Quetzalcoatl and Shiva were "registered" to Squall via his classroom terminal, which I take to mean he was assigned them some time during his education. He then goes out to get Ifrit for his SeeD exam prerequisite.
So these three GFs can be considered Squall's, in that they are assigned to Squall.
Zell, where are your GFs? You've been studying to be SeeD at Balamb Garden for around the same period of time as Squall. Why haven't you been assigned your own GFs, and are mooching off Squall's?
For that matter, where are Quistis's GFs? Did she have to turn in her assigned GFs when she resigned as teaching staff? But she also had to do missions as SeeD, so couldn't she requisition some GFs for that purpose? Known problem student Squall had two GFs assigned to him, after all, so they're clearly not a limited resource.
I end up in a slightly different place. Putting together the 'characters have plot-important memories that they've forgotten' thing, the time and possession weirdnesses, and my theory about how everything comes back to the Moon somehow, I arrive at one inescapable conclusion as to the genre:
You're just saying it because I used "moonlights" in my post, aren't you?
Though, if we go with this, I guess it's actually season two of Mercenary Moon: the previous big bad got defeated, all sacrifices undone, all is well, but the heroes have lost their memories and parted ways until fate brings them together against a new threat.
There's not much I can say that hasn't been gone over already. It's honestly not a bad twist, but so much about it comes dangerously close to breaking the very delicate surface tension of credulity the whole narrative sits on. I think it's a credit to the writing that If these characters were less well developed and we didn't spend so much time crawling around in their heads I think it'd absolutely kill the story stone dead.
Now, If you want a game that's all about taking a deeper look into what the cost entering into pacts and bargains are with arcane beings of inhuman power...there's always Drakenguard. :^)
It's kinda funny that people talk about this as the Big Controversial Twist back in the day... and when I got here I was like "Oh, because they said back at the beginning that GFs cause memory loss, sounds legit" and didn't even think it was that big a deal. It's only now that I'm here with people questioning how the memory loss works that the paint's starting to look a little shabby.
I suppose that tracks; after all, Rinoa is the one who has "Invisible Moon" as her Limit Break, and she was called "Princess" when first met. And the romance is the primary plotline of the story.
So... FFVIII as a shoujo battle manga confirmed?
Anyway, moving on to translation, let's see what's different.
- When Squall is reflecting on how "people don't really have any solutions and will just criticize each other without doing anything, while pretending to be thinking" in the English version, in the Italian one he's more pointed, his lines being "people will just complain and do nothing while the danger's there, and then criticize us when the danger is past", which is a more specific grievance, and seems to be a direct continuation of his discussion with Major Dobe in FH about the necessity of fighting and thus of people like SeeD who'll do the necessary fighting. This seems like an interesting alternate take, considering the discussion was started by Rinoa's asking for a non-combat-oriented solution and that at the end Squall will emphasize how they cannot stop using the GF since the need them to be able to keep fighting.
- An extremely interesting note here is that, unlike the English version, in the Italian one Selphie and Quistis aren't referred to with little-kid nicknames, but with their full ones. This is significant, since the very first foreshadowing of the orphanage twist (outside of the many, many reference to GF damaging memory in optional dialogue, such as when talking with the faculty after SeeD graduation) was, of course, Ellone referring to Quistis as "Quisty?" back when she and Squall saved her in the training center.
This matters because, as I mentioned before, I'm pretty sure that the inability to change the names of the rest of the cast was something added very late in the development of the game, and I strongly suspect it was added when the details of this twist - specifically, that Selphie, Zell and Quistis were all at the orphanage - were finalized. I've already commented that including them in the twist strains credibility and a lot of people agree with me, and I think the reason for that is that it was a last-minute change, so they weren't able to change enough things to make it fit the way other twists (such as Ellone's identity) mostly do. I have more to say about this, but it'd include discussing some spoilers, so I'll hold back for now; I just wanted to have this stated here, for the record.
Still, that is mostly based on the difference in translation, so, @Adloquium, while you did say that you weren't able to find the full original text for this section, would you at least be able to confirm whether the difference in names is reflected in the Japanese version? Or are you unable to?
- When seeing himself calling for his missing "sister", Squall's thought on himself are "how sad", rather than "how shameful"; as usual, a small nuance that makes Squall a little bit less harsh. I think by now I don't need to remark on these, they're a staple of the Italian translation, and I don't think they really change his character, but I do think they were the right choice in contributing to making him less grating to the audience and so easier to sympathize with before he began his character development.
- Most of the rest of the dialogue surrounding the explanation of the twist and Edea being the orphanage's Matron is the same throughout, but interestingly enough, when at the end everybody is reaffirming their willingness to fight despite the new context that surrounds the fight, Quistis' line is translated completely different in Italian, with her saying "it's like asking us to fight each other" instead of the English "We can't run from her forever." Very weird take, since it goes against everybody else's position; I'm not sure if this is a translation error, or perhaps the Japanese sentence was too complex and the two different translations focused on different aspects of it.
- Squall's line at the end is also slightly different, as rather than saying "it's the only way to move forwards with our lives", he instead says "it's the only way we can protect each other, protect those we care about", which naturally implies that they all care for each other, and includes Rinoa into it, whereas the English line is excluding her. It's the same sentiment, but I like this way to express it a lot better.
As a bit of fun trivia, when Irvine throws the basketball, he can actually miss, as well as make a perfect hoop instead of needing a bounce to get the ball in; that depends on gameplay, you need at least 200 total won battles for Irvine to not miss.
Additionally, Selphie updated her diary after the visit at Trabia.
By the way, @Omicron, you mentioned having obtained Aura; that's up there with Meltdown and Ultima in terms of being one of the game's top spells, so let us know when you end up using it in battle what it looks like!
Now, If you want a game that's all about taking a deeper look into what the cost entering into pacts and bargains are with arcane beings of inhuman power...there's always Drakenguard. :^)
A very literal way to experience the cost of entering faustian bargains, since playing Drakengard itself is the faustian bargain there, and the cost is very much inflicted on the player.
It's almost like somebody took the Yoko Taro writing from Nier, regressed it to a more juvenile take of what he'd do when he was twenty years younger then when Nier came out, and the team developing the gameplay was about six degrees of competence below those who developed Nier. Isn't it?
It's kinda funny that people talk about this as the Big Controversial Twist back in the day... and when I got here I was like "Oh, because they said back at the beginning that GFs cause memory loss, sounds legit" and didn't even think it was that big a deal. It's only now that I'm here with people questioning how the memory loss works that the paint's starting to look a little shabby.
To be fair, we are in a thread of people who deliberately pointed out the memory loss thing, directed the LPer to see the missable text that explains it, and are taking a deep, analytical look at it through the lens of a forum. It's very possible that the little detail in the terminal would have been missed and this twist would have come out of absolutely nowhere.
Compared to FF7, which clearly showed that Cloud was an unreliable narrator with damaged memory as early as the tutorial, this did come out of left field. I guess it's just a matter of foreshadowing? We've never been primed to see the memory loss as important or as a detail worth evaluating scenes from compared to Cloud clearly getting more and more schizophrenic as the game goes on. As has been said upthread, it's not a twist that truly recontextualizes anything in the game beyond "hey these people knew each other", I guess?
I mean, the game isn't over, or even close to being over, compared to when we learned the truth about Cloud's memory in FFVII.
I've already mentioned that I think this could have been handled better, and I mentioned before Omicron even started playing that, yes, FFVIII has so much missable content and lore that, if you fail to actually engage with the world and talk with many people (the note in the tutorial at the beginning of the game is the first mention of memory loss, but not the only one - more than one faculty members mentions it, it's in Selphie's diary, a couple of students in Balamb at the beginning reference the issue, and of course there's the various meetings with Ellone where she obliquely references her shared past with Squall) the plot can end up appearing nonsensical.
However, having taken that into account, I do think that it's fair to at least wait a bit to see what the game does with this twist in its remaining runtime of more than two disks, before saying that it does absolutely nothing for the narrative.
