FFVII Recap, Ep. IV: The Nibelheim Incident

[auronlu]

Woo hoo! It's time to head out of town and tackle the world map. A whole new wooooorld! A new enchaaanting point of v... good gods, what is this trash heap? Oh, right, Midgar.



Actually, before we can start gadding about, we must egress the Shinra building where I left Cloud hanging. (Or was that Rufus?)



Let's back up. Last time on Let's Play Final Fantasy VII, our heroes infiltrated Shinra HQ, liberated one Distressed Damsel plus one lab specimen, landed in prison after suffering a steaming pile of Villainous Exposition, escaped via a grisly plot device, and ogled the hair flip of Rufus Shinra, new CEO, tyrant and sub-villain.

Cloud "couldn't finish him," as is the way of Disc One sub-villains — Tifa tactfully does NOT say, "because you took him on solo instead of letting us help, you ninny" — and they adjourn downstairs to find their friends penned in by security forces surrounding the ground floor.

Aeris plays the martyr card: "It's not you they're after, it's me." Oh, sure. They'll just let AVALANCHE go, especially with all the bodies strewn about and all the eyewitnesses to our discreet manner of entry. Sorry, hon, I'm about done with my Distressed Damsel quota for this game.

Mini-FMV to the rescue! Sharp eyes may spot "Midgal's" painted on the side of the truck.

"" (Watch on YouTube)

Tip o' the hat to whichever lackey kept those showroom models fueled with keys in the ignition.

An Akira motorcycle chase ensues, during which Cloud has to thwack Shinra pursuers with his ginormous sword without tipping over. Thank Shiva that gravity is his friend, because minigames requiring coordination are certainly not mine.

We dispatch the inevitable boss machina that corners us at the end of the Overpass to Nowhere, then take stock.



"And that'll save the Planet?" Barret asks, dimly sensing mission creep and a logical fallacy or three.

"Seems like it," says the man who hears voices in his head and frequently loses arguments with himself.

That's enough for Barret, who confessed his love for cheesebrain allowed that Cloud was a good guy after all during the rescue mission. "Awright, I'm going!"

Tifa accepts this with equanimity: "I guess this's goodbye, Midgar." Once again, she gives Cloud a beady glance and hides her medical tricorder behind her back.

Aeris says she has things that she wants to find out. (Back in prison, she'd mentioned hearing her mother's voice telling her, "Someday [you'll] get out of Midgar... Speak with the Planet and find [your] Promised Land." Thanks a lot, Mom. Unless that was really Jenova meddling.)

Nanaki says he'll stick with the group as far as his hometown.

Motivations established, everyone shimmies down a Cable of Contrivance and prepares to set out. Remember how I noted back in part one that Barret, Cloud and Shinra Sr. kept jockeying for control of the narrative? Barret hasn't quite given up.



Dagnabbit, Barret. Up until this point, leadership sloshed between Barret, Cloud, and Tifa, depending on the scene. Now Aeris declares, "It would have to be Cloud," and Tifa backs her up. From now on, Cloud is usually in charge except when he shorts out.

...Or when Barret gets irked.



Destinations now color coded for our convenience!

Kalm is your standard sleepy, peaceful first-stop-on-the-world-map village with crappy souvenirs ethers stashed in cupboards, cheap weapons and a Motel 6 with rooms under $40. Most of the NPCs rhapsodize about how Mako power has made their lives more convenient, although a few harbor misgivings.



Some locals have noticed that plants and animals have been dwindling, while monsters seem to be multiplying. I think this is the first time a plot device has been introduced to justify random monster encounters. The woman above has heard that Shinra, Inc. is actually creating the monsters. (Whyyyyy?) She, like the other more clued-in NPCs, is too afraid of Shinra to protest.



Callback to the Mythril Mines of FFIII!

Another villager passes along the rumor that Rufus was pretty badly banged up while fighting AVALANCHE, who murdered his father. (Half right, anyway.)

It sounds like Sephiroth's found himself another sword.



That was quick. I wonder who his dealer is?

NPC rumors of Sephiroth like this provide handy signposts to direct our party from point A to B for much of the game.

Meanwhile, the rest of the party waits impatiently for Cloud to join them at the Inn.



Yep, Cloud's always late. Hey, he was gossiping with npcs buying new weapons for everybody. Barret turns his gun on choco-head and says, "So let's hear your story." Whoa now! "You know, the one about Sephiroth and the crisis facing the Planet."

Translation: "One minute, AVALANCHE is bombing Mako reactors to stop Shinra from draining the planet, and the next minute we're after some white-haired anime villain to stop him from reaching the Promised Land. What the cumquat?"

Okay, gather round boys and girls, Uncle Cloud will play the part of Maechen tonight.

I'm hesitant to recap the lengthy Nibelheim flashback, since it's so well-known to any FF7 player, but for those who haven't played this game, This Is It. The fun part for those of us who know the game is to play "spot the unreliable narrator."

