Game - Final Fantasy 8, Day 54
Hours Played/Hours Total - 5-1/2 hrs / 10 hrs
Starting Point - Balamb Hotel... in Balamb.
Current Goal - Make it back to Balamb Garden for SeeD exam results. Go from there!
What Happened - I'm just a step into this game, so I need to pick up the pace! Let's doo it!
After sleeping at Balamb Hotel, I decided to take a bit of time to look around town before leaving. It's a fairly small town, but there are at least some shops here. Walking around town didn't reveal a whole lot. I did find out that Zell's home is here. I visited it briefly and met his mother. After that, I looked at all the shops, but there wasn't a whole lot I could do. I bought a few status recovery items, but I don't really USE items...Nonetheless, I got them just in case. I also met the Queen of Cards in town. Basically, she travels all over the planet and helps enforce the rules. For me, that means she can tell me the current rules and even enforce a NEW rule if I pay her off. I could have played a card game with her, but I figured that wouldn't end very well. After a bit more exploration, I left town and made my way back to Balamb Garden.
Before going further, thought I'd mention another portion of the game...Weapons! You see, in EVERY Final Fantasy up to the first one, new weapons were available in new towns as you proceeded through the game. However, in FF8, you don't really buy new weapons. Instead of buying a new weapon you upgrade your old one using parts you pick up off of enemies. To unlock new upgrades, you have to find this in-game weapons magazine called Weapons Monthly (GREAT NAME!) In the long run, this makes it a lot harder to upgrade, but the results are usually a lot greater. As you upgrade your weapons, you open up new Limits for characters. Overall, Final Fantasy 8 has done its very best to be something vastly different from previous Final Fantasy titles. I'll definitely give it props for doing this.
Moving right along, after making it back to the Garden, the group splits up and proceeds inside for their test results. Before getting them, I was able to walk around and talk with a few people. Didn't learn much outside of the exam incident. Turns out Galbadia was only interested in the Communications Tower in Dollet. They ended up pulling out after Dollet promised to get the Comm tower back up and running. Although further talking reveals that radio communications don't even work worldwide. 17 years ago, radio communications of all types just stopped working. Now they use terminals and chocobos to deliver messages. Sounds like a bunch of currently pointless information that'll make sense later! Anyways, moving right along.
I met with Xu, Cid, and Quistis in front of the elevator. They congratulated me on doing well for the exam, and they said the results would be made known fairly soon. Thus I continued to wander about the Garden. The game did block me off though, so I couldn't go just wherever. This direction took me in Seifer's direction. Talking with him started up a small scene that made me feel a little bad for him. Basically, he was in trouble for disobeying orders although it resulted in the truth of it all. He claimed that he was playing the part of a smart leader, but Xu simply said that he'd never be SeeD or a leader at that rate. That...made him feel bad. I went away from this spot and was called up to the second floor for the SeeD exam results. One of the Garden people came up and announced that both Zell and Squall had succeeded. The rest of the people at that spot were of course disappointed. I was then taken up to Cid's office to be presented with my rank. Besides Zell and Squall, there were two others who graduated to become SeeD members (Selphie and a nameless guy). Cid made a small speech and then handed over our rank. He gave each person a few words of encouragement and then we were sent on our way.
From here, it was time for some sort of graduation party for those who were graduating. (So...all four of us? I'm assuming that more made it, but the scene only showed four.) Selphie came along to bring Squall to the party. Once there, Squall was basically just being Squall. He was sitting over in one spot while everybody else was moving about. Eventually, he spots a girl on the floor, and she approaches him. She asks Squall to dance, and he declines. He says he doesn't know how to dance, but she drags him onto the floor anyways. And thus the most well known scene in Final Fantasy 8 plays. It's a couple minutes long, and it shows Squall dancing awkwardly with the girl as the dance goes about. He really can't dance...and eventually, the dancing ends. As they finish up, she sees a group over to the side, waves at Squall, and walks away.
