Haney 0:00
Hey listener if you like the sound of my voice now you’re gonna love where we go from here. We started in 2019 and continuously improve along the way. Thanks for coming along on the ride and there ain’t no stopping this train we’re on this episode, the first encounter contains spoilers for the video game Final Fantasy seven. If you have not played this game, first off, what are you doing? Don’t be like me, and second, go play instead of listening to us. We’d also like to take a second just to remind you that we are in no way shape or form affiliated with or sponsored by square. Just a couple of guys trying to have fun with a cool video game.

Chris 0:31
Previously on first encounter, how old are you?

Haney 0:34
I am 28

Chris 0:36
and you haven’t touched Final Fantasy

Haney 0:38
my bar for this game is incredibly high after two decades of you hyping it up.

Chris 0:44
How have you encountered seven so far? Three ways

Haney 0:46
I would say the Kingdom Hearts franchise as a whole Final Fantasy Advent Children the film and you I’m very familiar obviously with all of the main characters of Final Fantasy seven.

Chris 0:59
Let’s name them.

Haney 1:00
Let’s go cloud the absolute Hot Topic emo one 100% Rockstar live in quiet. I’ve heard he’s a silent protagonist Sephora who is to my knowledge a genetic Angel and I believe him and cloud are somehow clones of each other even though they look completely not like each other at all. Selfie

Chris 1:21
selfies a through selfie. Oh. Yuna. That’s 10

Haney 1:24
there’s also a vampire named Vincent. Big Red Billy cloak looks like Dracula got like red eyes and a headband. There is red 13 yet it’s a big red dog. I like to call them Clifford. And now let’s press start.

Chris 1:48
Welcome to the first encounter podcast.

Haney 1:51
So much. I hate you. I hate everything about this. I quit.

Chris 1:54
Fuck. Okay, welcome to the first count podcast. Where one man? No, that doesn’t work. Fuck. Yeah, let me try again.

Haney 2:02
Slow. Welcome low and slow, like a pot of chili.

Chris 2:07
God, welcome to first encounter a podcast where one grown ass adult men plays through one of the greatest video games of all time, while another tries desperately to cling to their misspent

Haney 2:16
youth really desperately. It’s really, really sad to watch. It’s really tight. And so hey, what are we doing here?

Chris 2:23
Well, we just finished our first recording of the final fantasy. I thought we’d just kind of go over how we progress through this episode.

Haney 2:31
I have so many thoughts and so many feelings about just this very first hour of the game. It took me an hour I don’t know how long this normally would take. But this was a little over an hour of playtime for me.

Chris 2:43
So why don’t we start at the very beginning.

Haney 2:47
To some stars are moving down. Is this just a load? Oh, the lady. What is she looking at? Let’s green. That’s that’s aerith right? Yep. Oh, the Lily’s Yes. That’s your tattoo. Right? Okay. Whoa. I did not know there was cars in this game already. Just throwing that out there. Yeah. So it’s like New York City. This is like, Okay, go ahead.

Chris 3:12
Oh, I was I was just gonna say like this at the time was mind blowing. I mean,

Haney 3:17
it’s, I’m not gonna lie. It felt really good. That’s gorgeous. Yeah. So they live in like, Is this like a self contained city? This like, arena shape here? Like is everything the city?

Chris 3:28
Nice mid guard, mid guard. Welcome to mid guard.

Haney 3:32
I feel welcome. Train.

Chris 3:34
I think this is one of the best video game opening is an ad that I’ve played.

