Its been a sad time for me. Recently, my uncle had passed away and he handed down his game systems that he truly loved. My cousin got it first and so did his sister, but he had apparently committed suicide. Just 3 days ago, my cousin's sister stopped by my house and gave me a box. She told me that it was my uncle's old NES that he had owned. She left shortly after.
I opened the box and in it was the NES and a whole bunch of games. I remember games that I grew up playing such as Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden, and Double Dragon. However, there was one game that I enjoyed the most and that was Super Mario Brothers. I looked for the game but I couldn't find it or the second one. I did however find the third one. My nostalgia washed over me as this was my favorite of the NES Mario games. The one thing that was odd was that there was no game label whatsoever. It just said "MaRIo 3" and a crude drawing of Mario with Birdo's head. Thinking that this was a hack meant for jokes that was made by my uncle, I shrugged it off and hooked up the nes in my bedroom. I inserted the game and got ready to play. Now I kind of wish I didn't.
The game was normal as I went to the title screen except only Mario was there and he had the birdo head just like on the cover. I pushed start and got ready to play. I wasn't taken to the map screen like usual, instead a cut scene played out. It was just a black screen with white text saying, "The empire has risen. All of the mushroom kingdom belongs to me now. Only one thing left to do." I began to wonder to myself what that had meant, but I didn't care because after all this was a hack.
A level started. It was the same level as you would expect, but the sky was a dull gray and all the enemies were lying down on the ground dead. Mario was as how he looked before and I made him move throughout the level. About halfway through the level, I heard faint crying coming from the game. As Mario approached the end of the level, there were the koopa kids all with tears in their eyes. A text box appeared on screen and said, "Why did you kill our father? We didn't do anything to you. Please have mercy!"
I got a chill in my body and i was creeped out, but something forced me to watch what was going to happen next. Mario spoke in a way I never imagined. "There's more to it than you know. You are one of us now." He walked towards them. The koopa kids backed up in horror and then Mario charged at them. He tore apart their bodies in the most gruesome way. Their blood and organs were all over the ground and on Mario as well. After that, Mario just stared at the screen and pulled off his Birdo head. A new head then sprouted that looked like Mario's regular head, but he had black eyes and devil horns. I was too scared to run or even move for that matter.
He spoke to me in a demonic voice that shouldn't even be possible on an 8 bit console. "The empire has full control now. Nothing can stop us now. Not even you." Mario then laughed demonically. I heard realistic screams coming from the game. I wanted to turn off the game so bad, but I was hit on the head so hard that I was knocked out.
I woke up laying on the floor. I felt a pain in my arm so I looked at it and I saw "MaRIo" carved into my arm. That wasn't the only thing there though. There was another message saying "You are one of us." I heard a noise behind me, it was footsteps coming from the tv. I got up and saw Mario slowly walking towards me. I realized that I had a 9mm hand gun in my gun cabinet. I rushed towards the cabinet, picked up the gun and shot the NES multiple times. After I destroyed the NES, I threw it away along with the other games too.
To this day, I'm not even sure what that game was trying to tell me. I tried to forget about the game, but the scars will never heal and neither will I.