LWL's nontraditional Final Fantasy VIII Let's Play

Hello all,

Final Fantasy VIII was my first Final Fantasy. It's also my favorite, to the point where I would name myself after the protagonist on a message board and be here almost 14 years later. Other entries such as VII, IX, X, and XII are getting the next gen treatment and being added to Xbox and Switch. However, VIII is not on the current lineup. And since we're coming up on the 20th anniversary (February 11th, 2019), and my beloved game isn't in the spotlight, I thought it would be fitting to do a Let's Play. Sort of.

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So what do I mean by nontraditional?

This is a Let's Play for people who are already pretty familiar with this game. In fact, if you've never played Final Fantasy VIII before, this Let's Play probably isn't for you. As someone who has played this game dozens and dozens of times since childhood, I want to go through and do things I've never tried before. And see if I can find interesting facts, uncommon scenes, or just give general thoughts to places I've visited now that the years have gone by and I can give my adult take on them.

This is going to be a trip through Final Fantasy VIII for people who have already played the game. I'm going to presume you know what Balamb is, what Timber is, who the Brothers GF are, etc. There may be places or events I don't mention at all, if I don't feel I can add something to them.

So I will not be walking you through the story. "First we go to the Fire Cavern, and after that we go back to Garden", I'm not doing that narrative description style. Basically, this guide is my commentary to talk about interesting tidbits or facts I discover or think of during this playthrough, as someone who has played the game for hundreds of hours in the past.

The basic premise is, if I can find something new and interesting as someone who has played the game a lot, than you might find it to be interesting, as well. I will also include memes (You're the best looking guy here!) and music covers on YouTube whenever I get to relevant parts of the story. I also want to keep track of who turns into whom in the "Dream World", and see the stats on who becomes whom the most.

So just for the record, not that it will necessarily effect my commentary, but here's my setup and playstyle:

Quote:

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I'll be playing Final Fantasy VIII as a digital download on my PlayStation 3.

I'll be doing a complete playthrough, but not a "perfect" playthrough. In other words, I won't be getting 99 of every item, but I will do every sidequest and attempt to get at least 1 of every item. I will also attempt to:

-Exploit Card Mod to break my game early
-Defeat XATM092 during the Dollet mission
-Use the Magic Lamp to summon Diablos as soon as I get it
-"Read" Timber Maniacs to intentionally decide what scenes I see during the Laguna flashbacks and Selphie's website.

I want to say it has been roughly 5 years (maybe more) since my last playthrough, so while I remember a lot, there may be a lot I have forgotten, as well. Note that since this is a port of the original console version, I won't be able to use the Pocket Station features of "Chocobo World".

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To end this initial post, here's my first "Thing you might not have seen before". The Insert Disc 1 image.

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Unless you put the wrong disc in when you start a new game, there's no practical reason you would have ever seen this image.

I'm still not quite sure I've adequately explained what I intend to do with this playthrough, but hopefully as I start to post, you'll get a feel for the concept.

Thank you and enjoy. Maybe you'll learn something new, maybe you'll just enjoy the nostalgia.

I'm ready ! :jess:

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-The Garden Network terminal was kind of ahead of its time. Being able to call people out for overdue library books, students at the same school wishing each other well on upcoming exams, reaching out to the staff about what's on the cafeteria menu. In 1999 if my school had a website I certainly didn't see it, and I know it wouldn't have been designed to be like a forum.

-The Network is also a great, practical way to explore the locations and lore of the game and have it feel natural. Of course it would be available information you can look up. Unlike, some would say, the "Datalog" in Final Fantasy XIII where you're reading about the world and characters from your main menu, it makes sense in the Final Fantasy VIII world to address these things in a classroom, when you're first starting the game.

-The idea that Zell likes hot dogs was created to appeal to western audiences. In the original Japanese release, Zell likes a sort of flavored bread.

-As mentioned in the Timber Maniacs thread, there are novice seed cadets in the cafeteria who disappear later in the game if you don't talk to them.

-For the first time I can recall in any playthrough, I set the Fire Cavern time to the lowest possible of 10 minutes. I beat Ifrit with 1 minute to spare. It turns out if you leave your screen on the page where you name Ifrit after the boss fight, you can let your invisible timer run down to zero, and not have a consequence.

-I read that in the Japanese release, the time spent in the Fire Cavern is counted all the way until you leave the place, not just the end of the boss fight.

-Early on in the game, you should challenge the Queen of Cards in a match and quit until you see the "All" rule, then as soon as you see that, quit again. This will spread "All" through the region and allow you to win 5 cards from people instead of 1.

- Apparently if you don't go to the Cafeteria before heading to the Fire Cavern, you just miss the scene where Zell rushes in and asks about the Hot Dog supply.

-The music in the Dollet mission was different in the demo that was bundled with Parasite Eve/Brave Fencer Musashi. Allegedly this was because the theme sounded too much like Hans Zimmer's score for Sean Connery's "The Rock", which was a very big film at the time.



-Here's the movie track if you want to decide for yourself:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPtPxqTdkig

I like this idea! I've been considering doing this with FFX myself already, so I approve of this concept =P

Yeah the garden network is actually super neat. I tend to enjoy having a sort of hub to explore right off the bat in a game, and Balamb Garden does this pretty damn well, even allowing to find some hidden Draw Points - for which you need to have gotten Quezacotl and Shiva from your seat and experimented around with junctioning abilities. I feel like this part is designed to flow more organically than people give it credit for, especially since you legit cannot miss the Draw Point on the way out. Of course none of this prepares you for mass stock drawing later on but eh.

I'm kinda curious where Squall got Quezacotl and Shiva from, and are they + Ifrit the "default loadout" for SeeD, or are they just the GF that Squall happens to own?

Did you get the Quistis, Zell and Mini Mog cards yet? ^^ I like to get those right off the bat usually.

-(I think) the better your magic stat, the more likely you are to draw a lot of magic from any given enemy, so whoever has Quezacotl junctioned will draw the most in the beginning.

-It's better to strike down Biggs than Wedge, because Biggs gives you 2 elixirs. Where Wedge is just 2 cottages

-Another thing that struck me in this playthrough, fresh off of playing other FF games, is how unique it is to be able to draw your GFs from special enemies. It's set apart from having mandatory summons. But being able to find them in the wild, like in VII, is also cool.