Cloud's tale begins five years ago, when he had already reached the exalted rank of SOLDIER, First Class, at the hoary age of 16. I thought Sephiroth was the prodigy?



"You call that a friend?" Barret says.

"He was older than me, and he hardly ever talked about himself," Cloud fails to explain.

At this, Tifa shakes her head and imitates Squall ("....") She continues head-shaking and ellipsizing throughout Cloud's recitation.



Flashback!cam commences in the back of a Shinra transport, where a younger, much more caffeinated outgoing Cloud is determined to be pals with everybody, even the motion sick soldier who's ready to hurl on his socks.



Cloud enthuses about his new Materia ("Just like a kid," Sephiroth says), asks for a mission briefing, then interrupts it to blurt out his life story. He tells how he joined SOLDIER to emulate Sephiroth, but by the time he reached First Class, the war was over. He's still trying to become a hero, so he's joining every mission he can. He's downright giddy:



I suppose he's asking what it's like to be a hero, not making a pass at his superior officer. (Mr. S? Oh, dear, that explains Sephiroth's wardrobe.)

"...I thought you wanted a briefing?" Sephiroth says. Their mission is to investigate and dispose of monsters that have been spawning around the Mako reactor near Cloud's hometown. Right on cue, a dragon t-bones the transport. The SOLDIERS (not soldiers) hop out to fight it. Or rather, Sephiroth fights it while Cloud gets KOed a lot.



Holy sahagin, Batman. Sephiroth inflicts inhuman amounts of damage with both sword and spells. Instead of the usual battle music, there's Sephiroth's creepy Goth Pipe Organ and Bells of Doomy Doom. It's all very understated yet terrifying. Meanwhile, at the back of the player's mind niggles the worrisome thought: we're supposed to fight this guy?

[After Sephiroth two-hit-killed the dragon, I encountered a dreaded emulator glitch that hung the game at this point. I was about to throw in the towel when I found a way past it. Phew.]

Upon their arrival in Nibelheim, Sephiroth exhibits no immediate signs of Doomy Doom. In fact, he's quite personable.



[Side note: Nibelheim is Nilfheim, "Mist home," the home of the dwarves (miners) in Norse mythology. So there's the mist-motif in yet another Final Fantasy.]

"So how does it feel?" Sephiroth continues. He sounds like younger!Cloud. Cloud — still offscreen — says nothing. Sephiroth says he wouldn't know, because he doesn't have a hometown. Look behind you, goofball.

"What about your parents?" asks offscreen!Cloud.

"My mother, Jenova, died giving birth to me, and my father..." Sephiroth gives a strange laugh (indicated by spastically twitching polygons): "What does it matter...?"

Finally, Cloud and the two infantry grunts walk into view. The right-hand one whispers that Cloud will get in trouble for messing around; the left-hand lad is more eager to chew the fat with bigshot SOLDIERs.



Cloud jokingly coaches him on the correct pose (the typical FF hero stance with one elbow cocked). That's right; standing around voguing is SOLDIER's chief activity, as we know from that overwrought holodeck duel in Crisis Core. Eventually, the infantryman admits that he doesn't really want to be in SOLDIER, after all. Huh?

"Yo, wait a minute!" Barret butts in, snapping us out of flashback!cam. "I remember Jenova. That's that damn headless spook livin' in the Shinra building." I should hope you would remember, Barret; you're not the one with the memory problems.



I imagine Tifa sounds a bit brittle here.

Back in flashback!cam, Sephiroth enters the inn, leaves one soldier on lookout duty, and tells Cloud, "you may visit your friends and family." A number of villagers remember Cloud, but most don't recognize him at first glance (even his own Mom gives him a puzzled "Yeeee---es?" when he walks in, before bursting out, "Cloud!?")

You'd think this town was too small for paparazzi, but there's at least one photographer trying to score a photo of Sephiroth's bishie ass. (Cloud, alas, is too much of a nobody to warrant a picture.)



Cloud stops by Tifa's house, but it's empty — and unlocked, like every other home in town. Game options let him play creepy stalker to his heart's content: sneaking into her bedroom, plinking on her piano, reading a long love letter from Johnny in Midgar --



— and pinching her "Orthopedic Underwear" from a cabinet. Thank you SO much, Motomu Toriyama. (Just a hunch.)

Cloud shies away from talking about his own family, but Barret and Aeris press him. He says his father died when he was small, so he was raised by his Mom, a "vibrant woman." Yep, definitely a member of the FF Dead Moms Society. There's several odd white-screen flashes while he's recalling his visit home:



Cloud stammers in reply, "Mom...I..." *FLASH*

The scene jumps forward to the "My how you've grown...I bet all the girls never leave you alone" conversation that we saw in an earlier flashback.

Outside, Tifa's father dumps a pile of clichés on Cloud's pointy head: "We don't need the Shinra's help to protect our town!" Also:



Oh dear. Didn't Elmyra say the same thing, slightly more tactfully?