To be fair, we are in a thread of people who deliberately pointed out the memory loss thing, directed the LPer to see the missable text that explains it, and are taking a deep, analytical look at it through the lens of a forum. It's very possible that the little detail in the terminal would have been missed and this twist would have come out of absolutely nowhere.
While that would be funny and therefore is a strong argument, I feel like you're not considering a major pillar of Mr. Chiba's role: specifically, getting mind controlled by the arc villain in order to thrust Usagi into an impossible choice.
Thus, Seifer is Mamoru. By implication, that makes Squall Usagi, which I think is even funnier.
From there, Quistis is Luna (or perhaps Ami?), and Irvine is obviously Minako.
While that would be funny and therefore is a strong argument, I feel like you're not considering a major pillar of Mr. Chiba's role: specifically, getting mind controlled by the arc villain in order to thrust Usagi into an impossible choice.
Thus, Seifer is Mamoru. By implication, that makes Squall Usagi, which I think is even funnier.
From there, Quistis is Luna, and Irvine is obviously Minako.
Still, that is mostly based on the difference in translation, so, @Adloquium, while you did say that you weren't able to find the full original text for this section, would you at least be able to confirm whether the difference in names is reflected in the Japanese version? Or are you unable to?
Based on what I was able to find, there is a difference between adult and child names in Japanese. We saw it with "Quisty", which in Japanese is "Quistis" minus the last "S" (キスティス vs キスティ).
Meanwhile, Irvine is アーヴァイン, and in the orphanage Selphie calls him アービン. Which is how a child can't properly pronounce the "vine" part of the name, and shortens it to "bin"; "Er-bin" might sound a bit silly, so "Irvy" is probably what the translator went with.
Selphie is セルフィ, and in the orphanage was called セフィ. Fairly straightforward conversion to "Sefie", since it leaves out the "L".
In the context of whether these names could be "kiddified" at the last minute of development, I'd say it is highly unlikely. "Quisty" and "Sefie" might be relatively simple, but "Irvy"/"Er-bin" requires some thought on how to kiddify "Irvine". It provides some small circumstantial evidence that the names for the other party members were settled upon at least before the orphanage twist was written.
I was going to wonder what would happen if the player renamed Squall to something complex, and whether the orphanage children would suddenly be able to impeccably pronounce that name, but I just realized none of the children mention Squall in that flashback. Child Squall is always alone pining for Ellone, and apparently did not join in the fireworks shenanigans or Seifer's appearance. So that actually brings up the possibility that the player was always able to rename Squall, and the orphanage flashback scene was carefully written to avoid the children saying Squall's name.
In the context of whether these names could be "kiddified" at the last minute of development, I'd say it is highly unlikely. "Quisty" and "Sefie" might be relatively simple, but "Irvy"/"Er-bin" requires some thought on how to kiddify "Irvine". It provides some small circumstantial evidence that the names for the other party members were settled upon at least before the orphanage twist was written.
Thank you for the clarification! That's really helpful, but I'm not sure that it shots down my theory; I probably wasn't clear about it, but I didn't mean to imply the scene was written in a day, or even rushed, just that it was added to the plot once most of the surrounding game was already finished and thus modifying everything to make it fit better would have taken too long.
I'm well aware the scene doesn't ever uses Squall name; realizing this is one of the elements that gave me the idea in the first place, even if not the only one. In my theory, the form the twist takes in the finished game was not necessarily last minute, just a very late addition; certainly after the initial stages of the game (with the SeeD exam and the introduction of most of the team) was completed, and the twist wasn't originally intended to include the full team.
I don't want to discuss the details of how I view it too much, because spoilers, but I think that one of the reasons why the twist feels incomplete is that it was somewhat rushed; yes, the dialogue is scripted carefully within the scene itself, but it still doesn't integrates seamlessly with the surrounding narrative. To me, that really brings to mind re-shoots in certain movies, which are added after the main body of the story was done to fill up some necessary detail, but conflict to some extent with a story that wasn't originally intended to feature them. A "grafted on" quality that comes out in little details, despite the scene itself mostly holding up and having internal coherence within itself.
Of course, it's just my personal feeling on the scene, but it's something that really comes to mind about the twist: if you took this scene in isolation, you could imagine a version of FFVIII very similar to what we got, but also one that fit the scene perfectly, a version where the GF supposed effect on memories was raised more prominently in the preceding story, where Selphie's having used GFs as a child and Zell being adopted were things that you could find indications of before the twist came up, and a lot more little touches that the actual game itself is missing. That's why I think it's a late addition, and I have a very specific theory of what the reason for adding it later on was, as well, which I'll make clear when the time comes.
On a note , poor Zell, considering how he did not Knew that he was adopted and proudly showing of stuff that he had inherited from his grandfather even if he did not have a practical use for it . Talk about a harsh YA vibe there, and how he can then go and talk with his parents about it.
On a note , poor Zell, considering how he did not Knew that he was adopted and proudly showing of stuff that he had inherited from his grandfather even if he did not have a practical use for it . Talk about a harsh YA vibe there, and how he can then go and talk with his parents about it.
I mean they almost certainly thought he knew he was adopted. I mean he wasn't a baby when it happened, just you know memory lost that most people that don't know GF's probably don't know about.
And on the other side Zell probably was with them for long enough that it wouldn't be weird for him to have said 'they are my real parents, just not my biological ones'.
Normally I would have been on a new XIV expac on release day, but after Endwalkers I am mostly fine with letting the story go on without me for a while, and the post-EW patches really ground down my ability to tolerate XIV's mechanics, so I'm unlikely to play it in the very near future, though I'll get to it eventually, I'm sure.
Also this thread will update as soon as I have sorted some stuff that ended up distracting me from my Let's Play and Quest updates severely (no, Elden Ring's new DLC is only, like, 25% of it at most)
Also this thread will update as soon as I have sorted some stuff that ended up distracting me from my Let's Play and Quest updates severely (no, Elden Ring's new DLC is only, like, 25% of it at most)
Normally I would have been on a new XIV expac on release day, but after Endbringers I am mostly fine with letting the story go on without me for a while, and the post-EW patches really ground down my ability to tolerate XIV's mechanics, so I'm unlikely to play it in the very near future, though I'll get to it eventually, I'm sure.
Also this thread will update as soon as I have sorted some stuff that ended up distracting me from my Let's Play and Quest updates severely (no, Elden Ring's new DLC is only, like, 25% of it at most)
Oh absolutely understandable. Frankly, I think the output so far has already been superhuman, to the point where I get a little burnt out just reading it. So I can't imagine how exhausting it is to produce it to the consistent quality and timetable you have. Please don't ever take comments like that to mean that I'm trying to prod you to produce grist for the content mill, or honestly feel the need to explain any of happenings behind the scenes especially for us sitting here in the peanut gallery. I sincerely just meant it in the vein of "I hope Omi's eyes bug out just as far mine did when he finally gets around to playing them."
Welcome back, class, to Final Fantasy VIII 201. Today's lesson:
Hovership Troopers, Or The Coolest Shit You've Ever Seen (Also Some Truly Bizarre Choices)
A bunch of stuff happened and I got distracted following the next plot beat. Let's see…
Right. We found out that Squall and his friends all went to the same orphanage and lost their memories of it, likely due to GF-related brain damage. Now, they hope to find that orphanage again, in hope of shedding more light on their past, as well as Edea's.
So of course we're not gonna do that.
1. Odin
You see, in the process of touring the world looking for the lighthouse by the sea, we come across… This fucking thing. I know it's not easy to tell from this screenshot, but it's like some kind of hollow polyhedral skeleton around a central cylindrical structure. It becomes clearer once we set down and enter it on foot:
…yes, indeed, that is a 20 minute timer that triggered as soon as we entered, along with a distant voice saying, "I am Odin…" Props to the game for not hiding his cards here: We know exactly what we're here for from the get-go. One of the franchise's oldest and also mechanically fidliest summons is here, in a game centered all around summons. Historically, Odin has had a troubled history; its Zantetsuken's ability to kill all enemies on the screen instantly could trivialize certain encounters, but depending on the game often ran into sharp limits of usefulness as instant death resistance made him irrelevant or the only true challenge came from bosses. At times, Odin has had attack variations, changing for a heavy damage move when facing death-immune enemies. How useful will he be in this game?
