For those of you who didn't notice, yesterday was a snow day. Not necessarily the best timing, would have been better on Monday or Friday, but, we can't choose these things can we? I didn't get as much rest as I wanted, but I did get enough sleep. A full 11:30 to 7:00 block! I WOULD have almost 8 hours but my mom kept waking me up. before 7:15. Grrr.

Level 16/16 in Ninja Gaiden. I've beaten all the bosses and I'm now escaping the underworld / hell / illogically placed volcano in which the emperor, which was really an angel/skull demon, who shot lasers and ate you without any muscle. Yes. That's what happened. In full detail....

After climbing the core tower of Zarkhan (palace of the Emperor of the Vigoor Empire) we find that we must go to the 'Realm of the Fiends' to find 5 seperate waves of bosses. 1st wave, 8 easy units. 2nd wave, an easy boss. 3rd wave, 8 easy units with random explosions added by the "Emperor" of the "Fiend Realm", 4th wave, medium boss, 5th wave, hard boss ("Emperor" of the "Fiend Realm") with random rexplosions AND easy units thrown in. Took me about 6 tries. After obtaining the statue of the demon, I placed it on a pedastal, which opened the gates of hell. Which appear to go upwards, but the entire level is up-side-down, so it doesn't really matter. You climb the stairs, which conveniantly fall apart to make your travel faster. After entering the portal to hell, you land in a field of flowers. Look up, and you discover that a giant angel has the Dark Dragon Blade! You fight the angel floating around on a rock, and dodging these GIGANTIC LAZORZ, as well as the occasional strike from his 'hands'. That boss was probably the easiest one I've ever fought. Next, we face the most ANNOYING boss I've ever fought. The angel falls into the magma pits, which burned all the flowers. *sniff* Out comes a SKULL DEMON. This is really just a pile of glue with skulls attached, with remote controlled planes inside the skulls. I lamed this guy, and just magicked him to death in a matter of 2 minutes. It wasn't SUPPOSED to be that easy, but it was. After destroying this dude, you have NOW REACHED THE LAST LEVEL. Now you have to escape the randomly crumbling underworld / hell / former flower bed. But wait, it gets better! Your supposed beyond-scantily-clad-girlfriend has been RANDOMLY tied by her hand with rope from ABOVE THE PORTAL OF HELL. So after grabbing the Dark Dragon Blade you get to somehow rescue your supposed girlfriend, then magically warp into the overworld? I dunno, I haven't gotten there yet. Should be interesting though.

While the ending may be illogical, it's still a really fun game. Can't wait for that plasma sword. I should beat it today, putting me in under two weeks, and about 40 hours of gameplay. I'm going faster than the official walkthrough-maker at IGN. Once I beat it, I may go through it again to get the 'better' plasma sword, and the Dark Dragon Blade. You can buy the sword which the entire plot centers around in the 13th level. Pretty cool, really. I'll do it the next time on hard, which really should be extremely hard. It's hard enough already, though I've mastered killing any and every (xcept one) normal unit. Bosses, I'm still iffy on, but we'll get there eventually.

Something to note about the IGN review: they played through the game pretty darn fast. They didn't spend any time looking for the golden scarabs (semi-hidden items which you can collect to get items), getting money for more upgrades, or other important stuff like that. That can put in another 10 hours of gameplay, and the experience you get from the jumping off walls, and killing dudes repeatedly is invaluable. Heck, I didn't even get all the side stuff! I should be coming in under 40 hours of gameplay though.