Creepy (or disturbing) but true things in Video Games

The accident with the bike put Ash into a coma. Days later, he was found and hurried to the hospital and treated with heavy medications. This is why Team Rocket became less menacing. The medication took effect and stabilized his coma dreams so that, instead of being terrifying, they became idyllic. They allowed him to live out his Pokémon Master fantasies.

After the beginning episodes, the series is the result of Ash’s subconscious mind fulfilling his desires as well as attempting to escape reality. Should Ash realize he’s in a coma, he would wake up and suffer brain damage, so he must take down all of his mental barriers one by one.

If he can do that, he can come to grips with who he is and escape his coma. Further evidence comes from the realization that even though his journeys take him vast distances, he never usually travels by bike due to having developed a phobia of them.

The coma and fantasy explains why he never changes much, physically. It explains the worldwide socialism, as he thought up a safe system of government that would run smoothly and keep the world going, allowing his adventures to work like they do.

It also explains how a child can go off on his own into a world full of dangerous and untamed animals. In addition, it explains why every town has the same police officer and every Pokémon Centre has the same nurse.

Joy and Jenny he knew from his hometown and they act as a safety net or anchor, allowing him to feel safe no matter where he goes. They represent stability. The professors represent Ash’s ideals, which is why Gary became a professor.

The fantasy also explains why every time he enters a new region that virtually no one has heard of him, despite his conquests. How else could Paul, the rival of the Sinnoh area, not know of someone who placed in at least the top sixteen of all three leagues and destroyed the Orange League and Battle Frontier?

Moving on to the characters closer to him…Ash’s traveling partners are aspects of himself he can enjoy but cannot associate with himself.

Brock is Ash’s repressed sexuality. Ash fell into the coma a virgin and, as such, needed an outlet for his growing sexual frustrations. However, since he can never experience sex, Brock must never succeed. Brock’s stay with Professor Ivy was an attempt by Ash’s mind to suppress his sexuality.

Brock isn’t just a projection of Ash’s sexuality, but also a projection of Ash’s fatherly instincts. He leaves his siblings to journey with Ash because he can’t cope with having that much responsibility.

You may notice that James got much more dialogue in this part of the series, as well as getting more touchy-feely with his Pokémon and exposing much of his backstory. Ash didn’t enjoy this much, which is why Brock returns, horrified, and refuses to speak about it.

Ash’s subconscious was repressing him at the time so, other than a general feeling of dread, he has no idea what happened. Further evidence of Brock being Ash’s sexuality is that he keeps returning the series after Ash meets a new female aspect of himself.

Misty is the first such aspect we encounter. Because she is the first and is merely an aspect of Ash are explanations as to why Misty plays such a prominent role in the show but is ultimately unattainable (since he never really knew her before the coma).

Since Misty is his initial love interest (if only subconsciously), he needed her to reach a certain level of womanhood. He felt that people could only have relationships after they’ve matured.

In practice, however, he finds he can’t cope with it, as he lacks real-world experience. He wants the normal, pushy, arrogant Misty he knew…thus, not letting her keep Togepi. We can see this arc in the constant berating of his sexuality, but her eventual mellowing until she had faded into the background.

Since Ash was quite attached to her, this was traumatizing. After this experience, anyone around him “threatening” to mature quickly ends up leaving only for another, more naive fill-in to enter his life.

Gary Oak is what Ash wants to be. He is wish fulfillment. He succeeded and then settled down to a normal life. Ash needs someone to succeed in his world or he won’t be able to validate it and will start questioning why he is where he is. It’s a subconscious trap to keep him from becoming too aware of his situation.

His mind must have figured out that awareness of the coma would snap him out of it, so it took something the boy already loved and build a way out for him with it. However, Ash is too complacent to make a final stand and fight his way out of it, and cannot escape.

This is why he keeps encountering legendary Pokémon. They’re his mind’s way of showing him he can do great things if he tries. It’s a way to encourage him to push forwards.

Team Rocket are the qualities of himself that Ash deems “negative” but is coming to terms with. Jessie and James want to appease Giovanni, Ash’s father figure. To achieve this, Jessie will trick the submissive James into doing her bidding. Meowth especially wants to appease him because he remembers the good times with Giovanni.

This places Meowth in a category known as Ash’s (corrupted) innocence. This is apparent because Meowth is able to speak. In fact, the whole reason Meowth can speak is so Ash can eventually accept the aspects of Team Rocket as parts of himself.

Ash had issues with his father, so he put him atop the evil corporation and demonized him. There may be an actual Team Rocket (in the real world), but it’s doubtful that Ash’s father is their leader. Ash likely feels the split between his parents was partly his fault, but also partly blames his father.

