Part 84: Digging the Past, Part I

Chapter 83 - Digging the Past, Part I




Now that our Chocobo business is mostly taken care of, we're gonna visit an old place.




Unfortunately the doors to the slums are closed and we can't enter, but our friend here might have given us a clue on how to find a key. Excavation tour... Bone Village!



We aren't here for the Lunar Harp, though. You can choose between Lunar Harp, Good treasure and Normal treasure. We're going for Good Treasure.



Let's see...



I'll be honest, I completely forgot this weapon existed.



It's the Double growth weapon for Vincent, we aren't gonna use it.



It looks pretty cool, though.



Anyway, we keep on digging. I find a Megalixir in the process.



And voila, what we were looking for!



Oh and this. For Cid.



Now this we're gonna use.



Not that this game (or Midgar for that matter) is a reference for good proportion but the bizarre cartoony scaling of this scene has always irked me somewhat.



Huh.



Wait, what?



This is a creepy-ass scene. First because as you may have noticed a model can be seen in the center of the screen for one or two frames during the fade-in. Second because, as the kids point out - someone's been taking care of the flowers.

Spooky.

Anyway, remember the guy who are sick? He had a tattoo.











This is part of a very amusing series of dialogues. The first time you see this woman she says she is always looking down, because you never know what you'll find in the ground. After the plate falling she says she'll always look up from now on.

Now that the meteor has been summoned, this is her reaction.



Amen.



We can have some rest, though of course no one's here.



The place's mostly the same. Let's try the market.



Oh man, this place brings memories. I remember it like it was just two years ago.



We're coming here mostly for the Wall Market, really. Remember the broken Item Shop?





In it is [Premium Heart], Tifa's Ultimate Weapon. And our first Ultimate Weapon, in fact!



Like all other Ultimate Weapons, the Premium Heart has 8 linked slots (!) but no Materia Growth. Also, enormous damage.



I'm not sure "work hard" is the first thing that comes to mind when the apocalypse is right over there but what do I know.



While many would misinterpret him as a true Midgarian Patriot what he really wants to say is "I mean seriously the entire place is blocked so literally, no matter what happens we can't leave the city."



I think we owe ourselves some Korean BBQ, although I sure miss the Texan food from 7th Heaven.



Do I have news for you.



Hahaha.



Aw man.





We'll be checking him soon enough.



After we have some time with our best buddies in town.



Remember how ridiculously expensive (for the time) was his offer of the batteries?





129k is a lot. I mean, it's mitigated by the fact we can sell [All] materias, but it's still expensive.



But we have no choice here. Cloud is a sucker.



He gives us the [Sneak Gloves], an accessory that makes the art of stealing items much, much less painful by significantly increasing the odds of stealing.



They also make stealing Zeio Nuts from the Goblins much easier because they have a very low stealing rate.



And that's it. We can go inside the Don's house but there's nothing there. We're done here!



Well we didn't find anything about Aeris. Next we're revisiting the City of Ancients, maybe we'll find something.





The lifestream noise is eerie, kinda disturbing. Cid points out his head feels like it's getting crushed.



The difference between normal humans and the Cetra. The Cetra could distinguish what the noise is, filter it and understand it.





Aeris could listen to the planet anywhere, even back in the Shinra building prison.





As I pointed out many times, it's interesting how Aeris moved from love interest to the motherly figure of the group.



She was the only one who knew what was going on but, unfortunately, we don't have much instruction on what to do now.





I thought this was relevant.



Oh my God shut up.



Nibelheim comes next. We have unfinished business here.



The employees are freaking out with Meteor.



This is the most minor of all details but I've always found this bit of characterization interesting. When we first come down to the city we have this creepy conspiratory theory feeling and it's very irritating from our point-of-view because we know Cloud's been traumatized and suddenly there are all these people who are pretending nothing ever happened. Then we read about Hojo's experiments going on.



But they don't know either. No one has a clue. Or fault, for that matter.



The next secret comes when you play the main theme on the piano. I'm usually a defender of the game in the meaning that every secret no matter how obscure has an in-game explanation...



...but I don't really remember how you figure this out on your own so by all means if you know, do tell.







This is pretty heart-warming, so I'll just let you read it by yourself. We're gonna learn some of the background on Tifa, and what happened to her.

















So, Zangan was still alive the last time we visited Nibelheim, he might be still alive, and he took his time to tell us what happened. It's pretty nice of him and kinda heartwarming that there is someone looking out for Tifa.

I also like how this letter deals with the dichotomy of story/game. Tifa was hurt, there are cure spells, and he did what we'd do if we were dealing exclusively with combat mechanics, as if they're something that actually exist in this world. It also shows how our magic can only deal with moderate injuries - Tifa who's still alive could not be healed through Materia. And of course, neither could Aeris.



His gift is Tifa's 4-0 Limit, [Final Heaven]. Like her other limits, [Final Heaven] is cumulative and she will use all her previous Limits before it.



There's still stuff to be seen in Nibelheim. As we go down in the Shinra Mansion basement the screen fades to white. What horrors shall we find down there?



Next time:

Backstories! Flashbacks! Plot! Plot! More plot!