Haney 3:38
That is one of the best artistic moments I’ve ever seen that flipping between the train and the thing. That is incredible. Yeah. So we have the beautiful, beautiful animation of the train going into mid Gar. Is that correct? And I also learned that the city was called mid guard, and that there’s a city we we come into the tray or into a station riding a train with a group of folk named after Star Wars characters, which as a huge Star Wars fan I thought was very fun. My favorite character from Star Wars Yeah, yeah, that’s

Chris 4:12
exactly what that is. They named him after. Yeah. Like are you big, big switch. And Jessie is the girl

Haney 4:18
but are you kidding me? No, they’re actually Oh my God. That’s amazing. bigs wedge Jesse, who I don’t believe is named after Star Wars. They were just like, yeah, that’s fine. two characters. Jesse, Princess Jesse, my favorite Star Wars character, and Barrett, we get to a train station or into like a train platform. The rest of this group known as avalanche takes off, starts running and I’m kind of left to face the music of fighting some Shinra soldiers or Shinra guards. The battle system is very unique to me. When I play a turn based game like in Chrono Cross or Skies of Arcadia. I’m used to everything stopping until you make your selection for each of your party members and Then the game progress isn’t like a round robin kind of fight this is different if you don’t act fast you Will die oh wow the graphics between the fights Oh Jesus this isn’t real time right?

Chris 5:13
They have a bar yep that fills oh and when their bar fills they’re gonna act okay okay you see how your bar started filling right

Haney 5:20
yeah oh they haven’t guns

Unknown Speaker 5:22
yeah

Haney 5:22
this is very different oh and then oh and then I’m selecting the target okay but yeah the the first combat went well I didn’t die we’re definitely going to have a death count. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, so I did that be the first the first little learning battle and then proceeded to follow a bunch of characters running through reactor one.

Chris 5:49
And then you come to the gate where they’re all kind of huddled up together. Yep, some exposition,

Haney 5:54
which was my first look into Cloud being completely different than what I thought of. Oh, I’ve heard of avalanche. Wow, easiest soldier. Hmm, not really a group like avalanche soldier and they’re the enemy. What’s he doing with us an avalanche so this group is avalanche and they seem to be some sort of terrorists Yep. Oh, and I think I’m obviously gonna

Chris 6:17
be very pained if

Haney 6:19
I rarely do anyway but especially in a game like this like it’s cloud Yeah, he talked that’s already different cloud I

Chris 6:28
don’t care what your names are. Once this job is over I’m out oh my

Haney 6:32
god what a little bastard This is not who I thought he was at all

Chris 6:38
the hell you all doing? I thought

Haney 6:42
he’s he’s I always thought of him kind of as a dick in the like quiet emo II kind of way of being a dick like where he’s just like, I don’t care about anything and he is kind of like that but it’s more of a like I care about what I care about and I don’t care what you think about that yeah,

Chris 6:58
his attitude is more of a It’s not my fault Yeah, you learn right away that cloud is from soldier

Haney 7:06
oh yes that I did I did learn that and that’s I think that’s kind of why we got into it a little bit with Barrett Barrett seems to either not trust or not like us or a little bit of both because of our previous connection to soldier which is somehow connected to Shinra it seems exactly um yeah one thing I’m curious about that and don’t don’t answer this because I don’t think it’s come up yet is if cloud is an active member or a former member so you say former but I don’t know because it seems like I feel like I haven’t really left yet. I could literally be on a lunch break for all like it it’s only been like an evening you know I could have the night off from from folgen strip I’m so at the gate I believe we got Jesse to do some code breaking we kind of follow them along come into an elevator at that point have a little bit of a throwdown with Barrett so they’re like climate activists.

Chris 7:59
Yeah, essentially avalanche pump. The only thing I care about is finishing this job before security and the robo guards go very hates I love all their animations they do they portray so much with such a like limited visual. Okay,

Haney 8:15
is that a bad thing to do?

Chris 8:16
Well here’s on your way back up.

Haney 8:18
Oh, it’s an elevator Yeah. Oh, I’m just gonna It’s okay. Not too much happens from that point just a bunch of random encounters. I just got bit by a cat What is that thing? I hate that guard hound. Okay, well you know how I like my dogs with tentacles Yeah, Jesus What’s next? What do we do from there?