Well, to find out, we'll have to solve his timed challenge and defeat him.
Now, I never played adventure games much while I was a kid, so take it with a grain of salt when I say: this area's backgrounds are the ones that remind me most of early pre-rendered 3D adventure games like Myst or Atlantis, with strange environments of empty, abstract architecture, places that feel like they are pretending at having once been lived in by humans but are more of a skeleton off which puzzles hang. It's a very strange, eerie environment, and as a vibe I kinda like it; it's a huge departure from VIII's more grounded aesthetic style.
Now, as to what we're supposed to do here… Hm. The timer is constantly ticking down but our objective is not immediately clear, so I decide to just take it easy and check every corner while ascending the tower.
The stairs light up with a prismatic effect highlighting otherwise-nonexistent rails.
Those little fucks.
This is also the first place we encounter Tomberries. And this iteration of the little bastards is a pain. They still have their 'slowly walk forward, changing lanes until they reach a character and stab them' gimmick, but they also have enormous HP counts. This single Tomberry has nearly 20k HP, and most of my attacks barely touch 1k damage. That leaves the little shit plenty of time to murder my team. I try to be clever and cast Aura on Quistis (Aura procs Limit Breaks even outside crisis HP) and get rid of them with Degenerator, except it turns out they're immune to instant death. Muddying through with sheer damage is our only solution. In the end, it takes Quistis and Irvine going into Limit Break to put that awful thing down. Irvine's basic attack is 'shoot them.' Irvine's Limit Break is 'shoot them, but several times in a row.' The guy makes up for in deadliness what he lacks in imagination.
This is what my victory screen looks like.
Well, I can't accuse the game of not having challenge to still be found in place, goddamn. This ate a solid chunk of our time, and the rewards are… Abysmal. 0xp, 1 AP, and a Chef's Knife item that we can refine into Deaths. This was Not worth it.
Levitating giant stone cube elevator, as you do.
My problem here is that, in a typical case of "Omi decides to do two things at once despite them being contradictory," I am trying to solve the time-limited puzzle of the tower while also getting in some levels and AP in hopes of finally crossing the lv 30 threshold on everyone and getting some of those Actually Good Draws from monsters, so I haven't equipped Enc-None. Unfortunately, I'm not currently running a hideously OP one-hit kill build on anyone and these random encounters add up in terms of time.
Also, as we reach various time threshold, Odin speaks to us telepathically, making him one of the chattier GFs we've had thus far.
The 'thee' and 'thou' type of translation is back from FFVI (where it was Cyan's trademark), yet to fully coalesce into the series' brand for lofty/antiquated characters as it is with FFXIV's Primals.
Basically, we have to move up a series of ladders, press buttons to activate another stairway, and keep going. It's very simple navigation with the only real risk being to take routes in the wrong order and lose a little time, until we come to the statues.
First, we run into some kind of chimera statue that has a ruby for a left eye. It does not say that the right eye is an empty socket, but you can figure it out from context. Note the time left on my counter. I grab the eye, then head up.
This statue has a ruby for a right eye, and an empty socket for a left eye. So I first put in the left eye, as you can see below:
At this point, nothing happens. I want to emphasize this because we're going to get into how fiddly these kinds of puzzles in old-timey games can be in terms of what is obvious to the dev and what is obvious to some players. Here, I put in both eyes, and the next dialogue window asks me if I want to take out the right eye or leave it as it is. Now, if putting in both eyes was going to do anything, I was expecting that to happen when I put in the eye. But no. The correct answer is to "leave it as it is;" you have to first put in the other eye, then step back, and only then do you get the intended result. Because I did not think of this, it seems to me like the eyes did nothing, and I am running out of time (three minutes and going down), so I hastily grab both eyes from the statue (you get two separate prompts, for each eye) and head back down to the previous statue, slam both eyes in its sockets, and…
A torch lights up on the side, and numbers in iridescent colors appear floating above it. Those numbers start as a string of five 0s; however, with some trial and error, it appears it works like a simple bike lock and we can change it to read any sequence of five numbers we want. This makes it obvious that we are supposed to enter a code in order to gain access to the ruins' final prize…
…and we're toast. I don't know what the code is. I fucked up the 'obtain code' step earlier, and I no longer have enough time to repeat it. This attempt was a failure.
Realistically, we failed the moment we entered the ruins without Enc-None. Things could have been salvaged if I'd been maximally optimal with encounter combat, like fleeing from Tonberry instead of killing it, but in any case when I reached the gargoyle up top with 3 minutes on the counter we were already doomed. Waiting for the counter to tick down probably leads to a game over, but frankly, I have already waited long enough as it is.
Reload and retry.
Just keep in mind: That 20 minute timer to complete the puzzle is a real world timer. You cannot save inside the ruins (which is for the better, otherwise it'd be possible to soft-lock yourself), so every attempt is a full twenty minutes IRL. That's a pretty steep price to pay in time out of our life if we fail. It's the kind of thing that makes it really tempting to just refer to guides ahead of time instead of repeatedly running into these blind.
Anyway, once we equip Enc-None and don't fuck up the gargoyle it's simple.
We need to place both eyes in, then "leave it as is," and then it gives us a five digit code. We retrieve the eyes, head back down, and input the code.
Note the exposed cabling on the ground. Despite its antiquated outer shell, this Centra ruins was itself a highly advanced piece of technology, likely meant as a containment chamber for Odin.
The door opens, and we're let in.
That 12 minute above is like - it's pretty close to best time, I'm pretty sure? Assuming you're stopping at the Draw Points, you can do faster but not much faster. Simple traversal of the ruins eats up half the time you have on the counter, which is a good indication both of how much time traversal takes in FF8 and how much even a couple of random encounters can fuck you over. Because this? Is not the end, my friends. Now that we've obtained entrance to the mighty Odin's throne room, we still have to earn his service in combat…
And what a 'combat' it is.
Odin hews relatively close to his appearance from previous entries, including the lore-accurate six-legged horse and inexplicable yellow skin. With 8200 HP, it's not even half as tough as Tonberry. However, the timer is still running; we are still on the clock to defeat him.
And that's… The entirety of the challenge.
Odin doesn't fight. He literally does not take action in this entire battle. He just stands there tanking hits, until either he dies or we reach the time limit, whereupon he presumably uses Zantetsuken and wipes the party. This 'fight' is more like a puzzle, where our goal is to find a way to deal as much damage possible in as little a time window as possible while expanding as few resources as possible. Spamming Ultima would end things quickly, but Ultima is pretty valuable, while stretching things out with normal attacks would run closer to the timer but let us spare spell casts. Additionally, Odin both has stealables and Draw options, including Triple, a spell that puts a character into a state of Triplecast, which could be potentially extremely powerful. So there are contradictory incentives of time, stinginess, and profit all at play here.
Which is is conceptually interesting, especially if you don't have Enc-None and reach Odin with a low timer and this is actually difficult to manage, but it's also just not… As interesting as an actual fight against a boss who, y'know, does things?
Anyway, our first run is an easy win with 5 minutes on the timer doing a tentative mix of attacks, spells and draws.
I did use a couple of Ultimas in the end.
I'm not super enthused by it, though. We could have potentially profited much more off the divine pinata, without using valuable resources.
Notably, Diablos recently unlocked Darkside; a callback to Cecil's Dark Knight Ability, Darkside deals triple damage at the cost of 10% of the user's HP. It's a Command Ability, so it takes up a valuable slot, but it means that the only resource I'm spending on dealing massive damage is healing, and given the mechanics of the Odin battle, it's completely safe to use, since the enemy will never attack before I have a chance to heal Squall from his reckless self-endangerment. So reload, retry, and…
The screen turns black while Squall hits Darkside. It's really cool.
…we are able to take this fight down to the wire, carefully taking wide chunks of Odin's HP until he's in OHK range then Drawing Triple and Death, then finishing him off with 45 seconds on the counter and a fat stack of 100 Triples for Quistis.
