"Big bro, what are you doing?"
One-Ear looked on in confusion as Cheng Tian stuck out his butt and searched through the grass by the river like a dog.
After dealing with the Ghost Armor and crossing the river, Cheng Tian had not hurried onward. Instead, he had stayed behind and started doing exactly that.
"I'm looking for an Easter egg."
Without hesitation, Cheng Tian answered without even lifting his head.
Beside Cheng Tian, Ghost Cicada looked expressionless but was actually completely baffled. Still, since Cheng Tian was doing it, Ghost Cicada followed suit and wriggled through the grass.
Though Cheng Tian was only a temporary Trainer, the two had clearly formed a certain bond.
Under the influence of Cheng Tian's "Night Parade of a Hundred Demons," Ghost Cicada had completely said goodbye to its former Ghost Armor template. At this moment, it was a pure Pokemon that had borrowed a template from a proper world setting... it could never go back now~
Though One-Ear and Blood Scab were thoroughly confused, they followed the principle that whatever big bro said went. After a brief moment of thought, they joined the search as well.
After about five minutes, Cheng Tian felt his half-squatting knee bump into some hidden hard object. Immediately afterward, he heard something crash into the grass directly in front of him.
"Damn! There really is one!"
Cheng Tian jogged over and found a red-and-white windmill lying quietly in the grass.
During the NES era, many games included Easter eggs from other already released games by the same company. Usually, finding those Easter eggs required a bit of effort.
Some Easter eggs existed purely to give players extra points, while others had actual functions.
The "Miyachi Windmill" before Cheng Tian, with its red base and white blades, was a functional Easter egg... and a negative one at that!
When it came to mascots of old-school game companies, many people might first think of Nintendo's big-nosed Italian plumber Mario from Super Mario Bros., Kirby, the pink devil from Kirby, or Sega's supersonic hedgehog Sonic from Sonic. Even SNK had a strange fellow most people had never heard of, named "G-Mantle," who wore a "Moon Tuxedo Mask."
But Capcom's mascot was even less well known than SNK's.
It was neither Mega Man from Mega Man nor Ryu and Ken from Street Fighter, but the dangerous and negative Miyachi Windmill before Cheng Tian. Its origin was Mobi-chan, the robot protagonist of the 1986 side-scrolling shooter Side Arms: Hyper Dyne / Super Combined Side Arms.
Obscure as it was, the Miyachi Windmill had appeared as an Easter egg in quite a number of other games from the same company.
It appeared, either as the Miyachi Windmill or Mobi-chan, in the vertical-scrolling shooters Gun Smoke and 1943, the side-scrolling action game Destiny of an Emperor II, the 2D fighter Street Fighter Alpha 2, and the Demon World Village Cheng Tian was currently in.
Capcom had already begun showing its nasty side back then, stuffing negative effects that screwed over players into its Easter eggs...
"Don't touch it. I'm just confirming something, and there's a good chance this thing is a problem. Think of it as another kind of Treasure Chest Monster."
Cheng Tian raised his hand and directly stopped One-Ear and the others from approaching.
After hearing Cheng Tian's final description, One-Ear merely hesitated, but Blood Scab immediately backed away several steps. He stared warily at the windmill, which gave off no dangerous aura whatsoever.
The poor kid had suffered badly at the hands of the Vampire Magician. He probably would not dare casually touch treasure chests for quite some time.
The in-game trigger condition for this Miyachi Windmill was to crouch at the junction of the grass after crossing the third river. It would then immediately appear. Its effect was fatal to uninformed players: picking it up not only gave no benefit, but also instantly reduced the remaining time for the current stage by thirty seconds!
Like the time limit set for the Main Quest, many NES and arcade games came with built-in timers. If players failed to clear the stage within the allotted time, the controlled character would immediately die.
Actually, Cheng Tian had only stopped because it was on the way. He had just cleared three waves of Ghost Armor and temporarily had no enemies to deal with, so he had stayed out of curiosity to give it a try.
The main reason, however, lay in one of the Dungeon Modifiers.
[Authentic Flavor -- While conforming to certain real-world laws, highly restores the scene construction and relevant settings of the original source material.]
Since it was highly restored, would Easter eggs in the game that required special methods to trigger also be recreated within the dungeon?
Now Cheng Tian had confirmed it. Yes, the Easter eggs would be restored as well.
Though they were most likely one-time only, the fact that Easter eggs could be restored was already very telling.
By now, Cheng Tian and the others had reached roughly the middle of the first stage of Demon World Village. There were five Easter eggs in this stage in total, three of which were concentrated in the first half they had already passed through.
However, even after confirming the existence of Easter eggs, Cheng Tian had no intention of retracing his steps.
On one hand, Cheng Tian had just eaten and drunk his fill, gained Ghost Cicada's help, and worked off his meal by dealing with Ghost Armor. He was bursting with energy, and he wanted to save all of it for the stage boss. Going back and forth would not only waste extra time, but might also lead to new enemies.
On the other hand, those Easter eggs included both good and bad ones, but none that could immediately turn into Combat Power.
If there was time left after defeating the boss, he could return and trigger them then. Or he could simply wait until next time, when he was fully prepared and brought a map into the dedicated dungeon.
As for the Miyachi Windmill before him, Cheng Tian also planned to pick it up only if there was still time after the boss.
If touching it took effect immediately and deducted several hours from his Main Quest time, that would be truly unreasonable.
Besides, Cheng Tian had a somewhat suicidal idea... he wanted to see whether he could use an Easter egg to exploit a game bug.
The negative Miyachi Windmill in the game deducted thirty seconds. When the timer reached zero, the Arthur controlled by the Player would die on the spot.
But if the Player picked up this negative windmill with less than thirty seconds remaining, the timer would immediately hit zero, yet the Player could continue playing. The current stage would also no longer have a time limit.
At the same time, however, the Knight Armor on the Player would become effectively useless. Once an enemy touched him, he would die instantly and turn into a pile of white bones even while armored, instead of having his armor burst apart and leaving him in nothing but underwear.
Still, even courting death had to follow basic principles.
First, finish the proper business. Then come back and court death.
Leading two men and one bug around the Miyachi Windmill, Cheng Tian's steps visibly became lighter.
Before you continue