Chris 8:43
Well from there we reach the save point and we did save prior to the first boss encounter was very

Haney 8:47
good of us and then we proceeded to the point at the reactor where we’re going to set up the bomb which is I assume like the center of the reactor or the control panel or fuel cells or something safe assumption Yeah, at that point of an interesting happened that we got this like little red flash and mysterious message where it’s like, that’s not just a reactor. Like how their hands are like, have like a look like for ourselves. Like what is this movie was placed it ain’t gonna be nothing more than a hunkajunk that you said. Oh,

Chris 9:18
okay. What you didn’t know we were blowing up the reactor.

Haney 9:21
Oh, I knew we’re blowing up the reactor. I didn’t know I was blowing up the reactor. Right? Cuz I’m cloud I can think of myself as cloud right? Was that mean? What was that? What is happening? I’m so concerned and confused. I don’t like it. And it’s like an inkling that there’s definitely something more than just a group of ego warriors trying to take down a corporation that’s destroying the planet. It seems like there’s something seedier there. I am curious to know if that was cloud like thinking to himself, or if it was a voice inside clouds had And if it was a voice inside class had had that voice get there my thought just I’m going to go ahead and make some predictions because I think it Will be fun to see how right or wrong I’m going to do this I’m

Chris 10:10
not going to give you any answers oh please don’t

Haney 10:12
i don’t want I don’t want any my thought would be that it’s separate off in his head somehow I’ve said before on this podcast that I believe that cloud and saffer off are somehow linked possibly clones of each other we’re not going to get into the science there self love that was my nickname in high school. Um, aside from a little bit of self love I do think genuinely that it was suffer off voice in our head I don’t know if it is a like metaphysical psychic connection or a spiritual bond or being able to speak through the essence of the planet but there’s definitely something there that’s connecting me and whatever this voice to was that that was probably the point where my intrigue in the actual story kicked up a little bit the first half of the game that’s definitely like a you know, it’s typical RPG get to know the controls Get to know your character a little bit get comfortable with movement and combat. There’s like little snippets of exposition like here’s where you are, here’s what what you’re doing and here’s why you think you’re doing it. But at this point, there was some some intrigue kicked up there because now there’s a hook for me to follow it now. I’m like, constantly thinking about the hook of what’s going on here. Like what is this? There’s enough intrigue that I don’t really notice that I’m playing a game that’s what 23 years old something like that 21 years old

Chris 11:38
girl asked me to do math on the pod that’s fair. That’s

Haney 11:41
that’s that’s our first that’s our first merge no math on this podcast. Um, so we got to our first boss light Yeah, it was a scorpion. What was it called the guards scorpion.

Chris 11:54
Here comes

Haney 11:55
open your mouth Here it comes. Oh, we fighting? Oh, what is that? What is that guard scorpion. going to hurt it with magic. Oh, I did ice damage. That bottle was a little more difficult than I was expecting it to be I kind of had an inkling that it was an electric based machine. So having bolts seems like a good idea to use because it’s an electrical bolts. That’s that’s a fairly typical thing, right? Like in terms of weakness and resistance, like using electricity against machines. So we use both a lot. However, I was struggling to keep up with the pace of the fight. And we got really close to dying. Like really close. I think at one point cloud was at something like 30 hp and Barrett was at like 40 ish. Before I can get the potions going club got down to hp at 1.0 Really? Oh wow. It was it was bad.

Chris 12:50
Yeah. And a big part of that is when its tail with

Haney 12:54
its gonna counter attack with his laser. You know how scorpions have lasers if

Chris 12:58
you attack right? It’s

Haney 13:01
like that.

Chris 13:01
Yeah, exactly. probably keep an eye on your HP. Yeah, you’re okay. You just keep going right at it. Yeah. This might be a party like,

Haney 13:09
I want it so if cloud does but bear lives things a jerk. How do I how do I heal myself? We beat that though. The countdown? That was stressful. Come on. Let’s get out here. Oh, is this like an actual countdown? Could be? Oh sure. is should I save it just in case?

Chris 13:32
Sure. If you feel like you need to scrub get good.

Haney 13:37
So is that a slot gun? Is that something that I can equip to bear? Good I get it.

