Demo-ID-Lambda

Maybe some demos are better off lost.
If you’ve been a fan of rhythm games for a while, you may be familiar with the PaRappa The Rapper series. If not, they’re a series of games produced by NanaOn-Sha and Sony. There are two games featuring the series mascot, PaRappa (which is a pun on the Japanese word for “paper-thin”, due to the art style), but there’s an odd game out that may confuse many people. This game is Um Jammer Lammy.
Often abbreviated to UJL by fans, this game is technically a spiritual successor rather than a proper sequel. However it’s usually lumped in with the other two games due to its shared characters, similar gameplay, and iconic visuals (courtesy of artist Rodney Greenblat). In earlier development, though, they planned to make the game quite a bit different, or more mature, for lack of another term.
You can see remnants of this darker concept in the game itself, especially when juxtaposed with the relatively carefree PaRappa games that mainly focus on trying to impress your girl or stop people from turning everything into noodles. In Um Jammer Lammy, the main theme is anxiety. This was left in due to it being the lightest subject compared to the other concepts. These can be seen in Stage 3 (teen pregnancy) and Stage 6 (death, more specifically Hell), but the former is mostly glossed-over due to Lammy’s ambiguous age and the latter was heavily censored in the US release. The game also has weirdly heavy religious references that were, for the most part, removed in that version to keep the rating from being bumped up to a T. You may wonder why these existed in the first place.
Well, simply put, Um Jammer Lammy was originally going to begin with Lammy going to Hell and strumming her way through. Many people have brought up that she looks more like a deer or goat as opposed to a lamb, and this is because her design was actually a combination of two other ideas. The first was a group of similar designs that have been leaked showed her as more lamb-like, with prominent wool and a softer appearance. The other was a sketch done of a lanky, imp-like character that was planned to be either the antagonist or one of the masters who you’d play against. 
One UJL fan-blog stated that this character “was going to be a foil to Linda Lamb (the original name for Lammy) who would cause her problems throughout the game. One of the courses would be a Devil Went Down To Georgia-style guitar battle with him. A developer nicknamed him Urami, which would later be repurposed to Rammy’s Japanese name.” According to another website, this time a brief web-interview, Rodney Greenblat said that the heavy religious overtones made him a bit uncomfortable, which nearly made him back out of the project all together. However, this wasn’t the only part of it that made him feel a bit squeamish. He briefly mentioned a demo that the previously-mentioned developer (who he called the Grudge Man, real name unknown) had programmed all by himself, which was to function as a proof of concept. Rodney said that this developer stopped showing up later that month, and they reworked the game due to "sensitive circumstances".
I found it on some emulator site that I forget the name of. It was put in the files as a sort of bonus, alongside the full game. It was labelled as “Demo-ID-Lambda”, and stuck out like a sore thumb alongside the all-lowercase file names I had on my PC, including UJL itself. Initially, I put a virus scan on my computer to make sure that I didn’t accidentally install malware, but the coast was clear. I opened the file with the emulator and ran it, mostly out of curiosity.
The game started up with Linda Lamb standing on a white background, before turning around and saying “Hi! This is a demo for our upcoming game… uh, oh no, it doesn’t have a name yet, but we have a demo for it!” Her voice was quiet, soft, and sounded more like a child, roughly 10 or 11. Someone probably brought their kid to work and had them record the lines, since the project was so early in development and they hadn’t gotten a proper voice actor yet. 
The title screen then showed up, merely saying Lamb Demo, with Linda dancing on the side. The only available option was to play, no settings or credits. I selected it and was instantly thrown into a course. It was hand-drawn, clearly a texture that wasn’t designed by Rodney. It looked more like a badly-scanned pencil drawing of a concert. Linda stood by, a bit scared, clearly, when Urami the Imp stepped in from off-screen, smiling. He sort of had Lammy’s shape, minus the ears and clothes in the silhouette, but had small black eyes and a big, Cheshire cat-type mouth. He leaned over against what looked to be a bar, or maybe a table, before saying “alright baby, let’s do it like this” in a deep, distorted voice.
“Look at how pretty the moon is. Look at how stunning the stars are. Looking at you looking at me. I know how you are.” Initially, it just sounded like a little love ditty, perhaps written by someone as a “special song” to be performed for their significant other. However, Urami’s voice made it just sound weird.
“Look at your skin, fair as fleece. Look at your eyes, like a goddess of Greece. Look at your bravery, your confidence, your power, look at those petals… wilting off the flower.” He suddenly walks up to Linda before the scene changes to a swirling mess of red and black. 
“I know how you are, you’re just so mild. The mere thought of you just drives me wild. The way you laughed, the way you smiled. Linda, I want you to have my child.” There was suddenly a shrieking sound effect that sounded like a woman- or perhaps a girl -trying to fight back against someone. 
An FMV cutscene then played. It consisted of Linda trying to scramble away from Urami while he slowly approached her. It looked like they were at a concert venue of some sort, inside a public bathroom. The camera then moved outside as the screaming returned, hovering outside the bathroom. Urami, in a form that resembled a slightly more masculine version of Rammy, stepped out, smiling and zipping up something. The camera soon slinked back in and, right before it cut to black, showed Linda laying on the ground in a pool of blood, with a pipe from the sink lying next to her.
A picture was briefly shown of a teenager, roughly 15, 16 at the very most. I have attached the picture here. I censored her face, though, just in case some weirdos try harassing her family over it. Underneath the picture was a line of text written in romaji, saying “gomen'nasai, rinda,” or “sorry, linda” in English, placed in a reused text box from the original PaRappa. I reverse image searched the picture and found it in an old Japanese newspaper from 1979, talking about a 16-year-old girl being found dead in a bathroom during a concert, seeming to have been hit in the head with an old pipe. No assailant had been identified at the time, but I had a sick feeling in my stomach when I saw her name.
Linda/Rinda Hitsuji, or as she was nicknamed, “Linda Lamb”.
She had been born from an American mother and Japanese father, and had just recently gotten her driver’s license. She went to a small concert with two of her friends, but didn’t show back up at the car when they were about to come home. One went back in and looked all over for her, and soon found herself the bathroom, standing over Linda’s body in a pool of blood.
My blood ran cold, just picturing what happened to that poor girl. Near-instantly after I read this, I turned off my computer and decided to take a break from gaming, going outside for a walk instead. I was more confused than anything, why would someone base a demo of Um Jammer Lammy around a homicide? Why would someone seem to go into such great detail over it? Who wrote the song, who performed it? Was Urami a stand-in for whoever assaulted Linda?
Or was Urami a stand-in for the developer…
Category:Video Game Creepypasta
Category:Games
Category:PlayStation
Category:Sony
Category:Video Games
Category:Creepypastas
Category:Death
Category:Sutinnit's Shed