Luigi Forgotten

I am a major fan of Sonic and Shadow the Hedgehog and the others, but I am also a major fan of Mario and Luigi. Luigi is my favorite character from the Mario universe and so I am always looking for Luigi related games and attire. Several Saturdays ago, my friend, who will remain anonymous, and I were at my uncle's garage sale. My uncle was a huge gamer all his life and he has been my role model all my life.

While searching through the hundreds of games he had collected over the years I noticed one particular game that caught my eye. It was a GameCube game with Luigi on the cover doing a mid-jump pose, and the title was "Luigi's Time to Shine!" I thought it was a cool looking game and i showed it to my friend. He encouraged me to buy it, even though now I wish he hadn't.

I paid my uncle the money and took the game home and, once I had reached my house, my friend told me ,"Goodbye," and left, leaving me home alone while my mother was probably at the bar and my father working. I went up to my room, hooked up my GameCube, and put the game in. When the GameCube started up I noticed that the sound was slightly delayed, but thought nothing of it.

The Nintendo logo popped up on the screen with the usual coin sound effect. Luigi's face appeared on the screen and looked happy with a green background, cheerful music, Yoshi and Mario in the bottom left corner, and Daisy in the top right corner. The words "Press Start" flashed below Luigi's face and so I did what it said. It brought me to a "Select a Save File" screen and I chose the first file. A picture of Mario and Luigi showed on the screen where Mario was tied up and Luigi was saying,"I'm sorry Mario, but sometimes your brother, Luigi, needs some moments of glory too."

I thought that the picture was funny and the game started up the first level. This is where things went down hill. The level name was "Take What's Yours" and I thought it had meant that someone had kidnapped Daisy, but instead it showed Luigi with a knife up against Mario's throat. Luigi simply said,"Now it's-a my turn to be-a the star!" and slit Mario's throat. There was a sickening gurgling sound as Mario was gasping for air and died.

A cut scene began and the graphics were that of Super Smash Bros. Brawl as rain poured during a dark night and Luigi's silhouette could be seen atop a tower. Lightning flashed and Luigi's face and front could be seen as well as Luigi holding Mario's corpse above his head. Luigi's eyes were red and had a demonic smile on his face. His gloves were stained with Mario's blood and his clothes were soaked and wet from the rain.

The inhabitants of the Mushroom Kingdom, including Peach, Daisy, Yoshi, and Toadsworth stared in horror and disgust up at Luigi. Luigi opened his mouth and his words felt like ice down my spine and venom in my ears as he shouted," Now I am the star of the game! I am the hero! All will bow before me and worship me as king or perish like Mario!" Luigi threw down Mario's corpse and it landed with a sickening one crunching thud and everyone gasped in horror and some screamed in terror. Mario was dead.

At this I turned off the game and looked at the cover but it had changed. Luigi was no longer smiling, but frowning as if sad I turned the game off, and the background was entirely black. The title had changed from "Luigi's Time to Shine!" to "Why Did You Stop Playing??" I took the game out, snapped it in half, and threw it out.

I put in Super Mario Sunshine just for the heck of it because my GameCube was already out and i wanted to forget what I saw. I thought to myself,"What kind of sick, twisted person would make such a game?" and waited for the game to start. Instead of Bowser Jr. doing the laugh at the beginning, it was a demonic version of Luigi laughing. The title screen changed to a black background with the sad Luigi. Luigi's mouth opened and said,"Luigi forgotten, abused, and betrayed. Why don't you want to play with me? I'm so lonely. Why am I the sidekick?"

His words were cold and seemed to be longing for something. It seemed as if he wanted an answer from me but, before I could answer, the screen started breaking up my GameCube shut off. I tried to turn it back on but it wouldn't. I didn't tell anyone about this and for days I tried to turn it back on but it wouldn't. I decided to put it away for a while and that night, I heard a ghostly and soft voice whisper in my dreams,"Don't forgot ol' Luigi."