-I beat X-ATM092! This changes a lot of things. For one, you don't get to see the awesome cutscene of Quistis wiping the spider from existence. However, when you finish the battle you do get to see it explode, which is cool, but no cutscene. You don't have to save the dog in the town square, and actually you can't interact with it. And, of course, that one car doesn't get destroyed. You just leave by meeting Quistis at the ship. For destroying it I got a Power Wrist, but it also has the chance of dropping an Orihalcon, Hypno Crown, or Force Amulet.

-Of the two Timber Maniacs in Balamb (one in train station, one in hotel) you can decide how the scene with Laguna and Julia will play out. If you grab the train station one, he'll feel like he talks too much. If you read the one in the hotel, he'll fall asleep. This makes Selphie's jornal entry either about alcoholism or the hotel. Though, ironically, the article about alcoholism has her consider Laguna a lightweight, even though picking up that magazine makes him stay up longer. Reading neither magazine defaults to the train station choice.

-Abandon all hope ye who decide to rent a car for 3,500 G to travel from Balamb to Balamb Garden.

-My SeeD Rank is 9. A full 100pt on Judgment, 80pt on Attack, 70pt on Spirit, and 40pt for Conduct since the spider fight took so long. Points Deducted were 80 but I got a bonus of 100pt. I think the highest SeeD Rank you can get initially is 10.

-I'm bummed that SeeD never did end up being an acronym for something. The capitalized D made it seem like it might have, but it's simply a play on words because seeds come from a garden.

There is an unused image in the Dormitory. Wonder what's behind the door?

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJU20w-UjFA

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Karifean

Did you get the Quistis, Zell and Mini Mog cards yet? ^^ I like to get those right off the bat usually.

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I did! I'm about ready to get the Seifer card, as well.

-This is kind of random, but one time I was watching Charlie's Angels (2000) and Drew Barrymore fell down a hill and knocked on someones back door for help. The kids who heard her were playing FFVIII on their tv "two player" summoning Quezacotl in the training room.

-I think it would be neat if you could change your clothes whenever you wanted in Squall's dormitory. If the game were released now, that's probably how you would change your costume DLC.

-Some draw points definitely refill faster than others. I got back from Dollet and still can't use the one in the library.

-I beat Diablos with 1 Renzokuken. It's actually not a hard fight with the proper setup. If you cast Blind on him, there's a good chance he will only have his gravity attacks land, never actually being able to kill you. If you use Demi on him (from your stock, not draw cast) he will funnily enough heal you with Curaga. Interestingly, you can use Laguna and the gang to win this fight from their inventory, as well.

-The dance scene was created as a PS2 tech demo:



-There's no way I was gonna get to this point without reposting this gold:

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lone Wolf Leonhart

-I'm bummed that SeeD never did end up being an acronym for something. The capitalized D made it seem like it might have, but it's simply a play on words because seeds come from a garden.

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My head canon is that, since only S and D are capitalized, and the purpose of SeeD is to defeat the Sorceress, it stand for Sorceress Defeaters or something like that, while the double e's in are just there for the seed planted in a garden metaphor and to disguise the purpose of SeeD.

If you like though, Sorceress Defeaters.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lone Wolf Leonhart

-(I think) the better your magic stat, the more likely you are to draw a lot of magic from any given enemy, so whoever has Quezacotl junctioned will draw the most in the beginning.

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This is definitely true. Early in the game the difference might be small enough that there's room for doubt, but as the magic stat gets higher, you'll easily see the difference is undeniable and couldn't be purely random chance. It's a good reason to only draw with chracters that have good magic stats, and just transfer spells to the other characters.

I definitely spent all morning before going to work playing triple triad thanks to your recent threads. I look forward to testing any new stuff you might bring up as I play through!

-I really like the concept of the underwater train that travels between continents. A sort of hyperloop. Though I wonder how they build those tunnels underwater. Magic, I guess.

-I'll be keeping track of who becomes who in the flashbacks. Laguna=Squall, Kiros=Zell, Ward=Selphie. Another great concept that wasn't really explored outside of this game is the "invasion of the body snatchers" approach. Controlling other characters but with your character's stats. Very awesome.

-As a general, the money Laguna has can be spent and the items carried over, but the money itself will not carry over. So spend it all in the flashbacks.

-Even if you don't say "The Owls Are Still Around", they still let you through. They paid too much to let you leave. I really like the comedic relief of Zone and Watts and would have enjoyed seeing them incorporated into the story more.

-Another underappreciated aspect of the game is the train car mission, and being able to control your characters during an actual cutscene. You can't do much, but it helps with the immersion. I never stop for the "guard sensors". If you just run straight to the other side of the screen, they don't detect you.

-It's probably obvious, but talking to the NPCs really helps flesh out the story. Zone and Watt's fathers were shot in front of them, and that's what inspired them to carry the torch of resistance.

-As it turns out, America isn't the only place with a skinsack pretending to be human residing as the president, my dudes. Gerogero has "blue guts" in the western release, unlike the east which has the more realistic red. I think this was to turn down the grotesque factor.

-Do not teach Angelo Recover or Reverse, as this may slow down the Angelo Searching ability later in the game.

-The outdoor tv at Timber reads cryptic messages when the signal is lost, like "I am still alive", "Bring me back", "I will never let you forget about me" in red lettering. Great foreshadowing.

-It's a good thing the RNG is easy to manipulate in Dollet, otherwise people would be pulling their hair out trying to abolish random.

-Pretty much every hotel you stay at will have a Timber Maniacs when you stay the night, except in the case of Balamb, where it won't be there if you get the TM from the train station.

-During the second flashback (excavation site): Squall is Laguna, Selphie is Kiros, and Quistis is Ward.

-Also in the excavation site, examining everything (old keys, hatches, detonator) not only allows Squall's group to find new items there later, but reduces the amount of soldiers you fight at the end of this flashback.

-Off to Galbadia, and the gangs all here:

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You know later on for at least one segment, but I think it might be a couple ones you can choose who gets junctioned to who in the past (Squall/Laguna is probably locked). I wonder if that has any effect on dialogue. Probably not, because the degree to which the SeeD members' voices interfere decreases as the game goes on, but I wonder.

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-I really like that the earlier games gave train stations and gates between continents their own screens. It seems the more modern the games get, you're either in a city, a dungeon, or the world map. These older games gave you a lot more places to go, though granted it may be that newer games are open world and have less loading screens, so it may just appear like less.