The game takes me to outside where Squall is sitting on a balcony. Quistis comes out to give him a hard time over the dancing bit. She wonders why he so easily danced with a random girl when he would barely talk with her. They go on for a bit, and then she makes a last request of him. She wants the two of them to find the secret area in the training center. Apparently students go there late at night to hang out and talk. I go change Squall, and then it's time to meet Quistis at the training center! It was just a small walk to the training center where I met Quistis. Before going into the center, she mentioned something about a monster called T-Rexaur (something like that). She warned about it and said we should try to use Status attacks on it. (If I hadn't mentioned it earlier, you can equip magic to your weapon in both an elemental and status way. It's a pretty cool ability, and there is lots of customization you can pull off...MOVING ON!) Basically, I should try to put him asleep and possibly even run. He's supposed to be fairly tough. I proceeded into the training center.
Inside the training center, there really isn't much to say. There was only two enemies while heading towards the secret area. One was a plant thing that I could draw Sleep from (HMMMM). The only other enemy at this point was the T-Rexaur. Now this was an oddly placed and overly hard monster! For starters, he has 12,000 HP! On top of this, he could easily deal 100 to 200 damage to my group! Thankfully, he was easy to put to sleep and had a large weakness to Ice. Basically, the battle consisted of Shiva summoning and Squall attacks (he had Sleep junctioned to his status attack). It took quite a bit of time, but I managed to beat one! It rewarded quite a bit of experience and GP though, so it was well worth the effort. However, during my time here, I only met the one. It turns out that the area only consisted of 5 different spots (including the secret one with NO enemies). It didn't take long to reach the secret area, and once there, Quistis began to finally talk.
Turns out, she isn't an instructor anymore. They said she didn't have the right stuff to be one. With her no longer being an instructor, she was going to just be a normal SeeD member now. She even suggested possibly working with Squall on future missions. Although she was telling all of this to Squall, he came off as...uncaring. He didn't really have a response for losing her instructor status. On top of this, he didn't really feel like listening. Of course, all of this just makes her feel worse for the fact. As he walked away, she felt like maybe they were right about her being a bad instructor. The two proceeded back through the training center, but things didn't go quite as planned. When they got to the initial area, something was going on! A lady was being attacked by a giant monster. She called for Squall and Quistis, and the two of them charge at the monster for BOSS BATTLE TIME!
This boss battle consisted of a small group of enemies. One large bee-like monster plus a trio of rock monsters. The basic flow of the battle was the bee throwing the rock monsters at me. This would have been formidable, but it seems I was more than prepared for it. I took my time to draw out some Protect and Shell magic out of the group. I also took the time to cast Protect on both Squall and Quistis. It wasn't really necessary, but it helped regardless. The first GF I used ended up taking everybody down quite a notch. The second use wiped out the rock monsters. After that, I just attacked the bee guy several times and easily took him down...Boss battle success! With the monster defeated, a couple of soldiers appeared and escorted the lady away. The more puzzling part was that both Quistis and Squall didn't know who the girl was. With the monster taken care of, it was time to head out and get to sleep.
The next day, Squall was awakened by Selphie who informed him that they had their very first SeeD mission and to meet out by the front gate. Before going out there, I went around the Garden and got in many, many card games. After about 30 or so minutes, I managed to double (if not triple) my card collection. I also went upstairs to check out my class terminal. Now that I had a SeeD rank, I was allowed to up my rank through small Tests. Each test consists of 10 questions about in-game material. It mostly revolves around battle and Junction system details. There are some questions about characters and other bits too though. One nice little bonus of SeeD rank involves a steady cash flow from the Garden. Depending on your rank, you get a set amount of gil ever so often. It is set at a specific amount based on the current SeeD rank. Time to move on with the story!
I made my way outside to the front gate and was met there by Zell and Selphie. Once there, Cid explained to us the mission we were taking. They had been hired by a resistance group in Timber to help with something. The group wondered why only three of them were being sent. Apparently they had struck a deal with the resistance group despite not normally taking such a low paying job. I wasn't made privy to the details, and the only other thing they told me was the key phrase to contact the resistance group. With all the information given, it was time to head for Timber. Before leaving, Cid handed me a special item called a Magical Lamp. He said something about it being of help to us. And thus...the journeying began!
