Back in Whazzap Village the groups sees all of the villagers gathered in front of the giant altar before the statue. The Shaman introduces the so-called herald of Mu, Budicus, which is as expected just Bud in some kind of priest's gown. The villagers start bowing down to him and he says that he finds everything to be good before helping himself to some of the food that's been piled up. Geo and co. are left flabbergasted at the sight, and we have to go over to the Shaman to explain what's going on. The Shaman finds their claims that Budicus is really Bud Bison ridiculous, claiming that normal people don't simply fall out of the sky and that as Mu's herald Budicus will lead Whazzap into a golden age. Bud for his part continues to ignore his friends, and according to Omega he hasn't been taken over by an EM being either. The kids retreat to the Whazzap Lines to come up with a plan that'll enable them to speak with Bud directly, and they decide on making his favorite dish in order to lure him away: ginger beef. Zack, for some reason only known to him, brought some ginger with him already but nothing else, which dictates a scavenger hunt for the remaining ingredients.
We need onions, rice, eggs, and of course beef. Beef we steal from the offerings at the altar, rice can be gotten from an old woman who's using it as like confetti for Budicus (I know there's supposed to be a term for this, but I've forgotten what), and there're some wild onions growing in the village. That leaves the eggs, which we have to snatch from a bird nest up on the Whazzap Lines cliffs, which is only approachable via wave road, giving us a chance to explore the Wave World here, because in the future even primitive villages are wired for wifi. Right off the bat we can enter an ES that's coming out of a rock in the village for a Mega Class + 1 ability. In the village proper there's a security door that only opens if you have at least 600 Link Power. Notably it's impossible to open unless you have a real Brother, because otherwise the in-game total tops out at five-hundred if you include the Auto-Brother. The prize behind the door? The ultimate Mega Weapon in the game, Star Force Power. I'm going to have to make due with the Kaiser Knuckle. On the maze-like wave road of the Whazzap Lines is a Merchant Hertz:
- HP Memory 20 – 5000z
- HP Memory 20 – 9000z
- HP Memory 20 – 14000z
- Wood Grenade – 5000z
- Double Stone – 6000z
- Typhoon Dance – 9000z
- Atomic Mine 1 – 10000z
- Anti-Sword – 20000z
There's also a security system disguised as a dragonfly fossil with an ES we can access for an HP Memory 10, a Blank Card, and a Merchant Hertz with the Rapid-Fire Claw Mega Weapon for sale.
With those ingredients in the pack we can return to Luna, who'll give us a Matter Wave cooking machine named Eat-O-Matic, who's just a palette swap of the eating machine from Grizzly Peak. No cooking minigames to play here, the scene just cuts to nightfall when the group puts their plan into action by laying out the bowl full of ginger beef (it looks vaguely like a ramen dish to me) and letting its aroma do the rest. Bud eventually wanders over drawn by the smell of his favorite food, but he still doesn't react to his friends when they come over, though he complains about the “bruise on my head” starting to ache at the sight of them. Good ol' amnesia is the culprit behind his odd behavior. The Shaman walks over to the group to lead him back to the village for a feast being thrown in his honor, and when the kids try to convince him to let their friend go the Shaman isn't too concerned with that happening. The smell of Whazzap's trademark spare ribs draws Bud back to the village, leaving Geo and co. out of luck. Since Luna refuses to go home without Bud the group's camping overnight in a Matter Wave tent. I wonder if Geo thought to tell Hope that he would be out camping for a day or two before leaving this morning...
The next morning the group's awoken by a commotion that's coming from the village. They're holding another festival, in celebration of the day that the Shaman makes “Budicus” the village's leader. As Geo is wondering what they can possibly do the air starts shaking again and another black hole opens up in the sky. Solo finally makes another appearance, once again descending in an overly-dramatic beam of light. He immediately calls Bud a fraud of a herald and says he'll pay for disrespecting Mu (speaking of, the statue's designed in such a way as to resemble both Bud and Solo). Bud of course shouts for help but the villagers do jack shit other than panic so of course it's up to Geo to save the day. This time though he's smart enough to tell Luna and Zack to stay back first.
One of the wave roads conveniently leads right up to the stage where Bud and Solo are and Mr. Onesie Pajamas is first startled to see Megaman but immediately catches himself and demands the OOPArt in exchange for going easy on Bud. Geo of course has none of that so Solo Wave Changes and, since like before Geo's turned into a chump for most of this scene, knocks him to the ground in a single flash of light, and precedes to explain that the reason why his wave form is called Rogue is because he does as he pleases and doesn't rely on anyone. Unlike Whazzap, here the localization perfectly conveys the meaning of his original name, Burai.
But, he insists that he works alone, but what about the fact that he's clearly working with Vega, otherwise he wouldn't have bothered showing up here. I would like to give the writers the benefit of the doubt and assume that this hypocritical aspect of Solo's character was intended to be deliberate but since the game never acknowledges this (Geo certainly doesn't!) I can't. Instead of trying to build a character arc around Solo, all he does is just spew his misanthropic philosophy whenever he shows up, and whenever he's proven to be wrong (through battle because Geo can barely mount a counter-argument that goes beyond “No, you're wrong!”) he just plugs his ears and shuts his eyes in denial. He is more tolerable in the third game due to a lack of screentime in comparison to here and better quality of writing, but even there it feels like the writers had no idea what to do with him.