-I used card mod on the Kiros card in Deling City and now I have auto-haste for the rest of the game. Gotta go fast!

-Bio can be junctioned as both an elemental and status attack.

-It may not be efficient to get Lion Heart on disc one, though you technically can. You just have to mug/drop from level 30+ monsters for laser cannons, not beneficial for a low level playthrough (which you may want to do, since enemies level with you).

-Interesting that they would choose 3 people to go to the gateway team, and 2 people for the sniper team. I understand why they would need to do it from a gameplay perspective, since you max out at 3 characters, and one team goes through the sewers. But if it were a realistic strategy, you might just have 1 or 2 go to the gate to pull the lever, and then everyone else to attack the sorceress.

-During your walk with Caraway, most of the bystanders for the parade are just part of the scenery, having no dialogue.

-The NPCs in Deling City feel like they're "under a spell", which explains why they're cheering when Edea kills their president in front of them and calls them all idiots.

-If the Iguion fight is your first time using Irvine, he'll tell you about his limit break instead of talking about saving Rinoa during the battle.

-Seifer has like a 6% chance of being mugged for the "Hero" item, but if you've spent any amount of time modding yourself, you probably only have a sword swipe or two before the battle's over.

-Once you can start drawing the second level -ra spells, you're better off just converting all your level 1 spells. They're kind of a waste of your 8 page magic inventory otherwise.

-If you use Carbuncle during the Edea fight, she'll waste her next 3 turns dispelling you. You can't get a game over here for losing, but if you win you get 20ap.

-Squall isn't dead. Get over it.

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If it were a realistic strategy they would not alert the sorceress by closing a stupid gate before taking a shot. How does that help? What kind of sniper can't handle a target in a slow moving parade following a predictable path? A gate only obscures visibility and alerts a powerful magic user that something is amiss. I really have a problem with that mission for that reason. It's just an incredibly bad plan.

-Funnily enough, playing on PS3 I had to "digitally change discs". When I played Final Fantasy XIII on Xbox One, there was no disc change, it just went through the whole game.

-Winhill flashback: Laguna (Squall), Kiros (Irvine), Ward (Zell). This is the one where Ward is working at the prison and we don't see him.

-You have to ask Kiros about Julia if you want the Eyes on Me entry.

-Setting your cursor to "memory" really helps if you want to spam the draw function over and over again.

-I love everything about Winhill. The music, the cobblestone roads, the small town seclusion. It's like a family, Kiros is welcomed instantly. As long as you earn your keep, you're welcome to stay. Not everyone feels that way (the shopkeeper is rude) but I like the close knit feel, and how Laguna doesn't want to write about it because he doesn't want tourists to take away its sanctity (or Raine). Laguna just wants the best for Julia, and it's so nice to see that he's able to find a place with Raine, not dwell on the past, and just be okay with where everyone's at.

-Moombas are such adorable and memorable mascots, it's hard to believe they aren't used more often like moogles. If you have a Pocket Station, you can summon them:



-If the enemy is weak enough, it can be a good idea to keep healing them until you get their mug item. I healed Biggs with his own Cura so I could get the Regen Ring and Wedge's Strength Love.

-The card player on Floor 5 of the prison has a 1/64 chance of giving you a Luck Up if you beat him. Yeah, good luck with that. Update: Holy crap, I actually got it!

-The card player on Floor 10 gives you the "Character Report" upgrade for your battle meter. Assuming you got the battle meter from Cid when you got the magic lamp.

-The card player on Floor 11 can give you a Rosetta Stone and HP Up, both with longshot odds. I got the HP Up at least, and a RS can be found later.

-I totally forgot there was an item called "Hi-Potion+". Heals twice as much.

-There's 11 cards for each level of card 1 through 10. I wonder if there were any monsters made so that they could have 11 cards in each category?

-I'm really glad they carried over the Dolphin Blow from Tifa to Zell. Reminds me of sneaking into Junon.

-I wonder how you get paid your SeeD Rank? I get that it flashes on screen, but I wonder how the party receives it. This world has PetPals and PayPal.

If memory serves me correctly, doesn't Cid or Xu say that your salary is directly deposited into your bank account or something? Loving this Let's Play by the way.

I’ve apparently never gone to Balamb and talked to people before going to the fire cavern before. I’d never seen this short scene where a person sitting by the docks asks Quistis to sit with him and she says something like: “sure, we can discuss the test you failed last week.” Kind it amusing seeing her interact with other Garden students as a teacher.

Thanks to you reminding me, this is the first time I’ve tried manipulating the All rule right from the get go too.

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-If Squall doesn't give in during the torture scene in the prison (he should choose "just let me die"), there are more moombas in the room when the party gets there. Presumably because they can smell/taste Laguna on his blood. I'm not sure if Zell sticking up for himself has the same effect or not.

-When Zell's escaping, if you try to run towards the guards that are chasing you, you respawn near your starting point. You can't talk to the guard who is sending galbadian soldiers in your direction.

-This is around the time where Squall starts acting in a way where he cares about his comrades. Definitely not through words, but through actions. Rushing forward faster than Quistis or Selphie to save Zell from gunfire.

-It's interesting where they decide to place "hidden save points" that you can locate with move-find. You'd figure the one on top of the prison would be regular given its location, but you have to find it.

-There wasn't really a reason to fire missiles at Trabia first. Not only was Balamb the one to attack the sorceress, but Trabia's students get transferred there to become SeeD. The only reason I can think of is you need enough time to save Balamb for story purposes.

-When the two groups get split up between the missile base and Garden, I always put Zell and Quistis with Squall, because it's their home. Though you do get an impromptu tour of Garden with Rinoa, if she comes with you.

-You can even break the money in this game. Buy 100 tents, refine them into mega-potions, then sell the mega-potions. 25,000 G profit each time.

-General Caraway was dismissed from his duties after being involved with the assassination plan, but he still had enough pull to get Rinoa out of being captured? Friends in high places, I guess.

-One of the big reasons Galbadia infiltrates Timber (and elsewhere) is because they're afraid of Esthar, and want as much support as possible.

-If you drive to Deling City before the Missile Base, they make you leave in the same Galbadian vehicle if you try to leave on foot. Presumably because vehicles disappear if they don't belong there, and you need that specific one.

-One of the soldiers in the base has commentary about the way you all walk single file, which I thought was humorous considering how a meme about this game is how everyone walks identically. I think it helps that you're military members, and it makes sense to be in unison.

