Cid: Here, Squall. Have this magic lamp. It should help you. Squall: _uses lamp and summons an extra-dimensional demon that nearly kills the party_ Cid: Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention that it's cursed LOL
This whole SeeD thing working and Squall getting his own GF... I mean an actual girlfriend only makes sense because he's dead and dreaming of a purpose beyond being just a soldier.
Actually the GF memory loss is directly taught in the the curriculum. It's in the optional school desk tutorial before you leave class. However it says something like "these effects have not been proven"
Big possible evidence of G.F. affecting memory comes from Irvin, remembering the playable team since their time at the orphanage. The rest didn't remember.
It's actually more subtle than that. You can get ideas of the effect of GF on memories in many places, but always as a "rumor to be disregarded" sort of deal. If we found out our riffles gave soldiers an illness, the military would hide it to keep the power they have. Having such a strong power that amps the soldiers so much (keep in mind, the GF are what allow junctioning magic and stats, and access all abilities) they would want the reason for avoiding it to be an unbased rumor.
The first time I found estar I didn't even use the correct path, I glitched the game and managed to bring the garden on some ground that allowed me to walk to the salt field. I did it by abusing the slow fall of the garden when going from a cliff and kinda "hopped" from a landmass to another
I always viewed seifer was what happens when there are two candidates for being the chosen one. One is given all the opportunities to succeed, the other is forced to fight for everything they have. In another world you would be routing for seifer.
@@andrewdwilliams I know you said you made it up. I was saying if that was an actual series instead of the real HP we got I might have actually been willing to read it.
Of course Garden is a failure, they never have enough hot dogs? It's why Ultimecia wants to compress time. You can't run out of them if they always exist.
@@dviceix It's one of the best minigames of prime Squaresoft along with Chocobo Hot and Cold! It's a pretty easy to learn game with a lot of depth and provides the party with a LOT of power without having to Draw spells from enemies.
Also sterile Waifu's. I feel less sexual tension and/'or sexual hormones/arousel from a group of castirated Monks, living in seclusion at the top of the Himilayas. The Sorceror has a freak desperatly clawing to get out, however in PG-13 world, they are going to have to learn to code..... Next the girl wearing a skirt, that has her ass hanging out of it, behaves like Valevictorian in high school. "After I take these 2 math classes I will ahve enough credits, to enter college while I'm in High School! Selphie shut the hell up and Junction from the Slut magic node! Next you have Karan who disieves us with her faking being a naughty teacher.... Doesn't even spank you with her ruler... Let down! Lastly there is our lead heroine... She reminds me of that overly sweet girl in anime, that the writers always throw to the wolves just to show how quickly being naive will kill you... Yea she is Naivity given form..... What does this all leave us. Gay romance between Seifer and Squall, Idenity crisis with Irvine, and Arms the size of a bears, from Zell mastubating constatnly all day long. There is a reason Zell is so good at thowing the ball. Crank out cream pies all day is tiring . Even in FF15 that began as the bros on a road trip, and right before they entered Sausage Fest...... The Big Guy's sister shows up..... Wooo weee that little number screamed "I know exactly what I am doing" "Tee Hee Oh Prince, I got water all over me.... What to do? Hmm well my panties are basically a swim suit, and I know my friend the Prince won't mind... I bet he was just about to offer his lap to me... I accept!" Sweet and innocent my ass!.... probably has an emergancy cache of condoms, in her "emergancy pack" Forgot her name but whatever it is must rhyme with Rule 34
Counterpoint: Cid has no passion for what he is doing and is just winging it. He knows how the future will unfold, who why commit more than he had to? It’s his buffoonery that forced Squall to take leadership, because Cid wasn’t doing it. His perspective on everything is basically “idk dude figure it out”. “You kids going on a mission? Here’s a magic lamp with a demon in it lol figure it out”. “How long should you work with Rinoa? Idk man until Timber’s independent lol figure it out”. He is purposefully dispassionate toward the kids so he doesn’t get attached, because he believes it’s them or his wife. Like the only time Cid shows passion is when he’s cussing out Norg. Then when you find him at the orphanage he’s finally honest: he couldn’t handle the reality of the situation. The garden battle would end with his wife’s death, or the kids he’s been dealing with, so he ran away. Seriously, this might be the hottest take out there but the more I think about Cid’s predicament and what I’d do in his shoes, the more fascinating he becomes.
I'm heavily biased as it was my first FF game and I fully acknowledge this, but yeah, none of the others have ever quite landed as hard for me. Though, maybe my tastes are just different from most FF fans as I also rate 2 a lot higher than most. I played a ton of 2 and the GBA remake was amazing.
To be fair to Cid, Garden exists to train SeeDs to defeat the sorceress because Squall told Edea that she "had the idea for" Garden to train SeeDs to defeat the sorceress. Cid would never have been running any sort of military training facility to begin with on his own, and now he's just desperately running around trying to figure out how he apparently manages to train Squall, specifically, so he one day apparently defeats some sorceress somewhere and also time travel(?). Also, smaller things, separating him from Ellone had nothing to do with training him (she was already gone when he drops into the past, that's all on Laguna) and if you Squall's lessons they _do_ teach SeeDs that memory loss is a potential side effect of using GFs, it seems like it's the Shumi tribe members (the people we later learn are there on behalf of the financier to milk these kids for as much money as possible regardless of their well-being) who are pushing "No no no, that's just some radicals making things up! Ignore it, use the weapons that will let you get through more enemies faster!" because the actual lesson is very straightforwardly "While it hasn't been proven yet this is a possible side-effect you need to be aware of."
Especially Cid's dialogue throughout the early game, those guys keep interrupting him mid-sentence before he gets to say anything that might hint that these kids are supposed to be anything more than fighting machines for hire. And there's that bit when Cid is about to comfort or praise Seifer right after the SeeD exam but the Garden staffer walks in to tell Cid he has other matters to attend to.
This is very well written, and just as wonderfully spoken. Really got me thinking on this game's story, it's like you experience a new adventure each time I come back to this game.
Interesting analysis. Garden also struggles because of the tension between Norg and Cid. I think it's fair to say Garden was a failure. At the same time, I don't think Cid was wrong to push Squall. The push from Cid was a large part of Squall realizing he didn't have to think inside the SeeD box.. he could do what he wanted to do. Which amusingly enough lined up with Cid's goal too
I would love for the story to be more fleshed put in a full remake. FF8 is my second favourite game in the series and it really sucks that the game has been glazed over by most people for so long. Squall is more than an angsty teenager.
Not to mention his training. If he wasn't trained at garden and was just fishing at Balamb Town or FH he most definitely would not be skilled enough to do ANY of what he does in VIII.
@@billcox6791 which is lovely, but it would also mean that any fanfic could be considered canon, no matter what family wouldve adopted him or what path he wouldve chosen, because "fate will always find its way to the rightful path and so destiny shall be fulfilled". he couldve ended up fixing toys in FH and suddenly meets seeds from the balamb garden who he grew up with, when his hometown is being attacked by soldiers who look for ellone and he would remember all of them due to lack of GF usage. he couldve become a bartender in the timber pub and the same would happen. the thing is: i understand what the video wants to say, but at the same time, the thought process goes into the wrong direction, not thinking of the whole thing. in game doves eyes, garden would not be a failure, if squall wouldve used it as a base to time travel into the past and bombard ultimecias castle with it. but that doesnt have to be the case, because in the end, squall introduces himself as seed from the balamb garden to young edea and hes telling her that gardens and seeds were her idea. even if he has the ragnarok, even if his drive to save rinoa went above being a leader of a garden, he still sees himself as a seed. thats his identity. the garden fulfilled its purpose when squall decided to move forward and leave it behind, because in the end, hes still returning to it in the credits, which means the gardens were a total success. if he wouldve sold toys in FH, he would not have introduced himself as a seed from balamb garden to edea. he wouldve said hes selling toys in fh, which wouldve led to edea making a completely different decision. she never wouldve build the gardens or trained seeds. The gardens are a tool to the perfect timeloop which sent squall on his path. It doesnt have to be the finale force against ultimecia.
Also the fact that he decides to go to Esthar to save Rinoa might be the reason he ultimately gains the means to defeat Ultimecia, but it is also simultaneously the reason Ultimecia manages to start the time compression, because without Squall bringing Rinoa to the space station, Adel would have remained sealed. This is all like Skynet who creates a time machine to erase John Connor from existence, but ironically in doing so creates the means for John Connor to exist, since his father comes from the future, but then again if Skynet didn't create a time machine it wouldn't exist either because it was created by scientists examining the remains of the first terminator sent to the past.
Liberi Fatali - Fated Child. Your take is quite accurate, but in the end wrong. Squall (the fated child) is the one that gives Edea the idea of Garden as in order to succeed he wants nothing to change, creating that paradox that concludes the story. Also in the end the power of the Guardian Forces and the military training that Squall and his companions have are the reason that they manage their way through this terrible road that they have to take. Nothing has to change, not even the mistakes. That is actually a part of the charm of this amazing game with that amazing story. Squall should be "forced" and get trained to be strong and a leading personality. Every harsh bit of his life, every loving touch, should be there to succeed. Furthermore Squall chooses that he wants nothing to change as he wants in every possible fate to end up not only succeeding, but with the same people loving him and he loving them. It is a beautiful story of choosing that very outcome as it is, including every pain in it.
I think this video hits interesting points but makes a questionable conclusion. Destiny is as big a part of the story, as the video suggests however that ultimately intertwines with and solves the time travel paradox of causation. The paradox I speak of can be summarized with a classic example: you go back in time and kill your grandparent before your parent is conceived. What happens now? If you weren't born, your grandparent didn't die, which means that you were born, which means your grandparent did die, which means you weren't born... Ultimecia did accomplish her goal, which left her vulnerable to Squall's group, which culminated in Ultimecia passing her soul to Matron and Squall telling her about Garden/SeeD, which lead to totally unqualified foster parents creating Garden and SeeD, which eventually caused Squall's group to make it possible for Ultimecia to achieve her goal, which again left her vulnerable to Squall's group. I believe this is known as "pre-destination" theory. Bringing this pre-destination theory back to the example of killing your grandparent, it suggests that you would ultimately fail to kill your actual grandparent because the history you thought you were changing (which is also your future) is already the history that originally played out. You'll change nothing. This was always destiny. One last side note, for fun. Squall survives at the end only because Squall must survive at the end. He's in a time anomaly. His failure to escape might mean he NEVER existed... so he must escape, so he does, because that literally has to happen. Not because Rinoa saved him but because pre-destination.
