Before we get started here, I want to let you folks know that this is a work in progress, and was originally written with a... shall we say 'colorful verbal pallette'? Needless to say the colors I was using are a bit ultraviolet (that is to say, outside the accepted range) to Gamespot, so portions of the narrative may look a bit... odd. So just carry on reading and let me know what you think in the comments. ----- 042811-Lessons Learned From Videogames, '90s Edition: It is perfectly normal to barge into peoples' homes uninvited, rifle through their cabinets, drawers and bookshelves and take anything useful with you when you leave. +050911- No matter how monumental the importance of your ultimate aim, someone will always have something very nearly pointless, and yet excessively time consuming, for you to do before they give you the information/object you require. 042911-Hmm. Just excised a demon from a little girl while at the same time rescuing a small kingdom from imminent bankruptcy. Now where's that desert I was looking for...? 050311- Well, let's see... I found the desert I was looking for, slew an evil ghost(what a pain that turned out to be), saved the water supply of a whole town and now I can't find the damned elf village. How is it that no one told me ahead of time that Saving the G** D*** World would be so labor intensive?! 050411- Okay. Saving the G** D*** World has been put on hold indefinately- I've discovered the city of master chefs. 050511- Okay, back on track here- After a four and a half hour trek through a cave that really shouldn't have taken that long to traverse, I find out that the Professor I'm looking for is in a place called the Tower of Grief. This promises to be a happy adventure... 050911- Great. So I finally tracked down the Prof I've been chasing for the last four days and what do I get for my troubles? A leaky submarine(read: useless) and an order to track down the Prof's assistant who's HALFWAY AROUND THE $%*#$+@ WORLD! Y'know, when the four horsemen of the apocalypse are prepping the world for total annihilation, you'd imagine people would learn to prioritize. Jeez. On the bright side, however, this does mean I get to make another trip to the city of master chefs. 052511- After an unfortunate hiatus, the quest to Save the G** D*** World is scheduled to resume today. Now where the hell am I? Why's it so dark in here? WHAT THE F!!!?! 053111- Lessons learned while questing in the name of Saving the G** D*** World: Caves suck. I don't mean kinda sucks like, "Oh, man! I got all the way down to the video store and they're closed today! That sucks." No, I mean sucks like, "OH MY GOD, A GIANT NINJA WEREFROG IS EATING MY HEAD AND DROWNING MY GIRLFRIEND!" 060211- Crap. So after I find the Professor and bring back his assistant, he sends me off to find some metals he needs in order to repair the aforementioned leaky submarine required to further my ultimate aim of Saving the G** D*** World. Where do I find these metals, I hear you ask? In caves. Three separate mother*cough!*ing CAVES! And after raiding said caves(an endeavor of several hours per cave) I still don't have enough! In conclusion, I need a sidekick I can send out to do the necessary b****work called for in the course of Saving the G** D*** World. 060311-Son. Of. A. *WHIPCRACK!*. (Yes, I'm aware that none of the above are complete sentences. Shut up.) So yesterday I gathered six out of the seven necessary pieces of metal to finish the sub I need to Save the G** D*** World. The last piece I needed was in the possesion of a king. How do I convince the king to hand it over? Do I explain how I'm trying to SAVE THE G ! ! D ! ! ! WORLD?! Noooo... I have to dive into another (*space truck*)ing cave to find a purple newt to make the king something to EAT! (who the hell would want to eat a purple newt anyway?!) The Fate of the G-- D--- World is in my hands, AND I'M MAKING DINNER FOR THIS ###HOLE!!! ... So anyway, the king makes with the metal after dinner (I raided the (*Smucker's*) treasury while I was at it) and I hurry back to the Prof's lab to finish the submarine. As I step through the door, I'm immediately accosted by one of the Prof's lackeys, who informed me that, not only is the Prof NOT here, the abominable TWERP left for the pirate island. Just to make sure we understand one another here- this islet is about 40 meters square. The only thing on the islet is a tower owned and operated by pirates(hence it's name- THE PIRATE ISLAND!). WHAT THE F(bomb) WAS HE THINKING!? So now, instead of continuing on in my quest to Save the G** D*** World, I'm off the rescue the professor. Again. F(bob omb). 