You either have to not think about it, or simply accept that the worlds of Final Fantasy are, even within their own narrative, even within their own universe, incredibly small. Entire planets the size of Western Europe, with about as many power players and major urban centers (fewer, frankly).
I wonder if they were thinking about this when having FFXI not ever show you an entire world map. Expansions have added additional landmasses, but there's nothing I'm aware of to say that this is all there is to the world. (Though at this point, there's unlikely to be any more... but then I thought that before.)
FFXI also does some of those camera and composition tricks to make things feel bigger than just what you actually see, but it's not perfectly consistent IMO. The home cities and Jeuno are pretty good, but some of the outlying areas seem a lot smaller than they ought to be, particularly Kazham.
And then there's Adoulin, where someone apparently said "what if we tried making the city realistically large", and no one managed to stop them in time.
Also I cut it for space but there was a screenshot of Yuffie before boarding the Ropeway saying "I have no sympathy for Barret, he never should have trusted Shinra" which, wow, kid, that's harsh.
I'm not too sure of this. It's too irregular compared to what you see around Midgar, and it's not centered on the reactor. (In fact, it doesn't even contain the reactor, if I'm understanding the geography correctly.)
(Not real sold on the idea that Shinra created/is in direct control of the Gold Saucer either. It just doesn't seem like their style.)
The name 'Cait Sith' has been used for Coeurl-variant enemies before, as well as for one Esper in the previous game, though not one that had any story role.
Cait Sith declares that, as a fortune teller, having that kind of vague, unclear prediction hanging around is going to bug him; and he'll never be able to relax if he doesn't see how it's resolved, so he's coming with us.
So, yeah, as a teenager-or-so who'd already more or less developed my favorites in the cast, I didn't have much time for this guy. But as an adult with nominally more refined taste, I can appreciate a scene where a fortune teller is annoyed at the quality of their own predictions.
This part of the sequence is a headscratcher for me. The rest of the game kind of gives the impression that people with gun arms are, if not ubiquitous, not that unusual. But then all of a sudden it's rare enough that this detail alone is enough to condemn them?
Now, the fact that we have to win the race or else we can't advance the plot could be a problem… If actually playing through the race wasn't a sucker's bet. As I have mentioned before, on the Automatic setting, the Chocobo just handles the race on its own, and it's strong enough to win it. So the best way to win the race is to just… Not do anything at all.
I think the strategy guide I was using must have explained this a lot better, because I actually enjoyed this and didn't have much trouble winning. (And I don't think I was using the infinite sprinting cheat.)
I don't think I read this quite the way you did, but it's still a bit janky.
Just like the other minigames, the game is going to force you to keep trying until you beat it. But the game isn't really going to acknowledge that it took you multiple tries either. First time every time, as the saying goes. So of course the story is going to be based on you winning. And at that point, Ester's behavior kind of makes sense? Obviously she can't give you the letter until after you finish the race, win or lose...
But wait, the letter is written with the knowledge that you won. And since you won the first time you raced...
There's only one conclusion I can come to - Dio actually gave Ester two letters, one for if you won and one for if you lost. This is the most absurd possible conclusion, thus the most appropriate for him, Dio, to do.
Bugenhagen, who was listening in, approaches and asks if Red truly can't forgive his father, and Red says that of course - after all, his father abandoned his mother to die. When the "Gi tribe" attacked, he ran away, leaving the Canyon to fend for itself.
I kind of wonder about the Gi. Where did they come from? Why did they attack Cosmo Canyon? Would just doing a frontal assault really not have worked for them?
As for the whole business with Nanaki's history, my headcanon based on what's been shown in this thread is that he actually came up with that whole "my father's a coward" business himself based on having incomplete information, and never actually mentioned it in front of anyone until now, so Bugenhagen didn't know he needed to be set straight before.
On the other hand, official sources sometimes come up with some pretty janky stuff. You've got to give yourself the leeway to reject stupid stuff regardless of the source.
Swilvane, home of the Sylphs, is unacceptable and I will die on this hill.
I've never been sure what the hell the point of this was. Not only has Shinra not generally been that concerned about covering up their atrocities, this is one they could genuinely point to and say "That? Not our idea."
Notice how 'Jenova' is written not just on the doorway, but also on that large pipe running above the room, a cable which splits off into smaller pipes feeding into the tubes?
So, part of the back end at my old job was divided into two levels, and there was a large pipe slightly above head height running through it at one point.
It is one of my few regrets from that job that I never printed "JENOVA" on a piece of paper and stuck it up there.
HP Plus is a bit of a double edged sword as I understand it, since it makes you more durable but also slows down how fast you get limit breaks.
Although since you've got your team hopped up on goofballsinjecting themselves with Superadine using SAFE and LEGAL combat stims, the effect probably isn't too noticeable at this point.
This is 'Rocket Town', so named for what it was built around (which, incidentally, indicates that the town came after the rocket, rather than the other way around), only the rocket is rusted and covered in moss, and the metal scaffolding around it is damaged and broken.
The game actually does a fake out where the rocket starts to power up and lifts off, then the engines turn off and it lands back on the launch pad, which I'm pretty sure would fuck up a real rocket something fierce,
And the fact that the Materia is gone gives it an edge of challenge, although one that has to be brief to not overstay its welcome, as the Materia being gone also means that, uh, all the mechanical depth of the game is gone beyond "Attack "and "Limit Breaks."
This is one of those things that is really hard to get right IMO. Not having your mechanics just feels bad. Ar tonelico 2 has a sequence that stands out as particularly awful, because the way it plays out they can't have any mechanical difficulty because even more of your tools are disabled than the example here... but one of the two characters you've got is actually supposed to be good with a sword, so I'm not convinced it really had to be that way.
I'm not sure. I think even with a bit more mechanical variation between characters, six can sort of start feeling like too much. The game's gotta give you a reason it's worth switching characters, especially when shuffling materia around is as much of a pain as it can be. And with Cid it's like, we've come this far, why should I give this asshole party time over people I actually like?
This is why Mana Khemia still stands as one of my favorite RPG systems; they made switching characters mid-battle a dynamic and interesting part of the combat system. (Though it also means things feel a bit anemic until you get more than three characters...)
At least those seem to connect to things on both ends! (Even if what they connect to is "more belts".) Those... -things- Rufus has are just hanging there!
I've never been sure what the hell the point of this was. Not only has Shinra not generally been that concerned about covering up their atrocities, this is one they could genuinely point to and say "That? Not our idea."
I actually think that's the point. See, if you look at Corel, they can say "it was an accident, couldn't do anything about that"; that's fine, no one's culpable. People who know the truth, on the other hand, know that "Shinra will just kill you if you're in the way", which also works for them - it's incentive not to get in their way, and makes a point of how they can do whatever they want (I'm sure Rufus would appreciate that), that they have absolute control.
On the other hand, "the supersoldier we created escaped our control and went genocidal against our wishes" is the exact opposite of that; it sends the message that Shinra is not in control, that they're just as powerless in front of Sephiroth as everybody else. And that is unacceptable to them. They'd rather go to extremes and rewrite history to hide it, rather than admit that their power stands on such an easily broken pedestal.
Do you think that might work as headcanon for you?
I've rewritten this several times, so as to not sound entirely deranged or worse, stating the obvious.
