Conker's Dead Fur Day
I thought someone might want to hear about this.
I recently moved into a new apartment. Just like a little kid, I fully explored my new place, checking every nook and cranny. As I did this, I came across a small cardboard box tucked away in the back corner of one of the closets.
Intrigued by what the last people who lived there may have left behind, I pulled the box out and opened it up. I was pleasantly surprised with what I found. Inside was two N64 controllers, sadly in poor condition, and a few N64 classics: Mario 64, Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and Conker's Bad Fur Day. I was mostly excited about Conker, having loved the game when it came out. However, it had some deep scratches on it, and the label was mostly torn off. Clearly being an abused game, I had doubts that it would even work.
Nevertheless, I was overcome with feelings of nostalgia as I thought about the cartridge, and eventually decided to plug it into my N64 to give it a try. It took a couple of times to start, as even my best working games do, but when it booted up, it seemed to work alright... if anything, a little glitchy. It appeared to be missing the opening cutscene where Conker walked into the bar, the music seemed to be a little off, and the random characters that were usually in the bar were gone. Minor glitches for a majorly fucked up game, so I thought little of this and started up a new file. Once again, no cutscenes to speak of.
I was at the beginning of the game, where Conker was hungover and needed to get the remedy from Birdy the Scarecrow. I had begun to remember what I loved about this game, and I was looking forward to the hilarious conversations with the various characters throughout the world.
However, when I walked over to Birdy and hit the button to initiate the conversation, no words were spoken. I just stood there, holding a bottle of booze, as Birdy bounced back and forth. He would not respond or take the bottle.
I was starting to think that the game had just stopped working. Concluding that I would not be talking to Birdy any time soon, I continued to travel through the world.
Finally, when I had reached a gate, I waited a good five minutes before it opened like it normally would. I thought this was a bit weird, even for this game... Regardless, I advanced on through the gate, then hit the button that sobered you up. As Conker put the tabs into the glass, it flashed red for a few seconds and then went black. It was as if the texture failed. Conker tried to say his phrase, but it came out as a mess of a sound.
I progressed through the first area, and did not receive any of the cutscenes I remembered to be there. As well, some things were just peculiar... For example, the gargoyle was much different than I had remembered him being. He had blood around his mouth, and wore a very sinister look. When I knocked him off the bridge, there was no cutscene. I just hit him and he was gone... as if it had just been skipped.
In the next area, there were none of the regular characters I should have been able to interact with. They were all replaced by Reapers. None of them would talk to me. I could not hurt them, but some of them could kill me.
I ran around this area for a while. I looked for someone that would respond and give me an objective, but nobody would. I tried using the context buttons, yet most of them would not do anything. Some of them would even cause Conker to die immediately, such as by causing his head to fall off, or by making his body explode.
Another perplexing thing I noticed is that if you did not touch the controller for a while, Conker would do a "waiting for the gamer" action cycle. Though it was unlike any that I had ever seen. It would start out innocently enough, with Conker kicking at the ground, then twirling his thumbs.
"Hey, anyone out there?" he would say... but it seemed as if he was yelling it out to the world, not to me. Shortly after that, he would sit down and hold onto his head while he made an odd crying noise. Then he would pull out a magnum and proceed to shoot himself in the head. This resulted in losing a life.
That truly took me by surprise, as it was incredibly disturbing and I really was not expecting him to die from me not controlling him for a period of time.
It started to seem like the only thing that the game would let me do at this point was die. I had quickly run out of my starting lives, which I had about ten of. As soon as I lost my last life, I was transported to the area where Death told you about the Conker tails, and how they counted as lives. I thought this was odd, since as I had not seen a cutscene yet, and usually this happened after you died the first time, not after you ran out of all of your lives.
There was something undoubtedly strange about this area. It was completely red, and the bodies of NPC characters were sprawled across the floor. Not to mention that fire engulfed the region surrounding Conker. Death also seemed to be more menacing than normal, with piercing red eyes and an overly bloodied scythe.
With no control over Conker, I could only watch as he stood before Death shaking and crying. He stayed like this for an uncomfortably long time. Eventually, a text box appeared.