The split caused his mother to move out of the city down to Pallet Town and is one reason why Ash initially embarks on his journey: to escape the turmoil at home. The whole organization, including Butch and Cassidy, is symbolic of his inability to escape his father’s machinations.

James is implied homosexuality (which does not necessarily make Ash homosexual) and gullibility, while Jessie is vanity and manipulation. Since Meowth has the potential for rehabilitation and doesn’t want to be evil, this once again fits with the conflicting personalities and demonized-self theory.

Team Rocket cross dresses because Ash is exploring his sexuality (a different facet than what Brock represents) and this was a method that allowed his gay/vain side to experiment freely. When he found that it wasn’t something for him, he “free” side stopped playing with it.

Max came with May. He played the ego and she played the id with great aspirations in that “session.” They worked for a little while but, with Ash being a teenager, his sexuality had to come back into play. He kept reinventing himself and eventually wrote new aspects, but his mind slowly brought the old ones back as a crutch to make the transition easier.

Dawn is Ash giving himself a chance to love. Since he already established Misty as someone he’s not likely to go anywhere with, he created a new super female - one that was more like him and less violent. You may note that while both May and Misty had no tolerance for Brock’s behavior, Dawn seems to try to shrug it off.

Tracey, the breeder, was a possible future for Ash that he discarded. This future was one that he sent off to work with the professor (Ash’s ultimate ideal of a father figure) when Tracey disrupted the dynamic Ash had with his other possibilities.

With Ash’s mind fighting the coma and Ash viewing this person as a companion, Tracy was quickly replaced with a more threatening rival.

Pikachu represents Ash’s humanity. This explains the episodes where they get separated and Ash desperately wants to find him, even to the point of working with Team Rocket (aspects of himself he would never normally associate with), but for some reason cannot.

Team Rocket wants to steal Pikachu and hand him over to Giovanni. Jessie and James will always oppose Ash because he is terrified of the thought of his humanity lying in the hands of his father. However, this is the same reason he will work with those aspects of himself in order to save his humanity.

Ash couldn’t evolve Pikachu because that would mean challenging his concept of who he was, which was something he wasn’t comfortable with while still working through his original issues.

The narrator is Ash’s higher mind, recapping and explaining the progress he’s made and the tribulations he will face, allowing insight into how to best awaken him.

Team Rocket’s methods gradually become more and more ludicrous because Ash is only a child dreaming these things up. That is why Team Rocket’s disguises are always believed. He knows it’s them (at least on a subconscious level), but chooses to ignore it so he can better himself.

In a sense, the Ash who wants to escape is sabotaging the Ash who wants to stay lost in his mind so that there can be more conflict and, hopefully, an eventual escape. The escape is a consequence of coming to terms with who he is. As mentioned previously, Team Rocket are a method to Ash to deal with grounds he’s uncomfortable with tackling on his own.

You may recall that early in the show, there were animals and references to animals. For example, the fish in the aquarium of the Cerulean City gym or that the Pokedex lists Pikachu as “rat-like.” These animals don’t matter to Ash’s psyche, so they don’t come into play much.

If Ash loved puppies, everything would be about different breeds of dogs and a dog fighting circuit, but as the series goes on, you see fewer realistic animals and more Pokémon. This could be a sign of Ash’s mind deteriorating.

As he’s in the coma, he’s losing concepts of some animals and machinery and replacing them with Pokémon. It could explain things like electric Pokémon working as power generators; these are signs that his memory of the old world is slipping more and more as time goes by.

The Pokémon realm will be idealized continuously the longer he has no stimulus from the real world. Ash may or may not be mentally deteriorating, but he is becoming more accustomed to his fake world’s rules. The wild Pokémon are his rationalizations for the functioning of his created fantasy. It’s the “a wizard did it” syndrome. If he doesn’t know how it works, his mind says Pokémon.

The Pokémon in Ash’s team, however, serve the purpose of displaying his issues and aspects of himself. For example, Charmander represents his sex drive (not his sexuality, like Brock). At first it’s a cute, easy thing to control, but eventually becomes a raging inferno of disobedience since Ash has no real understanding of his sexuality (thus has no way to vent or keep it in check).

Bulbasaur was his unwillingness to change, reflected in when it declines to evolve and almost decided to stay behind unless he battled it. Squirtle was his willingness to follow the lead of others, as evidenced by the gang it ran with. Even though he ran the gang, they were viewed as one group and Ash’s subconscious gave him the strongest one.

Butterfree was his crushing loneliness, which he dealt with when he released it to join a flock. His bird types are his recklessness, always willing to sacrifice something at a moment’s notice for the win. When Ash is trading Pokémon, it’s an attempt to push his own problems away on someone else. However, he realizes this and usually trades back very quickly.

