NOTE: This is based of the creepypasta "Pikmin: Crash Landing" at the SomeOrdinaryGamers Wiki.
Hello. I haven't told anyone about this yet, but I decided it is best to do so, as this issue can continue to intervene with my recent family struggles and depression.
It was a pleasant day in June of 2013 when I decided I should obtain a new GameCube, as mine had been sold to a game dealer in exchange for a new Wii, and I wanted to take my mind off family problems, which had just begun at the time. My parents were in the middle of a decision pertaining to divorce, my grandfather died, and I just recently broke up with my girlfriend, all of which contributed to my relatively downbeat state. That's when I thought that I would try to relive my past in some way by getting the console. In addition, I wanted to buy the game Pikmin as well (I gave away all my games after trading in my GameCube), since it was one of my favorite games of all time, and Pikmin 3 was recently announced, so I figured it would be best if I got the original game to get a "back to basics" kind of feeling to get myself ready for the new game. I decided to visit Joe's Video Games, a store that sells old and new video games alike. Once I had arrived, Joe greeted me with a smile, as he was a really nice person. I searched the area with the GameCube games and found a copy of Pikmin. Then, I walked over to Joe and said that I would like to buy the game. He said it would be $9.99. I asked "Do you have any GameCubes?" He replied "Unfortunately, these 'GameCubes' sold out pretty quickly - but lucky for you, we still have one available, and even better - it's in mint condition." I asked how much it costed and he said"$89.99, since it's 'new' and all." I gave him $100 and he handed over the GameCube, the Pikmin game, and change, saying "Have a nice day!" as I left.
When I got home, I set up my GameCube, inserted the Pikmin disc and turned the console on. I grew extremely giddy as the GameCube logo appeared on the screen, which then cut to the main menu. I eagerly selected play and watched the opening cutscene. Everything was normal until towards the end of the cutscene when Olimar crash landed and saw the Red Pikmin pod. That's when I saw a black Pikmin peeking out of the forest. It didn't resemble any other type of Pikmin, being entirely black and having yellow eyes. There was one problem with this, though: I didn't remember this Pikmin type being part of the game! I assumed it was just a "newer edition" of the game with the new species added in. I continued to play the game, with no signs of the mysterious creature. When the evening came, I started to go back to the ship when I saw another Black Pikmin peer at my squadron from the landscape for a few seconds before it disappeared back into the forest. I kept wondering what it was, but still thought of the game as a renewed version and moved toward the ship once again. When I got to the ship, I felt uneasy, as if someone or something was watching. The ship flew off and I saw it again: a Black Pikmin standing there, looking up at the ship.
After this, I shut off the GameCube for the day. When I arrived at the Forest of Hope the next day, I still had the feeling from last night as if someone was watching me, but I shrugged it off as me just being paranoid. As I entered the forest, I could see 2 more Black Pikmin observing our ship from nearby ledges. Afterwards, I went to work and collected ship parts for the day. It wasn't until sunset came when I noticed that some of my Pikmin would act nervous, freeze in place, and sometimes flee back to the base and enter the Onion themselves. What was going on? I then thought of the Black Pikmin, thought that there might have been something more about them I didn't know. At the end of the day cutscene, I could see 5 of them chasing down the Red Bulborb that came to eat Pikmin at night. This left me feeling even more worried as I went to sleep.
After waking up once again, I decided to continue playing this strange edition of Pikmin. Things were going good until during my second-to-last day in the Forest of Hope, where the Bulborb didn't show up in the night as usual. Then, on my next day, I discovered something horrifying: in a pool was the rotting corpse of the Bulborb from before, complete with Sheargrubs scavenging the remains. I didn't even think about what had happened as I hurriedly collected the last ship part in the area. Then, as I was moving towards the base, I swore I could see a Black Pikmin following me for a split second. After the day was done, I wondered what had happened to the Bulborb. Something told me that the Black Pikmin had something to do with that, but I wasn't completely sure.
