Final Fantasy VII Part #89

Part 89: Rocket Queen

Chapter 88 - Rocket Queen

Hey no, we're here to stop the rocket.

We're doomed.

Yes, we are most definitely doomed.

I like how Cloud just gave up and is sitting there with Tifa.

Cid is a gentleman and a scholar.

Oh God we're gonna die.

Cloud: "There are generations of knowledge and wisdom inside the materia."

Right, this is their main intention. Not just messing up with Shinra for the sake of it.

Riight.

At this point I think Cloud is seriously confused about everything.

This is an interesting conversation, but a bit out of context. Which makes sense. We know Cid is just trying to find an excuse for something very simple -

That he really wants to be on a rocket.

This is all cool and all but we're dealing with a gigantic magical meteor here and I'm not sure a Rocket cosplaying the Tower of Pisa can do much.

There's something great about Cloud and Tifa's static models as they hear, powerless to act, about Cid's passion.

I guess there's no way around it. We're going to outer space and/or die trying, probably both!

Oh man. You'd hope being cut, shot and ran over by a truck would have done the job.

This is how we die. Launched into space by Palmer. This is the end.

Not pictured - everyone in Rocket Town died from the blast.

The true power of Shinra technology is how they manage to aim something that is literally falling off with no support to a celestial body thousands of miles away.

I mean seriously, that thing makes your first Kerbal Space Program attempt look glorious.

Maybe they were actually calculating the trajectory such that it will hit Cosmo Canyon and finish off those hippies, while blaming it on the engineers.

Actually given the direction I think it's aimed at Midgar. Maybe that's their new plan to destroy some random sector again.

Whee.

Good. Now we're dead.

Tifa's stoic, thinking of her depressing life in quiet, introspective misery. Cloud's secretly hoping he's still hallucinating in the lifestream.

In his final moments, he rejoices his happiest memories. The Honey Bee Inn, his "adventures" with Aeris in the Wall Market. How he never really liked the people in Nibelheim anyway and only visited the houses to make sure the assholes were in fact gone.

Tifa is thinking in the irony of dying smashed by a meteor by throwing herself into it. For a fleeting second she considers revealing her love for Cloud, but realizes these assholes are guilty of putting her into a death trap so they could get some fancy blings. Maybe this is for the best.

Well we all look silly now.

Cid: "If you want the Materia, do whatever you want!"

Yeah, we get that. Our crew is the worst.

On the bright side it seems our mission will succeed, against all the odds.

"The passcode can be found in your nearest gaming magazine, for your convenience."

It's puzzle time now!

Yep. This is definitely one of those classic games moment where you're supposed to read your stuff in a magazine instead of figuring it out.

But we're grown men and women now, so we'll figure it out and play the way the developers intended, just like we did with chocobos.

What makes this tough is that we're on a tight timer.

The way we figure it out is - as we make mistakes, Cid goes out and gives us a tip.

Some of them are horribly confusing like this one. He is saying that we shouldn't use Triangle instead of implying we should have.

Cloud really, really wants to punch this guy.

Right, so what are the tips?

* There's a key you have to push twice.
* You don't use Triangle.
* You have to use O but only once.
* We know 3 is X.
* We know 1 isn't Square.

1 - Not Square
2 - Unknown
3 - X
4 - Unknown

And for the last piece of the puzzle:

* The last key isn't Square or O, so it can only be an X.

So -
1) Not Square
2) Unknown
3) X
4) X

Since we have two Xs already, 1 has to be O (not square nor triangle). 2 has to be Square then, since Triangles are out, we already have a key used twice (X) and O can't be repeated.

Thus - O, Square, X, X