several later controller designs have elements from the Super NES controller, including the PlayStation , Dreamcast , Xbox , and Wii Classic Controller . This face button layout
15836-414: The girls in typical high school situations, often leading to their gruesome deaths. A spinoff of this series is "4 Gregs", which follows four of the squad's nerdy classmates, all named Greg. Marzipan's Answering Machine is a series of cartoons with almost no animation. It features messages from the other characters, being played on the answering machine belonging to the character Marzipan. In early episodes,
15984-555: The glasses as an equippable cosmetic item for the Demoman in Team Fortress 2 . The game was released for PC and Mac on November 22, 2010. Trogdor!! The Board Game is a board game made by The Brothers Chaps in collaboration with James Ernest . The campaign was put on Kickstarter on Tuesday, July 17, 2018, with a goal of $ 75,000, which was surpassed in the first few hours. The campaign ended on Wednesday, August 15, 2018, with
16132-503: The initial email. Each episode closes with Strong Bad finishing his reply, closing the episode with a link to email Strong Bad appearing via "The Paper", a dot matrix printer at the top of the screen. In later episodes, it is replaced with the "New Paper", an inkjet printer ; then with the "Compé-per", a pop-up balloon ; and finally with a CGI version of the original Paper, which instead promotes Strong Bad's Twitter account. As of April 1, 2022, 209 Strong Bad Emails have been released on
16280-577: The lockout chip as needed. PAL consoles face another incompatibility when playing out-of-region cartridges: the NTSC video standard specifies video at 60 Hz but PAL operates at 50 Hz, resulting in an approximately 16.7% slower framerate. PAL's higher resolution results in letterboxing of the output image. Some commercial PAL region releases exhibit this same problem and, therefore, can be played in NTSC systems without issue, but other games will face
16428-703: The main "shorts" and "big toons", including the most well-known, Strong Bad Email. Strong Bad Emails (also known as "sbemails") is a series featuring Strong Bad answering emails from fans. Since starting in August 2001, the initially brief episodes have grown in length and scope, introducing numerous spin-offs, characters, and inside jokes, such as Homsar, Trogdor, Senor Cardgage, 20X6 , the Teen Girl Squad shorts, and Homestar Runner Emails (also known as "hremails"). The format, however, has remained largely unchanged. Each episode typically begins with Strong Bad singing
16576-590: The main characters celebrating a traditional aspect of the holiday (such as ghost stories , trick-or-treating or pumpkin carving ) in costume, often making obscure pop culture references. The site also usually releases a separate Halloween video where Strong Bad views a slideshow and mocks and/or appraises photos sent in by real life fans of their Halloween costumes and props modeled after Homestar Runner characters and other elements. Similarly, Decemberween cartoons typically satirize Christmas traditions such as gift-giving and carol-singing. The fact that it takes place on
16724-484: The music for Strong Bad Email #99, different town , and the band wrote and vocalized the intro song of the 200th Strong Bad Email. Another group, The Skate Party, helped The Brothers Chaps create "The Cheat Theme Song". The band Y-O-U helped with the Strong Bad Sings and Other Type Hits CD, as well as songs on the strongbad_email.exe DVDs. The Brothers Chaps also employed the services of Paul and Storm of
16872-611: The necessary parts. On March 3, 2016, Nintendo Co., Ltd. announced that it would bring Super NES games to the New Nintendo 3DS and New Nintendo 3DS XL (and later the New Nintendo 2DS XL ) via its eShop download service. At the Nintendo Direct event on September 4, 2019, Nintendo announced that it would be bringing select Super NES games to the Nintendo Switch Online platform. The 16-bit design of
17020-426: The new system. Meanwhile, Sony engineer Ken Kutaragi reached an agreement with Nintendo to design the console's sound chip without notifying his supervisors, who were enraged when they discovered the project; though Kutaragi was nearly fired, then-CEO Norio Ohga intervened in support of the project and gave him permission to complete it. On September 9, 1987, then-Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi revealed
17168-643: The origin of the name "Homestar Runner" as an in-joke between themselves and James Huggins , a childhood friend of the Chapman brothers while growing up in Dunwoody, Georgia . It actually comes from a friend of ours [James]. There was an old local grocery store commercial, and we live in Atlanta, and it advertised the Atlanta Braves . It was like, "the Atlanta Braves hit home runs, and you can hit