The benefits to Junctioning are, uh, kind of out of proportion with almost everything else we got.
And that's Odin dealt with. A new GF has joined our roster.
…
Or not.
This is a screenshot taken after acquiring Odin. As you can see, the big boy does not appear in our GF collection. But I can check that I didn't accidentally fuck up my save order again by simply looking at our Card menu, where we find the Odin Card we got from the boss fight. So what gives?
Well… If I were playing the game fully blind, I would have no fucking clue. There is nothing I'm aware of that gives any hint as to what happened. I would probably be driven to madness trying to figure out where my GM went.
I know, however, from having been told, that some of the GFs in this game don't work in the standard way. We've seen one so far, Phoenix, which is triggered by consuming the Phoenix Pinion. However, because the game doesn't tell us that using the Phoenix Pinion even once adds Phoenix to the RNG roster with a possibility of summoning itself to save the party from a TPK, we wouldn't know this if were playing blind, because the game never tells us. And this is also what is happening with Odin: Acquiring Odin as a GF added him to the game's RNG roster, and he now has a random chance of appearing in battle, presumably using Zantetsuken as he does so. Like Phoenix, however, he is not added to our GF menu, does not learn abilities, and cannot be Junctioned.
…
To some degree this is a kind-of-elegant solution to an issue inherent to the game's design. At a default, each summons bring in a new boatload of abilities and expands the capabilities of each character, further burdening the game's overall precarious balance. So it would appear that the devs had the idea of creating a special tier of pseudo-summons that do not bring in extra character building capabilities or tactical considerations but instead summon themselves sometimes, as unreliable but welcome allies.
Shame this isn't explained anywhere. Not even, as far as I'm aware, in the manual. This is a mechanic that is completely obscured from the player. And it's also a mechanic rooted in randomness, which is not… Fun? I have no idea if I'll ever actually benefit from having Odin on my team. I don't even know when he will decide to actually show up. At least not in our trek down from his throne room, where I turned off Enc-None and ran into fucking Tonberry again. Those things are a nightmare, and I wish not to fight them again. They take forever to kill, and anything that makes killing them faster costs resources. I don't want to deal with this. Let's just flee and leave.
Some distance to the south, we find what looks very much like the orphanage and its lighthouse. Quoth Squall: "..I remember now… This is Edea's house. I get the feeling there's something nearby. Something huge… Nearby."
Unfortunately, we cannot enter that house at this time. Leaving us little choice but to follow on Squall's hunch and check around a little aaaaand-
2. Garden vs Garden
God but I love it when this game's FMV go full tacticool.
That's Galbadia Garden, airborne.
Nida: "What do you think?" Squall, mentally: "(They probably know we're here, too. If not, we'll make the first move.)" Squall: "The battle is inevitable." Nida: "The sorceress is with them, then? So this is going to be the final battle?" Squall: "I hope so." Squall, mentally: "(What should I do first? I have to give orders to everybody. It's my responsibility. I have to try to keep it simple. If I give out too many orders, it could lead to chaos. What should I say? Come on, think! There's no time!)"
Cue a long list of possible choices.
Well, Squall, seeing as we are on Disc 2 of 4, I highly doubt this will be the 'final battle.' Anyway, I see this menu, get decision paralysis, close the game and don't open it again for three weeks.
But now that time is past! Time for the "final" "battle"!
Whichever options we pick here, Squall gives a slightly different speech. The core remains the same, but he appends different remarks. If we try to pick everything, Nida interrupts us a couple of choices away from the end; if we pick too many options, or pick a frivolous option (ahem, hot dogs) at the end of the speech Nida politely chides us.
Squall: "This is Squall speaking." Squall: "This is an emergency so listen carefully." Squall: "We're going into battle against Galbadia Garden." [My feelings on this] Squall: "As you may all know, Seifer is with them. I plan to settle everything, once and for all, with this battle." [The Garden's course] Squall: "The Garden will proceed straight ahead. Set speed at 50% in case we need to take evasive maneuvres." [Prepare for the attack] Squall: "1st and 2nd Class Sabers, assemble in the parking lot. Those with MG Rank 3 or above, head for the 2nd floor deck and await instructions. Be sure to warm up." [Prepare our defense] Squall: "The enemy will probably come aboard. We must concentrate our forces at the front gate and the quad. If your Student ID number is even, report to the quad. If it's odd, report to the front gate." [Call my comrades] Squall: "Quistis, Zell, Selphie. Report to the bridge right away!" [Notice how he doesn't call Irvine or Rinoa, huh.] [What to do with the hot dogs] "Cafeteria team, collect all the hot dogs and store everything in the secret shelter. Leave nothing for the enemy." [Take care of the junior classmen] Squall: "Those who have a Student ID number ending in 8, take care of the junior classmen."
A few things can happen here. If we pick the hot dogs, Nida chimes in with, "I think that was a bit unnecessary. People tend to get a little wild in battle. They just need to hear what's necessary." If we forget to 'take care of the junior classmen,' then Dr Kadowaki speaks up on the speakers, delivering the line about Students with an ID ending in 8 taking care of them. If we somehow fuck it up by not giving a single order for the attack or defense, Nida asks us what the hell we're doing, Squall berates himself, and then he gives all the proper lines himself regardless of our choices.
All in all, nothing here matters much to the final outcome, with safeties in case Squall forgets something that really should be obvious, but giving us the ability to pick those options is good at making how Squall has grown as a leader come across. His language is professional, but it's also technical.
If you're wondering what a "MG Rank" is, that's because we've never heard that before, as far as I'm aware. This is one of several instances in this sequence in which Squall and other characters will make references to a more complex and granular level of military ranks, roles and tactics that, implicitly, they've always been training for and been aware of, but which has never been relevant to us as players, so it's never been brought up. Same for what a "Saber" is; presumably a special grade of combat-trained students, but what matters is that it suggests Balamb Garden has a more organized military with more specialized ranks than was relevant to us before. Similarly, Squall using Student ID numbers as a means of sorting people quickly into the needed task groups is very utilitarian and just… Clever? There are presumably 50% of students with even numbered IDs and 50% of students with odd numbered IDs, so it's a very easy way to split them into two groups without needing to sort them manually or take time, and there are presumably 10% of students with IDs ending in 8s, so if there are, say, 200 students and you need 20 to watch over the kids, "those with an ID ending in 8" is just a quick and intuitive way to do it; it means you don't have to go through a non-existent officer cadre, the students will organize themselves.
Generally speaking, the upcoming sequence is the best FF8 has been at milfic since the Dollet Raid. I can't speak to military plausibility, but it's certainly aimed squarely at creating life-long damage in a particular breed of 90s teenager reading and watching it.
Squall: "Sorry about that. Irvine: "Why am I always the odd man out?"
Squall gathers up with the others, sans Zell and Rinoa; he asks where Zell is, and Selphie tells him that he's taking a nap because he hasn't slept at all lately. Now, this is transparently an excuse, and even Squall kinda sees through it, and the others tell him it's nothing.
This is going to be the other leg of this whole sequence: even as it succeeds as a piece of shounen military sci-fi, the actions of the characters are utterly baffling. Zell taking a nap through the final battle of the Gardens colliding together would be baffling, and of course it's not actually true, but whatever he's actually doing is clearly some trivial teenager drama shit he had started before Galbadia Garden came into view and instead of aborting and reporting for duties, everyone is covering his ass while giggling. But it'll get worse.
First, we form a party with Squall, but amusingly, he follows this up by telling us not to bother equipping our GFs yet. There's something comical to the fact that at some point the devs must have realized junction-swapping was so onerous that they needed to warn players when to not bother doing it because the group would get swapped again before they got into any fights, just to minimize wasted time and sour feelings.
We head to the quad, and…
The fact that they have a full on deer bounding away at the Garden's approach, and that profile view of the giant hovership looming, is just, really good scene setting.
