Fred Plays Final Fantasy VII Part II
Nov. 20th, 2011 03:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ariadThis installment of "Fred Plays Final Fantasy VII" takes us from Nibelheim to the end of Disc One! Which is quite a lot. Two more party members, a date, a betrayal, Cloud losing it a few times, one less party member, tears, and a lot of foreshadowing. Screencaps are from Caves of Narshe.
Nibelheim
What? Nibelheim isn't burned down? Bizarre!
I took Tifa with me and was disappointed by her lack of reaction to the creepy folks skulking around her house moaning, "REEEUUUUNNIONNNNNNNN." Also, I could not play the piano. What. Being on the tail of a mass murderer and finding creepy caped folks skulking around your mysteriously not-burned-down hometown is not an appropriate time to play the piano? I anticipate that when they finally do let me play, there will be a much greater threat to the planet, but at least there won't be a creepy caped dude in Tifa's parents' bedroom.
Getting Vincent to join my party was really annoying, not because Lost Number was an especially difficult boss, although it did kill me my first try, but because of that stupid safe. Oh my God. No safe in real life is so sensitive that it's that easy to turn the dial too far.
Tifa's reactions were less than satisfactory, but Yuffie, on the other hand, does not disappoint. I knew there was a reason I take her everywhere.
I love you, Yuffie.
I had forgotten that Vincent was such a ham who floats and somersaults through the air. I don't know how people take this guy seriously. In the recent releases, he's been animated beautifully, but he's so overdramatic and loltastic. Even the game doesn't take him seriously. I named him "Batman" because of his ridiculous voice in the English dub of Advent Children. Oh, boy, I can't wait to play Dirge of Cerberus. Fun times ahead.
Went down to the library to get pelted in the stomach by a Materia chucked by a serial murderer who can fly. (Free Materia! Yay!) Then I read some documents which, UNBEKNOWNST TO ME, WERE ABOUT MYSELF. OH MY GOD FINAL FANTASY VII, YOU ARE KILLING ME WITH YOUR FORESHADOWING.
This is what I love about video games as a medium for storytelling. In any other medium, documentary foreshadowing would have to be blatant, but in a video game, you have to explore and find those pieces of the story, whether it's by examining objects or talking to NPCs or being alert to possible side quests. The more detail you want, the more detail you get.
ANYWAY, THOSE DOCUMENTS. AAAAAAAAAAH. AAAAAAAAAAAH. Let me try to recount what they said:
1. Subject A showed no reaction to Jenova somethingorother. Experiment failed. Subject B showed reaction to Jenova somethingorother.
2. Escapees: Subjects A and B.
3. A was shot. B escaped while Subject A was being taken care of.
4. Whereabouts of B are currently unknown. Not an issue because of B's deteriorating state.
GOD. DAMMIT. *creys*
Then I just ran around Mt. Nibel for freakin' ever fighting Dragons for Gold Armlets. You think I'm going to pay, Rocket Town shop? Hah.
Rocket Town
YOU GUYS. Don't you think we should meet Cid first? Or we'll never hear his catchy musical theme. Come on.
Okay. Now we can steal the Tiny Bronco. Meanwhile, Yuffie continues her role as Cutest and Funniest Character Ever:
Forgive me, but I have to ask, why is Shera such a stupid fuck? "Go ahead and take off, Captain, I'm just going to quadruple check these oxygen systems while you broil me alive." HOLY SHIT, SHERA. IF YOU ARE CONCERNED ABOUT THE OXYGEN SYSTEMS, THERE ARE BETTER WAYS TO DEAL WITH THAT. LIKE. I DON'T KNOW, MAKING YOURSELF HEARD INSTEAD OF BEING SUCH A DIFFIDENT PUSHOVER. YOU WOULD JUST BE DOING YOUR FRICKIN' JOB, GEEZ. And why the fuck was everybody except Cid okay with blasting off while Shera was still in the engine room? Apparently, Cid had hired a bunch of dicks. (Or Shinra had hired a bunch of dicks, which is not unlike them at all.) Oops, we committed murder, but at least we achieved space travel! If I were Cid, I'd cuss at Shera every opportunity I got, too. What the fuck.
