I made the mistake of following the Mario tunnel. Eventually had to give up.

Given how over the top this one is and the fact that the next comic is #1111, there is speculation it's a swan song.

Over the top, and I was over it in about a minute.

There's a page out there that converts it into a google maps interface with scroll zoom. Must faster.

The balloon guy shows up again near the extreem right edge, saying something to the effect of "I wonder where I'll go now." Could be a hint.

I doubt it's anything of the sort. Dude is just obsessive. Hardly his first large scale, work intensive comic. Hell, just look at the amount of effort he puts into the calculations he does for the weekly what-if's. No way he's done.

Here's the zoomable version:

http://xkcd-map.rent-a-geek.de/#10/1.0999/0.2005

And on this day I learned about an entire part of a website I'd somehow missed.

And the Friday strip is up with no sign off, so that's a good thing.

Apparently that was a call back to his very first strip.