Haney 0:00
This episode of First Encounter contains spoilers for the video game Final Fantasy VII. If you’ve not played this game, first off, what are you doing? Don’t be like me and second go play it instead of listening to us. If you’d like to follow along, listen to the end of the episode for where we play to next, as well as how you can get in touch with us. We would also like to take a second to say that we are in no way affiliated with Square, we’re just a couple of guys trying to have fun with a cool video game.

My min- I’m just like not thinking clear at all right now. I’m so upset. I hate that they give me this big fight and I just like trying to mentally deal with the fact that I just got- I’m like going through all the stages of grief right now and I’m at anger at the moment. I don’t even know what I just unequipped because I’m so upset, fuck. Dude, I’m not- this is not okay. Stop looking at me. Stop looking at me when I cry, damn it. Can I help you?

Welcome to the First Encounter 3D experience. Now in 4D, including smell.

Chris 1:04
Coming from the right… the left… all around you.

Haney 1:08
Dolby Digital. Bwaaaahh. Just, fucking, that aggressive noise at the theater that always blows my eardrums out before a movie.

Hey!

Chris 1:16
How you doing pumpkin?

Haney 1:17
Awful. Just awful.

Chris 1:19
Yeah?

Haney 1:19
Yeah, today was not good.

Chris 1:22
I mean we got- we got that good-good.

Haney 1:25
Oh, we got too much of it. I didn’t ask for this.

Chris 1:27
Back it up. Back that good-good out of there.

Haney 1:28
I don’t want the good-good. Well, first of all, Chris, let’s talk a little bit about the beverages we’re imbibing. What- what’cha got there?

Chris 1:36
Got a nice cuppa deep black coffee.

Haney 1:39
Same.

Chris 1:40
I- it’s your coffee you’ll- you’ll have to describe what you bought.

Haney 1:43
It’s like Folgers brand It’s nothing special.

Chris 1:47
Best part of waking up..

Haney 1:49
Some dude in your… hmmm.

Chris 1:53
Bring it home. Save it.

Haney 1:57
Cuuuup.

Chris 1:58
Lovely.

Haney 1:58
Excellent.

Chris 1:59
So, we touched some Final Fantasy.

Haney 2:01
We did. We opened up Final Fantasy. We touch space tilde backslash dot bash RC. It’s been a while since I’ve opened a bash profile. I use ZSH now.

Chris 2:15
You- You lost me.

Uhh touch is a command Iin-

I literally couldn’t care less.

Haney 2:20
Nevermind, nevermind. That’s fair.

Yeah, we- we touched some Final Fantasy today. Went on a journey. Let’s- let’s give some quick highlights here.

Chris 2:27
Yeah.

Haney 2:27
First: archaeology. Big A+ from me.

Chris 2:31
Two thumbs up.

Haney 2:31
Uhh boating. That came before archaeology but that’s fine.

Chris 2:35
It was in there.

Haney 2:36
We had a good time. Uhh.

Chris 2:39
New party members. Tried them out.

Haney 2:41
Yeah.

Chris 2:41
Showed them around.

Haney 2:41
Yeah. Got a new summons. It’s a good day. Got some key items.

Chris 2:45
Yeah, real high notes. We’re just riding here-

Haney 2:48
Riding here. Yeah. I mean, it all seemed to be going absolutely my way.

Chris 2:53
May have ridden them a little too far into the ground.

Haney 2:56
I might have gotten too close to the sun, would you say?

Chris 2:59
I would say.

Haney 3:00
I definitely Icarus’d a little bit.

Chris 3:02
So-

Haney 3:02
Let’s back it up here though and- and talk- take- take it from the beginning, as one does when they’re telling a story. So last episode, Aerith visited us in a dream sequence from the sleeping forest outside of the Lost City of the Ancients. Kind of ran quickly over her plan of pursuing Sephiroth solo because only an ancient or Cetra I think she said could do it. See last week’s episode for-

Chris 3:28
More details.

Haney 3:28
More details. Um, that being we were like yeah, cool Aerith. Let’s go find Vincent and uhh Yuffie and did that. This week, picked up after grabbing Yuffie and storing her immediately in the party. So just some quick equipping, did some uhh- some materia movement and decided to try out our new found Yuffie and Vincent by getting directly in the Tiny Bronco and not having any random encounters for quite some time. Uhh we boated around a little bit more than necessary.

Chris 4:03
And we’re back on the ocean.

Haney 4:07
Nyyyoooommmm.

Chris 4:07
I’m sure this won’t-

Haney 4:09
No, I know where I’m going.

Chris 4:10
Alright, where are we going?