SERIOUSLY, SHERA.
Palmer and Rufus pay a visit, the latter taking advantage of his presidential resources to hunt Sephiroth. Good on you, mate. I'm wondering where the truck that hit Palmer came from, considering Cid's backyard is enclosed in a white picket fence.
The Tiny Bronco flight scene is one of the more epic scenes in FF7. ♥ Welp, Cid's in my party now because he was sad and I stole his airplane (on accident!) and then I broke his airplane and he was like "fuck all this shit I'm coming along," to which Yuffie did some rude but adorable gestures.
Anyway, Yuffie's cryptically nudging me toward Wutai now. She's not being very subtle, but if I were Cloud, I would follow her recommendation to go west just to figure out what's up with this endearing nugget. Tough luck, though. I'm going to save that for later in the game.
Gold Saucer
On the advice of some dude in some house on some peninsula, I went to the Gold Saucer to find the Keystone to open the Temple of the Ancients. That night,
I choose to believe that line was mistranslated from "room," or possibly even "shared bed where we can snuggle together under the covers." After all, why else would the hotel be horror-themed if not to scare people into having sex.
Another example: In the middle of the night, Barret comes to call. YEAH DATE WITH BARRET. But just the two of us?
We went to the Event center because some dude was like, "We have a bitchin' play, y'alls. Come check it out." And then the guy at the door didn't think we were a couple, so we were like, "BOLLOCKS TO THIS. WE DON'T NEED YOUR HOMOPHOBIC SOCIAL NORMS." And then we left.
Shame, though. I wanted to see Barret play the princess.
Then commenced the most awkward tram ride. They just sit in silence for such a long time before they start talking, and you can make Cloud look around awkwardly. IT IS SO HILARIOUS.
Okay, that was weird because I broke out of character and changed tenses and only then realized I had been writing as if I were Cloud. >>
What Cloud and Barret talk about?
And then the rest of the text went too fast for me to transcribe, but it was something about how Barret would rather be there with Marlene than "a foo like you" and then he started shooting at the fireworks.
THEN CAIT SITH REVEALED HIMSELF TO BE A SPY. MOTHERFUCKER. AND HE KIDNAPPED MARLENE, TOO? WOW, WHAT A BITCH. I hope Elmyra is okay. Better head for the Temple of the Ancients now. But first I'm going to play that game with the Mog and discover that it is the most boring mini-game ever. (Well, the Gold Saucer games are all pretty dumb.) And it has NO PRIZES.
Temple of the Ancients
I don't know why I thought for so long that Tseng died here. Maybe it's something someone says later in the game. But I think this is the last time I'll see Tseng? :( I hate the Temple of the Ancients. It's so hard to get around.
Wow, the Ancients aren't even a little bit not Egyptian. Check out that Egyptian artwork of Egyptian headdresses and crowns and geez. Then Sephiroth comes and it's EXPOSITION TIME!!! I like all the gesturing Cloud does when he starts to go crazy, as if he is trying to assert his identity.
These scenes with Cait Sith No. 1 as he goes to his death are so sad, even though he is a toy and will be okay. I have a feeling they put this in to fool the player into thinking that party members don't permanently die in this game, just before they off Aerith. That was a cute scene with Cloud and Aerith, though. But guess what happens next!
