The Aerith effect

[Trumpet Thief]

There were deaths in the Final Fantasy series before, but I think her's had extra impact because it was ...IN 3D!

[Jiro]

Agree. It seems like Aerith's job was to only make a emotional impact on the player and then die. She was designed to be the sweet, innocent but courageous Flower Girl that got sadly murdered. So Sephiroth could look more evil and make the player emotional and keep playing forward to CD 2.

Because nobody really mentions or raves about what impact she made while she was alive.

Well what was the point of the other characters then? Aren't they all intended to be a combination of actors in a narrative and vehicles for the player's progress? What good is a character if they have no point? I'd say being there purely to make an "emotional impact on the player" is probably the single most important trait any cast member has.

[Shorty]

the smurf are you guys talking about? She's famous because she died, yes, but she puts the cause and effect into main plotline for several of the events that happen. Meets Cloud, recruits him as her bodyguard. She's one of the ancient ones and is thus sought after. She gets kidnapped, Cloud has to go after her, and so on and so forth.

I'd say she's a pretty important part of the story. It's true that you don't realize how important she was until her death, but throughout the entire story leading up to it, she's pretty significant in a subtle way.

[Mercen-X]

Cloud is already sucked into a second job for AVALANCHE long before he meets Aeris. If she hadn't been in that church, Cloud would have seen Tifa carriaged into Corneo's mansion and he would have gone in and killed everyone (just like if Corneo doesn't pick Cloud which always pissed me off 'cause it was like, WTF was the point then? I'm fighting my way through anyway), they would have gotten back to Sector 7 and the plate would have come down. Tifa would have been the one sent to get Marlene out of the bar so it only would have been Barret and Cloud fighting Reno. Without Tseng flying up to gloat, the two of them would have had more time to get out and probably could have saved Biggs and Jessie along the way... maybe. Maybe even Wedge. The plate crushing 7 is a major push for the group to seek revenge. Despite their claim to the contrary, they are a terrorist group and would be motivated by emotion. Barret would likely ask either Jessie or Wedge (once recovered) to take Marlene out of Midgar while the others fought their way up the Shinra tower to rip them a new one. They still would have learned about Sephiroth and still would have met Nanaki. They'd simply have no knowledge of Jenova or the Ancients by this point, which would mean nothing... they're no worse off. Nope. Aeris lent nothing to nothing.

[Shorty]

Why would they need to go to Shinra headquarters if Aeris wasn't taken there then? They were a terribly disorganized terrorist group hiding in the shadows who wanted to simply blow up the reactors and avoid all other conflict and had no reason to outright confront Shinra unless they were forced to do so. Aeris being kidnapped forced them to do so.

[Jiro]

I suppose revenge for crushing Sector 7 might have been a plausible explanation for them to assault Shinra HQ in this alternate timeline, but I do agree that AVALANCHE is not the type of group to go on the offensive; instead, they would have targeted other reactors and slowly tried to cause hell for Shinra.

[Wolf Kanno]

Aeris was also important to the story because of the Gold Saucer date. This was an example of real player choice in a JRPG, where over the course of a game, a player's dialogue options eventually culminated in a scene that could be quite different. It also had an impact on the romantic situation of the rest of the game. If Aeris goes on the date, the rest of Cloud and Tifa's relationship looks like that of close friends. If Tifa was on the date, it seems like much more.

Not really when the dates all end up being the same scenario of all the characters calling Cloud out on his weird behavior making them all thematically the same. Not to mention that Tifa and Cloud smurf at the end of Disk 2 kind of sealing the deal of their relationship. So it equaled little more than one arbitrary event to cater to the shippers.

[Roogle]

I wonder sometimes how different the game would be if Aerith could be saved. Would Cloud and Tifa have developed a relationship? Would Aerith still find herself attracted to Cloud knowing about his personality problems?

[Wolf Kanno]

Honestly, I still feel Cloud would have wound up with Tifa. Aerith's dialogue in the date always sounded to me like she knew Cloud wasn't who he said he was and confirmation that she only really likes him because he reminds her of Zack whom she's still holding a torch for. I'm pretty sure had she lived to see the truth about Cloud she probably would have dismissed herself from the triangle and taken up more of a "big sister" role for Cloud and Tifa much like she has in the post VII Compilation material.

[Crop]

Not to mention that Tifa and Cloud smurf at the end of Disk 2 kind of sealing the deal of their relationship

Actually that's not totally true. I think dialogue choices up to that point slightly change the scene. In one it is implied that they had sex, in the other it's implied they just talked all night.

I also think Cloud and Aeris would have hooked up if she had stayed alive. Or at least Cloud and Tifa wouldn't have.

[Wolf Kanno]

I'm afraid the player choices don't alter the scene except the player's own perspective of it, but it has been stated by the team they smurfed and even toned the scene down to make it less obvious.

[Crop]

I'm afraid the player choices don't alter the scene except the player's own perspective of it, but it has been stated by the team they smurfed and even toned the scene down to make it less obvious.

Yes it does. After the scene I believe Tifa can either say something like "were you watching us" or "were you listening to us" to the rest of the team depending on choices made previously in the game.

EDIT: Here, I found this http://clerith.heliohost.org/LowAffectionHWAnalysis.htm

The scene is actually even more different than I thought depending on choices made.

[Wolf Kanno]

Well I'll be damned. Never noticed and the game script guide I checked didn't either it seems.

[Skyblade]

Ok, so I read that collection of articles. They seem to be written by a rather die-hard Cloud/Aeris fan, rather bluntly misinterpreting and misrepresenting things. My favorite being his comments on the Ultimania interviews, where the interview specifically discusses not only the risque nature of the scene, but also that they had to tone down the original version, which is something that he quotes, but completely forgets about when it comes to his analysis.

I also find it odd that despite the talk of the various requirements for the differing versions, there are no concrete requirements listed. No specific discussion points for the revealing of the information he says is needed, nor any required affection value to reach the "High Affection" ending.

Of course, there are screenshots that don't look altered, but even that doesn't tell if this is final game code or dummied out script. I'd prefer a source a little less biased and a little more scientific, thanks.

Also, this all belongs in the love triangle thread.

[maybee]

I always assumed that the way FF VII played out that Tifa and Cloud were official but you had a choice whether to have them get along together or not if you hated the idea of them being a couple, giving the player more choice and freedom into the storyline.

But then Case and Tifa and Advent Children and I got so confused and then stopped caring and then just shipped Cloud with Zack because they have a good relationship and good chemistry.

It's like SquareEnix wanted us to become crazy insane shippers that fought for their choosen pairing so we would still remember FF VII so they most likely tease us all on and give out hints on purpose. Meh it's all marketing tactics imo.

@ Shorty

Yeah but the point is no matter what Aerith did how how much impact she put on the storyline and the characters the only thing players and fans remember her is being stabbed by Sephiroth. Aerith could of fought Sephiroth in battle and won and then be killed by a monster, people would still only remember her for her death and her dieing.