**SPOILERS** Final Fantasy X, X-2 & Final Fantasy 7 Connection Theories ONLY

[Star Champion]

THEORIES ONLY... This topic is not about wether or not they are connected. This topic is only for theories, stories and concepts.

I want to make it into an assumptions and theories thread on how we can make the FFX world eventually become the FFVII world.

Again, this is for those of us who either believe or want them to be connected, to be able to elaborate together on it. It is also for those who just want to have fun and forget wether or not it is true and just join in on the theorizing.

Thanks, and have fun guys!



*** *** SPOILERS AHEAD *** ***

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Here's some info to help us all get started:

For example... Does Shinra go to another planet? Or does Spira evolve into the world of VII? What are your takes from beginning to end? What kind of characters are there, what events happen? Have fun with this! And do not bash each other. This is merely a story type thread.

To help with this, let's take some of the comments in the game that could link the worlds, and then go from there.

IN THE GAME:

[This was posted in an earlier thread, but sums up the in-game discussion rather well]

Before going to the Farplane to duel Shuyin you have the option of talking to Shinra who mentions the vast amounts of energy on the Farplane. He calls it the lifestream of the planet and becomes dreamy as he wonders if he can harvest it for the good of mankind and Spira.

Yuna then discusses that a city could be made to run off of this harvested energy. Then she becomes depressed as she realizes she will never live to see this dream become a reality.

***
In Final Fantasy VII a city named Midgar is in existence feeding off of Mako Energy or the planet's lifestream. Speculation is then possible deducing that the company harvesting Mako was named after Shinra who created the idea for that dream and more than likely, the technology. ***

So there is some in-game concrete discussions to go off of. I personally like the theory of keeping the planet the same. There is a lot of room to create a completely far out explanation since we are only limited in keeping the name Shinra, creating mako energy, and creating Midgar. Have fun!

[Star Champion]

Here's our first theory. This is an excerpt from an interview conducted with the scenerio writer for FF7 and FFX, X-2:

Nojima: After Shinra quit the Gullwings he got enormous financial backing from Rin and went to the Farplane to start extracting the Mako energy used by the Vegnagun. But the system for utilizing this energy could not be completed in his generation, so far in the future when space travel was possible, the Shinra Company was founded on another planet... or something like that. That would be a thousand years or so from this game's story.

[Star Champion]

***SPOILERS AHEAD***
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Here is a start of my theory. There are just little tidbits, not a full-out theory, though.

I can see how Aeris could be the descendent of Tidus and Yuna. Since she is related to the ancients it definitely ties back to the mythical nature of Tidus and Yuna. Yuna being a Summoner gifted with magic and Tidus being a dream of the Faith, coming from the legendary Dream Zanarkand. Good stuff for an Ancient-type race.

Other possible character connections that could be great nostalgia: What about Tifa being the ancestor of Wakka and Lulu? Hey, how else could you explain... the chest? =)

Another fun possibility is having Cid of FF7 be an ancestor of Rikku and Gippal, or any other member of the FFX Cid family tree. Having Al Bhed blood would be a great way to explain Cid's gift for technology, and also the FFX Cid connection can explain Cid's know-how when it comes to building a space ship.

Now to theorize about the world, here are some tidbits...

The FF7 airship has some similarities to the design of the 1st airship in FFX. The downsized nature of it can also be explained by stating it is a product of actual built technology by the Shinra corp. and not just an excavated ship from Spira's past.

Explaining the technology... Since the Spira of FFX/2 is just now starting to embrace Machines (They even begin calling it machine instead of machina) they are only now learning more about it. The Al Bhed have been digging up old tech for years and it is a matter of time before they build their own technology from scratch.

Since the power source of the old Spira isn't known, Shinra comes into play. Just like any other powerful man in history, Shinra has the right friends and right resources to become very influential. His harnessing of the energy in the Farplane thus creates the theory of Mako energy, and through the generations his ancestors come up with many new inventions and figure out better ways of using this energy.

Materia is also an invention of the first Shinra. He expands on the dressphere idea and adds Mako to create Materia. Tidus and Yuna are even first to try it out!

After awhile when Mako becomes prominent, Midgar is constructed on top of the ruins of Zanarkand. Also, the new Spiran technology is everywhere.