I DON'T HAVE A SCREENCAP FOR THIS BUT NO CLOUD WHAT ARE YOU DOING NO DON'T GIVE SEPHIROTH THE BLACK MATERIA CLOUD WHAT ARE YOU BEATING ON AERITH NOW STOP IT YOU LITTLE BITCH WHY IS VINCENT JUST PRANCING AROUND LIKE A PRAT DURING THIS SCENE AND THEN CAIT SITH NO 2 COMES AND IS JUST LIKE oops I guess this is a bad time AND THEN FINALLY VINCENT COMES TO SAVE AERITH. GOD. I BET IF I WERE BEATING ON CID, VINCENT WOULD HAVE BEEN THERE IN A SINGLE UNDEAD VAMPIRE HEARTBEAT. BITCH.
Then Aerith leaves my party. ALREADY?! DAMN. I had only two of her Limit Breaks! I was trying so hard to have her kill enough enemies to get her third one! T__________T Well, what could I expect, considering I spent the previous scene BEATING ON HER.
Gongaga
Wake up in Zack's hometown? Awkwarrrrd, considering I was just BEATING HIS GIRLFRIEND. But Barret gives a nice little speech about manning up here. DASS RIGHT BARRET YOU TELL 'IM. I like this trio of Cloud, Tifa, and Barret. I'm sad that it doesn't get more appreciation, but I guess it's sort of overshadowed by the characters' other relationships. I like that, even though shippers have sort of created this rivalry between Tifa and Aerith, they only treat each other as rivals once, in Don Corneo's manor. The rest of the time, they're good friends, and while Cloud's like "oh man guys idk if I should save Aerith; maybe I'll just let her die," Tifa is all, "YEAH RIGHT DAMNED IF I'M GOING TO LET ANYTHING HAPPEN TO AERITH YOU GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER BOY."
So Tifa/Cloud or Aerith/Cloud? NEITHER. TIFA/AERITH, GODDAMMIT.
Forgotten Capital
RPGs reuse a lot of city concepts; Bone Village is basically Fossil Valley from Chrono Cross, Icicle Inn is a snowy city like Flanoir from Tales of Symphonia, etc. (Although FF7 came before both those games, huzzah!) But the Forgotten Capital is really something else, all bone-white coral and pale green rock. It's lovely. All the locations in this game are gorgeous, actually. The area art is so detailed, complete with bathrooms in most of the houses, and ugh, artgasm.
Too bad we are not here sightseeing. Time to pay a visit to Aerith.
SHIT. SHIT. SHIT. SHIT. SHIT. THIS IS NOT A GOOD TIME TO GO CRAZY, CLOUD. I love that when you press the cancel button, Cloud shakes his head as if he's trying to cancel, too.
No, stop it, I can't cry. IF I CRY, I'LL BE PHYSICALLY COMPROMISED FOR THIS UPCOMING BOSS FIGHT. But this scene is so powerful. A bit awkward, too, to be honest, but I think Cloud's gush of FEELINGS is to make up for the fact that he is made of polygons.
AERITH'S THEME IS GOING TO KEEP PLAYING DURING THIS BOSS FIGHT? THAT'S NOT FUCKIN' FAIR.
WELL. THANKS TO FRICKIN' AQUALUNG, I LOST THAT BOSS FIGHT SO NOW I HAVE TO WATCH AERITH DIE AGAIN.
WATCHING THIS FOR THE SECOND TIME IN A ROW AND I'M CRYING AGAIN OH CLOUD YOUR GRIEF. BUT THIS TIME, I AM PREPARED WITH BIG GUARD, YEAAH.
End Disc One. SIGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. CRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.
Damn it. ;__________;
I'm moving through this game so quickly. Now it's 3 AM, and I didn't do any research for either of my two research papers today, but I just really want to start Disc Two. Square, why must you always ruin me. ♥
Nibelheim
What? Nibelheim isn't burned down? Bizarre!
I took Tifa with me and was disappointed by her lack of reaction to the creepy folks skulking around her house moaning, "REEEUUUUNNIONNNNNNNN." Also, I could not play the piano. What. Being on the tail of a mass murderer and finding creepy caped folks skulking around your mysteriously not-burned-down hometown is not an appropriate time to play the piano? I anticipate that when they finally do let me play, there will be a much greater threat to the planet, but at least there won't be a creepy caped dude in Tifa's parents' bedroom.
