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I got this idea from a thread over in FFVI...

So, what strange references found in Square games to other things do you know of? Here are a few right off the top of my head...

In SMRPG, a Toad says, "I'm shaken, but not stirred!" A reference to James Bonds preference for his drinks. (a half day later, I realize my bad rhyme)
In FFVI, there is at least one reference to Star Wars (Biggs and Wedge in Japan) and the Three Stooges (from Cyan's dream). Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk!

There are so many more, I'm sure. Please post the ones that you know. Please do NOT post ones that have already been posted.

This post has been edited by Figaro on 24th December 2003 19:56

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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;

there was already a similiar thread to this involving character names
ohhh well here is one

in final fantasy tactics the corruption of the church is actually based off of an historical event, inwhich the church was dominating the world(through false religous information), and extorting money from peasents. see basically they lied to the people because they couldn't read latin, inwhich back then all bibles were written in latin
*the book given to ramza on St. Ajora beibg a false prophet(similiar references)

-so basically the church became corrupt, and the corruption didn't start to stop until the memorable Martin Luther.

another wierd tie-in exept this time with world history(mainly europe)

(and toad is not made by squaresoft he is pure nintendo)

Moderator Edit

Way to oversimplify a complex situation to make it fit into your theory, CS510. Any similarities between the Roman Catholic church and Glabados do not really go to say that the game was "based on historic events." Obviously the "corruption" of which you speak is because the pre-renaissance clergy were possessed by demons. Oh, and Toad is a Nintendo creation, and in Figaro's example he is in a game MADE BY SQUARE. Time to start thinking before you speak. - R51

This post has been edited by Rangers51 on 24th December 2003 14:22

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"Have you ever seen a baby do that before?"

My personal favorite is the reference in FFII to FFI. In some town or other, I forget which one, you can talk to a woman walking around and she says, "Light warriors, revive the power of the Orbs!" To which Guy says, "Shut up." Never fails to get a giggle out of me.

R51 covered a lot of what I'd have said with his reply, but on a similar note, it's not even as if the creators had something like that in mind when they made the game. You seem to forget the "church dominates the world/town/area but is actually controlled by an evil force" is a console RPG cliche and Tactics wasn't the first to do it by far.

The Japanese are largely hostile to Christianity (not taking kindly to Westerners attempting to convert them), particularly the Catholic church, so often this comes up in games. In many cases, the offending video game religion seems to have symbolism similar to the Catholics.

On a similar note, Xenogears took the EVA route and jammed a bunch of religious symbolism in for the heck of it.

Mario RPG has tons of references. Link sleeping in an inn, Samus makes a cameo, there's FF music when you fight Culex, Luigi is mentioned a lot despite being left out of the action, and of course there's the Axem Rangers. 8-bit Mario, Donkey Kong style enemies, etc. It goes on and on.

This post has been edited by AndrewTS on 28th December 2003 05:25

This is not exactaly a weird reference, depending on how you look at it. It's so stupid, IMO.
In Kindom Hearts (a co-production of Disney and Square), a lot of the bosses are characters from various Final Fantasy games. Well, not THAT various, but to my knowledge, you fight Squall (conveniently named "Leon" in KH, named for his last name, Leonheart), Yuffie (FFVII), an uber-deformed Cloud, and, well, take a look:
Kingdom Hearts Site
Go to 'Game Info' and then 'Characters' and then 'Guest Characters'. I think that all those are FF character cameos (I haven't played 9 or 10, so I don't know If they all are...).
There's also Sephiroth (FFVII) in there, too, even tho they don't show him there.

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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;

How about the relationship between Gogo (FFVI) and Adlai Stevenson?

Then there's the similarity between Kefka's final form and

Possible spoilers: highlight to view

Lucifer.

And I've heard a lot of textual allusions like the "shaken, but not stirred" line mentioned above. Can't seem to remember any right now but...oh yes, I read of a line about "Neither cloud nor squall shall deter us" or something like that in FF8 or 9, I think.

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Check the "What games are you playing at the moment?" thread for updates on what I've been playing.