I'll try to explain it the best I can, but the Midgar-> Junon -> Gold Saucer -> Corel Prison -> Cosmo Canyon -> Rocket Town -> Wutai sequence, to me, is Exhibit No. 1 in the argument that FFVII is just a 48 episode anime in JRPG clothing. Everything about the pacing feels like it could be broken up into one, two, or three part 30 minute episodes. The party wanders into some visually distinct locale, meets 1-2 kooky characters with a problem, advances exactly one major and one minor plot point relating to either the main plot or a characters backstory, then leaves. Each location they visit has some sort of new genre twist (horror, beach episode, comedy, wild west prison fight etc.) and gimmick setpiece to keep viewer's attention.
To be clear, this isn't a complaint at all. It's just driving me nuts thinking about it.
I've rewritten this several times, so as to not sound entirely deranged or worse, stating the obvious.
I'll try to explain it the best I can, but the Midgar-> Junon -> Gold Saucer -> Corel Prison -> Cosmo Canyon -> Rocket Town -> Wutai sequence, to me, is Exhibit No. 1 in the argument that FFVII is just a 48 episode anime in JRPG clothing. Everything about the pacing feels like it could be broken up into one, two, or three part 30 minute episodes. The party wanders into some visually distinct locale, meets 1-2 kooky characters with a problem, advances exactly one major and one minor plot point relating to either the main plot or a characters backstory, then leaves. Each location they visit has some sort of new genre twist (horror, beach episode, comedy, wild west prison fight etc.) and gimmick setpiece to keep viewer's attention.
To be clear, this isn't a complaint at all. It's just driving me nuts thinking about it.
On one hand, what I'm getting from this is how in over 20 years has Square not attempted a FFVII anime, considering it could slot in perfectly and would probably be especially popular during peak FFVII popularity times?
On the other hand, it's not like it's the first Final Fantasy or even JRPG to have a rather episodic nature of things, particularly since FFVII is only just now actually kind of opening up. Like you'd think "we hit the world map, time for exploration" but in reality, FFVII has still been remarkably linear up until the Tiny Bronco is finally giving Omi the option to run off for actual sidequests and fully optional areas.
I've rewritten this several times, so as to not sound entirely deranged or worse, stating the obvious.
I'll try to explain it the best I can, but the Midgar-> Junon -> Gold Saucer -> Corel Prison -> Cosmo Canyon -> Rocket Town -> Wutai sequence, to me, is Exhibit No. 1 in the argument that FFVII is just a 48 episode anime in JRPG clothing. Everything about the pacing feels like it could be broken up into one, two, or three part 30 minute episodes. The party wanders into some visually distinct locale, meets 1-2 kooky characters with a problem, advances exactly one major and one minor plot point relating to either the main plot or a characters backstory, then leaves. Each location they visit has some sort of new genre twist (horror, beach episode, comedy, wild west prison fight etc.) and gimmick setpiece to keep viewer's attention.
To be clear, this isn't a complaint at all. It's just driving me nuts thinking about it.
You're not wrong, but I think this isn't so much specifically like anime as it is anime being one of the many things that tends to employ this sort of formula.
I've never been sure what the hell the point of this was. Not only has Shinra not generally been that concerned about covering up their atrocities, this is one they could genuinely point to and say "That? Not our idea."
They do put in some effort though. Corel Town was 'full of terrorists'. The plate drop was 'the work of Avalanche'.
Nibelheim's a lot more effort than usual, but considering Sephiroth is not just a super-weapon but their propaganda poster-boy, they probably don't want him going crazy and killing a bunch of people with no reason getting out.
They do put in some effort though. Corel Town was 'full of terrorists'. The plate drop was 'the work of Avalanche'.
Nibelheim's a lot more effort than usual, but considering Sephiroth is not just a super-weapon but their propaganda poster-boy, they probably don't want him going crazy and killing a bunch of people with no reason getting out.
ShinRa just did something stupid and short-sighted: "Send out a press release titled 'Terrorists did it, IDK' or something."
ShinRa having to admit one of their terrible ideas was a bad idea: "We have room in the budget to perfectly recreate a small town and staff it with paid actors, right? Our loose cannon bio-weapon never happened. Understood?"
President: "Sure, we can take it out of Urban Planning's budget, no one will mind."
Reeve: "But president, I need those funds to deal with the Corel disaster–"
President: "Hush, Reeve."
Reeve: "..." 😢
Welcome back to Final Fantasy VII, the game which is entering its very special Extreme Yuffie Bullying Episode.
Last time, absolute shitkid Yuffie stole all our Materia and ran, and we chased her all the way to Wutai. Today, it's time to get our precious magic back… And get a tour of Wutai while we're at it.
I really like the composition of this shot, with the use of perspective on the river leading to this tower rising in the distance, with the statues carved into the face of the mountain behind it. It's interesting that FFVII is using Asian architecture as a signifier of cultural difference, of 'remoteness' in contrast to the Western architecture that is used in most of the setting, though. I don't think the games have done this before; even when we see the ninja castle of Eban in IV, it used a Western style of architecture.
Also Wutai is… not very big, is it? Towns in the game don't look large in general, but Wutai is very spread out, doesn't have buildings you can't enter to suggest it's bigger like in Kalm or Nibelheim, and is encroached by vegetation. It's hard to imagine that place being a major power or, really, being able to fight a war against Midgar at all. And sure, they lost, but… Worth to keep in mind, I think.
There's something off about the whole thing, to be honest. Like the fact that these buildings are kind of overloaded with signs advertising whatever's inside them. Of course, I can't read whatever they say, and the information doesn't appear to be anywhere online, but if one of you can read them, hit me up.
Townswoman: "Life is just like a river. It flows from the large ocean of life, and eventually it returns back to it. Wutai is a historical place. There are some very unusual things you should see."
Store owner: "Sorry, but we're entirely sold out now. What's this here? Ah, no… that's uh… …A sample! Yeah, that's it… a sample. Sorry, but why don't you come back later?"
Okay, it's not clear what 'this' is, but I assume he's alluding to the dozens of weapons hanging from every wall in the store that they allegedly can't sell us, and 'sample' is a weird choice of word, but I assume he's saying they're like, display models or replicas. Given their enormous size, which would make them impractical (to people who aren't Cloud), it's possible they're not meant for sale or use but just to show off the craftsmanship of the owner. Or… Just to look cool? Hmm. That's assuming he's being honest, though. He seems very hesitant and kinda shifty in demeanor, like he just made up an excuse on the spot, and why is the store open if they have nothing to sell?
Quite possibly they just don't want to sell to us and they're lying about it, for whatever reason.
Incidentally this is as good a point as any to mention that I'm going to be heavily restricted in my ability to compare the original translation of the game to re-translations in this update; because Wutai is optional content that can be tackled at any time, both of the Let's Plays I'm using to cross-reference the game (Tim Rogers' Let's Mosey for his live commentary on the original Japanese, and a YouTube account called MorayAbyss for the Retranslation mod) have it happen at wildly random time, which means I can't easily find it without diving into a sea of potential spoilers. So there's that.
The Materia store has the same issue as the weapon store; they have no Materia to sell, and in their case there's no weird ambiguity about whether they're lying to us, they give us a little background information - there's no Materia left in Wutai, which they describe as a 'backwoods town' which has little to do with Shinra. Instead, they sell us the normal consumables plus two items called Fire Veil and Swift Bolt, which are consumables that cast Firaga and Thundaga on use. Seeing as we're still Materia-less and those are better spells than we normally have access to, I buy a couple of each in anticipation of a potential boss fight as part of Yuffie's questline.
