Over a year ago, we left our blocky heroes in a rather tight spot. They broke into the Shinra building to rescue Airhead, got caught, and then got loose when someone or something mysteriously murdered all the guards. In the meantime, they heard a lot of mumbo-jumbo about the Promised Land, the Cetra, Neo-Midgar, Sephiroth, and Jenova. It made about as much sense as Squall having sex with a woman.
On the 67th floor, the party follows the rather magenta-colored blood trail past Jenova’s ominously empty boob container, up the elevator, past more dead scientists, and up the stairs. I’m not sure if the blood is supposed to be from the rather…incomplete Jenova as she was dragged up the stairs, or from the trail of NPC carnage. Though all the Shinra peons were brutally murdered, somehow all the random monsters in the place survived. The blood trail leads up a curving set of stairs to President Shinra’s office. I’m sure he and Jenova had a nice, friendly cup of tea together, reminiscing about old times and no one got killed at all.
The camera view changes so that we get a decent shot of President Shinra’s desk, as we head straight into a cut scene. A purple and yellow blob sits atop the desk with a line of pixels sticking out the top of it. I’m pretty sure that back in the day I figured out what it was. But with the jaded eyes of a gamer in 2004, I can’t imagine how the fuck I did so. The graphics of this game hold up about as well as FFX-2’s plot. I won’t keep you in suspense — the vague blob is, in fact, President Shinra, slumped over, with a sword sticking out of his back. Gay Lion and Mr. T run in just in time for Mr. T to explain just what the fuck is going on: “He’s dead… The leader of Shinra, Inc. is dead…” And for once, we really do need the explanation.
It’s a purple slug humping a ladybug…no, it’s a duck with a yellow butt and purple head!
Tita runs around to get a closer look — the graphics are so shitty, even she can’t tell what it’s supposed to be. “Then this sword must be…!?” she exclaims. “Sephiroth’s!!” Bitch finishes. So in addition to being a brilliant and famous member of SOLDIER, as well as the killer of Tita’s dad, Sephiroth is also a guy with a uniquely identifiable sword who just leaves it in one of his victims. Unless he’s got a whole closetful of swords just like it. The pieces are all falling into place. “…Sephiroth is alive?” Tita wonders brainlessly. If you’re smart like me, you’ve probably said (possibly out loud to these fictional characters), “Yeah, if Sephiroth is the only guy who can possibly use that sword.” This is most likely uttered in a completely sarcastic manner. But according to Bitch, Sephiroth is the only person in the world who can use that particular sword. No, really. Now, before any fanboys shoot me off a wank-filled e-mail about how Sephiroth’s sword is ungodly long, and by association, their own penises are also impressive because they like this game — I know. About the sword part of that equation anyway. But I still stand by my assertion that this is a silly way to determine whether or not someone is alive. It’s a moot point anyway, since Sephiroth is alive, but still.
Mr. T the freaking brain surgeon announces that the Shinra Corporation is finished. Because I’m sure that the entire company rides on this one guy, and there are no contingencies in place for his death since everyone figured he would live forever. Just then, a face peeks around the corner of the desk. It’s the gay little troll, Palmer, and his desperate attempt to flee is thwarted by the much larger Bitch and Mr. T. It turns out that Palmer witnessed the entire bloody event. Indeed, it was Sephiroth, who Palmer saw “with [his] own eyes.” Which kind of makes that whole positive identification via sword doubly lame and unnecessary. Bitch is skeptical, in spite of, yes, the lame sword identification he did a few moments ago. God damn this game.
As opposed to seeing him with someone else’s eyes.
Palmer heard everything, too. “Um, he was saying something about not letting us have the Promised Land,” Palmer recalls. “Does that mean that the Promised Land really exists and that Sephiroth’s here to save it from Shinra?” Tita pulls out of her ass. “So he’s a good guy then?” Mr. T duhs. These people have the intelligence of an earthworm. Bitch scoffs at these assertions, as he knows all about that meanie Sephiroth, who, like, totally made fun of his hair back in the day. “It’s not that simple! I know him! Sephiroth’s mission is different!” Bitch insists. I wait for him to enlighten us, since he knows all this shit, but now I’m just being silly. At that moment, Palmer squeezes out of their grip like a greased pig and runs off. Probably to eat, because he’s fat.
A helicopter appears at the window. Mr. T, unlike the rest of us, recognizes it. “Rufus! Fuck! I forgot about him!” Rufus is, as Mr. T has to explain to the clueless Tita, President Shinra’s son and the Vice President of the company. I don’t know who’s dumber — Tita, a member of AVALANCHE who didn’t know who the fucking Vice President of Shinra was, or Mr. T, who did know and still thought there was no one to take the President’s place. That’s like asking if Squall or Link is gayer.