After some time Spira discovers that the planet is deteriorating because of the Mako energy. They find out that it is the planet's lifestream. The Shinra corp., however, generations removed from its founder, refuses to give up mako. A war ensues between Spira and Shinra. This directly parallels the war between Zanarkand and Bevelle of Spira's past, as Bevelle fights Shinra and Midgar, which was built ontop of the ruins of Zanarkand. Ironically, the older was was between Bevelle, which was technologically advanced, and Zanarkand, which was more advanced in the arts of Summoning. Now however, the new Zanarkand called Midgar is advanced and Bevelle is less advanced. However, Spira eventually wins and the leaders of Shinra go into hiding. The Spirans begin to stop the use of Mako and once again stop using technology and Midgar is abandoned. Bevelle once again becomes the center of life in Spira.

Now the more wide open area is how Spira becomes the FF7 planet. There has to be some kind of disaster. This disaster happened 2000 years before FF7. This was when Meteor crashed to the planet. This happened because Shinra was once again on the uprise, having been hiding for many years, and began to start another war for power. To combat this, the Spirans summon meteor as their last hope. On it, however, was a new Sin, named Jenova, which began spreading its virus. The Spirans (Or Cetra in FF7) began turning into fiends, and thus, the race was losing alot of its history and knowledge of Spira. After Shinra and the Cetra teamup and begin containing Jenova the world is completely different as a result from the metoer. This explains the geography of the planet in FF7. Also of note, Bevelle was completely destroyed by the meteor.

Thus, Midgar is once again re-constructed, the Cetra begin dying off, and Mako energy is once again coming back. Jenova is forgotton, and the world of FF7 is now in full cycle.

Oh, another aspect of FF7 that can be explained is that of the Promised Land. Notice any similarities to the Far Plane of FFX? Definitely something to touch on.

[Star Champion]

** SPOILERS AHEAD***

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This is not my theory, it is written by someone else and is my personal favorite. It uses the 1,000 year gap created by Nojima, and is based on his comments:

0 - After the events of Final Fantasy X-2, Shinra realizes that the fossil fuels modern machina run on are becoming scarce and harder to cultivate. (The reason behind this is because now that summoning no longer exists, there is nobody to send the dead to the Farplane. Due to this, the Farplane—you could call it 'Gaia'—has become weakened. The 'Lifestream' is beginning to lose support of the Planet itself, and therefore it cannot produce fossil fuels as good as it once did.) Shinra studies Vegnagun and realizes that instead of using fossil fuel, Shuin used the Farplane itself to power Vegnagun. How was this possible? Shinra—brave as ever, driven by his thirst for knowledge—enters the Farplane in order to find out. Shinra learns that mako—Lifestream—is manually taken in by the Vegnagun and converted into fuel; into mako energy. Shinra tells Rin that if Rin lends him a bit of cash, he just might be able to get all the machina working again with this newfound mako energy. Rin agrees, and puts a huge financial backing into Shinra's project. Shinra studies Vegnagun more and learns how it works, then creates a mako reactor in its vision. The mako is converted into mako energy, and thus is able to power the machina. The project thus becomes Shinra Electric Power Company.

50 - Shinra marries and has a kid; Shinra II.

70 - Shinra I dies in a freak accident when he falls into the depths of a mako reactor. Due to his unexpected death, much of how mako energy and its related issues works is lost. Shinra II takes Shinra's place.

100 - Shinra II marries and has a child; Shinra III.

130 - Shinra II dies due to natural causes. ShinRa III takes over the Shinra Electric Power Company.

131 - Shinra III marries, but not to an Al Bhed—instead, to a human woman. Shinra IV is born.

170 - The Planet is dying. Spira is falling apart; the wind has stopped, the crops have ceased to grow. The rain never stops, the sea rages, and the Apocalypse seems nigh. The souls of the Farplane are not being recycled due to the lack of summoners, and the mako reactors are sucking out its remaining life. Shinra III—who is quite old at the time—demands that his son create a device that will allow him to leave the Planet. Shinra IV reluctantly creates Shinra's Ark, a space shuttle powered by a limited amount of mako energy. He takes his loved ones with him—particularly his wife, who is also not an Al Bhed. Shinra III stays behind on Spira in order to watch over those remaining. (After all, now that Spira is modern, everyone needs electricity; Shinra Electric Power Company is on top of the world.) Shinra's Ark blasts off into space, in the direction of a distant planet that appears to be covered in water—a planet that seems to be free from the havoc that is taking place on Spira.

