The Secret Aquarium (Super Mario 64)
The rest of this list isn’t going to be quite as in your face as animal abuse, but if you’re anything like me, you may still be crippled with the existential crises on display. Also if you’re anything like me, you’re free this Saturday and want to meet up to watch Goof Troop. Just saying. I’ll bring paninis.
Jolly Roger Bay is one of the spookier Mario 64 levels, tasking you to dive into a deep lagoon and come face to face with Unagi the Eel. If you’re fluent in Japanese, you’ll know that that means Eel the Eel, which is redundant and silly and redundant.
However, the room containing its entrance holds another mystery, courtesy of a small hole in the wall. Should Mario venture through this hole, he’ll be transported to the secret aquarium, home to one of the castle’s secret stars.
Getting that star is no particular challenge, as the plentiful coins act as oxygen and the only audience is a school of fish minding their own business.
But… why is this secret aquarium a thing? How did you go from the castle grounds into this tower with no discernible exit? There’s no way for Mario to surface, so if he exhausts his coin supplies before grabbing the power star, he’ll drown.
Can you shatter the windows to free yourself from your watery prison? It doesn’t look like it, and even if you could, the aquarium is suspended somewhere up in the clouds. Taken out of gaming context, this is a cruel fate for anyone who makes the innocent mistake of exploring suspicious holes in the wall.
What if a carpenter saw that hole? They’d be inclined to check it out, maybe see if they could patch it up, only to be teleported to a watery grave. How many tradespeople has Princess Peach killed with her witchcraft? Are those fish actually the imprisoned souls of all who ran afoul of the secret aquarium?
The answer is most definitely yes. Please adjust your creepypastas accordingly.
