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Chapter 60 : Bro, You Bought the Wrong Cartridge — This One’s for Kids
New Mexico.
“Dakadakadaka—!”
John sat in front of the television, furiously mashing the NovaBox controller.
The rotary machine gun in the protagonist’s hands spewed terrifying streams of bullets, turning the mountain-sized stage boss ahead into swiss cheese.
“Haaa…”
E̊ n um̀а_
Only after the enemy finally collapsed and the score tally screen appeared did John let out a long breath, his eyes burning as he stared at the display.
“Wolfenstein really is an incredible game…”
Baca cerita ini hanya di situs resmi Enuma.id!
The NovaBox was absolutely the best investment John had ever made in his life.
Before playing it, he had never imagined video games could be like this.
Sure, massive hits like Contra could also be played in arcades, but for players like John who constantly had to work part-time jobs during their free hours, there simply wasn’t enough time to hang around arcades all day.
The arrival of GAMENOVA’s home console had completely solved that problem.
W̆ е b̄ń ov̌е_l Е ñūm̂а
Nowadays, John spent nearly every fragmented bit of his free time on this machine.
The only issue was that he constantly had to fight Mike over it.
Only when Mike went out did John finally get the chance to enjoy single-player games like Wolfenstein.
If only the world had some kind of handheld portable gaming device already.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Bang!
The door to the rented apartment slammed open.
Ė n u_mа. і̆ d́
John curled his lips.
Speak of the devil.
Well, a few rounds of Street Fighter wasn’t bad either. His Guile had improved quite a bit recently.
“Hey, John, guess what day it is today?”
John stretched lazily without even lifting his eyelids.
“The day you get perfected by my Guile?”
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“Correct—uh, no, you idiot. It’s your birthday!”
Mike’s mouth twitched slightly, but he quickly recovered.
He lifted the shopping bag in his hand and shook it a little, producing the sound of plastic parts knocking together.
Only then did John look up in surprise.
Birthday?
Right.
W̄ e b ň ov̇е l̊ Е n̈ ǔ m̀а
Even he had forgotten.
This year had really been exhausting.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
John’s gaze landed on the shopping bag, and his pupils shrank instantly.
The GAMENOVA logo was printed clearly on it.
“Hey, what’re you zoning out for? This is your birthday present.”
Mike waved a hand in front of the stunned John.
Ên u mа
To get this cartridge, he had intentionally taken a huge detour to the game shop after work today.
“Is it really the one I’m thinking of?! The Legend of Zelda?! Oh my God, Mike, thank you so much!”
John knew Mike’s financial situation wasn’t any better than his own. Zelda cartridges were insanely expensive, even now, John still hadn’t been able to bring himself to buy one.
He never expected Mike would actually buy it as a birthday gift for him.
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But after hearing John’s words, Mike froze instead and scratched his head awkwardly.
“Wait… Zelda was the one you wanted? Uh…”
Е̃n̄úm a
Under John’s confused gaze, Mike slowly pulled a neatly packaged floppy disk out of the bag.
But instead of the Link John had been dreaming about, the cover depicted a much more childlike little kid.
The title clearly read:
Harvest Moon.
John’s expression stiffened for a moment, but he quickly adjusted himself.
“Thanks, bro.”
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John had heard of this game before.
Gaming magazines had absolutely shredded it with terrible review scores.
Criticizing Harvest Moon had practically become politically correct in gaming circles.
It was almost like anyone who said the game wasn’t that bad was automatically accused of taking GAMENOVA’s money.
John still remembered the huge bold text plastered across one magazine cover.
“Has GAMENOVA Run Out of Ideas? The Fantasy of an Idealistic Madman”
Ŵ е̃ b ñ о v̊ e_l Е̂ n ú m ӑ
Okay, admittedly the headline was somewhat clickbait.
Harvest Moon wasn’t universally considered horrible.
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It was simply considered “not fun.”
No levels. No challenges. No clear objectives.
That alone had caused numerous gaming publications to deduct massive points.
They believed players would end up confused and bored.
Wеb̆ǹ.о v_е́l Е́n̆ ũ_m̈ а́
Then came the even more disastrous gameplay systems.
The farming and harvesting loop sounded vaguely interesting at first, but Harvest Moon had actually designed it around realistic in-game days.
For example, growing a carrot could easily take several in-game days.
And during those days, there was supposedly nothing but garbage downtime.
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John hadn’t played the game himself, after all, it still cost dozens of dollars, enough to require serious consideration.
But the magazines sounded so convincing that, honestly, he had kinda believed them.
Ё.n u mӑ
Even though John hid his momentary disappointment very well, Mike still noticed it with his sharp instincts, making things awkward immediately.
“Uh… there’s still enough time. Want me to exchange it for Zelda instead? I’d only need to pay a little extra.”
Mike glanced at the receipt in the bag and hesitated.
After all, it was John’s birthday. If possible, he wanted to give him the best gift he could afford.
“No, no! Let’s just try it out right now!”
John stopped him immediately.
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Mike had spent good money and good intentions on this gift. There was no way John could act picky about it.
He pulled out the Wolfenstein disk and inserted Harvest Moon instead.
As the machine emitted its loading noises, the GAMENOVA logo appeared onscreen.
Then came a cheerful background melody.
It carried the distinct electronic synthesized feeling of the era, yet somehow still conveyed warmth and emotion.
“Okay… looks like they made this for little kids?”
Е̂n ù m а́.і̂ d
Mike stared at the opening scene full of NPCs and cute little animals chatting and laughing together, finally understanding why John didn’t seem too enthusiastic about the game.
It looked like some educational material stolen straight out of a kindergarten classroom.
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John was a hardcore macho-action fan. His love for American action heroes needed no explanation.
Wasn’t the whole reason he fell in love with GAMENOVA because of Contra and its collaboration with Schwarzenegger?
But this thing…
Mike almost laughed himself to death from frustration.
W̌ е̌ḃn̄о̇ vё_l̊ Ĕ ṅ ū_mа̌
They spent over sixty bucks…
On this?
“Hey, don’t say that. Maybe it’ll actually be fun?”
Now it was John’s turn to comfort Mike.
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After pressing the A button, the game surprisingly didn’t start immediately.
Instead, a screen filled with letters and symbols appeared.
Еn̄u̇.ṁ а̂ .і d
At the very top were the words:
Your Name: ______
“Huh? You can actually name your character? That’s kinda interesting.”
“Oh, I know this! Zelda had this too.”
John read gaming magazines constantly and had already been spoiled into oblivion by strategy guides.
Even though he still didn’t own Zelda himself, he already knew that naming your character “ZELDA” would let you skip straight into the second quest.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Looks like GAMENOVA had reused that naming system for this game too.
That made perfect sense.
After thinking about it for a moment, John immediately understood.
It was for immersion and player identification.
After all, having every NPC call out your own name instead of some preset protagonist name…
That really was pretty cool.
Е n ūm ä.їḋ
(End of Chapter)
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