Chris 13:44
The countdown doesn’t stop in the menu. Oh good are in battles. Oh good. I don’t think you saved it. Of course.

Haney 13:53
That was way more stressful than I thought it was going to be because I was like 10 minutes. That’s fine. took me five minutes to get down here. Yeah, it’s easy. Well, it’s only 25 minutes because I’m super slow. I do not do well on time to challenges at all video game or real life.

Chris 14:10
breaks out in hives, start sweating profusely.

Haney 14:13
I get really uncomfortable when I’m up against a deadline. It’s just how I am I have severe anxiety so I see a countdown and I start freaking which Chris can attest to I started freaking. I’m sure he has some fun audio to cut in. Now

Chris 14:28
that I’m not putting anything.

Do I decide you’re on your own? That’s fair. But you do have 40 minutes.

Haney 14:45
You got a stop this so much I’m so stressed out and I’m almost dead but I keep forgetting to heal. The game is so much harder than I’m used to. I have a really bad tendency in games like this to just run around and not remember how to get in or out of anywhere. But one of the problems with this game is the more you run around, the more random encounters you’re going to have. And it was bad because I didn’t realize a couple of things. So I access the menus to heal myself. To which I didn’t realize until Chris pointed out that the countdown was still going while I was on the menu that ate up a bunch of time. Also didn’t realize that the countdown wasn’t going to stop while I was in battle. I am so scared right now what is that? One? Oh, whoa, bear attack. God, we have time. Let’s go.

Chris 15:42
I’m gonna wait your turn.

Haney 15:44
Oh my god, I’m so stressed out. My heart is legit racing because boldo here can’t say that. It’s not because I’m sitting

Chris 15:51
next to you.

Haney 15:52
Can you feel your heartbeat racing? Can you just be in a sweat?

Chris 15:57
Just coffee. So you get out of the reactor, and the group convenes and they’re like, Barrett says everyone be back at the hideout.

Haney 16:07
Right? Can I do it? Should I not die? Only God.

Chris 16:10
And that’s Final Fantasy seven. You beat it.

Haney 16:13
I did it. Again. This is what you’ve been hyping up for. 20 years.

Chris 16:17
What do you think? Be honest with me though?

Haney 16:20
It felt like there was some parts missing and was just been on fire to us.

Chris 16:26
We’ve all been there. I mean,

Haney 16:27
figuratively. Daily. Literally, literally. twice daily.

Chris 16:36
When you were leaving the reactor after blowing it up, you bumped into. Oh my god. flower girl is Yeah,

Haney 16:42
flower girl. I’ve completely forgot about flower girl. We did bump into flower girl. I she asked me what was going on. And I just said get out of here and ran away. And she ran the other direction. Yep. Oh, it’s a girl. Power Girl. Excuse me. That’s not what she sounds like.

Chris 17:04
You get into some scuffles with some

Haney 17:06
guards. And I just stood still and let the guards run out to me. So I had guard fight after guard fight. There’s a lot of soldiers attacking me. Oh boy. That’s

Chris 17:17
what happens when you don’t make a decision. This is just teaching you to take control of your life panic. This isn’t about the game at all.

Haney 17:26
I’m getting attacked from both sides. This is college.

Chris 17:31
That’s untrue.

Haney 17:33
No, that was very cool. I actually got to like shaken a little bit because I was trying to figure out where to go. And there’s guards coming down every street. I didn’t realize that had actually switched over to a cutscene of sorts. And suddenly, I was jumping on a train passing underneath which moved into a really cool train animation. I’m, I’m a weirdo. I really like trains. So when I see like Coltrane animations, it’s actually very exciting for me.

Chris 18:00
I didn’t know you were trained fan.

Haney 18:01
I really like trains. Okay, I really like trains.

Chris 18:05
Okay, okay, creepy.

Haney 18:08
I worked in a toy and hobby shop for college. And part of that was mini modeling, particularly for trains. But I’m a fan of like Warhammer and other. I’m a big fan of really little things. Yeah.

Chris 18:22
And then you were like, go because they caught you touching the trains too much. Yes.