Not only are Ash’s Pokémon a manifestation of different parts of himself, the Pokémon of other trainers are as well. Koffing and Ekans were symbolic of Team Rocket’s willingness to change, hence their evolutions. Once his mind was able to overcome that roadblock and allow them to change once, it gave him the chance to truly change.

An interesting note is that Pupitar is a rationalization: a Pokémon a rival caught before they met. Even Ash would become suspicious if everyone he met had no carry-over Pokémon from previous places he had been to.

Other trainers are more direct forms of his issues - ones he must either come to terms with or outright suppress. Gym leaders are more primary aspects of his personality, with each Pokémon being stronger than the last to display a level of skill he could only be capable of if he gave into it.

In effect, he is doing battle with a part of him that he would rather not have in control. Originally, Ash had the battles, which evolved into team battles and contests. The explanation for this is that his issues became more and more complicated and the means of dealing with them needed to become more complex. The fact that he uses issues he has already dominated to win is a sign he’s growing stronger.

Ash releases his Pokémon because his mind is forcing him to get go of them. The second he raises an overpowered team, a tournament comes up and, after fighting his way through it, he has to go to a new land for new challenges. However, with an overpowered team, there won’t be any challenges or any way to motive him further.

The Ash that wants to stay in the coma and keep journeying hands his solved issues over to Professor Oak so he can continue and overcome the unresolved ones. This is essentially his mind forcing him to deal with his issues.

Ash’s rivals and the Elite Four are ultimately the strongest part of this cycle. Having Pokémon that are essentially godlike, they represent both what can be attained and what is unattainable. Ash’s rivals are all possible futures he envisions for himself (note they are all older than him).

This originated with Gary Oak, someone Ash knew from real life and built up into a sort of god within his mind. However, Gary progressed and changed to suit Ash’s vision of himself and his ultimate desire, eventually settling down into a professor role after beating the Elite Four.

With Gary Oak in retirement, his mind needed a new rival for him. Thus the births of Richie (the good aspect of his rivalry) and Paul.

Paul is his mind’s last ditch efforts to snap him out of it - to force Ash to actually come to terms that this perfect world is not the best option or path to waking up. Paul is Ash’s shadow, one that wants to push on even harder and harder. He is the part of Ash that will stop at nothing to escape the coma world.

Mewtwo is a new form of treatment, done with electrical impulses and a machine to know Ash out of it, taking down every last one of his mental guards (the original Pokémon in the movie). In Ash’s mind, Mewtwo and his clones were (in the real world) the treatment for the mental safeguards that were protecting Ash and keeping him comatose: the Pokémon of his world.

The clones were counters to the issues Ash had thought solved and each appeared to Ash as the exact copy of his defence. The clones didn’t play by the rules of Ash’s world. They didn’t use any special attacks or moves. They just beat down their counterpart through brute strength. The treatment was working.

There were side effects. The electric jolts were beginning affect Ash’s nervous system. If the treatment continued, he would be paralysed. His mind manifested this in the dream world by petrifying him. Were it not for the end of the treatment by Ash’s mother, who knew her son wouldn’t want to live in a world he couldn’t explore, Ash would have remained as stone forever.

After this, Ash needed to recover from the damage caused by the electric therapy. In order to reduce the danger Ash’s consciousness felt from it, his subconscious began downplaying the effects in this world, which is why Pikachu’s electric attacks - once noted for their strength by Team Rocket - no longer have any effect on Ash, other than comic relief.

As we can see, Ash may well have been trapped forever in this world. However, like every dream, like everything, there is a beginning and an end. What would happen if Ash never recovered?

In his hospital room, we see Delia, obviously distraught. She’s talking to a doctor with a grim look on his face. The man is saying their insurance is up and the boy has had no change in brain activity in years. The shock of taking him off life support has a very small chance of awakening him.

She tearfully agrees.

Back in Ash’s world, he has finally defeated the Elite four and, one by one, the people around him disappear. Eventually, everything is black. Pikachu comes dashing toward him, glowing brighter and brighter in the darkness. Eventually, he reaches Ash and the two embrace one last time.

In the hospital room, his life signs fading, Ash mutters his final words.

“I…want to be…the very…best…”

He will die never having known his dream, except as naught but a dream. When he came back to reality, he knew it all for the lie it was, knew it as his imagination. Knowing that all his efforts, ambitions, and friends were nothing, he will let go.

As he utters his final words, he barely opens his eyes and sees the silhouette of his mother, her face hidden by her hands wiping away tears. They make eye contact and one final realization fills him before he loses all strength.