Squall: "What are you doing? What's your status?" Trainee: "Indirect magic operative, level 2, sir." Squall: "You're a 1st class MG. Report to the deck immediately!" 1st Class MG: "Yes, sir!" Squall: "What about you guys?" FL3 Trainee: "Fire Platoon, level 3 trainee, sir!" FL1 Trainee: "Fire Platoon, level 1 trainee, sir!" Female Medic: "Rescue Team A, Medic, sir!" Squall: "You two head to the deck. Medic, report to the defense team." All three: "Yes, sir!!!"
That little vignette is a really neat way of showing Squall's growing instincts as a leader, the fact that while he's shit with people he gets a lot better once he can think of them in terms of roles to organize, and also that everyone obeys his orders enthusiastically.
We get a new camera angle for the same classroom we've had since the beginning of the game. In case it wasn't clearly implied already, the "junior classmen" are the children of Balamb Garden, both those old enough to wear a tiny uniform like this one, or the other younger one. They're all various degrees of scared and nervous, though one of them wants to show off that he's learned Firaga (This seems highly irresponsible to teach a child). I'm sure the fact that all the children are packed in one room won't be relevant later.
We don't have full BGU access at this time, there are rows of students blocking off most paths so we don't get lost, and we have a bunch of displays of military discipline - students in military rows, messengers running about with important information, and so on.
We're still getting paid through all this, of course.
We finally find Zell at the quad, giving a pep talk to the assembled defense team.
However, all this preparation is interrupted when Squall approaches him ("I thought you were sleeping?") and Zell takes him for an aside and asks him for… His ring?
Now, he's referring to it in a way that suggests this ring is something Squall has been wearing visibly this whole time, but of course, PSX models being what they are (even the Remastered ones), I've never seen Squall wearing a ring before. In fact, because he wears black gloves, there's no ring to see even in FMV cutscenes. I think Squall is only bare-handed during the prom dance cutscene, but even then, it doesn't seem like anyone modeled a ring for him in that scene, so this is a totally new character element that's been brought up.
It's a very trivial thing to get hung up on and I don't wanna make it seem like it really is a big deal, it's just emblematic of how sometimes these games bring up something that's supposed to be a minor character element that feels like it should have been set up earlier but wasn't, and also because Squall does have a prominent piece of themed jewelry he's been wearing this whole time: his necklace. The one with a huge lion cross. It's enough that it made me wonder if that's the "ring" Zell was referring to and there was a translation error, but no, this is followed by an animation of Squall actually taking a ring off his hand (with a little effort; it seems like he doesn't take it off often).
That necklace, for the record.
Squall is reticent at first, thinking to himself that he likes this ring, but Zell insists all while refusing to explain his motives for borrowing the ring. Finally Squall relents and gives it to him and Zell jumps in joy, saying "Rinoa is gonna be so happy!"
Like I said, they're about to crash into another city-sized hovership and they're on their drama still.
Then we reroute back to the main plot. Zell says he won't just hide and intends to fight, that he hopes this is the last time they have to fight for their home, and Rinoa adds that she has to fight to prove to herself that she can do it, that she belongs with her friends. Sure would be a shame if Rinoa was then instantly damsel'd in the next five minutes, huh.
Squall is summoned back to the bridge, and we get another sick-ass FMV of Galbadia Garden's approach.
Rotating halo buzzing above the top of the trees, giant silhouette advancing ominously, shot from the back of Balamb Garden arriving in the distance, they're really going ham on these, and it's far from over.
Side note: Instead of a more sophisticated dashboard, Nida directs the Garden by literally moving a giant joystick every which way, visibly needing to throw this whole body into the effort every time. It's kind of a stupid design for a giant flying ship, except if you consider that it's meant to suggest that the original navigators were not human or had better ways of controlling it that Nida is having to approximate due to lack of understanding of the incredibly advanced machine, in which case it's genius visual storytelling.
And now it's time for the attack of the flying motorbikes.
I have no words, this is the coolest shit I've ever seen. And also, possibly, the dumbest? Not like I care.
Up on the bridge, Nida is trying his best to maneuvre around Galbadia Garden to prevent a collision, while Galbadia Garden's own pilot is merrily ramming into their ship (if we ever found out who's piloting, my money's on Fujin). Back at the quad, though, Zell and the others are surrounded by Galbadian motorbikes running havoc around the place, and then we get the message "by the way equip your GFs!"
Cut for image break.
Final Fantasy VIII, Part 22.B: Odin & Galbadia Garden
Bikes are swirling all around are protagonists. Galbadian troops have entered the Garden. The situation is critical.
So anyway at this point I take an hour off to play with spreadsheets.
3. Junction Schmunction
Okay, not spreadsheets as such, but I opened a gdoc so I could finally write out the various traits of all the GFs in one easily-referenced format so that I could try and craft something resembling actual builds. Not optimizing my characters as such, just trying to figure out how to do some combos.
Basically: Brothers grants Cover, a passive ability that lets a character take hits for his teammates. Carbuncle grants Counter, a passive ability that lets a character retaliate when taking a physical hit. Previously, I had Carbuncle on Rinoa, who was otherwise specced as a mage, but that meant her Counter was comically weak. If I want to take full advantage of it, I need Brothers and Carbuncle on the same character so I can combine Cover + Counter and Junction a strong spell to Strength so they hit as hard as possible.
Meanwhile, Diablos grants Darkside, as mentioned before, which hits really hard but costs 10% HP; however, if I had a GF with Status Attack Junction, I can junction 100 Drains to Attack, and Darkside will drain as much HP as it costs to use. However, the only two GFs with ST-Atk-J I have are Carbuncle and Siren. Seeing as Carbuncle is already going on whoever has the Brothers, that means Siren is the only other option. And given that neither Diablos nor Siren have Strength Junction, that means Darkside will be comically weak unless I also junction one of the GFs with Str-J: Shiva, Ifrit, or Pandemona (Brothers also have Str-J, but they're going on the Carbuncle team). Seeing as I have 9 GFs and three characters, so everyone gets three GFs, that means one character will specifically have Diablos/Siren/Shiva, Diablos/Siren/Ifrit, or Diablos/Siren/Pandemona. With me so far?
This is actually a fairly engaging exercise. It just runs into one problem: The actual effect of Junctions depends on what magic a character has access to. If my Darkside/Drain super-attacker has Blizzaga as their best Strength junction, they'll still be outcompeted by someone with Ultima junctioned to Strength.
This is ultimately what makes me give up on trying to handcraft perfect little builds. The magic menu is simply hell to navigate. Each character can have up to 4 spells on each page of their Magic menu, which has 8 pages maximum. This means each character can hold up to 32 individual spells. Which seems like a lot, except, this is easily filled up with instances of drawing 3 Blinds there or having 80 Thunders leftover from chargen, loading up the spell inventory with trash. In theory, members who aren't in the party could be used as a "storage chest" holding up the spells you don't need on your active members, and stray instances of 5 or 15 spells can be consolidated on one character. This is what I spent most of the first 20 hours of the game doing. It's just grown completely unmanageable over time. The tiny and inconvenient UI combined with the sheer glut of spells accumulated over time and the need to go back and forth between multiple menu to see if Blizzaga gives better Strength results than Quake gives better Magic results than Aura gives better Speed results than Tornado is a hell without escape or end. My previous approach of giving myself rules about junctions based on GF elemental affinities was fun while it lasted but, in case you think 'well just abandon that silly idea,' I already did that several hours ago; magic has simply grown too annoying to navigate even beyond that stage. The Magic menu management has defeated me. I abandon doing it this way and I just abandon managing Magic altogether. I just press "auto junction" and let the game do its thing.
My current build is: One character gets Diablos/Leviathan/Shiva (Darkside, Strength-Junction), Carbuncle/Brothers/Ifrit (Cover + Counter, Strength Bonus), Pandemona/Siren/Shiva (Strength and Magic Junction, Magic Bonus). This means I don't get my cool Darkside Drain effect, but the character with Siren gets Magic Bonus, which increases their Magic stat on level up, so I can train them to have a stronger magic baseline over time. Is this any good? Man, I don't know. I just wanna go back to playing the fucking game.
Anyway, I forget to turn off Enc-None for the next ten minutes so we just never run into an actual Galbadian attack force until I do.