Haney 18:25
So after we jumped on the train, there’s a little bit of expositional scene where everyone’s like, Oh my god, do you think clown died and everyone’s like, no, cloud eight dead, and some people are like, maybe cloud is dead. And then cloud does the best thing anyone can ever do, which is enter on a high note and just be like, y’all thought I was dead didn’t push his hair back. Like I’m a little late. Oh, come on a cool intro after jumping in through. Look at this cool guy. What a cool guy. I feel like after everything he says he should push his hair back.

Chris 19:00
I do think my favorite line from that section is when clouds like you were worried about me. And birds like what?

Haney 19:08
start shaking? Yeah. They look like hums right? It’s not just me. No. Okay. Especially with parents got arm because it looks Yeah, like a shoe. Like a horseshoe. Yeah.

Chris 19:17
And honestly, he’s just wearing a shoe on one hand.

Haney 19:21
Just an Adidas sneakers.

Chris 19:22
Oh, you can’t he hates the gun that way just at the end of the gun.

Haney 19:27
No,

Chris 19:28
Nobody. Nobody notices.

Haney 19:29
I hate that so much. So on the train, we get into a little bit of kind of exposition about mid guard about the reactors, how many reactors there are

Chris 19:40
you learn that mid guard is kind of separated into two different levels. You have a top plate where Yes, wealthier people live in a bottom plate which is like the slums in the less wealthy and influential

Haney 19:52
people.

Chris 19:54
He’s talking about the plight

Haney 19:56
Oh because like a circular Yeah, huh? This is This world is a lot different than what it was in my head Why doesn’t move on to the plate? Probably cuz ain’t got no money

Chris 20:08
at this point when you learn more about Midgar you made the comment that this is not the world expected

Haney 20:13
no yeah so mid Gar I assumed when we started talking like playing the game that if Midgar was a thing it was not a city it was the entire realm and I didn’t realize that we would ever be traveling outside of the city any

Chris 20:25
cities you didn’t expect there to be cars

Haney 20:27
I didn’t expect cars or TVs or computers. The bomb when they said bomb like in the reactor at first I was kind of thinking was like maybe steampunky like 1920s like so Okay, so like there’s like reactors and like some some energy source but it’s not as advanced as I would think like I was definitely expecting more of a fantasy based realm and I’m always shocked when like there’s motorcycles and some of the newer Final Fantasy games that I’ve seen you know, I think in the newest one day like or driving cross country it looks like like on a boys road trip.

Chris 20:57
I’m very excited to get to that one because all it is is a road trip and I just want to experience it with you

Haney 21:01
just want to have a boy’s rhetoric together without actually leaving and just boy time. Boys time boys time. I hate that so much. But yeah, so we kind of get some exposition on the train get off the train in the slots and this is our first experience on the slalom and it sucks like you get off and it doesn’t look that dirty like the pixels are bad intentionally like everything looks good growth merit

Chris 21:28
cloud get off your slow moving ass

Haney 21:32
I’m not ready to go I want to talk as the sales rank in the news says they’re like TVs and stuff in this world. Yeah, this is so different than what I thought I just love them homemade cocktails with one of these people have been doing so at that point we kind of walked around the slums talked a little bit to some of the people get a sense of depression of being beat down of being less than and feeling weirdly at home there to like you’re definitely you don’t feel like you’re different or your other or you’re better and definitely like with all the signs posted around like the graffiti that’s like all pro avalanche pro eco eco terrorism.

Chris 22:15
I think a lot of that was put up by avalanche though so don’t get too behind that. That’s fair. So you come into sector seven, and everyone’s reconvening at the seventh heaven bar. So we go into the bar. After Barrett kicks everyone out of the bar very aggressively.