Cloud meets Sabin as an old man Zangan in the Inn. He's a martial arts / monk instructor who travels around the world, randomly teaching children to kick ass and bouncing around like Gau the human flea.



Upstairs, Sephiroth is peering out the window towards the mansion that looms at the edge of town. Or Mt. Nibel, but I bet he's scoping the mansion.



Foreshadowing, your key to quality literature.

Sephiroth mentions that he's hired a guide, but he's having second thoughts, as she's very young. The eavesdropping Shinra grunt turns towards them as the screen darkens.

The next morning, Cloud is shocked — shocked, I say — to learn that the guide is Tifa, despite the fact that Tifa's Dad accosts them with another "don't you let anything happen to her" tirade while waiting for her to appear. Tifa stands up for herself:



(Shinra Manor is the big building at left.)

Sephiroth drily tells Cloud that since he's so worried about her, he can be her big manly man protector. *sigh* Wantz The town paparazzo gets his photo of Sephiroth and friends, and we head to Mt. Nibel. Which of course has disintegrating rope bridges (is there any other kind?) to set up Dangling Damsel sequences:



This proves pointless when the entire bridge breaks. They all plummet into the abyss.

One of the Shinra guards gets left behind. The other gets to be an honorary PC and enjoys a lessening of local gravity. After they dust themselves off, Tifa notices grunt #1's absence, but Sephiroth coldly says they can't afford to waste time searching for him.

Alas, poor blueshirt. We continue on. In the nearby cave, we find a free-flowing Mako fountain where raw Mako is bubbling up and condensing into natural Materia (the crystalline balls). Sephiroth decides they have time for a lengthy Mako 101 lecture.



"Anyone with this knowledge can freely use the powers of the Land and the Planet. That knowledge interacts between ourselves and the planet calling up magic...or so they say."

[Sephiroth, just say "Midichlorians" and be done with it. It's quicker.]

Sephiroth laughs and immediately corrects himself (and Tifa) for using the term "magic," saying that a man once got furious at him for using such an unscientific term. Which man? "Hojo of Shinra, Inc. ... An inexperienced man assigned to take over the work of a great scientist."



Mr. Pot, Mr. Kettle would like a word with you. (Also: Who's your daddy?)

We proceed to the fateful Mako reactor. To Tifa's annoyance, Sephiroth insists that only Shinra personnel may enter. He orders the no-name guard to stay outside and look after her while Sephiroth and Cloud investigate.

This reactor is far more interesting than previous ones (at least before they exploded).  It's full of pods and — waaaitaminute — there's a sealed door labeled "Jenova" at the top.



Sephiroth is conspicuously quiet, directing Cloud's attention back to the other tanks, which appear to be the cause of the "malfunction."



"Now I see, Hojo," Sephiroth mutters for the player's benefit. "But, even doing this, will never put you on the same level as professor Gast."

Sephiroth expounds to Cloud that "This is a system that condenses and freezes the Mako energy..." except that instead of just distilling it down into Materia, these tanks have something else in them.



I would ask why the heck a power company is letting Hojo use its Mako refinery (FOR SCIENCE!) to create monsters, but possibly ShinraCorp doesn't know, or perhaps the monsters give Shinra yet another excuse to plant troops everywhere. Also: why is Jenova being stored in this security-free reactor in some podunk backwater?

None of these questiosn occur to Sephrioth; it's all about him. "Was I created this way?" he wonders, clutching at his temples. Uh oh.



Sephiroth starts slashing at the tanks in a frenzy.

One of the tanks pops open to reveal a monster in mid-metamorphosis, limbs betraying its human origin.



Back in the present, Barret says hearing all this makes him hate Shinra even more. Even Tifa is shocked: "Who would have ever thought the Mako Reactor held a secret like that."

The flashback picks up with Sephiroth returning to the village and disappearing into the bowels of Shinra mansion, the big building at the edge of town which locals say was once a residence for Shinra personnel. Sephiroth pores over Professor Gast's field notes.



Gast names the specimen "Jenova" and identifies it as an Ancient. His notes mention a "Jenova Project" using a Mako reactor, but no details. That doesn't stop Sephiroth from jumping wildly to conclusions.



I'm pretty sure it wasn't Gast's idea.

Sephiroth kicks Cloud out and buries himself in the library. After several days of waiting for him to emerge from the stacks, Cloud awakens in Shinra Mansion to the Sephiroth Bells of Doomy Doom.

"" (Watch on YouTube)

Well, that doesn't sound good. Prompted by theme music, Cloud heads downstairs to confront his war buddy. Sephiroth greets him as "Traitor" and spews backstory for a good fifteen minutes. The short version:



The longer version is a little incoherent, but here's the gist: The Cetra were an "itinerant race" that would settle a planet, then move on. Legend foretold that "at the end of their harsh, hard journey, they would find the Promised Land and supreme happiness."