4. Rinoa, Just Hangin' Out
MEANWHILE!
The Galbadian motorbike troops are racing past our characters, giving them little chance to intercept. They decide instead to run to the edge of the quad, to hit them directly as they land. Then they decide to take a break for romance.
Zell pauses to give Rinoa the ring he got from Squall. He promises that he'll make her one just like it, and until then, she should hold on to it. That was their big plan - they noticed Squall had a cool ring with sentimental value to him, and Zell is planning to make it into a matching pair for Rinoa. Kinda like some kind of… Practice engagement rings? Rinoa asks Zell how he convinced Squall to part with his ring and Zell says he just told him to hand it over, which makes Rinoa laugh. She comments that the ring looks cool, but it's too big to fit on her finger. Hopefully, this won't lead to the ring slipping off or falling off her pocket or being lost or some other tired old cliché. Irvine reminds her that it's not like she's going to be wearing that ring, just the duplicate Zell makes for her that's in her size, and that they should get a move on.
Then Rinoa falls into a hole.
No, look, it's a really cool cutscene, taking advantage of both the spectacles FF8's FMV are capable of and how expressive their character models are, I was genuinely impressed. What happens here is that Galbadian Garden clips the edge of Balamb with its halo, using it like some kind of buzzsaw ram and breaking off a chunk of the quad. Now Rinoa is left dangling off a rock from the cliff, which is things get weirder.
Zell can't reach Rinoa, and Irvine says they should find something to pull her up. So far so sensible; this seems like a problem that could be solved with Float or superhuman agility or whatnot, but we know magic only exists outside of combat when the devs feel like it. So let's get a rope. That is sensible.
What is less sensible is… Just leaving the quad entirely and traipsing around half of Balamb Garden until we run into Squall again.
Our sole random encounter of the sequence, after I remembered to turn off Enc-None.
We find Squall at the front gate, where Zell and Irvine tell him Rinoa's in danger. But just then, Nida calls on the speakers, telling Squall the enemy is attacking the classroom upstairs, the one where the children are holed up, and then Xu warns that the enemy are coming in for a frontal assault on the gate.
Sick shot, btw.
Zell shouts at Squall asking if he heard him, Squall shouts back that Rinoa isn't the only one in danger, Irvine accuses Squall of being heartless and tells him Rinoa is gonna die.
This is the most artificial possible drama. This is only happening because Zell and Irvine decided that, of all the things they could do to save Rinoa, crossing half of the Garden to find Squall and yell at him would be the most effective. Rinoa is dangling from her rock right now as we speak, waiting for any of these guys to stop yelling and instead find, I don't know, a rope, a tent pole, a daisy chain of convenient underclassmen, anything at all in this giant mercenary school full of people.
Anyway, Squall tries to focus. There are three tasks at hand: protecting the front gate with Xu, heading for the classroom to protect the children, and helping Rinoa. PCs need to be allocated to each task, but it's a very simplified choice - Zell is always the one helping Rinoa, so basically we choose which two of Irvine, Quistis and Selphie we want to head with Squall to the classroom, and the leftover character teams up with Xu to defend the gate.
Squall: "Zell, you help Rinoa. Do whatever it takes, alright!?" Zell: "Leave it to me!"
…
I cannot emphasize enough that the sum total of Zell's actions after Rinoa fell over the cliff was to leave, run around the school until he found Squall, ask Squall what to do, berate him from thinking of things other than saving Rinoa, then be told "Do whatever it takes to help Rinoa," say "Got it!", and run back the other way to go and help Rinoa with no new help, orders, tools, or ideas.
This is stupid. This is a stupid subplot. The game is just hoping you're too taken in the rush of events and cinematic excitement of it all to notice.
Once again, Galbadia Garden rams Balamb Garden, shaking the whole structure, and we take over Squall to head for the classroom, and suddenly it's time for MORE SICK MIL SCIFI DROPS.
A hangar opens up to reveal mechanized paratroopers that drop into the sky then turn on their exoskeletons that fly up to the Garden walls, using pistons to latch onto the surface? Oh, baby, talk dirty to me.
It's a little surprising that the exoskeletons are apparently use-and-drop, serving only to attach to the surface before the troops manually grapple and drop by swinging on ropes, but I guess they're not combat exoskeleton - it'll be more apparent soon but the mechs aren't articulated; they can be directed fluidly in the air but the arms and legs can't move and they don't have mounted weapons. Interesting tech.
These are Paratroopers, a palette swap of the normal G-Soldier, who use Demi (so they can deal some real damage regardless of our resistance or HP) and Status effects. They quickly deploy Silence on Selphie and Squall, which could prove a problem, except my auto-junctioning happened to give Irvine a max HP in the 3k+, so his current 977 HP is enough to proc his Limit Break, and he blasts away the entire group with shotgun ammo.
He kind of is cool, honestly.
Squall congratulates the SeeD girl on taking care of the trembling children (good leadership again!) and tells her to take them somewhere safe, then Nida calls on the speakers again - Dr Kadowaki is on the bridge and wants to talk to him. Maybe they could have sent a messenger to deliver whatever important message this is supposed to be, I don't know.
While we head back, Galbadia Garden rams into us once again, knocking down one of the fleeing kids and several students who moan that they're finished. When we reach the bridge, Kadowaki asks for an update on the situation and Squall tells her we were able to repel the first two waves of the attack, but there are many injured and he doesn't know if we can withstand another wave. Quistis (who was with Xu at the gate) that the gate force is holding its ground, but only barely.
Dr Kadowaki: "So… Looks like this is it." Quistis: "Their Garden has more experienced fighters. On the other hand, most of our troops are students who are still in training. Like Squall said, one more wave and we'll be finished." Squall, mentally: "(Maybe I should've focused on attacking in the beginning instead of concentrating on our defenses…)" Dr Kadowaki: "Seifer is with them, right? You said it yourself. There's no way you can run from him… It's kind of like your destiny to face him." [She approaches Squall and leans in towards him.] "...Looks like it's now or never!" Dr Kadowaki: "You've come this far already. What is there to think about? You're not gonna run away are you?" Squall, mentally: "(Never!)" Squall: "There's no way I'm gonna run from him! Besides, attacking him might be our only chance."
It looks like Dr Kadowaki has taken the role of 'reasonable adult figure who is giving life lessons' over from Cid. But it's weird that the school doctor is the one to summon Squall and tell him "it is your destiny to fight Seifer, do it now!"
Admittedly, Kadowaki has always seemed close enough to Cid and apart enough from the faculty that I sort of suspect she's an old friend of Cid and knows much more about his background and his designs than she's letting on, and she's acting here on prior knowledge that she hasn't disclosed with the SeeDs.
That aside, it's interesting that Galbadia Garden is winning against Balamb Garden, considering how one-sided all previous conflicts between SeeDs and Galbadian soldiers were. Presumably, the issue is that Galbadia Garden concentrates the Galbadian army's elites and officers, instead of large hordes of mooks with only a few of those elites dispersed throughout, and SeeDs benefit from acting like special operatives more than front line troops, so this is a bad match-up for them.
Which means it makes sense that they're doing worse when fighting in a defensive posture as opposed to, say, boarding Galbadia Garden and sending out a few times behind enemy lines to, say, disable their engines and kill their leadership, and it makes sense that Squall's big turn-around moment is deciding to do just that.
Squall: "The only problem is, how are we going to board their Garden?" Irvine: "Say, how about if we crash into their Garden? I know it sounds crazy but at least we'll be able to get in. Their pilot's been ramming us all along. I'm sure Nida can do it, too." Squall: "We have no choice. Let's do it."