Haney 22:30
Yeah, it’s fun. So we go into the bar and this girl Marlene is screaming for her Papa very excited for him to return. Definitely assumed it was me. What is poppin? Is that my child? So I have a child. You know, clouds dead. Marlene, you guys say anything to cloud? Con. Talk to me. You’re my daughter. Let’s go. I did not know cloud had a daughter. Yeah. Wasn’t me. We did me a childhood friend of ours though, who seems to be watching Marlene Tifa. We named her and she is named watching loosely considering Wait, this person has known me since I was a child. Who is that? Hey, that’s a name I know. What is that name? Tifa was Tifa one of the people I actually remembered from Yeah, that got on me with prompting. Some I’m not this kid’s dad. We go into the bar. Have some conversations that I don’t think were overly important Let’s be tasty kickin let’s just fucking shoveling food in Jesus Christ.

Chris 23:39
I’m really fully

Haney 23:41
I’m fed because of tiva isn’t that hilarious?

Chris 23:44
I don’t know whether I’m happier said

Haney 23:47
Jesse is so done with this team. I don’t blame her.

Chris 23:51
Mostly learn that your childhood friends with TiVo?

Haney 23:54
Yeah. And and that Marlene is actually Barrett’s daughter, which I’m very curious about. I want to hear more about their relationship and who Barrett’s wife was and how this Daughter of his came to be and well, what

Chris 24:08
a man and a woman love.

Haney 24:09
Oh, shut up. That I understand. Okay. No, seriously though, when this goes off, can you tell me a little bit more about it?

Chris 24:16
I got you covered.

Haney 24:19
So we all go downstairs. We got to a old school pinball machine I believe is what it was and proceed downstairs to a secret

Chris 24:27
room to which is absolutely how we should access your basement.

Haney 24:30
Oh 100% I am so there. One thing I did notice that was fun was one of the neon signs in the upstairs of the bar says Texas in it, which makes me believe that this is actually a dystopian future. I’m fairly certain that mid guard is actually just the Denver Airport. Taxi draft here from Texas and mid guy. Cannon. As far as I’m concerned mid guard is Dallas.

Chris 24:56
You can’t prove us wrong. There’s no way to prove us wrong. Obviously and downstairs there throw some accusations at you he does the setup for this, by the way was when Barry asked if there were any soldier members opposing them when you go into the correct Yeah. And Claude very cockily says there’s no way I would know because we wouldn’t have made it out if there were

Haney 25:16
Yeah, like I’m the best and variants start speeding up it was big. Yeah he like throws bigs across the room. He’s like, you ain’t so tough.

Chris 25:27
You’re skinny ass is working.

Good God. One of the best animations just big slamming against the

Haney 25:41
fourth wall. Yeah, that was very fun. So bear and Saul pithy

Chris 25:45
accuses cloud of like wanting to stay with Shinra cloud basically says, Listen, I don’t give a shit about Shinra. But I also don’t give a shit about avalanche. I don’t care about the planet. I just I’m here for the money. Yeah. And she goes upstairs to leave and Tifa runs after you.

Haney 26:01
And then she says Do you remember the promise? Yeah, I assumed at this point that that promise was going to be something about marriage. Yeah, I’m like, do you remember our childhood promises a pretty common trope in a lot of media. I was like us like we’re gonna get married when we’re growing up or something like that. Or we’re always be friends or We’ll always be together. tifus is a little more specific and a little darker, which is, if I’m ever in a bind, and you’re famous, you’re gonna need to help me out of that bind. And that’s really concerning.

Chris 26:29
To set this up. They have a, you kind of get a flashback

Haney 26:33
really, really pretty. Full on cutscene of kind of pans up and some really pretty stars pans back down and you’re outside of mid guard. You’re like near Oh, well. Like a moonlit night outside. This is you actually see the sky here which is different from being in Midgar where the sky is blocked by the plate by the rotten pizza. And we have a conversation. The thing that stuck out the most to me about this conversation aside from teeth is very weird, very specific request was the mention of Sephora.

Chris 27:06
This is their memory.

Haney 27:07
Yeah. I’m not just going to find a job. So he’s leaving town. So this town that we’re seeing right now is not Midgar that’s just outside of Midgard. Look at that

Chris 27:19
hair,

Haney 27:19
that ponytail.

