One Big Happy Chaotic Family

One big happy chaotic family ✨

So I welcomed another member into Final Fantasy Void BroTP, the Trash Uncle, Ardyn Izunia.  They are now an extremely chaotic gang. 

Nice! 👏👏👏

Of Zack Fair, Genesis Rhapsodos and the strange narrative POV of FFVII-Crisis Core (Part IIIa)

Part I: https://buffaloborgine.tumblr.com/post/650462647672766464/of-zack-fair-genesis-rhapsodos-and-the-strange

Part II conclusion: https://buffaloborgine.tumblr.com/post/653809930861674496/of-zack-fair-genesis-rhapsodos-and-the-strange 

_______________________________________________

Warning: Sincerely, this part takes on a very controversial route. Please read the previous parts first before reading further on this part. (I did have the link to part I in case you are new reader)

Also, please keep an open mind when you read this. I appreciate any kind of discussion about theories, but please, try to keep your bias out when we discuss on an objective subject. Thank you. 

_________________________________________

Before we get to the main problem of this part, let me introduce you to a term that maybe you have heard somewhere before: the Rashoumon effect. 

The Rashomon effect is a term related to the notorious unreliability of eyewitnesses. It describes a situation in which an event is given contradictory interpretations or descriptions by the individuals involved. 

This is a kind of effect that is used very frequently in detective stuffs, as a way to fool the audiences, driving them away from the main problem, the objective truth.

Why am I telling you about this? Well, in many Japanese stuffs, ranging from movies, books to games, no matter what the genre is, the Rashoumon effect is utilized to create plot twists. And of course Rashoumon effect is also used in FFVII as well. 

Take one example, the Deepground incident in Dirge of Cerberus. While Vincent and the WRO believed that Weiss is the one leading Deepground at that time, and we don’t even get to know the truth that Nero is the real leader of Deepground until Vincent and Yuffie finally barged in the throne hall in Reactor 0. It’s just one of the clearest example of the Rashoumon effect in FFVII. And if you have read the other parts of this theory series, you may see the pattern of Rashoumon effect in both events that I have pointed out: the Genesis’s parents’ grave and the Seven Wonders. 

So, let’s move onto our main problem this time. 

_________________________________________

The Mails. 

One of the strangest systems that occurred in Crisis Core, is the mail system, 

Zack can access the mails through his phone, along with many other systems like Materia Fusion, Equipment, Shop, DMW, Mission and some others. 

Problem with the Mails is that, reading one mail from one person may give you a contradictive information to the info you took from the mail of another person, and it even contradicts with the details you discovered in places around the game. Because mails are written according to the view point of the writers, will get confused with many info that the mails provide. 

However the worst problem with the mails is that Zack only receives the mails, he never answers them. We never see Zack point of view in this, which in turn, forcing us to use our own point of view to examine the information given by the mails. 

Here, I want to discuss the reliability of one of the most well-known CC mails: the 1sts’ fanclubs’ mails. 

Keepers of Honor 

Fanclub of Angeal, the group releases mails that provide “unauthorized” info about Angeal’s profile. While there is not much to take from the mails of Keeper of Honor, there is one particular mail we have to look into. 

“Angeal Fan Club Newsletter 313

Today’s update features a conversation between Angeal and Genesis.

G: You’d better do something about those plants in your room.

A: Those plants represent nature. Some of us converse with nature to hone our spirit and honor.

G: And some of us are getting bugs in our rooms because of those blasted things.

A: Come on. Don’t you remember? We used to have bugs in our rooms all the time when we were kids.

G: That’s why I hate them. And the past? It can stay there. We’re in Midgar. We’re not supposed to have nature here.

City-born Genesis, and nature-lover Angeal: so completely different, yet friends all the same.” 