However, the present-day humans' ancestors decided to abandon the journey and settle permanently, creating an "easier life" by taking resources from the planet, "without giving one whit in return." (So the Cetra and humans are the same species?)



Sometime after Cloud's ancestors chose to abandon the journey, there was a catastrophe that wiped out the Cetra. The humans who had built shelters mysteriously "hid" and survived.

Sephiroth declares that he's an Ancient created from Jenova by Professor Gast's research. So why did he think he was a monster created via high exposures to Mako? Is that how the Ancients incubated their babies?



Oedipus complex ahoy.

Cloud, giving chase again, emerges to find the town of Nibelheim on fire.  Firaga, I assume.



(A more loaded question than one might think, although at this point it was still an unqualified "Yes.")

Cloud tries to help Zangan pull people out of houses, but it's too late. He staggers out of his Mom's house and sags in defeat.

Then he spots Sephiroth cutting down villagers. Blocky polygons and post-game hype aside, this was a hell of a hair-raising sequence, thanks largely to Uematsu's music (still the Bells of Doom).



And here's the iconic moment of Sephiroth turning and disappearing into the flames.





Crisis Core re-rendered the same sequence with better graphics, less awesome music:

"" (Watch on YouTube)

Okay, enough of that. Cloud dashes through the flames and follows Sephiroth back to the reactor and Mommy Dearest.



Inside, we see the same sequence glimpsed in an earlier flashback. Cloud spots Tifa crouched over her dead father, crying vengeance. (Unanswered questions: Why did her father follow Sephiroth here? Why did Tifa?)



"I hate them all!" Tifa shouts, picks up Sephiroth's sword -- again, he's terribly absent-minded about leaving his stuff lying around -- and charges into the reactor to take on Sephiroth all by her lonesome. This isn't going to be pretty.



Tifa, hon, this is definitely a case of "strike first, ask questions later." I'm sure Zangan taught you better.

Sephiroth turns to meet her, wrestles the sword away from her, slashes and throws her down the stairs. Cloud, late as usual, rushes in to find her crumpled.



Once again, the polygons get in the way, but the animation suggests that he's cradling her head.

Meanwhile, Sephiroth has called on "Mother" to open the door to her inner sanctum. Alarmingly, something has the power to respond and open the door for him.



"I've thought of a great idea," he says, a catch phrase echoed in Advent Children. "Let's go to the Promised Land."

Which crazy-ass scientist designed the art deco façade of a metal angel with wings surrounding Jenova's holding tank? Sephiroth wrenches this away and comes face to face with the real Jenova.



Back then, the preserved body still has a head.



Yes, it's got wings— this is Final Fantasy, so it has to have wings.

Um, Sephiroth? Remember how Professor Gast's notes said that humans were basically Cetra who settled down? Does that look... human?

Cloud interrupts Sephiroth's Villainous Gloating ("Those worthless creatures...are stealing the planet from Mother...but now I'm here with you...")



"My sadness is like yours," Cloud says. Sephiroth laughs and goes on an extended "I am the Chosen One" rant.



Cloud yells, "I trusted you!" and brandishes his bigass sword. It looks like there's going to be a face-off, but that's where flashback!cam runs out of tape.

"...and that's the end of my story," Cloud says, capping the most anticlimactic ending ever. Barret is not well pleased.



Cloud doesn't remember anything else, but he's sure that he didn't have the skill to beat Sephiroth. Shinra's official account in the papers is that Sephiroth died, but everyone here can smell a cover-up. Still, if he wasn't dead, where's he been, what's he been doing, and why has he come back?

Cloud adds (how does he know?) that Shinra shipped Jenova's body back to Midgar. Where'd the head go?



"....I'm alive, too," Tifa offers quietly.

So many unanswered questions, but that flashback was overly long as it is.

Barret loses his temper — "Damn! Don't none of this make sense!" Nevertheless, he's signed onto Cloud's cause. "I ain't lettin' Sephiroth or Shinra get to no Promised Land. If they do, then we're all screwed." He storms out, telling the others to do the thinking for him. Again, I think Barret would make a great gaming buddy, and I'm sorry I haven't written this entire recap from his POV.

Tifa asks Cloud just how badly she was wounded when Sephiroth "cut her."



"...." Tifa says yet again, perhaps because the translation totally mangled the pathos of his statement. Or perhaps  because she's keeping quiet about something yet again. Dammit, woman, just spit it out!

I'm going to pause here, because anything after this would be more anticlimactic than Cloud's "that's all, folks."

Comments

[zen_monk]

And horror dawns upon Tifa as she puzzles over Cloud's memories and her own, while also listening to a potentially triggering narration of the tragedy that defined her reveeeeeeenge.

I thought it was interesting how once the game got to the point where Cloud narrated the basis of the game's conflict, he emoted more and gradually revealed his more empathetic nature. Though, he uses it in relation to his feelings in order to reach out to someone, which he would repeat later on. I dunno, sometimes when some protagonist tries to promote empathy in order to go against a villain's actions or unsavory decisions, it would be more general. Cloud's tend to gravitate to his own experiences, which I guess is thematic once we go to his heart-dive.

