Then Punk wanders around the castle some more and finally happens upon the Queen’s Room. “Leave us, I need to talk to this individual,” the Queen says to her attendants as Punk enters the room. They leave and she addresses Punk: “Come nearer, Sir.” This is my cue to make Punk talk to her again. I’m glad this scene is so interactive. “Giggle… fooled you, didn’t I, Punk?” she says, “It’s me, M!Sue! But everyone calls me, Leene!” I faint dead away from this sudden and totally unhinted-at plot twist, but M!Sue just keeps on yapping. “I’m so relieved you are here!” she gushes, and starts going on about how she knew Punk would save her. Then the screen turns blue and every videogame player’s fantasy comes true. No, Lulu and Rikku don’t appear and get it on onscreen. The female lead explodes in mid-wank! Well, it’s actually less of an explosion and more of a strange disappearance in a flash of light, but explode sounds ever-so-much cooler.
I don’t waste any time savoring the moment, though, because videogame heroes are always cursed with the worst timing and I’m afraid guards will bust through the door and arrest Punk for MarySue-icide any minute. So I do what any sane person who had just seen somebody cease to exist would do. I run away like a little girl.
My estrogen-powered fleeing is cut short when Lucca suddenly runs down the hall to greet me. She doesn’t tell me how she got past the over-zealous guards, but I’m somewhat glad, as I fear it has something to do with Lucca’s showing off her “polygons.” “Did you find the girl?” she demands of Punk. Then she reads his thoughts and yells, “GONE?! Whaddaya mean she’s gone?!”
Punk, in an amazing display of character development, says … nothing. It doesn’t really matter though, because Lucca continues the conversation all by herself. “Hmmm, it’s just as I thought. I knew I recognized her! And this looks identical to the castle in OUR time!” Lucca slips on her Exposition!Glasses before finishing her train of thought. “I’ll bet they mistook that girl for her ancestor… you see, she’s a member of the royal family in OUR time! She’s Princess Nadia!” She even conjures up a huge black screen to explain to Punk How-This-Can-Be.
“M!Sue, that is, Princess Nadia, is a descendant of Queen Leene!” Lucca says as we watch a Queen Leene sprite walking forward yet not moving at the bottom of the screen. She coughs up a daughter, who grows into a Queen, who in turn coughs up a daughter who grows into a Queen, who coughs up M!Sue. Because there were only four queens over 400 years. Riiiight.
Anyway, Lucca starts talking again. “Queen Leene has been kidnapped. As I recall, someone was supposed to have saved her. But history has been changed!” It’s a darn good thing that Lucca has such a firm grasp of 400 year old history, because otherwise, I wouldn’t have any idea what is going on. Anyway, back to the demonstration. A blue goblin drops from the sky, grabs Leene from out of the line, and kicks her. She disappears. Then the other three women disappear too. Cue Exposition!Lucca. “M!Sue looks so much like Leene, that they probably called off their search when she appeared here.” That’s what happens when you try and keep bloodlines pure. You pop out babies that look just like you that travel to the past and end up screwing over your entire ancestry. Damn inbreeding.
“If the real Queen is killed…” Lucca continues, oblivious to my snarky ramblings, “…M!Sue will simply disappear. There might still be time! If we can save Leene, history as we know it should remain unchanged!” The demonstration ends and we rejoin Punk and Lucca inside the castle. “Something must have happened to the Queen in this era. As a result, Princess Nadia ceases to exist! Hurry! We have to find the real Queen!” Lucca concludes as she and Punk exit the castle, the over-used plot device task of finding the Queen now clearly set out for them.
Using my amazing clairvoyant capabilities, I decide to inspect the Cathedral that is conveniently located a short distance from where I currently am on the overworld map. The nuns inside say amusing things like “We want nothing but world peace… Or a piece of the world, tee, hee…” and “Oh dear… it looks like you could use some food and a place to … rest!” I don’t know about you, but I certainly can’t tell by conversations as innocent as those that these are the bad guys AT ALL.