He sees that his mother was holding out hope that he’d recover all that time. He sees her and finds that her hope had been broken as she’d come to the realization that she’d outlived her only child. He dies knowing that he is loved, but that it means the one person closest and most real to him is utterly crushed.

Still, there are other possibilities. The fountain of time flows in mysterious ways. One could not go back against the current, such as Gatsby. However, one could never see what is waiting for him downstream. Ash finally defeats Lance, only to be confronted by not Gary Oak, but a mute mirror image of himself.

The voice of the narrator speaks to him, telling him that now he can finally escape the prison of his own mind. One by one, his friends appear and melt away into more copies of himself, cheering him on. After a long, tough battle against himself with the assistance of all his Pokémon he had ever befriended, he jolts awake.

In his hospital room, he sees his parents, asleep. He finds himself unable to speak.

Ash pushes forward toward his recovery. He goes through physical therapy, training harder and harder with rehabilitative Pokémon until he can walk on his own again. This time, an older and wiser Ash sets out on a journey.

Just like last time, he’s late getting to Professor Oak’s laboratory. When there’s only one Pokémon left…he suddenly recalls all his memories of his “life” and realizes all his friends are gone forever.

As he sets out with his new companion, he finds the world is darker than he imagined. More “real.” Pokémon and people die. He, too, has aged.

He vows to become the Pokémon Master he dreamed he was. He vows to himself. He vows to “them.”

“I WILL be the very best!”