176 - Sanubia Desert is split into two as a piece of the Planet actually separates from its core. The debris enters the atmosphere and like thousands of meteors destroys most of Spira's civilization. Those who survive are then victims to seas of magma and constant earthquakes. In the end, Spira quite simply falls apart, and everyone dies.

179 - Shinra's Ark makes an unexpected crash landing on Gaia, the Planet in which Final Fantasy VII takes place on. In the crash, Shinra IV's wife is killed. Her child, who was born six years earlier, is not. Shinra IV and V step out onto the new, desolate world that is Gaia. They are immediately discovered by The Cetra, ~Followers of Gaia~, who warmly welcome the visitors. The Cetra assume that Shinra IV and V are superior beings that should be treated with great care.

195 - Shinra IV has learned the language of the Cetra, and he and his son live peacefully with the Cetra. Shinra V has a child with a Cetra woman, and this time (for once) it's a female. She is named Terra. Thus, the Cetra and survivors of Spira integrated and the population increased.. The landing place of Shinra's Ark (which creates the crater Lucrecia's Cave resides in) becomes a tourist attraction for the curious Cetra, and for other generations to visit in order to rediscover their origins.

400 - Jenova is created. Jenova is the cultivation of all the horror and havoc that occurred on Spira during its Apocalypse—it is the enormous group of pyreflies that was created when everyone died, and since the Farplane no longer existed, they had nowhere to go. The pyreflies latched onto a piece of Spira and formed themself into a shapeless figure that was Jenova. The piece of Spira is then hurled towards Gaia..

500 - Jenova crash lands on Gaia, creating The Crater. The group of pyreflies forms itself into a spectral figure of a woman. The Cetra—curious as always—approach it. The pyreflies posess the Cetra curious enough to step close, and drive them mad, turning them into fiends. Jenova reveals its true form; a beast. A fiend. The epitome of all death and destruction that has been raging in its sorrow for three hundred years.

520 - The remaining Cetra establish The City of the Ancients, a city protected by a maze-like forest only the Cetra can find. They record when Jenova landed and what occurred—and whatever need to be stored just in case they were wiped out by Jenova, including their spells and their secrets—into materia. One of the descendants of Shinra, who will hereby be called Humans, note that the materia is not materia at all; it is a sphere. The Cetra correct the Humans; it is materia, not a sphere. (In reality, spheres and materia are exactly the same things.) The Cetra and Humans put their knowledge together in order to create a weapon to battle Jenova; it would be called.. WEAPON. Created with the machina (called machines now on Gaia) knowledge of the Humans and the magical knowledge of the Cetra, they are godlike creatures of great heights, able to be tamed and controlled.

524 - The Cetra finally decide to launch an attack on Jenova, and are able to seal it without the help of the WEAPONs. The Cetra also seal the WEAPONs, so that should Jenova ever awaken, they will be able to come to life again.

525 - The Humans suddenly have a great change of heart. They notice that Jenova looks like Sinspawn, which is a tale passed down from generation to generation ever since the destruction of Spira. Could they ahve been behind Jenova? The death of all those Cetra? They separate from the Cetra and outlaw any contact between Human and Cetra, for the good of both races.

526 - The Humans create Mid-Guard, which is a large fort on the 'middle' of the Planet created to protect themselves from Jenova, and the fiends that have spawned ever since some of the Cetra were turned into them. The eight portions of Mid-Guard are named Besaid, Kilika, Luca, Djose, Salam, Bevelle, Gagazet and Zanarkand.

890 - The Cetra, due to low population, infertility and low birth rate, slowly decline to near-extinction. However, a couple in star-crossed love—Adam, a Human, and Eve, a Cetra—attempt to bring the Cetra and Humans back together.

892 - Adam is executed due to his contacts with the Cetra, and Eve escapes her own execution. She returns to the City of the Ancients and has Adam's child. She claims it is a full-bred Cetra child, and names her Ifalna—a Cetra name—in order to back her claims up.

