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mimi_sardinia: (Hot Rod)
I just got this idea into my head, while reading the Wikipedia article (as opposed to the Teletraan one) for Daniel Witwicky.

I found myself wondering, what sort of opinion would other human kids have of Daniel? I would think that he gets considered the slightly odd kid who spends all his time hanging around Autobots, to the exclusion of building friendships with humans.

That in turn gave me another mental image, one of Daniel being dropped off at school by Arcee or Hot Rod (pre-movie, post-movie Rodimus would be too busy as leader), much to the envy of other kids who might have a bit of hero worship of the Autobots (and given that Hot Rod's Autobot insignia is very prominently positioned right in the middle of his bonnet... well it'd be very obvious, even if he's never seen transforming).

Ahh the advantages of being the son of Earth's ambassador to Cybertron! XD
mimi_sardinia: (Paladin Cecil)
I just had a thought about the whole crystal thing in the early FFs, and how it isn't in FFVII.

It actually is there, but it isn't a central theme in the world construction.

I mean, there's four caves located in difficult-to-reach spots where you can find really important materia - Mime, Quadra Magic, HP<->MP and Knights of the Round.

The other crystal reference is the Huge Materia, which now that I think about it, remind me greatly of the crystals in FFIV - especially how the FFIV crystals seem to be kept floating in their special chambers, and the Huge materia float around in Bugenhagen's observatory.


Oh, and what do you think of the icon? Frankly, I nicked it off a favourite info site for FF. The site always has a little quiz on the frontpage. I went there looking for the names of the four rare materia that you get from the caves and the quiz was whether Tifa and Cecil would make a good couple. 3 people had voted "Yes", 5 voted "No" (including me). The sprite was cute and just what I was wanting.
mimi_sardinia: (Ashe)
Oh. Dear. Eru.

I just realised one of my silly theories about Final Fantasy has proven true for FFXII as well.

Spoiler cut for the sensitive who are still playing XII - and I mean REALLY a spoiler! Like don't read unless you've finished the game!spoiler! )
mimi_sardinia: (Default)
I've just been thinking, over the last few hours since I got thinking about Larsa Solider, about kids in FF games, and it seems that practically all the games since FF7 (since I don't know any of the pre-7 ones well enough to give an opinion) have some sort of Token Kid - either of the Cute Kid, or Smart Kid type.

FFVII - Marlene.
BC - Yuffie.
AC - Denzel (though he shares with Marlene).
DoC - Shelke.
FFVIII - Ellone.
FFIX - Ekio.
FFX - Bahamut's Fayth.
FFX-2 - Shinra.
FFXII - Larsa Solider.

I know, I didn't include FFXI, but I know crap all about 11 and am never likely to bother since it's a MMORPG and my internet connection is crap for things like that.

Also, KH kinda doesn't count, since the lead character is still young either that he scrapes into the "Cute Kid" catagory - or at least he did in KH1, before puberty really hit him. (That makes me wonder, has anyone ever written a fic that actually brings up how much Sora grew while he was asleep between CoM and KH2? That'd be interesting reading.)
mimi_sardinia: (Default)
I think it's because a couple of the skintones I'm trying to download for the Sims 2 are black ones that I got thinking on drow (Genensims had at least one black skintone labeled "Drow") which in turn got me thinking of the one drow I probably have the most interest in - Solaufein - which in turn made me think of my Twit that I played through the Sola romance with - Blaise Draconis.

Last time I played BG2 through it was the fact that I read somewhere that the Solaufein romance is totally equal oppertunity that I started playing the Draconis game again after months of ignoring it.

Yeah, slash made me play BG again.

I guess one of the drawbacks of getting into slash was that I lost interest in playing BG because all the romances in it were het ones - the romance wouldn't activate unless you had a mod that cut the restrictions but that would have even more WTFery than the slight implications I ran across in Sola's dialog that implied that Weimer was thinking hetronormatively when he wrote it.

Wherein I contemplate Forgotten Realms religion )


So after all that pointless thinking on an OC for an old game most folks on my Flist will not be familiar with I suddenly have this idea that some time I think I will try making sims of Blaise and Solaufein and dumping them in my neighbourhood.
Blaise can take a military career.
mimi_sardinia: (Seph/Yunalesca)
This can be counted as Mimi's Not Quite So Random Followup To Her Random Thought of the Day.


To put it simply, the observation on Balarlai's complection being similar to Xehanort's has reminded me of how Squeenix likes to make all of their bad guys (and girls) white-haired.

Let me list the usual suspects: Jenova, Sephiroth, Ultimecia, Kuja, Yunalesca, Baralai, Ansem/Xehanort/Xemnas, Kadaj, Loz and Yazoo, Wiess. All of them are white-haired.

The one who is a little questionable is Baralai - as that manifesto makes note of. He was possessed and really is only as much the true villain of the piece as say, Seifer. But it still means that through the mechanics of possession Shyuin has white hair by proxy.