Getting Vincent to join my party was really annoying, not because Lost Number was an especially difficult boss, although it did kill me my first try, but because of that stupid safe. Oh my God. No safe in real life is so sensitive that it's that easy to turn the dial too far.
Tifa's reactions were less than satisfactory, but Yuffie, on the other hand, does not disappoint. I knew there was a reason I take her everywhere.
CLOUD: Now it's your turn.
VINCENT: Sorry... I cannot speak.
YUFFIE: Oh, that's okay. It was probably depressing anyway.
VINCENT: There was no way to cancel the experiment. I couldn't stop her. That was my sin. I let the one I loved, the one I respected most, face the worst.
YUFFIE: OK. Boring story no. 1.
VINCENT: All right. I've decide to go with you.
YUFFIE: Huh? Oh great just what I needed...
I love you, Yuffie.
I had forgotten that Vincent was such a ham who floats and somersaults through the air. I don't know how people take this guy seriously. In the recent releases, he's been animated beautifully, but he's so overdramatic and loltastic. Even the game doesn't take him seriously. I named him "Batman" because of his ridiculous voice in the English dub of Advent Children. Oh, boy, I can't wait to play Dirge of Cerberus. Fun times ahead.
Went down to the library to get pelted in the stomach by a Materia chucked by a serial murderer who can fly. (Free Materia! Yay!) Then I read some documents which, UNBEKNOWNST TO ME, WERE ABOUT MYSELF. OH MY GOD FINAL FANTASY VII, YOU ARE KILLING ME WITH YOUR FORESHADOWING.
This is what I love about video games as a medium for storytelling. In any other medium, documentary foreshadowing would have to be blatant, but in a video game, you have to explore and find those pieces of the story, whether it's by examining objects or talking to NPCs or being alert to possible side quests. The more detail you want, the more detail you get.
ANYWAY, THOSE DOCUMENTS. AAAAAAAAAAH. AAAAAAAAAAAH. Let me try to recount what they said:
1. Subject A showed no reaction to Jenova somethingorother. Experiment failed. Subject B showed reaction to Jenova somethingorother.
2. Escapees: Subjects A and B.
3. A was shot. B escaped while Subject A was being taken care of.
4. Whereabouts of B are currently unknown. Not an issue because of B's deteriorating state.
GOD. DAMMIT. *creys*
Then I just ran around Mt. Nibel for freakin' ever fighting Dragons for Gold Armlets. You think I'm going to pay, Rocket Town shop? Hah.
Rocket Town
BARRET: Let's steal it.
YOU GUYS. Don't you think we should meet Cid first? Or we'll never hear his catchy musical theme. Come on.
Okay. Now we can steal the Tiny Bronco. Meanwhile, Yuffie continues her role as Cutest and Funniest Character Ever:
YUFFIE: What's his prob!? I'm gonna go clean that guy's clock!!
Forgive me, but I have to ask, why is Shera such a stupid fuck? "Go ahead and take off, Captain, I'm just going to quadruple check these oxygen systems while you broil me alive." HOLY SHIT, SHERA. IF YOU ARE CONCERNED ABOUT THE OXYGEN SYSTEMS, THERE ARE BETTER WAYS TO DEAL WITH THAT. LIKE. I DON'T KNOW, MAKING YOURSELF HEARD INSTEAD OF BEING SUCH A DIFFIDENT PUSHOVER. YOU WOULD JUST BE DOING YOUR FRICKIN' JOB, GEEZ. And why the fuck was everybody except Cid okay with blasting off while Shera was still in the engine room? Apparently, Cid had hired a bunch of dicks. (Or Shinra had hired a bunch of dicks, which is not unlike them at all.) Oops, we committed murder, but at least we achieved space travel! If I were Cid, I'd cuss at Shera every opportunity I got, too. What the fuck.