You can find me on the Fediverse! I use Mastodon, where I am @[email protected] ( https://sakurajima.moe/@glennmagusharvey )

In the Secret of Evermore, Cecil (from FF4j) owns one of the armor shops. If you say that you have heard of him he gives you a discount.

Names of characters, locations, items, etc, are all linked to legends, history, semantics, science, pop culture, etc.

Quote (AndrewTS @ 26th December 2003 23:12)

The Japanese are largely hostile to Christianity (not taking kindly to Westerners attempting to convert them), particularly the Catholic church, so often this comes up in games.  In many cases, the offending video game religion seems to have symbolism similar to the Catholics.

Not true. Christianity has fad-level popularity in Japan, and they throw in crosses and things everywhere they can in video games and anime.

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"I had to write four novels before they let me write comic books."
-Brad Meltzer

Quote (Dark Paladin @ 30th December 2003 02:35)

Christianity has fad-level popularity in Japan, and they throw in crosses and things everywhere they can in video games and anime.

and apparnetly, a shopping mall crucified santa this christmas...


And as for the 'Neither cloud nor squall shall deter us' thing...

Possible spoilers: highlight to view

thats at the very end of FF9, during the play at the end, one year after the game IIRC. second most upsetting ending ever cos it turns out Hes not dead after all...

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"Only the dead have seen the end of their quotes being misattributed to Plato."
-George Santayana

"The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here..."
-Abraham Lincoln, prior to the discovery of Irony.

I always thought that in the second tier of the final boss of FFVI, one of the gods looks like Jesus on the cross (the middle one).

Possible spoilers: highlight to view

Terra's speech to Kefka has religious relevance as well.

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FFXI (Siren server)
Tauu the Windurstian Tarutaru!
White Mage & Paladin

don know if anyoens mentioned this but at the calmlands of FF10, i belive a conversation mentions high summoner Galuf...

Which i intially misread as Gandalf, leading to a mental image of a character yelling "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!" at Sin...


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"Only the dead have seen the end of their quotes being misattributed to Plato."
-George Santayana

"The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here..."
-Abraham Lincoln, prior to the discovery of Irony.

"Macarena Temple" - Tidus in FFX

"Game over man. Game over!" - Yuna in FFX2, quoting the movie "Aliens"

I, however, don't think "Weird References" is such a good topic. It doesn't need the weird because a reference is just a reference. If we were to get into the mythological references that DP is talking about this topic would give an encyclopedia a headache. Midgar in FF7 is Midgard from Norse Mythology (were the gods live, and there was a serpent closeby there too). Shiva is actually a male Hindu god but it sounds like shiver (get it?), and so on and so on. I looked at DP's link and it seems to have it all (or close to), and I'm so happy: I finally understand what Ragnarok is. My mythology book is vague about it and doesn't put it in the glossary.

P.S. More examples - Excalibur, Phoenix, Claymore, Quetzalcoatl, Odin, Raiden, Titan etc. etc.



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Get me off this Disciplinary Committee so I can play any FF except for FF8!!!

There are literally tons of mythological allusions: Fenrir, Ragnarok, Zeus's Rage...I don't want to go into that many, partially because I don't think they're the most interesting of the references.

But I would like to know where some of the names came from, such as Golbez and FuSoYa (FFIV).

And a comment about names: Has anyone thought of the relationship between the name Cyan (FFVI) and the chemical (or rather, anion) cyanide (CN-)?

Possible spoilers: highlight to view

He does see his country, his king, and his family killed by poison, and cyanide is a deadly poison, and also, he's supposed to be a deadly force with his amazing (well...depends on if you can wait) sword techs.

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Check the "What games are you playing at the moment?" thread for updates on what I've been playing.

You can find me on the Fediverse! I use Mastodon, where I am @[email protected] ( https://sakurajima.moe/@glennmagusharvey )

Speaking of Cyan's name, Cayenne pepper's name sounds similair . You say that the same way, right? That would explain... absolutely nothing. But still something to take into consideration.