Just when Zack came to Fort Tamblin with Angeal, Angeal told Zack about the dumbapple. And one those lines is: 

Angeal confirmed that Genesis, his childhood friend grew up with him in Banora. But in the mail above, the Keeper of Honor believes that Genesis is “city-born”. Although the word itself can be understood in two ways, one is “born in the city” and the other is “having city life style”, if you first read into it, you will immediately think that they mean Genesis is born in the city, which is not true, the other meaning may fit with the situation more, perhaps? So we could agree with them that Angeal loves nature and Genesis has a city lifestyle, thus, Genesis gets annoyed with nature, right? 

Guess what? When Zack found out Genesis’s diary, the info may get contradictive. 

Consider the fact that Genesis won an award for inventing the Banora White Apple juice, it means that he has to have a great love for nature, especially the apple trees and the fruit to actually spend time to invent a the juice. 

This info and Angeal’s confirmation contradicts with the info given by the mail from Keeper of Honor. This means the fanclubs’ mails themselves are just sources with medium liability, especially when the fanclub of one person wrote about a different person in the trio. Besides, the event described in the fanclubs’ mails may not even exist, because in Keeper of Honor’s mails, those are “unauthorized” Angeal’s profile. 

In conclusion, by not showing Zack’s replies to the mails to the players, Crisis Core forced the players to check the reliability of the mails given to Zack through their own perception, not everything written in the mails are true because they are affected by the POV and biases of the ones giving them out. 

I think that’s enough for the beginning of this part, we will continue on the other ambiguous mails in the next parts. Thanks for coming to my Ted-Talk and have a nice day. 

_________________________________________

Part IIIb: 

Of Zack Fair, Genesis Rhapsodos and the strange narrative POV of FFVII-Crisis Core (Part IV preface)

Part I: https://buffaloborgine.tumblr.com/post/650462647672766464/of-zack-fair-genesis-rhapsodos-and-the-strange 

Part IIIb: https://buffaloborgine.tumblr.com/post/655899595763859456/of-zack-fair-genesis-rhapsodos-and-the-strange 

_______________________________________

Warning: Again, I warn you, this series is very controversial, it may not fit with what you know or remember about Crisis Core. So please, read the former parts (I did put the link to Part I in case you are new reader) before putting your foot further down below.  P/S: I welcome all kind of discussion. I love discussion. But this subject is an OBJECTIVE subject, please make sure to keep your bias and prejudice out of discussion. Thank you. 

_______________________________________

The real matter at hand and why you didn’t realize it 

I usually compare the narrative of Crisis Core like a minefield and people just happily hug the mines while they go kaboom with them. 

In Crisis Core, the is a very big elephant in the room but most of the time, people forget that it exists.  So here I will give you some cutscenes and a mail that I will analyze later on the main writing of this part. These things are important but they are very short and people mostly don’t remember them, not not remember them exactly.  Remember to look carefully at each word used in the sentences and the way the scenes are laid out (even the motions of the characters), they may be extremely important. 

Exhibit 1: 

Exhibit 2: 

Exhibit 3: 

Exhibit 4: 

Exhibit 5: 

Like I said, these are very important stuffs, treat them carefully.  I will see you guys again, in the next part.  _____________________________________

Part IVa: 

1 week to go!!!

We are so excited for AeriSeph Week 2021 🤩🤩🤩

A theory on what (or who) is the cause of the time paradox/time distortion phenomenon in FFVII Remake (Part I)

Warning: It’s very long wall of words so take your time to read because this writing consists of the elements taken from other Final Fantasy titles and even spin-offs. Many details are taken from Final Fantasy wikia and from my own experiences with the games.  _______________________________________

Before we start talking about this subject, please ask yourself this question: 

“If you have the power to control time and space, thus making you a time traveler, but you only have one chance to time travel, when and where would you travel to? To an unknown future? Return to a point in the past where your best memory lies? Or to that point in the past that you made the heaviest mistakes so you can fix them? Remember, you only have enough power to do it one time.” 