I would be curious to know the hair colours of villains in other FFs - both before 7 and after 10-2. Maybe it's a theme that only started with Nomura but that would not be totally accurate because I have this impression that Nomura had nothing to do with 9 - barring borrowing Vivi for KH2. Plus going against the custom, Marluxia is totally not a silverhair - though silver-haired villainy makes its appearance elsewhere in CoM, in Riku's half of the game (if I'm not mistaken).


Anyway, it kinda makes me think that one may be able to predict who the true villain is in Squeenix productions (at least in FF stuff) by seeing who has the white hair.

And this post so demanded this icon!
mimi_sardinia: (Rinoa - You'll Find Me)
I have been contemplating for a while the paradox that Ultimecia's powers represent. See, Ultimecia dies, Edea inherits her powers, passes them on to Rinoa, and when Rinoa eventually dies she will pass them on and they will be passed down the succession of witches until Ultimecia inherits them.

One great big loop with Ulti's powers circling endlessly through time.  )
Ehh... *Shrug*
mimi_sardinia: (RinUlti)
I think I have come up with a reason why the Item command in FF8 could be a junction ability.

Simply put, GFs can maintain a dimensional pocket that the person they are junctioned to can store things in. This pocket is maintained even when the GF is not junctioned, so long as it has something within it, but the human cannot access it unless they have a GF junctioned.

Added extra reasoning for the shared inventory of the whole team - as one person gains more GFs the GFs already junctioned show them the location of the team's collective storage dimension. Therefore, because Squall had both Shiva and Quezecotal at the start they both had access to the one inventory, then showed it's location to Ifrit when he was gained, the junction of whoever drew Siren showed her the location, and so on as more GFs were gained along the way.


This however also raises another idea, that if someone got ahold of one of the team's GFs they have access to the team's inventory, if the GF has no compunction against betraying the team.
mimi_sardinia: (Heros run the other way (Nanaki))
I was just rereading a chapter of a fic I have missed a huge whack of and the line about Red's name came up Hojo has named me, Red XIII. A name with no meaning whatsoever to me.

An idea came to mind of the posible significance of the name Red is known by. At the start, Red allows AVALANCHE to call him "Red XIII" - a designation that means little to him.

It should also be noted at this point he only agreed to accompany them as far as his hometown.

Later, at Cosmo Canyon, his real name - Nanaki - is revealed and (game mechanics aside) AVALANCHE may start calling him that instead of something Hojo slapped on him.

The passing thought I had was that he truly became a part of the team at Cosmo Canyon - dedicating himself to the greater quest and as a symbol of that takes back his true name - possibly letting AVALANCHE use that name to address him.
mimi_sardinia: (More Fun Than A Hole In The Head)
I have idly been toying with a Squall-Becomes-A-Sorcerer idea for a little while (not surprisingly, growing off of my previous plotbunnies) and I couldn't help but plot out a history of sorcery in the process.

Hyne, Sorcery, and the civilizations of Terra )


o.Ô
mimi_sardinia: (Squall)
FF8 fanon usually dumps the job of Headmaster on Squall - eventually - but I think that's wrong. There's line in the scene where Cid anounces Squall's promotion to Commander that said something about administration stuff being handled by him and the normal staff but Squall would be in charge of battle planning and such.

So basically, the idea that Squall is totally in charge is wrong. In more peaceful times I can imagine he'd be on whatever committee decides to accept contracts, probably gets information on admissions and is part of deciding who graduates too, but absolutely everything? No, I don't think so.

I mostly latched onto this because even before I played the game I suspected this was more like how administration of Garden would be divided up - instead of Squall having to do every-fucking-thing - and now I have at least one clue that suports it.
mimi_sardinia: (Squall)
The more I play this game the more annoyed I get at Rinoa. This time round I had her on Squall's team when everyone split up after D-District so the spot where I just saved it, she's just pestered him into giving her a tour of the Garden.


And while I'm on the subject of Garden... )


Edit: Interesting little discovery, if one goes to the library during Rinoa's tour, Squall gets to see Ellone. She's kinda sad he doesn't remember her.
mimi_sardinia: (Squall)
Because I am currenly such a damn addict to Squall's cute butt I've started another game of FF8 as well.

So I decided to rename everyone in FF7 after FF8 characters... well turnabout is fair play )

Also, I was reading through the info available on the Student Panel and I noted a few things.

Rules and stuff of Garden )

Also, the statement on Sorceresses, it refers to the "Reign of Hyne" but there seems to be nothing in the game that elaborates on Hyne. The only other mention I've seen of him is that Rinoa get called "Descendant of Hyne" when she and Squall are met by Esthar officials after landing the Ragnarok.

Anyone know any concrete information about Hyne or is it all fanon?

