A Frozen Trap
Written by hfactor66
November 15th, 2014
Dear diary,
I recently bought myself a red Game Boy Advance SP off of Amazon, to bring back some childhood memories. I was pleased that the previous owner was a Sonic fan like I was and included the Sonic Advance trilogy with it, and even included the original boxes. I can't wait to play these games again, I remember when I was younger I spent a lot of my free time playing these games, and my parents were always telling me "Eva go outside," or "Eva go do something else." Whenever they made me do something else, as soon as it was done, I went back to playing those games. I'm 17 now, so it'll be different this time. Eager to get started, I opened up the Sonic Advance box picked up the Sonic Advance cartridge, but felt a chill as I held it in between my fingers and dropped it. I put it away, and picked up the Sonic Advance 2 cartridge, and played the game for a few hours. I tried to stay focused, but I couldn't stop thinking about the Sonic Advance cartridge. Why did my fingers get cold when I picked it up? Maybe I'm just being irrational.
November 16th, 2014
Dear diary,
I tried to pick up the Sonic Advance cartridge again, but I was greeted with the same cold feeling I felt yesterday, and put it back down. Now I know something is up with this game, but whatever it is, I'm not going to find out. I went to GameStop today and got a used cartridge of the game from them. No sinister cold feeling this time. After I bought the game, I went home and played it. Late that night, I decided to stay up playing, and found myself enjoying my secret fetish - making Amy stay underwater in Ice Mountain zone. I don't know why, but I seem to enjoy creating these scenarios where Amy is trapped underwater like this.
November 17th, 2014
Dear diary,
This Sonic Advance game that came with the Game Boy is starting to creep me out. The box art changed slightly. Everything looks the same, except Amy's color changed from its traditional pink to an icy blue, her dress instead of red is now blue, and even her eyes are blue.
. (link to box art)
How did that happen? Everything else looks the same, but I'm still baffled by how the box art changed. How can the box art on a game change like this? Was it something I did? I'm probably imagining this, I just need to calm down.
December 1st, 2014
Dear diary,
My curiosity over that game has been killing me the last few weeks. I'm trying to ignore it, but there's something different about that game, something that's egging me on and making me want to play it to find out.
December 7th, 2014
Dear diary,
I can't take it anymore. I'm going to play the game. I have to know what's going on with this game.
-Eva's POV-
For the third time, I picked up the Sonic Advance cartridge, again greeted by the same sinister cold feeling in my fingers, and put it into my Game Boy Advance. I prepared myself for the worst, and turned on my Game Boy. It did the traditional Game Boy Advance boot up, and the opening cutscene of Sonic Advance and the title screen were perfectly normal. Everything was as it should be. Forgetting I haven't played this cartridge, I started a new game as Amy. The game played exactly how it should have, there was nothing odd about it. It was an enjoyable and nostalgic playthrough that really took me back to my childhood.
Then I reached Ice Mountain Zone. It was then I decided to mess around with Amy again and made her stay underwater, enjoying the little scenario I was creating in my head. That is, until the time hit it's max, 9:59.99. Instead of the traditional Time Over, Amy froze in the water. The screen then faded to black, and I restarted at a checkpoint above water.
The time, instead of restarting, stayed at 9:59.99, and Amy's sprite was doing something I had never seen it do before; shiver. She was hugging her arms rubbing them frantically with her hands in a futile attempt to warm up. I made Amy walk right, and she continued to hug her arms. I wanted to get out of this zone so I could make Amy feel warm again. When I reached the water though, instead of walking down into it, Amy slid across the top. It was frozen over, which meant Amy was trapped in the first half of the level. I tried to break the ice with Amy's hammer, but the ice wouldn't break. I led a shivering Amy away from the ice and started to look around the level, or what parts of it I had access to, for any potential ways to try and warm her up. Nothing was standing out though, and Amy was getting colder. She was starting to shiver more violently, and her walk was shaky. I tried interacting with the objects in the level, but nothing would warm her up. After a few more minutes of searching with no success, Amy started to walk slower, and a text box appeared at the bottom of my screen. It read "Amy's legs are starting to feel numb.
I started to feel bad for Amy, she was trapped on a mountain slowly freezing to death with no warmth. I led her to a wall, where she sat down with her back to it curled up, pulling her dress over her legs to try and keep them from numbing. Amy was shivering more violently now. I just sat there and watched her, figuring there was nothing I could do to help her. At this point, I opted to turn off my Game Boy. As I reached for the power switch, another text box appeared at the bottom of my screen, this time saying "please don't leave me! I need your help!" Amy was looking at me with a pleading face, and she looked as though she was about to cry. "It's just a game," I told myself. "It doesn't mean anything." With that I turned the game off.
December 8th, 2014
I decided to play that Sonic Advance cartridge again. Upon starting up my Game Boy however, it took me straight back to Ice Mountain act 1, where Amy was trapped, instead of restarting the game from the title screen. My eyes widened at what I saw. Amy's fur was an icy blue, her dress was a dark blue, and her eyes were blue. I tried to make her move, to no avail. "Amy's legs are numb," another text box said.
All of a sudden, Sonic walked up to Amy, and the time started to count down from 9:59.99. Upon seeing Sonic, Amy instantly threw her arms around Sonic to share his body heat.
"What happened to you Amy? Why are you so cold?" Sonic asked. "I've been trapped here all night," Amy replied, "I'm cold." "Well let's warm you up then," Sonic told her. Amy wrapped her arms more tightly around him and held him close for warmth. Her colors were starting to come back! I watched with delight as Amy grew warm again. When the time hit 0:00.00, Sonic disappeared, and Amy reverted to the icy blue look, except this time she lay motionless by the wall. Amy had been hallucinating those last 10 minutes. The screen slowly faded to black.
Text appeared on screen that read "you killed her." I pressed A, and it took me back to the title screen. Amy was missing. I pressed start and went to start a new game, and once again, Amy wasn't there. She was replaced by a frozen looking sprite of Amy, labeled "frozen by Eva, 12-08-14."
I shrieked in fear and shut the Game Boy off, then pulled the cartridge out of the slot put it back in its box. I noticed Amy was now frozen on the box art, and was missing from the other boxes and cartridges, as if she didn't exist in either of those games. In a panic, I loaded up Sonic Advance 2, and was met with the same frozen Amy, and the same label that read "frozen by Eva, 12-08-14." I didn't even try Sonic Advance 3. I didn't want to. Instead, I took the games out to the garage.
There, I set each cartridge down on the ground and grabbed my brother's metal baseball bat, and smashed each cartridge with it. I then grabbed the shattered remains of the cartridges, and their boxes, and tossed them all in the trash. No one else is going to play that game. I felt like I was forgetting something though… wait! The other Sonic Advance cartridge I bought from GameStop! I ran up to my room, only to discover it was gone. I hope no one finds it. I'm sorry Amy…