I, generally, have a lower opinion about that kind of method when trying to get back at a villain, but whatevs.

Man, Nibelheim is super creepy.

[auronlu]

Yes, I realize it's mostly a narrative device, but Tifa's restraint in not saying a thing during this whole nightmarish flashback -- apart from the awkward bits in her house -- astounds me, in retrospect. Cloud's not the only one who went through hell that day, and she's rather more together than he is. (Of course, she didn't have the aftermath he did, but still.)

I'm trying to grasp what you mean about Cloud using empathy "in order to go against a villain's actions." You mean Cloud's "what about my sadness?" speech, trying to get through to Sephiroth by pointing out that he's not the only one with manpain? Or...? Sorry, it's late, and my brain is a little fuzzy, and I'm afraid I'm missing something here.

[zen_monk]

Yeah, basically. Using the "what about my sadness" thing, and he does it again at the Forgotten City when he's listing various bodily sensations of great duress. I dunno, I've always thought it was a little bit strange because it's not usually something that I see in other narratives, like in tv shows or in movies.

I hope that I wasn't trying to make it super defensive in regards to Tifa, because i also recognize that it was really strained plot contrivances to have her not say anything or to analyze what Cloud was saying. I thought it was a very weak moment in the plot where this is one of those things where you do expect someone like Tifa to give some pointed questions, so it struck me more as lazy writing. Unless she really just pussyfooted around a lot in other areas that we don't see.

[raaj]

The funny thing is though, with how things actually happened, he didn't try to reach out to Sephiroth at all. He literally did the "strike first, ask questions later" (well more like "strike first and then express how angry and upset you are in words, in case the striking did not make that clear enough"). Though he does do empathy later, in this case it's something he wrote in after the fact--maybe because he wanted Sephiroth to have understood how much he hurt him, but it wasn't possible for him to express back then. (...If he'd tried, giving away his approach, he probably would have just ended up like Tifa and then they'd both have bled out to death.) But yeah, he's definitely emoting more in the telling of the Nibelheim incident, and I think it shows just how powerfully his feelings have gotten tied up in this one event and sets up how the pursuit of Sephiroth breaks down afterward.

[zen_monk]

I actually thought that at the time of Cloud's narration, it was when his false persona was solidifying. That also happens once mentions about Sephiroth came about during the second reactor bomb setting right before falling into the church, because that was the first time when Cloud started voicing some sort of personal self-interest.

It could also be Jenova cells solidifying his false persona once there were more inquiries and remembered mentionings about Jenova and Sephiroth, but that's just more conjecture.

[pyritic]

Cloud "couldn't finish him," as is the way of Disc One sub-villains — Tifa tactfully does NOT say, "because you took him on solo instead of letting us help, you ninny"

The sudden compulsion of "I KNOW WHAT TO DO" made him get a few wires crossed on what was actually smart to do. (...come to think of it, that could probably describe a few other things.)

I assumed Aerith playing the martyr card was more her offering to be a distraction while they got out--Shinra wants her alive, she can rush at them and make a struggle while AVALANCHE slips out the other way. ...So still martyr-y and like Barret ever would have gone with that anyway, but less...distressed damselish. May be wishful thinking on my part. Hooray for Barret shooting it down anyway.

And the descriptions of Barret and Cloud in this just amuse me. Although:

Okay, gather round boys and girls, Uncle Cloud will play the part of Maechen tonight.

Maechen would be appalled at the way Uncle Cloud ended that flashback. Shaaaaame.

[Side note: Nibelheim is Nilfheim, "Mist home," the home of the dwarves (miners) in Norse mythology. So there's the mist-motif in yet another Final Fantasy.]

A lot of people like connecting it to Cloud's name too (Clouds and mist being both made up of water--so Nibelheim could be considered "Cloud's home", in a way).

...One other fun tidbit of names, though I only know this through the FF wiki--apparently in the coding, one of the grunts is "Zax", the other "Zako". "Zax" is, well, the source of our unreliable narration, "Zako" is a kind of degrading term that pretty much means "cannon fodder". The blueshirt. Makes me wish I could look at the coding because there's moments before blueshirt's death when I can't tell which one should be the future protagonist. I mean, was Cloud more likely to be the one trying to imitate Zack (seems right), then saying he didn't really want to be SOLDIER (huh? ...okay, this could make some sense if he was sour graping), or is he the one whispering that Zack shouldn't be goofing off (makes sense for him wanting this visit to be clean and cut, in-town, out-of-town, no-one-finds-out-he's-really-a-nobody?) Pretty much trivial in the long run but it still makes me curious.

I'm pretty sure Tifa's supposed to read as brittle, given Barret's sheepish reaction to her objection.

Oh dear. Didn't Elmyra say the same thing, slightly more tactfully?