-Seeing Selphie in uniform reminds me that there's probably women in the Galbadian Army. It's hard to tell, since they're all Wedge clones.

-I set 10 minutes at the missile base and blew it out of the water. The BGH251F2 always sort of struck me as sentient like the X-ATM092, probably because of the big eye on the front, but really it's just a big vehicle. I like how the group hides inside it like a fridge in nuclear fallout, another feature I'd like to see more often in future games is hiding in/controlling big tank bosses.

-The dialogue you get for sending certain characters certain places is under appreciated, I think. If you send Irvine with Selphie, he's sad because he thinks Squall doesn't trust him. A lot of the dialogue between characters depends on who you choose for your party, so if someone complains that so and so didn't get enough screen time, maybe they need to use them more.

-When you gain control of Squall again, you can still leave and play cards in Balamb despite the urgency of the plot. I took this opportunity spread "all" again. Yet later, if you challenge Cid, he says "This is no time for cards".

-You don't have to mix card rules when you got to a new place. When they ask if you want to play with their rules and yours, keep saying no. Eventually they'll just ask if you want to play without prefacing it with anything. Then you'll just play with the regions rules. However, mixing does end up being important if you want to abolish rules later.

-Some people don't know this, but if you fail to stop the missiles, you get a full fledged cutscene showing the Garden being destroyed.



-By the way, at this staircase:

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-The square sticking out at the top always looked like a fat credit card to me. Also, I always walk up and down the left side. It's not even a conscious decision. Sitting here now, almost 20 years since release, I just thought "Hey, why don't I see if I can walk up the right side"?. Never even thought about it til now.

-Too bad you can't strike the Garden Master minions (with the yellow hats). They're probably the only characters that appear in battle but can't be touched. They're just there to introduce the monster.

-I like that the Garden battle color schemes stay true in a fight. I.e. When you fight a Grat in the library hallway, the stripe down the middle of the floor is still blue.

-It also helps to bring Zell with you to Garden because talking to the pigtail girl that has a crush on him will net you a mega-phoenix instead of a remedy.

-I'm on disc 2 and the draw point in the library STILL can't be used after the first time I used it in disc 1.

-I wonder what Seifer thinks of Fujin and Raijin being in the Garden while missiles head to demolish it.

-Even with a turbo controller, you'd be unable to open the valve in the Garden basement with just Squall. At least one party member needs to join you.

-You know, this game isn't hurt by not having any treasure chests. There's enough to explore, and enough to steal and draw, that you don't really feel like you're missing anything by not having boxes around.

-Despite changing the error ratio on the missiles, it appears in the cutscene that if Balamb didn't fly away, it would have got hit anyway despite what the missile group did?

-Part of this game's charm, and a reoccurring theme, is "If you just smash a control panel randomly, the thing you want to happen will happen".

-Let it be known to all haters that this game has a flying school with dinosaurs on it.

-Some games don't even have 1 airship (sorry, flying car) but this one has 2. Although I guess technically for world map purposes Garden is more of a boat that can hover.

-Until the first time you have to go outside on the balcony on 2F, I don't know if I ever really knew you could go further on down that hallway past the classroom. Some of the screens are hard to tell which direction you're allowed to go to find a new room.

-Found this and thought it was a great use of green screen:

Some draw points can only be used once for whatever reason. I think the library is one of them. The ones who can be used multiple times refill based on the number of steps you take. I can’t remember specifics, but some take more steps than others to refill.

I’m also pretty sure you can’t go to the second floor balcony before you have to. The screen won’t change at all when you run past the classroom before that point.

Technically Trabia had to be attacked first because it's farther away. If Balamb had been hit first, Trabia may have learned about it fast enough to evacuate the students. Regardless the distance alone would mean that the missiles meant for Trabia would launch first even if they were suppose to be hit simultaneously.

As for the Draw Points, Scotty_ffgamer is correct concerning how some never refill while your steps are used to count when they will refill. There's well over a hundred draw point in the field and of those, 32 of them are one time only deals such as the Garden Library and Timber Maniacs draw points. You can tell which ones are one time based on the color of the swirl when you draw from it. If it's a whiteish color it will refill but if it's blue then it's a one time deal. Funny enough, several draw points in one time locations like Laguna's dream sequences or the D-District Prison are actually refillable but unless you spend an incredible amount of time walking around, you would never know they refilled. It takes 10,240 steps before the game rolls a check to see if any of the drawn points will refill and even then you only have a 50% chance they'll refill.

I don't remember having too much of an issue without treasure chests since draw points often fulfilled the same purpose. I think I had a harder time adjusting to the lack of equipment because I am a gear whore in RPGs so not having much to tinker with was a bit depressing for me at first but I got over it.

I have one other comment about dialogue changes based on who you send, but I'll wait until you complete the FH sequence because I have a feeling it might be something you'll bring up. Great job so far!

-The Solomon Ring shown in Occult Fan III and the Ring of the Lucii from Final Fantasy XV look very similar, and the Occult Fan description says it used to belong to a royal family. This is believed to be an homage.

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-Apparently if you talked to the left Cafeteria lady early in the game about her son and let her tell her long story without interruption, he's supposed to show up in Fisherman's Horizon, but he's not showing up for me.

-I really feel for Martine when he's sulking in FH. The townspeople welcomed him with open arms much like Winhill did for Laguna. I think these are my 2 favorite places in the game. It's funny, when you meet Martine at G Garden his robe looks sort of majestic but when he's sitting by the solar panels it doubles as a bathrobe. Best believe I won my Ifrit card back. He also has any cards you might have lost at G Garden.

-I changed the FH card rules back in Deling City when you can face the tourist. It's just easier to do when a single person is in a different region than changing in the region itself.

-Some subquests only have a very small window they can be completed in and that can be good or bad. It's realistic and makes sense certain things can only be done at a certain time (Master Fisherman quest), on the other hand, if you aren't using a guide like me, you may miss out on some good stuff.

-Me, when someone interrupts my Final Fantasy VIII gameplay:

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-I used to be finicky about modding cards for items, especially one of a kind cards, but now I kind of appreciate it. It allows you to use cards that might not have normally been in your top 5. Plus you can win them back endgame, anyway.

