Monday, June 16, 2008

My Nomination for the Scariest Video Game Character Ever

There are many scary videogames. There are many scary characters. Some would argue that the zombie dogs, as well as various other creatures and characters, from the Resident Evil games are very scary. Some can’t sleep while thinking of that little girl in F.E.A.R., and some people similarly think that the “Little Sister” character from BioShock is someone to fear (while the heavily armored “Big Daddy” from the same game is mostly laughable). Some people fear anything in the Silent Hill games, and a dear friend of mine thinks that Mario is damn right creepy. But I think that another character from various games in the Mario franchise have them all beat.

Freaking Yoshi. That stupid little dinosaur-thing is one of the creepiest things in the world of videogames. Not because of the stupid voice or silly appearance, but simply because of its outlandish biology.

This thing can eat almost anything, and mostly eats fruits and enemies almost half the size of the whole dinosaur. And it can eat lots and lots of them, without gaining in size at all. Now, that isn’t all that strange in the world of videogames. A lot of video game characters can eat many times their weight with no apparent effects. No, what scares me is what happens to the enemies that it swallows.

In some games you can use Yoshi’s freaky tongue to pull an enemy into your mouth, and then squat down to pop out a damn egg. Somehow it seems like Yoshi’s reproductive system (Yoshi is usually said to be male; did I mention that?) is directly linked to the digestive tract, so that food can be made into eggs. And not just egg shells over the corpses of your newly digested enemies; no, as far as I understand they are actual, functional eggs. At least one game I’ve heard of (though haven’t played) lets you put the eggs in nests to make Yoshi-young from the corpses of the beasts you eat.

That is freaky, and it all goes with an amazing speed too. But Yoshi doesn’t really seem to care much about the eggs though, even though there could be its precious sons and daughters in there. No, Yoshi uses its own eggs as a freaking weapon and throws them at enemies, switches, and whatever else needs to be reached or killed.

I’ve got to go back to killing some zombies or something, in some other game. Games with Yoshi in them scare the crap out of me. That is one freaky dinosaur.