Because this is an RPG, and apparently there’s this unwritten rule that in all RPGs there must be at least one scene in which a character confronts his/her innermost fears manifested as an evil version of themselves, a doppelganger of Cesuelia appears. Hmm, I don’t think she just dropped in to share some haircare tips. Of course, she’s dressed as Princess!Cesuelia as opposed to her current incarnation. “Are you me?” Cesuelia dumbasses. No, she’s your Great Aunt Maude. Doppel!Cesuelia plays on her non-evil twin’s self-doubt: “You requested this dangerous adventure because you wanted to be loved by someone…you’re going to save the world because it’s your duty as a princess. But, what you really want is sympathy. You hypocrite.” Ignoring the awkward wording of this speech, the sentiment behind it is so spot-on that I actually just screamed “WORD!” at the screen. I think I’m letting this fictional game affect me a tad too much.

Cesuelia sinks to her knees, melodramatically wailing “Am I wrong? Answer me!” The illusions of the King, Minister Johan and the random courtiers disappear into the ether, leaving the two Cesuelias alone together. I think the minds of fanboys the world over just went into overdrive at the thought of the possibilities conjured up by this situation. Listen closely, and you can hear the sound of a million tiny wangs fapping away. “No one loves you…” my new favourite snarky doppelganger finishes. “You don’t love anyone. Wake up!” With this, Doppel!Cesuelia vanishes and returns to wherever the hell she came from (a game designer’s wet dream is my choice), forever forfeiting the possibility of her own entry in the cast list. I do hope she’ll be able to get over it.

Cesuelia blacks out and wakes up in the same room Indy found himself in, leaving only Rudy to complete his test. The test itself involves bombing stone blocks to forge a path, a task marginally more difficult than breathing. In the second screen of the test, the game designers mix things up a little…by hiding holes in the ground underneath some of the blocks. As Rudy could potentially fall into one of these holes if he were drunk, walking backwards or carrying a white stick, I’m sure you can imagine the sense of danger prevalent in this task. I, however, as a leet gamer, manage to guide Rudy across the entire screen without falling into a single hole. The sad thing is, I actually feel a faint sense of accomplishment about this.

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Rudy’s test leads him into a large room with three full-length mirrors framed on the far wall. Curiously, Tony, the wee lad Rudy rescued from the Berry Cave of Death, Doom, Destruction, Devastation & Darkness back in Part 2, is sitting on the floor. I wonder what that’s all about. Oh, right, it’s Pretentious Pseudo-Therapy Time again! Tony screams that “the monsters are coming”. As if on cue, a red demon pops up behind Tony, and Rudy swiftly despatches it with his sword. Even though he didn’t use his PENIS to slay the monster, Tony backs away, mumbling that Rudy is just as scary as the monsters. Well, they certainly aren’t packing any loaded weapons, if that’s what he means. A number of illusions representing random Surf villagers then join in the fun, accusing Rudy of being different to them, because this storytelling device isn’t completely exhausted yet. The villagers still can’t let go of their PENIS envy, it seems. Indeed, one villager is so incensed by Rudy’s impressive specimen that he even claims that PENISes could have originally belonged to the demons! Inspired by this preposterous talk, another villager clone — or it could be the same one, for all the game tells me — says that Rudy is just another monster. To illustrate this, Rudy’s reflection in the gigantic mirror changes to that of another red demon. All the villagers disappear sans Tony, but any hope Rudy had that his PENIS might be accepted by the boy is dashed when he snits “Feelgayer isn’t for you…you don’t belong here.” Tony vanishes and Rudy — you guessed it — sinks to his knees in despair. Will anyone in Feelgayer be able to look beyond the PENIS and see him for who he really is?

I like to imagine this is said with an air of disbelief and incredulity.

It seems this question will have to go unanswered for the foreseeable future, as the game designers have more important matters in mind. Rudy is transported to the same room Indy and Cesuelia ended up in (and presumably spent the last twenty minutes picking their asses). Before they can share the details of their therapeutic trials, a voice booms from nowhere “This is the girl Stoldark has chosen?” If you cared to remember, Stoldark is the Water Guardian who beseeched Cesuelia to embark on her journey way back in Part 1. For that, I despise him by default. If only he had kept his big Guardian mouth shut, she would have quite happily spent the rest of her whiny days holed up in Mary Sue Abbey while the remaining two members of the Trifecta of Duh bumbled their way across Feelgayer having all kinds of gay wacky adventures. Cesuelia concludes that the mysterious voice is another Guardian speaking into her heart — although it’s implied the other party members can hear it too, which doesn’t really make a lot of sense. I mean, does she have a megaphone inside her chest or something?