Sure but that diminishes the theme the game built up. The flower field that reappears at the end was symbolic of Rinoa and Squalls love keeping them together. Sort of an anti-romeo/juliet
@nathank2289 sorry, I should've clarified, the last paragraph is just my head cannon. Nothing discussed in the game supports my view so far as I know. At best, you could argue an Interstellar kind of ending where either interpretation works, but I think Square would reject mine. That said, I like my explanation. First; it's weird yet logically consistent in an odd way. It fits nicely with the rest of the story in my view, not the themes per se but it's a very unsettling and weird, somewhat tragic story... a bit macabre if I have the term right. My interpretation adds a whole layer of tragedy. Squall spends the entire arc of his character learning to trust in and rely on others only for him to face the end... trusting them come to him, to save him, but ultimately ending up utterly alone. It's really DARK. And while I don't care for such darkness for its own sake... I think it fits here.
Saying you don't know Ultimecia is a lie because even if you don't see her, she is possessing Edea and you can see how evil she is. She is the one who brainwashes Seifer and not Edea. The gardens were also created to fight against the sorceress and not only to stop Ultimecia, Edea didn't even know who Ultimecia was and she was afraid because Edea also knew how evil the sorceress were especially after what happened with Adel, that's why she had an orphanage for the orphans of that war. Also, the SeeD although their true mission is to stop Ultimecia, are also mercenaries, so armies and civilians can hire them for different missions, since for example there are many monsters that are a threat to people and the game itself shows you where they come from. The wars that have taken place were started by Adel with his Esthar army and then Galbadia with the president. If the SeeD had really done more harm than good, Galbadia and Ultimecia would be ruling the world.
Adel's tomb is only temporary too, and its not fully sealing her power away. She will eventually return and start the war anew, potentially having a worse battle considering it would be two demigods duking it out. Adel also has the power to absorb other sorceresses into her so it could be really really bad
I see it more as Cid setting up the dominoes so to speak. He knows that Ultimecias defeat is inevitable, but not the full details of how Squall gets there. If he tries to interfere too much that might break everything. So instead he setups everything based on what Edea told him; a SeeD leader from the future who uses a Gunblade is the one who defeats Ultimecia.
I always thought Cid’s manipulation and gaslighting of his students was kinda part of the whole thing. Maybe it was a secret, but I think the biggest secret is that the cycle wasn’t actually broken. Sure, Ultimecia can’t go possessing people anymore, but that’s not what made Adel so scary. Many FF games end with killing a god, and the god Hyne who cursed sorceresses into existence is still out there…
Rinoa is not instrumental to the Time Compression Plan, only Ellone and Edea are.. Rinoa and Adel are incidental. The Ragnarok is not instrumental to the plot neither, as they get inside Lunatic Pandora through other means. It's a flashy prop for the story.
Fascinating vid! Never really considered how often the characters' immaturity comes into play, but it makes perfect sense that they'd mess up the way they do. Btw for a second I honestly thought this was going to be about how the White SeeD Ship was a malevolent entity
Always nice to see other interpretations, however I'd argue for the exact opposite in this case. You say Cid and Garden didn't help, but it's Cid who forced Squall to go to this mission, and furthermore, bound Squall indefinitely to Rinoa. Squall would never have accepted this mission, let alone stay on it more than a couple of days. Garden provides the support and connections needed for pretty much every single step Squall takes towards the end goal - from going to various places, meeting various people and officials, even going to the moon. Garden provided Squall with the decade-long education and training to become what he is during the game. Even though the video states that it's "acting for his own personal interest" that led to the defeat of Ultimecia, it's the exact opposite that drives every success during the game: it's when Squall stops being selfish and starts opening up and showing interest towards others that things move forward. Indeed, without that, Squall would've never stayed true to his initial mission, care about Rinoa, inspire his comrades and students and many more things. I'd strongly argue that the game shows the journey of a person succeeding through learning to care for others and stand for your morals against all odds (Squall), and another one failing through being selfish, opportunistic and acting on his own interest (Seifer). But most importantly: the video states all the problems Cid and Garden caused retrospectively, when in many cases the effects of various actions would be almost impossible to accurately predict, and they are much, much more complex than what they seem after everything has happened and we have all the info. Real life is chaotic, cause and effect are extremely sensitive to initial conditions, and in the majority of complex cases you can only tell what went well and what didn't in retrospect. Thus, in retrospect, there's no "almost failed". Squall, and the Garden, succeeded with nearly a perfect score, so with the only means we have to judge, both Cid and Garden were very, very successful.
Idk if we can call garden a failure because we never see a world without it. The time loop is something that canonically always happens so there was never a timeline garden didn't exist. Who knows, maybe they needed to all have their mistakes to eventually pull off the win? Also Seifer didn't turn on them simply because he dreamed of being a knight, he turned on them because he was an unappreciated genius who was abandoned by garden instead of embraced. If they had made him a SeeD and treated him with love then Ultimecia wouldn't have been able to fill the void in his heart.
but............... being in Garden is what lead him to falling in love with Rinoa.... so......... and it was that love that saved the world.... without Garden, he never would have fallen in love and would have been more like Seifer. I think Seifer shows the player what squall would have been if he did not find love.
Considering “fithos lusec wecos venosec” was a lyrical anagram of “love & succesion of witches” both being the leading theme for this story - I was bothered by how shallow the sorceress lore was. From the initial assassination mission, all we really get is we must defeat them because we were hired to. Then once Edea’s true identity is revealed, we hear the technical lore from Dr. Odine. But once Rinoa becomes one, I thought it would’ve been a great series of side missions to find out about the sorceress lineage that leads up to Ultimecia.
"fithos lusec wecos venosec" doesn't have enough letters to be "love & succesion of witches" I could get "One love, success of witches", out of it, though. Or perhaps, "Success of one witches love".
Great stuff as usual! Squall gets manipulated by the adults alot of this game, and like you say its his individuality which actually leads to breaking the Succession of Witches at the end of the game. Love it! -Jack
You definitely have.. points. I will give you that some of them hit on themes that other games did better (child soldiers and inexperience causing more problems than helping; hellooooo MGS2/5). But you are trying to assign a lot of meaning to some stuff that really doesn't flow narratively speaking. While I will grant you that Cid did cause quite a bit of trauma, and it was Squall's sense of needing and longing for connection with others that lead him to heal even partially from it with Rinoa and the party of people from the Orphanage.. none of those things would have even been a thing if Squall hadn't specifically set it up to be a thing. Cid, Edea, and everyone else was set up to become a thing by the time paradox created by Ellone sending Squall back during the time compression to tell them basically this is happening; they create SEED and the Gardens in hopes to make Squall who Edea saw in the visit that day. So to say that they weren't important to Squall's development would be... short sighted at best, and a complete misunderstanding of their purpose in the story at worst. There would be zero reason for Squall to come and tell her that if it wasn't so they could do what they should to create the future that would then.. send him back and be successful in creating the better future. Without that visit, and the subsequent actions of Cid and Edea -- which again, were working with limited information, and were trying to make the best choices they could possible -- Squall would have never been prepared to become the downfall of Ultimacia even if it DID cause trauma or connect with Rinoa (which lead to his healing of that wound -- and eventually rediscovery of his father and sister) which then was destined to be the conduit with Ellone so they could even use time compression to beat Ultimacia in the first place. This is the problem with any type of 'time travel' mechanic -- even if they try to fill in all of the holes it causes folks to overthink how it has to work. Self contained though FFVIII does its job to tell a story, and show flawed characters doing flawed things in hopes of making a better future through the lens of self contained time travel.
I imagine Edea told Cid about her meeting with Squall. I guess they would figure out that the game is won if they can train seeds, like Squall at the end. Squall is basically a paradox, or more so gardens as a whole..
@@shanaeverowe9626 unfortunately without Garden he lacks training, and only Galbadia military would exist to oppose a sorceress. But without Garden Ultimecia would never have went back in time. He would have been a fairly old man by the time Adel naturally escapes
@@masterrhyno while he wouldn't have had the same level of training he had with seed, seifer was definitely a mob boss like personality. So he could have still been combat trained, just not professionally.
Good video. I agree with most of your take, but I would posit that Irvine didn't fail from a lack of being able to bring himself to shoot Edea. After Squall motivates him, he takes the shot and it's right on the money. Problem is Edea uses that forcefield to deflect/stop the shot.
It looked like the protect spell. She was still weakened by the shot, which is why the first battle with her isn't quite as challenging as the 2nd battle (disregarding the scripted ending of the first). Irvine also hesitated initially knowing who the sorceress was.
The editing in this video is so good, with all the cuts demonstrating exactly what the narrator is talking about. Subbed and waiting for more FFVIII videos, because IT'S THE BEST GAME EVER MADE and I could listen to somebody talking about it forever.
I think there is an implied message in FF VIII against letting other people dictate your choices and set up your fate, whether in school, college or a job. I think Gardens are part of this criticism, but so are many other things in this game, like sorcerers and empires.
It is SeeD's fault that Ultimecia hated the whole world. Squall and the gang saw the state of the world and the fate of the SeeDs. The game ends with Balamb Garden knowing that a Sorceress from the future will bring ruin to the world. and that their purpose is to Fight the sorceress. This means that at some point after Squall died, SeeD would start a literal witch hunt to prevent that future. Imagine being a child being hunted without doing anything wrong, just because you are a sorceress (and you didn't even ask for it). If I were in her position, I would do the same. Also, she knew that she was destined to die due to a time loop, at that point "Time compression" sounds like the only way out.
Fault lays less on SeeD but more on Hyne for this mess. Hyne's own legacy is the reason why sorceresses are born. SeeD in itself is just a circumstance resulting from Hyne perpetuating the cycle. If you read the in-game lore, you would have learned of Hyne.
When you break it down for the full story Cid's goal with garden was never to kill the sorceress (Ultamicia), his goal was to save her (his wife). So in that regard Garden was indeed a success. Which is why I love the ending video so much.
I was about Squall's age when I first played FFVIII, and even then, I spent much of it grumbling about useless adults dumping way too much responsibility on the shoulders of a KID. Rather than thinking, cool, soldiers who are my age, I was more worried about them and feeling like it was all so unfair. Also, unrelated, but since you brought it up, I never understood how Seifer was able to KO Odin like that, and I never forgave him. Odin was awesome and I was not placated by his less-badass replacement.
@@Athlynne th-cam.com/video/fFl9kBvm9JU/w-d-xo.html although the exact nature of what happened to Odin is somewhat ambiguous, it would be more accurate to say that Gilgamesh killed Odin, with Seifer being more of a circumstantial reason for their confrontation rather than the direct cause of Odin's default the scene could imply Gilgamesh's superiority of the 'Zantetsuken' technique, he also makes away with Odin's sword, I think his intervention was deliberate and precise, it also ended up saving Seifer's life
Time travel always makes things wonky. I mean, Ultimecia is technically destined to fail once you realize she passes on her powers to Edea. She can control sorceresses from the past, but didn't realize Edea had her powers. Everyone trying to manipulate events to prevent a certain future instead ended up creating it.