Haney 4:12
Uh I’m gonna try to find that Bone Village again. Um, here’s the problem. Don’t remember where it is. And I don’t want you to help me this time.

Chris 4:20
Yeah.

Haney 4:21
Sorry. I’m just trying to actually get these fucking controls to work right.

Chris 4:25
Sure.

Haney 4:26
So to turn right, I use the left trigger.

Chris 4:29
Yep.

Haney 4:30
To turn left, I use the right bumper.

Chris 4:33
I don’t know what the problem is. Seems like you got it.

Haney 4:35
No, no, no, no, no, no, no problem.

Chris 4:37
Seems like it’s working fine.

Haney 4:38
No problem here. So I think- Alright so there’s Gold Saucer. Let’s just head right back up to Dio. Do I have to go up the river or can I go up the landmass a little bit more?

Chris 4:52
You can do whatever the hell you want.

Haney 4:53
No, I can’t- I can’t- I cannot do literally what I want to do.

Chris 4:56
You expressly said do not help me.

Haney 4:59
Are you having fun though, that’s all that matters.

Chris 5:01
Yeah. Heyyy.

Haney 5:03
Nibleheim, and my uh trusty-

Chris 5:06
Steed.

Haney 5:06
Steed. My six-

Chris 5:08
Our Iron Horse.

Haney 5:09
Hmm.

Chris 5:10
What?

Haney 5:11
Don’t like that. I don’t know why there’s the- there’s nothing wrong with it. I just don’t like it. Yeah. All right. This isn’t the way I want to go but-

Chris 5:20
We’re sure going it.

Haney 5:21
Well, in terms of how I wanted to get there, it’s not the way I wanted to go. But it is the direction I wanted to head in. If that makes sense.

Chris 5:29
I think so. Are you happy about it?

Haney 5:30
I wanted to have it that I wanted to go straight up this channel and it does not let you. No.

Chris 5:36
Why would it?

Haney 5:37
Yeah, it was like, Fuck you, dude.

I knew where we were going. Like, I was like, I’m gonna go check out the Bone Village the last time you know, the guy gave me some good, good-good advice. He was like, hey, this is where you need to go. I was like, let’s just go back there. This time, however, I was tempted by the devil himself in the form of in game gambling, which is a nightmare for me, always. We get to the Bone Village, if you will-

Chris 6:03
I will.

Haney 6:04
And talk to the initial guy who we screamed. were separate that last time. This time we have the equally fantastic dialogue of where’s our Where’s she? Did you see? The other dialogue options where? What you deal with? And what was the top one? Where’s the city of the or? Yeah, where’s the city of the ancients? Welcome to bone village uptown. For nature lovers. What do you want? Where’s

Chris 6:35
the city of the ancients? Do you know where aerith is? What are you doing?

Haney 6:46
This is just fucking This is just a treat. left, right and center. Yeah,

Chris 6:49
it’s just good

Haney 6:50
to know why I had it here. Because last time he gave us explicit marching orders, and I was like, let’s see what else happened.

Chris 6:56
These guys very helpful. Let’s start with what are you doing? What are you doing?

Haney 7:01
excavating is great. It’s like a history of the planet told them the land.

Chris 7:06
Where is the city of the ancients?

Haney 7:08
The city of the ancients? Oh, you must mean the Forgotten city. This is what we call good good.

Chris 7:16
I didn’t mean that. I guess fuck me.

Haney 7:19
I take it back.

Chris 7:21
Do you know where aerith is?

Unknown Speaker 7:23
Are you talking about that girl? I warned her but she went into the sleeping forest anyway.

Chris 7:31
Thanks, dude. Fuck

Haney 7:32
this guy. doesn’t tell you where it is. doesn’t tell you anything about it’s like, Okay, cool. Next I decided what to do. And he’s like, oh, excavating the shit. I love it. Nothing else. Cool. Where is there? Oh, you mean that girl in the pink that came through here. Nothing else. Excellent. Love to hear it. Fucking great.

Chris 7:53
We know we’re on the right path. At least Yeah,

Haney 7:55
it seemed like this was the right area to be. So I decided to go over to the other gentlemen who believe previously only sold you items. Now you have the option of buying and selling like an item shop but also excavating ellia boy am I in for an excavation listener. I don’t know if you know this about your old pal Han. But I’m a big fan of history channel and Science Channel. Garbage fringe theory. science shows I science in the strictest of quotes, but uh, Ancient Aliens, Oak Island, anything like that. I’m a huge, huge fan.

Chris 8:33
Here’s your disclaimer from Chris saying the archaeology and excavating are not fringe science very much alive and good science.