-It's pretty poignant social commentary how against all odds the Mayor marches down to the station to try and talk things out with the Galbadian soldiers, but of course, it was to no avail. There are some people that you can't just talk things out with, as ideal as that would be. There's the world you want and the world you live in. Squall thinks it's best if there are people with both the viewpoint of the Mayor to carry to the future and the practicality of SeeD for the present.

-Absence does make the heart grow fonder if Rinoa was not in your party. Squall actually opens up and has the opportunity to say he missed her. If the prison was where he started physically showing concern for his comrades, FH is where he starts begrudgingly verbalizing it.

(I probably missed what you were thinking of, WK)

-Looking at Selphie's diary, it appears you do end up getting both Balamb journal entries even though you can only pick up one. Unless the second was a repeat you can find later.

-I wish you could reenter the secret area of the training center.

-There's a library girl scene for Zell's love quest when you're Irvine solo. Another example of an easily missable quest without a guide. There isn't really a reason you'd think to go back to Garden when you're trying out instruments.

-Irvine rightly calls out an NPC who accuses them of being warmongers. Who are you to leer down from your mountaintop and accuse us, what have you done that's significant?

-Ever try to eat pizza with one hand and use your non dominant hand to use the analog stick to walk? (This has been the sidequest of this Let's Play. Thank you.)

-Never really noticed this before, but when you come down the elevator from 2f to 1f, you're only ever able to use the left side of the stairs to walk down to the main hall of Garden.

-I chose the Slow Dance over the Irish Jig. It's way more fitting for the coming scenes. I gave Zell electric guitar, Selphie bass guitar, Irvine saxophone, and Quistis piano. Based off the 4 choices I try to go with what I feel like closely resembles their personality. Zell is loud, Irvine has a cowboy jazz thing going on, the rumbling of the bass represented Selphie's booming personality. Quistis I chose piano because I associate pianos with high learning curve, and Quistis has the most Garden experience, at least in terms of being able to be an instructor so young.

-I really love the concert scene on top of its location in Fisherman's Horizon. This entire place is a moment of bliss, a blip between conflicts.

-At first I wasn't sure how the technicians would know how to fix and fly the Garden, but since FH is full of people from Esthar who wanted to live under different ideals, presumably they have a wealth of knowledge on a whole lot of things.

-Sometimes, annoyingly, the card rules will change back from "all" to "one", even if you changed it with the Card Queen and she's still in the area.

-I'm glad Quistis is the Card King. They do a good job of sliding that under the radar, and not allowing you to challenge her at all beforehand.

-As soon as I had free roam, I went to get the Tonberry GF right away, especially considering certain attacks it has get stronger the more enemies you kill, so the sooner the better. The Centra Ruins are a great example of a place where you want low HP so you can use Renzokuken to take out the enemies high HP.

-I enjoy this video where someone describes why Fisherman's Horizon is important to them. Especially the music. It's worth a look:

-The phrase "Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec" in the song Liberi Fatali is an anagram of the phrases "Succession of Witches" and "Love", and not Latin like the rest of the song.

-You shouldn't pick up the Timber Maniacs in Shumi Village until after visiting Trabia Canyon, otherwise Ward will be absent for Laguna's Ruby Dragon fight on disc 3.

-I got 14 Ultima my first draw! Feels good man.

-I feel like you could live in the Shumi elevator. So spacious, a rug, a lot of seats. Just give it some wifi and you could take a nap in there. Also, I wonder why the outside of their village looks like a giant spider? Just a really cool design, I suppose.

-The Shumi's have a similar stature to the Guado of FFX. No similarity in the face, but in the long hands and slender frames. It really shows in comparison how gluttonous NORG was. It's so amazing how they turn into moombas. I really enjoy that the elder's house has an aquarium that surrounds the room.

-The Shumi live in a unique way. The only reason they want you to collect rocks is so you appreciate their village. The elder shows you his hand, not because of vanity (not a "kiss the ring" moment), but because his hands have shoveled the earth and he wants to show you a symbol of his energy, passion, and hard work. It's a great concept. (Really they knew it was a handful of nothing, but they wanted to give you peace in thinking about it.)



-I'm doing the Chocobo Forests now, but sadly since I don't have a Pocket Station or the PC version, I won't be able to continue Boko's adventures in the Chocobo World. It would be nice if the forests showed up on the world map with a yellow dot after you found one.

-Winhill is one of the few places (along with the orphanage, and maybe the boy in the chocobo forest) that uses Centra card rules. Fortunately there is only a card or two to win that's rare so you might not bother with changing the card rules.

-It would be neat if the hole where Garden once was had a hidden draw point.

-Zell's Ehrgeiz weapon definitely has to be an homage to the Square fighting game of the same name.

-If you find Raijin in Balamb with the dog you get a full SeeD rank, you get less if you pester the guy in front of the train station or just generally waste time.

-Raijin won't hit a female if there are still male's standing.

-From what I gathered about the way Fujin talks in capital letters, essentially in the Japanese release she uses a unique/different kind of Kanji which cannot make grammatically correct sentences. And it doesn't translate well, so for some reason they went with caps lock. I figured she was yelling, but she doesn't in Kingdom Hearts, so it's likely just the way it was translated and not that she's angry all the time. Could be wrong, though.

-Taking a GF from an enemy removes a skill from the enemy as well, when you draw Pandemona from Fujin she loses her tornado ability.

-There are so many more optional scenes than I'll ever be able to keep track of. Having certain members in your party can net you different conversations in Garden if you talk to the inactive members in your party. For example Rinoa asks Zell about the book he's after in the library. I wonder how many combinations there are.

-If you try to revisit the Dollet communication tower, you can cross the bridge but two X-ATM092 block you from going to the actual tower, one of which hilariously falls off the cliff.

-I would have liked to see Trabia before it was nuked. I tried to look up some concept art in case they hadn't decided if it would be destroyed in the early drafts, but even the concept art is of a ruined Garden.

-The infamous orphanage scene. I actually think it's great that using GF had a real consequence. There's repercussions for being able to summon these large demons at will. They also explain how those lingering emotions from the past effect how Seifer and Quistis treat Squall.

-However, the only thing I can't defend is how Irvine knew all along but didn't say anything because everyone else forgot:

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-I think how well you've done in battle will determine what type of shot Irvine makes with the basketball.

-The message on the blue board in the 2F classroom changes periodically.

-Zell's little buddy the big bad rascal can give you a Spd Up. But it's another one of those random quests where you have to talk to the right person at the right time.