You do bring up a large number of valid points. The only thing I can say is that, it's not as though Garden's mission is done. The sorceress Ultimecia is still destined to rise up some day in the future, and SeeDs do need to be there to confront and stop her. So... maybe it started as a failure under Cid, but Squall can turn it into what it needs to be in the end?
That’s true ! But I’d argue that since Cid is welcomed back by the main party in the games final credits, it’s likely that Squall might end up following in his footsteps rather than questioning his methods and doing differently…but I guess we’ll never know!
The SEEDs are the best at what they do, and dont forget your looking at a very young group who just passed the exam to be allowed go on missions. It is strange though how squall was given so much command over more experienced members and how we dont see any other members out in the world (except for the white SEEDs who dont count as they arent from Gardens.)
That bit about the White SeeD ship gave me flashbacks too😂 But hold on, originally SeeD weren't meant to be mercenaries. That was NORG's idea when funding for the school dried up. I do think the original plan was to train the children up till adulthood, then tell them their true mission
Teared up a little when the Fisherman's Horizon theme started playing. Man i love this game. But it certainly helps that it was one of my earliest deep media attachments, 100 or so hours in at age 9... Good points around Garden, manipulation, expectation, etc
@@sharp7j I thought it was probably tied up with the events that happen there, most notably with Rinoa. I do love playing it on piano, and it does have this kind of bittersweet and nostalgic feeling with little twists to the melody and harmony. So maybe part of it is inherent, and part of it is our experience. Very cool. What a great soundtrack, taught me a whole lot.
While I politely disagree with some of your points, your final remarks actually made an impression on me. Thanks for making this video! I do agree that Garden is questionable as a system, but the sub lore stablishes that humans must prepare to battle the sorceress and the monsters that come from the moon. Squall ended up being a leader, because he helped his friends to overcome all their fears and feelings to save Rinoa. He has to develop urgency that ultimately leads to find love and save the world (?). What I do wonder if in the end the entire FF8 is the actual compressed time, which Ultimecia achieved but costing her life. The loop always exists from the point where Edea gets the powers from Ultimecia and there it also ends. Well that might just be a stretch.
FFVIII is a narrative I really enjoyed discovering again as an adult. A lot of big ideas like child soldiers and (garden) propaganda told in a story that I think still has some fumbles, but being able to forgive the weak points due to being more familiar with the non-traditional structure and presentations a game this ambitious was trying for. Neat video, thanks!
I would argue Cid pushing him as hard as he did is what gave him the ability to push beyond limits and never give up. Throughout his tenure as a student and a SeeD, he is pushed by everyone to open up and lean on other people. If none of this happened then he wouldn’t have pushed past his anxiety and lone wolf nature to admit his love for Rinoa and his fellow students. And he never would have done what he did to save Rinoa and consequently go to space etc. so despite him “abandoning his role”, he would never have made this decision without Cid, Edea, Quistis, Rinoa and the crew pushing him to open up.
Love this assessment. You are supposed to notice the sadness and trauma caused by Garden but remember why it was like this to begin with, because not even 2 decades prior to the main events of the story the world was terrorized by a near limitless demigod. The world is accepting of Garden because they know they need soldiers to fight an evil Sorceress one day in the future and are willing to overlook anything to have hope. Another point; These arent only children sent to military school, the majority of these kids are War Orphans (not just our main crew). Cid isnt perfect in his implementation for sure, i mean he does side with the shadiest dude in the game to get it done, but that also shows he is just human. He hides stuff because he is afraid it will break the events to come and cause a paradox, unfortunately for Cid he doesnt know he is already in a Bootstrap paradox. So Ultimecia only goes back in time with the JME because she is being hunted by SeeD of the future, this happens before the bootstrap paradox gets looped in, so we know that eventually without Cid SeeD will exist. Ultimecia doesnt realize the moment she goes back using the JME she started a paradox that will push up the time scale and ultimately lead to her death. Everything that happens inside the paradox is necessary for Squall to defeat her, including the trauma he was inflicted with. Without it he wouldnt have trained so hard, he wouldnt have been so isolated, and he wouldnt have been so willing to fight to begin with, all of it is growth from hardship that leads him to bloom as the true leader he is For Fun i like to think about the timeline if Ultimecia didnt go back in time; Soldiers are trained by galbadia even without garden, they arent as plentiful or well trained. After a few years of tampering with her cell Adel is able to move it gently to get hit with a natural lunar cry. The Cry lands near Esthar where Adel is free again, she promptly goes to eradicate Laguna and retake control of Esthar. War resumes with Galbadia but this time Adel decides to attack them directly, Soldiers try to defend but without the use of GFs they are easily defeated. Adel continues her campaign of acquiring girls with magical powers and absorbing them, growing stronger and stronger. Resistance starts to build in secret, starting project Garden and training the White SeeDs (mostly from War Orphans, remnants of galbadian soldiers, and esthar defectors) With this some of Odines research makes its way there leading to Junctioning of GFs being part of the training. After a few decades of tyrannical rule the White SeeDs finally strike, Defeating Adel. Garden and the White SeeD soldiers decide the best way to ensure peace is to destroy any sorceress potentials that arise. Decades pass with SeeD executing any sorceresses they can find before they get the power they need to cause terror. A Young Ultimecia goes into hiding, training in secret to control her powers. Eventually an older Ultimecia emerges and starts wiping out swaths of SeeDs so she might one day have peace. She makes a castle and declares full war on Garden, one of the Gardens she destroys has old Esthar relics including the Junction Machine Ellone, Upon using it she realizes that if she can go back far enough she can stop SeeD from ever existing and bring about the peace she wants for herself. Unfortunately the only peace she will have is in death man i love ff8's world, its 4am and im having fun rambling. If anyone reads this good luck out there, this is a great video. peace
Just save before you start a card game in a new region. Then reload till either a rule you like spreads or one you don't like gets removed. It is rare tho because of course it is. Pure luck either way, might have to reset 300 times.
A really nice point. I still, to this day, find FF8 one of the quirkiest and oddest games - where it ends is completely different from where it begins - and no other game in the franchise manages that about turn nearly as reliably. Interesting to see it doing just as many quirks in the narrative!
thats the whole thing with 8 it's secrets ill have to check out your other videos. but ff8 is game to fully know the game you have to look at every nook and crainny twice! and even then you wont find everything. some reponces come from who you take back to garden ( without renoa) who you have a good relationship with. and so much more it was indeed ahead of its time in a time loop
I personally believe Garden did its job properly. Squall created it really in a weird time-back loop. He only needed it to bring him and his friends to the point where Rinoa and him go to Esthar. Edea and Cid didn't know the full reason for the Garden, just that they would create it and Squall would defeat the sorceress. Their project failed as they didn't know the point of it, Squall's project for the garden completely succeeded.
Well... Many times in the game, the whole team are shown as kids, and their own personality and fears keep showing until they overcome those fears and assume their own responsibilities and fate. Gardens exist to train kids and give them the abilities they will use in the future because they know the fight is against a much more powerful enemy they don't know yet. Failure is the way of getting experience. Gardens actually give the kids all they needed for that future. The greatest evil is already waiting for them. That can't be changed.
I gotta say, i love 8 with a passion. It was my first FF. But i tend to avoid watching videos about it because i feel like most people just dont get it. However, i clicked your video on a whim and loved it. Well done
The biggest lie everybody overlooks about this game is its translation, in that the English one was basically unfinished. It's very unfortunate because the rushed job butchers the main characters and leads to them getting a lot of hate. The French translation, if you remember enough French from school, is very accessible now if you've got a digital version of the game and is worth playing. This is one of the few games I won't play in English anymore.
I had never considered that Irvine choked because he recognized Edea. Playing through again right now it seems there's way more trauma and emotion in these characters that some acknowledge while others (Squall) suppress. I think it's pretty well written and actually does a great job at exploring these ideas. But when you have random battles every 20 seconds you start to lose some of the pacing. Sad that the best way to play the game is by skipping half of it and turning encounters off.
7R is pretty bad and not technically existing in the same continuity as vanilla FF7 so it didn't really "fill" anything. The other issue is that most of the "holes" of FF7 stem from a really bad machine translation whereas FF8's story is intentionally vague and convoluted but actually is the first FF game that's translated well. The only real holes I can recall were with the ending and wtf was the deal with Griever and given how SQEX "reimagined" the events of Midgar in 7R I don't trust them to touch FF8.
This was all Ultimecia's Fault. If she never did time compression then Squall would've never given Ednea the idea to make Garden and SeeD. Meaning Squall made his own Destiny from the very beginning. When you talk to townsfolk they often mock Squall for his lack of basic knowledge. Showing the GFs have taken their toll. He's simply forgotten what SeeD is all about and that's why he feels so detached from everyone else. He only remembers being lost from his sister but he didn't even remember her face. That's why when you go to the Student Desk at the start you "Receive" Quetzalcoatl and Shiva. That's because Squall forgotten them. Which makes his expertise with the Gunblade standout much more due to its inherent complexity. Only he and Seifer were destined to be Gunblade users. The "Sorceresses Knight" Seifer was referring to was actually how he got his Gunblade skills. By watching Laguna fighting the dragon in the movie about the "Sorceresses Knight" with a gunblade. That wasn't a reference to how Squall knows how to use it but how Seifer knows how to use it. He watched the movie and got obsessed with the story all because of the Gunblade scene. Which is why he does the same pose as Laguna in the movie during the dream sequence. Which just shows how deeply connected they really are. Since Ednea is also their Matron that explains Seifer natural instinct to protect her took over because of their long forgotten past all thanks to using Guardian Forces. He was almost always destined to protect her despite being raised specifically to defeat her.
I don't understand these rants about the white seed ship. When I first played the game in 1999, it was nice to break from the story for a moment and have time to explore the world. I hate when games always tell you exactly what to do and where to go, because I feel a sense of urgency that spoils my experience. Anyway, great video. You nailed it, but nobody talks about it because nobody is interested in FFVIII, at least until a remake comes out. New generations generally don't like these games, and that's ok.
I have a theory that somewhere between the FF8 regular timeline and Ultimecia's occupation of her castle, that flying edifice was built using improvements of the Garden antigrav tech, and for a time was known as Solaris, home of Ellhaym Van Houten, and that Cid & Edea, Laguna & Raine were the continuing lineage of the "Pony-tailed Hero and Beloved Proto-Sorceress", who came together in this generation. Yes the girls here are brunettes and not gingers, but the genes for red hair are recessive and can disappear for a generation or two before resurfacing. Since both Xenogears and FF8 have the ongoing plot thread of generational Sorceresses, it all ties together.
