My new hero – Zack Fair

I’ve been playing Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII on Wai Hong’s PSP for a few days now, and I clocked in at about 17 hours before finishing the game earlier this afternoon. I doubt most of you guys have played the original Final Fantasy VII (circa 1997) on PlayStation or the PC, but it has been agreed by gamers worldwide who have played the game that this particular RPG set the benchmark for future RPGs to come. And it introduced most of the gamers to the RPG genre, yours truly included.

And the attraction of this game lies in its masterful storytelling that drags players into the game right from the start, and its myriad of colourful characters with their unique personalities that has so much character development it could rival probably two novels worth of them. The spawn of a few games under the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII for its 10th anniversary, including Crisis Core, were more than welcomed for.

Crisis Core acted as an excellent prequel, and SPOILERS TO THOSE WHO HAVE YET TO PLAY FFVII AND ITS OTHER GAMES, it was sad to play through the game only to have the protagonist Zack Fair die at the end. :( Even though it was to be expected if you’ve played FFVII or watched Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children.

There was so much emotional attachment involved that plenty of other guys in a forum I frequented who’ve finished the game admitted that they teared or cried at the ending of Crisis Core, something they normally wouldn’t have done at movies or other games. That in itself proved that the Final Fantasy VII series has set itself worlds apart from other games – that no longer are games played through for their gameplay alone, they are played for the stories the players want to be told, like a child waiting to be told a bedtime story for the night.

I didn’t cry on finishing the game at last, but I felt this bout of sadness that bordered on depression that could only be cured by Wikipedia-ing the legendary FFVII series and watching some other movies. If Lord of the Rings is hailed as the pinnacle of movies and books, Final Fantasy VII is that quintessential game.

Here’s a picture of the characters of Crisis Core:

From left to right: Cloud Strife, Zack Fair, Aerith Gainsborough, Sephiroth.

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This is how my bed looks like since last week:

I think I may come off sounding proud saying this, but my trait of laziness really peaks here. I have a range of books from Business Statistics and Financial Accounting on the right side of my queen-sized bed – because no one sleeps on that side – as I study (occasionally) for my finals, and without clearing them up, I continue to sleep on the left side of the bed without clearing the books away, calculator and pencil box included wtf.

Yes I’m very, very lazy. Spot that Macroecons course guide book on the left side of my bed which has been there since last week as well. >_>

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Oh yeah, also caught Iron Man in the cinemas on Saturday night after the whole missing brother commotion. Belanja some of them who could come like Heng and Wai Hong (and some yang langsung takde kaitan lmao like Ding and Andy) who helped me search for my bro at McD’s Summit, and then off we went to catch the 7.25pm movie.

It was damn good – I wouldn’t have suspected the slightest bit that it could turn out nice ‘cause its trailers were really awful and put off-ish.

Later that night Andy dropped us off at Ding’s house, where Wai Hong and I played with Ding’s kittens for a while (the darned mother cat gave birth for the 3rd time again wtf) before setting off to my house to pick up my Japanese homework and then to Shawn’s, for our weekly do-Japanese-homework event. And WH helped us with our Japanese homework a lot, some of which we didn’t learn as detailed as he taught us.

But the next day our Japanese class was cancelled as there was an MCA meeting at our designated class venue.