SERIOUSLY, SHERA.
Palmer and Rufus pay a visit, the latter taking advantage of his presidential resources to hunt Sephiroth. Good on you, mate. I'm wondering where the truck that hit Palmer came from, considering Cid's backyard is enclosed in a white picket fence.
The Tiny Bronco flight scene is one of the more epic scenes in FF7. ♥ Welp, Cid's in my party now because he was sad and I stole his airplane (on accident!) and then I broke his airplane and he was like "fuck all this shit I'm coming along," to which Yuffie did some rude but adorable gestures.
Anyway, Yuffie's cryptically nudging me toward Wutai now. She's not being very subtle, but if I were Cloud, I would follow her recommendation to go west just to figure out what's up with this endearing nugget. Tough luck, though. I'm going to save that for later in the game.
Gold Saucer
On the advice of some dude in some house on some peninsula, I went to the Gold Saucer to find the Keystone to open the Temple of the Ancients. That night,
VINCENT: Hey Cid, let's go back to our rooms.
I choose to believe that line was mistranslated from "room," or possibly even "shared bed where we can snuggle together under the covers." After all, why else would the hotel be horror-themed if not to scare people into having sex.
Another example: In the middle of the night, Barret comes to call. YEAH DATE WITH BARRET. But just the two of us?
We went to the Event center because some dude was like, "We have a bitchin' play, y'alls. Come check it out." And then the guy at the door didn't think we were a couple, so we were like, "BOLLOCKS TO THIS. WE DON'T NEED YOUR HOMOPHOBIC SOCIAL NORMS." And then we left.
Shame, though. I wanted to see Barret play the princess.
Then commenced the most awkward tram ride. They just sit in silence for such a long time before they start talking, and you can make Cloud look around awkwardly. IT IS SO HILARIOUS.
Okay, that was weird because I broke out of character and changed tenses and only then realized I had been writing as if I were Cloud. >>
What Cloud and Barret talk about?
B: Hey foo. What you wanna see fireworks with me for?
C: Not having fun?
B: You should've asked one or the other!
C: Which would you have asked?
B: Oh man, there just ain't no choice!
B: Tifa, Aerith.
B: Ah, Yuffie?
C: (hoo boy)
B: What the hell's that supposed to mean?
B: Hey, you don't mean...Marlene?
B: NO WAY! Forget it!
B: There ain't no way I'm lettin' a wacko like you anywhere near my little Marlene!
B: She's my baby. My prized possession.
And then the rest of the text went too fast for me to transcribe, but it was something about how Barret would rather be there with Marlene than "a foo like you" and then he started shooting at the fireworks.
THEN CAIT SITH REVEALED HIMSELF TO BE A SPY. MOTHERFUCKER. AND HE KIDNAPPED MARLENE, TOO? WOW, WHAT A BITCH. I hope Elmyra is okay. Better head for the Temple of the Ancients now. But first I'm going to play that game with the Mog and discover that it is the most boring mini-game ever. (Well, the Gold Saucer games are all pretty dumb.) And it has NO PRIZES.
Temple of the Ancients
I don't know why I thought for so long that Tseng died here. Maybe it's something someone says later in the game. But I think this is the last time I'll see Tseng? :( I hate the Temple of the Ancients. It's so hard to get around.
Wow, the Ancients aren't even a little bit not Egyptian. Check out that Egyptian artwork of Egyptian headdresses and crowns and geez. Then Sephiroth comes and it's EXPOSITION TIME!!! I like all the gesturing Cloud does when he starts to go crazy, as if he is trying to assert his identity.
These scenes with Cait Sith No. 1 as he goes to his death are so sad, even though he is a toy and will be okay. I have a feeling they put this in to fool the player into thinking that party members don't permanently die in this game, just before they off Aerith. That was a cute scene with Cloud and Aerith, though. But guess what happens next!
