Scratch Cat 64: You are damned

(Based on Super Mario 64)

I always liked Scratch Cat 64. One day in 1997, I was at a thrift shop and bought Scratch Cat 64. I played with it a lot, but one thing I particularly liked was messing with the Scratch Cat's face at bootup. In 2016, I found this lost game. It was in very bad condition. I got out my Nintendo 64 and put the cartridge in. I booted it up and the giant Scratch Cat head appeared. I moved the cursor over to Scratch Cat's ear and pulled it to eleven proportions. I was going to do the same to the other ear, when the TV suddenly produced loud static. The Scratch Cat's face had melted and the whole head started deforming and twisting in ways that I didn't even know were possible for the model. Random sound effects from the game started playing along with the static. As all this was occurring, I could hear a faint voice whispering in Japanese. The voice was stammering and whimpering.

I rebooted it and immediately selected a new file. When I selected the file, the game skipped the opening monologue by Tera and the database outside. Scratch Cat was placed right inside the editor. Creepier still, Kaj didn't say anything either. I tried to ignore it and played anyway. However I also noticed that there was no music, just dead silence. There weren't even any Gobos around to talk to. The only door I could enter was the Hacker Battlefield. The other links wouldn't even respond to my button commands. The Hacker Battlefield's picture was just Kaj and 0101001. The mission select menu came up, and yet another weird detail was present. Instead of "Big Hacked Data on the Summit", the mission was called "YOU ARE DAMNED". I have no idea what drove me to press A, but I did. The level seemed normal. Everything was how I remembered it. I thought I could finally enjoy my favorite childhood game, but then I saw him. Mario. I was absolutely shocked. He was never in this game. His model wasn't even a Scratch Cat palette swap. He looked like a completely original model. Mario just stood there until I tried to approach him.

He started running at unexpected speeds. I followed suit and went through the level. Strange things happened as I pursued him. Each time I picked up a block, the enemies and music would get slower, and the scenery would look darker in color and more morbid. It kept gradually getting worse until I collected a 5th block. Then, the music just stopped. The enemies laid down on the ground like they were dead. I was seriously freaked out, but I kept chasing Mario. I went up the hill. No cannon balls rolled down trying to knock me over. I really wasn't surprised at this point. Mario was always just out of my sight as I ran. Once I reached the summit, I saw yet another object out of place. A small cottage was all that was seen on the top of the hill. Mario was nowhere to be found. The cottage was certainly odd-looking for a Scratch Cat game. It was old, plain, and broken down. Regardless of my fears at that moment, I had Scratch Cat enter the cottage. As soon as the door closed. A disturbing picture of a hanged Mario immediately popped up along with a very frightening scare chord. It sounded like a violin screech accompanied by loud piano banging. Scratch Cat laughed maniacally for roughly 5 minutes, then the screen irised-out. I turned the game off, but 10 seconds later it came back on. I returned to the castle. Scratch Cat just slumped out of the painting. The image switched from the Lethal Lava Land portrait to the image of Mario hanging himself. The room was different this time. It was now a small hallway. Gobos with blank expressions and white robes lined the sides of the hallway. There was another painting at the opposite end that just completely and utterly scared me. It was a picture of my family It wasn't even a photo from the time *Scratch Cat 64* was released. It was a very, very recent photo. I remembered posing for it last weekend. I reached for the on/off switch on the N64. There was no way I was going to play this anymore. However, when I flipped the switch, the game was still on. I flipped it back and forth, but to no avail. I tried unplugging the whole system, but it never left the screen. I was even still able to control Scratch Cat. I couldn't just leave it on forever... so I kept playing. I went to the photo of my family, and jumped in. Only one mission was available, of course. This one was called "Run, Don't Walk". I selected the mission. 'Let's-a-go'...

