Cuteness Battered, Vanishes

For this week's game post, I move out of the dim early '90s, and into the less dim early 2000s, to look at a game from my Gamecube collection. I have to admit, the Gamecube kind of disappointed me, all things considered. Maybe it was the games I bought (I'm sure that was part of it), or that I rarely had anybody around to take advantage of the party game abilities of the system. Who knows. Either way, this is one of my older games, and I still enjoy it. Or a part of it at least. The game in question? Sonic Adventure 2: Battle! That title seems like it's worded out of order. Not my fault though.

It's a pretty standard Sonic game: deals with Chaos Emeralds (of course), has Robotnik as the bad guy (when the hell did they start calling him "Eggman"? He uses robots for his plans of conquest, that's why "Robotnik" worked! Eggman is some twit Hank Pym outsmarted!), you run around collecting rings, yadda yadda. Nothing at all Internet-shattering about it. The part that actually caught my interest was the Chao world.

During the game, you can break open certain blue boxes and find a key. At the end of the level (provided you found the key), you're transported to the Chao World. Initially, you enter a peaceful field, with a couple of fruit trees, set next to a waterfall. There are two eggs there. The eggs will eventually hatch, and those are the Chao. You can name them, send them to kindergarten, have them compete in races and karate tournaments, where they can win toys as prizes. To help them get stronger, you collect things in the levels of the game, either different-colored vials from robots you destroy, or cute little animals scattered throughout the levels. Depending on what you get, you can increase their ability to swim, fly, run, or climb. The only way to increase stamina is through them eating fruit. They can be leveled all the way up to 99th.

Additionally, the Chao can be Hero, Dark, or Neutral. I had a Dark Chao once, I've forgotten it's name, but it was a great way for me to relieve stress. See, one of the ways to make a Chao Dark is to mistreat them (conversely, treating a Chao well will tend to make it a Hero. At some point, I came back from class angry, and sent Knuckles into the Chao World, selected one of the Chao, and bopped it around for about fifteen minutes, while roommate Papafred looked on in horror and amusement. Pretty soon, that little fellow turned Dark. I grant you it was a pretty crappy move on my part, but I felt a lot better afterwards. See, reactionary authority figures, video games prevent real-world violence, rather than promote it, because they serve as a safe outlet for one's frustrations!

That's about the only time I relished sending a Chao to the Dark side, because really, they look so pitful when they get up after you punched them, it's almost impossible not to feel horribly bad about it. I mean, they win races and karate championships, bringing greater glory to you, their owner/older friend/whatever the hell the relationship is, hurting them shouldn't be fun. And it's always sad to lose one.

Oh yes, the Chao can die. I had one, possibly the second one that ever hatched, by the name of Cheng (the name was given by a Chao Fortune Teller, but you can also choose your own names). Cheng had won every race, every tournament,been leveled up to 99 on everything, except Stamina. Since he had to eat fruit to gain stamina, and had to be hungry for that, you had to stay in the Chao World long enough for them to get hungry. So I started turning the game on, entering the Chao World, then letting the game run while I went to class. Except one day, Cheng wasn't there when I got back. I looked all over, even checked the other Chao Gardens on the off chance the game had glitched and moved him there, but nothing. Cheng was gone. All the potential for future good times, lost. All I had left were the memories of how good a swimmer he was, even with no legs and wearing an eggshell over his head.

Sniff, I'm sorry, it's getting a little dusty in here, I've got to go. Good night.