26. Wonder Momo

(Arcade/PC Engine/Virtual Console, Namco, 1987)
Did you have to put on stage shows at your school? I'm sure you did, I myself was repeatedly forced to construct, paint and wear the world's flimsiest, cheap-ass costumes in order to pretend I was a thundercloud, Shem from Noah's Ark or a Happy Hungarian Hunter. Once, I played the owner of a marionette show who played a flute to make my puppets dance, the harlequin puppet had a girlfriend and there was some other puppet who wanted her, so he jealously stabbed the harlequin to death. At the end, the harlequin's ghost came back for vengeance.
Indeed, my junior school was dark.

Wonder Momo also puts on stage shows. Momo's shows however have far less fatal stabbings and far more panty-shots than any I starred in. Basically, the player controls Momo as she fights off hordes of creepy looking mutants with a physics defying high-kick. After much brawling, she gains her super-powers and becomes the armour clad "Wonder Momo" which allows her the use of the terrifying "Wonder hoop" to defeat some boss or other nasty creature.

Here's the kicker though: this is all a theatrical play. the action takes place on a small stage (The Namco theatre, no less) with a badly painted backdrop and a sparse audience in the foreground watching the action. Momo entertains with the story of her super-hero battles as she is cheered on by the headband wearing onlookers. In a beautifully perverse twist, When Wonder Momo falls down, you can see her panties, some sweaty-ass guy with a camera runs along the stage constantly and Momo must be careful that this dirty nonce doesn't get a Kodak moment of Momo's momo. Should this happen, Momo becomes incapacitated with embarrasment for a short period.

The game simply plays through the show's various scenes while increasing in difficulty. In between rounds, the curtain drops to reveal various pictures of Momo. For a girl who is shy about getting her photo taken, she doesn't appear to mind having a giant half-naked image of herself emblazoned on stage. Girls have such damn twisted logic.

Wonder Momo is an ok game, it rises above its generic gameplay by having a great concept, cutesy art and voice samples and nice presentation. Momo is a cool character who has since made cameos in various games. Like Time Gal's Reika, Momo is a fun and sassy anime heroine whose failure to get her own game since is mind boggling.
Maybe she's still too traumatised by her paparazzi ruined fifteen minutes of fame.
The paparazzi, they kill princesses and crush the dreams of 80's anime girls.

Anyway, I'm off to the Namco theatre, I've got tickets for Splatterhouse: The Musical.
Jack-6's spoken word show was sold out.