Outside the window, we see Palmer’s little blocky form running toward the helicopter. He made it all the way out there in, literally, five seconds. Who would have thought that tubby little gnome was a world record sprinter? I have control of Bitch again, and take the opportunity to talk to my moronic party members. The ones who have actually heard of Rufus (which is everyone but Tita) give me all the juicy gossip. According to Airhead, he’s a badass non-crybaby, non-bleeder. Sort of a Not!Tidus, if you will. Mr. T informs us that Rufus has been out of town for an indeterminate period of time. And Gay Lion, bless his clueless heart, only knows Rufus’s name. Well, that’s one step up from Tita, anyway.
Instead of doing something sensible, like getting the fuck out of there while everyone’s distracted, Bitch elects to follow Palmer’s path out to the deck to check this Rufus guy out. He might be dreeeeeeamy. The team finds Rufus getting all the dirt from Palmer, who confirms that Sephiroth was indeed there. Once again, he leaves out the reason he managed to survive. But never mind sense! We need our exposition!
Rufus looks like a blocky version of Seifer, down to the orangy blond hair and grayish whitish long coat. In fact, it’s quite obvious that Rufus was Seifer’s immediate ancestor, so he is now ProtoSeifer. Whether or not he shares the same attraction to the main character remains to be seen. And quite frankly, I’d much rather see the attraction between Squall and Seifer. Blocks just don’t do it for me, which sets me apart from 99% of the fangirls out there.
ProtoSeifer wants to know who the blond unicorn man, giant one-armed black guy, ho, Mary Sue, and gay orange lion are. He’s probably happier not knowing. For some reason, they all oblige him, listing their exact occupations one by one. “What a crew,” ProtoSeifer snarks. Hey, he’s not that bad. Unfortunately, he tries too hard to be badass. He announces that he is now the President of Shinra as he twitches his blocky arm and head. I think he’s supposed to be flipping his hair effeminately. “You only President, ’cause yer old man died!” Mr. T screeches. Dead silence. Well….yeah. Fuck, this is supposed to be an insult?
ProtoSeifer is unperturbed. He randomly decides to let this random group of strangers hear his “new appointment speech.” I’m sure it will be full of flowers and bunnies and pixies. As he delivers this grand speech, he walks up to each of them in turn, which is probably supposed to be uberkewl. Unfortunately, when a group of blocks moves over to another group of blocks…well, I guess you could say it loses something.
ProtoSeifer says that his “old man” (God damn you, Tidus) was into controlling the population using money, which worked well enough. Everyone figured that Shinra and its army would protect them from the big bad terrorists and their weapons of not-so-much mass destruction. “It looks perfect on the outside,” he says. “But, I do things differently.” This is where the bunnies and the kitties come in, right? Right? Alas, it appears that ProtoSeifer isn’t about to turn Shinra into a shiny happy corporation. Nope. In his exact words, “I’ll control the world with fear. It takes too much to do it like my old man.” Not only is this kind of non-threatening coming from a blocky sprite or a girly man (take your pick depending on how much you can look past the graphics), but it doesn’t make much sense. But I’m getting stuck on those pesky things like “sense” and “believable motivation” and missing the fact that we’re just supposed to think ProtoSeifer is an intimidating and bad dude. Yeah. Not in that outfit.
Tita comments that ProtoSeifer, like his dad, is all about the longwinded speeches. Bitch suddenly remembers the reason they came to this dumb building in the first place, and orders Mr. T to get Airhead out of there. “What?” Mr. T morons. “I’ll explain later! Mr. T! This is the real crisis for the Planet!” Bitch wanks. So this pretty boy is a dire threat, but for some reason you send away one of your better fighters. Mr. T is confused. Not that that’s a surprise, with his IQ in the double digits, but at this point I can’t blame him. Bitch assures him once again that he’ll get the full scoop later. Which means nothing, as any explanation in this game is about as useful as a vagina in an orgy of video game males.
‘And by “take care” I don’t mean that I’ll do it with him. Really. Why are you looking at me like that?’
Apparently “Mr. T, get Airhead out of here” means “Everyone, leave now so that you in no way will improve my chances for winning this battle.” As the blocky figures of Bitch and ProtoSeifer face off against each other, the action follows the rest of the party while they make their grand escape. They head down the set of curving stairs to level 69 (HURR HURR), where Airhead airheads, “Bitch…I just thought of something.” From this statement, we would undoubtedly conclude that Airhead has just thought of something, most likely to do with Bitch. A proper response from the other characters might be to ask her what it is, or perhaps to tell her that it has to wait until they’ve escaped. But I’m just being naïve and silly. The proper response, according to the game designers, is for Tita to announce, “…I’ll wait for Bitch! Everyone, get to the elevator!” The only explanation I can think of is that Tita is once again threatened by any mention of Bitch from any woman other than herself. And if the world were fair and just, this dipshitted obsession with Bitch would end up getting her killed in this instance.
The real motive behind this nonsensical exchange is for us to reduce the party membership by one, thus leaving us with a valid battle party. In case we didn’t realize this, Airhead reminds the party to check up on their equipment and materia. I then get a menu that allows me to remove the materia from Bitch and Tita. Since I can’t usually mess with materia for party members that don’t show up in the menu, this means that while this ability is very convenient for the upcoming battles, it really makes no fucking sense. Can you imagine that?