A few weeks ago, I found myself trawling the Underground in my Platinum game. I had already reached the Elite Four, and I was trying to raise money for Potions and Revives. If you’ve ever been down there, you know it’s pretty rare to find stuff like evolutionary stones and fossils, so I was down there a while digging. About one hour in, as I was about to dig into another wall, I got a message: “The wall seems unstable. Are you sure you want to keep digging?” with a YES/NO choice.
I blinked. I didn’t think this message was normal, but hey, I’d never gotten it before and it probably didn’t mean anything. I clicked YES and Zally, my female player character, continued to dig. At every new dig site, I got the same message. But I barely noticed, because I was suddenly finding a lot of expensive items. I probably should have stopped, but I was getting greedy, excited at all the supplies I’d be able to buy. If I’d known what was coming, I would have turned the game off in a heartbeat.
But I pressed on. It was only after a while that I came out of my trance–like state to the sound of rumbling- a low, bass rumble issuing from my DS’s speakers. I peered at the screen- the Underground seemed darker somehow, and that rumble kept growing louder and softer, louder and softer. As I watched, the lights in the Underground flickered and then went back to normal; the rumbling stopped.
I can’t tell you why I kept digging- I suppose I just wanted more money. The next wall I dug into had another discouraging message. “It might be dangerous to keep digging. Do you want to continue?” I hesitated. What would happen if I didn’t heed the game’s words?
Well, this was Pokémon- a children’s game. It couldn’t be too bad. So, steeling my nerves, I clicked YES.
The dig screen popped up, and I dug up four Rare Bones. I figured this would be a good place to stop, but…
When the screen returned to the Underground, it was obvious something was wrong. The rumbling had returned, louder than ever, and there were huge cracks in the walls. With a loud CRACK, the floor fell out from under Zally’s feet, and the screen went black. I pressed all the buttons, but nothing happened. Puzzled, I booted up my computer and turned to the Internet for answers- perhaps this was some sort of rare event, exclusive to Platinum. But I could find nothing, and my DS screen stayed dark.
Frustrated, I decided to go do something else, hoping that the game was just frozen, and that it might eventually unfreeze. After several minutes of beating up bandits in Oblivion, I heard it.
Drip… Drip… Drip…
The sound had a hollow echo to it. I turned and saw that the DS’s screen had lit up, sitting where I had left it on my table. Picking it, up, I saw that I was in a small cave with no exit. There were jagged, fallen rocks along the walls, and a twisted, broken steel girder lay across the cave. A lantern shone weakly next to the girder, allowing a little light in the darkness.
With a chill, I realized that I wasn’t the only one in the cave. Under the girder lay the sprite of one of the vendors in the Underground, his tiny hand outstretched towards the lantern. It convulsed every so often, like it was straining to reach the lantern. There were puddles of blood around his prone form, and I couldn’t see his lower half- if it was still there. With horror, I realized what the dripping noise must be. I moved Zally over to him to talk.,
“…. The tunnels… collapsed…. *gasp*” The text moved slowly, as if to emphasize his pain. “I can’t feel my legs…”
He would only repeat those two sentences. I realized that I was somehow trapped here, in the Underground. At the same time, I knew this must be some kind of hack. I had bought this cartridge used, and even though it was smooth sailing up until this point, I knew nothing like this would ever be programmed in by Nintendo.
Frightened, I tried to open the menu, but the menu displayed was the Overworld menu from above ground. My Pokémon were all gone, and most of the items I’d had were too. I still had the last couple items I’d dug up, the Rare Bones. I tried to use the Explorer Kit, but all it said was “You can’t return to the surface now!” Closing the menu, I went over to the vendor. He was no longer moving, and the puddle of blood had grown larger. When I pressed A in front of him, Zally only said “…He’s not moving…” Then a message popped up saying “You got the Lantern.”
Sure enough, when I moved around, the little circle of light that the lantern had given off followed me. But what was I meant to do now? I couldn’t dig out to the Overworld, after all. I wandered around the small cave, trying to find an opening. Eventually, I noticed that one of the walls sparkled in the light of the lantern. I clicked on it, and sure enough, a text box popped up. “This wall seems thin. There might be something on the other side. Do you want to dig into it?”
Well, I clicked YES- what else could I do? A rumbling sound effect played, and a hole popped open in the wall. I rushed through, hoping to get back to the Overworld and sell my items.
I wish I hadn’t.
The hole led into a tunnel full of corpses. Male and female sprites, Pokémon, all half-buried in the walls or crushed under rocks… puddles of blood…. Limbs… I cringed, tears in my eyes, as I stared at the horror before me. I tried to use the Explorer Kit again, but this time it said “There is no surface to go back to!” I steeled myself, and walked on though the horrific hallway. As I went on, the corpses appeared to be more decayed, older… as if they’d been there longer. And messages would pop up every so often….
“Zally feels lightheaded!”
“Zally feels nauseous!”
“Zally is slowing down.”
“Zally is tired…”
“Zally doesn’t have enough air…”
At that last one, I shuddered. I’d noticed that my character was walking slower than before… By now, the corpses littering my path were merely skeletons, little white bones gleaming in the darkness. Suddenly, the tunnel ended in a semi-circular rocky opening, with a dim light shining out of it- kind of like when you exit a cave. I almost got excited, thinking I would finally get out of this nightmare, but then I remembered what happened last time I’d been offered a way out…. But my Explorer Kit still didn’t work, so there was only one thing I could do. I stepped inside.
It was a large room; whereas the hallway had been so narrow I could see both walls with the meager lantern’s light, this room’s walls extended into darkness. The dripping noise had returned, louder than before. I stepped forward, and suddenly the room was illuminated by an eerie, purple light. A shadow sat in the center of the room, surrounded by six flat-topped rocks arranged in a circle. On each rock sat a jumble of dark shapes I couldn’t make out. A grinding noise was playing through the DS’s speakers, like rocks shifting against each other. I couldn’t move Zally, and I was about ready to drop the DS and run down the street to my friend’s house.
Abruptly, the light in the room brightened, turning white. It was then that I realized what the things on the flat-topped rocks were.
They were bound with cords, each one’s body twisted in agony, little more than entrails at this point… their chests and stomachs ripped open, bones exposed to the open air, spilling gruesomely rendered blood and guts out onto the rocks on which they lay and the floor around them.
They were… they were my Pokémon.
And the blobby shadow in the middle of the room… that awful shadow… spoke to me.
“ …
…
…
I’M STILL HUNGRY…”
The screen flashed black and white, and I jumped before I realized it was the segue into a Pokémon battle. There was no music, just the grinding and cracking noise from before. The thing sat where the enemy Pokémon would typically sit, no longer a shadow but a decaying corpse, its graying skin splattered with blood. Where its name would usually go, there was only a bunch of glitchy text and symbols.
“*glitch* wants to EAT YOU.”
Of course, I had no Pokémon, so Zally herself stood to face the monster. The only option on the battle screen was STRUGGLE (not Fight, like normal).
“Zally is too afraid to attack! *glitch*used BITE!” Zally flashed red, and her HP went down a bit. With horror, I realized that the thing wasn’t going to kill her quickly..
“*glitch*used CRUNCH! *glitch* used RIP! *glitch*used BITE!” Zally’s HP went down a little more each turn; she was afraid to attack, while he kept nipping away at her. Finally, her HP was nearly exhausted, and she appeared covered in wounds. The thing readied its final attack.
“*glitch* used DEVOUR.*
Suddenly, the battle ended and I was back in the cave. The monster spoke once more to my bloodied avatar.
“I’M SO GLAD YOU DUG UP MY MISSING BONES.
NOW I CAN MOVE AGAIN…
NOW I CAN EAT AGAIN…
NOW I’LL EAT YOU.”
Suddenly, he lunged at Zally, and the screen flashed images…
Images of her being eaten, ripped and torn open, of her insanely fearful face, of her Pokémon , somehow reanimated by its evil power, even joining in and helping that thing destroy her body… like mindless animals… while a long, high pitched, painful scream seemed to split the world in two.
Suddenly, the screen winked off.
I ran to the bathroom and vomited.
…
It’s been a few days since this occurred. I haven’t slept- the nightmares won’t leave me alone. Other than that, nothing unusual has happened, other than the fact that whenever I turn on my DS and try to play Platinum, those horrid images keep playing over and over on the screen.
I’ve been avidly researching Pokémon hacks… it seems there is no shortage of creepypasta floating around out there on the Internet. I haven’t been able to find anything like the one I experienced (though I’m still not sure whether my game is possessed or whether some fucked-up hacker is to blame for what happened.) Well… there was one story… the one about Lavender Town Syndrome… and Buried Alive. As I read the story, those images of Zally being eaten …. It seemed too similar to that creepypasta to be a coincidence. Maybe, as insane as this might sound, some talented hacker decided to recreate that event in the Platinum game that I happened to buy….
I know one thing for sure. Now that I’m done writing this, I’m going out to the river and throwing that cartridge in. No matter why this happened, I don’t want to even see that cartridge ever again.

