A Forgotten Soul

It was a normal day I guess, not doing anything productive per unusual. So through browsing the internet I find a trailer for a game that happened to be the upcoming Animal Crossing for the 3DS.

After finishing the trailer I found the urge to play the game was quite strong, I was in the Animal Crossing mood you could say.

Sadly I had lost my animal crossing cartridge more than a two year ago and I had no way of quenching my urge to play it.

After watching the trailer again a few times I could no longer hold myself I need to play animal crossing, NOW.

I went into my room hoping strongly that I would be able to find the cartridge with not much effort needed. I had played the game a ton when I first got it on my birthday, three years ago.

But after two month of solid playing I just stopped, don’t really know why I just had no interest for it any longer. And the game quickly became lost, forgotten I guess you could say. As I kept searching I became frustrated, I had turned over all the furniture looked in all my drawers, but nothing. I decided to call it a night and went to bed a little upset.

The next day I grumpily went to my 3ds and turned on the system. But something was there, something that really confused me. At the slot of where the cartridge game is showed, there was the game animal crossing hovering on the screen like Ds games do on the 3ds.

I quickly popped the cartridge out of the system and lone behold it the same one that I was looking for all day yesterday. This confused me a bit, but I did tell my whole family I was looking this game. It could have been very likely that they found it and put it in my 3DS to surprise me.

But alas I had my cartridge and I was ready to play, yes very ready. I clicked on the icon and the game started. So at this point everything seemed to be fine the opening with the Nintendo logo, the credits. Then the opening menu came up, you know the one where it follows one of your villager as they walk, well here was my first sign that something was off. It was what seemed to following a villager, but nothing was there. The screen for sure was moving in an irregular pattern as a villager does, but nothing, nothing at all was there.

I found this odd but continued on, and the next strange thing came up, the options, all the options were there except one. New residents was not there I was pretty sure at the time that option was in the main menu, a little searching later I could not find the option for new residents anywhere.

A little frustrated I pressed on Continue option and proceeded to play the game on my old file that I played 3 years ago. I stated off with the choice of three characters, the first was Kern, the two others oddly had no name and could not be chosen, I found this weird for I knew I had never made more than one character, though it could have been my sister. So obviously I chose Kern and it then proceeded to load the town.

I chuckled at the town name which was Happytown “How unoriginal I was.” I thought to myself. The game then let me move and I headed to the exit of the house. There was a little fear that that idiot mole would show up since I did not know if I had saved or not, Luckily he did not come up so that was a relief I guess. I quickly noticed all the weeds that were scattered about, honestly any place there could be a weed there was one. This annoyed me quite a bit since I would have to pick up all of them if I wanted to enjoy the game.

So starting on the job right away I started plucking the little devils, as I did this I noticed something a little strange. I had been plucking weeds for about ten minutes and yet I had not come across any villager anywhere. This was weird because when I went to check the map there ten houses in it, it was also day time I should mention. So I decided to check one of the houses to see if the villager was in there, I entered the house only to find it completely empty, I mean empty there was nothing in the house no villager, no furniture, not even any boxes were there when a they moved, the music also stopped abruptly.

This sort of weirded me out a bit, so at this point I thought the cartridge had glitches from getting dirty, dusty or something like that. So not caring to much about the weeds I made my way to see if there was anything else that was glitched or out of order. I made my way to the tailor shop in the game the “able Sisters”. In the shop everything seemed in place other than the sisters not actually being in there.

One thing I noticed quickly was the sewing machine was still going with a fabric being spun around as if she was there I made my way there I tried to speak with her. All I got was the message board to pop up and that was it, it was completely blank nothing was on it at all. Talking to her again it showed the same thing, and this was the same thing happened with the Town hall, Museum. They weren’t really there, and when you tried to talk with them where they usually were, they always gave you blank message box.

So finally I made my way to tom nooks place, which was might I add was in its first version when you start a new game. When I enter I’m greeted with a surprise, Tom Nook himself is there and he’s not invisible like the others! But he does look really odd, as if his textures were all jumbled up. He then proceeds to speak gibberish with the entire group of letter overlapping each other; all I got out of his first message was “long”.

As I look though the store I find that there are only two items for sale a fishing rod and a shovel. I decide to buy them and as I did, I noticed I had no bells but I was able to buy the items anyway. When buying both items Tom Nook seemed to say the same thing each time, though mostly unreadable I got these two words out of the message “see”, and “regret”.

After buying the items I made my way to the nearest rock to find the one that drop gold each time you hit it. With my luck it was the first one I tried, after collecting the money I started to dig random holes in the surrounding area. This is where something really creepy and odd happened, as I dug Kern found something, as he showed it to the camera I heard the sound of a villager talking then abruptly cut off.

What Kern was holding was what seemed to be a messed up and morphed model of a villager......He then proceeded to put in his bag. At this point I was a little disturbed, after wandering about (Still no villagers anywhere to be seen other than the dead one in my bag) I find there is a fish swimming in the river I quickly pull my fishing rod out and decide to catch the sucker.

