Guest posts are blog posts that are written by Poptropicans who are not staff writers on the PHB team at the time of writing. Interested in contributing? Check out our “Write for the PHB” guide under the Contact tab up top.
Hey Poptropicans, this is a guest post from Invisible Ring. Enjoy!
Happy Halloween, Poptropicans! This year, I’ve drawn and colored an 8-page comic book combining three of my favorite things ever: Halloween, Super Mario, and Poptropica! It’s inspired by Poptropica’s graphic novels, Nintendo’s Super Mario movies, and Charles Schulz’s Peanuts comics. (And maybe the Super Mario Adventures fan comic series, too.)
Join grown-ish Mya, Oliver, and Jorge as they take on a new age of tricks and treats, and meet some familiar faces from the award-winningPoptropiCon Saga! Together, they are determined to show the world that you’re never too old for Halloween fun. Read Poptastic Halloween!:
Have a spooktacular fun season, everybody! 👻
Hope you enjoyed this guest post by Invisible Ring. If you did, you might also enjoy her PoptropiCon Saga comic series, which won “Favorite Poptropica Fanfiction of All Time” at our 2026 Poppies Awards.
The Poptropica Help Blog welcomes interesting Poptropica insights from anyone in the Poptropica community with thoughts to share. Interested in writing for the PHB? We’d love to hear from you!
This is a guest post from Hyper Berry sharing her My Place in Poptropica story, which is all about one’s Poptropica journey. Enjoy!
Thanks to the PHB staff for the warm welcome! Anyway, to set the stage, here’s a quick lightning round of My Place in Poptropica!
Hiya, fellow Poptropicans! The name’s Hyper Berry, and I’ve been a Poptropica fan for as long as I can remember (and long before I could speak full sentences!). Throughout my childhood, Pop was one of the few online games I frequently came back to, despite not knowing how to fully complete an island quest (I was a naïve kid when it came to understanding Poptropica). Fast forward to early 2025, when I replayed it on Flashpoint, just to relive nostalgia from years past.
Hyper Berry rocking out on 24 Carrot Island
Little did I know, that playing for nostalgic reasons would make me hyperfixated on Poptropica, and throughout 2025 and this year, I’ve bought many Pop merch items, such as various books, one of the Jazwares plushies (Cool Boy to be exact!), and custom plushes of Oliver Hartman (from the graphic novels and comics), Ned Noodlehead, and Director D (these are just a few of the Pop merch I own, I have lots more!)
I commissioned these guys through the custom plush site iDooodle (not an ad). They look a bit wonky (Director D especially since his face has an “whatever, I’m too slick to be a marketable plushie” expression), but that adds up to the charm of these plushes.
Some Poptropica-related facts about me are that my favorite islands are Night Watch Island and Back Lot Island, and my favorite Poptropican is Oliver Hartman (I relate to both his comic and graphic novel counterparts), and if we’re talking about in-game Poptropicans, it’s Ned Noodlehead (I know Ned is hated, but I still like him anyways).
Let’s get the elephant (or Poptropican) out of the room, and move on to the meat of this post!
Here’s an early version of the first strip of the Poptropica comic strip by Paul Gilligan and Kory Merritt, where Oliver and Jorge get teleported into an island inhabited by monkey people. It looks just like the final strip, but there’s one visual difference.
Jorge has his orange hair here! As shown here, and in the concept art of the scrapped animated series. I’m not sure why they changed his hair color to black, but I assume it’s to avoid clashing with Oliver’s hair color (which is somewhat similar enough from Jorge’s original hair color).
And to answer the question y’all have been thinking while reading this, how did I come across this early version of the first strip?
Well, the answer is quite straightforward. A few months ago, I was looking for obscure info/images of Oliver Hartman (and the graphic novels in general) online, and came across former Poptropica web developer Paul Chapman’s now-deleted website directory for the promotional site for Mystery of the Map, some miscellaneous ads for Pop in the mid-2010s, and a handful of the comic strips. As I dug deeper into the comics section, I found this piece of Poptropica lost media, and as a lost media enthusiast myself, I genuinely felt enthralled finding a piece of media that probably hasn’t been seen since 2014.
GPS: You’ll never get lost, unless you already are.
Poptropica as a whole means a lot to me. On top of that, I was at Hot Topic a month ago (to buy spiked cuffs) and when I went to checkout, the cashier noticed the plush keychain (basically a tiny shaped pillow) of Ned Noodlehead that I had hanging on my bag, and the cashier immediately said “IS THAT A POPTROPICA KEYCHAIN?!” out of excitement, and soon after, we started chatting about what our favorite islands were (her favorite was Poptropolis Games). She quickly called over one of her coworkers to look at my Ned keychain, and we all said “POPTROPICA IN 2026?!”. During those moments, I lit up like a bunch of holiday lights, and it also adds to why Pop means a lot to me.