Before the party can ponder this head-scratcher, a second voice roars from Cesuelia’s thorax: “What a weak mind! The weakening of the world is really the weakening of the human soul.” The gist of this is that humans themselves have inadvertently weakened the Guardians’ power by giving up on such notions as courage, hope and love. Now the Guardians have been reduced to shadows of their former selves, no longer having shape in the physical world. I guess this means we’re going to be adding ‘Bring courage, hope and love back into the world’ to the Cliché Trio’s ever-expanding To-Do List. The Guardians — joined by a third voice — argue back and forth for a while about whether Cesuelia and her dumb friends are truly the ones for the job. As if this weren’t bad enough, Cesuelia joins in, yammering on about hearing the emotions of the Guardians in her heart. Does her heart have its own fucking sound system now? Eventually Indy tires of this, and yells out for the Guardians to show themselves. Thankfully, they oblige.

As they can no longer manifest in this world, the Guardians temporarily warp the Trio to a subspace that consists of a trippy rainbow void. I think I now have some idea of what it’s like to be a game designer. A huge blue dragon-like creature with what appear to be icicles sticking out of its back appears, bellowing “I am the Earth Guardian, Gurdijeff.” Wait, what? You mean this isn’t the Ice Guardian, what with the blue colouring and the iceberg on its back? Now I’m confused. It’s like the universe has turned on its head. Maybe the Light Guardian will turn out to be a shadowy creature holding the complete works of Lovecraft, and the Wind Guardian will be a huge walking tree or something. I know I rag on the game designers for being cliché and predictable, but can’t they be a little more imaginative without simply resorting to making things completely ass-backwards?

Sucks to be you, then!

Fortunately, normal order is restored with the appearance of Moa Gault the Fire Guardian, who takes the form of a phoenix rip-off huge bird with wings of flame, and the Wind Guardian Fengalon, who appears as…a white tiger inside a cyclone. Nope, I got nothin’. The Guardians make some more redundant statements about the Trio’s lack of ability and the weakness in their hearts. Regardless, it seems they don’t have a Plan B, and must put their trust in the wand-waving girl, the explorer with the IQ of a cactus, and the mute guy with a PENIS. They’re going to need all the luck in the universe, not to mention the infinite parallel ones. Gurdijeff reveals that the Guardians are too weak to fight the demons in their current state, and need the Tear Drop, the “light that gives life”, to defend Feelgayer. “Yes, it’s the same light that gives _us_ life,” Fengalon clarifies. “Which means you hold the key to our existence…” Now that is a scary thought. If these imbeciles held the key to my existence, I’d jump off the nearest building and get it over with.

Cesuelia wonders what the demons want with the Tear Drop. Apparently, it’s possible to reverse its power in order to destroy the world. I would ask for a show of hands to see who didn’t expect the Tear Drop to have world-destroying potential, but I figure there’s no point wasting ten seconds of all our lives on such a pointless exercise. Surprisingly (as much as anything in this game can be deemed surprising, at least), the demons’ main goal is not to destroy the planet, but to use the Tear Drop “to revive their master, Mother”. If she’s their mother, shouldn’t that be ‘mistress’? Or maybe she’s gender-confused. Quite frankly, I almost expect it from videogame villains these days. The Guardians try to wrap things up by telling the Trio that time is running out, but Indy still has questions for them. The end result of this drawn-out scene is that the Guardians agree to lend the Trio their power (read: add this game’s equivalent of the ‘Summon’ command to the battle menu) in order to prevent the demons from reviving Mother. They also prepare to use the last of their physical power to teleport our heroes to the demons’ headquarters. Before they can complete the process, however, something goes wrong. The screen flashes red a few times, then the Trio is unceremoniously dumped back into reality. “That was a shock from the Dark Spear of Zeikfried!” the now-disembodied voice of one of the Guardians roars. Rudy doesn’t know who the hell this Zeikfried is, but his interest is definitely piqued by the mention of his “Dark Spear”. Perhaps this impressive piece of equipment can rival his PENIS?

Apparently one thrust from Zeikfried’s Dark Spear is enough to sever the Guardians’ ties with the mortal world completely, as the fading voice of Gurdijeff tells the party that he can no longer transport them to the demons’ crib, yo. However, he does have enough power remaining to move them somewhere. This location remains a mystery for the next few minutes, as we abruptly switch scenes and find ourselves in a strangely hi-tech area complete with a glass floor and huge tubes filled with an unknown yellow liquid. The lone figure in this room is none other than the purple-caped figure we briefly saw salivating over the mysterious cocoon in the intro. He’s totally Zeikfried, the current leader of the demons, which means the enormous cocoon — which now has pride of place inside a glass tube nearby — contains Mother. Of course, that isn’t the first thing I notice in this scene. That honour goes to Zeikfried’s oft-mentioned Dark Spear, which, somewhat disappointingly, turns out to be an actual spear as opposed to a humongous PENIS. Way to shatter my Rudy’s dreams! Before I continue, another name change is on the cards. Since I renamed Belselk/Squatt after a Power Rangers villain, it seems only proper that his leader be given a similarly-fitting moniker. And for the current leader of the demons, there is only one possibility.

I would have written a witty caption here, but I have no fucking idea what she’s talking about.