After talking to all the nuns, a sparkly thing appears on the floor. Punk pounces upon the SHINY SHINY object like a dog with ADD, and Lucca uses her widely acclaimed artifact appraisal skills to identify it as a Coral Hair Pin with Guardia’s Royal Crest. Hot damn! Is there anything this girl can’t do?
As if on cue, the nuns all line up, turn into Naga-ettes, and attack Punk and Lucca. Our heroes make short work of them, but as Lucca gasps, “Phew, that was close!”, another Naga-ette appears and claws at her. Then, a Frog drops from the ceiling, kills the Naga-ette, and says heroically, “Lower thine guard and thou’rt allowing the enemy in.” This would make him the first and only person in 600 AD to speak using an “appropriate” dialect. Instead of making this character seem cooler and more mysterious, like it is supposed to, it just makes the whole era seem even more contrived. But I’m sure that is the effect the fine people at Square were hoping for.
“Thou’rt here to save the Queen? The lair is deep within. Will thee accompany me?” Frogman asks, which causes Lucca yells to Punk, “Punk, it’s a talking FROG! I hate frogs!” Well, I hate Mary Sues, but you don’t see me shrieking with disgust every time M!Sue talks, do you? …On second thought, don’t answer that question.
“My guise doth not incur thy trust…” Frogman says sadly. “Very well, do as thee please. But I shall save the Queen,” he mopes and he starts walking towards the exit. Then Lucca reads the script and suddenly cries for Frogman to stop. “W,wait! You don’t seem like a bad… uh, person-frog-thing… I mean… Punk! What should we do?” she demands, because now that she is a member of the party, Lucca can’t make any decisions without Punk’s input. I am given the choice between “Go with the frog” and “Refuse,” but since I know that this is one of those things I’ll keep getting asked over and over until I pick the “right” answer, I opt to “Go with the frog.”
“I’ll just have to handle it! I mean… deal with… him!” Lucca says smoothly and I get to name “Frog.” I decide to keep his (un)original name, and he joins the party. “Mayhap a hidden door lurks nigh? Let us search the environs.” Frog says cryptically as he and Lucca line up behind Punk. By “us” he means “Ryan,” because he and Lucca are content to just chase Punk around for the next ten minutes as I try to find Queen Leene.
The only thing worth knowing about this dungeon is that every time you play an organ, a door opens up somewhere. That said, I am going to skip straight to the boss. Any complaints can be directed to crymeariver@videogamerecaps.com. Thank you. Remember, your opinion is important.
“Prepare yourself, Leene!” the Chancellor (I knew he was in on it!) yells as Punk and Co. bust into the final room of the Cathedral. Gosh, it sure was convenient of him to wait for us to get here before carrying out his evil plot. When he sees Punk, the Chancellor yells, “YOU! HOW DID YOU GET IN HERE?!” Punk doesn’t answer, duh, but Leene yells, “Frog!” cause heeeeeeeeeeeeee’s heeeeeeeeer heeeeeeeeeeeero! “Majesty, stand back and allow us the honor!” Frog yells bravely, and Leene runs away. Wow, this Mary Sue thing must be genetic.
Then, the Chancellor shows his true colors. “Gyah, ha, ha… It’s useless to fight! No one will leave here alive! True-Form-CHANGE!!” he yells, and starts spinning around. Some very flashy electricity appears and the Chancellor reverts to Yakra. There is even a little text box that pops up to alert us to this change, as if we can’t tell the difference between a big slug monster and a man in a funny hat. Enter battle mode.
And here I thought he just had some crazy glandular problem.
