Part 36: A Star Wars Holiday Special
Chapter 36 - A Star Wars Holiday Special
Immediately upon entering the mysterious city, Red XIII runs forward and, well, you can see the rest.
Oh?
Oh!
Nanaki is obviously Red XIII's true name. You know, the one that wasn't given by a crazy sociopath doing SCIENCE!
The one he could have told us from the start, but that wouldn't add to his mysterious aura.
It's also worthy mentioning that Nanaki is another reference to Star Wars.
Nanaki is an anagran for Anakin.
Which goes hand-to-hand to his nickname, Red XIII (as in, a X-Wing Pilot from the Red Squadron).
Just like Biggs and Wedge. Final Fantasy as a whole has a lot of references to Star Wars.
A lot of very funny people like to name Red XIII Nanaki to render this conversation more stupid than it already is. There's no alternate dialogue, so it makes zero sense.
Anyway, welcome to Cosmo Canyon. I'd like to talk a bit about it.
The first thing one notices about Cosmo Canyon is the music.
Seriously, the background music for Cosmo Canyon is absolutely fantastic. To me, at least, it's the best and the most immersive town track from the game.
The second thing you soon realize is that Cosmo Canyon, although suspiciously lacking flora, has no reactor. The community is independent.
This explains why Hojo wanted to breed him... with...
Well, he told us back in Midgar he'd travel with us as far as to his city. What really makes me wonder is how'd he end up in Midgar in the first place?
And that we do. We now have some freedom to explore the city, so let's do it!
Sounds... touristic. Let's visit it.
There are boomerangs and swords. Also a cactuar drawn in the barrel. Hmm Cactuar Wine.
More importantly, we find the fourth Turtle Paradise Newsletter.
I have lot of experience waiting for my LP videos to upload at 30 KBp/s thanks to my godawful Internet.
Worst pub ever.
Nevertheless, the item repertoire sold here isn't useless. We buy some Silver Armlets.
Bugenhagen. Bugenhagen. Bugenhagen. Nymphadora really got nothing to complain about.
Yuffie once again speaking what we all think, but I digress -
This is the first shop that sells [HP Plus]. While this is not the first opportunity we have to get this materia (remember the Junon final mini-game where I got a sword? Second best reward was a HP Plus Materia. Some people prefer it because you can buy the sword sooner than the HP Plus), this is the first shop that sells it.
[HP Plus] is fairly straightforward - it increases your HP, by 10% per level per materia.
Let's see some more of the town.
It puts you in the heat.
Talking about not knowing when to stop, have you guys ever seen the Star Wars wiki? They talk about everything there. Even faucets. I'm serious, there's a wiki entry about faucets and where it's referenced in the EU.
Why would you advertise for a competitor in your pub? These people don't seem to grasp capitalism very well
Cosmo Canyon indeed is one of the prettiest places in the game. The music adds a lot to the environment.
Why hi the
OH GOD WHERE ARE YOUR LEGS
HOW DO YOU MOVE
Bugenhagen: "So you see his 48 years would only be equivalent to say that of a 15 or 16 year old in human reckoning."
Cloud: "15 or 16!?"
Hurr.
He can. We saw him doing it at the Junon Boat
I can't help but imagine Bugenhagen's laughter sounding like Jabba's hoo hoo hoo.
I'm serious here, this whole update is taken straight from Empire Strikes Back.
There's a point in everyone's life when you realize most of the things that are commonly passed as "wisdom" are, in fact, "total bullshit". This is about Red XIII's realization.
I mean, we can finally see Buggenhagen legs. And his legs are booze. The shadows reveal everything. More like Boozenhagen, right?
But I'm just kidding, of course. Thematically, this is in fact a very important part of the game.
You see, Final Fantasies are (were) games with a well-defined central theme. With the exception of Final Fantasy 8 which failed in that department because three people with an entirely different vision authored the story (it was supposed to be primarily about love, though).
At the end of the day, the story is not about chasing Sephiroth. Or Cloud. The story is a metaphor. The official theme of FF7 is about the consequences of fucking up with the planet.
It's all a huge metaphor to the things our generation is familiar with. Notice that there's an immediate urgency - it may be tomorrow or in 100 years, but shit is very likely to happen during your lifetime.
There's a sound effect that plays here. It's eerie, and it plays often in the game, supposed to be the sound of the planet screaming.
Bugenhagen, in case you don't know, is a German surname. I have no idea what it means.
Seems like they've found our friends!
We get to choose a party. I stick with the FFX-2 group (you know, Yuna, Rikku and that other chick (Cloud)).
Just to make sure you're weirded enough...
...I want to make absolutely sure you get this:
Bugenhagen flies around. Who needs legs when you can fly with a giant green pogo ball.
And it looks cool, truth be told.
The entire sequence was pretty impressive. Over a decade ago.
Buggenhagen: "Ho Ho Hoooo. Yes, it is something, isn't it?"
Fantasy World 101
There's not much to talk about as this is basically huge exposition, so I'll let you enjoy the class.
Basically the cycle of life as we know, but with an additional component - spirits.
In case it's hard to understand - a tree and a human die, their spirits merge in the lifestream and a new human is born.
I don't know about you, but seeing a planet crack and fall into nothing creeps the hell out of me.
This is what this has been all about. Mako Reactors create a huge wasteland because they're literally draining the spirits out of the planet to convert into energy.
And with these dire news of impending doom, we conclude our update.
NEXT TIME:
What most consider to be the most insufferable dungeon in the game!
Awesome music we've listened to:
Cosmo Canyon - One of the best themes in the game.