900 - Mid-Guard, after so many years, has become ShinRa Electric Power Company. Most of the Cetra and Spira has intentionally been forgotten, and therefore Mid-Guard's name and even the names of its sectors have been eradicated. Mid-Guard is now Midgar and sectors are now Sectors 1~8. Many people have left the Home of the Humans, migrating to other continents and whatnot to start their own lives and living places. However, ShinRa Electric Power Company—just as it did to Spira—was now governing Gaia, and slowly killing it by extracting its mako energy in order to power its machina; its machines.

1000 - Present day in Final Fantasy VII.


Source: http://hometown.aol.com/i2ic0/timeline.doc

[DocFrance]

Why just FFVII and FFX? Why not connect FFV to FFI? Or FFVI to FFVII? If you ask me, magicite is the predecessor for materia.

[TheAbominatrix]

Originally posted by DocFrance
Why just FFVII and FFX? Why not connect FFV to FFI? Or FFVI to FFVII? If you ask me, magicite is the predecessor for materia.

Well all the magicite was destroyed at the end, not to mention it isnt at all the same as materia.

However, this four posts of stuff... mostly seems like nonsense to me. Like Doc said, why these two? Why not any two games in the series? It can be done, if you have the time.

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

Because of Shinra in X-2, and his reference to the Farplane as a "lifestream."

[TheAbominatrix]

I know, I read that. But there's other connections to be made from other games, right?

[DocFrance]

You mean there actually is a connection between these two? HOLY CRAP!!!

Hmmm... I'm starting to think that Square might be setting us up for something - maybe a grand connection between each and every one?

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

Shinra and his lifestream comment are, of course, just cute references, which fill the series. These two are just much more blatant than most others.

[TheAbominatrix]

Like the many, many references to other games in the series in IX. *nods*

[Star Champion]

Well I am new here and I thought you guys already heard of the big debate.

Along with those comments Shinra made came these comments in an interview conducted in the Japanese Final Fantasy X-2 Ultimania Guide, with Kazushige Nojima, the WRITER of both Final Fantasy 7, Final Fantasy 8, Final Fantasy X Final Fantasy X-2 and Kingdom Hearts...

Ultimania Guide: Is there a connection between Final Fantasy 7 and Final Fantasy X?

Nojima: After Shinra quit the Gullwings he got enormous financial backing from Rin and went to the Farplane to start extracting the Mako energy used by the Vegnagun. But the system for utilizing this energy could not be completed in his generation, so far in the future when space travel was possible, the Shinra Company was founded on another planet... or something like that. That would be a thousand years or so from this game's story.

When asked if this was final, or something like that, Nojima said that that is what he feels about it. Thus, since he is one of the main writers of the two games, that has a lot of weight.

[eternalshiva]

ha I knew there was a reason he was called Shinra. And the blurb about *harvesting the palnet's life stream* was way too obvious.

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

"FFVII is FFX-3! Congraturation!"

No. I'm not goin' for it.

[Ouch!]

I take that response as sarcasm. I think as Kishi said, it was just a cute, but blatant, reference. I don't buy it for a second.

[ChibiInuYasha]

I agree with DocFrance. Maybe there's more to the first sequel than we think. I'm thinking Squenix is setting us up for something big. Maybe like Yuna said "Everything is connected."

[Mo-Nercy]

That is one F.U.B.A.R connection. If Squenix pulls any connection crap on me, my heads gonna explode just like it did after Matrix Reloaded.

[muchacho]

dude its just a game, games arent suppose to get this deep.

[DocFrance]

Not to mention that FF12 is going to take place in Ivalice, the same world that Tactics took place in.

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

It's a different Ivalice from FFT's, though, since it has Bangaa and Viera and everything. It's also different from FFTA's Ivalice, since that Ivalice was mostly created within the mind of Mewt Randell. I think the primary possibility is that FFXII's Ivalice is the one that provides the inspiration for Mewt's.

[muchacho]

do you think that rikku's mascot sphear is liked to?

[TheAbominatrix]

Cait Sith has also appeared in VI (as the summon Stray), I believe it has to do with some Japanese myth or another. It isnt because of VII.

[Kawaii Ryûkishi]

Celtic myth, really, hence the Celtic name and everything. (Cait Sith is actually pronounced "Ket Shee.")