Anyways, this concludes the post. Until my next guest post (if that happens sometime in the future), toodles, folks!
Hope you enjoyed this “My Place in Poptropica” story! If you did, you’ll probably enjoy our other MPIP stories here on the PHB.
If you haven’t already shared your story, we invite you to send in your own. Interested in writing for the PHB under a different Pop-topic? Take a look at our Write for the PHB page for ideas, guidelines, and more!
Hey Poptropicans, this is a guest post from Outbound Train. Enjoy!
This is my very first guest post… woo hooo! Hello everyone, I am Outbound Train. I am a master’s student in game studies focusing on Poptropica, or as I like to refer to myself, a Poptropica scholar!
Poptropica has a long and interesting history both technically and culturally with its numerous changes, spinoffs like Poptropica Worlds (remember that reboot attempt?), and communities like the PHB.
Today, almost 20 years since Poptropica came out, the game can still be played on various formats because of how much we love Poptropica. Some express that love with fan art, some with community preservation projects, and as for me… well, I am writing my master’s research paper on Poptropica’s history and how I grew up with the game in parallel.
Several months ago, I presented my research at an academic symposium. There I talked about my history with Poptropica, my sibling rivalry with my sister on who could complete the most islands, the engine changes, the preservation projects, and finally, where Poptropica is today. It was a blast talking about Poptropica in front of a room of academics and definitely a terrifying yet rewarding experience.
Here are some pictures from the event:
Leave a comment if you want to learn more about game studies or my research. I plan on writing more guest posts in the future about Poptropica academia (Poptrodemia?).
The Poptropica Help Blog welcomes interesting Poptropica insights from anyone in the Poptropica community with thoughts to share. Interested in writing for the PHB? We’d love to hear from you!
Hey Poptropicans, this is a guest post by Invisible Ring. Enjoy!
This is it, the best of my seven Realms for last: my Home Realm, Asgard. It’s my first Realm, and one of the first experiences I ever had when I first came to Poptropica back in the fall of 2014. It was so strange, and so different from the Poptropica that I visited in 2008… and yet so beautiful. I was utterly lost in the mountains and trees and rainclouds here, none the wiser that Realms was just as new to Poptropica as I was… and none the wiser on how much Realms had in common with Minecraft.
…And apparently none the wiser that these rainclouds are soaking me right now! *ACHOO!* …I better finish my thoughts INSIDE this house rather than on top!
There, that’s better. Now, as I was saying, this is my first Realm, AND my favorite. And this is the first house I ever built here in Realms! …Those were the days when I was just learning HOW to create, much less mine and explore Realms, but I took to it like a fish to water and gave it a try. I LOVED how this first try came out, and I still love it now.
Hey Poptropicans! I’m back here on the PHB with a new community art collab for you all. This collaboration is themed around the genies of Arabian Nights Island, where you get to draw your Poptropican (or anyone) as a genie! Feel free to give your genie a name, and even some lore. All of the submissions will be featured on a collage to be revealed…
And to add to the fun, at the end I will also announce the following awards: Most Creative Genie, Scariest Genie, and Cutest Genie. 🏆
Puffed Up: The smoke gets in your eyes.
How to Participate 🧞♂️
🧞♂️ Create or draw a genie of your choice. This can be a genie of your Poptropican, yourself, or anyone! Please save your art as a ✨png file with a transparent background✨; doing this makes it easier for me to add your piece to the collage. Besides drawing, you can also create a genie costume in Poptropica and share a screenshot, ideally with a solid color background.
⬆️ Upload your picture to the internet and share it with me (max 3 images). Post your art to a website that supports transparent images such as Imgur, then share the link in the comments of this post, or by messaging my Instagram @poptropicafanblog1.
🗓️ Submissions will close on July 21 (Tue) at 11:59pm EST, with the finished collage to be revealed on the PHB on July 26 (Sun) to celebrate the PHB’s 18th birthday! 🥳
I can’t wait to see all of the finished pieces! Thank you for reading, and have an excellent start to your summer!
Djinn and Tonic: One of these is the cure for what ails you.
The Poptropica Help Blog welcomes interesting Poptropica insights from anyone in the Poptropica community with thoughts to share. Interested in writing for the PHB? We’d love to hear from you!