I DON'T HAVE A SCREENCAP FOR THIS BUT NO CLOUD WHAT ARE YOU DOING NO DON'T GIVE SEPHIROTH THE BLACK MATERIA CLOUD WHAT ARE YOU BEATING ON AERITH NOW STOP IT YOU LITTLE BITCH WHY IS VINCENT JUST PRANCING AROUND LIKE A PRAT DURING THIS SCENE AND THEN CAIT SITH NO 2 COMES AND IS JUST LIKE oops I guess this is a bad time AND THEN FINALLY VINCENT COMES TO SAVE AERITH. GOD. I BET IF I WERE BEATING ON CID, VINCENT WOULD HAVE BEEN THERE IN A SINGLE UNDEAD VAMPIRE HEARTBEAT. BITCH.
Then Aerith leaves my party. ALREADY?! DAMN. I had only two of her Limit Breaks! I was trying so hard to have her kill enough enemies to get her third one! T__________T Well, what could I expect, considering I spent the previous scene BEATING ON HER.
Gongaga
Wake up in Zack's hometown? Awkwarrrrd, considering I was just BEATING HIS GIRLFRIEND. But Barret gives a nice little speech about manning up here. DASS RIGHT BARRET YOU TELL 'IM. I like this trio of Cloud, Tifa, and Barret. I'm sad that it doesn't get more appreciation, but I guess it's sort of overshadowed by the characters' other relationships. I like that, even though shippers have sort of created this rivalry between Tifa and Aerith, they only treat each other as rivals once, in Don Corneo's manor. The rest of the time, they're good friends, and while Cloud's like "oh man guys idk if I should save Aerith; maybe I'll just let her die," Tifa is all, "YEAH RIGHT DAMNED IF I'M GOING TO LET ANYTHING HAPPEN TO AERITH YOU GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER BOY."
So Tifa/Cloud or Aerith/Cloud? NEITHER. TIFA/AERITH, GODDAMMIT.
Forgotten Capital
RPGs reuse a lot of city concepts; Bone Village is basically Fossil Valley from Chrono Cross, Icicle Inn is a snowy city like Flanoir from Tales of Symphonia, etc. (Although FF7 came before both those games, huzzah!) But the Forgotten Capital is really something else, all bone-white coral and pale green rock. It's lovely. All the locations in this game are gorgeous, actually. The area art is so detailed, complete with bathrooms in most of the houses, and ugh, artgasm.
Too bad we are not here sightseeing. Time to pay a visit to Aerith.
SHIT. SHIT. SHIT. SHIT. SHIT. THIS IS NOT A GOOD TIME TO GO CRAZY, CLOUD. I love that when you press the cancel button, Cloud shakes his head as if he's trying to cancel, too.
No, stop it, I can't cry. IF I CRY, I'LL BE PHYSICALLY COMPROMISED FOR THIS UPCOMING BOSS FIGHT. But this scene is so powerful. A bit awkward, too, to be honest, but I think Cloud's gush of FEELINGS is to make up for the fact that he is made of polygons.
AERITH'S THEME IS GOING TO KEEP PLAYING DURING THIS BOSS FIGHT? THAT'S NOT FUCKIN' FAIR.
WELL. THANKS TO FRICKIN' AQUALUNG, I LOST THAT BOSS FIGHT SO NOW I HAVE TO WATCH AERITH DIE AGAIN.
WATCHING THIS FOR THE SECOND TIME IN A ROW AND I'M CRYING AGAIN OH CLOUD YOUR GRIEF. BUT THIS TIME, I AM PREPARED WITH BIG GUARD, YEAAH.
End Disc One. SIGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. CRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.
Damn it. ;__________;
I'm moving through this game so quickly. Now it's 3 AM, and I didn't do any research for either of my two research papers today, but I just really want to start Disc Two. Square, why must you always ruin me. ♥