Think it as Oedipus' (Edipo) story, but Yocasta was Ultimecia, Oedipus was Squall and Laius (Layo) was Cid. Oedipus' destiny was to fall in love with her mother and k1ll her father, no matter how hard he tried to run away from his destiny, he couldn't... because everything he did to escape from it, was necessary to fulfill it. Garden and Cid were necessary for Squall to fulfill his destiny :3
its amazing, there is always someone discovering new deep themes about classic ff games, FF in the Sakaguchi Era are masterpieces, thx for the great video!
This game is a consequence of destiny predetermined by the timeloop. The journey is about the discovery of people who don't know they are destined but two main protagonists who always try to avoid their destiny in the premise of freedom. Basically showing a position that's usual in life when you face the real world and career. It is not about a LIE. A lie is thinking you own your life without any responsibility; or treating a normal situation where you grow stronger as abuse. There are some places where we respect characters like this. It basically justify their strong will.
"The white SeeD ship exists in it's own dimension, because its a sentient evil force that thrives off human misery and decides where and when it wants to be found entirely depending on how much of your day it CAN RUIN.." 😂😂😂 It's been years but damn, did this hit hard
FF8 is a hidden gem, all the lore about the creation of the sorceress, why only female wields true magic and such is as good as it's completly hidden and overshadowed by the main events happening.
nice video but a pretty shallow reading of the game. we can say a lot of negative things about cid. but in the end he didnt create garden out of a strong conviction. its not like he was in any way motivated to turn children into soldiers or make them kill his wife. the seed (haha) for all of cids chocies is squall. the squall that came back in time after fighting ultimecia and told edea what she and her husband had to do. squall does not get to that point in time in spite of cids meddling. he gets there precisely because he told cid and edea exactly what they need to know. you make it seem as if squall would have ended up there anyways, regardless of what cid did. but this is not true. he ended up there because he chose to complete the time loop. ultimately it was his choice. from cids perspective its a simple matter. he doesnt need to shape squall into anything. squall might not have been ready for leadership when cid thrust it upon him. but cid knew that one way or another squall WILL rise up to it. many things impacted squalls path. the love and support of his friends. his training. his struggle. even his dissatisfaction with the responsibility he would bear. cid didnt need to give him the precise tools nor tell him the precise way. because he already knew that whatever the way is and what puzzle pieces he needed squall would ultimately find it. there is some poetic irony to ultimecias prophecy. yes. squall might have just ended up as a SeeD because thats where he grew up and because he didnt have anything else to do. He might have not liked leadership. He might not have wanted to go on this journey. or make the connections he ended up making. but whatever lead up to this: the squall that stepped through this portal was THE legendary SeeD. A man that has accepted the responsibility he previously denied. A man following the mission he initially didnt want. He coudlve walked out of that portal and confront edea about all his grievances. About how everythign she and cid did was a mistake. but he didnt. he walked out there as a seed pursuing the sorceress. he told edea what it means to be a seed. he salutes her. and he says "ill be allright matron". That is a man at peace with himself and who he is. And the embodiment of what SeeD is. And this interaction is what shaped what SeeD would be. Squalls choice made garden and SeeD what they were. I wrote a lot already so lets not get into Seifer.
As someone who’s been playing this game since he was 8 in 04 I always questioned stuff like this. Especially with the HGs. Also love you called out the biggest lie about the white ship first
I was hoping you'd touch on the other thing that nobody really talks about. These are individuals who are only a few generations removed from an *apocalypse* . There's literally no one left to describe how the 'world that was' used to be. It almost seems to be something obfuscated on purpose as if the survivors wanted a clean slate and kept information from getting to their children on purpose. The children were sealed inside mobile shelters and cast adrift. When they emerged nothing of that world remained. 80 years is an insanely short time to just have had everything foofed away. The legend of Hyne also seems to be a cautionary tale that withholds important information while still conveying the hubris of those that came before. I always mused that Hyne was no divine being at all but some all too human dictator. And when he couldn't have things his way, he called down the Great Cry in order to burn it all down. Or maybe the Cry was the result of a military experiment where Hyne in his madness tried to weaponize the Cry and it went terribly, terribly wrong. That abandoned lab in the ocean seems to point to some extinct military organization attempting to weaponize and control powerful energy beings which eventually became known as the Guardian Force. It becomes obvious that some of these entities were far too strong to contain let alone tame. But the military was ready to foolishly try anyway. At great cost.
Without the manipulation of Cid and, by proxy, Garden, none of this would have happened for certain. Cid secured and offered the circumstances that would have ensured his involvement and victory against Ultimecia.
Here's another mindbender for you - why is Ultimecia so keen to destroy SeeD? It's not just about Time Compression - she makes a solid effort to launch missile strikes against two of the three Gardens, while taking over the third as her own mobile base. The best explanation is from near the end, when Squall sees the bodies of White SeeDs on the way to her castle. "We're fighting across generations," he says. SeeD has been actively hunting for Ultimecia with the aim of killing her since *before she was even born*. She's been on the defensive for her entire life. If Garden had never existed, and SeeD never came about, would she be living a relatively normal life rather than using time magic to end the universe?
I mean technically it is Edea's empire, although I'd cut my baby girl some slack here. Not the best idea from conception, but she just took what she knew and had available to kick this into gear.
I have to imagine that part of the inspiration here was the Sierra Leone civil war that was raging throughout the 90's. Child soldiers were a major part of that conflict as was the fallout of colonialism. Cid is, in one respect, a stand in for the English. A self interested party who cared more about his goals and desires than anything else and at some point, he just leaves. Forcing everyone else to pick up the pieces of the world he built. Notably, England was in part responsible for helping to end the civil war. So it's both a villain and hero here. Or at least, they did some good even if a lot of what happened was a result of their actions in the first place. Also sounds a bit like Cid. Though I've never seen anything confirming this as an inspiration, so it's just speculation.
Playing FF8 for the first time as a teenager: "Man, the seeds are sooooo cool! And Squall is such a stoic badass!" Playing FF8 again as an adult: "Oh, wow. This whole game is about how child soldiers are a bad idea that creates nothing but emotional wrecks very skilled at killing stuff."
Great video and great point. I think the Garden's were a failure, but I think Cid knew that. I think that's why he picked Squall. Really, on paper, Squall was a terrible candidate for anything. He was apathetic and indifferent, selfish and impetuous, but he was clearly skilled and creative. I think Cid realized that Squall had the "IT" factor that couldn't be taught.
Final Fantasy 8 is stuck in a loop and is unable to break free. When Squall "Defeats" Ultimicia, they go back in time only to restart the loop again. Who knows how many times Squall had fulfilled his destiny.
Cid: Here, Squall. Have this magic lamp. It should help you.
Squall: _uses lamp and summons an extra-dimensional demon that nearly kills the party_
Cid: Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention that it's cursed LOL
People keep saying stuff like this but then forget what abilities Diablo has lol
He never forgets to tell it's cursed, plus the description tells you to save.
Puts lamp in pocket.
Wakes up in Laguna's body.
Gets Laguna and his friends to fight Diablos instead.
"Thanks, dad!"
@@andrewdwilliams this was my little kid strategy xD
@@andrewdwilliamsomfg lol
Finally, a FF8 theory/discussion that's not "Squale was dead the whole time!" Thank you.
This whole SeeD thing working and Squall getting his own GF... I mean an actual girlfriend only makes sense because he's dead and dreaming of a purpose beyond being just a soldier.
@@coolnightair4661 there's way more evidence of him being dead the whole time than that, too.
The worse theory of all time I hate the Squall is dead theory 😭
@thebigbadrascal3398 any "they were dead the whole time" theory just suck. It just refuses to engage with the material.
I fucking hate this theory and the "Ultimecia = Rinoa" so much
Actually the GF memory loss is directly taught in the the curriculum. It's in the optional school desk tutorial before you leave class. However it says something like "these effects have not been proven"
The last part you say means it wasn’t really taught. It’s treated more as of a rumor than fact. Especially since there is one sentence about it.
But in the dialogue it comes across as if the Balamb SeeDs weren't aware of it when it gets brought up. Maybe they just forgor due to the GFs.
@@23Scaduwell played.
Big possible evidence of G.F. affecting memory comes from Irvin, remembering the playable team since their time at the orphanage. The rest didn't remember.
It's actually more subtle than that. You can get ideas of the effect of GF on memories in many places, but always as a "rumor to be disregarded" sort of deal.
If we found out our riffles gave soldiers an illness, the military would hide it to keep the power they have. Having such a strong power that amps the soldiers so much (keep in mind, the GF are what allow junctioning magic and stats, and access all abilities) they would want the reason for avoiding it to be an unbased rumor.
I couldn't find Esther for the life of me, but 13 years later, I bought the remastered version and am gonna finish this game!!! Wish me luck!
Good luck friend! ❤
The first time I found estar I didn't even use the correct path, I glitched the game and managed to bring the garden on some ground that allowed me to walk to the salt field.
I did it by abusing the slow fall of the garden when going from a cliff and kinda "hopped" from a landmass to another
its all in the cards remember this
You can do it my friend! Even if it takes a few hours, keep going!
I always viewed seifer was what happens when there are two candidates for being the chosen one. One is given all the opportunities to succeed, the other is forced to fight for everything they have. In another world you would be routing for seifer.
Imagine a Harry Potter series in which Neville, after years of being ignored, quits school to work for Voldemort.
@andrewdwilliams I might have actually read that series. Never got into HP, wasn't my cup of tea at the time
@@shanaeverowe9626 I doubt it - I just made it up! Though there's a lot of fan fiction out there; it might already exist...
@@andrewdwilliams I know you said you made it up. I was saying if that was an actual series instead of the real HP we got I might have actually been willing to read it.
FFVIII's biggest secret is it's a soundtrack disguised as a game.
@@samuelpipe88 it DOES have an excellent soundtrack…
Uematsu went so hard with the soundtrack. My favourite of the series.
A card game disguised as an RPG.
@@Soshikix agreed I think it’s some of his best work along with ff6 soundtrack!
No argument there.
Of course Garden is a failure, they never have enough hot dogs? It's why Ultimecia wants to compress time. You can't run out of them if they always exist.
Or Mellon bread....
And yet they simultaneously never exist.
need the What If story where garden is well stocked with the favorite foods
@@Voidswaythe rush for melonpan is completely understandable
It was awfully nice of Square to package a whole game with Triple Triad.
i have never ever found out how to play a single game of Triple Triad in FF8 even tho i tried, did i miss something?
@@dviceix It's one of the best minigames of prime Squaresoft along with Chocobo Hot and Cold! It's a pretty easy to learn game with a lot of depth and provides the party with a LOT of power without having to Draw spells from enemies.