Anyway, he declares to the absent Hollow whether he believes that they're truly evenly matched now and then goes on to punch out Bud. Geo, still suffering from the Wuss Ball thrown his way, shouts for Rogue to leave him alone and manages to flare up with the Zerker aura again. Rogue asks if he'll really risk being destroyed by the OOPArt to save his friend (apparently the game forgot about the Queen Ophiuca scenario) and Geo retorts that he'll tear him apart if he lays another finger on his friends. Seeing that his adversary has regrown his pair, Rogue declares that he'll make all the bonds and friends that he holds dear disappear.
Rogue
HP: 800
Element: Normal
Attacks:
- Rogue Arts – Rogue attacks Geo with a series of punches and ends with a flipkick that deals 20 damage per hit.
- Rogue Burst – Rogue fires off a two-column-wide shockwave for 30 damage.
- Rogue Knuckle – Rogue randomly fires a volley of energy fists down the field for 50 damage per hit.
Rogue's talk in the cutscene about holding back before was obviously complete bullshit because he's exactly the same.
Solo is forced out of his wave form. Omega urges Geo to finish him but before he can (not that he would anyway) Hollow appears to retrieve Solo. Apparently that display just changed his mind because he flat-out tells our little misanthrope that he's too weak to defeat Megaman. Hollow leaves just as soon as he arrives with Solo in tow, not even bothering to speak to Geo.
After that interlude we jump forward another day. Bud's apparently still out cold, but Zack says that he has a plan in mind. The Shaman is lamenting the fate of Whazzap's supposed savior when our crew strolls in and sets what's left of the ginger beef down on the ground by Bud's unconscious form and Zack's plan seems to be to have Luna strike a pose and try to rouse him by uh, pretending to be his mom? A hot chick? While trying to coax him awake by saying she cooked his favorite ginger beef. Without Whazzap's chefs running interference with their ribs, this does the trick and Bud leaps to his feet, stomach growling and memory restored. A quick fade to black later and he's back in his regular outfit, graciously apologizing for the trouble he put the others through, and thanking Geo for his efforts. Just like with Luna, his Brotherband strengthens and its Link Power goes up to eighty. That puts me at an even three-hundred, I believe.
But plot twist! The Shaman wasn't just an old, ignorant, unenlightened coot, he knew all along that “Budicus” was an amnesiac fraud! He tells Bud that he still can't leave since he's supposed to be the village's ruler, and his response is pretty much “yeah uh, thanks for the food but I'm leaving now.” So the Shaman calls for help, claiming that Budicus has gone out of control and must be stopped. Cue a scene of our heroes being Chased by Angry Natives until Geo gets an idea. After Wave Changing we must approach the Shaman, who spills that his plan is to use Bud as a figurehead to rally the village behind so that Whazzap can grow more influential. By this point the Shaman realizes that Megaman's left hand is actually a talking dog's head, making him pretty much the only character in the series to remark on this. As you can imagine it unsettles him, and Omega plays along, claiming to be an ancient monster called “Eatzitup” that is said to have driven Whazzap to the brink of starvation in the distant past. The Shaman passes out in fright, distracting the villagers enough to allow our heroes to escape unmolested...
...but first we have to go back to the Whazzap Lines to dematerialize the tent because I don't know. Zack materializes a freakin' Matter Wave car (though it looks more like a Star Wars airspeeder) so that he, Luna, and Bud can return to the airfield that they arrived here at while Geo's gonna be taking the Sky Wave again.
Once we've cleared out and left the village in a panic we see the Shaman grumbling to himself over getting tricked and bemoaning that Whazzap will never know prosperity now. But a voice says that Whazzap still has a chance to prosper and Hyde appears out of thin air by the Sky Wave access point (I actually like that touch). He initially ignores the Shaman to gloat over Solo's failure before introducing himself to the Shaman and saying that he's here to pass on the legacy of Mu. He proves it by summoning the EM being Condor, which the Shaman recognizes from the bird pictograph. Hyde promises that the legacy of Mu will cause Whazzap to prosper and offers to hand over an Ancient Star Carrier in return for Mu's supposed location. The Shaman reluctantly reveals that it's to the east according to their texts (Ancient Mu is actually theorized to be in the Pacific Ocean) so Hyde hands his artifact over.
The Shaman immediately Wave Changes into Terra Condor
◊ and right away declares that he'll be the ruler of Whazzap, not a phony. As Hyde starts laughing himself silly our new boss flies off into the air. What could he possibly be up to, I just can't imagine.
Virus Listing
- Moaian
- These immobile moai statues attack by rolling their heads down the field, randomly bouncing from column to column.
- Matjinn
- This virus family floats around on magic carpets and attacks by literally rolling them out to greet you. The carpet rolls cover two adjacent columns and change panel type. Matjinns create grass while stronger versions can create ice and poison.
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