Makes me wonder if Cloud's superimposing what she said onto Mr. Lockhart now--since after all's said and done, it's unlikely he actually had this conversation with Tifa's father.

Sephiroth declares that he's an Ancient created from Jenova by Professor Gast's research. So why did he think he was a monster created via high exposures to Mako? Is that how the Ancients incubated their babies?

I think the "Jenova" inscription being near all the monsters created via high exposures to mako is what led to that logical leap in the first place.

Cloud adds (how does he know?) that Shinra shipped Jenova's body back to Midgar.

I think this is just awkward translation/writing getting in the way again--it's not really THAT puzzling how Jenova might have gotten from one Shinra-controlled facility to another Shinra-controlled facility in the first place. His line would read a little better if he said something like "Shinra must have shipped it" rather than just "Shinra shipped it", but the logic isn't that weird or anything. (Actually I think Aerith's questioning is just badly set up here--the real oddness is that Jenova, headless spook, disappeared from Shinra HQ, and that's her next question and it's still weirdly phrased.)

translation totally mangled the pathos of his statement

FF7: the eternal question of if translation is at fault, or if Cloud's own emotional/mental quirks are. At least, I'm never quite sure...

[auronlu]

All excellent comments, and thank you for the many tidbits! Alas, poor Zako. Yes, I was very puzzled about the two guards during the gate-to-Nibelheim scene. Maybe it'll be more clear when we revisit the flashback later.

Aerith-as-martyr: "Martyr" was probably a bad word choice on my part. She's not being a sacrificial lamb. She knows Shinra wants her alive. So she'd prefer the inconvenience of getting captured again to the pain of having her friends killed.

...and I was actually wondering if Cloud saw Jenova boxed up. I can't remember the exact sequence of events between the end of this flashback and Cloud winding up in a tank. Again, the next time we revisit this flashback should help untangle it.

[flonnebonne]

Re: Tifa not saying anything, maybe it's because she doesn't want to upset the psycho in the room by contradicting him, but I am surprised that she doesn't say anything after, to the others, when Cloud is not around. Really, if your friend just said a bunch of absolute crazy, wouldn't you want to talk to your other friends about it? It just seems unrealistic. What kinda reliable narrator are you, girl?

I feel like Square could have Tifa to give the player some clear hints about Cloud's unreliability. Foreshadowing! When she finally drops the bomb later on it's a bit too sudden to be satisfying. Or maybe fifteen-year-old me was just obtuse?

That said, the first Nibelheim flashback really is pretty cool. Even if Jenovah keeps making me think of somber Jehovah's Witnesses at my door more than anything.

Thank you for summarizing Sephiroth's blah blah blah in Nibelheim. I never understood it before but I think maybe I do now! Maybe.

[auronlu]

There have been very tiny bits of foreshadowing that Tifa knows something is wrong with him, from her frequent "are you okay" questions out of left field to her sudden "...." silences to the fact that when he falls over in front of Jenova, she doesn't ask, "What's wrong," but instead starts trying to bring him back to himself. They all add up to hints that Tifa knows there's something funny about him.

There's a much bigger hint in Cosmo Canyon (not to mention the hints that Something Isn't Right when they reach Nibelheim). Most are really subtle, though, and I can see why they'd easy to miss. On my first playthrough, I knew there was something wrong with Cloud, but I put too much stock in what Sephiroth said and thought maybe he was some kind of construct modeled on (or using the corpse of) the original, dead Cloud. It's fascinating, but confusing, in that so many people in this game aren't telling the whole truth.

[cygna_hime]

God, this whole sequence is just...heartbreaking to see the second+ time round, when you know just how dissociated Cloud is, how he's flipping back and forth between his own POV and Zack's, plus filling in some blanks to form them into a coherent story. And he can't remember what happened with fighting Sephiroth in the reactor because both Zack and Cloud have very definite memories of what happened that are completely irreconcilable into one person's point of view.

I got the impression that Tifa here and for a lot of the story is genuinely unsure which of them is remembering accurately - after all, it was a horribly traumatic time for her, and a lot of things will have been distorted in her mind, plus she was in a coma for a while afterward. So while she can tell something's off about Cloud, and the story isn't how she remembers it happening exactly, she isn't sure. She gets more evidence as the game progresses, but I think at this point she's still not willing to commit, especially since it sounds so flat-out crazy; how can she say Cloud wasn't there and she didn't see him (because he never took his helmet off), when he remembers everything so clearly, including that conversation about materia that she would never have considered relevant enough to tell anybody? What seems more likely, that he's got someone else's memories in his head (and also was in Nibelheim without telling her), or that she's blocked him out for some reason? As we encounter more objective evidence later, the balance shifts, but until then, I don't really blame her for not wanting to play a lovely game of Who's The Crazy One.

[akycha]

Yes, that was what was so fascinating for us playing it, this time, was trying to unwind the narration and noting just how beautifully it's tangled so that at points you can't.

