With Homestar Runner's expanded move into games, fans can pit Strong Bad against Trogdor the Burninator. All images © HomestarRunner.com.

In the last eight years, the independent entertainment website Homestarrunner.com has generated a loyal following for its cartoons, music videos, podcasts, e-mails and games, all through word of mouth, with virtually no formal marketing. Sales of merchandise -- including t-shirts, messenger bags, posters, figurines, CDs, videogames and DVDs, distributed primarily online -- financially support the site and its main creators, Atlanta-based brothers Mike and Matt Chapman.

The biggest change to the site recently is that one of the most popular features, Strong Bad Emails (also known as SBEmails), in which the character Strong Bad comments on current events, has been put on hiatus after the 200th episode. Strong Bad's retirement has given the creators more time to focus on other characters, including Homestar, Pom Pom, The Cheat and Marzipan.

"The content is more varied now," says Mike Chapman, who founded the site with Craig Zobel in 2000. "Before, at least 60% to 70% of the updates were Strong Bad Emails, but now it's sort of a mixed bag. It's a little more fun for us."

Much of the new content these days consists of cartoons covering a wide range of topics, while later in the year, from Halloween on, the content will move more toward holiday-themed episodes. One area where the Chapmans would like to increase their production is Flash-animated interactive games. These are posted under the Videlectrix banner and take their inspiration from 1980s-style arcade games. The person responsible for programming Homestar Runner games recently took a full-time job elsewhere, so there are not as many new titles being made available as has been the case in the past.

Videlectrix style shows the Chapman brothers' love for vintage videogames.

Last year, Telltale Games released a Homestar Runner title, Strong Bad's Cool Games for Attractive People, for the Nintendo Wii. It is available through Nintendo's distribution channels as well as on the Homestarrunner.com website. However, more partnerships with outside companies are unlikely in the near future. "That was like a second job on top of our already interesting job," Chapman explains, pointing out that the game had as much dialogue as six or seven years' worth of cartoons on the website. Although the partnership with the creatives at Telltale went well, Chapman adds, "It was more work than we anticipated. People noticed that the site wasn't being updated as much, and creatively, it took a lot out of us. Our brains were fried. Now we're taking a deep breath and getting back to doing the cartoons."

New content is posted almost every week, with inspiration coming from a variety of sources. A certain visual style might spur an idea, or perhaps the brothers feel like adding some Puppet Stuff -- music videos and other content featuring puppet versions of the characters -- and brainstorm concepts to achieve that goal. Sometimes the spark might come from something that happens in the creators' lives. "A while back, Matt was making donuts and he thought: Why don't we do a cartoon where Homestar is making donuts?" Chapman recalls.