You walk up to people and press Square @@dviceix
@@themarky2714 i know what tripple triad is, despite my efforts i simply never had a chance to play it in FF8 xD
Also sterile Waifu's. I feel less sexual tension and/'or sexual hormones/arousel from a group of castirated Monks, living in seclusion at the top of the Himilayas.
The Sorceror has a freak desperatly clawing to get out, however in PG-13 world, they are going to have to learn to code.....
Next the girl wearing a skirt, that has her ass hanging out of it, behaves like Valevictorian in high school. "After I take these 2 math classes I will ahve enough credits, to enter college while I'm in High School! Selphie shut the hell up and Junction from the Slut magic node!
Next you have Karan who disieves us with her faking being a naughty teacher.... Doesn't even spank you with her ruler... Let down!
Lastly there is our lead heroine... She reminds me of that overly sweet girl in anime, that the writers always throw to the wolves just to show how quickly being naive will kill you... Yea she is Naivity given form..... What does this all leave us.
Gay romance between Seifer and Squall, Idenity crisis with Irvine, and Arms the size of a bears, from Zell mastubating constatnly all day long. There is a reason Zell is so good at thowing the ball. Crank out cream pies all day is tiring .
Even in FF15 that began as the bros on a road trip, and right before they entered Sausage Fest...... The Big Guy's sister shows up..... Wooo weee that little number screamed "I know exactly what I am doing"
"Tee Hee Oh Prince, I got water all over me.... What to do? Hmm well my panties are basically a swim suit, and I know my friend the Prince won't mind... I bet he was just about to offer his lap to me... I accept!"
Sweet and innocent my ass!.... probably has an emergancy cache of condoms, in her "emergancy pack" Forgot her name but whatever it is must rhyme with Rule 34
Counterpoint: Cid has no passion for what he is doing and is just winging it. He knows how the future will unfold, who why commit more than he had to? It’s his buffoonery that forced Squall to take leadership, because Cid wasn’t doing it. His perspective on everything is basically “idk dude figure it out”.
“You kids going on a mission? Here’s a magic lamp with a demon in it lol figure it out”.
“How long should you work with Rinoa? Idk man until Timber’s independent lol figure it out”.
He is purposefully dispassionate toward the kids so he doesn’t get attached, because he believes it’s them or his wife. Like the only time Cid shows passion is when he’s cussing out Norg. Then when you find him at the orphanage he’s finally honest: he couldn’t handle the reality of the situation. The garden battle would end with his wife’s death, or the kids he’s been dealing with, so he ran away.
Seriously, this might be the hottest take out there but the more I think about Cid’s predicament and what I’d do in his shoes, the more fascinating he becomes.
VIII is a personal favorite of mine, love to see more people talking about it!
I'm heavily biased as it was my first FF game and I fully acknowledge this, but yeah, none of the others have ever quite landed as hard for me.
Though, maybe my tastes are just different from most FF fans as I also rate 2 a lot higher than most. I played a ton of 2 and the GBA remake was amazing.
@@rainbowkrampus 8 is also my first & favorite. Screw the haters. I played almost every single FF and enjoyed most of them.
me too
That's mine too
To be fair to Cid, Garden exists to train SeeDs to defeat the sorceress because Squall told Edea that she "had the idea for" Garden to train SeeDs to defeat the sorceress. Cid would never have been running any sort of military training facility to begin with on his own, and now he's just desperately running around trying to figure out how he apparently manages to train Squall, specifically, so he one day apparently defeats some sorceress somewhere and also time travel(?).
Also, smaller things, separating him from Ellone had nothing to do with training him (she was already gone when he drops into the past, that's all on Laguna) and if you Squall's lessons they _do_ teach SeeDs that memory loss is a potential side effect of using GFs, it seems like it's the Shumi tribe members (the people we later learn are there on behalf of the financier to milk these kids for as much money as possible regardless of their well-being) who are pushing "No no no, that's just some radicals making things up! Ignore it, use the weapons that will let you get through more enemies faster!" because the actual lesson is very straightforwardly "While it hasn't been proven yet this is a possible side-effect you need to be aware of."
Especially Cid's dialogue throughout the early game, those guys keep interrupting him mid-sentence before he gets to say anything that might hint that these kids are supposed to be anything more than fighting machines for hire. And there's that bit when Cid is about to comfort or praise Seifer right after the SeeD exam but the Garden staffer walks in to tell Cid he has other matters to attend to.
@@aozf05 easy to miss this, NORG doesnt want his money machine being interrupted
Garden staff be like "This is just enemy propaganda, ignore it"
I wondered why NORG wasn't included into the theory
Memory loss is a small price to pay to have a giant horned lion drop a gigantic meteor on someone's head.
This is very well written, and just as wonderfully spoken. Really got me thinking on this game's story, it's like you experience a new adventure each time I come back to this game.
That rant about the white seed ship, I felt that in my soul.
Haha damn just thinking about the HOURS AND HOURS I spent looking for that damn thing.. Shudder.
Interesting analysis. Garden also struggles because of the tension between Norg and Cid. I think it's fair to say Garden was a failure.
At the same time, I don't think Cid was wrong to push Squall. The push from Cid was a large part of Squall realizing he didn't have to think inside the SeeD box.. he could do what he wanted to do. Which amusingly enough lined up with Cid's goal too
yeah it was all needed to push Squall onto the path to defeat Ultimecia
I would love for the story to be more fleshed put in a full remake. FF8 is my second favourite game in the series and it really sucks that the game has been glazed over by most people for so long. Squall is more than an angsty teenager.
wouldn't even call him angsty... dude clearly suffered a lot of trauma and feel it was portrayed well by his inner monologue
Totally agree. Id actually argue squall is one of the more emotionally mature ff protagonists!
"whatever..."
Agreed. Although I think you meant glossed over. Glazed over would be a very different thing.
@@tpolutts3309 100% what I meant, 2am commenting is never a good idea
FFVIII is about:
“You can't change the past, you can only change yourself."
-Ellone
Yet you went to the past to change yourself.
@@vincentangwyn2144 But nothing was ultimately changed as the game is one big endless time loop.
One flaw in your theory: if Squall wasn't SEED and didn't work for Garden, how would he and Rinoa even cross paths?
yes, the loop itself is already closed and perfect.
Not to mention his training. If he wasn't trained at garden and was just fishing at Balamb Town or FH he most definitely would not be skilled enough to do ANY of what he does in VIII.
That you can’t avoid fate and any actions you take to prevent it only work toward it is a well worn idea. Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, for example.
@@billcox6791 which is lovely, but it would also mean that any fanfic could be considered canon, no matter what family wouldve adopted him or what path he wouldve chosen, because "fate will always find its way to the rightful path and so destiny shall be fulfilled". he couldve ended up fixing toys in FH and suddenly meets seeds from the balamb garden who he grew up with, when his hometown is being attacked by soldiers who look for ellone and he would remember all of them due to lack of GF usage. he couldve become a bartender in the timber pub and the same would happen.
the thing is: i understand what the video wants to say, but at the same time, the thought process goes into the wrong direction, not thinking of the whole thing. in game doves eyes, garden would not be a failure, if squall wouldve used it as a base to time travel into the past and bombard ultimecias castle with it. but that doesnt have to be the case, because in the end, squall introduces himself as seed from the balamb garden to young edea and hes telling her that gardens and seeds were her idea. even if he has the ragnarok, even if his drive to save rinoa went above being a leader of a garden, he still sees himself as a seed. thats his identity. the garden fulfilled its purpose when squall decided to move forward and leave it behind, because in the end, hes still returning to it in the credits, which means the gardens were a total success.
if he wouldve sold toys in FH, he would not have introduced himself as a seed from balamb garden to edea. he wouldve said hes selling toys in fh, which wouldve led to edea making a completely different decision. she never wouldve build the gardens or trained seeds. The gardens are a tool to the perfect timeloop which sent squall on his path. It doesnt have to be the finale force against ultimecia.
Also the fact that he decides to go to Esthar to save Rinoa might be the reason he ultimately gains the means to defeat Ultimecia, but it is also simultaneously the reason Ultimecia manages to start the time compression, because without Squall bringing Rinoa to the space station, Adel would have remained sealed.
This is all like Skynet who creates a time machine to erase John Connor from existence, but ironically in doing so creates the means for John Connor to exist, since his father comes from the future, but then again if Skynet didn't create a time machine it wouldn't exist either because it was created by scientists examining the remains of the first terminator sent to the past.
Liberi Fatali - Fated Child. Your take is quite accurate, but in the end wrong. Squall (the fated child) is the one that gives Edea the idea of Garden as in order to succeed he wants nothing to change, creating that paradox that concludes the story. Also in the end the power of the Guardian Forces and the military training that Squall and his companions have are the reason that they manage their way through this terrible road that they have to take. Nothing has to change, not even the mistakes. That is actually a part of the charm of this amazing game with that amazing story. Squall should be "forced" and get trained to be strong and a leading personality. Every harsh bit of his life, every loving touch, should be there to succeed. Furthermore Squall chooses that he wants nothing to change as he wants in every possible fate to end up not only succeeding, but with the same people loving him and he loving them. It is a beautiful story of choosing that very outcome as it is, including every pain in it.
Irvine didn't choke. He was dead on balls accurate. Edea popped a shield.
he started to but yeah that bro was gonna drill her between the eyes, also the first time we see Squall act like a real leader
I think this video hits interesting points but makes a questionable conclusion.
Destiny is as big a part of the story, as the video suggests however that ultimately intertwines with and solves the time travel paradox of causation. The paradox I speak of can be summarized with a classic example: you go back in time and kill your grandparent before your parent is conceived. What happens now? If you weren't born, your grandparent didn't die, which means that you were born, which means your grandparent did die, which means you weren't born...
Ultimecia did accomplish her goal, which left her vulnerable to Squall's group, which culminated in Ultimecia passing her soul to Matron and Squall telling her about Garden/SeeD, which lead to totally unqualified foster parents creating Garden and SeeD, which eventually caused Squall's group to make it possible for Ultimecia to achieve her goal, which again left her vulnerable to Squall's group. I believe this is known as "pre-destination" theory.
Bringing this pre-destination theory back to the example of killing your grandparent, it suggests that you would ultimately fail to kill your actual grandparent because the history you thought you were changing (which is also your future) is already the history that originally played out. You'll change nothing. This was always destiny.
One last side note, for fun. Squall survives at the end only because Squall must survive at the end. He's in a time anomaly. His failure to escape might mean he NEVER existed... so he must escape, so he does, because that literally has to happen. Not because Rinoa saved him but because pre-destination.