06/04 - 06/13: on hiatus- The Haps(or, a short synopsis on events during the off time): Killed the pirates, saved the Prof, was too busy worrying about Saving the G** D*** World to give a damn why he (the Prof) was there (on the pirate island)in the first place, went back to the shop, fixed up the sub, raided underwater caves(much cursing and gnashing of teeth ensues), spent some time with three of the four horsemen, horsemen make worrisome claims about my girlfriend's parentage, and finally returned to the Prof's workshop to receive another pointless fetch-quest that accomplishes nothing but to delay my Saving the G** D*** world. Now that we're back up to speed: 061411- Huh. I had a feeling this wouldn't be quite as simple as I hoped- while traversing the latest in a seemingly unending series of caves, I started getting a sinking feeling when all of the items I pulled out of the chests scattered about were "dragon" somethings or other- dragon tooth, dragon egg, dragon claw, etcetc. Am I surprised to find a living, (fire)breathing dragon at the bottom of the cave? Bummed out, maybe- and resigned- but no, not surprised. 0615-062311- Slew the aforementioned dragon, got the item the Prof wanted, ran back to his lab to fork it over. Turns out I was so busy not giving a crap about what the Prof had to say that I was surprised when he announced that with the use of the item I procured from the dragon, my submarine was now a flying machine- which is unexpectedly useful, considering the big bad guys are presently chilling out on a floating island fortress. Of course, as I attempt to board their floating island fortress, my airship is batted around like a cat toy by some kinda magical air shield, rendering my shiny new airship useless. Thanks for yet another pointless delay, Prof. So how am I expected to get aboard the floating island fortress(if I keep referring to it that way, I'm going to need to start capitalizing it)? By climbing the tower conveniently placed underneath the floating island fortress. How do I get to the tower conveniently placed underneath the Floating Island Fortress? You guessed it! Through a series of underground caverns(also known as CAVES! MOTHER! (Love)ING! CAVES!). 062411- Lessons learned while questing in the name of Saving the G** D*** World Volume 2: Teleporters-contrary to their very nature- are not timesavers. More often than not, a teleporter's sole function(within any self respecting dungeon/tower/cave) is to confuse you, get you lost, and/or waste your time. After climbing the Tower of Teleportation Tiles and dispatching the Horsemens' underling, there's a big flash and I wake up to find both my girlfriend and my Legendary Ancestral Sword have gone missing. Crap. The Floating Island Fortress departs the tower I just spent 2 hours scaling, and now I need to find out where it went. 45 minutes later... Y'know, you'd imagine a giant levitating island would be kinda hard to miss. You'd also be wrong. 25 more minutes later... Oh, this is rich! So during the whole of my Quest to Save the G** D*** World, I've been teleporting in and out of these mysterious shrines inhabited by a Mysterious Old Man(who will henceforth be referred to as MOM) who always has something creepy to say after reminding me of whatever pissant task I'm performing for the Prof or other random blockhead. I haven't mentioned MOM before now because he doesn't piss me off, and has been rather helpful from time to time. Now I come to find out that the whole time I've been popping in and out of the shrine where he's at(always teleporting inside, where the exit doors are locked), he's been on the Floating Island Fortress! So basically, I've been to my final destination about 20 times already, BUT THE OLD FOOL NEVER FELT THE NEED TO TELL ME SO!! Jeez. Well, this is (allegedly) the home stretch, so I'm off to stop the 3 Horsemen of the Apocalypse. And my girlfriend. Talk about awkward reunions... [Several hours of dungeon crawling later:] Oh, ho ho- so you bastards brainwashed my childhood sweetheart into being Horseperson of the Apocalypse #4 and smashed a priceless family heirloom/world saving sword to bits, and now you're talking smack? You jokers are destroyed. Way destroyed. [Reforges world saving sword with magical Chutzpah] [Epic clash ensues; fate of the world hangs in the balance] Final score: Saviors of the G** D*** World- 3, Horsemen of the Apocalypse- zip. And my girl has rejoined the winning team- this day ain't turning out too bad after all. O wait, final form battle- the 3 horsemen mash themselves together real good and now I have to fight an Apocalytic Smoothie. Great. [Epic clash, blah blah- fate of the world, blah blah blah] Sweet, sweet victory! Oh yeah! Waaaaaait a minute- so it turns out my girlfriend was, in fact, one of the world ending evildoers in a previous life, and with the death of the Apocalyptic Smoothie, she's doomed, too. This sucks! Jeez... I'm gonna take a walk. (One year later) [Walking into a random town] Christ, my feet are killing me... hey, look- it's deus ex mach- I mean, it's MOM from a few paragraphs up! Who's that he's got with him? It's my girl! And she looks suprisingly well for a girl who's been dead for a year! She doesn't remember me(or anything else), but the BGM is cheery, and we're fading to black! Woohoo...! THE END