“The president has been kidnapped by ninjas. Are you a bad enough dude to rescue the president?”
This is one of my favorite video game related quotes. It perfectly conveys the sensibilities and priorities of the times: the nation’s nearly paralyzing fear of a sudden uprising of ninja activities, and reliance on streetwise martial artists to save the day.
Taking control of the martial artist of your choice, both equally generic but wearing different colored sleeveless shirts (for maximum badness, no doubt) and inexplicably trained to be exceptionally deadly. So much so that one hit will kill most of the ninjas that will swarm on you.
And swarm they will. The ninjas of the Dragon Ninja clan constantly come at you from every nook, cranny, rock, tree, and they even run up on the side of the semi you’re riding down the freeway. They’re relentless. If you can manage to slog through the piles and piles cookie-cutter, nearly completely ineffectual fodder, you get to fight the stage boss, who will put up more of a challenge. He’ll take several hits to kill off, and is much more maneuverable than our heroes. But you will not be thwarted, you must save the president!
If you can manage to make it through and murder the thousands of ninjas in your way to rescue the president, he shows his gratitude by inviting you to go out with him to get a cheeseburger. The game wraps up with the president holding a cheeseburger and smiling in your general direction, obviously approving of your derring-do. If there’s anything more American, I don’t know what it is.
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