[Zell enters stage left, alone.] Squall: "Where's Rinoa?" Zell: "Sorry, man. There's nothin' I can do! There's no way to get to the quad! Those bastards have the area barricaded. Man! The only way we can get to her is by going over the roof or flying there." Squall, mentally: "(...Rinoa)" Irvine: "Whoa, wait a minute. You just gave up on her, didn't you?" [He walks up to Squall.] "Listen… Do me a favor. YOU… go help Rinoa. It may be too late, but don't give up until you're CERTAIN that there's nothing more you can do!" Squall: "I… I have to lead the attack." Irvine: "I don't care what you have to do, or how you feel. Just do it… Please! For Rinoa." Quistis: "Listen to Irvine, Squall. She's one of us." Selphie: "What are you waiting for!? I can't believe you!" Zell: "C'mon, Squall! Please! It's gotta be you! You're the one that has to save her!" Irvine: "I'll take everyone inside Galbadia Garden. Don't worry. I know the place like the back of my hand." Quistis: "We'll clear a path. Once Squall arrives, we move in."
…
It's not like I don't get what the story is going for here.
Squall does want to save Rinoa, but he feels shackled by his new responsibility as leader of Balamb Garden. That's why he sends Zell, rather than doing it himself: He's trying to make sure she's safe but can't allow himself to abandon all the students counting on him to do so. That's why Zell fails, and has to come back, and Irvine puts it to Squall that he has to make a decision. He has to save Rinoa himself or accept that she's lost (and he obviously can't do the latter). He is the protagonist and Rinoa's love interest, which imbues him with a special agency that means only he can pull off that rescue, regardless of the actual abilities or whoever is doing the task.
I could criticize that plot beat from two angles - one is that Squall's growth as a person, a friend and a team leader has been closely associated to his growth as the leader of Balamb Garden, so creating a sudden gap where he has to choose one of the two feels jarring. But that's minor. The other is that this sequence has the characters all but telling Squall "only you have the narrative agency to save Rinoa, we can't do it because we're not the main character, regardless of whether it makes sense or not," and that's also jarring with how FF8 has handled its themes so far - they're not usually this meta.
But no, most of that is just post-hoc rationalizing of why I am frustrated with this plot beat, which is having this entire, like, half-hour to hour of gameplay (depending on combat encounter length), of combat happening, running around the school, swapping party setups, reporting to Dr Karawaki, planning the next attack, all of it happening while Rinoa is suspended over the abyss dangling from a rock just waiting for everyone to have it all sorted out so they can actually come and help her is just. It's dumb. It's a dumb scenario. I mean, props to our girl for having arms of steel, but it's silly. Like, Galbadia Garden rammed into Balamb Garden, knocking everyone over, twice since Rinoa fell off!
5. Squall's Counterattack
Anyway, before we can actually do that, Karawaki chimes in to remind Squall that he is forgetting 'something important,' that is, before he leaves to save Rinoa, he should first climb up to the bridge and broadcast a speech to bolster SeeD and student morale. Again, while Rinoa is just casually dangling from a cliff face. She's just in a narrative timeout waiting for the camera to come back to her.
It's a good speech, too! (Also it's preceded by Nida telling Squall that he probably doesn't know it, but everyone in Garden looks up to him, and that they like him, which is sweet.)
Notably, these dialogue boxes start and end at their own rhythm; they are synced to the sweeping, inspiring music playing in the background and to the movement of the characters in the various vignettes looking up as Squall's voice inspires them.
It's a really cool emulation of war movie montages where the camera pans over the characters going to their own missions, the medics carrying the wounded, someone taking care of the children, and so on.
Squall: "......Everybody. This is Squall. How's everyone doing? You're probably all too tired to even stand up after all the fighting. But I want everyone to listen to me… We still have a chance to win, and I need your help. This is going to be our final battle. We're going to attack them before they come in again. To do that, we're going to head straight into their Garden. So I want everyone to prepare for a major collision. Take care of all the junior classmen. Irvine, Quistis, Zell, and Selphie will lead the attack into their Garden. As for everyone else, please support them if you can. SeeD was formed to fight the sorceress; at least, that's what I heard. And Garden was created to train SeeDs. So this battle is Garden's destiny and also our destiny. It's a grueling battle, and I'm sure you guys are all exhausted. But I don't want to have any regrets. I don't want anyone to look back and regret this day. So just this once, I want you guys to give everything you've got! For yourselves and for me!"
Like, Squall didn't suddenly manifest implausible poetry and oratory skills since his last speech, but this was perfectly decent. He reaches out to everyone with sympathy (How's everyone doing?), he acknowledges the hardship they're being put through, he expresses his care for the children, then gives practical orders and leaders to look up to, then ties it up into the greater mission of SeeD and then into a sense of their destiny and their belonging as a group, and then asks them to give him their strength and exhorts them to give it their all. It's a perfectly good speech! He's really grown!
Then Squall orders Nida to ram the enemy garden, which he does; the two Gardens become somehow embedded together, and Quistis's party hop down from the front stairs onto Galbadia's courtyard.
As for Squall, he's now solo running through Garden, once again passing through the classroom corridor, where he runs into… Heavy sigh. The SeeD in charge of the junior classmen. Who tells him that she can't find "Mark," one of the kids.
She advanced one screen since we last left her, in the process of running away, several minutes and a rousing speech ago.
No matter. We run to the backrooms, where Squall finds Mark alone and possibly crying, and Squall acts compassionately towards him then tells him to run over to the girl waiting for him, and the kid does so. Squall is good with kids now, character growth.
At this point, a health bar labeled "Squall" appears at the bottom of the screen. This is intended as a kind of stakes-raiser, a spooky thing, why would a health bar appear when Squall is alone and seemingly safe?
Unfortunately, it's a warning for the worst minigame in the game so far.
One of the Galbadian exosuits flies in through the back door and rams Squall repeatedly, knocking him down and against the wall. We do not enter combat proper; the suit is just flying around rigidly and bumping into us every time I try to take a move action. Go left, get slammed. Go right, get slammed. Advance, get slammed. It's inexplicable and Squall's health bar is just depleting until…
…we hit a pseudo-game over and the game offers me bonus HP to try again, as a pity difficulty adjustment. It is, somehow, infuriating. The problem isn't that I don't have enough HP, the problem is that I don't know the rules of the game you're asking me to play.
The answer, which I figure out on the second go, is that instead of trying to move, we should stay still and press X, which triggers a choice of option: Run away, threaten the enemy, call out to the SeeD girl for help, or press the emergency exit button. Only one of those sounds like it will do anything, so we press the button. The exosuit rams Squall again, only this time…
…the door is open (complete with inflatable toboggans, airplane-style, natch), so they both go out tumbling through the sky, Squall thankfully managing to get a grip on the guy's armor before he can fall to his death.
What follows is, technically, kind of amazing, and it ties back into something we've been talking about since the beginning of FFVII.
We've talked about how pre-rendered backgrounds have one major asset (they can be much, much higher quality than the in-engine textures), and one major drawback (they are perfectly static, you can't move the camera around). But that's not… Entirely true. It's not that you can't move a pre-rendered background, it's that you often don't, because the pre-rendered background is, well, your background. If Squall is traveling down a busy city street, you might 'move' the camera by showing different sections of the pre-rendered background, but you need every reference to be mostly static so that it looks like Squall is 'by the bench' or 'interacting with the shop door' or 'standing in the street in front of the bus,' yeah?
But in theory any pre-rendered background is just, like, a movie you are displaying in the background of your characters. So if your characters are totally unmoored from anything physical and keeping consistency between in-engine models and pre-rendered background elements doesn't matter, say, if your characters are tumbling through the sky wrestling with one another, then… You can do this:
In terms of spectacle, this aerial wrestling match between Squall and a nameless Galbadian Soldier is one of the highlights of the entire game. The game is playing an entire FMV that involves sweeping aerial shots and a battle scene featuring dozens of characters duking it out with swords and immense vista shots that capture pieces of both Gardens, while in the foreground our hero is engaged in a blow-for-blow fight for his life. I am genuinely amazed by what they did there with the technology of the time.
Which is why it's such a shame that the minigame that goes with it is absolute ass.
Basically, Squall and the Galbadian Soldiers both have a health bar, and they can each Punch, Kick, or Block on a given time unit. There is no explanation of how that works, whether timing matters, whether a particular type of blow can counter another, or whether it's possible to read a blow and react in advance. This is like the rock'em sock'em robots from VII, only flying around, with multiple camera angles obscuring character movements, and with several screens loading. It is basically impossible to play except at random, as far as I can tell, and I promptly fucking die, again.