Haney 8:42
I don’t understand the difference between fringe. Oh, there is that? disclaimer. I don’t necessarily believe everything on them. But I love those shows. They’re really

Chris 8:55
tall. Yeah.

Haney 8:56
Oh, yeah. So this guy is like, Hey, I’ll lend you my crew. If you want to go around excavating 100 gil to place a person and then you do a little bomb. And then they point and show you where to dig.

Chris 9:09
It’s great. You know, excavating.

Haney 9:11
The Lunar harp is somewhere in the ground here. We can excavate it for if you want us to

Chris 9:16
guess you better start digging.

Haney 9:18
Other than the lunar harp. What else do you want us to dig for?

Chris 9:21
Good treasure? Normal treasure. Good treasure, the lunar heart.

Haney 9:28
All right, then I’ll lend you some of my stuff. Show us where you want us to dig. Oh my God isn’t mini game. No.

Chris 9:35
Switch to set staffing position.

Haney 9:37
We also don’t know what

Chris 9:39
switches order is search for 100 gil, yeah,

Haney 9:42
I help

Chris 9:44
you per switch. I am. Clearly you are not. I’m leaving. stout socks, socks. One of those buttons is the switch. But

Haney 9:55
this is definitely a switch isn’t they’re not doing anything. Move to the dig point and press Which select

Chris 10:01
Stop hitting that button and hit the other ones.

Haney 10:03
Do you mean the ones I’ve already hidden?

Chris 10:05
All right, let’s see how many nights we spend here.

Haney 10:07
Are you ready for this nightmare?

Chris 10:09
Give me the good treasure.

Haney 10:11
Wha excellent. All right, you know this entire episode is us digging right? Check how much Gil I have at some point. I think I did it like six times five times. Before I finally hit the point of no no treasure be found but I think the first time I found a mop. Well yeah, looks like a weapon for Cid. Very excited to try that out. Next up was I bunt something. It was a long range weapon that it looks like definitely Vincent use the next thing I found was some stupid key item called the harp of buts. I don’t even remember. I

Chris 10:49
just left it there.

Haney 10:50
Yeah, I was like, I don’t want this. Now. Just kidding. What is that Chris, the lunar harp, lunar harp, according to all of the randos around the bone village, if you play the lunar harp, it wakes the forest and you don’t get confused. If you go into it. I didn’t actually try going into the forest beforehand. So I don’t know what happens. Maybe Chris can enlighten us.

Chris 11:10
You just run in a loop. You can’t progress through the forest, you have to turn around and go back to the village if you don’t have the heart.

Haney 11:17
Dan in it in in, in, in, in in in in in in in in in Denon. So if I’m the learner harp, and then after that started coming up, nothing. So Chris wrestled the GamePad out of my hand and was like, honey, listen, this is a problem. Like we’re gonna have to talk about this later. You’re gambling really needs to

Chris 11:36
stop 2000 gil on these fucking

Haney 11:39
I had so much Gil, though. You ended with 10,000 Yeah, I had like 26 when I started. It’s been a lot of good. Um, so yeah, spend a whole bunch of Gil on excavation. And then after I found the lunar harp, which was the key item needed to progress forward. Try it a couple more rounds just to see if there was anything interesting. Seemingly not seemed like I got everything. So I’m headed into the, into the sleeping forest. As I headed into sleeping forest, I saw this little red ball rolling around the screen that looks a little bit like a summon materia.

Chris 12:12
And he just ran on by

Haney 12:14
Yeah, I tried chasing it tried running by it. And a whole bunch of nightmares happened eventually Chris was like, you know, you know where it’s gonna be. You can just stand there and wait for it right? And I was like, course I knew that. Just want to make sure you knew that. Duh. I sell a position myself as one does. And waiting for that good, good ball to come at me. picked it up and we got a new summons materia. What would you call that one?

Chris 12:40
Could Yata could jata

Haney 12:41
That’s right. Cue data is pretty fucking cool. So far. I use it a couple times now. I really enjoy it. After we picked that up. There’s not really much else in the sleeping forest. So just ran through and we come out on to a very bizarre looking cityscape. That’s like somewhat organic, somewhat inorganic or ancient made, kind of come off this side of a hill down into a valley almost Yeah, it’s this like kind of parallax scene. As you progress forward. You see, like the parallax view of the valley and like the city and then you’re like on a winding path up to it. The interesting part about this, to me visually was how much of the nature in this area looks like coral. Yeah, it looks like it should be underwater. And it was giving me some a little bit of like a lattice vibes.

Chris 13:33
Yeah, the buildings are very shell shaped as well.