"My, haven't you been the lucky one...."
The camera panned across the grotesque and bloodied bodies until another message interrupted.
"...When it is YOU that deserves to DIE?!"
The camera whipped back to the wide shot of Conker and Death enclosed by the bodies. Except now, the bodies were all Conker. Slowly, the screen faded to black.
One more message appeared on the screen.
"Welcome to Hell."
It stayed for a few moments, until an evil laugh was heard and the game restarted.
After the Rare icon was displayed, there was blood coming from the chainsaw as Conker cut the N64 logo in two. No sound was heard. Just as before, there were no opening cutscenes, but this time, the Reaper was in the bar.
When I loaded my file, the laugh was heard again, breaking the silence. I was in the level with the mansion full of zombies. In the background, I could hear eerie wind and ghost screeches, which could have actually just have been from the soundtrack. However, it was made abnormal, with a continuous faint whimpering sound, and the occasional scream that seemed to be far too loud.
Upon entering the mansion, I was in a long spanning hallway that headed upwards. I had no choice but to run up which felt almost endless. The further I went, the more the music became distorted, and the more the screams became regular.
When I reached the top, the Reaper came into view. I slowly took steps towards him, until a message stopped me.
"Now you will know what it means to suffer."
Grinning, the Reaper disappeared into the darkess. The floor beneath me collapsed, causing me to fall into the dark below. Before respawning, the camera showed what appeared to be Conker standing alone, completely covered with bodies that appeared to be him.
I returned to a small room with nothing in it but a hole in the floor. I could do nothing except jump down. I fell through room after room. As I passed each room on my descent down, the floors became more and more disturbing... more gory and atrocious. When I ultimately landed, I appeared to be up to my waist in lava, that strangely did not hurt me.
I was in a river of this lava, and the only other thing around was a small island. There was another Reaper on it... watching me. Not wanting to die again, I tried to run past the Reaper by using the door that was on the wall behind him, only to be prompted by another message.
"Where do you think you are going?"
Out of frustration, I decided to try to attack the Reaper... only to get another text box.
"YOU WILL KNOW PAIN!"
Conker burst into flames. I swear I could see his flesh melting off...
The Reaper proceeded to laugh until the screen faded black.
"This is your final chance."
Upon respawning, I was in a room that looked similar to the last one. Yet this time, there was a grate over the hole as smoke bellowed out of it. As if the game knew I was fixated on the grate, text appeared.
"Smells like burning squirrel."
There were two doors in the room. One of them had an exit sign. However, when I tried to go through it, I would be given a message instead.
"Exit – but you know you will never leave."
"Exit – but you are compelled to stay."
"YOU CAN NEVER LEAVE!"
I reluctantly decided to try the other door, that appeared to be covered with some kind of bloody ooze. As I entered I received another message.
"You should have left."
I immediately noticed the Reaper behind me, and knew to expect something bad.
"Now you will be mine forever."
He then vanished completely, which triggered a glitch. I was suddenly surrounded by a hoard of zombies that attacked me all at once.
There seemed to be more blood than there should have been when they attacked me... The twisted laughing and screams from before abruptly caused the game to fade into black.
The game reset again.
This time when it loaded, Conker was a zombie as he cut through the N64 logo.
The bar was now full of Reapers.
I heard the laugh once more when I entered my file.
I was at the mansion level, this time as a zombie. I could only move slowly. After looking around the level a bit, I could only find non-zombie characters that would kill me. There was no way for me to fight them. The Reapers showed up as well, and instantly killing me at their leisure. They all had similar messages to share.
"How does it feel to be a slave?"
"Time to die for me again."
"I knew this day would come."
Every death was accompanied by a hateful scream, which seemed to get louder every time I died.
I played as Zombie Conker for a little while, before realizing that the game was going to make me stay that way for the rest of the time I played. I could no longer start a new game, or I overwrite my current one.
I have not played that game since, and it had really changed my opinion on Conker's Bad Fur Day.
I suppose, in conclusion, if you happen to find a game cartridge that somebody left behind, sometimes it is better not to know what it holds.
Credited to Omega Reactor
Originally uploaded on November 16, 2012
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