Also, this store has a chest we can loot. Free stuff! And look, it's something we've never had before - the MP Absorb Materia!
YUFFIIIIIIIIEEEEEEE!!!
Yeah, we get the MP Absorb Materia from the chest and Yuffie instantly drops from the ceiling behind us, steals it and runs.
…
As a random note this is a bit where the narrative of FFVII is kind of undercut by its mechanics. Because Yuffie is a thief. One of her defining traits in the narrative is her obsession with, and skill at, stealing shit, even breaking the fourth wall to do so. But because the gameplay is entirely predicated on Materia being what gives characters access to skills, she can't mechanically be a thief unless you equip her with the Steal Materia. In the same way that Vincent in cutscenes might or might not be able to fly/hover (or at least Batman-drift with his cloak) in cutscenes but not in combat, it feels like there should be some kind of 'class' mechanics? Ah, well.
There's also a bar, which…
The Turks are here!
The Turks are here, and they are on vacation. The moment we talk to her, Elena says this must be fate that brought us together and tells her to be ready to die, which prompts Cloud and the party to split up and go into combat stance… Only for Reno and Rude, who haven't even stood up from their seats, to tell her to sit her ass down, they're not on the job. They came all the way here, "in the middle of nowhere," to take a break from work, and they have no intention to change that just because the second-most wanted group on the planet just wandered in right in front of them.
I like this version of the Turks. The henchmen who are only doing it because it's a job is a fun archetype. It's weird that they killed and replaced the original Turks we were first introduced for the game, but these ones have more potential as fan-favorite antagonists. Why, you might even do a whole spinoff with them as the main characters!
Also one of the other clients has something interesting to say…
Patron: "Hey. Did you hear? There used to be a Water God here in Wutai. They say the Water God was a huge snake! Now we live in a world filled with Mako. Not many people would believe in something like that now… But some in the world, and here in Wutai, still believe. Believe in the scales of the Water God and in Materia that has its power in it."
At this point in the series I feel fairly confident that this is signposting Leviathan as a Summon Materia we can acquire somehow. Lore-wise, though, it's interesting how traditional worship of gods is posited as this old way that's been forgotten even here, in Wutai, in the new age of Mako; between this and the Church in Sector 5, there's a subtle theme of religion having been abandoned, displaced by the modern, materialist mindset embodied by Shinra's new technology.
The barkeep tells us to relax and make ourselves at home, and adds that "these days, Wutai's just able to get by thanks to the tourists;" put a pin in that.
There's also this 'unoccupied' house which is only unoccupied in the sense that there are no humans in it:
It's full of cats. And, as you can see, it's doing an interesting thing where the 'cross-section' lets us see a hidden passage that's not visible to our characters - unfortunately, there is a cat standing on the first step of that stairway-cupboard thing, and Cloud cannot bring himself to shoo away a cat. We'll be back later.
If we head towards that tower lost in the vegetation, we find an additional part of Wutai, which seems to be a kind of 'temple/palace district' of sorts.
Keep an eye on the big bell to the left, it'll be important soon.
Man: "That five-storied pagoda over there is called the Pagoda of the Five Mighty Gods…" Man: "The Five Gods are Power, Speed, Magic, War and Omni. Omni has the best of the others." Man: "For generations, we in Wutai have worshipped Da-chao the Water God." Man: "Legend has it that the village has been protected by Da-chao, the Water God, and the Five Mighty Gods…" Man: "But, in the last battle, we didn't fare so well… I guess our beliefs were only based on legend."
I'm sure those gods' names sound better in Japanese.
But, okay; the traditional religion of Wutai failed them in the war against Shinra, and there was a general crisis of faith afterwards. Makes sense.
We can't enter the temple at this time - or rather, we can, but there's only an empty room and a man who bars us from ascending further as we are not Wutai natives. The house on the right is the home of one Lord Godo, whom I assume to be the local leader, who apparently spends his days sleeping. We can visit him, though it's not very illuminating.
I'm not sure what his weird verbal tic is meant to represent, but he offers us free rest while in town, which is nice. There's also a hidden door in the wall of his house that leads to a chest, so we just rob the nice man without any remorse.
That's a weapon for Red.
As far as the Yuffie plot is going, we have to hunt for her across town; several townsfolks have dialogue that updates based on where she is hiding, which allows us to find her and forces her to run away to her next hiding spot.
Like behind that paper screen.
After a couple of such evasions, we spot a huge stone jar with a lid that is rocking suspiciously. When we interact with it, the party shows a degree of problem-solving initiative I honestly wasn't expecting (for all that it is extremely basic), with Aerith and Tifa splitting up to cover both exits from the area before Cloud goes to punch the jar and scare Yuffie out of it. Yuffie pops out and instantly attempts to run away, but is cornered on all sides.
Looking sheepish, Yuffie says she'll give us back our Materia and tells us to follow her. As the group heads towards her hideout, we cut to the bar, where a bunch of Shinra soldiers say that "HE is here" and that they "finally found him;" the conspicuous emphasis on using only a pronoun and no name telegraphs that the game is trying to fool us into believing that they mean Cloud but they actually mean someone else pretty hard; the Turks insist that they are on vacation and aren't going to get off their asses and do anything, to the shock of the Shinra soldiers, before they tell us that they'll totally get 'him' without their help and headquarters will hear about this.
I guess even mooks have their pride.
Elena is offended by their lax attitude towards their job; Reno tells him that people who sacrifice themselves for their jobs aren't pros, they're just fools, and Elena rejects that attitude and storms out of the room to go hunt 'him' on her own.
Yuffie, doing her best impression of being ashamed and contrite, brings us to a room under her house, where she tells us about her childhood and Wutai.
Yuffie: "Before I was born, Wutai was a lot more crowded and more impressive." Yuffie: You see what it looks like now, right? …Just a tourist trap…" Yuffie: "After the war, we got peace, but we lost something else. Now look at Wutai…" Yuffie: "That's why… If I had lots of Materia I could…" Cloud: "Listen, Yuffie. I don't care about the history of Wutai or your feelings. You've got our Materia and I want it back… now."
HOLY SHIT, CLOUD
SIGMA MALE CLOUD STRIFE DOESN'T CARE ABOUT YOUR TRAGIC BACKSTORY
This is genuinely one of the funniest beats in the game, after Yuffie has reacted to every single tragic backstory so far with the verbal equivalent of the yawn emoji, she attempts the sympathy play on Cloud and he gives her exactly the same treatment she gave everyone else. Fantastic stuff. Absolutely top-tier bullying.
Anyway, Yuffie starts crying (LIKE I BUY THAT) and then tells us that we just have to pull a switch on the back wall and the Materia will be ours; she tells us to flip the left switch, so obviously I pick the right switch, and…
…a giant cage falls from the ceiling and traps Tifa and Aerith.
WHY DOES SHE EVEN HAVE THIS. HOW DID SHE GET THAT MONSTROSITY INSTALLED. DID ALL OF THE MONEY SHE STOLE GO INTO FUCKING HOME ALONE TRAPS?!
Yuffie mocks us and runs away, while giving a weird hint at the Materia's location ("And when you're looking for the Materia, remember you gotta steel it. Heh heh… Steel… steel! Get it?"). I'm not sure whether that's supposed to be a pun with a hidden meaning or just a joke about how the cage she dropped on us is made of steel, but it won't matter either way. We pull the lever again, raising the cage, and go hunting once again.