Chris 27:21
I want to join soldier remember when I had one of those tiny ones?

Haney 27:25
Oh, yeah,

Chris 27:26
it’s so hard being close.

Haney 27:26
Oh, I’m going to be the best there is just like Sephora. So Sephora is like a an entity, like a known thing. Oh yeah.

Chris 27:34
He’s a hero.

Haney 27:35
The heroes famous the great Sephora. Oh man, I’m so hyped now. I love Sephora off just from the little bits I’ve seen of him from Kingdom Hearts. And Adventureland.

Chris 27:46
He’s really

Haney 27:47
not only a display has everything I’ve considered about the game been completely blown out the window. Now Sephora is a good guy as well. And a hero at that not only a good guy, but actually a hero. And he like you kind of get a sense that like cloud absolutely here at warships who ever suffer off is also the fact that Sephiroth is a grown man and a hero. And cloud as a child means to me that my prediction or my assumption that they are somehow clones or related or part of the same Super Soldier program is completely wrong. We’ll see. I still am holding out that there’s some sort of connection between sepher offing pod, which is who I think was talking to cloud in the reactor. When cloud was like, This is more than a reactor right before the guard Scorpion attacks. Yeah.

Chris 28:37
So he have this flashback where cloud promises to come to Tifa whenever she’s in trouble and cutting into this flashback Barrett climbs back up out of the basement just scales the wall.

Haney 28:47
Yep, that was funny. Cuz the elevator is still downstairs. He could have just used the elevator could have done, but nope, he just climbs up. He throws me my money. And he’s like, I didn’t forget. Okay, okay, you know, why did he? Wait a sec big time. So thanks for my dollars. How many guilds did I get? Oh, dash. Have a lot of gills. First of all, Clint

Chris 29:12
says,

Haney 29:13
this is all I’m good. That’s right. Yeah, he’s like, 1200 That’s it. He’s like, next job is three grand bear gets pissed. teef was like, come on, like we need them. Like, avalanche doesn’t have any volunteers. And Barrett says, fun. But that’s my Orleans tuition money. Oh, what the hell? I feel so bad. I don’t like can I be cloud and to say no, I’ll do it. Because that’s not who

Chris 29:37
cloud is.

Haney 29:38
That’s awful. A cloud sauce.

Chris 29:40
You got to watch out for number one.

Haney 29:42
I’m taking Barrett’s daughter’s school fund, but

Chris 29:46
you’re helping Tifa because you’re a good childhood friend. As long as you’re getting paid for

Haney 29:51
I’m stealing a child’s school tuition. The fact that cloud is willing to just Rob blind, not really Rob, but you know what I’m saying? Just take a little girl’s tuition money that her father is working to the bone to save up I can only assume

Chris 30:07
we don’t know what anyone’s job is at this point now seems to be the only one who’s employed running her own bar,

Haney 30:14
which seems to be getting an unfortunate amount of business. So yeah, they he makes this demand Barrett agrees to pay him 2000 instead of 3000 but I

Chris 30:26
just took the money you son of a bit

Haney 30:28
I asked Chris at this point, I was like, Is there a way I can say no, like I want to do it for free because I don’t want to take this little girl’s school money and Chris like now you just have to take it so

Chris 30:37
you can by the way changes the game completely. Oh, what? No. Oh,

Haney 30:42
I thought I missed something. I was like, the game just ends there. And you you send you send Marlene to school on a football scholarship. And that’s it. The earth still gets destroyed, though. Yeah, well, after we get our payout, we we go to bed at that point, and woke up in the morning and proceeded to save one thing about waking up in the morning as we’re ready to roll out. I was super concerned because Marlene seems to be running the bar. At first I thought she was playing which still didn’t want her to be playing in a bar because she’s obviously a little child. Seven years old, I believe at this point. Good God. And then I realized that Marlene seems to be in charge of the bar, as we’re leaving because teeth is now in my party. And it’s just like Marlene, take care of the bar for me while I’m gone for alcohol, and she’s mixing drinks What?