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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;

I remember in FFIX Zidane made a reference to Cloud in the weapons shop in Lindblum. I am not sure what he exactly said but it was something like, "Hmm I know a pointy haired guy who used to carry a sword like this". Also I think in FFVIII they made a reference to Cloud again but I am not sure where.

Also I love the scene in FFX-2 after you go back to the Celsius from the Farplane and Shinra is talking about a way to absorb the energy from the Farplane to power the world. Hmmm Shinra where have I heard that before...oh yeah FFVII. Its funny how excited Yuna and the others got when he told them (until he said it would take hundreds of years)....if only they knew

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War is for the participants a test of character; it makes bad men worse and good men better. - Joshua Chamberlain

U sir R a n00b >:-( - Cactuar

Figaro: Funny you should say that; in my version of FFVI, his name is Cayenne, not Cyan. And no, they're not pronounced the same way: Cyan is pronounced with a soft S-sound and rhymes with "my fan", and Cayenne is pronounced with a hard K-sound and rhymes with "my den". Heh, it's times like this I wish I could use my International Phonetic Alphabet font online.

Quote (Glenn Magus Harvey @ 2nd February 2004 18:30)

he's supposed to be a deadly force with his amazing (well...depends on if you can wait) sword techs.

Cyanide takes a few minutes?

Cyan is a blue color (like the armor). I don't know what his link to Cayenne pepper woud be. It's not like his personality could be compared to anything spicy or such.

Quote (BGrugby @ 2nd February 2004 21:17)

Also I love the scene in FFX-2 after you go back to the Celsius [...]

Is that an airship? In Bahamut Lagoon, the airship's name is Fahrenheit.

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"I had to write four novels before they let me write comic books."
-Brad Meltzer

How abotu thsi for odd? in FF8 *spits and washes mouth out with soap*

Possible spoilers: highlight to view

Raine says 'use proper English speaking to ellone!' to Laguna t the start of Disc 2. BUT there IS no England on that world, so where the hell did English come from?!

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"Only the dead have seen the end of their quotes being misattributed to Plato."
-George Santayana

"The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here..."
-Abraham Lincoln, prior to the discovery of Irony.

In the original Final Fantasy game in the Elf town, you can find a grave with the name "Link" on it. It had to be changed in the original release, but in Origins, it still has Hyrule's hero's name on it.

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Love and Peace- Vash, the Stampede

If Life kicks you long enough, eventually he'll get tired and walk away- Drew Carry

Heh, that's pretty darn cool, i4v.
When I was playing FFIX, I talked to this old geezer in a town called Lindblum. Here's a screenshot:

Why is his name Locke?

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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;

Quote (Figaro @ 7th February 2004 19:06)

Why is his name Locke?

It's probably not a reference. Locke isn't really into any technology (Not like Edgar or any of the Cids), and if it were a reference to the VI Locke, he should probably be in the Theater District (Tantalus hideout).

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"I had to write four novels before they let me write comic books."
-Brad Meltzer

Locke is in the Business District in this screenshot, and since he's a theif, he'd be stealing from the various shops. Even in his old age!
Of course, he would need a hideout, which is in the Theatre District. Hmmm...

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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;

Just found this one today. In Secret of Evermore, in the colloseum, you're introduced along with the opponent.

But wait...who's that in the audience?


This post has been edited by Neal on 12th March 2004 03:15

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Hey, put the cellphone down for a while
In the night there is something wild
Can you hear it breathing?
And hey, put the laptop down for a while
In the night there is something wild
I feel it, it's leaving me

Is that Relm, Mog, Vargas, Strago, Terra, and Umaro?

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Check the "What games are you playing at the moment?" thread for updates on what I've been playing.

You can find me on the Fediverse! I use Mastodon, where I am @[email protected] ( https://sakurajima.moe/@glennmagusharvey )

I think it is actually Locke, Mog, some little girl (not Relm), Strago, Terra, and Umaro.

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Wow. 1,000 posts.

I miss you all now that I'm in boarding school! ;_;