“That damn Guardian!” Lord Zedd hisses. “He scanned this area with his mind!” Although the sprite graphics don’t convey it, I imagine he thumps his fist onto the nearest flat surface prior to delivering those lines, just to complete the caricature. Suddenly, a mean-looking woman with full body armour and magenta hair appears from a hole in the air (not shitting you here) and lands on the ground with a flourish. Lord Zedd isn’t particularly fazed by this, so it must be a regular occurrence in the demon household. The woman — Lady Harken — declares “His scans have been shut off. The Duke’s mansion is superb.” Wait, what? Who the hell is the Duke and why are the demons so enamoured with his mansion? Obviously this is a reference to something that was mentioned earlier, and if I were a true fan of this game I would immediately recognize it for what it was instead of jumping to the conclusion that the localization team were off getting stoned somewhere when this scene was translated. The rest of Harken’s speech is thankfully less cryptic — she confirms to Lord Zedd that the humans are now in contact with the Guardians, a development which could seriously Fuck Up Their Plan. Lord Zedd seems less than perturbed by this, and tells Harken that the Guardians’ power has been rendered too insignificant for them to pose any real threat. An assumption that would hold infinitely more weight if he knew which three mental giants had been tasked with reclaiming said power.

I should point out that Harken, currently being the token female of the enemy group, shall now be renamed Scorpina, in keeping with the Power Rangers naming theme (Rita Repulsa will come soon enough). I’m just trying to be consistent here! Scorpina doesn’t seem to share Lord Zedd’s confidence, but before she can protest, our old sinister friend Blankie warps into the room. “Now that the Elws are no longer helping the humans, they don’t stand a chance!” he crows. The point is, unless humans, Guardians and Elws are able to put aside their differences and unite, just like in the good ol’ days before Feelgayer turned into the asscrack of the universe, the demon forces will prove too great to be overcome. As if this scene wasn’t about to overflow with ineffective villainy already, Squatt meanders into the chamber and makes a comment about feeling his power grow when all the puny humans “squirm in the flames”. Because his entire character can be summed up in the sentence “I am superior to humans and like to watch them suffer”, I probably won’t need to recap much more of his dialogue.

Apparently, the demons live in an internet forum.

Scorpina turns and rags on Squatt, telling him that they could have ‘procured’ the Tear Drop without so much bloodshed. Clearly, she’s the requisite ‘bad guy who isn’t really bad and dislikes indiscriminate killing and wanton destruction’. It’s nice to see MediaVision trying something new with their antagonists. Squatt retaliates by calling Scorpina a “newby”, giving us an important clue that she hasn’t been around here for long. Which I’m sure is a completely extraneous detail and won’t be addressed later. Before Scorpina can tear Squatt a new ass with her giant halberd, Lord Zedd kicks into a motivational speech. “We, the Quarter Knights, gather for a single purpose. We must break the seal which binds our leader, Mother. The dreaded Guardian seal must be undone!” Unfortunately, his call to arms doesn’t quite have the desired effect; the rest of the Quarter Knights kinda just leave. He must be such an esteemed leader. With his subordinates gone, Lord Z is once again alone with his precious cocoon. “Mother, when you finally wake, will the rest of the Quarter Knights share our dreams?” he wonders, pressing his hands to the glass tube that binds his dormant mother. He’s probably going to stay there for several hours, just steaming up the glass — these two don’t exactly have the most…conventional relationship, as our gag reflexes will find out later.

Fortunately, the mother/son squick-union won’t be upon us for several hours yet, so the Black Screen of Impending Incest makes a quick appearance before we rejoin the Cliché Trio. It seems the Guardians have transported them to a random forest clearing, and for some reason there are leaves blowing all over the damn place like a hurricane’s about to sweep through. Indy wonders where the hell they’ve ended up, to which Cesuelia confidently replies “The place of the seal. Gurdijeff said he would lead us here.” As soon as the words have left her mouth, she begins to doubt herself, as there doesn’t seem to be anything here besides trees and grass. Suddenly, though, she notices three stone slabs in her hands — the mediums of Gurdijeff, Fengalon and Moa Gault. ” She also remembers that Gurdijeff mentioned something about protecting a seal, but is unable to determine exactly what he meant. I’m sure the two other Einsteins in the party will help her to figure it out!

The Fifteen Commandments of Wank?

The scene abruptly ends, and the party find themselves plonked onto the World Map with no idea where to go next. Fortunately, the lost Strategy Guardian, Gamefaquon, speaks to Cesuelia’s heart and tells her she and her companions must head northwest to the tribal village of the Guardian-worshipping Baskars. Amazingly, they manage to reach the village without being sucked into a single random battle. I think the Apocalypse must be dawning. The first port of call in Baskar Village is the save parrot. With the hellish gauntlet that was the Guardian Shrine fresh in my mind, I immediately make a permanent save file at this point, before transferring said save file to a second memory card, just to cover all bases – quite honestly, I would rather be repeatedly slapped around the face with Tidus’s flaccid penis than be subjected to the verbal exchanges of that Gods-forsaken dungeon ever again.