-The battle between both Gardens has some of the most epic cutscenes in Final Fantasy history. Airships ramming eachother, motorcyles flying from one to the other, that beat-em-up with the paratrooper while the cutscene plays behind you, running through a battlefield. It's a good thing you don't get a game over if you fall off that paratrooper, because I think I always lose the first time. Doesn't help they take off 30% of your HP at the start of a minigame you've never played before. It's still awesome.

-I really like that Angelo doesn't have to wait until the limit break to show up. Her random appearances are great, as well. Angelo was designed after an Australian Shepherd that one of Nomura's co-workers had during the game's production.

-As per other scenes in the game, the Seifer battle has different dialogue depending who you bring with you. I brought Rinoa and Irvine. He tries to convince Irvine to side with him since he's a Galbadian student, and with Rinoa he hits her with an "Et tu, Brute?".

-When I was young, for the longest time the fight with Seifer and Edea on disc 2 was the farthest I had ever gotten. I didn't know how to do junctions properly. Now all these years later, as my playthroughs have gotten better, I am able to get through this with relative ease and proper planning.

-Well, as far as discs are concerned, we've made it halfway. Thank you to everyone who has been reading and writing so far. I'm having a lot of fun with this.

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To elaborate on Fujin's talking, in the Japanese version she speaks only in kanji (for reference, Japanese uses three different writing systems: hiragana, katakana, and kanji) so her speech pattern is unique in the original script, but you lose out on her uniqueness when you translate it cause she technically talks normally and there is no English equivalent to this unique trait. Apparently some of the European translations did different changes to make up for it as well.

As an added fun bonus, Raijin and Fujin were originally created for FFVII but the devs decided there were too many characters and that the Turks largely fulfilled their role anyways so they were dropped. Edea has a similar origin as well by being a potential design for VII that was rejected. She was also Nomura's attempt at drawing someone in a style similar to Amano.

This is a really good thread

-Finished the Zell love quest. This can be kind of hard to do even when following a walkthrough, because sometimes there's just no one in the library when you expect them to be. You don't have to see every single scene to progress the story, but the reward is the same. Combat King 03.

-If you wait until disc 3 to scavenger hunt the dog's bone all around Dollet, the rewards are better. Upgraded potion to x-potion, etc.

-When you're talking to Cid and Edea, make sure to listen to every single thing they say until they repeat themselves. Otherwise you'll miss out on data entries for Esthar, Time Compression, and Hyne in the tutorial.

-Full credit for this next image goes to Nebezial at Deviant Art at http://nebezial.deviantart.com/ , please give them a look for some more great art:

Attachment 75842

-You'll only be able to spread and abolish rules if the place you're playing doesn't already have every rule you have. I learned that the hard way. Well, you can technically abolish a rule but you'll still have to play a few rounds to get the prompt. I went to Centra and all I had was open, which I guess I gave them earlier. So even if I go back to Balamb or Deling City to get those regions rules, it won't help me, because Centra for me already has open and same. I just decided to tough out random for the Edea card, as that's the only one of value now to me in Centra, anyway.

-When same plus is in effect, you have to change your entire approach to triple triad. Instead of looking for the highest number, your focus should only be on additions. 7+3 on two sides 4+6 on another side, etc. Don't worry if someone flips your card with a higher number, because your goal is just to add numbers. All the same, I'm glad to be out of this region.

-During the Trabia Canyon flashback, your team is Squall as Laguna, and then whoever you want. If you've played the game than this isn't anything new, but I'm keeping track. If you picked up the Timber Maniacs in the Shumi Village, Ward won't be here. For the record I picked Quistis (Kiros) and Selphie (Ward) since Zell and Irvine were in the last time.

-Laguna fighting the dragon for his movie is another awkward defend/attack minigame like the paratrooper. I'm really not good at these. But I ended up getting it my third or fourth time.

-Seifer was inspired to become a gunblade wielder by Laguna's movie, hence the reason they have an identical stance with a gunblade.

-The novice SeeD candidates who are always talking in the cafeteria are now in SeeD uniforms. I've talked to them enough to "complete the quest", which was essentially just dialogue.

-If you decide to give Zone the Girl Next Door magazine for free, he'll give you the Shiva card. On the other hand, if you're concerned about having the magazine as a one of a kind item, then wait until disc 4 to get the card. I just gave it to him.

-I've been taking notes the whole time to decide my GF ability order (most have learned the important ones), among other things, they look like this presently:

Attachment 75839-I love being able to use Edea. Maybe it's because it's only for a limited time, but her limit break is really cool and I like her look, and the little sparkle noise when the battle starts.

-Resistance flashback: Squall is Laguna, everyone else is whoever you want. I picked Zell (Kiros) and Irvine (Ward). At this point in time Edea has one third of my magic, so one of my characters is nerfed.

-Esthar is one of the more unique and futuristic cities in any Final Fantasy game. It's the type of place people talk about when they speculate on FF places they would like to visit in real life. It's very big and sprawling, and at times I wish I had a map, Tomb of the Unknown King style, where I could open it like the world map and an x says you are here.

-Your "Call Shop" list will never have a Trabia Shop, though the data is on the disc. If you were to hack your game to put the Trabia Shop in your list, it would just be a generic shop like Timber or Deling City.

-Off to Doomtrain land. The idea was that Occult Fan magazines were supposed to help here, but the translations made the hints kind of unintelligible.

-If the Lunatic Pandora passes through Esthar and you don't catch a ride, you just skip to the next scene, there's no penalty or game over. Though, it's important to get on at the first stop so you can get the items from the second Laguna flashback.

-I'm reminded of the limitations of our own technology when I see the space stations in video games and anime. You get shot in to space, literally like a bullet in a chamber, and the team slows you down and picks you up with invisible force fields. Places like these have me aspire towards greatness for our future just as much as any real life accomplishment.

-You should play Ellone for the Laguna Card before even talking to her, because once you talk to her in the Lunar Station, you don't have much longer.

-When Adel's trapped in space she kind of looks like an Aeon from FFX encased in glass.

Attachment 75840

-There's a bonus little cutscene showing the Lunar Station dangling in space if you examine the control panel after everyone has evacuated.

-Another nondescript minigame. I don't think I've ever caught Rinoa in space on the first try, I didn't quite get it. Vague directions about pointing the analog stick in her direction. But once you're able to finally land it, it's satisfying. Certainly the following scenes are, and finding the coolest airship in the series.