Chris 31:30
I don’t understand why you’re so confused.

Haney 31:32
This place is terrible. I don’t want the terrorist away. What are you

Chris 31:35
talking about?

Haney 31:38
A child of what I would assume is like seven to 10 years old is behind the counter of a bar mixing drinks in a terrorist organization. What do you mean what am I talking about? Um, and at that point, we we saved and decided to wrap it up for our first story beat Chris, how are you feeling about where I’ve come so far? Oh, I’m

Chris 31:57
feeling real good. I’m so pumped. Then. Every time somebody starts this game, it just makes me want to immediately jump back in and play.

Haney 32:05
I’m literally playing it right now.

Chris 32:08
I’m watching you. Decisions you’re making or just stop. You’re doing good. I’m very excited. I think it’s gonna be awesome. Why don’t you talk to me about your prior conception and assumption of cloud compared to how you now see him?

Haney 32:24
My assumptions are gone. Entirely just removed. He is definitely not silent protagonist. He is absolutely mouthy. He’s a dickhead about it. He’s definitely looking out for himself. He’s not like the quiet emo type at all. And all I’m I’m an hour into this game. All I can say is what the fuck happened in the writers room of admin children that that came out. That is not a cloud. What the hell is that? I don’t know, man. I just I don’t get it. Like he he has depth he has interest. He’s not this flat monotone. Like pretty boy. Like I don’t know what the hell was in the Zeitgeist when they made that movie, but it is completely wrong. Yeah, from what I can tell, and I’m actually upset about it. Because in those other children, one of the things I didn’t like was like, Okay, he’s just a quiet emo guy. Why? Why do we care? Why are we following him around? Whereas in this He’s like, a badass who’s like, got a chip on his shoulder. He’s full of himself. He has personality. He much has so much personality, and now we’re in and I already know that he’s a douchebag. But I like him. Yeah, like he’s he’s he’s a likable asshole. Yeah, he’s got a lot of intrigue. I just I don’t understand. I can’t wait to finish this game. Just to watch Adventureland. Again. I think we should absolutely do a couple episodes on average. Because I am so riled up already. That he is not who he should be like, what why would you take a character that is like in one of the most beloved games? Sure, I’ve never played this game prior to now. I understand that as one of the most beloved games and cloud is one of the most beloved characters I go to conventions. I’ve seen how many cosplayers they are like he is a very popular character. This is a very popular game. What the hell I get why people hate it even children now, I mean, I didn’t like it because I was confused the entire time, but I don’t get where they went wrong with it. Like what were they thinking?

Chris 34:15
Let me just bask in this for a

Haney 34:19
while you’ve been waiting to hear since 2005

Chris 34:21
This is the reason for this podcast. This is all I wanted. Because I’ve been saying it for years and you just have not understood

Haney 34:33
No I didn’t get it I was like hey he’s kind of cool. Cool show I guess he’s got a big sword beneath big sword black leather. Also what the hell is that outfit that outfit is not what he’s wearing

Chris 34:44
at all. It’s like each iteration of cloud from seven onward has they’ve dropped more and more of his personality

Haney 34:50
Kingdom Hearts and trip NYC have sex. Made sweet, sweet love, waited nine months, and then that baby was whatever the hell came out in Advent Children Kingdom Hearts in one ship in New York City and my see it was trip pants generals from Hot Topic the ones that have all the belts and collars on oh my god we used to wear them in high school they both did it you

Chris 35:13
know I never knew I only wore the trench coat

Haney 35:17
Do you remember like I have pictures of us posing in a graveyard

Chris 35:21
where that part where

Haney 35:24
thank you so much for listening to the first encounter podcast if you enjoy the show, it would help us out a lot if you just shared it with one other Final Fantasy seven lover you know, if you want to subscribe follow us on social media again. Check us out on spill potion calm. Hey guys, if you’re playing along with me at home for the next episode, you want to play up to the second mayco bombing run just about to the point where you beat the second boss and you’re kind of stuck on a cliff. You’ll know when you get there.