I have some nebulous theories floating through my head but if I could find more info I'd love to see it.
mimi_sardinia: (The Wonder of Man (Tseng))
So I have been chatting with [livejournal.com profile] angel_0f_sorrow on AIM, where she was talking about a nutty RP she was in that was a cross between FFVII, Beauty and the Beast and Sleeping Beauty, where she was playing Lucrecia.

The discussion got onto Grimore Valentine, then onto DoC as a whole and she found a german website with DoC spoilers.

THESE LINKS HAVE SPOILERS!!!
So here's the website (Google translated so expect bad grammar) and here's [livejournal.com profile] angel_0f_sorrow's theory on what it means.
THESE LINKS HAVE SPOILERS!!!


My thoughts on it turned to what could be extrapolated about FFVIII, based on this info (yes, I know the DoC info was created after FF8 so I know it has no bearing but I like theorising anyway).

BIG FREAKIN' SPOILER CUT!!!! )


Meh, that was cheery.
mimi_sardinia: (Squall)
I posted my thoughts on Garden being very young to [livejournal.com profile] new_shinra87, here, adding on the end something about the dead White SeeD lying around Edea's house in Time Compression.

Well I found the proof that it implies they are from the future right here )

At the very least Squall also thinks they are people from the future.

Edit: Geez Quistis, trying to immitate FF7 are you? You do know it's Squall who's the party leader, not Irvine?
mimi_sardinia: (Squall)
It strikes me that Garden - as an organisation - is still very young. I mean Edea got the idea for the place from Squall when Time Compression sent him back to the orphanage after Ultimacea's death and the child!Squall in that scene was what? 4? 5 years old?

Squall was probably sent there as soon as it was ready to take in students (Quistis said she ended up in Garden at the age of 10 and she's a year older than Squall, yet Squall was there before her) but I do wonder, they must have taken in older students at the begining as well if they wanted to start drawing in money from incidental mercenary jobs.

I can see why the internal war that Squall can back from Galbadia happened, I would think the first lot of instructors that would have been hired would have all been outsiders - old soldiers, school teachers, people like that. They wouldn't have the sort of loyalty the younger students would grow up with and more likely go with the one who they saw as holding their paychecks.

That also makes me think that as the first group of truly Garden-raised SeeDs (that sound so botanical) became "veterans" (one would think that Squall and his friends would be counted as such pretty early, considering their status as heros post-game) they would take over positions as instructors which in turn would probably make something like that civil war less likely and would seriously start in-Garden traditions setting in.


Generally though, the simple thought I have in mind is that Garden is still young, the Sorceress War may be over but SeeD has a long future ahead of it.
mimi_sardinia: (Default)
Not that long ago I reread a couple of bits from an arc of Laguna/Squall stories, one of them being a series of little written things from Laguna's POV. One of the tings in it was his disgust at what Garden turns people into - or more specifically how the kids who became SeeDs seem to have had no normal childhood - especially Squall and the others of the "Orphanage Gang". It mentioned specifically that even Selphie - the cheerful one of the lot - was not undamaged.

Now I have seen how Selphie acts in the game, she's cheerful, a bit hyper sometimes (but not as much as fanon would have you believe) and she is a total little warmonger with a thing for blowing stuff up an causing havok.

Thing is, I just found this is not the result of her being in Garden; if you watch the Trabia flashback, Irvine is talking about there being one kid he particularly liked in the orphanage and the scene has the child!Selphie turn to him and ask him if he wants to play, his child-self asks what they're playing and child!Selphie says "WAR!"

So it was in her back then as well.
mimi_sardinia: (Where is the light)
I just got thinking about the ShinRa xs. Wutai war and Yuffie's opinion of what Wutai had become afterwards and considering the symbolism of that.

It occured to me that the Wutai War may be symbolic of World War 2.

After all, Wutai is very classically asian in design, it faced up against a huge capitalist giant (Japan vs. America and allies) and the result is a country that seems to be pandering to it's conquerors (somehow I get the idea Japan has done that to a degree since WW2).

So if that is the symbolism inherit in the Wutai War that means ShinRa/Midgar = America.

Not a symbolic representation that I have all that much problem with, given how much of an ass Dubya is.
mimi_sardinia: (Default)
Squall is Galbadian. Anyone notice that?

Laguna's Galbadian, Raine lived on the Galbadian continent, therefore - racially speaking - Squall is Galbadian.

Pointless thought brought up by my [livejournal.com profile] fanficrants post.
mimi_sardinia: (Default)
Just thinking of some of the logistics of FF8, where does a super-city like Esthar get it's food? The plains? I suspect then they'd be in for some serious problems post-game. Some of the fics I have read about SeeD coming in to help clean out the monsters called by the Lunar Cry sounds sensible because I imagine the plains around Esther are their prime farmland and it wouldn't do the economy much good if all those monsters are interfering with growing crops (the year's crops are probably lost already anyway so it's probably just as well that the country seems to be damn rich - they'd need it for both the general aid needed and for hiring every damn SeeD Squall can mobilize).

Meh, My mind is currently stuck on FF8.