You see, I am a simple college student living alone in an apartment. I was very enthusiastic about the release of Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver here in the states. I have purposely locked myself out of all media and the internet aside for school purposes. That means no 4chan, no /v/, no Bulbapedia, etc.
As I was busy with the school year and being poor at the time, I wasn’t able to buy SoulSilver on its launch date. After my school year ended, I ordered SoulSilver on Amazon. However, it would take a week for it to arrive. I decided that during that time, I would replay my Crystal version on my Gameboy Color.

However, I realized that long ago, my mom threw it away because I told her the save went dead, and I was very upset about it then. She also threw away my Silver version, so all I have is my Gameboy Color. As such, I set out to Gamestop and bought a used Silver version, as it’s the only Pokemon game left that they have for the GBC. Ten dollars – fairly cheap.

I went home and started it up for a nostalgia trip. However, that’s where things started getting bizarre, and most likely the reason why you read this.

The Gamefreak logo started up as normal, but it just froze there. I thought the cart was just errored or something, so I turned it off and on. The same thing happened. I tried pressing A and Start over and over, and all of the buttons. Eventually, the logo vanished and there was a black screen for about five seconds. Suddenly, rather than going to the usual menu screen, I was already in the game in a previous saved file, which was odd as I was expecting all of these carts to have been wiped by the poor battery. Either way, I wasn’t complaining, as I would have chosen the “Continue” option to see what the previous guy did anyways.

First off, I checked his trainer information. His name was just “…” – He didn’t have much originality.

I checked his profile and apparently he had 999:99 hours put into the game, with all 16

badges, 99999.9 Pokedollars, and all 251 Pokemon on the Pokedex.

Seeing as he apparently had Mew and Celebi logged also, I am guessing he either used a Game Genie or was a really hardcore Pokemon player back then.

I checked his Pokemon to see what a badass team he has. To my surprise, I saw 5 Unowns and a sixth Pokemon named “HURRY”. I’m thinking that this must be some cruel joke by the person who last played this game, but I decided to check the profiles of those Pokemon anyways. As expected, they were different letters of Unown, all Level 5. I was a bit shaky with my Unown alphabet at the time, but I identified the word spelled out to be “LEAVE”.

As for the sixth Pokemon, it turned out to be a Cyndaquil (mind you, this is before there were individualized Pokemon icons). The Cyndaquil looked normal, but it was Level 5 with only 1 HP left with only two attacks: “Leer” and “Flash”. I don’t know why they named him “HURRY”, but at the time, I just disregarded it. The most eerie thing was that, despite my volume being at max, none of the Pokemon he had said their usual cries. Just pure silence.

Having enough of the team, I closed it. I was parked at what appears to be a room inside Bellsprout Tower. However, for some reason, there were no NPCs around. Even more eerie was that the “pillar” in the middle didn’t move at all, as if just leaning on its side. There was no music at all, and there was no exit or ladder, or least I thought there wasn’t.

I walked around for a few minutes but can’t seem to find a way out. This was certainly not a room I’ve seen in the Bellsprout Tower before. I’ve tried checking my items for an Escape Rope, but the bag was completely empty. There wasn’t any Wild Pokemon either.

Finally, I’ve managed to find a ladder, which turned out to be behind the “pillar”. The screen turned black and the music finally started playing. I had a sudden chill, as I recognize that melody I heard to be the theme you hear when you listened to the radio at the Alph Ruins where the Unown are at.