I'm really interested in stories where people build up false pasts: Revoluotionary Girl Utena is another one that uses this device, although differently (it's not someone else's memories) to great effect.

This time through, we were watching the narration and playing "spot the real Cloud," along with "I bet that's a Cloud memory" and "this must be from Zack" and "who the hell knows?" It's a really well-done piece from a writing point of view. Especially when you think, as you point out, how much Tifa's own memories must be confused and terrifying from the trauma.

It's pretty amazing what they managed to do with this as a storytelling medium.

[auronlu]

Oh, I'd forgotten that Tifa really couldn't know if he was there at all, since he didn't show his face until she was badly injured -- she could have imagined it!

The soppy romantic side of me thinks it's very sad that he told her -- back at the beginning of his game -- that he couldn't keep his promise, when she was partly fishing to see if he HAD, or whether she'd only imagined it.

[akycha]

More replies, less serious this time:

Tip o' the hat to whichever lackey kept those showroom models fueled with keys in the ignition

You know darn well that the janitorial staff were going for joyrides around that huge showroom after closing hours.

"And that'll save the Planet?" Barret asks, dimly sensing mission creep and a logical fallacy or three.

"Seems like it," says the man who hears voices in his head and frequently loses arguments with himself.

Oh, gods, poor Barrett. I really feel for Barrett. He had such potential as a character. I like him so much. And he was ridden over by the bishonen's plot like a beetle on railroad tracks.

[akycha]

Crap, I didn't mean to post so soon.

I suppose he's asking what it's like to be a hero, not making a pass at his superior officer. (Mr. S? Oh, dear, that explains Sephiroth's wardrobe.)

The all-caps MISTER makes me wonder if he's using -sama (or perhaps -sempai?) to address Sephiroth. But the translation does come off as somewhat flirty, I admit.

Are we avoiding spoilers here? I didn't think we were. Because you do realize that "surprisingly resilient blue-shirt" and "guard who eventually decides he doesn't want to be in SOLDIER" are the same person, who is Cloud, yes?

I love the way the plot gives us these little clues.

Although I'm still not sure why Cloud's memory fuzzes out when he's thinking about his Mom, except as a general message to us that Things Are Not All Right In There. Also, possibly the writers were too lazy to want to write all the dialogue, which frankly does not seem likely given the enormous amounts of optional dialogue in this game.

[auronlu]

I'm noticing on this playthrough that despite Cloud getting voted leader, Barret keeps giving out orders, while Cloud seldom does.

[heavenscalyx]

I suspect that one of Sephiroth's superpowers is spontaneously generating swords. His swords get longer when he feels more threatened.


It's really the flashback that cinches for me the quality of the writing for this game -- the reason THIS game is the Classic Final Fantasy. The complicated storytelling, the baroque politics, and the intricate (for videogames) characterizations are the things that set FF7 apart from, especially, the subsequent FFs for me. I love, love, love FF9, it's my favorite FF, but it's a very straightforward story (compared to this), though the characters are comparable to FF7's character development, which is the main reason I adore it.

(My biggest beef with FF8, FFX, and FF12 is that the main characters feel limp, lifeless, and gooby compared to the development we get with Cloud and Zidane. Either make them "blank" voiceless characters like the main characters of Persona, or give them personalities that don't irritate people. The other characters are often relatively well-developed, but the POV character is so annoying that I can't get into the story.)

I'm also very very grateful that FF7 was made before voices were added, because BOY HOWDY is there a lot of opportunity for USian voice actors to mess it up.

If I were 20-something and somewhat gothier, I would want a duplicate of the Jenova metal angel for my wall.

Maybe when you're done with the FF playthrough, we could get a bunch of people together to do Suikoden or Persona playthroughs? I'm loving reading these, and I'd love to see Suiko get more fanlove.

[auronlu]

Maybe! It may take a while, though, as...It's a long way to the end of this marathon, and I may need a break by the end. (also, I want to try the Dragon Ages I got last year for Treestice; so many of my friends are waiting for me to catch up and enjoy a game which allows for queering the main character).

But I would love to introduce more of my friends to S5 in particular.

[stealth_noodle]

So there's the mist-motif in yet another Final Fantasy.

It's like as soon as this series was on hardware that could handle transparency effects, it was ALL MIST, ALL THE TIME. :P I wonder if anyone's come up with a unifying FF theory that centers around the ever-present Mist?

Also, I would play the hell out of an FFVII remake that centered around Barret.

I got curious and hit up that Japanese script again, and Cloud does sound less doofy for that "I thought you were a goner" line; what he thought was もうダメだ, which is more like "it was hopeless." And the "MISTER Sephiroth" bit is 英雄セフィロスさん, which is literally "Hero Sephiroth-san." Maybe a little less flirty, but still goofy and still pretty far up Sephiroth's ass.

