My family was going on a trip that I wasn't interested in, I've been to Kentucky so many times and there wasn't much to do there except for visiting relatives. I had the house to myself for the week and I was thrilled about it. During my family's vacation, I decided it was a great time to clean my room since there wasn't anybody around.
While I was busy cleaning my room, I found a precious treasure that I lost long ago. It was my copy of Wario Land 3 for the Gameboy Color. I finished cleaning my room and picked the game up and inserted it into the Gamecube Player. Upon starting, I erased my old save file and began a new game. Wario ended up crashing his plane and then discovering the music box that then proceeded to transport Wario into the music box world.
After Wario was taken to The Temple, the Hidden Figure showed up. At the time I was playing, I noticed Wario was shaking his head as if he was in shame or discouraged due to his predicament. I wasn't aware this was different because I hadn't played the game in a while. I only began to get a little suspicious when the Hidden Figure talked to Wario.
Hidden Figure: "Welcome, It's good to see that you're here to help. I think you know the drill, find all of the music boxes and I'll help you escape this world. Now go and crush those who stand in your way! That's an order! "
The Hidden Figure's dialogue made it clear that he had evil intentions. I didn't remember him making it obvious that he was going to be the antagionist. I've been away from the game for so long that I couldn't remember all of the text entirely. I shrugged it off, he was probably this way when I played the game as a kid as well.
Besides that weird beginning, I played through the game and enjoyed it. Wario Land 3 was amazing like I was hoping for it to be. I noticed how difficult the enemies and bosses were, they seemed to be more of a challenge than I remembered. I don't remember all of the supposed differences, but here are the one's I do remember.
Spearhead: Even when Wario was far away from them, they would stay alert and be on guard. I had trouble attacking them from behind and had to jump on them and then charge to deal with these guys.
Fire Roboto: He moved at a faster speed and would barely give Wario any time to react.
Brrr Bear: Sometimes, they would spit multiple ice rocks at Wario. This made them more annoying than usual.
Robo-Mouse: This was the enemy that had the biggest difference to him. When I met this thing in The Stagnant Swamp, I ended up getting caught by it and getting a game over. I've never been caught by this thing before in past playthroughs and I thought only the final boss could do this.
Red Fish: When I was playing through the Big Bridge level, These enemies immediately sprang out of the water without peeking their heads out. You had to know where these things were placed in order to get past them.
Now for the bosses.
Wormwould: Similar to Brr Bear, sometimes he would spit out multiple rocks at once.
Wolfenboss: Throughout the entire fight, the spike ball he shoots out would try and follow you. This would usually happen after you delivered the second blow, but this time it happened from the beginning.
Shoot: This boss fight was a soccer match where you had to jump on him in order to make him into a ball. He could do the same for you and you were required to hit him into the net about three times. During my fight with him in the game, he only had to shoot me into the net once in order to win.
Scowler: He was a pushover, but moved slightly faster.
As you can imagine, the enemies were relentless were determined to put an end to Wario's Quest. That didn't stop me from breezing through the game however, and I only got stuck on some of the areas. It only took me a couple of days to find all of the music boxes and I was finally able to take on the last boss. I entered The Temple again and spoke to The Hidden Figure, this is where shit hit the fan.
The Hidden Figure laughed in his dialogue and began his transformation into Rudy, the main antagonist of the game and the one who tricked Wario into releasing him. I finally noticed that things were off when he spoke.
Rudy: "So you came back, You knew this was going to happen, yet you continued to slaughter the people I cursed. This time, there won't be any second chances. Your repeated mistake will not go unpunished."
Rudy attacked me and I tried my best to defeat him, but sadly I ended up getting caught in his hands. Rudy did his laugh when I got caught and I thought I was going to get another chance to take him down, but instead, he spoke to me again.
Rudy: "What was all of this for? For Amusement? For the treasure? Did you really think you could defeat me again? I've learned your tricks and now you've doomed this world, it is mine now! Humans are indeed foolish."
Rudy as he appears in the game.
Rudy squeezed Wario as tightly as he could by closing his hand. I watched as he slammed Wario into the ground multiple times before i finally the game off. I didn't want to see a childhood icon go down like that and I knew this wasn't part of the game's programming. I can only be thankful that I stumbled upon this horror and not some little kid.
I still own the cartridge, but it's nothing special considering I've never been able to get that event to trigger again. I still enjoy Wario Land 3 to this day, but every once in a while, I have nightmares of Rudy torturing the people inside the music box, and taunting me on my failure to stop him.