If you take this problem seriously, yes seriously, I think you may choose the same to mine: to travel back to the point where you made the heaviest mistakes to fix them. Maybe it is not the same for all people, some may think they will move to the unknown future because they only have one chance to time travel, why wasting it on reminiscing the past, but if it’s to travel back to the past, I think many will choose to go back to fix their mistake rather than reliving a moment of memory. 

That’s the basic I took to write this theory. For many characters in a franchise, all have their own problems in the past, would they choose to begin again at a random point in their past, or would they choose to go back to fix their heaviest mistakes they made?  ________________________________________

Part I: The fundamental set up of Final Fantasy multiverse - Void

To be in a multiverse means that there rules that one realm has to follow. This is shown in Dissidia series, as all the realms of Final Fantasy multiverse are connected through the flow of a certain anti-matter, Void. The world of Dissidia, or World B, exists like a singularity connected to the Interdimensional Rift, which is basically a Void gate since the Void was cast into the Interdimensional Rift and expanded in it, as shown in FFV. As featured in many FF realms, Void is a very special type of matter, it exists beyond time and space and it flows in between the realms. Thus, people who got stranded into the Void if not totally lose themselves due to the nihilistic nature of it, may get the ability to time and space travel, they become rendered as existence beyond time and space, and is known as Dimensional Travelers.   The two most well-known Dimensional Travelers are Gilgamesh (first appears in FFV) and Shinryu (first appear in FFI): 

Void is not presented in all realms, it may exist in all the realms but only becomes a presented force in some of them. However, we need to look at the concept used to set up Void in Final Fantasy. 

Void (Aether/Emptiness/Nothingness) happens to have multiple definitions, depending on which category you fit it into.  In astronomy, Cosmic voids are vast spaces between filaments (the largest-scale structures in the universe), which contain very few or no galaxies. In other words, Voids are where you can’t find anything in it.  In general philosophy, we have the term “Nihilism”, is a philosophy, or family of views within philosophy, expressing negation (i.e., denial of) towards general aspects of life that are widely accepted within humanity as objectively real, with the root of word “nihility”, meaning “nothingness”.        In Godai, or Japanese Five Elements Philosophy, Void is of particular importance as the highest of the elements, it represents those things beyond and within our everyday comprehension, particularly those things composed of pure energy before they manifest; the emptiness that the energy is made up of. Bodily, Void represents spirit, thought, and creative energy. It represents the creation of phenomena. It can also be associated with the potential of power, creativity, spontaneity, and inventiveness. In Hinduism, Nirvana is a state of perfect quietude, freedom, highest happiness as well as the liberation from or ending of samsara, the repeating cycle of birth, life and death.

Throughout all the Final Fantasy realms, we see these concepts are used to build either characters, or phenomenon. Many antagonists have nihilism as their motivation, namely Exdeath (V), Kefka Palazzo (VI), Necron (IX), Seymour Guado (X), Caius Ballad (XIII) and Ardyn Izunia (XV). The representation of Void as a type of nothingness space exists in FFI, FFIII, FFV, FFVIII, FFXIII. And Void as an element is seen through out FF realms not directly but mainly through the element crystals: the four crystals seen in many FF realms are of Fire, Water, Earth and Wind elements, these are the four elements in Godai, in the rank of ascension: Earth, Water, Fire, Wind then Void. 

And then we have to look back at FFVII. Even if it looks distinctively different from most of the other realms, it is still a part of the Final Fantasy multiverse. Thus, there will be Void seeping into FFVII realm in a certain kind of form. 

The question is, where do you see it? And in what form?

- First of all, we need to look at the concept of Godai in FFVII. Like I explained above, Godai consists of five elements (with their correspondent colors) in the rank of physical and spiritual ascension: Earth (Black), Water (Blue), Fire (Red), Air (White), Void (basically multicolored or colorless, depends on how you think it is). Of course, listing it like this, where do you see these colors before? 