I woke up, did my morning routines, played Pikmin, you know the drill. Another huge discovery was made today. While walking in the "fire abyss" of the Forest Navel, the craziest thing happened. A Black Pikmin jumped out from the abyss. And then another. And then around 10 more or so appeared and started following the others. What I noticed when I followed these beings was that they were completely unaffected by fire AND water, which meant they would become a brilliant asset to my team! Unfortunately, my whistle wouldn't work on them. After more time spent coming after the Black Pikmin, the whole place just turned pitch black and sounds of violence could be heard. After a brief moment of silence with a shocked reaction from me, the place brightened...but I was in the spot where the Black Pikmin leaped out. I thought "What hell of a sequence was that!?". The Black Pikmin returned...presumably carrying the answers. There were much more this time, and they were all carrying the dead bodies of enemies. Shearwigs, the Breadbug, Puffstool, even the Beady Long-Legs! (which disappears when it's defeated, so how can it have remains?) Then, still holding the corpses, they went back into the abyss. When there were none left, I could faintly hear the violent noises from the blackout, but with a seemingly creepier tone than when it was last heard. After that day in the Navel, I made some more progress, with no sign of the creatures except on the final day there. All of my Pikmin dashed to their onions at sunset and went inside. A single Black Pikmin could be seen watching me as I took off in my ship. Then, the Day Results menu appeared, but there was a different option at the bottom of the screen, "Enemies Killed". The kill count was 38, which was all of the enemies that lived in the Forest Navel! My mind then flashed back to the Black Pikmin taking the corpses into the abyss. I was thankful that all of the foes were defeated by them, but the dead Bulborb in the FOH made me think otherwise. Next, I went to sleep, but as I closed my eyes, I briefly saw a pair of yellow eyes appear at my window.
That turned out just to be a dream, as I was awake and sweating from the nightmare I just had. Then, you guessed it - Pikmin time! I ended up heading to the Distant Spring, only to find out it was completely deserted. On the plus side, this meant that I could retrieve the ship parts easier, and I did so in about 2-3 days. I still wondered what could have happened to the area to leave it empty like that. Also, during my stay there, my Pikmin all went inside their Onions at the 10-second countdown, but they did it for not one, but ALL 3 days. Were the Black Pikmin that huge of a threat? Sure, they helped us by defeating enemies in the past, but does that actually guarantee that they are good? Once my moment of pondering was done, I went back to the previous areas out of curiosity. Forest Navel: Empty. Forest of Hope: Deserted. Impact Site: Devoid of all living beings. And when I reached the Final Trial, the Emperor Bulblax was not there! Luckily that meant a free Secret Safe for me, but worse thoughts floating in my head. Stranger yet was that once I collected the final part, the ending cutscene showed, but as Olimar was taking off, he decided not to, stating "No. I will not leave yet. There is a much larger threat in this planet, and I am out to stop it." He jumped out of the ship and gathered his Pikmin. Then, the screen faded into the level selection, but it was night and the meteor shower when you unlock the Final Trial was there, too. However, one thing struck me as odd; most of the levels were not even present on the map. I had no choice but to visit the last remaining stage: The Distant Spring.
When I arrived at the area, it was not only deserted, but dark, as well. The day meter had also disappeared. I decided to wander around to see if I found something interesting--which I did. It was the Smoky Progg's egg, which I did not hatch on the previous days. Its presence was unexplained because it was day 17 and the egg couldn't spawn after day 15. I decided that I wanted to fight the boss anyway. 100 Red Pikmin were gathered from their Onion, and those that were not flowers were turned into them. Next, I punched the egg with Olimar alone, and it soon hatched into Smoky Progg. I readied my Pikmin as the beast advanced towards base, but something made it stop in its tracks, pause its movement, stare directly. It lay frozen just inches from the Yellow Onion for quite a few minutes. Suddenly, all my Reds entered the Onion, and then I saw what the boss was so afraid of. A group of 75 or so Black Pikmin were running up from behind Smoky Progg, seemingly ready to attack. I was sure that it wouldn't be defeated, because the smoke/poison kills all Pikmin (except whites), right? My answer came as they latched onto the creature for a while. Then, they ripped Smoky Progg into shreds! Unbelievable. These odd Pikmin just killed the boss that would normally harm them all. And to top off the matter, you could see something bleed out of the creature as it burst into flames - a black, sticky substance which I assumed was its blood.