[auronlu]

If I'm not totally burned out by the end of this marathon, I'm going to do some write-ups on recurring tropes like Mist / Crystals / forbidden tech / The Ancient Civilization (that one's all over the place) / summons / dreams / etc. I think it would be fun to grab an FF theme and compare how it's used in each game.

and thanks for the MISTER Sephiroth translation. Hah. Since I wanted to present my write-up mostly as the game presents it, I had to force myself to avoid saying things like, "AAAAAAAW ZACK IS SUCH A GOOFBALL PUPPY!" i've never played CC, but I've seen enough to be quite charmed by his blend of noble, capable hero and optimistic doof. .

[akycha]

HERO SEPHIROTH SAN. That is such a fanboy thing to say!

Thank you so much for translating!

[cumuluscastle]

I have to say that one of the things that's always mystified me the most about this game is Sephiroth (keeping in mind I've only ever played the original game). The way people talk about him sometimes makes me feel I played a different game. I just don't get him. He was a hero? People looked up to him? We don't get to see much of him before he loses his mind in Nibelheim, but what we do see does not suggest a hero to me--his cold disregard for the soldier who falls from the bridge, his creepy manic laughter.

I don't really understand why he completely loses his mind. I mean, I understand it. Finding out you're partially a science experiment is deeply troubling, but presumably, since Sephiroth is 'a hero' he's seen some deeply troubling shit in his time and lived to tell the tale. Why is this what unhinges him for good?

And then his reaction doesn't make sense to me. Wouldn't he just be enraged at Hojo and perhaps Shinra in general? Instead he embraces his Cetra heritage and destroys Nibelheim. That seems bizarre to me when the only living member of the Cetra is some weirdo space monster. Would one really be able to identify with that thing so easily? I mean, I understand wanting to have a relationship with your mother, but I don't understand the ease with which he is able to call Jenova his mother.

But anyway, he's one of *those* villains who end up deciding to destroy the world and gain godhood. I never really like those ones that much anyway.

[auronlu]

Sephiroth was injected with more Jenova cells than just about anybody -- or rather, he was injected while still in the womb, so his mind developed with Jenova latent in it from the start. Jenova isn't actually a Cetra, it turns out; the researchers were mistaken. It's an alien, highly malignant intelligence, essentially a sentient virus.

It's not entirely clear to me how much of Sephiroth's behavior is due to human mental breakdown, how much is due to his being genetically modified such that his brain may have faulty wiring, and how much is the direct influence or control of Jenova, which affects the minds of those injected with its cells. Still, you'd think he wouldn't entirely snap until he woke Jenova up by opening its tank. (Or was it aware of and reaching out to him from the moment he set foot in the outer reactor chamber, in front of Jenova's holding cell?)

The heroism of Sephiroth is not all that well developed in FF7, no. Everyone's heard of him, and Cloud wants to get his name in the papers just like Sephiroth, so apparently his exploits are famous. But all we really see of him before he goes ballistic is that he's superhuman in his abilities, yet as you say, a rather cold fish. (And I'm betting that "how does it feel to be back in your hometown?" line is actually Zack's, misremembered).

Crisis Core does a good job of showing why Sephiroth really could inspire awe and respect. He's a little like Beatrix, Celes or Gabranth, in that he's serving a master we don't like, but he's much more fleshed out as a person. (It also sets up that Sephiroth was beginning to question Shinra well before he snapped, although that doesn't explain why he took his anger out on innocent civilians). Sephiroth also looks different: people usually respond to otherness either by antagonism or by putting it on a pedestal. Most of all, Sephiroth's uber-stats make him ungodly impressive in battle. There's a certain mystique that tends to go with that kind of character, even if as writers we find it an unsatisfying archetype.

I do roll my eyes at the way that Squeenix milks Sephiroth, and the way he's acquired a sort of cult status in fandom. But the latter, more than anything else, convinces me that in gameverse, Sephiroth could have commanded the same kind of fan following.

[mintywolf]

Aaah this is getting really exciting and super creepy. I have a fascination with/terror of stories where there are monsters that used to be human but have been twisted or mutated For Science.

Thank you for recapping for the benefit of people who haven't played the game yet. :) I've seen some of the images before but didn't have any context for them, like that shot of Sephiroth surrounded by flames and the art deco metal Jenova angel. (Which I like.)

But what DID happen to her head? D:

Hahaha everything in Final Fantasy is magical crystals, mist, or both. (Though in X it was spheres everywhere as they showed off their new ability to render round things.)

Poor Tifa. :( (I wonder what she's hidingggg.)

Although "....I was really sad," made me laugh out loud. Cloud you are so eloquent.

[auronlu]

Yeah, that was a dumb line, and yet it's such a dude line. Cloud is another fine specimen in the proud tradition of Final Fantasy doofuses.

[samuraiter]

I'm catching up in order to get to the next post, and everybody's weighed in on plenty of things, but here's my little addition:

How many of those pods are in the Nibelheim Reactor, especially as compared to the number of Seph clones we meet throughout the game?