I left the garden and made my way to Balamb. Once in town, I took the time to play a few card games with some random people. After that, I used my newly gained funds to stock up on items. However, before boarding the train and leaving for Timber, I decided to investigate the Magical Lamp. The Magical Lamp is actually a special one-use item to help gain a new GF...Diablos. By using the item, you begin a boss battle against Diablos. Umm...BOSS BATTLE TIME! I was sure in for a big fight! Diablos is fairly limited as far as attacks go, but that doesn't stop him from being decently tough. His three attacks are a physical one, the Demi spell, and his special attack Gravija. The Demi spell takes a quarter of a target's health. Gravija was a party-wide attack that took three-quarters of each character's health. This battle took quite some time to finish because he had 8000+ HP! On top of this, he has a hefty defense against magic attacks, and my physical attacks weren't doing much. I had to stick with GF summoning and drawing Demi off of him to use against him.
Luckily, I got to finally use some of the character's Limits during this battle! Selphie's limit is called Slots, and it allows you to random a spell with a number of uses. Basically, you constantly draw out a spell with a number by it. Once chosen, that spell is cast upon the intended member. It automatically targets the correct group depending on whether it is offensive or defensive. I also was able to use Zell's Limit. His Limit is called Duel, and it is pretty darn powerful. Basically, you have 15 seconds to input several different commands so that Zell does multiple attacks. Every time he attacks, it gives you two different commands to input. A successful input pauses the time and allows him to attack again. If you're really good, you can get in like 8 or more attacks! With the help of these two limits, I was able to put Diablos in his place...and earn a new GF! When summoned, Diablos takes a percentage of health away based on his current level (ie Level 9 = 9%). Well...good for me! I've done enough now, and I'm ready for Timber! I jumped on the train at Balamb and made my way to Timber.
On the way to Timber, I got a little insight from Zell about the situation. It turns out that Timber was by itself at one time, but it was invaded by Galbadia. It is currently under Galbadian occupation, but there are known resistances all about (aka the people who hired us). However, right after learning about this, Selphie steps into the room claiming to not feel well. Before I know it, the entire group has collapsed and thus begins a very strange offset of the game.
The screen starts to come up, and I've taken control of three Galbadian soldiers. The three of them are in a large forest and talk about Timber and fighting. As I walk along, strange greyed speech boxes appear all over. Obviously, they are coming from Squall, Zell, and Selphie. Eventually, the group of soldiers find a vehicle and take off for a place called Deling City. Once there, the trio (named Laguna, Kiros, and Ward) go over to a hotel and sit down at a bar. Everything surrounding this suggests that they are common customers here and are just doing the usual. Laguna approaches a woman playing a piano (named Julia) and attempts to talk with her. His attempt mostly fails, but she eventually comes and talks with him. She invites him to talk with her privately in her room. Once there, the game goes through a flash of screens showing off Laguna chatting with Julia. All this time, it pops up with comments from the three not currently present (Squall, Zell, and Selphie). Eventually, Laguna and his group are called back to go do something else. And the dream ends...
The group wakes up and finds that the train has reached Timber. A bit of talking reveals that they all had experienced the same dream. They figure that there isn't anything they can do about it for the moment and plan to talk with the Headmaster upon their return. For now...we return to the mission at hand! The train arrives in Timber, and I get off. Once there, there isn't much to see so far. The first person I talks to mentions something about a forest, and I'm left with three options. Obviously, this is one of the resistance members. I respond appropriately, and he leads us to a separate platform. A train pulls up and lets us on. From there, he introduces himself plus another to our little group. Before going into explanation, he asks that Squall goes to wake up someone he and the other one refer to as "Princess." Squall isn't very happy to be running errands, and he reminds them that they are the special forces, SeeD. He apologizes and goes off to a corner. I then proceed through the train to find this "Princess."
However, I decided to stop for now and finish up the post right here. Kind of a sudden stop I know, but I figure I'm about to get into a long part, and that will only drag this on a lot further. So...the post is wrapping up here! Thank you for reading as always, and I'll be working on the next post for...hopefully next Tuesday. So...that's all folks.!
Ending Point - In Timber.
Current Party -
- Squall - Level 15
- Zell - Level 11
- Selphie - Level 10
Next Goals - Find out what the Forest Owls have planned and complete the mission.
~May the Crystals Guide Me~
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