Haney 13:37
Most of them are a spiral to a degree. A lot of those staircases are spiral and they just have like an overall shell like conch shell quality to them. Coral is a lot of the plant life. The music in this area is also really good. It is it’s very like electro synth. Yeah, it’s got like a way different vibe than I would choose, I think, but it was cool. Music.

Chris 13:58
I think for the setting, it actually works pretty well because it’s so like otherworldly compared to everything else. Yeah,

Haney 14:03
synth music does a really good job of being ethereal. And this is a very ethereal place. So we proceed through this path up to the openings of the city. Basically, there’s three branches off of the road towards the city. We took the right branch first just to explore found a house I guess a seashell kind of house had some chests in it kind of took whatever we could. There’s also some glowing orbs that when you try interacting with them, cause just like what the fuck I don’t speak ancient. What is this garbage out of my face? I don’t know how to speak this. And it’s like, oh, wish era was cool.

Chris 14:41
Welcome back with her next pass.

Haney 14:43
I’m gonna throw my coffee cup at you fuck the other the people who are listening to this podcast who have played the game are also gonna throw their coffee cups at you

Chris 14:50
sure it’s fine.

Haney 14:51
I’m sure it’s fine. So we carry on, explore a little bit more of this path exploring our way back Took the left branch. There’s another home down here. This one makes you sleep. Like makes you spend the night. Yeah, you just slept in a 10,000 year old bed. I’m sure that’s fine. And had a great time with it. So we wake up, leave. And clouds like I hear Eric yelling from the air, like I hear Eric’s voice or something up was like, how do you hear that? And he’s like, I feel it in my soul. And finally, at this point, I couldn’t dilly dally any longer and decided to take the actual way into the city of the ancients.

Chris 15:36
We come across this building that’s got kind of a spiral staircase that goes down into below city.

Haney 15:43
Yeah, it’s like a under city almost. I don’t know. It’s like, it’s hard to tell because like, it’s we know, it’s a lost item. You don’t know how ancient it is. So like, you know, like, it could have been all above at one point and just like collapsed, we kind of descend into the undercity. And in the undercity, there’s a safe point.

Chris 16:02
There’s a like,

Haney 16:03
yeah, you know, you spray you keep your water, obviously. And then there’s these like jutting stone columns that lead over to a almost like a naturally formed gizzi bow.

Chris 16:13
That’s all I can think of. That’s perfect, right? perfect description of and

Haney 16:19
I decided to Russian saved but then I rushed it. I’m so glad I saved. I rushed in and decided to see what’s up with her.

Chris 16:29
She’s kneeling. Looks like she’s praying seems to be praying.

Haney 16:35
You lose control of cloud though. You get some red flashes, cloud starts shaking his head doing the like, I don’t want to do this thing. You lose control of the controller at this point. And the only button that works is the action buttons. Cloud takes an action but it’s not like what you want. The first thing he does is he draws the Buster Sword and I was like, No, like put that away stop and then like trying to like get him to move I hit square again. He raises the Buster Sword up above Eric’s head. big no no, no ninja ninja now ninja now. Hey, it’s Eric. Hey. What do you think she’s doing?

Chris 17:10
think we’ll see in a moment.

Haney 17:12
Looks like she’s doing some praying. Wait. Oh. Oh, no clouds losing it again. Chris just gonna leave. What are you doing cloud? Have you sorted out? Hey, I don’t like that. I don’t have control over my body. Please stop arming yourself. No, no. No. Cuz this is not like now this is not what happens. Cloud stop. Like I know what I think I know what’s about to happen. I don’t want it to happen like this. It cannot be cloud like don’t do it. Finally press square again. his lack of action is he’s about to strike aerith from above he brings the Buster Sword down onto what would be cleaving her in half. But as he does your other party members scream like stop and wait and like cloud don’t so cloud is able to like gain control at the last second like hold his Buster Sword from like, it seems like he’s struggling though. It seems like the the sword still wants to go down but something is like helping him like pull it back. So he’s like struggling to not kill Arif actually is praying. And at this point,

Chris 18:31
he says, What are you making me do?

Unknown Speaker 18:33
Yeah,

Chris 18:35
Eric raises her head. She’s cloud right there.

Haney 18:38
Smiles beautiful, big smile.

Chris 18:41
Clouds gazing back at her.

Haney 18:45
our old friend. Sephora descends from the ceiling. I need to talk slow because my voice is breaking and drives massive m&a directly through air.

No.

It is heartbreaking. It is so unthinkable. In a video game. For me. Given the video games that I’ve played to lose a character. So pivotal to the entire plot story. Literally everything So early in the game, I can see why people were absolutely fucking livid when this happened. Because I’m still a little livid and I’ve known for like 30 years that this has happened.