-If Edea is still junctioned when she leaves your party, the magic gets distributed among your other party members. If for some impractical reason all 6 characters are full, you're out of luck.

-Killing the Propagators by color combination isn't the only way to clear out your new ship. You can also just kill 25 of them randomly, but it's a significant use of time with little pay off.

-To this day, the Eyes on You scene on the Ragnarok still has magic. It still makes me happy to see that scene play out, and realize Squall is becoming the person he really needs to be. He can't be afraid of letting people in. Rinoa helps him see that loss is the risk you have to take in order to live a life with any meaning.

-Finders keepers. You find the Ragnarok floating through space, and it's no longer Esthar property. You found the keys in the cockpit, it's yours. This also makes flying to Shumi Village to draw Ultima much less laborious. As great of a concept as the flying Garden is, and as much as it feels like home, you can't beat the speed and efficiency of the Ragnarok. This is also my personal favorite airship in the series when it comes to design. Maybe not the interior, I'd have to think about that, but certainly the dragon exterior.

-If you return to Shumi Village after getting the Ragnarok, you get a scene where you can see the Laguna statue being finished. The master fisherman is there, as well. That may be dependent on whether you did the master fisherman quest.

Attachment 75841

-You could make a case that it wasn't a good idea for Squall to break Rinoa out of Esthar captivity. She has the powers of the sorceress within her, and your party's argument for freeing her is basically "She's our friend, let's go get her". As the player, we know our group can handle the danger. I'm personally in that long line of people who says hell yeah let's do it.

Attachment 75844

-Right after getting the Ragnarok is a great chance to go get not only the Cactuar GF, but to farm the cactuars in the sands for AP. You get high AP gains and little to no experience. Around this point in the game you'll have most if not all of your stat boosting abilities, so there isn't really a need to avoid battles now unless you want to.

-Finished getting my ultimate weapons. Quistis had the hardest to get, fortunately there's a fixed Elnoyle battle in Esthar that drops energy crystals. I think the malboro tentacles took a while to get just because you either have to mod 4 cards for 1 or find them rare in the wild, on top of needing the tentacles for Doomtrain.

-By the way, I pronounce the name Quistis with the Qwiss sound. Apparently if you go off the romaji it's Kisutisu, making it more like Kee-stis. Ain't nobody trying to hear that.

-Even though you can get Bahamut and Eden from the Research Center, it may be recommended just to get Bahamut your first time through, because if you defeat Ultima Weapon, the enemies of the area disappear. If you're not interested in the high level monster drops for a perfect playthrough or farming certain items, than go for it. I'd rather get Eden now.

-Using protect or shell while they're already active doesn't re-up their time, it just misses.

-Ruby Dragon's won't use their terrible "Breath" attack on you if one of your members is KO'ed.

-The Deepsea Research Center is also called Battleship Island. There's a Battleship Island in Japan, with an abandoned city named Hashima built around a coal mine. It went into decline after power plants switched to petroleum. There are ruined structures in both the real and game Battleship Island.

-I'm abandoning the Queen of Cards quest. Manipulating the RNG and running around to certain locations she chooses is way too much hassle just for the sake of getting 5 cards early. I've beaten the Card Club quest, and I'll be on to PuPu soon, so there isn't anything I'm really missing out on other than the sake of doing it. I've done it on previous playthroughs, so I'll let it go this time. I did however do most of the quest so I could manipulate rules in certain regions.

-Even though they explained why it's there for story purposes, it seems like a missed opportunity to not use that crater in Trabia for anything. Secret dungeon, hidden draw point, whatever.

-A nice Ellone concept sketch:

Attachment 75846

-I wish that AP carried over when you learned an ability. If you learn boost for 10ap, but your recent battle dropped 30 ap, you lost the 20ap. But in any case, I just got the last GF ability I needed to learn.

-There are a lot of similarities between Seifer and Squall. Headstrong leaders with insecurities, parallel scars, and by the end of disc 3, desperately wanting to be someone's knight against the world.

-I don't know if I ever really noticed this before, but Ward has a blonde beard in the present day.

-We never really find out what happened to Galbadia Garden after disc 2. Presumably it gets destroyed, and then you just never see it again.

-The FFVIII Ultimania explains that Ellone's powers to connect to people's minds is kind of like how the characters can equip a GF. The game explains how her powers work, but doesn't really describe how she got it. She just has it, which is believable that there's a unique person in a world where people already have supernatural powers like sorcery.

-Kiros mentions how Squall looks like his mother and not one person says "wait, what?"

-Talk about a life lived. One of the great things about playing as Laguna is that we get to go through his life. From a young soldier, to a journalist, doing odd jobs including movie star, and finally the Estharian President. (I'm coining the term, Estharian). We also get to see him lose and regain so much love.

-I made a second save right before the disc 3 fight with Seifer. This is our first point of no return, and I may want to go back to Balamb Garden after I finish the game to read Timber Maniacs or whatever else.

-It was a really nice touch to have Seifer's coat be tattered in this 3rd battle. Physical representation of wear and tear in a game where people don't change their clothes really helps. I've also elected not to get Odin until disc 4, so that he doesn't get taken out in this battle. You miss out on Gilgamesh, but Odin is stronger. However, I did get Gilgamesh on my last playthrough.

-This is an excellent rap, using the game's music and relevant lyrics. Have a listen. I was looking forward to posting this video more than any other because I really like it:



-And finally, we have arrived at....

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Isn't the crater in Trabia a UFO encounter point?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lord Golbez

Isn't the crater in Trabia a UFO encounter point?

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Nope. You do find one in the Trabia region on I think a peninsula but the final showdown with PuPu is the Balamb Garden crater.

-You could mug 8 Megalixer's from Rinoa when she's attached to Adel, but since she has to live in order to win the fight, an overpowered party might not want to take the chance. It's a good idea to draw regen from her and then cast it on her.

-People often mistake Adel as male, having a traditionally masculine torso (certainly for a 90's jrpg). However, the appearance of sorceresses change as they acquire their powers, such as Edea growing claws. Adel got her powers from Hyne directly and so her physical representation is a manifestation of all that energy and power. Even growing exceedingly larger and taller than a normal human. That's my take on it anyway.

-It's believed that the fight against Adel was meant to be the last boss of disc 3, but they ran out of space (or could potentially run out of space). Not only is Seifer a pushover, but it would also make it so that a sorceress is the last boss of every disc.