…
What Cloud cares about aside, Yuffie's story is interesting, though. The explanation for why Wutai is so small, "most of it got blown up in the war," is obvious in retrospect, I just hadn't considered it because there are no scars of war - there are plenty of ruins and rubble elsewhere in the game elsewhere, so they're clearly not adverse to putting them in to signal lost glory, and what we see of Wutai is shiny, well put-together, and surrounded by trees that probably took longer than five years to grow up to this size, so it didn't strike me that we might be looking at the skeleton of a country mostly ravaged by war, but…
…it makes sense, even if it could be presented more clearly. The Wutai that we see is supposed to be a pretty face to put on the broken nation. It was once, most likely, the 'old city,' the citadel, the historical quarter of the city that was Wutai, the one which most avoided damage because the nation had surrendered before troops could reach it. And that historical quarter, they turned into…
A theme park.
That's why it looks so oddly unlike every other modern town in the world. Why every shop is covered in too much signage. Why they don't have Materia - Shinra probably stole it. And the weapon shop owners, they're probably shifty because they're not allowed to make or sell weapons under Shinra rule-by-proxy, except antiquated ones for decorative purposes - overwrought gigantic swords, not guns, like in every other weapons shop in the game. They're not supposed to have magic, weapons, or power - they're just a tourist trap, deliberately kept looking 'exotic', for foreigners to gawk at.
…
There's something to the fact that this Japan/China stand-in was defeated in a war with the Western-looking Shinra and turned into a shadow of its former self, a tourist attraction with its cultural features turned into tourist attractions. Wutai may or may not be an independent nation, but if it is, it's one where Shinra troops are running around like they own the place anyway - not unlike the US in post-WW2 Japan. FFVII is a very political game, and a game whose politics are very easy to treat as nicely universal (who doesn't love environmentalism), as opposed to specifically Japanese. But that would not really be accurate, would it?
…
There's a theme there, spread across the game, about the way Shinra arrives in places with either the seduction of Mako energy and modern technology or the brute force of arms, and then erases these places' identity, subverts them, absorbs them into itself. The now-nameless town that became the Sectors of Midgar; the way every house in Kalm and Nibelheim has been overgrown with Mako infrastructure like parasitic ivy; the way Corel was lured away from its coal-mining ways and destroyed, leaving room for the Gold Saucer; and the way Wutai is only kept as it was (notice how it and Costa del Sol are the only towns we've seen to not have conspicuous, unaesthetic Mako infrastructure all over the place, and they are both towns meant first and foremost to draw people through appearances). Shinra's modernism and technological advancement subverts everything. And it's an interesting observation, but it's also… Where the game might most easily slip into regressive attitudes, into a kind of anti-modernist bend, as we might see in Corel and the game mourning its coal-mining tradition.
Anyway, we head to the temple district, ring the big bell, enter a space downstairs, and find…
…Yuffie being abducted by Ninjas.
As the ninja runs away carrying Yuffie, Cloud steps forward, exclaiming "You!" before we can see anyone; there's a bubble speech of laughter, and then the camera pulls up, revealing the true antagonist of this stage of the game…
…Don Corneo???
Of all people! How did he even get to Wutai? This is like fighting a mob boss in New York and then bumping into him three months later in Tokyo, incredible. Corneo boasts about having now found a new 'chicky, two in fact,' so I guess he's still up to his old bride-stealing ways. He runs off laughing, we pursue, and just as we're about to catch up to him…
…Shinra soldiers barge into the room, revealing that the 'him' they were looking for this whole time was, in fact, Corneo himself.
It's a weird twist; I guess they're still hunting Corneo as revenge for him spilling the beans on the Sector 7 plate collapse? It's an odd thing to hold a cross-continental manhunt about, and the red herring is also completely pointless; the soldiers charge Corneo, who immediately step aside, causing the guard to run into Cloud and initiate combat, so the end result is the same as if they had been looking for Cloud in the first place.
I'll note that, at this stage, we still don't have any Materia. That makes the fight take slightly longer than it otherwise would, but it's ultimately still easy (biggest thing is the soldiers' guns can shoot sleeping gas); it does, however, give Corneo enough time to escape. As we run outside, we then bump into the Turks.
Surprise: the second 'chicky' Corneo boasted of having captured was Elena. She stormed out on Reno and Rude to look for him and capture him, only to be immediately captured; kind of an eye-rolling twist, but whatever. Cloud says he's looking for Corneo too; he has Yuffie, and without Yuffie, we can't get our Materia back (Are you really looking for her only because of the Materia thing? Incredible), and since we're after the same target, Reno offers a truce between us. Of course, they throw in some shit about how we're totally not working together or cooperating or anything, and Cloud agrees that we're definitely not cooperating, it's only a mutual ceasefire, then immediately asks if they know where Corneo went, which is. Y'know.
Cooperating.
Boys, am I right?
Anyway, Corneo left for 'the most obvious place,' which is kind of sort of a riddle, in that it sounds like 'the most obvious place for Corneo to hide,' when it actually means, literally, 'the most obvious place,' as in the one you can't miss from wherever you are in Wutai, ie the giant carved relief of the gods.
Cloud and Reno promise to each other to not do anything that would endanger Elena/Yuffie, then split up to cover ground. We get some really cool shots while exploring the monument, as well as a sick battle background for random encounters.
Until, eventually, we find Corneo, along with his two captives, arranged in… Whatever the hell kind of scenario this is:
He has them… suspended in a cross shape on the eyes of a statue of a god? The religious imagery clash here is fascinating.
Well, I'm not a fan of 'damsel in distress' tropes at the best of times, and it involving Corneo, Mr Sexual Assault Man from Wall Market, makes it worse. Also… How old is Yuffie? Not that it would make it better if she was an adult, but… Oh, and this is the first time Elena has done anything on screen and it's "getting captured…" Look, I get that the scene is meant to be a gross dude being gross, but I could absolutely do without this energy in my life. And every line out of his mouth makes it worse.
Corneo: "Hmm! Delicious… Scrumptious! I think I've just found a new HOBBY! Which shall it be? Hmm… Hmm…" Corneo: [Looking up at Elena] "Should I take… HER?" Elena: "He… Hey, I'm a 'Turk'! You can't get away with this!!" Corneo: [Looking up at Yuffie] "Or… Maybe… HER?" Yuffie: "Oh GAWD! If I knew this was gonna happen, I would've taken those rope lessons more seriously!!
I'm sorry Yuffie, what?
Corneo declares that he's made his choice, and his "companion for the night" will be "the cheerful one," meaning Yuffie, whereupon Yuffie shouts "GROSS-NESS" and tells him not to mess with her, he "doesn't even have Materia." The implication being… that she might be okay with this… if there was Materia at the end of it???
I want out of Corneo's reality warping sleaze field, Jesus.
But at last, the heroes are here.
Bringing Tifa and Aerith along was the right choice, as they immediately start giving Corneo shit for his attitude and and for that trap he made us fall down, and it's time for some payback. Corneo laments that we don't know how much he suffered since he was driven out of Wall Market, and starts telling us about his backstory, immediately being cut off by Tifa saying she doesn't care about any of that and he better let the girls go.