Unknown Speaker 20:16
It was

Haney 20:18
a really good cutscene it was beautifully animated. It was beautifully executed. The abruptness of it was extremely striking to me. Like it’s shocking, like, just how quickly it happens and how little control you have over it. Like it does a really good way in my in my mind, what they were trying to do was emulate basically how cloud feels at that time, which is just helpless, like everything’s happening too fast and he has no ability to stop anything. And that’s how you feel at that time. Like I felt absolutely helpless. I I’m glad this happened in a way because I think this is probably one of the things that gave this game so much steam power. Is that like this this death is not something that any game had really tried to do before something like this. And I feel like it probably gave a lot of story writers for video games some Liberty after this point like well, they did it so like let’s do something like you know, like we it unlocks a lot of paths, right? it lets people take risks in storytelling that they might not have taken before and I can I know there’s way more to the why this game has staying power but that’s got to be a massive, massive part of it is just like the shock and abruptness and just like the we don’t give a shit we’re telling the story that we want to tell kind of thing and we’re not gonna water down or candy cut it just to make some executive happy. Yeah,

Chris 21:46
it’s not catering.

Haney 21:47
No, not at all. Like no one wants me to die. Least of all me.

Chris 21:54
It’s very good.

Haney 21:55
It’s Yeah, it’s amazing. I mean, I’m just gonna throw it out here. I fucking cried. I cried a lot, man. It’s rough. That was a rough scene to watch. I think the only thing I cried at harder was what came after the next chunk. But we’ll get there. So unfortunately, Arif gets run through. And at this point, you know, she’s she starts falling and kind of like falls off and stuff or off sword. Something rolls away from her. It looks like a material or an item or something. I think when it’s just like a magical orb like that. It’s a material. It was white though, or silver, white or silver. And that’s not a material color. But it looks like a material. It falls down those stone columns that you have to jump across to get to Arif and eventually lands in the lake and just sinks down. So at this point, separate and cloud have a bit of a dialogue Sephiroth starts going off on a you know whatever garbage diatribe I actually don’t even know what he said. Because what happens is cloud just said shut up. Error. Can’t be real.

Chris 23:06
Do not worry. Soon the girl will become part of the planets energy. All that is left is to go north. The Promised Land waits for me over the snowy fields. There I will shut up.

Haney 23:21
cycle of nature. Your stupid plan don’t mean a thing. Earth has gone airfoil no longer talk. No longer laugh, cry or get angry. What about us? Are we supposed to do? What is this pain? My fingers are tingling. My mouth is dry. My eyes are burning.

Chris 23:43
What are you saying? you trying to tell me? You have feelings now?

Haney 23:47
Of course. What do you think I am?

Chris 23:51
Stop acting as if you’re sad. And there’s no need to act as if you’re angry either. Because cloud

You are

Haney 24:02
like a way before Wade probably just like listen to his diatribe. And just like then counter at this point. He’s just like, no, shut the fuck up. I will murder you if you stay here another second. Like how how are we going to deal at this point?

Chris 24:15
Yeah. And the dialogue in the scene is so good because the way cloud reacts almost seemingly like for the first time like these are not feelings he’s experienced. He does. He’s not familiar with this emotion.

Haney 24:29
Which is interesting because Sephiroth actually says something akin to like, Oh, don’t tell me you’re like upset or angry. Like he’s like you can’t be and he says you are and then just like leaves and it’s like, I’m What? Yeah, as he’s rocketing away, suffer off style. He dropped something on you. And the battle starts Yes, seemingly, the thing he dropped on you, as we find out is a little bit of Genova. So immediately a fight starts.

Unknown Speaker 24:57
I don’t want to

Haney 24:59
know Feel like it What the fuck just happened is bubbles

Chris 25:08
the end?

Haney 25:11
I’m not okay right now I need you to know that I was not looking for this. No,

no.

Did you catch I did not catch what this gentleman’s name was it looked like it was Genova life but I wasn’t sure Genova life. So that’s an interesting little detail is that we have Genova birth Genova life seems like we’re getting some stages here of the Genova monsters. This monster doesn’t look super dissimilar from the first one like it was like yeah, I get what they’re going for with this vibe. This thing’s fucking strong. Yeah, it crushed me. I don’t even know what it did its first move but it it bubbled and then that fucking destroyed up one go. It took a cloud as well, right because I got Vincent’s Limit Break off, and then I lost control of Vincent. So Vincent has revive all which would have been super excellent. However, unfortunately, listener Chris was like, Oh, you gotta use Vincent slim and break it so sick.

Chris 26:10
I don’t know. That’s exactly the order that things happened.

