Excitement runs over me as I stare at the invitation in my hands. It reads "Team Ninja invites you to a sneak preview of Ninja Gaiden 2". The weeks until the event pass in seemingly minutes and before I know it, I'm at the event. The crowd is in the hundreds, so it seems as though the invitation is not as exclusive as I thought.

The screen that is showcasing the game is the largest screen I've ever seen. After waiting in line seemingly forever, I get the chance to play the game. My Ninja Gaiden skills seem better than ever. I dispatch enemies left and right. After playing for about fifteen minutes, I decide it's time to pass on the controller to someone else. To my surprise, as soon as I set down the controller a group of intimidating men come out from the sides of the auditorium. They start tying people's hands together with plastic restraints and kick them into a stream that runs through the building. It carries them outside the auditorium to a destination unknown.

I go to grab my fiance's hand and try to escape, but it's too late and she's been captured and screams for me as she flows down the stream. Fury fills my lungs as I scream out to the captors to free her. No sooner do I do this though and I too find the plastic cuffs around my wrists and a foot in my back, kicking me into the watery travel way. I float along the stream for seemingly forever until we arrive at a large Temco owned building. Inside, the stream eventually disappears into a velvet curtained room. Instinctually knowing that no good can be on the other side, I muster all my strength to break my restraints. I climb out of the stream and set out to find out who has done this and to stop them.

After a maze of hallways, I eventually end up in a very large training room. At the front of the room is a podium where a ninja barks orders at a crowd made up of captives from the Ninja Gaiden 2 event. They all seem in a zombie like trance and they repeat what this instructor says, word for word. It seems fairly obvious that some sort of brainwashing is at hand. I see my fiance high up on one of the bleachers, in the same vegetative state as the others. I run up the bleachers to try and reach her.

No sooner do I start this climb though, than the instructor yells out "GET HIM!" I punch and kick my way to my fiance, but to my horror, when I reach her, she to is trying to fight me. As more and more surround me, I realize that this tactic isn't going to save anyone. I force my way out of the large training room and head backstage. Once I get back there, I see Tomnobu Itagaki himself. I ask him what is going on. He states that they are making a new generation of ninjas for Team Ninja. More loyal, in greater numbers and harder workers. He hopes that these new ninjas will help propel Team Ninja into the number one game developer in the world.

"I like your games, and I used to like you, but I can't allow you to do this!" A ninja sword materializes in my hand. Created by my own will and determination to stop this. Itagaki looks at the blade and laughs as he transforms his body into a twenty foot yellow giant with a TV for a head. Just like a boss battle in Ninja Gaiden, it isn't easy, but after I figure out Itagaki's pattern, I dispatch him. But my victory rings hollow as I realize that even without a commander, the brainwashed ninjas are still not back to normal.

Depression and anger fill my entire being as I realize that I'll never again kiss my fiance's cheek, never again spend time with her that doesn't involve a battle to the death. I try to will this world out of existence. I scream to the heavens at the injustice of it all. Then almost as if my wish is realized, I awaken in my bed. To my right is my fiance and she most assuredly doesn't seem like a brainwashed ninja. I put my loving arm around her and thank whoever is responsible for making the real world so much cooler than the one I dreamed up. Though through it all, I still can't help but wish that I actually did get to try Ninja Gaiden 2.