Corneo: "Hmm… You guys are serious. …Good, good. …this time I'm not fooling around either…" Corneo: "Why did you kill my little Aps? I'm gonna make you PLAY with my new pet, so you won't interfere in my search for a bride!" Corneo: "RAPPS– Come here!"
WHERE DOES HE EVEN FIND THOSE THINGS.
No! Seriously! Where does Corneo find these monsters and more importantly, how does he even carry them around!? At least Aps/Abzu was chained in a sewer, probably being tossed meat (and prisoners) every now and then, but where did that thing even come from? Corneo doesn't even seem to have henchmen anymore!
Well, never mind that, boss time.
So, Rapps.
The core difficulty of this fight, as you might expect, is that we have to do it without any Materia. If we had access to our abilities, it would be trivial; Rapps has only 6k HP and has no weaknesses, resistances or immunities, but since all the mechanics of the game are tied to Materia, our own tool kit is highly limited; among other things, I don't know how much HP or what weaknesses Rapps has or doesn't have, because I don't have access to Sense. The boss also has one very powerful move in the form of Aeroga, a Wind-type damage spell that deals around 1,500 damage, enough to kill Tifa or critically injure Cloud or Aerith.
…the animation, while pretty, says less 'terrible hurricane magic' and more 'inexplicably deadly rainbow streamers,' though.
There's an extra difficulty I end up making for myself in this fight without meaning to, which is that the first time I attack to test Rapps's defenses, I miss - and this, with Cloud, Aerith, and Tifa. It's just a stream of bad luck but, the thing is, there are some bosses that are immune to melee attacks, right? The Hundred Gunner and the Bellbottoms, plus probably a couple others, have to be attacked by either Magic, Limit Breaks, or character with long range attacks like Barret, Vincent or Yuffie. And because I happen to have filled my party with melee fighters, and they all whiff their attacks, I conclude that Rapps, who after all is flying, is one such opponent, and become convinced that attacks are completely useless. Which, considering we have no Materia at all, would be a problem!
That's not the case, but it doesn't change the fact that I think this is the case, making more problem for myself.
Fortunately, I also happen to have an entire game's worth of consumables.
Fire Veil and Swift Bolt cast Firaga and Thundaga respectively, while the lesser Fire Fang and Bolt Plume cast Fira and Thundara, and I have plenty of each. Plenty, but not enough; without Materia to boost characters' magic attack rating, these spell items only end up dealing around 200 to 300 damage at most, making progress slow and giving Rapps ample time to poison Aerith with its Scorpion's Tail move - a condition I have no recourse to, as I never thought to purchase any Antidote. As a result, my damage is significantly reduced by the need to lob around Hi-Potion to heal characters one at a time, 500 HP at a time, with no Cure All.
Fortunately, we have a few aces up our sleeves, the strongest of which ends up being a Limit Break I have never used before.
You see, Aerith, at this stage, Aerith has two Level 1 Limit Breaks and one Level 2 Limit Breaks. The way LBs work is that you only have one level 'equipped'; you have access to either LB1s or LB2s, and LB2s are more powerful but take longer to charge. Only in Aerith's case, her only LB2 currently unlocked is Breath of the Earth, which is a party-wide Esuna - it cures status effects. But… I don't need that nearly as much as I do actual healing, so I still have her equipped with LB1s so I can use Healing Wind.
But that does mean she has access to a second Limit Break from her Level 1 LBs, one I've almost never used: Seal Evil. Seal Evil is a party-wide debuff, casting Silence and Stop on all enemies. Because random encounters are mostly (but not universally, see Shinra Mansion) trivial, and bosses have immunities, it's never been much use to me.
Except. As mentioned before. As a boss designed outside the normal paradigm of battle tobe faced without Materia, Rapps has no immunities.
On a wild hunch, I throw Seal Evil at him, and it works. It's not really possible to show this in screenshots, but Rapps's model freezes, becoming completely static in the air, and the party gets multiple turns to unload everything they got into his face.
Cloud's Climhazzard Limit Break remains the strongest tool in our arsenal, dealing over two thousand damage to Rapps.
Before long, however, we've exhausted all our consumable damage items. Rapps's stasis has saved us from his deadly Aeroga attacks, but without spell damage items, the only way I could hurt it would be if he triggered Limit Breaks on Cloud or Tifa. Unless…
Out of desperation, I throw the tool I know won't work: A basic Attack.
…
Well now I just feel like an idiot.
Alright, turns out Rapps wasn't even as hard as I thought it was, I just got real unlucky with my accuracy roll on these first attacks and ended up making some mistaken assumptions. I could have saved myself a few valuable items (as a side-note, while I say he has no immunities because that's what his wiki page is saying, I tried both a Biora item and a Quara item and they both dealt 0 damage).
In the end, not a tough battle, and I wouldn't want to have to keep going through the game without Materia, but it was a fun one-time challenge - and our reward is the Peace Ring, an Accessory which protects against Fury, Sadness, Berserk and Confusion, as well as a whopping 20,000 gil.
I guess we just found a Xanax-dispensing mood monitor. I love the modern age.
Corneo begs us to wait, just wait a moment, then asks, as he did in the Corneo Estate, "Why do you think a bad guy like me would swallow his pride and plead for his life?"
The answer, as before, is "because he's sure to win," and as he delivers it, Corneo triggers some kind of hidden mechanism which causes Elena and Yuffie to… turn upside down?
I'm not clear on the mechanism of what is happening here, but either way, Corneo threatens to push a button and release the girls' restraints, causing them to plummet off the face of Da-Chao and be smashed to the ground.
Our protagonists are in a bind; after all, they promised the Turks no harm would come to Elena! Yuffie is there also.
Corneo throws in a "give me your women too" which I think is asking Tifa and Aerith to surrender themselves to him, which shows that he has zero pattern recognition from the last time he let them close to him, declares that he has the 'last laugh,' only for a voice from off screen to say: "No, that would be us."
Enter the Turks.
Reno says they're going to take care of him "personally" and Corneo waves his remote around, saying he'll take the girls down with him - but in an uncharacteristic display of good planning on the part of the Turks, Reno stepped in full view to draw Corneo's attention so that Rude could sneak up and flank him. He throws a weapon at Corneo, knocking the remote out of his grasp - and the mafia down back over the ledge.
Standing over Corneo, with his foot planted firmly on the fingers that are holding him above the yawning void, Reno delivers the ultimate taunt - the ironic echo.
Reno: "All right, Corneo. This'll be over quick, so listen up. Why do you think we went to all the trouble of teaming up with those guys to get you?" Reno:
"1. Because we're about to die
2. Because we're sure to win
3. Because we're clueless" Corneo: "Two… Number two?" Reno: "All wrong." Corneo: "No! Wait, st-"
[Reno kicks him off the ledge, and Corneo disappears.] Reno: "The correct answer was… Because it's our job."
Oh my god Reno you piece of shit YOU LITERALLY RESISTED DOING YOUR JOB UNTIL THE LAST POSSIBLE SECOND AND ONLY DID IT BECAUSE YOUR TEAMMATE WAS ABDUCTED, HOW DARE YOU TRY TO PLAY THE COLD-BLOODED PROFESSIONAL, YOU LAZY FUCK
God.
Well, let's hope Don Corneo is dead and we never have to deal with him again, I feel greasy just from having had to go through this scene.