Haney 26:14
So I use Vince’s Limit Break which is really cool until you know like it pumped up all of his life that was sick. Then I lost control of him. So I couldn’t use any of his magic or restore or revives or Phoenix sounds nothing he did some damage he started wailing on Genova but he died and I got a game over at Genova we are rebirth in the same cavern at the same point so have to go through the whole earth death cutscene again didn’t feel much different the second time still felt awful and I hated it. reached Genova his boss fight again. And this time did a little better was more controlled a little more measured. kind of knew what I was doing threw up some barriers started getting to the defense of magic game a little bit more than I usually do. And just started wailing on it with summons

Chris 27:02
it seemed to focus mainly almost entirely on up

Haney 27:06
which was lucky in a way but also I really wish you if he hadn’t died multiple times I think I think I lost or twice in that fight. If not if she didn’t die the first time she was like 50 Hp before she got to heal off. So he’s using up primarily as a healer and Vinson and cloud primarily as aggro up did unfortunately perish just remember like killed up actually and I’m real bummed about it but I feel like I have to be honest with your listener. This is this there’s this thing that that Genova does called reflect right yeah, this has killed me before in the past at shinder Manor tried to use bio Genova ended up just reflecting it back it up and murdering her unfortunately she was the one at this point that had restored or revive rather and I just didn’t have time to focus on getting a phoenix down out and I think like two hits later Genova died so up unfortunately did not gain any experience for this battle, which is great because she’s currently the lowest level party member and I don’t like having party members that aren’t lined up. So the fight ends and we get a black screen with white text on it and it’s labeled as Genova speaking first time to Nova spoken if I’m not mistaken, and it says you’re a puppet seeming to finish SAP Ross previous feel like thought of you are dot dot dot for cloud. After we get the little message a little interchange between cloud and Genova focus down onto the scene of Vinson up cloud just kind of staring at Eric’s lifeless body slumped up against the side of the little like place they were in. Vincent kind of just like, keeps shaking his head and like looks at Cloud and like looks at Earth and he’s just like, kind of walks off. Just seemingly very bummed out. But like, unable to express that up starts just sobbing uncontrollably hugs cloud and just like is crying and crying. And I do wish I had a different party, not because of how they did in the battle or anything, but because I think it would have been more appropriate to have Tifa and Barrett and my party at this point. Yeah. purely from a just feels perspective. But you know, I think it was regardless is awesome. It was beautiful. Cloud, walks over to Eric’s body and scoops her up and walks her down the stairs and into the lake and places her body in the lake and she starts just kind of sinking like me

Chris 29:57
watching the screen

Haney 30:07
Oh, yeah.

Chris 30:10
Um, the way he lets her goes just I know I’m just

Haney 30:13
like so like fucking drained emotionally right now. But it’s, it’s a beautiful, beautiful scene. At this point, you get a pop up that says, and part one. Would you like to save the game to your PC? The next immediate thing that happens after you save the game is cloud talking to the rest of the party. And his basic like, thoughts are, I shouldn’t do this journey anymore. like something’s wrong with me. There’s some part of me that’s not me. I don’t know what’s gonna happen like I could make mistakes like I could go crazy like I could hurt people like I don’t know what’s gonna happen. But Eric’s gone. And I have to like, keep going. Like we have to go We have to stop suffer off like for Arif, we have to get the black material before he can use it before he can do anything. He’s like, I need to keep going. And I want to know one thing. Are you all with me? I need you to come with me and keep me from doing something bad. And Vincent guess yeah, yes. So, which is pretty Vincent, seemingly on brand. And we party back up? I proceeded to go out of the room. Save the game, and that’s where we ended today. Oh, yeah. Chris, How you feeling? Good. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. At least one of us. Fuck,

Chris 31:40
man. What a way to end the year. You know what?

Haney 31:45
I guess so man. I mean, this is really put a bow on 2020 Well, it was amazing. Just what an incredible first part. I can’t believe we’ve made a third of the way through the game. That’s bonkers to me. I’m so ready to keep going. I’m so excited to get started and just like see what part two brings? Um, also, that was the last spoiler I knew for the AM. Yeah, I don’t have nothing from here. Literally everything past this point is green. Greenfield for me. I’m so excited to just have tree after tree. I don’t even know where to go next. I have no idea where to head

Chris 32:26
Sephiroth was telling you before a cloud told him to shut the fuck up.

Haney 32:29
Oh, good. Good thing I was paying attention to cloud not Sephora. Cool. Well, I’m gonna listen to the episode. Hopefully that parts and the next episode of first encounter, know where to go before playing.

Chris 32:42
The most appropriate walkthrough 100% completion guide, first encounter podcast.