Sure but that diminishes the theme the game built up. The flower field that reappears at the end was symbolic of Rinoa and Squalls love keeping them together. Sort of an anti-romeo/juliet
@nathank2289 sorry, I should've clarified, the last paragraph is just my head cannon. Nothing discussed in the game supports my view so far as I know. At best, you could argue an Interstellar kind of ending where either interpretation works, but I think Square would reject mine.
That said, I like my explanation. First; it's weird yet logically consistent in an odd way. It fits nicely with the rest of the story in my view, not the themes per se but it's a very unsettling and weird, somewhat tragic story... a bit macabre if I have the term right. My interpretation adds a whole layer of tragedy. Squall spends the entire arc of his character learning to trust in and rely on others only for him to face the end... trusting them come to him, to save him, but ultimately ending up utterly alone. It's really DARK. And while I don't care for such darkness for its own sake... I think it fits here.
Saying you don't know Ultimecia is a lie because even if you don't see her, she is possessing Edea and you can see how evil she is. She is the one who brainwashes Seifer and not Edea.
The gardens were also created to fight against the sorceress and not only to stop Ultimecia, Edea didn't even know who Ultimecia was and she was afraid because Edea also knew how evil the sorceress were especially after what happened with Adel, that's why she had an orphanage for the orphans of that war.
Also, the SeeD although their true mission is to stop Ultimecia, are also mercenaries, so armies and civilians can hire them for different missions, since for example there are many monsters that are a threat to people and the game itself shows you where they come from.
The wars that have taken place were started by Adel with his Esthar army and then Galbadia with the president. If the SeeD had really done more harm than good, Galbadia and Ultimecia would be ruling the world.
Adel's tomb is only temporary too, and its not fully sealing her power away. She will eventually return and start the war anew, potentially having a worse battle considering it would be two demigods duking it out. Adel also has the power to absorb other sorceresses into her so it could be really really bad
I see it more as Cid setting up the dominoes so to speak. He knows that Ultimecias defeat is inevitable, but not the full details of how Squall gets there. If he tries to interfere too much that might break everything.
So instead he setups everything based on what Edea told him; a SeeD leader from the future who uses a Gunblade is the one who defeats Ultimecia.
FF8 in my opinion is the most gibbly studio esque ,in terms of story telling.
Huh. This makes me want to replay it again and see how I feel about the story these days.
I always thought Cid’s manipulation and gaslighting of his students was kinda part of the whole thing. Maybe it was a secret, but I think the biggest secret is that the cycle wasn’t actually broken. Sure, Ultimecia can’t go possessing people anymore, but that’s not what made Adel so scary. Many FF games end with killing a god, and the god Hyne who cursed sorceresses into existence is still out there…
Rinoa is not instrumental to the Time Compression Plan, only Ellone and Edea are.. Rinoa and Adel are incidental.
The Ragnarok is not instrumental to the plot neither, as they get inside Lunatic Pandora through other means. It's a flashy prop for the story.
Fascinating vid! Never really considered how often the characters' immaturity comes into play, but it makes perfect sense that they'd mess up the way they do. Btw for a second I honestly thought this was going to be about how the White SeeD Ship was a malevolent entity
Always nice to see other interpretations, however I'd argue for the exact opposite in this case.
You say Cid and Garden didn't help, but it's Cid who forced Squall to go to this mission, and furthermore, bound Squall indefinitely to Rinoa. Squall would never have accepted this mission, let alone stay on it more than a couple of days.
Garden provides the support and connections needed for pretty much every single step Squall takes towards the end goal - from going to various places, meeting various people and officials, even going to the moon.
Garden provided Squall with the decade-long education and training to become what he is during the game.
Even though the video states that it's "acting for his own personal interest" that led to the defeat of Ultimecia, it's the exact opposite that drives every success during the game: it's when Squall stops being selfish and starts opening up and showing interest towards others that things move forward. Indeed, without that, Squall would've never stayed true to his initial mission, care about Rinoa, inspire his comrades and students and many more things. I'd strongly argue that the game shows the journey of a person succeeding through learning to care for others and stand for your morals against all odds (Squall), and another one failing through being selfish, opportunistic and acting on his own interest (Seifer).
But most importantly: the video states all the problems Cid and Garden caused retrospectively, when in many cases the effects of various actions would be almost impossible to accurately predict, and they are much, much more complex than what they seem after everything has happened and we have all the info. Real life is chaotic, cause and effect are extremely sensitive to initial conditions, and in the majority of complex cases you can only tell what went well and what didn't in retrospect.
Thus, in retrospect, there's no "almost failed". Squall, and the Garden, succeeded with nearly a perfect score, so with the only means we have to judge, both Cid and Garden were very, very successful.
Idk if we can call garden a failure because we never see a world without it. The time loop is something that canonically always happens so there was never a timeline garden didn't exist. Who knows, maybe they needed to all have their mistakes to eventually pull off the win? Also Seifer didn't turn on them simply because he dreamed of being a knight, he turned on them because he was an unappreciated genius who was abandoned by garden instead of embraced. If they had made him a SeeD and treated him with love then Ultimecia wouldn't have been able to fill the void in his heart.
but............... being in Garden is what lead him to falling in love with Rinoa.... so......... and it was that love that saved the world.... without Garden, he never would have fallen in love and would have been more like Seifer. I think Seifer shows the player what squall would have been if he did not find love.
Considering “fithos lusec wecos venosec” was a lyrical anagram of “love & succesion of witches” both being the leading theme for this story - I was bothered by how shallow the sorceress lore was. From the initial assassination mission, all we really get is we must defeat them because we were hired to. Then once Edea’s true identity is revealed, we hear the technical lore from Dr. Odine. But once Rinoa becomes one, I thought it would’ve been a great series of side missions to find out about the sorceress lineage that leads up to Ultimecia.
"fithos lusec wecos venosec" doesn't have enough letters to be "love & succesion of witches"
I could get "One love, success of witches", out of it, though.
Or perhaps, "Success of one witches love".
@@h3lblad3it does, both of you just mispell it
@@CrnaStrela, I just copy-pasted the other guy's thing.
Exploring the Lineage and witnessing the closed loop of the bootstrap paradox is kinda the main story. Ultimecia's power begins and ends with Edea
Great stuff as usual! Squall gets manipulated by the adults alot of this game, and like you say its his individuality which actually leads to breaking the Succession of Witches at the end of the game. Love it! -Jack
Thanks so much Jack! Yeah I’ve always felt there’s a really sinister underbelly with squall and the adults in his life?!
You definitely have.. points. I will give you that some of them hit on themes that other games did better (child soldiers and inexperience causing more problems than helping; hellooooo MGS2/5). But you are trying to assign a lot of meaning to some stuff that really doesn't flow narratively speaking. While I will grant you that Cid did cause quite a bit of trauma, and it was Squall's sense of needing and longing for connection with others that lead him to heal even partially from it with Rinoa and the party of people from the Orphanage.. none of those things would have even been a thing if Squall hadn't specifically set it up to be a thing.
Cid, Edea, and everyone else was set up to become a thing by the time paradox created by Ellone sending Squall back during the time compression to tell them basically this is happening; they create SEED and the Gardens in hopes to make Squall who Edea saw in the visit that day. So to say that they weren't important to Squall's development would be... short sighted at best, and a complete misunderstanding of their purpose in the story at worst. There would be zero reason for Squall to come and tell her that if it wasn't so they could do what they should to create the future that would then.. send him back and be successful in creating the better future.
Without that visit, and the subsequent actions of Cid and Edea -- which again, were working with limited information, and were trying to make the best choices they could possible -- Squall would have never been prepared to become the downfall of Ultimacia even if it DID cause trauma or connect with Rinoa (which lead to his healing of that wound -- and eventually rediscovery of his father and sister) which then was destined to be the conduit with Ellone so they could even use time compression to beat Ultimacia in the first place.
This is the problem with any type of 'time travel' mechanic -- even if they try to fill in all of the holes it causes folks to overthink how it has to work. Self contained though FFVIII does its job to tell a story, and show flawed characters doing flawed things in hopes of making a better future through the lens of self contained time travel.
I imagine Edea told Cid about her meeting with Squall. I guess they would figure out that the game is won if they can train seeds, like Squall at the end. Squall is basically a paradox, or more so gardens as a whole..
I hadn't really thought as much about the problematic child soldier aspect as I should have. Nice video.
Squall doesn't go to garden- doesn't become a SeeD- Doesnt meet Rinoa- Doesnt go to Esthar- Doesnt meet Laguna- Doesnt defeat Ultimecia
@@Romnonaldao seifer doesn't become the black knight, instead becomes the brash hero
@@shanaeverowe9626 unfortunately without Garden he lacks training, and only Galbadia military would exist to oppose a sorceress. But without Garden Ultimecia would never have went back in time. He would have been a fairly old man by the time Adel naturally escapes
@@masterrhyno while he wouldn't have had the same level of training he had with seed, seifer was definitely a mob boss like personality. So he could have still been combat trained, just not professionally.
On the other hand: Garden doesn't exist - SeeD doesn't exist - Ultimecia is not persecuted as relentlessly - Ultimecia doesn't need Time Compression
Good video. I agree with most of your take, but I would posit that Irvine didn't fail from a lack of being able to bring himself to shoot Edea. After Squall motivates him, he takes the shot and it's right on the money. Problem is Edea uses that forcefield to deflect/stop the shot.
It looked like the protect spell. She was still weakened by the shot, which is why the first battle with her isn't quite as challenging as the 2nd battle (disregarding the scripted ending of the first). Irvine also hesitated initially knowing who the sorceress was.
I really enjoy your style of video. I've always thought that school is crying out for an Ofsted inspection.
@@orion8550 thanks so much! Agreed, one health and safety inspection and that place is toast
Now this here sounds like some serious Sorceress-tier Anti-Garden propaganda.
Of course you'd want to find the White Seed Ship. :P
The editing in this video is so good, with all the cuts demonstrating exactly what the narrator is talking about. Subbed and waiting for more FFVIII videos, because IT'S THE BEST GAME EVER MADE and I could listen to somebody talking about it forever.
Thank you!! FF8 is the best !
I think there is an implied message in FF VIII against letting other people dictate your choices and set up your fate, whether in school, college or a job. I think Gardens are part of this criticism, but so are many other things in this game, like sorcerers and empires.
It is SeeD's fault that Ultimecia hated the whole world. Squall and the gang saw the state of the world and the fate of the SeeDs. The game ends with Balamb Garden knowing that a Sorceress from the future will bring ruin to the world. and that their purpose is to Fight the sorceress. This means that at some point after Squall died, SeeD would start a literal witch hunt to prevent that future. Imagine being a child being hunted without doing anything wrong, just because you are a sorceress (and you didn't even ask for it). If I were in her position, I would do the same. Also, she knew that she was destined to die due to a time loop, at that point "Time compression" sounds like the only way out.