Elena is overwhelmed, saying she'd never thought the others would come for her, and Reno tells her gruffly not to act 'so weak', then his phone rings; Shinra is calling the Turks to ask them to find Cloud. Rude asks if that means they're "on," and Reno looks at Cloud and says no - today is their day off.
It's a classic beat, with the strong implication that what started as "Reno is a punch clock villain who won't hunt for Cloud on his day off" mutated by the end into "Reno uses the 'day off' excuse as a face-saving way of letting Cloud go out of acknowledgement that we helped them save Elena and he's grateful, even though he can't say it."
I mean, we would have kicked his ass, but still.
The whole thing really does feel like an anime episode, "the one where the main characters and the quirky miniboss squad have to team up." It's interrupted by Yuffie yelling at people to get her down from that statue, and we move back to her house, where we see Yuffie dart between everyone as she puts the Materia back in their equipment.
Cloud immediately tells her that she got the order of the Materia completely wrong and basically just slammed random Materia into random slots, which she tries to brush it off. Then she turns around and starts monologuing while throwing punches at the air.
Yuffie: "Anyways, that sure was close. No, normally I would kick their butts, Boom, Bang!!" Yuffie: "That Corneo guy's a real pain. I'd rather deal with my dad than with that guy." Yuffie: "You know, some of those Turk guys are pretty good, huh?" Yuffie: "At least, after all that, we got the Materia back." Yuffie: "Now come on everybody, let's continue on our journey…"
At which point Yuffie turns back around.
And finds that EVERYONE JUST LEFT WHILE SHE WAS TALKING.
Incredible stuff.
Bullying Yuffie will never not be funny. Honestly, I am starting to think leaving Wutai for later might be the best option, not for difficulty or balance or pacing reasons, but specifically to maximize the amount of shitkiddery for which all of this is deserved payback.
Yuffie calls out to the group to wait for her, then grabs that MP Absorb Materia she stole from us earlier and runs after us, saying that no matter what we think, she's going with us.
I'm honestly not even sure why, at this point. Perhaps she hopes she'll find a treasure along the way that'll make up for all that Materia she failed to steal from us? Maybe she feels she owes us after we saved her life? Maybe she's starting, just a little, to believe in friendship? We don't know, because no one in the party gives a shit.
Truly the character of all time, 10/10.
And that's the main story portion of Wutai done, at least for now, but we're not done with Wutai yet! Now that we have all our Materia back and can include Yuffie in the party, we can check out more stuff. For instance, what about that weapons store?
Okay, there was no deeper explanation, Yuffie just asked them to lie to us and not sell us anything. Incredible. Now that she's back in the party, they boast to have the finest blades, fresh from the surface, and indeed there's some pretty good stuff in there - weapons that upgrade our attack ratings by 10+ points in one go. This includes the Murasame, a sword meant for Cloud, and I'm immediately interested to see what it looks like in this game, so I grab it along with a selection of weapons for a few other party members.
At least the Materia shop wasn't lying, checking it afterwards they weren't just hiding Materia under the mattress, they genuinely don't have any.
I wonder to what extent our party's Materia could have done anything. Like… I don't think that part of Yuffie's story was a lie. I think she genuinely tried to grab a whole bunch of upgraded Materia and hope that distributing them (okay, selling them at an outrageous cost, more likely), would help Wutai somehow. But even as armed to the teeth as our party is, they're just nine people. They're not that much of a concentration of force, are they? Yuffie was never going to kickstart the Wutai Revolt off the back of three Firas, two Thundaras and a handful of Curas.
…
You might get a pretty solid terrorist cell out of an Enemy Skill Materia loaded with Beta and Big Guard, though. And isn't that where the game started? With a single terrorist cell five people strong, dealing significant damage to the world superpower?
Maybe we've come back full circle and cut off that circle, and spared Yuffie, years from now, the same moral dilemma that now haunts Barret.
If we revisit the cat house, we find that the resident of the bottom step of the stairway has moved, allowing us to climb up and into the secret passage.
And we now have the HP Absorb Materia to go along with the MP Absorb Materia!
Both Materia work in the same way: They are Support Materia that do nothing on their own but which can be paired with another Materia, converting some of the damage dealt by that Materia's related command into HP or MP. So if I pair the Fire Materia to MP Absorb, casting Fira will convert 1% of the damage dealt into MP, and if I pair it with HP Absorb, 10% of the damage dealt will heal the character. Pretty neat!
Alright, we've only got two things left before we're done with Wutai. First off: Now that we have a Wutai native in our group, let's check out the Pagoda of the Gods again.
'Climbing the pagoda,' you say? This is phrased suspiciously like some kind of a trial…
Yuffie: "Yeah!" Man: "Then I, Sacred Gorky, will be your opponent on the first floor!"
[A child runs into the room.] Child: "Yo! They call me Shake! I'll be watchin' your fight with Gorky!" Gorky: "Then, begin!"
[The party steps back; Cloud and the third party member leave the ring, and Yuffie stands inside it opposite Gorky.] Gorky: "Power change!"
…oooookay.
So, that 'Power change!' transformation is interesting! Previously in this game, we didn't have the 'some people can just assume a monster form' the way we had in IV and V, likely due to the game hewing to a more 'grounded' take on its antagonist - people who turn into monsters do so through mad science and Jenova injections, not just through channeling magic, with Vincent standing out as having a monster form he can turn on and off because of mad science. So this immediately marks out what's happening with Gorky as interesting and unique!
We know that this pagoda has five stories, and is linked to the Five Mighty Gods worshipped in Wutai - Power, Speed, Magic, War and Omni. Weird portfolios aside, it seems to stand to reason that each floor of the Pagoda will have one opponent thematically linked to one of the five gods. Either Gorky is one of the five gods (or the beings who were worshipped as gods, whatever their true nature), or he is a priest/worshipper who's learned to assume a special form in emulation of his god of choice?
…as a fight though we're not going to get anywhere today. I wasn't expecting a fight, so I didn't bother equipping Yuffie properly. Gorky has 3,000 HP and a weakness to Wind, but I have no Wind Magic equipped, Yuffie has a paltry 1,300 HP, and Gorky delivers powerful attacks that deal hundreds of damage to her, while she has no Restore Materia equipped. We put up a valiant front but, at several points, Gorky appears to… Completely heal himself? I have no clear explanation, but at a couple of times a message appears saying 'Gorkii's skill power is used up' (incidentally, yes, his name is spelled differently during dialogue and during battle), and then when I check him again he's back at full HP. There's essentially nothing I can do if he has some kind of free heal whose source is opaque to me, and defeat is inevitable.
We are defeated, to Gorky and Shake's disappointment, and told to come back when we are stronger. This makes Yuffie incredibly mad, and she yells at everyone to shut up before storming out.
Well, we'll see about this later. Hopefully the rewards are commensurate to the challenge we're being faced with.
And finally…
…
So, remember the Turtle's Paradise posters? They're those posters that are plastered at various points across the world advertising the Turtle's Paradise, a cool place with drinks and ambiance. The posters are part of a promotional campaign, and we're supposed to collect them all. Well, I don't know if you've noticed, but there's a building in Wutai with a particular feature…
The local bar has a turtle hanging over its entrance.
Checking the board next to it reveals a Turtle's Paradise sign telling us about their awesome new publicity campaign, and all we have to do to get our special reward is find all six posters in the world, read them, and come back here to boast about it!
There's just one problem.
We have missed exactly one of the posters.
And it's back at the Gold Saucer.