Then, the Black Pikmin turned to the Onions, which they dismantled, and all while I could hear the Pikmin inside screaming. The death screams were normal, but were much louder as if hundreds of voices were crying out, and no ghosts were left behind. They also managed to blow up the S.S. Dolphin, rendering me unable to leave and leaving me no choice but to evade them for as long as possible. I quickly sprinted to the edge of the map, hoping to find safety from the hostile beings. Out of nowhere, 12 Black Pikmin bounded from the trees and began circling around Olimar, who had no means of escape. Unlike the others, which were either leaves or buds, these had flowers, which were the color silver. The circle eventually began spinning more quickly and moving closer to Olimar, who was trembling on his knees, weeping at the sight of his allies turning on him. Then, he said his first and only spoken line in the game, which wasn't pretty:
"NO, WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME!? NO!!! NO, GOD, PLEASE NO, DON'T HARM ME..."
The last line was cut off when the Black Pikmin finally reached him. The scene cut to black as gruesome sounds of bloodshed were heard. The screen returned, and it showed the Black Pickmin laughing and staring at the screen while holding Olimar's severed head, though oddly enough no blood was present. I was disgusted and creeped out by what had just happened. Those Black Pikmin were murderous killing-machines. They killed the enemies in the Forest Navel, as well as Smoky Progg, my Pikmin, and Olimar, and could infer that they slaughtered the end-of-day Bulborb and all the other foes, even the final boss! I tried to shut off my GameCube, but something was stopping me from doing so. It was like I was being pulled in a trance, but I knew right there and then that something made me move closer to the screen all while the disembodied head and the silver flowers stared. Then, the screen faded into black once more. Olimar's Journal for the day popped up. What follows is an extremely long entry, which makes sense since Olimar was in a hurry and hadn't written about the Black Pikmin yet, and a gruesome reminder of the hostile Pikmin species:
"I have not told anyone about this yet, but I need to. 2 or so weeks ago, when I discovered Red Pikmin, it felt as something was watching me. I soon found out the source of this uneasiness: Black Pikmin. They were unlike anything I have seen before, with dark bodies, yellow eyes, and silver-colored flowers for the ones that had them. More data kept being discovered about them as the days went by: they often hid in foliage or watched from a distance, dangerous wildlife seemed to be afraid of them, and they wouldn't come under my control if I tried to whistle them. One day, I somehow encountered a rotting corpse of a Spotty Bulborb. This gave me further notes to add to the mysteries of these creatures. Once at the Forest Navel, many Black Pikmin jumped from an abyss and marched in a line, where I noticed that they were invulnerable to hazards that would normally damage other species of Pikmin. Then, a blackout occurred, and I found myself standing myself in the same spot where I first saw them leaping! The Black Pikmin came back with the bodies of all of the enemies, and went back into the abyss. I realized there that this species can potentially be lethal, as they wiped out the entire population of an area. Later on, I stopped finding the organisms that were once spread out across the lands. This did mean my ship parts were going to be collected rather easily! Once I went to leave to Hocotate, however, I decided to bring back the peace and natural order of this planet by eliminating the alien species. I traveled to a watery area with an egg which hatched into a dark green ovular beast with red eyes that emitted poisonous gas and targeted my base. It paused for a second before a massive group of the Black Pikmin tore it to shreds. Soon, they killed off my entire squadron of Pikmin, leaving me unable to defend! I ran into a rocky corner, where I now hide and hope this horrible day never repeats itself, and I see them... I don't have much time left. I'm sorry I'm unable to come back alive. Goodbye.
seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive. seize and survive."
Seize and survive...I wonder what that meant. I had no time to think as my GameCube made a loud, high-pitched buzzing noise and shut off. Were the Black Pikmin really that game-breaking? Then I remembered it all. The bulborb....the enemies...Smoky Progg, Olimar and his Pikmin...they seized them all, and ate them to survive. There must have been some way that they could mercilessly devour creatures (leaving corpses or not trace at all), and make more of themselves. I forgot about the experience and stored the disc in my attic, leaving it there for evidence in case something really bad happened. As time passed and the game remained there, my parents got back together, but I still couldn't find a new partner to start a relationship with. At least what mattered is that I was considerably more content with my life from when I first bought the game. Then, about a month later, as I was playing other games I bought for my console (which still works fine), I swore I could spot wide yellow eyes staring at me from the distance...