Playground Date

When Cloud and Aeris are on their way to visit Tifa, they stop and hang out in the little playground there. While sitting on the weird slide (wtf is that thing? plus it looks like a safety hazard anyway) they talk about Aeris and how she used to date someone in SOLDIER. When Cloud asks who it was, she brushes it off.

Can you imagine wtf could have happened if she said Zack? I think at this point Cloud's mind is still pretty damn crippled and he probably would've just up and died. Or maybe he would've been like "oh yeah baby I used to be called Zack but I dyed my hair".

Maybe.

Or he would have said that he never knew anyone named Zack. I don't think that a simple name drop would have changed things much.

Though can you imagine how the game would have turned out had his memory snapped back at that point? Especially if it caused him to miss Tifa's choco-cart moseying on by.

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plus it looks like a safety hazard anyway)

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You mean like all the coolest playground equipment?

I doubt anything would have happened. If you remember you can talk to Zach's parents on Disk 1 and they ask about him and nothing big happens. Even if you're with Tifa or Aeris

^ I was going to say that. Although they're in that playground just a few days after Cloud arrived in Midgar, correct? It might've brought up the trauma of what happened just before he arrived if they mentioned his name.

Good question.

I always thought that slide was weird too... the actual entrance to the 'slide proper' was tiny! I'm pretty sure even Marlene wouldn't have fit down that slide.

Maybe it was some kind of Shinra torture device designed to lure in small children... they would get stuck in the gap at the top of the slide, captured, then slowly eaten by Dark Nation.

Dumb question here: How long was it in between Cloud being left at the outskirts of Midgar and him hooking up with Tifa and joining Avalanche? Was it more or less the first thing he went to do or did he wander around the city some?

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Originally Posted by Flying Arrow

Dumb question here: How long was it in between Cloud being left at the outskirts of Midgar and him hooking up with Tifa and joining Avalanche? Was it more or less the first thing he went to do or did he wander around the city some?

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To me, it seemed like it was maybe a couple of hours because Cloud was still out of it until Tifa spotted him and snapped him out of it. Then boom--Cloud started to play SOLDIER in his mind.

^ Cool, thanks. Makes sense, if you consider his freak-outs at the reactor and the Honey Bee "incident" to be effects of a fresh Mako psychosis or something.

Back on topic: I think not much would have come of it had Zack's name been dropped. Cloud seems pretty unfazed during that semi-hidden scene in Gongaga if you have Aeris when visiting Zack's parents.

If I may be allowed one more minor de-rail, what happens if you visit Zack's parents after discovering the flashback from the Nibelheim lab? Do they mention Zack, and, if so, what does Cloud or Tifa have to say about it?

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Originally Posted by Flying Arrow

If I may be allowed one more minor de-rail, what happens if you visit Zack's parents after discovering the flashback from the Nibelheim lab? Do they mention Zack, and, if so, what does Cloud or Tifa have to say about it?

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Good question. I don't remember ever returning to Gongaga to speak to them after Cloud finds himself, let alone after the basement flashback. I'd like to think he lets them know but Square may not have included that dialogue in the script.

I'll go check later today.

I doubt it has any extra dialogue, but bringing up the scene in Gongaga was an excellent point. Cloud's memories were probably way too dormant at that point. I'm surprised he remembered the Well scene with Tifa even.

That was probably because it was far enough back, far enough that it didn't conflict at all with what what he & his Jenova cells were trying to make out of him.

They don't bring it up.

About the well scene, Cloud pretty much just went along with anything Tifa told him. He's a fairly exceptional judge of character and was probably able to guess the things he could say that wouldn't arouse too much suspicion about the fact he had no idea what she talking about... lol.

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Originally Posted by Mercen-X

They don't bring it up.

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Oh well. Gongaga was always one of my favourite little towns in the game. I've always wished there was more to do there with regards to Zack's backstory.

I reckon when the game gets re-made for the FFVII anniversary in the year 2097... they'll definitely include more of the Zack back story. I can't wait!

You need to bump that number by about a hundred years.

Did they include Gongaga in Crisis Core? I don't remember and I can't replay it 'cause my portable's busted.

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Originally Posted by Mercen-X

You need to bump that number by about a hundred years.

Did they include Gongaga in Crisis Core? I don't remember and I can't replay it 'cause my portable's busted.

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Yes, but he didn't go see his parents. Of course, this makes sense because they did note that they didn't see him for several years.

What a trout son to be in that small town and avoid his folks (I know the town was bigger before it went kaboom but no idea how big)

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Originally Posted by Sephex

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Originally Posted by Flying Arrow

Dumb question here: How long was it in between Cloud being left at the outskirts of Midgar and him hooking up with Tifa and joining Avalanche? Was it more or less the first thing he went to do or did he wander around the city some?

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To me, it seemed like it was maybe a couple of hours because Cloud was still out of it until Tifa spotted him and snapped him out of it. Then boom--Cloud started to play SOLDIER in his mind.

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Cloud seemed to have been found by Tifa very shortly after the death of Zack, which was several years before FFVII. He made it to Midgar, though he was still very out of it from the trauma of the events of Nibelheim, and Tifa nursed him back. That is the impression the game gives.

He seems to have spent a couple years hanging around Midgar, but didn't actually join up with Avalanche until the reactor mission, which is why Barret didn't know him yet.

Likely he was picking up Zack's job of being a jack-of-all-trades, helping out people with odd jobs around the slums.

Which also means that, had Aeris mentioned Zack, it would have been little different than Zack's parents mentioning him. His memory had already solidly blocked that out.

If the game does it actually say when Zack died? From the timeline that the game gives it would seem that Cloud and Zack spent quite a bit of time (years) as Hojo's research subjects.

So from Cloud's point of view there wasn't much of anything between the events of Nibelheim and the beginning of the game.

At least that is the way that I read it.

This is all from memory, but:

Cloud's more or less a teenager during the Nibelheim incident, right? 17, unless I'm mistaken. And all the media for the game (instruction booklets, etc) say that he is currently 21.

So, yeah, either he spent a good, long time in Hojo's lab, wandered around Midgar for a few years, or a mix of both.

Basically, yeah. When he tells the party the story about Sephiroth, he says he was 16, and that it was five years ago. And then he doesn't remember anything until the point Tifa found him, I think.

They spend a couple years in the tubes with Hojo as I recall. I guess I'll have to look into it when I get that far.

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Likely he was picking up Zack's job of being a jack-of-all-trades, helping out people with odd jobs around the slums.

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So Cloud was a WRPG hero before he became a JRPG hero.

Killin' rats n' trout.

Oh great, now we know what the next spin off is going to be.

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Originally Posted by Jiro

Killin' rats n' tit.

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Originally Posted by VeloZer0

Oh great, now we know what the next spin off is going to be.

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Final Fantasy VII: Rodent Crisis Core

"But my sword isn't big enough for rat killing!" ~ Cloud

He will be so happy when he moves up to fixing windows for little old ladies.