17316-604: The original Dangeresque: Roomisode 1 web game that adds two new episodes. On April 10, 2008, an episodic licensed game based on the series centering around Strong Bad titled Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People (abbreviated as SBCG4AP ) was announced for the Wii 's WiiWare service and Microsoft Windows, developed by Telltale Games in partnership with Videlectrix. The first episode, Homestar Ruiner , premiered on August 11, 2008 on Telltale Games' website and in North America on Nintendo's WiiWare service on August 11, 2008. It
17464-552: The other ten main characters: The Cheat, Marzipan, Coach Z, Bubs, Strong Sad, Strong Mad, Pom Pom, the King of Town, the Poopsmith, and Homsar. The Brothers Chaps have described them as “dumb animal characters”. These characters all live in the fictional town of Free Country, USA. Each character has multiple alternate versions of themselves, such as "Old-Timey" and "20X6" versions. Homestar Runner features several spin-off series from
17612-426: The pack-in game Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island . Like the earlier New-Style NES (model NES-101), this is slimmer and lighter than its predecessor, but it lacks S-Video and RGB output, and it is among the last major Super NES-related releases in the region. A similarly redesigned Super Famicom Jr. was released in Japan at around the same time. The redesign stayed out of Europe. Nintendo ceased production of
17760-545: The redesigned model consolidates the console's hardware into a system-on-chip (SoC) design. The redesigned console lacks the bottom expansion slot, rendering it incompatible with the Japan-exclusive Satellaview add-on. For AV output, the redesigned console features the same multi-out port used on the original models. Unlike the latter models, the former's AV port only supports composite video output natively as support for RGB video and S-Video
17908-465: The rest of the system. It is clocked at a nominal 24.576 MHz in both NTSC and PAL systems. It is capable of stereo sound, composed from eight voices generated using 16-bit audio samples compressed using BRR and capable of applying effects such as echo . On early revisions of the motherboard the S-SMP audio system was spread across four chips: the DSP, the CPU, and two RAM modules. On later revisions,
18056-669: The rising ownership rates of these devices in industrialized nations means that web series are available to a wider range of potential viewers, including commuters, travelers, and other people who are on the go. The emerging potential for success in web video has caught the eye of some of the top entertainment executives in America, including former Disney executive and current head of the Tornante Company, Michael Eisner . Eisner's Vuguru subdivision of Tornante partnered with Canadian media conglomerate Rogers Media on October 26, 2009, securing plans to produce over 30 new web shows
18204-429: The role of one of the twelve "Keepers of Trogdor". Each Keeper has unique powers and items, both decided by cards. The game is for one to six players, and play time is 30 minutes with variable levels of difficulty the players can set. The recommended age is 14+. It comes with a mini-game titled "Stack 'Em To The Heavens" in which you stack the meeples in different ways. An album titled Trogdor!! The Board Game Rulebook EP ,
18352-529: The same day as Christmas has been presented as just a coincidence, having been stated that Decemberween takes place "55 days after Halloween". April Fools' Day features various gags, such as turning the site into a paid subscription service, or turning it upside down. Other holidays celebrated include New Year's Day , "The Big Game" (around the time of the Super Bowl ), St. Valentine's Day , Mother's Day , "Senorial Day" (a parody of Memorial Day featuring
18500-405: The same region chip. This can be overcome through the use of adapters, typically by inserting the imported cartridge in one slot and a cartridge with the correct region chip in a second slot. Alternatively, disconnecting one pin of the console's lockout chip will prevent it from locking the console; hardware in later games can detect this situation, so it became common to install a switch to reconnect
18648-503: The series' main antagonist, becoming a breakout character. Since 2000, the site has grown to encompass a variety of cartoons and web games featuring Homestar, Strong Bad, and numerous other characters. At the peak of its popularity, the site was one of the most-visited sites with collections of Flash cartoons on the web , spreading via word of mouth . The site sustains itself through merchandise sales and has never featured advertisements . The Brothers Chaps have turned down offers to make
18796-444: The shape of the slot differs between regions to match the different shapes of the cartridges. The MULTI OUT connector (later used on the Nintendo 64 and GameCube ) can output composite video , S-Video and RGB signals, as well as RF with an external RF modulator . Original versions additionally include a 28-pin expansion port under a small cover on the bottom of the unit and a standard RF output with channel selection switch on