Frog and Punk wail on Yakra, and the big slug eventually gives up the ghost. Frog runs to the Leene’s side immediately, and I make the mistake of striking up a conversation with the Queen before emptying the treasure chests in the room. Without so much as a “thanks for saving me from pointy violation,” Leene uses her Retreat!Skills to make us head back to the castle. The Real!Chancellor somehow frees himself from inside of one of the treasure chests and runs after the merry crew, whining like a little baby. I think we just went from bad to worse on the Chancellometer. I mean, I know the last one was THE 3ViL!!1, but at least he had a backbone.
Anyway, cut to Guardia Castle’s throne room. The King is all, “You had me worried” and Leene, being the woman that she is, accepts full blame for getting her Queenly Ass kidnapped. The Real!Chancellor interrupts this tender moment of wifely submission to whine about how “we must create a criminal justice system to do away with such fiends” that would kidnap a Queen and impersonate the Chancellor. Watching Leene take all the blame must send Frog on a massive guilt trip though, because he interrupts the Chancellor, steps forward and says, “I failed to protect the Queen. I hath disgraced thee.” Then he walks away. Umm… I guess since we have an open spot in the party now, we should go see how M!Sue is doing.
King and Queen Guardia must get it on right there in the throne room in front of God and everybody as soon as Punk and Lucca leave, because just as they get to the Queen’s room, M!Sue reappears. M!Sue whines on to Punk about having been someplace “cold, dark, and lonely” as Lucca addresses her by her “real” name, Princess Nadia, three separate times. Then she finally realizes that Lucca gave away her secret identity. M!Sue is all, “I didn’t mean to deceive you, but you wouldn’t have shown me around the fair if you had known I was a Princess, right?” And I can either choose to make Punk be sympathetic and understanding or a hard-nosed prick. Do I really even have to tell you which one I chose? Regardless of what I say, M!Sue rejoins the party.
Before Punk and company can leave the castle, we have to talk to Frog, who took it upon himself to stand just inside of the castle gates and wait to talk to us before leaving. He takes a moment to comment on the uncanny resemblance between M!Sue and Leene and to tell Punk that he has the potential to be a good swordsman before banishing himself from the castle for good. Lucca comes forward and says, “You weren’t such a bad guy either, Froggy,” just after he leaves. That Lucca, she can even get over her prejudices within ten minutes of meeting a guy! What a great gal. Now pardon me while I go gag myself.
Having tied up all loose ends in 600 AD, our motley crew checks the strategy guide and heads back to the top of the mountain that the Big Blue Portal spit Punk out onto. M!Sue wonders aloud how in the heck they are gonna get home, and Lucca fumbles for a moment, trying to decide how to best address the Princess. “Call me M!Sue!” M!Sue finally screams, waving her arms about like she’s trying to fly away. “Well then, M!Sue… Observe!” Lucca shouts as she pulls out the core of her UmbrellaMachine, which is conveniently shaped like a little wand, and starts spinning around, à la Sailor Moon. Instead of getting a snazzy new wardrobe, however, Lucca summons up the Big Blue Portal. Punk and M!Sue are all, “You’re the shit!” and Lucca is all, “I know!”
Moon Power, Makeup!
Then they read the script and wonder what caused the BBP to suddenly appear. Nobody can think of a good reason, so decide to fuck it and go home. The trio hops into the BBP and is magically transported Back to the Future. I’ve been waiting all recap to say that.
After they return to the Millennial Fair in one piece… well, three separate pieces, M!Sue invites Punk and Lucca over for dinner. Lucca respectfully declines, claiming that she has some work to do at home, and leaves. M!Sue seems absolutely heartbroken over this and tells Punk to take her home anyway because she is a dependent waif that can’t even find her own house without help. The contrivances in this game are going to kill me.
And at this suspenseful point, I’m stopping the recap. It’s been grand! Next time, Punk escorts M!Sue home and meets her Dear Old Dad and his lawyer. I’ll give you just one hint about what will happen to tide you over, because I’m a great guy like that. Picture this: Punk in prison with four other men, and a little move called “Zonker-38.” Until next time, faithful readers!