That’s right, it’s the colored Tsviets, Nero the Sable represents Earth, Azul the Cerulean represents Water, Rosso the Crimson represents Fire and Weiss the Immaculate represents Air.  

Even their designs fit in somewhat reversal to the four elements’ traits in Godai:  1. Earth: stability/stubbornness; holding ground and using strength and presence (source: strength) 2. Water: flexibility/emotionalism; defensive angling and footwork to overextend the attacker before counterattacking (source: power) 3. Fire: aggression/fear; using high energy attacks defensively (source: energy) 4. Air: wisdom/love; evasive, elusive methods that redirect attacks away from their targets (source: resiliency) We all know that Weiss is basically the strongest of the colored Tsviets, and he represents Air, the second highest in the chain of ascension. Even his name, Weiss, is pronounced as “Vice”, either means a very powerful thing, or that of a “person in second in command”. These details hinting the existence of someone above Weiss in the chain of ascension to represents Void. 

- Secondly, we need to look for the concept of nihilism in FFVII. In short explanation, nihilism is a kind of philosophy that deem existence as meaningless. In a positive way, it encourages finding values outsides of physical existence, but in a negative way, it is basically what it means.  It’s not hard to see where this concept could be around in FFVII, as we know in DoC online, Weiss told the Restrictor that “Aren’t you the one saying that death is always with you as long as you are a part of Deepground?”, which shows that his view on existence is trivial, to the point that it may be meaningless. We also see that all the colored Tsviets share the same motive, either that is endless battles (Azul) or that existence means nothing if you are not free (Rosso) or that existence is meaningless without your brother (Weiss and Nero), they all share the nihilistic view. 

- Thirdly, we can look for Void as a nothingness space. This is easy, as we already saw it in DoC, when Nero transported Vincent into an empty space known as “Oblivion”, well, basically “Oblivion” is a word associated to Void. Not even that. what we see in Intergrade implies that Nero’s darkness is actually Void, because with his movesets named, we get “Dark Matter”, “Abyssal Wings”, which is clear indication that it is related to Void more that just normal Darkness element. Not only that, Nero is the only character in FFVII up till now has the ability to “Spatial Shift”, which is one of the two powers Void can give, the other is probably “Chrono Shift”, but we don’t see Nero uses anything related to time, so we are sure he only receives Void power to a certain extend. 

- Lastly, let’s look at the concept of Nirvana. As stated above, Nirvana is considered to be a form of Void, where souls are freed from the cycle of birth and death to achieve perfect happiness and freedom. You may realize where this concept is if you played or watched FFVII OG, because it is the exact concept of the Promised Land.  “ …The Promised Land. So you want to know…? There is no one place called the Promised Land. That’s what I believe. No no, it does exist. Hmmm…… you can say that too. In other words, it doesn’t exist for us, but it did for the Ancients. The Promised Land is the resting place of the Ancients. The life of the Ancients is one continuous journey. A journey to grow trees and plants, produce animals, and to raise Mako energy. Their harsh journeys continued throughout their lives… The place they returned to after their long journey… Their burial land is the Promised Land. Huh? Supreme Happiness? I believe that, for the Ancients, it was the moment that they were able to return to their Planet. At that moment they were released from their fate, and gained their supreme happiness… At least that’s what I believe. I really don’t know whether or not it’s the truth now. “ - Elder Hargo at Cosmo Canyon. 

So, there you have it, FFVII does follow the rule of the FF multiverse as there is Void existing in it in many different forms.  And we know that Void is the matter that grant the ability to shift in space and time for the one that can command it. Remake and OG are probably two parallel timeline, existing in a time paradox, so if you think about it, Void must be taken into account for this phenomenon. 

The question is, who or what commanded the power of Void to create this time paradox? 

We will continue in the next part. Thanks for coming to my Ted-Talk. ________________________________________

Part II:  

Void bros.