-I don't know if you hit R1 too soon if it messes up your chances to hit it again on time, I've never wanted to take the chance to find out.

-I really like that the fight against multiple sorceresses takes you through multiple battlefields used in the game. It's a nice representation of all the places you visited in the game and reminds me of how far I've come.

-I love that Ultimecia's Castle is in itself a puzzle to be solved. It's a nice twist on the typical end game dungeon, which could be a long area with hard enemies.

-Playing Left Diamond on Ragnarok will net you every single card in the game except PuPu. She uses Trabia rules, which fortunately for me, is only "open" thanks to the RNG manipulation I did earlier in the game. I'm gonna take some time to win every card I've either modded or didn't get in the QC quest.

-I beat Omega Weapon! I'm very happy about this because I've never beaten Omega Weapon before. In fact, I think it's the only thing I've never done in all my playthroughs. Unlike other encounters, Omega Weapon is fixed at lvl 100, so you're fighting an uphill battle when you do the low level playthroughs. I had to spam invincibility and limit breaks, and even then, I took it down on my last invincibility. Apparently in the Steam version, he levels with you like every other monster instead of being 100 no matter what.

-After Omega Weapon, Ultimecia was like a cake walk. I spammed Irvine's Pulse Ammo.

-That's the end, everyone. Another playthrough in the bag, and my first Let's Play, non traditional as it was. Time to wrap up my final thoughts.

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I started this thread on December 10th, and I started playing the game the next day. December 11th is my birthday, so that's another reason I wanted to start up a playthrough of my favorite Final Fantasy. As i'm writing this it's December 19th, so I beat the game in 8 days.

It was around 70 hours of game time. I got everyone's ultimate weapons, did the majority of the sidequests, and learned every GF ability. There are only a few things I didn't do.

I didn't beat the Queen of Cards sidequest. By the end of disc 3 I was so done with manipulating RNG. However, I feel like I can still check it off the list, since I did get the rest of the playing cards on disc 4 from the Card Club members.

One other thing I didn't get is the Shockwave Pulsar limit break for Quistis. I didn't have the foresight to get the 100 cursed spikes before the endgame, and at that point I didn't want to go to the Island of Heaven/Hell to farm them, especially because I knew I wouldn't use the limit break at that point.

Here are the 5 times you're able to control Laguna:

Timber Forest: Squall (Laguna), Zell (Kiros), Selphie (Ward)
Excavation Site: Squall (Laguna), Selphie (Kiros), Quistis (Ward)
Winhill: Squall (Laguna), Irvine (Kiros), Zell (Ward, off screen working at the prison)
Trabia Canyon: Squall and whoever you want
Esthar Resistance: Squall and whoever you want

Looking at the list I was surprised it was only 5 times. It always felt like more.

It's been a few years since my last playthrough, and it'll likely be a few more until my next one. I still enjoy this game as much as I ever have, and I'm glad I've been able to talk to people about it here over the years. Fingers crossed by the time my next playthrough rolls around, whenever that is, we'll be able to give it the current gen treatment like these other games are getting. I won't hold my breath for the HD remaster, but I'll settle for PS5 trophy support and a new coat of paint.

Thank again to everyone who has been following along. I probably won't do this with another game, but if you have any final questions or comments, I'll be glad to hear them. Otherwise, I'll finally get back to posting in the other areas of the forum, haha.

There's only one proper way to send us off.

You went through this game so bloody fast ! wtf ?! ^^;

Nah. Adel is a Behemoth. Fact.

It usually takes me about a week or so to play through this game if I’m not too busy.

This was enjoyable to read though. Thanks for the let’s play!

Yeah, if you know what you're doing, doesn't take long to finish one of these guys. Course I would have probably put in an extra twenty hours on Triple Triad on top of the CC Club and Queen of Cards quests, but I love that game to death. :love:

Anyway, this was a fun Let's Play and very informative. I even picked up a few tidbits myself so thank you for enlightening me.

He did say he put 70 hours into it, so I wouldn't say he breezed through it so quickly in time played (that's actually a pretty lengthy run) but rather only in how quickly in calendar time he put those hours it. A leisurely pace, where you aren't devoting hours to triple triad could probably be done in 40-50.

I usually ended up with somewhere around 80 hours or so in my playthroughs thanks to triple triad and stuff. I just loved the game so much that I’d still get through it in a week or two depending on how much triple triad I did. Of course, I was getting less hours at work the last time I did that. I might not be able to do it now.

I still have always wished that we could have actual triple triad cards in NA to collect. I tried collecting the FF TCG for a bit, but I always just wanted them to be triple triad cards.

I miss when we had triple triad on the forum. :(

Damn this was a fast LP ^^

On Adel, it made me laugh way too hard when I first saw on a youtube video that Gilgamesh can actually show up and one-shot Rinoa if you're unlucky. Kind of a case of poor design, but it's so rare that (hopefully) it's more funny than anything when it happens. Didn't know about those 8 Megalixirs though O.o definitely something I'll try to get next playthrough.

Yeah if you hit R1 at any time during Squall's lengthy run up to the enemy, you don't get a second try.

I feel like Squall choosing to break out Rinoa is a great conclusion to his character arc. After everything, deciding to embrace who he is and how much he really needs Rinoa, and taking that to its conclusion regardless of the danger it puts anyone else in, is pretty poignant. Goddamnit if only R=U was true and confirmed

I also like how Rinoa herself is left out of the equation there, as she should be. The choice to break out Rinoa is, in the end, entirely about Squall and his development and what he wants for himself, not about what he wants for her. If the game had gone down the route of him doing this for anyone other than himself, it'd have rung much more hollow. It'd have just felt patronizing at worst.

Ultimecia was a much harder boss before I figured out that her HP is already depleted when she starts speaking her lines and you only need to inflict single points of damage at that point. Before that I was like, how many Lion Hearts can this witch take !?

Congrats on beating Omega Weapon ^^ it can easily be one of the more fun superbosses in FF VIII.

If you really care to be a completionist, all I can say is on the PC version you can have Chocobo World running on the side all game. And due to the wonderfully poor coding involved you can get infinite items with ease; by far the fastest way to max out your stats.

I do like FF VIII a bunch. Squall is easily one of the better developed characters in the series, and the gameplay, despite being breakable to insanity, is still fun somehow. It gets pretty crazy, but where's the harm in that =P