…
So of course I head back across the entire winding spawn of the mountains south of Wutai, all the way to the southern tip of the Western Continent, grab the Tiny Bronco, sail halfway across the world, circle around the Corel Desert, find Corel, take the Ropeway, pay THIRTY THOUSAND GODDAMN GIL for a lifetime 'Gold Ticket' pass to the Gold Saucer, and find the poster.
Then I head back, circle around the desert, pick up the Tiny Bronco, sail halfway across the world, cross the winding mountain paths south of Wutai, and head back to the goddamned pub.
It only took me an hour.
But at last! Our reward!
It's a complete set of 'Sources,' these items which permanently increase a character's stats and which I have been hoarding without making use of it - Power Source, Guard Source, Magic Source, Mind Source, Speed Source, and Luck Source, plus a Megalixir on top of it for good measure.
I don't know if it was worth it. But damn if I was going to allow myself to be defeated by this one missing poster.
And that's Wutai done.
(Pending the Pagoda of the Five Gods and Leviathan whom I am certain is in there.)
…
This is a really interesting part of the game, to the point that I'm honestly surprised it is (seemingly?) optional. Granted, it has the vibe of a standalone episode that never gets mentioned again, with the Turks and Avalanche temporarily joining forces, Corneo inexplicably come back to annoy us more, everyone pointedly refusing to acknowledge Yuffie trying to have a character arc…
It's great fun, except for everything that gets on my nerves about Corneo. I don't know if tackling it now was best idea in terms of pacing, but unless difficulty somehow scales with level (and I'm pretty sure it doesn't) it would have been trivial at any later point in the game, but for something that could easily have been obnoxious the 'we've disabled most of the mechanics so you have to use things you never thought about like variant Limit Breaks and consumables' was a nice change of pace, although I feel like I really lucked into the correct team with bringing Aerith on board.
And Wutai as a piece of worldbuilding is fascinating. The… themeparkification of the East Asian stand-in by Western powers is probably one of the more interesting and complicated wrinkles the game has thrown at us so far, thematically speaking. It's also interesting that… How to put it…
It's not the first time (although, in historical order, it would be) that I've seen a Final Fantasy game do "here's our East Asian rep, it's a fusion of both Japan and China;" Final Fantasy XIV does this too. Which… I would make a joke about how if a Western dev did it that would be a wild faux pas, but actually considering the history of 20th century Japanese-Chinese relations that's not necessarily much better. Hmmm.
Well, I'm treading way out of my depth here, so I'll leave it at that. Food for thought.
Anyway, a lot of fun in this update, FF7 at some of its comedic best, Corneo also exists. I'm going to see how much a proper Materia and equipment loadout for solo battling can help Yuffie in tackling Gorky, and then move on, I think.
Thanks for reading!
Next Time: We try to get back on track to the Temple of the Ancients, wherever that is!
No! Seriously! Where does Corneo find these monsters and more importantly, how does he even carry them around!? At least Aps/Abzu was chained in a sewer, probably being tossed meat (and prisoners) every now and then, but where did that thing even come from? Corneo doesn't even seem to have henchmen anymore!
My theory is that he was working with Hojo. He gets the greasy doctor test subjects that won't be missed and the greasy doctor gives him some reject abominations as cheap muscle.
I would say it's weird how Yuffie can just tell people in town what to do and they obey immediately without question and they're all deferential to her in conversation and unusally call her 'Miss' and she somehow has the pull to just hang out in random people's houses and build secret underground lairs, but, uh, Runaway Secret Ninja Princess is absolutely one of the cliches the FF devs are gonna have no hesitation in busting out, right? It feels on-brand and fits the evidence. She even complains about her dad!
And the whole 'look at JapanChina, ruined by the evils of nuclear power and America' thing is very much the vibe I'm getting from this bit, yeah.
Also are the statues in the... Stormblood trailer, I think it is, where they have the martial arts duel on the giant stone palm... a reference to the statues here, do you reckon? I don't think we've seen the 'mountain carved into statues' bit in FF before now. (I get that it's likely a reference to a number of monumental carvings from China in terms of real-world references.)
Also are the statues in the... Stormblood trailer, I think it is, where they have the marital arts duel on the giant stone palm... a reference to the statues here, do you reckon? I don't think we've seen the 'mountain carved into statues' bit in FF before now. (I get that it's likely a reference to a number of monumental carvings from China in terms of real-world references.)
Listen, I know Lyse is hot, but she has the personality of a plank of wood and a whole White Savior narrative bundled up around her, Just Say No to marital arts with Lyse Hext-
It's interesting that FFVII is using Asian architecture as a signifier of cultural difference, of 'remoteness' in contrast to the Western architecture that is used in most of the setting, though. I don't think the games have done this before; even when we see the ninja castle of Eban in IV, it used a Western style of architecture.
While I don't think Final Fantasy has done this, Dragon Quest actually had a "far east, remote and strange" town as far back as Dragon Quest III, where you meet a bunch of people in Japanese-style houses who speak in stilted English to you, call you an outsider, etc.
He seems very hesitant and kinda shifty in demeanor, like he just made up an excuse on the spot, and why is the store open if they have nothing to sell?
Quite possibly they just don't want to sell to us and they're lying about it, for whatever reason.
I know it gets covered later in the update with the "Yuffie just told them not too sell to you lol" but my first thought was that considering Wutai previously went to war with Shinra, they just recognized Cloud's eyes as SOLDIER and went "nope not selling to them quick gotta think of an excuse". You know, just some good old leftover war prejudice.
As a random note this is a bit where the narrative of FFVII is kind of undercut by its mechanics. Because Yuffie is a thief. One of her defining traits in the narrative is her obsession with, and skill at, stealing shit, even breaking the fourth wall to do so. But because the gameplay is entirely predicated on Materia being what gives characters access to skills, she can't mechanically be a thief unless you equip her with the Steal Materia. In the same way that Vincent in cutscenes might or might not be able to fly/hover (or at least Batman-drift with his cloak) in cutscenes but not in combat, it feels like there should be some kind of 'class' mechanics? Ah, well.
Yeah, FFVII probably could have used cutting out a few materia and just making them abilities certain characters had baked into their skillsets, similar to FFVI. Would help drive uniqueness between characters, at the very least.
I like this version of the Turks. The henchmen who are only doing it because it's a job is a fun archetype. It's weird that they killed and replaced the original Turks we were first introduced for the game, but these ones have more potential as fan-favorite antagonists. Why, you might even do a whole spinoff with them as the main characters!
It's pretty clear to me at this point that we just have to ignore that one tiny little murder incident with the plate drop. Because aside from that, the Turks are... just the fun, quirky miniboss squad, through and through. Hell, even before the plates we had the Reno encounter in the church where he was a bit of a doof, but not exactly some murderous threat.
SIGMA MALE CLOUD STRIFE DOESN'T CARE ABOUT YOUR TRAGIC BACKSTORY
This is genuinely one of the funniest beats in the game, after Yuffie has reacted to every single tragic backstory so far with the verbal equivalent of the yawn emoji, she attempts the sympathy play on Cloud and he gives her exactly the same treatment she gave everyone else. Fantastic stuff. Absolutely top-tier bullying.
