one of the trolls, Terezi, survive. With Terezi's guidance, John retcons key events in the narrative, most notably Vriska's death, setting up a timeline with a clear path to victory. In the retconned narrative, the kids and trolls defeat their enemies in a giant battle and create the new universe. The comic ends with Lord English fighting an army led by Vriska, Caliborn becoming Lord English after gaining unconditional immortality, and the remaining living heroes about to enter their newly created universe. Style and development While nominally a webcomic, Homestuck consists of a combination of static images, animated GIFs, and instant message logs. Generally, pages included a single panel, and navigational links to successive pages are phrased similarly to commands in interactive fiction games. Additionally, unlike previous works from Andrew Hussie which exclusively relied on GIF images for animation, Homestuck introduced complex animations and browser games made with Adobe Flash, many involving contributions from fan artists. According to academic Kevin Veale of Massey University, Homestuck used these various methods of engagement to manipulate its readers' experiences in order to tell a multilayered non-linear story. The basic premise of Sburb has been described as similar to games like The Sims, Spore, and EarthBound. As in Hussie's prior webcomic Problem Sleuth, the adventure is characterized by time travel, mystery, a complex fictional universe, and frequent references to pop culture and previous adventures. Changes from previous stories include an emphasis on contemporary society, such as online gaming and Internet culture, which contrasts with the historical settings of MS Paint Adventures comics Bard Quest and Problem Sleuth. Hussie first launched an early version of Homestuck, the Homestuck Beta, on April 10, 2009. The Homestuck Beta was published only three days after Problem Sleuth and ran until April 13, 2009. The initial style of the webcomic was developed to be advanced by fan contributions, with the fans deciding what actions the characters would take. Later, Hussie moved away from this style because the fan input method had grown "too unwieldy and made it difficult... to tell a coherent story." While Hussie now controlled the main plot of the story and the characters' actions, he still "visit[ed] fan blogs and forums" to figure out small things to add into Homestuck. However, throughout its run, content within Homestuck would cease to be updated in several named pauses. The most infamous of these pauses was the result of