I immediately realize that it wasn’t a loading transition, but rather I was in a dark room and would need Flash. Before I took care of that though, I immediately checked my Pokegear to change the radio to something more pleasant, but it turns out that there was no Radio card, or even a Phone nor Time cards. There was only a Map card in which Gold (“…” from earlier, and I will call him Gold from now on) was just walking in a midst of black.

I recall that Cyndaquil has Flash, so I turned off my Pokegear and made Cyndaquil use Flash. I didn’t see any message saying “HURRY has used Flash!” or anything like that. The room just became lit just like that, and I soon regretted it. The room was a chilling blood-red with a linear gray path heading south. The ladder I used to go up/down was not there at all.

I had no choice but to head south. The screen got darker every 20 steps I made, until I finally made it to the end, which appears to be a sign. I read the sign, which said “TURN BACK NOW”.

Suddenly, I was asked to answer YES/NO, but there was no question asked. I chose YES as I do not know what it was asking, and the screen went black again, making a “ladder climbed” sound. The Unown Radio music stopped, and in a few seconds was replaced with the not-as-creepy Poke Flute radio music.

I was in another dark room, but I held my breath and used Flash again. Suddenly, it said that “HURRY has fainted!” which was odd since I recall that there was no status conditions like Poison on him, and I clearly wasn’t in a battle. I checked my Pokemon quickly and suddenly he’s no longer in my party. In fact, after a bit of investigating, none of my Pokemon are there, but instead all replaced with Level 10 Unown. I did the same thing as before and spelled out the Unown. My then team of Unown spelled “HEDIED”.

Either way, after that creepy change, the room was lit to reveal myself in a very small room that appears to be only four squares big. The walls of that room were gray bricks, as if I was inside something that was hollowed out. Outside that room appears to be a bunch of graves similar to the ones in Pokemon Red/Blue. I’ve walked around that small room and pressed A but nothing happened.

I’ve already concluded that this was clearly a hacked game and some sadistic fuck sold it to GameStop. However, my curiosity kept me going. I checked the trainer profile of “…” again only to find out that the sprite of Gold was missing his arms. He also seems to appear less smug, but rather seems more sad and empty in a way that I do not know how to describe. For some reason, it also now said that he has 24 badges, which was clearly impossible.

After a few minutes of aimless wondering, my character suddenly spun and did the Escape Rope spinning animation. Instead of flying up though, my character spun downwards slowly, as if sinking.

After that screen, the music stopped. After finally landing, the overworld sprite of Gold is coloured differently now. Instead of the usual red colour he dons, he appears completely white now, including his skin. It’s as if he came straight from the colorless Game Boy games placed into a colored background of the Gameboy Color. I checked his profile, and now, while now is as white as his overworld sprite, he lost his legs and has what appears to be bloody tears from his eyes. It also says he now has 32 badges, which now starts to disturb me as this change of number seems to represent something important.

I also checked my Pokemon, which this time contains 5 Unowns and a Level 100 Celebi without a nickname. The Unown are this time Leveled 15 and spelled out “DYING”. I checked the Celebi’s profile. It was a shiny Celebi, except there’s only half of the sprite. One leg, one arm, one eye. It only has one attack: “Perish Song”.

The area I was in itself was the Sprout Tower with the immobile pillar as before, except everything is apparently red now. I walked north for what felt like forever. Eventually, I finally encountered some generic men and women NPC. They were all lined up to the side just facing the long slantish pillar in the middle. They were also white, and nothing happens when I try to speak to them. I kept on going north until eventually the pillar finally appears chopped off, with a transparent Red in that spot. I went up to Red and without even pressing A, I was suddenly engaged and finally in a battle.

The music starts again, which it sounds like the Unown Radio music again, but played backwards. Gold’s battle backsprite matches his front one with the bloody eyes, white skin, and lack of arms, while Red’s sprite was the same as before in GSC, except transparent. The text simply said “wants to battle!” as if he has no name, and both of us only have one Pokemon each, which is weird as I swore I had six with the Unowns. My shiny Celebi came out, conveniently with half-a-sprite for the back sprite also. The “Shiny” noise and animation was different, as the sounds it made sound like multiple “Screech” attacks used consecutively. Red sent out a seemingly normal male Pikachu, except he is Level 255 and his sprite seems sad and has tears in his eyes.

Rather than the usual “FIGHT/ITEM/PKMN/RUN” menu, I was only given the option to use the Attacks. Since Celebi only has one, I chose it. Naturally, since Pikachu was Level 255, he went first.

“PIKACHU used CURSE!”, lowering his Speed and increasing his other Stats. I’m not even sure if Pikachu could use Curse.