It takes several attempts to get it right, and we need to cheat. A 'helpful hints' screen that appears when we fail tells us that a special move is unlocked by blocking multiple times. So, if we spam Block, we eventually unlock the option "Deathblow!" by pressing Circle, which deals massive damage. However, 1) Blocking is not very reliable, 2) Deathblow isn't a one-hit kill, 3) the Galbadian soldier can counter Deathblow sometimes, 4) If we move to a new screen while Deathblow is up, it will be canceled. So we die, again.
Finally, after a couple more attempts, we get it right and the guy plummets to his death. In any other circumstances, I would have a deep appreciation for 'random mook decides to put up and gives the protagonist an inexplicably tough fight'; "TRAITOR!" is my favorite bit of the otherwise very forgettable The Force Awakens. But the minigame is too tedious for me to think of this sequence as anything but a frustrating waste of my time.
Once the soldier falls to his gruesome death, Squall hangs onto the grappling rope dangling from the exosuit and proceeds to climb up on it and ride it to its final destination…
Rinoa, who has been just chilling on her rock the whole time, jumps and grabs onto the rope, and Squall carries them to safety.
Or, well, "safety." He puts down the exosuit in the middle of a fierce melee between SeeD and Galbadian troops, which obeys the classic Hollywood movie style of 'everyone is wielding swords and squaring off randomly in a field in total chaos.
Again using the 'pre-rendered backdrop as movie playing in the background' to great effect. I don't know why they waited until what I assume is the end of Disc 2 to pull that trick, but it definitely makes an impact when it comes in. The scene is really dynamic, there's a sense of actual fights happening, with casualties we see in real time, explosions going off, and so on. This is exciting! This is cinematic! This is action!
And now it's time for more teenage romance. Which, like, to be clear, this is the right moment for teenage romance. Squall just rescued Rinoa and ran through a battlefield with explosions going off and now they have a brief moment of peace, this is the perfect moment for it.
Squall tries to play off saving her as still being his job, what with their standing contract, and Rinoa laughs at that, since it's incredibly a transparent excuse, and tells him she couldn't afford to fall off that cliff and die: She has something very important that belongs to him, and she can't die until she gives it back. Which leads to a fascinating exchange.
Squall, mentally: "(I'm gonna kill him…)" Squall: "That's my favorite ring. You'd better give it back." Rinoa: "I'm sure it is. It's a cool-looking ring. What's this monster on it anyway?" Squall: "It's not a monster. It's a lion. Lions are known for their strength and pride." Rinoa: [She does a cutesy 'shuffling over with her hands behind her back' animation] "Hmm… Great strength… pride… …Kinda like you, Squall." Squall: "I wish…" Rinoa: "Hmm… So this L I O N of yours, does it have a name?" Squall: "Of course."
Okay, I'm not crazy, that 'face portrait' is the necklace Squall wears in cutscenes, right?
…
He gave his lion ring a name.
And that name is Griever.
And it's considered meaningful enough that we get an option to change it like we do GF names.
…
We'll see where that leads eventually, sure.
But no, what I'm getting stuck on is - Rinoa doesn't know what a lion is. An animal that is both entirely mundane and extremely popular as well as highly symbolic in our world is a 'cool-looking monster' to her, and Squall has to explain both what it is and what's associated with it. When she repeats, 'L I O N' spelling out the letter, it strongly gives the impression that she's repeating a name she only ever heard just now, she didn't simply mistake the ring's appearance for something else.
It's… entirely possible that apex predators like the lion 1) are likely target for the Lunar Cry to turn into a monster, 2) cannot survive as animals in a world where prey has turned into monsters stronger than they and other, more powerful predatory monsters are outcompeting them. The lion… May very well be an endangered, or even extinct species in Squall's world.
…
We know people raise chocobos. We know people have cats and dogs. We know Moombas are used as pseudo-animal labor. But we haven't seen any livestock, have we? Farm animals?
Like, in retrospect, 'sometimes moonbeams turn your cows into superpowered hornbeasts' would be an issue for farming. And furthermore, 'the minotaurs are interfertile with your cows, so even if you keep your cattle safe from the Lunar Cry sometimes they pass through your field and ten months later you have a brood of Catoblepas on your hands' would make it even more difficult.
(Fun story: My aunt raises organic, free-range pigs for a living. They had one sow that was always kind of temperamental, physically a little different from the others, not so much the runt of the litter as the aggressive delinquent pig of the family. When came the time to do the dirty deed, they brought her to a professional as they do all their pigs, who told them 'yeah, I can't take that one, that's a boar-pig hybrid, hygiene rules won't let us.' That's the kind of thing we deal with in that business, I suppose.)
FF8 has the same kind of empty world as FF7, with vast stretches of plains and wilderness and unoccupied places between human settlements, and I'm getting the impression that part of the reason for that, on top of the monsters just being monsters, is that their existence makes raising livestock impossible? Dogs and cats are small and have a personal relationship with you, and chocobos are kind of basically already monsters, just friendly ones, but sheep, cows, horses? I'd wager that perhaps the only animal you can raise for food in this world might be, like, chickens.
…
Never mind, there's that UFO abducting a cow, forget everything I just said.
Rinoa: "You know Zell said he'll make me one exactly like it. Who knows, maybe I can become like a lion," too. That'd be crazy, huh!? I mean, everyone might, y'know, get the wrong idea about us." Squall, mentally: "(If it's so crazy, why do you sound so delighted? Everyone is trying to get us together. It's so obvious even I can tell.)" Squall: "You sound like you want everyone to get the wrong idea." Rinoa: [She does a hand-wagging gesture.] "No-no-no-no-no!"
It's… cute? That Squall is able to recognize that everyone is trying to set him up with Rinoa? I mean, he would have to be incredibly dense to not notice, but there is a kind of like… Authenticity to the way this relationship is handled; the way instead the old romance cliché of Rinoa and Squall growing closer but in a weird way where they don't fully know why they feel until a dramatic kiss happens, Rinoa is very clearly coming on to Squall and teasing him about it, and Squall is aware that his whole social circle is trying to set him up with this girl, and his own feelings are too complicated to either go along with it or break it off with her, so whether this will actually pan out into a relationship is contingent on whether or not Squall can sort out his own feelings, but he's aware of it. He knows Rinoa is flirting with him and his friends are trying to push them to get together. He's not completely socially blind.
We now get the option to tell Rinoa to stay here or tell her to come on as we join up with the others; I didn't bother with the first. I grabbed Aura from a draw point at the back of the trees, and now, we're heading into Galbadia Garden.
Whatever lies within, we'll find out next time.
…
Boy, that sure was a sequence. What a frustrating combination of high-octane cinematic action and baffling handling of straightforward plot beats. This is FF8 as its most 'war movie'-like since Dollet, and it really knows how to handle that aspect, from the chaos of battle, the grand speeches, the power of military technology in action, the sweeping vistas of conflict, the on-the-fly tactics and adjustments, all of that - top notch. When FF8 borrows the aesthetic of military sci-fi, it really finds its niche in a place no other FF game has before - FF7 was almost demilitarized by comparison, its focus entirely on its (outstanding) industrial aesthetic, the greatest army in the world merely a security corps playing second fiddle to giant robots and mad science projects. Rufus wishes he had a Garden to command. This isn't a value judgment between the two games; if anything, it's a criticism that FF8 doesn't quite lean enough into that angle that is really what it has of most unique, especially in combination with the geopolitical technothriller angle it had early on.
But also there's so much bullshit and I'm just not over Rinoa spending this entire update suspended above the void by the strength of her arms waiting calmly waiting for rescue. Or the weird placement of the ring stuff (and also I'm pretty sure it got changed from necklace to ring or the opposite at some point during development??). Not helped by me having to once again grapple with the junction mechanics for an hour to ultimately very little positive effect, all for two combat encounters total.
Also Odin was there I guess. Hopefully he'll show up as a summon in the next update, he has yet to do so.