Fault lays less on SeeD but more on Hyne for this mess. Hyne's own legacy is the reason why sorceresses are born. SeeD in itself is just a circumstance resulting from Hyne perpetuating the cycle. If you read the in-game lore, you would have learned of Hyne.
When you break it down for the full story Cid's goal with garden was never to kill the sorceress (Ultamicia), his goal was to save her (his wife). So in that regard Garden was indeed a success. Which is why I love the ending video so much.
I was about Squall's age when I first played FFVIII, and even then, I spent much of it grumbling about useless adults dumping way too much responsibility on the shoulders of a KID. Rather than thinking, cool, soldiers who are my age, I was more worried about them and feeling like it was all so unfair.
Also, unrelated, but since you brought it up, I never understood how Seifer was able to KO Odin like that, and I never forgave him. Odin was awesome and I was not placated by his less-badass replacement.
Gilgamesh killed Odin
@@XenoSilvano Are you sure? It's been a while, but I think I remember hurling my expletives at Seifer for that...
@@Athlynne th-cam.com/video/fFl9kBvm9JU/w-d-xo.html
although the exact nature of what happened to Odin is somewhat ambiguous, it would be more accurate to say that Gilgamesh killed Odin, with Seifer being more of a circumstantial reason for their confrontation rather than the direct cause of Odin's default
the scene could imply Gilgamesh's superiority of the 'Zantetsuken' technique, he also makes away with Odin's sword, I think his intervention was deliberate and precise, it also ended up saving Seifer's life
Time travel always makes things wonky. I mean, Ultimecia is technically destined to fail once you realize she passes on her powers to Edea. She can control sorceresses from the past, but didn't realize Edea had her powers. Everyone trying to manipulate events to prevent a certain future instead ended up creating it.
You do bring up a large number of valid points. The only thing I can say is that, it's not as though Garden's mission is done. The sorceress Ultimecia is still destined to rise up some day in the future, and SeeDs do need to be there to confront and stop her. So... maybe it started as a failure under Cid, but Squall can turn it into what it needs to be in the end?
That’s true ! But I’d argue that since Cid is welcomed back by the main party in the games final credits, it’s likely that Squall might end up following in his footsteps rather than questioning his methods and doing differently…but I guess we’ll never know!
The SEEDs are the best at what they do, and dont forget your looking at a very young group who just passed the exam to be allowed go on missions.
It is strange though how squall was given so much command over more experienced members and how we dont see any other members out in the world
(except for the white SEEDs who dont count as they arent from Gardens.)
That bit about the White SeeD ship gave me flashbacks too😂
But hold on, originally SeeD weren't meant to be mercenaries. That was NORG's idea when funding for the school dried up. I do think the original plan was to train the children up till adulthood, then tell them their true mission
Teared up a little when the Fisherman's Horizon theme started playing. Man i love this game. But it certainly helps that it was one of my earliest deep media attachments, 100 or so hours in at age 9...
Good points around Garden, manipulation, expectation, etc
So Im not the only one who thinks that song is crazy sad somehow.
@@sharp7j I thought it was probably tied up with the events that happen there, most notably with Rinoa. I do love playing it on piano, and it does have this kind of bittersweet and nostalgic feeling with little twists to the melody and harmony. So maybe part of it is inherent, and part of it is our experience. Very cool. What a great soundtrack, taught me a whole lot.
While I politely disagree with some of your points, your final remarks actually made an impression on me.
Thanks for making this video!
I do agree that Garden is questionable as a system, but the sub lore stablishes that humans must prepare to battle the sorceress and the monsters that come from the moon.
Squall ended up being a leader, because he helped his friends to overcome all their fears and feelings to save Rinoa.
He has to develop urgency that ultimately leads to find love and save the world (?).
What I do wonder if in the end the entire FF8 is the actual compressed time, which Ultimecia achieved but costing her life.
The loop always exists from the point where Edea gets the powers from Ultimecia and there it also ends. Well that might just be a stretch.
FFVIII is a narrative I really enjoyed discovering again as an adult. A lot of big ideas like child soldiers and (garden) propaganda told in a story that I think still has some fumbles, but being able to forgive the weak points due to being more familiar with the non-traditional structure and presentations a game this ambitious was trying for. Neat video, thanks!
You never forget your 1sr! FF VIII was my 1sr and favorite final fantasy ❤
I would argue Cid pushing him as hard as he did is what gave him the ability to push beyond limits and never give up. Throughout his tenure as a student and a SeeD, he is pushed by everyone to open up and lean on other people. If none of this happened then he wouldn’t have pushed past his anxiety and lone wolf nature to admit his love for Rinoa and his fellow students. And he never would have done what he did to save Rinoa and consequently go to space etc. so despite him “abandoning his role”, he would never have made this decision without Cid, Edea, Quistis, Rinoa and the crew pushing him to open up.
Love this assessment. You are supposed to notice the sadness and trauma caused by Garden but remember why it was like this to begin with, because not even 2 decades prior to the main events of the story the world was terrorized by a near limitless demigod. The world is accepting of Garden because they know they need soldiers to fight an evil Sorceress one day in the future and are willing to overlook anything to have hope. Another point; These arent only children sent to military school, the majority of these kids are War Orphans (not just our main crew). Cid isnt perfect in his implementation for sure, i mean he does side with the shadiest dude in the game to get it done, but that also shows he is just human. He hides stuff because he is afraid it will break the events to come and cause a paradox, unfortunately for Cid he doesnt know he is already in a Bootstrap paradox.
So Ultimecia only goes back in time with the JME because she is being hunted by SeeD of the future, this happens before the bootstrap paradox gets looped in, so we know that eventually without Cid SeeD will exist. Ultimecia doesnt realize the moment she goes back using the JME she started a paradox that will push up the time scale and ultimately lead to her death. Everything that happens inside the paradox is necessary for Squall to defeat her, including the trauma he was inflicted with. Without it he wouldnt have trained so hard, he wouldnt have been so isolated, and he wouldnt have been so willing to fight to begin with, all of it is growth from hardship that leads him to bloom as the true leader he is
For Fun i like to think about the timeline if Ultimecia didnt go back in time;
Soldiers are trained by galbadia even without garden, they arent as plentiful or well trained. After a few years of tampering with her cell Adel is able to move it gently to get hit with a natural lunar cry. The Cry lands near Esthar where Adel is free again, she promptly goes to eradicate Laguna and retake control of Esthar. War resumes with Galbadia but this time Adel decides to attack them directly, Soldiers try to defend but without the use of GFs they are easily defeated. Adel continues her campaign of acquiring girls with magical powers and absorbing them, growing stronger and stronger.
Resistance starts to build in secret, starting project Garden and training the White SeeDs (mostly from War Orphans, remnants of galbadian soldiers, and esthar defectors) With this some of Odines research makes its way there leading to Junctioning of GFs being part of the training. After a few decades of tyrannical rule the White SeeDs finally strike, Defeating Adel. Garden and the White SeeD soldiers decide the best way to ensure peace is to destroy any sorceress potentials that arise. Decades pass with SeeD executing any sorceresses they can find before they get the power they need to cause terror.
A Young Ultimecia goes into hiding, training in secret to control her powers. Eventually an older Ultimecia emerges and starts wiping out swaths of SeeDs so she might one day have peace. She makes a castle and declares full war on Garden, one of the Gardens she destroys has old Esthar relics including the Junction Machine Ellone, Upon using it she realizes that if she can go back far enough she can stop SeeD from ever existing and bring about the peace she wants for herself. Unfortunately the only peace she will have is in death
man i love ff8's world, its 4am and im having fun rambling. If anyone reads this good luck out there, this is a great video. peace
You know what's a FF8 secret that no one talks about?! How every single method of trying to get rid of 'Random' on Triple Triad, doesn't work!
Just save before you start a card game in a new region. Then reload till either a rule you like spreads or one you don't like gets removed. It is rare tho because of course it is. Pure luck either way, might have to reset 300 times.
@@travissapienza4930 300? Jesus. Better odds just having random and save scumming wins on games
A really nice point. I still, to this day, find FF8 one of the quirkiest and oddest games - where it ends is completely different from where it begins - and no other game in the franchise manages that about turn nearly as reliably. Interesting to see it doing just as many quirks in the narrative!
thats the whole thing with 8 it's secrets ill have to check out your other videos. but ff8 is game to fully know the game you have to look at every nook and crainny twice! and even then you wont find everything. some reponces come from who you take back to garden ( without renoa) who you have a good relationship with. and so much more it was indeed ahead of its time in a time loop
I personally believe Garden did its job properly. Squall created it really in a weird time-back loop. He only needed it to bring him and his friends to the point where Rinoa and him go to Esthar.
Edea and Cid didn't know the full reason for the Garden, just that they would create it and Squall would defeat the sorceress. Their project failed as they didn't know the point of it, Squall's project for the garden completely succeeded.
Great video. I would say Squall didn't exactly abandon Garden since they had already stopped Edea and planned to find Ellone in Esthar.
Well... Many times in the game, the whole team
are shown as kids, and their own personality and fears keep showing until they overcome those fears and assume their own responsibilities and fate. Gardens exist to train kids and give them the abilities they will use in the future because they know the fight is against a much more powerful enemy they don't know yet. Failure is the way of getting experience. Gardens actually give the kids all they needed for that future. The greatest evil is already waiting for them. That can't be changed.
I feel personally attacked and my life philosophy being put in question with this video. Like, did we even go to the moon?
I gotta say, i love 8 with a passion. It was my first FF. But i tend to avoid watching videos about it because i feel like most people just dont get it.
However, i clicked your video on a whim and loved it. Well done
The biggest lie everybody overlooks about this game is its translation, in that the English one was basically unfinished.
It's very unfortunate because the rushed job butchers the main characters and leads to them getting a lot of hate.
The French translation, if you remember enough French from school, is very accessible now if you've got a digital version of the game and is worth playing. This is one of the few games I won't play in English anymore.
I had never considered that Irvine choked because he recognized Edea.
Playing through again right now it seems there's way more trauma and emotion in these characters that some acknowledge while others (Squall) suppress.
I think it's pretty well written and actually does a great job at exploring these ideas. But when you have random battles every 20 seconds you start to lose some of the pacing. Sad that the best way to play the game is by skipping half of it and turning encounters off.
This might have been the best FFVIII video essay I've come across so far!
Nice job, have a sub. Your voice is easy to listen to
Thank you so much!