“CELEBI used PERISH SONG!” In three turns, both Pokemon get KO’d – not like I have a choice.

At this point, it didn’t even go back to the Fight menu, as the battle just continued without me. Also note that there were no animations at all for some reason.

“PIKACHU used FLAIL!”, which didn’t do much damage despite his Level and boost as his health was maxed.

“CELEBI used Perish Song!” Nothing happens as it was already used.

“PIKACHU used FRUSTRATION!”, which did a shit-ton of damage, knocking Celebi down to less than 10 HP.

“CELEBI used Pain Split!”, which surprised me as Celebi didn’t even have that attack in the first place. Now Celebi and Pikachu have about 150 HP.

“PIKACHU used MEAN LOOK!” Not like that did anything.

As expected, due to the effects of Perish Song, my Celebi fainted. Except in the text, it said “CELEBI has died!” and instead of the ordinary drop off the screen animation, the CELEBI backsprite just vanished. For some reason, the Pikachu was still up even with Perish Song and it didn’t count as my loss.

Pikachu used one more different attack beyond the 5 attack limit:

“PIKACHU used DESTINY BOND!”

Afterwards, it said “PIKACHU has died!”, with a slow fade-out animation. Apparently, I was the winner, as the transparent Red Sprite showed up and said “……….”

At that point, I just freaked out, as that transparent Red sprite was suddenly beheaded, leaving nothing but his transparent body. The battle then ended at that point and faded out along with the music.

I’m back in the overworld, with another change to the Gold sprite – he’s now as transparent as Red’s overworld sprite. I quickly checked Gold’s profile, where this time the only thing remains of him is his head, with a transparent skin. The head was zoomed in a bit, showing a black void in his eyes. It now stated that he now has 40 badges. I then backed out and checked my Pokemon. They were all Level 20 Shiny Unown, which when spelled out, read “NOMORE”.

I was at what I now know is next to the end. There was apparently no music playing, but for some reason I still felt like something was there that could be heard. I was back in my room in New Bark Town. Maybe finally I get to play this game properly, but who am I kidding. I knew that sadistic fuck must have done something. I “walked” around my room to interact with things, as I’m a bit afraid to go down the stairs to see what was awaiting down there. Note I said “walked”, as while the background was moving, Gold was not moving his transparent limbs at all while doing so, just floating like those ghosts you see in Diamond/Pearl.

As expected, the radio, computer, and TV did not work, so I had no choice but to go down the stairs. I ended up in the same lower level room of my house. Everything appears normal, except mom isn’t home. After failing to interact with anything in this room, I decided to go outside. To my surprise, that door leading outside at the south didn’t work, and instead I just walk straight through it to a void. I continued moving south to see what the fuck was going on. My house vanishes as I head south into the void. It was creepy as when I entered the void, the outline on Gold’s transparent sprite turned white to contrast with the pitch black. Eventually, I reached a white area and Gold’s sprite turned black and transparent again. I continued south without thinking of stopping at all.

After a long trek south, I finally encountered something. It was GOLD’s regular sprite. I talked to it. He said “Good bye forever ….” (notably with a space inbetween the forever and ….), and vanished. As that happened, it said “??? used NIGHTMARE” which at that point, I would not deny that being possible. Gold did another Escape Rope animation spinning slowly downwards like before.

I’m now back into that small hollowed-out room surrounded by graves earlier. Or at least I say I was back there, as there’s no sprite anymore. I tried to walk around but nothing moved – not even wall bumping noise. I checked my trainer profile with absolutely no Gold sprite left. It said I have 0 badges and all the pictures of the Johto Gym Leaders at the bottom were replaced with skulls.

I checked my Pokemon, which were all Level 25 Unown. As expected, it spelled out a phrase that I dared to read: “IMDEAD”.

As soon as I went back to the overworld, the room I supposedly was in was then covered with the same blocks as the walls. I then figured out what exactly that room was when the final text was said: “R.I.P. …”

That room was a big grave, surrounded by other graves. Gold has already been dead. He died presumably a few years after he defeated Red.

He was a young trainer who, despite his efforts in collecting so many badges and attempts at becoming a Pokemon master, was still unable to avoid the inevitable fate of death, and his efforts were eventually forgotten by the next generation.

I was unable to escape from that text no matter what I pressed. I tried resetting the game, and the same thing happened, at which I then finally decided to give up on that horrible nightmare.
After that experience, I will never look at the “gimmick” Unown the same way again. They say that only the first generation have folk tales and legends, but the second generation have shown me how unpleasant the truth can be. I eventually enjoyed SoulSilver immensely, but I still can’t unthink what that rigged game has told me.