There's something to the fact that this Japan/China stand-in was defeated in a war with the Western-looking Shinra and turned into a shadow of its former self, a tourist attraction with its cultural features turned into tourist attractions. Wutai may or may not be an independent nation, but if it is, it's one where Shinra troops are running around like they own the place anyway - not unlike the US in post-WW2 Japan. FFVII is a very political game, and a game whose politics are very easy to treat as nicely universal (who doesn't love environmentalism), as opposed to specifically Japanese. But that would not really be accurate, would it?
…
There's a theme there, spread across the game, about the way Shinra arrives in places with either the seduction of Mako energy and modern technology or the brute force of arms, and then erases these places' identity, subverts them, absorbs them into itself. The now-nameless town that became the Sectors of Midgar; the way every house in Kalm and Nibelheim has been overgrown with Mako infrastructure like parasitic ivy; the way Corel was lured away from its coal-mining ways and destroyed, leaving room for the Gold Saucer; and the way Wutai is only kept as it was (notice how it and Costa del Sol are the only towns we've seen to not have conspicuous, unaesthetic Mako infrastructure all over the place, and they are both towns meant first and foremost to draw people through appearances). Shinra's modernism and technological advancement subverts everything. And it's an interesting observation, but it's also… Where the game might most easily slip into regressive attitudes, into a kind of anti-modernist bend, as we might see in Corel and the game mourning its coal-mining tradition.
There's a video that goes into quite a bit of detail about this kind of talk with a lot of references to FFVII which was actually posted just a month or two ago, iirc. That said, pretty sure it has all the way up to endgame spoilers, so we'll have to wait until after the FFVII playthrough to bring it here.
To be generous, it could probably be considered a "whatever after-action report nonsense comes up after this, we better make it clear we were not working with the second most wanted terrorists while off-duty" for the Turks.
I'd assume it was something in her ninja classes she spaced out on, either properly tying up whatever kidnapped hostage you have or escaping from ropes in situations like these.
No! Seriously! Where does Corneo find these monsters and more importantly, how does he even carry them around!? At least Aps/Abzu was chained in a sewer, probably being tossed meat (and prisoners) every now and then, but where did that thing even come from? Corneo doesn't even seem to have henchmen anymore!
Yeah, at least the first one made sense as a "lock it in the sewer below and call it a Return of the Jedi reference". Genuinely no idea where Corneo finds a wingy boi for this fight.
giving Rapps ample time to poison Aerith with its Scorpion's Tail move - a condition I have no recourse to, as I never thought to purchase any Antidote.
Man, I don't remember when it was, but at some point in my JRPG experiences I went from never ever buying status effect cures and the like because "meh waste of money" to almost always stacking 10-20 of each because they tend to be cheap and every once in a while, come in clutch.
Alright, turns out Rapps wasn't even as hard as I thought it was, I just got real unlucky with my accuracy roll on these first attacks and ended up making some mistaken assumptions.
To be fair, you seem to be having some of the absolute worst accuracy between Vincent's Deathblows and now this. I probably would have assumed the flying monster was immune to melee attacks myself if I didn't recall attacking targets like that usually gives a "can't reach" message.
Yuffie calls out to the group to wait for her, then grabs that MP Absorb Materia she stole from us earlier and runs after us, saying that no matter what we think, she's going with us.
I'm honestly not even sure why, at this point. Perhaps she hopes she'll find a treasure along the way that'll make up for all that Materia she failed to steal from us? Maybe she feels she owes us after we saved her life? Maybe she's starting, just a little, to believe in friendship? We don't know, because no one in the party gives a shit.
A little bit of everything, I'd guess? Personally I lean towards between traveling with the party and now being saved by them, Yuffie's grown just a bit attached, just enough to decide to keep helping with the whole Sephiroth thing. And if she can get a few more materia for herself along the way... well hey, isn't that a nice coincidence?
I wonder to what extent our party's Materia could have done anything. Like… I don't think that part of Yuffie's story was a lie. I think she genuinely tried to grab a whole bunch of upgraded Materia and hope that distributing them (okay, selling them at an outrageous cost, more likely), would help Wutai somehow. But even as armed to the teeth as our party is, they're just nine people. They're not that much of a concentration of force, are they? Yuffie was never going to kickstart the Wutai Revolt off the back of three Firas, two Thundaras and a handful of Curas.
…
You might get a pretty solid terrorist cell out of an Enemy Skill Materia loaded with Beta and Big Guard, though. And isn't that where the game started? With a single terrorist cell five people strong, dealing significant damage to the world?
It's a complete set of 'Sources,' these items which permanently increase a character's stats and which I have been hoarding without making use of it - Power Source, Guard Source, Magic Source, Mind Source, Speed Source, and Luck Source, plus a Megalixir on top of it for good measure.
I don't know if it was worth it. But damn if I was going to allow myself to be defeated by this one missing poster.
Is now a good time to point out you could have uh... just waited until the game brought you around to Gold Saucer again? Like say, when you eventually got whatever kind of airship this game gives you?
Obviously, it's just a wild coincidence that this bloke Gorky happens to share the pronunciation of the Wutaian God of Power, Gorkii.
That said, any nation with the power of ninjas and tokusatsu hero transformations on their side should have been able to put up a fight against ShinRa.
Also are the statues in the... Stormblood trailer, I think it is, where they have the marital arts duel on the giant stone palm... a reference to the statues here, do you reckon? I don't think we've seen the 'mountain carved into statues' bit in FF before now. (I get that it's likely a reference to a number of monumental carvings from China in terms of real-world references.)
I don't know if you can say 'statue carved out of a mountain' can be a throughline, but the Ala Mhigo half of Stormblood cribs a lot from the Cambodian temple complex of Ankor Wat, which is formerly Hindu, later Buddhist, and the Wutaian statues have the look of a Buddha statue.
While I don't think Final Fantasy has done this, Dragon Quest actually had a "far east, remote and strange" town as far back as Dragon Quest III, where you meet a bunch of people in Japanese-style houses who speak in stilted English to you, call you an outsider, etc.
Though Dragon Quest III is also set on kinda-sorta Earth with stand-ins for countries all over, so it's not quite the trope of Planet Europe plus the one Japantown.
With Yuffie's materia theft to try to help Wutai, and Yuffie featuring heavily in the intergrade, now you know what the main theory for how Rebirth is going to justify starting everybody off at level 1 with no endgame equipment or materia is!
Though Dragon Quest III is also set on kinda-sorta Earth with stand-ins for countries all over, so it's not quite the trope of Planet Europe plus the one Japantown.
Although that did still suffer from the "limited sprite tilesets make the counterpart cultures all look pretty European" issue FF6 had with Doma, at least outside of the artbook.
With Yuffie's materia theft to try to help Wutai, and Yuffie featuring heavily in the intergrade, now you know what the main theory for how Rebirth is going to justify starting everybody off at level 1 with no endgame equipment or materia is!
It's not the first time (although, in historical order, it would be) that I've seen a Final Fantasy game do "here's our East Asian rep, it's a fusion of both Japan and China;" Final Fantasy XIV does this too. Which… I would make a joke about how if a Western dev did it that would be a wild faux pas, but actually considering the history of 20th century Japanese-Chinese relations that's not necessarily much better. Hmmm.
On one hand, Japanese culture did take a lot of influence from China in centuries past, so a fictional Japan-China hybrid culture isn't without some historical precedent. However, that doesn't quite work for FF7 though since it's set in the modern day (or its world's version thereof) after Japan's long since changed, and yeah Japan having invaded China in WW2 adds an uncomfortable layer