18944-607: The site in years. Matt confirmed their commitment to continue the series in July 2014. Since then, the site has featured occasional updates, usually for holidays. Until 2017, this was mostly due to the brothers' involvement in developing the Disney XD animated show Two More Eggs . With the impending discontinuation of Adobe Flash in December 2020, most new Homestar Runner animations were released directly as videos to YouTube ;
19092-477: The smallest games contain only 2 Mbit. Cartridges may also contain battery-backed SRAM to save the game state, extra working RAM, custom coprocessors, or any other hardware that will not exceed the maximum current rating of the console. 1757 Super NES games were officially released: 717 in North America (plus 4 championship cartridges ), 521 in Europe, 1,448 in Japan, 231 on Satellaview , and 13 on Sufami Turbo . Many Super NES games have been called some of
19240-461: The sound hardware consolidated to a single chip, the S-APU. Nintendo employed several types of regional lockout , including both physical and hardware incompatibilities. Physically, the cartridges are shaped differently for different regions. North American cartridges have a rectangular bottom with inset grooves matching protruding tabs in the console, and other regions' cartridges are narrower with
19388-510: The system was distributed by Steepler from 1994 until 1996. Although each version is essentially the same, several forms of regional lockout prevent cartridges for one version from being used in other versions. The Super NES is Nintendo's second programmable home console, following the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). The console introduced advanced graphics and sound capabilities compared with other systems at
19536-622: The term Doge . In-universe, “Powered By The Cheat” videos are short cartoons made by the character of The Cheat, and are often music videos done for other characters. During these segments, Matt Chapman does the animation and Mike Chapman provides the voices, a switching of their usual roles. As a result, the cartoons are deliberately poorly animated. Over time, many alternate versions of the Homestar Runner world and characters would appear, parodying other cartoons and animation styles. Many of these feature in their own cartoons. The many alternate universes would later cross over in some cartoons, such as
19684-534: The time, like the Sega Genesis . It was designed to accommodate the ongoing development of a variety of enhancement chips integrated into game cartridges to be more competitive into the next generation. The Super NES received largely positive reviews and was a global success, becoming the best-selling console of the 16-bit era after launching relatively late and facing intense competition from Sega 's Genesis console in North America and Europe. Overlapping
19832-523: The title of Infoseek's "Cool Site of the Year," an award which later became the Webby. In January 1999, Showtime licensed the animated sci-fi web series WhirlGirl , making it the first independently produced web series licensed by a national television network. In February 1999, the series premiered simultaneously on Showtime and online. The character occasionally appeared on Showtime, for example hosting
19980-526: The video and audio co-processors. The WDC 65C816 supports an 8-channel DMA unit, an 8-bit parallel I/O port a controller port interface circuits allowing serial and parallel access to controller data, a 16-bit multiplication and division unit, and circuitry for generating non-maskable interrupts on V-blank and IRQ interrupts on calculated screen positions. Early revisions of the 5A22 used in SHVC boards are prone to spontaneous failure which can produce
20128-399: The voices of the male characters, and Mike's girlfriend (now wife) Missy Palmer provided the voice of Marzipan. They initially started off with shorts that featured competitions between Homestar Runner as a heroic character and Strong Bad as the villain, but these did not really capture viewers. Mike and Matt came up with the idea of animating the scenes between competitions; Matt stated "that
20276-759: The website (with another six exclusive to DVD releases), separable into distinct eras by Strong Bad's different computers; the Tandy 400, the Compy 386, the Lappy 486, the Compé, and his current computer, the Lappier. Prior to the 2010 hiatus, holiday specials were a regular feature of the site, released to coincide with popular holidays, specifically Halloween and Decemberween (a fictional holiday similar to Christmas also celebrated on December 25). Halloween shorts typically feature