The level started in a flooded hallway with platforms floating on the water. Scratch Cat landed on one of these, and the camera turned to show what was behind. A silent black void was slowly approaching Scratch Cat. It didn't look like anything. It didn't even look like finished graphics. Just a giant, blocky, black blob. I started jumping from platform to platform. With no goal in sight, I kept running, the darkness slowly but surely gaining speed. This kept going on for what felt like hours. I was really doubting there would ever be an end. Scratch Cat was just going in circles. Finally, the black blob/void/thing caught up with Scratch Cat, and enveloped him in darkness. He didn't scream or resist at all. It just consumed him. Scratch Cat fell out of the painting and back into the castle. I lost one of my 3 lives. The room was different now. Some of the Gobos were gone, and the painting looked different. My family and I were in the same positions, but our bodies were partially decomposed. It looked too real to be photo-shopped. It looked more like someone just took our dead bodies and posed them.

Regardless, I jumped into the painting again. Scratch Cat was in a small room. There was still only one mission available. It was called "I'm right here." spelled just like that. I selected the mission and prepared for the worst. Scratch Cat landed in a small, dark room. There no visible way out. The room was empty except for a piano in the corner. I knew what that meant. I was stuck in there with the Mad Piano. I approached it and it started chasing me as always. There was no way to damage it, so I had no choice but to let Scratch Cat take damage. When he lost all his health, the usual death animation didn't happen. Mario just got mauled by the piano. He fell as his blood and guts spilled on the floor, and the camera panned to a top down view of his corpse. A distorted version of the merry-go-round music from Big Boo's Haunt played as the screen slowly transitioned from the in-game shot to a photo-realistic sketch of Scratch Cat's dead body in the same view as the shot. It was very unsettling. I was crying softly as I gazed upon the image, and lost another life.

The photo of my family was shown again. We were even more rotten then before. The view zoomed into the painting, like I was warping again. I was greeted with a shot of the Scratch Editor from the outside. The website was crumbling in ruin. The fields were on fire. The sky was pitch black. Kaj's laugh played on a loop in the background as children mockingly chanted, "You couldn't save her!" This went on for a long time, until, a close-up of Tera's face accompanied by an extremely loud screech interrupted the loop without notice. Tera's mouth was wide open as if she was screaming, and her eyes were empty, black holes. Suddenly, I was back in the hallway as Scratch Cat was once again ejected out of the painting. Now all of the Gobos were gone, and me and my family looked positively repulsive. Maggots were wriggling around in holes in our flesh. Guts were spilling out of our bodies. My dad's eyeball was hanging loose from its socket. It was too much to bear, but something still urged me to trudge on. I jumped into the painting with only one life remaining. This time, there was no name for the mission. Just a blank space where the title would be. I selected the mission, and Scratch Cat landed on a very small island in the middle of the ocean. There was a solitary sign that only read "DIVE." I did just as it said and entered the water.

The ocean was dark and empty. There were no fish. I wasn't even able to see anything in the water besides Scratch Cat. I swam downwards. I kept going for quite some time, yet Scratch Cat never ran out of breath. I counted roughly 10 minutes of swimming until I decided to go back up. Just as I turned Scratch Cat around, it came. A huge, and I mean huge DEATH the Eel came out of nowhere and swallowed Scratch Cat whole. I was dumbfounded. It went by so fast I wasn't even sure what I saw. The Game Over screen didn't show up. All that happened was a fade-out.

The photo of my family and I was shown again. We were plain skeletons now. Once again, it looked very real. I couldn't move the camera at all. It just stayed focused on the picture. I shut off the game and turned it on again. I chose my file, but it just went to the skeleton photo of my family. I tried this about three more times before giving up. I desperately wanted to stop, but some force kept me from walking away. I decided to select the only other saved file. The camera once again focused on the skeleton picture, but this time they were in a different position. As if they were a different family. I shut the game off and ripped it out, unplugged the N64, and destroyed both of the items. After a week, I was taking a walk and suddenly I was going in circles. A giant, blocky, black blob appeared, and I ran, but the darkness consumed me...