Balamb Garden in Final Fantasy VIII
Final Fantasy VIII was the very first Final Fantasy game I ever played, and I still regard it as my favourite Final Fantasy game. I remember the first time I played, it was at my cousins in Prince Albert. One of them was playing and I was immediately hooked, it looked like so much fun! They eventually let my sister and I try playing, and I absolutely loved it. I remember buying it shortly after we got home from that trip, and playing it into the wee hours of the morning for days afterwards.
The game starts out with the above opening before you get into any of the gameplay. Afterwards you find out that your name is Squall Leonhart, and that you and another student named Seifer had been training earlier that morning when you got injured. Squall and Seifer attend the military accademy, Balamb Garden, and are in training to become part of "SeeD", a group of mercenaries paid by the academy to perform various tasks around the world.
Zell
Characters
Main article: Characters of Final Fantasy VIII
The six main playable characters in Final Fantasy VIII are Squall Leonhart, a loner who keeps his focus on his duty to avoid vulnerability; Rinoa Heartilly, an outspoken and passionate young woman who follows her heart in all situations; Quistis Trepe, an instructor with a serious, patient attitude; Zell Dincht, a martial artist with a passion for hot dogs; Selphie Tilmitt, a cheerful girl who loves trains and pilots the airship Ragnarok; and Irvine Kinneas, a marksman and consummate ladies' man. Temporarily playable characters include Laguna Loire, Kiros Seagill, and Ward Zabac, who appear in "flashback" sequences, and antagonists Seifer Almasy and Edea Kramer.
Selphie
Final Fantasy VIII begins as Squall duels with Seifer in a training session outside the Balamb Garden military academy. Meanwhile, the Galbadian regime invades the Dollet Dukedom, forcing Dollet to hire assistance from the Balamb Garden branch of "SeeD", Garden's elite mercenary force. SeeD uses the mission as a final examination for its cadets; with the help of his instructor, Quistis, Squall passes its prerequisite and is grouped with Seifer and Zell. Seifer disobeys orders and abandons his team, forcing Selphie to accompany Squall and Zell for the duration of the mission. After the mission, SeeD halts the Galbadian advance; Squall, Zell, and Selphie graduate to SeeD status while Seifer is disciplined for his disobedience. During the graduation party, Squall meets Rinoa, whose personality is apparently the opposite of his. When assigned with Zell and Selphie to help Rinoa's Galbadian resistance, Squall learns that a sorceress named Edea is behind Galbadia's hostilities. Under orders from Balamb and Galbadia Gardens, Squall and his comrades—now joined by Rinoa, Quistis, and Irvine—attempt to assassinate Edea. However, the sorceress thwarts the attempt, and the party is detained. Squall's party also learns that Seifer has left Garden to become Edea's second-in-command.
Quistis
After the team escapes, Edea launches a missile attack on Trabia Garden. Fearing that Balamb Garden is the next target of Edea's revenge, the team splits into two units. Squall's group returns to Balamb to warn of the attack, but must first stop an internal conflict incited by NORG, SeeD's financier. Selphie's team travels to the Missile Base to stop the launch, but fails. Squall inadvertently turns Balamb Garden into a mobile fortress, allowing the facility to evade the missiles; however, he loses control, and Garden collides with the docks at Fishermans Horizon. While local technicians repair the Garden, Galbadians invade in search of a girl named Ellone, who had been staying at Balamb Garden until recently. Ellone eventually escapes to Esthar, the world's technological superpower. During Squall's meeting with Ellone, he learns that she had been "sending" him and his allies into flashbacks set seventeen years in the past in a vain effort to alter the present. The scenes center on Laguna and his two friends, Kiros and Ward. During the flashbacks, Laguna changes from a Galbadian soldier to the defender of a country village, and then from leader of a resistance movement against Sorceress Adel to president of Esthar.
Squall
Meanwhile, Squall confronts his personal anxieties fueled by ongoing developments, such as Headmaster Cid appointing him as SeeD's new leader, and his increasing attraction to Rinoa. While investigating Trabia Garden's wreckage, Squall and his comrades learn that they, along with Seifer and Ellone, were all raised (with the exception of Rinoa) in an orphanage run by Edea; they later developed amnesia due to their use of Guardian Forces. It is also revealed that Cid and Edea had established Garden and SeeD primarily to defeat corrupt sorceresses. After these revelations, the forces of Balamb Garden and the Galbadian army, led by Squall and Seifer respectively, engage in battle above the orphanage. After Balamb defeats Galbadia, the player learns that Edea is merely an unwilling tool for "Ultimecia", a powerful sorceress from the future who wishes to compress time into a single moment; it is for this reason she has sought Ellone. Edea loses a decisive battle against the SeeD, forcing Ultimecia to transfer her powers to Rinoa; Edea survives, but Rinoa enters a coma. Squall becomes obsessed with waking her and goes to Esthar to find Ellone, as he believes that she can help save Rinoa.
Rinoa
While Rinoa is being treated on Esthar's space station, Ultimecia uses her to free Sorceress Adel from her orbital prison. Ultimecia then orders Seifer to activate the Lunatic Pandora facility, inciting a rain of creatures from the moon that sends Adel's containment device to the planet. Having selected Adel as her next host, Ultimecia abandons Rinoa in outer space. Squall rescues her, and they return to the planet on a derelict starship. Upon their landing, delegates from Esthar isolate Rinoa for fear of her sorceress abilities, forcing Squall to rescue her. President Laguna apologizes for the incident and announces Dr. Odine's plan to let Ultimecia possess Rinoa, have Ellone send Rinoa (and thus Ultimecia as well) to the past and then retrieve only Rinoa back to the present, enabling Ultimecia to achieve Time Compression, as it would allow Squall's group to confront Ultimecia in her time. To do this, Squall's team infiltrates Lunatic Pandora, defeats Seifer and Adel, and has Rinoa inherit Adel's sorceress powers. Time Compression is thus initiated; Squall and his allies travel to Ultimecia's era and defeat her.
Ultimecia
With Ultimecia defeated, the universe begins returning to normal; however, Squall is nearly lost in the flow of time as he witnesses the origins of the game's story. When a dying Ultimecia travels back in time to pass her powers to Edea, Squall informs Edea of the concepts of Garden and SeeD that she will create. Afterward, he is able to properly recollect his memories and was able to regain consciousness and thus return to the present. The ending cinema depicts the events after Squall's return to the present. Seifer is once again reunited with Raijin and Fujin; Laguna visits Raine's grave (and recollects his proposal to her) along with Ellone, Ward, and Kiros; and a celebration takes place in the Garden, with Squall and Rinoa kissing one another under the moonlight.
Related Links
Final Fantasy VIII on Wikipedia
Final Fantasy VIII on FFOnline
Final Fantasty VIII on FFInsider
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