The Official Generic Video Game Quest String
by Prue
Hey, game developers! Lost your plans for a quest string in your new RPG/action game? No worries, we found the perfect solution. Just use our Official Generic Video Game Quest String and get back to designing more dungeon levels and congenitally retarded characters who need to be escorted somewhere at approximate speed of a tranquilized sloth.
Mr. Lord General Commander Awesome: Welcome, soldier/adventurer/rookie! I am your mentor/commanding officer/biggest kingpin in the area. Please ignore my twitchiness and shifty eyes. I’m sure they’re not relevant at all to the next several hours of your time. I’m glad that you’ve come to me, and yet, I don’t know yet whether you can be trusted with the important work I have for you. I know! Why don’t you do something to earn a teeny bit of respect with me? I know that I’ll think much higher of you if you follow the game instructions and travel a short distance to talk to someone else. I promise to reward you moderately for this. Now be off with you.
*****
Mr. Short Distance Away: Ah, so Lord General Commander Awesome sent you. Hmmmm. Did you notice the twitching and shifty eyes? Really? Well, ignore them, they’re meaningless. He has psoriasis, you know. It’s good to know that they’ve sent someone to do our meaningless errands. I’ve been so bogged down in work lately—what with sitting here and sometimes walking in a small circle—that I can’t get everything done. I tell you what. If you can take this unimportant item back to Lord General Commander Awesome, I would really appreciate it. I know he is technically standing about 500 yards away from me, but I can’t really be bothered to go that far. I just like walking in this circle and that’s it. Thanks.
*****
Mr. Lord General Commander Awesome: Ah, you have now proved your worth to me by doing a minor errand that could be accomplished by a moderately intelligent 6 year-old. I see that I can trust you with slightly bigger things. Nothing too crazy though—we don’t want to throw too much at you all at once, or you might decide that you’ve gotten all that you can out of this game and go outside or start playing Madden or something instead. No, we’re going to parcel the fun out in carefully measured doses, like a crack dealer—just enough to enjoy, but not enough to kill you. So maybe not like a crack dealer after all.
Anyway, as you can see I don’t like to go anywhere or do anything for myself. So please run all over the place collecting these 6 hookers/ammo pouches/sparkling toadflowers and bring them back to me. To keep it interesting, I’ll make sure you are occasionally attacked by low level enemies—but nothing too intense.
*****
Mr. Lord General Commander Awesome: So you have successfully returned from getting more stuff for me. Excellent. Please give me a second while I finish conferring with this shady character here. Thank you.
Your outstanding ability at running around doing errands for me has proven that I can trust you completely. So could you do me a favor and go find Mr. Obviously Bad Guy? He’ll probably try to kill you, so don’t be a moron about it or anything—or if you are a moron, maybe go get a strategy guide about now. Please be aware that the firing system/fighting mechanism on this game is unimproved from an earlier version, so you may occasionally find yourself facing the wrong way or trying to kill the wrong person. Don’t blame me—I’m not the one who wanted to move the release up to make the Christmas rush.
Oh—and please don’t listen to anything he might say about me. He’s really obviously bad, remember?
*****
Mr. Lord General Commander Awesome: So you have returned from killing Obviously Bad Guy. Good. You shall be richly rewarded.
But wait . . . you seem to have learned about my nefarious traitorous plot from him. I suppose this just goes to show that you never know when the untrustworthy person to whom you confided your plan is going to stab you in the back. I suppose that you’re going to try and kill me now. Be my guest, but you should know that as soon as you attack me, a bunch of henchmen are going to materialize out of thin air and jump you. Also, even if you do manage to get close to killing me, the fight will stop and I will make a miraculous getaway. Don’t worry though, you’ll see me again after about 30 more hours of gameplay, at which time I’ll monologue for a good five minutes about how this was all part of my plan. See you then.