20424-589: The website and its YouTube channel on an occasional basis, usually to celebrate holidays. Homestar Runner was created in Atlanta in 1996 by University of Georgia students Mike Chapman and friend Craig Zobel , who wrote the original picture book, The Homestar Runner Enters the Strongest Man in the World Contest , while working summer jobs surrounding the 1996 Summer Olympics . Matt described
20572-561: The year 2000, ending with the release of Metal Slader Glory Director's Cut on November 29, 2000. Many popular Super NES games were ported to the Game Boy Advance , which has similar video capabilities. In 2005, Nintendo announced that Super NES games would be made available for download via the Wii 's Virtual Console service. On October 31, 2007, Nintendo Co., Ltd. announced that it would no longer repair Family Computer or Super Famicom systems due to an increasing shortage of
20720-423: Was "a cool feeling to know you're as important as a cup of coffee or morning crossword to some folks". Their father suggested Matt quit his full-time job to devote time to creating more Homestar Runner shorts. With the number of visitors to the site growing, by January 2003 the site had outgrown its original web host, Yahoo . Merchandise sales paid for all of the costs of running the website as well as living costs of
20868-571: Was also released in Europe and Australia the following Friday (August 15, 2008). The second episode, Strong Badia the Free , was released on September 15 on the WiiWare service in North America and on the Telltale Games' website, and in the PAL region on October 3. The third episode, Baddest of the Bands , was released on Telltale Games' website and the WiiWare service in North America on October 27, and to
21016-550: Was disabled internally; however, they can be restored via a "relatively simple" modification. The internal RF modulator was also removed, requiring an external one for such output if needed. Due to the SoC design, it is highly sought after by Super NES/Famicom enthusiasts since its RGB video quality (if restored) is improved over earlier internal revisions of the console. The redesigned console first released in October 1997 in North America, where it originally retailed for US$ 99.95 in
21164-461: Was exposed during her performance, and later from the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami . Karim could not easily find video clips of either event online, which led to the idea of a video sharing site. From 2003 to 2006, many independent web series began to garner and achieve significant popularity, most notably the series known as Red vs. Blue by Rooster Teeth . The series was distributed independently using online portals YouTube and Revver , as well as
21312-408: Was made to explain the rules of the game. An email worm named Lacon, which featured Homestar Runner characters, was created and distributed by someone going by the name of DimenZion in 2003. It affected 32-bit Windows computers on the 10th of each month, emailing copies of itself to contacts in the computer's address book, and also adding various .exe files to the hard drive. Its final payload showed
21460-422: Was released during the launch week. In North America, Super Mario World was launched as a bundle with the console; other launch games include F-Zero , Pilotwings (both of which demonstrate the console's Mode 7 pseudo-3D rendering), SimCity , and Gradius III . The rivalry between Nintendo and Sega was described as one of the most notable console wars in video game history, in which Sega positioned
21608-486: Was the exclusive manufacturer and supplier of NES cartridges. Competition from Sega's console brought an end to this practice; in 1991, Acclaim Entertainment began releasing games for both platforms, with most of Nintendo's other licensees following suit over the next several years; Capcom (which licensed some games to Sega instead of producing them directly) and Square were the most notable holdouts. Nintendo continued to carefully review submitted games, scoring them on
21756-501: Was the stuff that was funnier, the stuff happening between the plot points, which is hilarious because we hadn't even established a routine of making cartoons about competitions, we'd made like one". From May 2000 to February 2001, the website and cartoons started out with different art styles. In February 2001, it gained a new look, which has largely remained consistent to the present with minor changes. The site grew slowly at first and primarily through word-of-mouth. They were able to sell
21904-457: Was uploaded to the Internet, making Rox the first series distributed via the web. The same year, Scott Zakarin created The Spot , an episodic online story which integrated photos, videos, and blogs into the storyline. Likened to Melrose Place -on-the-Web , The Spot featured a rotating cast of characters playing trendy twenty-somethings who rented rooms in a fabled Santa Monica, California beach house called "The Spot". The Spot earned
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