Horribly enough the same thing as before happens, I catch the “fish” there a little sound clip of one of the villagers speaking, and in Kerns hands is another disturbing messed up model of a villager. I don’t really know what to do at this point so I head back to Tom Nooks place and sell the dead villagers to him; I kind of wanted them gone. For selling them I receive a huge ton of bells. I had the most you could hold after the selling, also the only thing Tom Nook said when I sold them was “tHaNk e you.”

After that... I headed back to Kern’s/my house, and when I entered there, there...was nothing in it, everything was gone. I was sure when I first started that there was stuff in the house. Feeling a little scared now I made my way upstairs where the beds are. When I entered the room I noticed both of the other nameless playable characters were gone, the phone was also no longer there also.

With nothing else to do I made my way out of the house again but this time I was greeted with non other than the mole man himself. Instead of being annoyed I was freaking out. He looked so weird, unnatural, and his colors were a tone off.

Like Tom Nook his textures were jumbled, and to top it all off his pick ax was glitching though his head. He spewed out a bunch of stuff that was unreadable but this is what I got out of it; “Long”, “regret”,“Tom”, “abandon”, “boredom”. After that he glitched frozen and just stayed there until I noticed I could move again.

So after a little bit of nothing I made my way to the one place I had not yet gone, the town gate. As I went there everything seemed to be gloomier, or more a darker tone of its color, my character seemed to have a sad expression. When I arrived one of watch dogs was there well both actually the other one (the dumb one) was glitching though the floor so only really his head showed, I ignored him since I was unable to talk with him.

The other one was normal though, yup the only normal NPC in the game so far. When I talked to him he simply ask if I would like to open the gate, there was no “no” option so I chose yes. At that moment the screen scrolled up the doors swung open but when it scrolled down back at me I saw Tom Nook at the entrance. The screen went black and I heard a shrilling, creepy, heavily edited and chopped sounding laugh presumably from Tom Nook.

The screen fades back, I’m in Kern’s house again, and I make my way down to the first floor only to find it completely filled with a coffin furniture item. I was not able to go outside so the only option was the basement. Disturbed and scared at this point I make my way down the stars.

What I find is something I will never forget. The entire village as messed up models lay on the floor, the floor is also a dark red color. At the center of them is Tom Nook but this time he’s different he’s all black and he has completely white eyes. I stood there for a long time, nothing seemed to be happening so I finally got the courage to go up to the disfigured villagers, and I’ll list out what they say:

1 “Why...Y.”

2 “alone...O.”

3 “sad... U.”

4 “tears....”

5 “end...L.”

6 “death...E.”

7 “ darkness...F.”

8 “forgotten...T.”

9 “torment...U.”

10 “anger...S.”

Finally I know I would have to talk to Tom Nook, I approach and try to talk to him. The instance I do the screen then again goes black and I hear a screeching scream, it was like Tom Nooks laugh, it sounded heavily distorted and edit to sound like a scream.

I fade back in front of my house, it for some reason changed to night time, and this time Tom Nook was just there, and he follows me like he does in the store. Whenever he got close I hear tormenting scratching sounds and the distorted sounds of all the villagers speaking. My character had no more color and had a blank face.

I couldn’t go in any building whatsoever, whenever I tried Tom Nook would Glitch over me and the scratching and villagers would get really loud, I would then appear back in front of my house (the mole man is still frozen/dead there BTW) So after trying all the places I try the final location, the town gate.

I was surprisingly able to go inside, sadly the dog, the only normal NPC in this town, now had his textures jumbled. Also the gate was already open, reluctantly I went inside. The screen went black, again, I heard all the villagers scream, that distorted scream, while Tom Nook laughed.

When the screen faded back in I was in the beginning sequence when you’re in the cab, but instead of the cab driver there was rudely placed model of the black Tom Nook. A text box came up saying “Why was I alone, I was so bored, so very bored...” He then started to laugh again. It stayed like that for what seemed like a couple of minutes, and then the game restarted.

There was no sound at all anymore, and at the title screen it was following the black Tom Nook, he held what seemed to be a bloody shovel. I clicked on the continue option, picked Kern whose name was now Dead. It then loaded the town.... “Happytown”. Once it finished the character just stayed in the bed I couldn’t move at all, it was like this for a quite while then I heard it, that laugh.

It was getting closer yet I couldn't do anything. Then I saw him pop in and slowly approach Kern/Dead he then stopped and looks at Kern/Dead and says “Become forgotten...” I hear his scream for the last time, and then my 3DS crashes, I reboot and try to launch the game but there’s always error saying the cartridge is unreadable.

The cartridge now lays in a box under my bed, left there. I would throw it away or give it away, but something keeps me from doing so. I want to understand why, or how rather, how I can fix what I have done, the pain I've caused.

Yes, maybe I can restart, maybe I can learn to remember them, maybe the forgotten can forgive.

Bringster