Haney 32:47
Love it. You love to hear it. You know what, I think I’m going to go back to mid guy. Yeah, why not? Fuck it. It’s been a bit. Absolutely. So Chris, do you have any thoughts for today’s the rest of today’s talk through anything you want to go over? Anything you want to touch on? I had a I had a point.

Chris 33:04
Yeah, let’s go over your point. First, I said there’s something related to Advent Children in the Forgotten capital.

Haney 33:10
Do you remember way back in episode zero when I was hell bent on describing Vinson as a vampire? And as like he’s in some sort of crystal cavern? Yeah. Is that what the was that the last city in? I

Chris 33:22
think it was the last city because I believe cloud is there.

Haney 33:25
Yes. And they’re talking. I don’t remember what the whole point is. But I the color palette of those like crystals and stuff like in the underground part of the city. I was like, Wait a second. I think what I thought was the Crystal Palace or like some like weird crystal like underground cavern. I think it’s actually this. Yeah, so that was a that was all I wanted to bring up. But I was starting to connect the lines there. Yeah,

Chris 33:48
it has been a long time since I’ve seen Advent Children so

Haney 33:51
could be completely 15 years for me.

Chris 33:53
Yeah,

Haney 33:54
I do think a God now I’m not even gonna make that conjecture. It’s been too long since I’ve seen that movie. I was like, I think that’s the point where he sees Eric’s ghosts, too. So like maybe like that would make sense that she’s like in that city, but I It’s been too long. I’m not even gonna pretend

Chris 34:10
Yeah, it’s we’ll get there.

Haney 34:11
Yeah. So what did you want to talk about?

Chris 34:14
Well, let’s talk about Sephora. I

Haney 34:15
don’t want to think I’m mad at him. Because Stupid sexy Sephora.

Chris 34:21
Look the the transformation we’ve seen of Sephora place in this game. I guess we’ve gone from Sephora the great suffer if he was a hero. Cloud worshipping Sephora. I

Haney 34:34
really don’t think he’s much of a hero no more to

Chris 34:38
Sephora losing his shit not so much a hero doing some Noddy’s but unstable. Unstable to Sephora dreamy Why is he acting weird he’s flying through me now doesn’t recognize me. What are you up to SF you

Haney 34:50
got rocket feet.

Chris 34:51
We’ve got rocket v two.

Haney 34:55
Now he knows where we are now also.

Chris 34:57
He’s he seems to know cloud.

Haney 35:00
Seems to or I don’t know it just seems like it like from his maybe it’s from his control of cloud he’s like seen into his mind and is now he’s like, Oh, I know you like I know who you are now you’re a puppet. But it’s been the wild Sephora I think unstable Sephora so far has been my favorite. Yeah, iteration just because I love watching someone just lose it. I don’t know, like just purely in a fictional standpoint not in real life obviously, but fictionally I think it’s a very powerful moment to watch someone’s just world unravel. And that was very, very cool to be witness to four Sephiroth and nibble Hime he I think I’m weird Sephora where I’m like questioning like everything was my least favorite so far. Because I’m just like I too many questions answer some goddamn questions. Sit down drink God DMT Sephora. Um, I do think that that this iteration of Sephora we’re getting more and more into his mind and like into seeing like he’s still like flying and rocket Phaeton and doing some weird shit dropping bits of mother on us, if you will, could have a bit of mother please.

He right now.

This is probably my my I’m getting to the point where I’m really enjoying this part of Sephiroth where he’s seems to be very like, I don’t know if all knowing the right word, but he’s very powerful. And he knows a lot more than we do. And he’s not being so strange anymore. Like he has a purpose. He’s like to find his purpose and like bond style toll it to us, so I am really enjoying him at this point as a villain. That being fuck him. He killed Arif. I love Arif. Fuck him. Yeah. That was brutal. Just I’m not over it. I’m never going to be over it. I don’t think Yeah.

Chris 36:52
And what do you think of jovens frother finishing each other’s sentences. They’re just so close now.

Haney 36:58
I mean, this is classic Mother Mother son kind of behavior. Don’t you think? This is fun? You and your mom finish each other’s sentences all the time right? Totally. Yeah, me Me and my me and my mom to right after I pull her arm off and throw it at my mortal enemy. Mommy, just kidding. I would never do that. Love you. Where’s Mother?

Chris 37:17
Mother?

Haney 37:21
It’s gross. It’s weird. I don’t like it. I don’t think I care for it. I do wonder you know a little bit with Sephora. We haven’t really talked about Genova much I feel like yeah, that was gonna be my next

Chris 37:33
touching Oh, love it let’s

Haney 37:34
let’s perfect bridge right? What?

