I’ve completed four video games thus far this year (3 from start to finish, 1 resumed after several long, mostly Guitar Hero-induced hiatuses. Hiatuses? Hiati?) so it was at long last time to strip the plastic off Final Fantasy XII. Neither of us could remember if I bought it myself or if Alan gave it to me as a gift, but I’ve had it for quite a while. I wanted to finish up those incomplete or shorter games before I even opened this one, because I knew that once I got started, my life would be all FF-XII, all the time. I love me some Final Fantasy. There are many reasons but foremost, Square-Enix has the best bestiary of all time. For full-of-w00tness examples, look at this ahriman and this drowsy ochu.
Last night as he watched me play some FF-XII, Alan asked about the relation of it to Final Fantasy X and X-2 (the only ones he’d seen me play before); he was wondering if this installment was the continuation of the same characters or spinoffs of more minor characters or what. I’d thought much the same thing back in the heyday of FF-7 mania; somehow I’d gotten the impression that to understand what was going on and how to play, you needed to play them in order so even though I longed for that game - it looked SO COOL! - I didn’t buy it.

Helly: No, except for X-2 which was definitely a sequel, they take place in different worlds with different characters, although there are common elements - like chocobos! There are always chocobos, and moogles, and an airship, plus there’s usually a Cid. Some things remain fairly constant, like spells. Healing spells go cure, cura, curaga; you always get fire spells and those go fire, fira, firaga, and like in the bestiary there are almost always bombs and tonberries and marlboros -

Alan: But it’s different people? Like this one isn’t Tidus and Yuna and Rikku?

Helly: Yeah, they were only in X and X-2. FF-7 was about Cloud Strife, eight was Squall Leonhart, and nine was...nine...who the hell was nine? [I had to look it up] Zidane, then I didn’t play eleven because it was on-line and this one is mostly Vaan but I’m not very far along.

Alan: I don’t like him. He’s too pretty. And what the hell is he doing now?

Helly: Curing. So far this game is stingy with the gil so I’m not buying a lot of potions. I’m using cure magicks instead.

Alan: He looks like he’s wiping his nose. No, wait! He's smelling his hand.

Helly: Well, he might be! You don’t know how a cure spell works.

Alan: But it possibly involves smelling one’s hand? Make him do it again. Okay, from that angle I think he’s fixing his hair. I told you he was too pretty. Where is he, anyway? That’s a new place.

Helly: Rabanastre. It’s the capital of Dalmasca.

Alan: You didn’t go there in FF-X. Where’s the Calm Lands? Or the Highroad? I want chocobos! [Alan is a big fan of chocobos, particularly the Chocobo Jam song from FF-X]

Helly: No Calm Lands. No Macalania Woods either. This a totally different world from Spira.

Alan: [stunned] No Macarena Woods? How is that possible?

Helly: See, this is Ivalice which is the world in FF Tactics and maybe another one. FF-7 was Midgar - well, the world might have been something else, I disremember, but Midgar was the main city. Spira was just for X and X-2. The villains are different, too but all that’s important about that is Sephiroth. Sephiroth was the villain in FF-7, widely regarded as the best video game villain OF ALL TIME. The only people who don’t think so are jealous or else they’re HATERS. Don’t be a hater, Alan.

Alan: I won’t be a hater. Even though I evidently married a FANBOY.

Helly: As much as I would like to take issue with that, and be offended...hell, I got nuthin’.


****************

Have I ever blogged about how I got into Final Fantasy and given the appropriate mega-props to my brother? Several years ago I was playing Kingdom Hearts, which contains many Final Fantasy elements. What with all the spiffy spells and summons, my longing to play FF was kindled anew. I whined about this to Bo, who clued me in that each game stands alone and I could, in fact, play a Final Fantasy game without starting at the beginning. I got very excited at the prospect of FF-7, at the time still being touted as the greatest game EVAH over at Gamefaqs.

As it turned out, Bo actually owned this wondrous game, which made me very jealous. I was grateful and a bit awed that he was willing to loan it to me when he made a confession: his game might not work because he had freaking HATED the game, so much so that at one point he ripped the disc out of his PlayStation and flung it across the room. Happily for me, it worked (still works to this day) and as much as he’d hated it, that’s how much I totally loved that game. The day I beat the final boss (Sephiroth!!!) I called him to report this, and started fake-crying and begging to keep it, really just messing with him, but he replied in a thoroughly disgusted tone that I was oh, so much MORE than welcome to consider it a gift if only I’d keep it out of his sight.

Since then, I played several installments of the franchise as new ones were released and went back to play some of the older ones on re-release. I’ve played: FF Origins (re-release of FFI and II), FF Chronicles (re-release of FFIV and Chrono Trigger), FF Anthology (re-release of V and VI), VIII, IX, X, X-2 and now I’m working on XII. Dang - Alan’s right. I’m a fanboy - er, girl. Fangirl. I blame my brother.