That's why FF 8 needs a remake. There where alot of missing holes in FF7 and remake fill them. They could do the same for FF8
@@shadowzx10 I thought the same for resident evil 3, and look how that turned out
7R is pretty bad and not technically existing in the same continuity as vanilla FF7 so it didn't really "fill" anything. The other issue is that most of the "holes" of FF7 stem from a really bad machine translation whereas FF8's story is intentionally vague and convoluted but actually is the first FF game that's translated well. The only real holes I can recall were with the ending and wtf was the deal with Griever and given how SQEX "reimagined" the events of Midgar in 7R I don't trust them to touch FF8.
Ff7 relying on good looking cloud and sexy tifa on their remake sales
rather have a new game than another remake of a game. just lazy easy money from clowns like you
FF7R is a trainwreck that altered a story that was already complete. It didnt fill holes, it told a different story.
This was all Ultimecia's Fault. If she never did time compression then Squall would've never given Ednea the idea to make Garden and SeeD. Meaning Squall made his own Destiny from the very beginning. When you talk to townsfolk they often mock Squall for his lack of basic knowledge. Showing the GFs have taken their toll. He's simply forgotten what SeeD is all about and that's why he feels so detached from everyone else. He only remembers being lost from his sister but he didn't even remember her face. That's why when you go to the Student Desk at the start you "Receive" Quetzalcoatl and Shiva. That's because Squall forgotten them. Which makes his expertise with the Gunblade standout much more due to its inherent complexity. Only he and Seifer were destined to be Gunblade users. The "Sorceresses Knight" Seifer was referring to was actually how he got his Gunblade skills. By watching Laguna fighting the dragon in the movie about the "Sorceresses Knight" with a gunblade. That wasn't a reference to how Squall knows how to use it but how Seifer knows how to use it. He watched the movie and got obsessed with the story all because of the Gunblade scene. Which is why he does the same pose as Laguna in the movie during the dream sequence. Which just shows how deeply connected they really are. Since Ednea is also their Matron that explains Seifer natural instinct to protect her took over because of their long forgotten past all thanks to using Guardian Forces. He was almost always destined to protect her despite being raised specifically to defeat her.
I was really going to dig into the channel and was so surprised to see it just started lmao, keep it up, I love your videos!
Cool take! That's how you know a piece of art. 25 years later people are still analysing it. This game is still my number 1 after all those years.
I don't understand these rants about the white seed ship. When I first played the game in 1999, it was nice to break from the story for a moment and have time to explore the world. I hate when games always tell you exactly what to do and where to go, because I feel a sense of urgency that spoils my experience. Anyway, great video. You nailed it, but nobody talks about it because nobody is interested in FFVIII, at least until a remake comes out. New generations generally don't like these games, and that's ok.
I have a theory that somewhere between the FF8 regular timeline and Ultimecia's occupation of her castle, that flying edifice was built using improvements of the Garden antigrav tech, and for a time was known as Solaris, home of Ellhaym Van Houten, and that Cid & Edea, Laguna & Raine were the continuing lineage of the "Pony-tailed Hero and Beloved Proto-Sorceress", who came together in this generation. Yes the girls here are brunettes and not gingers, but the genes for red hair are recessive and can disappear for a generation or two before resurfacing. Since both Xenogears and FF8 have the ongoing plot thread of generational Sorceresses, it all ties together.
I've never heard anyone say Ultimecia out loud and I like your pronunciation of it. I always read it as ultee-meh-see-uh.
Think it as Oedipus' (Edipo) story, but Yocasta was Ultimecia, Oedipus was Squall and Laius (Layo) was Cid. Oedipus' destiny was to fall in love with her mother and k1ll her father, no matter how hard he tried to run away from his destiny, he couldn't... because everything he did to escape from it, was necessary to fulfill it.
Garden and Cid were necessary for Squall to fulfill his destiny :3
its amazing, there is always someone discovering new deep themes about classic ff games, FF in the Sakaguchi Era are masterpieces, thx for the great video!
This game is a consequence of destiny predetermined by the timeloop. The journey is about the discovery of people who don't know they are destined but two main protagonists who always try to avoid their destiny in the premise of freedom. Basically showing a position that's usual in life when you face the real world and career. It is not about a LIE. A lie is thinking you own your life without any responsibility; or treating a normal situation where you grow stronger as abuse. There are some places where we respect characters like this. It basically justify their strong will.
Subbed.
You opened my mind. What game was I playing in highschool lol.
I gotta replay it.
Great video.
"The white SeeD ship exists in it's own dimension, because its a sentient evil force that thrives off human misery and decides where and when it wants to be found entirely depending on how much of your day it CAN RUIN.." 😂😂😂 It's been years but damn, did this hit hard
This was a pretty good video, hope you make more! Im subbing.
FF8 is a hidden gem, all the lore about the creation of the sorceress, why only female wields true magic and such is as good as it's completly hidden and overshadowed by the main events happening.
nice video but a pretty shallow reading of the game.
we can say a lot of negative things about cid. but in the end he didnt create garden out of a strong conviction. its not like he was in any way motivated to turn children into soldiers or make them kill his wife.
the seed (haha) for all of cids chocies is squall. the squall that came back in time after fighting ultimecia and told edea what she and her husband had to do.
squall does not get to that point in time in spite of cids meddling. he gets there precisely because he told cid and edea exactly what they need to know.
you make it seem as if squall would have ended up there anyways, regardless of what cid did. but this is not true. he ended up there because he chose to complete the time loop.
ultimately it was his choice.
from cids perspective its a simple matter. he doesnt need to shape squall into anything. squall might not have been ready for leadership when cid thrust it upon him. but cid knew that one way or another squall WILL rise up to it.
many things impacted squalls path. the love and support of his friends. his training. his struggle. even his dissatisfaction with the responsibility he would bear. cid didnt need to give him the precise tools nor tell him the precise way. because he already knew that whatever the way is and what puzzle pieces he needed squall would ultimately find it.
there is some poetic irony to ultimecias prophecy. yes. squall might have just ended up as a SeeD because thats where he grew up and because he didnt have anything else to do. He might have not liked leadership. He might not have wanted to go on this journey. or make the connections he ended up making. but whatever lead up to this: the squall that stepped through this portal was THE legendary SeeD.
A man that has accepted the responsibility he previously denied. A man following the mission he initially didnt want. He coudlve walked out of that portal and confront edea about all his grievances. About how everythign she and cid did was a mistake.
but he didnt. he walked out there as a seed pursuing the sorceress. he told edea what it means to be a seed.
he salutes her. and he says "ill be allright matron".
That is a man at peace with himself and who he is. And the embodiment of what SeeD is. And this interaction is what shaped what SeeD would be. Squalls choice made garden and SeeD what they were.
I wrote a lot already so lets not get into Seifer.
📠
As someone who’s been playing this game since he was 8 in 04 I always questioned stuff like this. Especially with the HGs. Also love you called out the biggest lie about the white ship first
I was hoping you'd touch on the other thing that nobody really talks about.
These are individuals who are only a few generations removed from an *apocalypse* . There's literally no one left to describe how the 'world that was' used to be. It almost seems to be something obfuscated on purpose as if the survivors wanted a clean slate and kept information from getting to their children on purpose. The children were sealed inside mobile shelters and cast adrift. When they emerged nothing of that world remained. 80 years is an insanely short time to just have had everything foofed away.
The legend of Hyne also seems to be a cautionary tale that withholds important information while still conveying the hubris of those that came before. I always mused that Hyne was no divine being at all but some all too human dictator. And when he couldn't have things his way, he called down the Great Cry in order to burn it all down. Or maybe the Cry was the result of a military experiment where Hyne in his madness tried to weaponize the Cry and it went terribly, terribly wrong. That abandoned lab in the ocean seems to point to some extinct military organization attempting to weaponize and control powerful energy beings which eventually became known as the Guardian Force. It becomes obvious that some of these entities were far too strong to contain let alone tame. But the military was ready to foolishly try anyway. At great cost.
Squall only succeeded because of Zell's epic tap dancing.
Without the manipulation of Cid and, by proxy, Garden, none of this would have happened for certain. Cid secured and offered the circumstances that would have ensured his involvement and victory against Ultimecia.
Here's another mindbender for you - why is Ultimecia so keen to destroy SeeD? It's not just about Time Compression - she makes a solid effort to launch missile strikes against two of the three Gardens, while taking over the third as her own mobile base.
The best explanation is from near the end, when Squall sees the bodies of White SeeDs on the way to her castle. "We're fighting across generations," he says. SeeD has been actively hunting for Ultimecia with the aim of killing her since *before she was even born*. She's been on the defensive for her entire life.
If Garden had never existed, and SeeD never came about, would she be living a relatively normal life rather than using time magic to end the universe?
so much insight in this video- wow you totally blew my mind and you saw my favorite game in the most unique way !
Now you got me super curious with your cliffhanger ending.
Yes, an excellent understanding of the essence of the White SeeD ship deserves a like.
Subscribed because all your videos are of FF8. Keep the faith, my friend 🙏🏾
I mean technically it is Edea's empire, although I'd cut my baby girl some slack here. Not the best idea from conception, but she just took what she knew and had available to kick this into gear.
I have to imagine that part of the inspiration here was the Sierra Leone civil war that was raging throughout the 90's. Child soldiers were a major part of that conflict as was the fallout of colonialism. Cid is, in one respect, a stand in for the English. A self interested party who cared more about his goals and desires than anything else and at some point, he just leaves. Forcing everyone else to pick up the pieces of the world he built.
Notably, England was in part responsible for helping to end the civil war. So it's both a villain and hero here. Or at least, they did some good even if a lot of what happened was a result of their actions in the first place. Also sounds a bit like Cid.
Though I've never seen anything confirming this as an inspiration, so it's just speculation.
Playing FF8 for the first time as a teenager: "Man, the seeds are sooooo cool! And Squall is such a stoic badass!"
Playing FF8 again as an adult: "Oh, wow. This whole game is about how child soldiers are a bad idea that creates nothing but emotional wrecks very skilled at killing stuff."
You know it is pretty wild. What kind of good guy trains child soldiers to ultimately (hah!) fight a moon sorceress?
Without Garden Squall never develops the abilities that allow victory.
Not sure how the algorithm would treat it, but i would happily listen to you say the word "Garden" for longer than 8 minutes 😂
Great video and great point. I think the Garden's were a failure, but I think Cid knew that. I think that's why he picked Squall. Really, on paper, Squall was a terrible candidate for anything. He was apathetic and indifferent, selfish and impetuous, but he was clearly skilled and creative. I think Cid realized that Squall had the "IT" factor that couldn't be taught.
>seifer is strong enough to defeat an ancient god
this entire video is actually a secret gilgamesh glaze
Final Fantasy 8 is stuck in a loop and is unable to break free. When Squall "Defeats" Ultimicia, they go back in time only to restart the loop again. Who knows how many times Squall had fulfilled his destiny.