Chris 37:38
Please perfect

Haney 37:40
um it’s ironic to me to a degree that sefer authen Genova called me a puppet when it seems a lot like saffer office the true puppet and this I have a feeling Genova has a lot more pull over Sephora than we’ve kind of gathered up to this point like it seems like Safra is the one in charge like gonna get mother together and stuff but we haven’t talked about Genova really as a sentient being like clearly something right like it was locked in a jar in mountain nibble seemingly. And then at another point in Shinra headquarters like the fuck that’s like probably a creature like it had a face like some sort of like mind to it right. And up to this point, we’ve really talked about Sephora being the one in charge like trying to do all this stuff, but I wonder how much of that is really Sephora Roth’s plan versus how much of that is actually Genova is plan engineered by Sephora because she you know for whatever reason, not sure why right now doesn’t have agencies to like move about by herself. Like she can’t leave or move and like that could be if she doesn’t have strength or she doesn’t have you know, the mental fortitude anymore or something like I don’t I don’t really know what it is or physical fortitude, rather. But it seems to me like Sephora is the actual puppet here not cloud, and that he shouldn’t be using such big mean words that puppet got like three whole consonants in it for fuck um, yeah, that’s that’s kind of where I’m vibing right now is I’m wondering I’m really thinking that Sephora while he is the intended big bad or the, you know, maybe even a red herring for Genova being the actual big bad. I do. I do think he’s more of a puppet than even he knows at this point.

Chris 39:36
Hmm. Curious, curious, curious.

Haney 39:39
Do you know, it’s really bothersome about these mic shields? What’s it? I can’t see your face? I can’t see if you’re smiling or not. I can only see your eyes. Perfect. Perfect. That’s the only place you should be looking. Always those limpid pools.

Chris 39:50
So how do you feel about Jehovah taking an interest enough to talk to us now?

Haney 39:55
That’s concerning, because Genova has left not for All I know whatever he dropped on us that gave rise digenova life, did a full party life and then did a partial party wipe the next round. really concerned that the whole mind and body coming together might not like me feel like I need to be at least 60 levels higher before that happens. pretty concerned about that. I don’t really like sticking my neck out far enough to have an actual maybe God. be upset with me. Love it. You love to see it. Excellent.

Chris 40:31
Well, I think that about does it for me you got any lasting thoughts for this episode?

Haney 40:36
I have so many thoughts about this, but I just don’t, I don’t know how to formulate them at this point. I’m still very upset by Earth death. I knew it was coming. And I’ve talked about it since episode zero. But I’m I’m pretty devastated by it. And I just don’t, I can’t like put a cohesive thought together right now. But I’m gonna be at a very big loss without Eric moving forward. This game is going to be fundamentally different feeling moving forward, like aerith had that bright, playful spirit that like was all like good in the world, you know? And now that that’s gone, you know, like, that’s gone for me for cloud for our property. And it’s just, I’m wondering how we’ll ever be happy again. Or like, or just like, what what can we do to like, move forward? like yeah, sure we can get revenge on Safra we can save the planet but it’s not gonna bring Earth back.

Chris 41:32
Yeah. Eric really balanced. Oh, a lot of the party members like her interactions with all of them. Barrett read 13 Tifa.

Haney 41:40
Yeah, Kate Seth even. Like, it was Yeah, she was like the mom of the group. She was like the best friend she was the shoulder to cry on. She was the compassionate lunch. She was the funny one she was, she was a lot and I’m gonna be very, her loss is going to be felt like for me playing through the rest of the game. I don’t know how I’m gonna get to two thirds of this game. Without I it’s gonna be interesting to see how many times I say like, Oh, I’m gonna play Eric back. Oh, yeah. Well,

Chris 42:11
I think that wraps it up for the story talk. Got a couple of things to touch on. We just finished part one of Final Fantasy seven. We’ve released an episode every two weeks for an entire year, which blows my mind. That’s wild. We’ve been pretty consistent about it. Yeah. This is going to go out then. January. for the whole month, we’re going to stop releasing episodes so we can record a bunch get caught up and ahead of schedule to make it a lot easier for us going forward in 2021. We’ll also have some pretty cool news coming up. Yeah, some stuff going on behind the scenes that don’t want to touch on yet because it’s not quite ready. But stay tuned for what’s happening.

Haney 42:52
When do we get to play the game again, Chris? shortly after New Year’s Eve.

Chris 42:55
Yeah, we’ll see. I want you to stew on this for a little

Haney 42:59
bit. I’m doing I can tell you that right now. My juices are basted Oh, good. Yeah. Excellent. Thanks so much for listening. And we’ll see you next year.

Chris 43:09
Bye

Unknown Speaker 43:10
bye.