LogFAQs > #926923981

It makes me sad that the little kid who jogs around the concourse of the Garden runs faster than Squall. Why must you make it so difficult for me to get your Mini Mog card? Oh well, I wait until I get the Ifrit card to start playing Triple Triad because the starting deck is pretty rough.

The game tells you what Squall's student ID number is exactly once, and it's a random Garden Faculty dude who refers to him as Student No. 41269. Yet I've always remembered what his number is because my birthday is March 4, the girl I had a crush on at the time's birthday was August 12, and 69, well, yeah. The things that stick in your memory when you're 13. It's kind of interesting that the faculty dude refers to Squall as "that problem child." I don't know if he's confusing him with Seifer or if it's just because Squall generally comes across as uncooperative, but most of the regular staff seem to think quite highly of him.

I like the stuff that random NPCs bring up that mean nothing to you the first time through because you know nothing about the world yet. This one dude in the library brings up the fact that no one seems to know what happened to the sorceress who used to rule Esthar. He chalks it up as, "I must have cut class that day," but there's more to this than meets the eye...! Also, it's funny that there's a magazine in the game called Occult Fan, and they have seemingly pointless anecdotes in them. However, they're supposed to be hints that show you how to summon Doomtrain later in the game.

Fun fact that I didn't learn until several years after the game came out: If you push O in the middle of a tutorial, you can just skip it. That's pretty handy because some of these tutorials can be pretty long!

I'm a huge FFVIII fan (obviously), but I'm not a huge fan of Blue Fields (the world map theme) or Don't Be Afraid (the regular battle theme). I think they're both on the lower end of the series in terms of similar themes in other games. Also, I used to have ATB set to "Wait" just to give myself time to make choices when I'm in the menu and whatnot, but man, it suddenly feels very slow (I guess modern games have spoiled me), so I just set everything to the fastest speed and set ATB to Active. I don't think I'll use any of the cheats just because I don't plan on grinding out levels or spells or whatever, but this game would definitely benefit from it more than most.

I do really like FFVIII's dungeon theme (Find Your Way). It's kind of a simple theme and blends into the background, but I think it enhances the exploration aspect of the dungeon and almost makes it easier to concentrate. I always set the time limit for the Fire Cavern to 10 minutes because your SeeD Exam score is based on how little time is left on the clock by the time you beat Ifrit. The closer to 0:00, the better.

I love that Squall and Quistis banter throughout the dungeon as you run through it. I wish the game did a lot more of it because I'm always in favor of more banter. Now while I said I didn't care for FFVIII's regular battle theme, the boss theme (Force Your Way) is another story entirely. That's a top tier boss theme. FFVIII has great boss themes overall, too. I like how, when you scan Ifrit, it says that because he's part of the SeeD Exam, he's not that difficult to beat. I also love his expression of shock when you summon Shiva against him. Also, part of me wonders if there's just an infinite supply of Ifrits for this exam, or if GFs are somehow really common and so it's easy for every SeeD to get one. Or maybe when SeeDs stop using a particular GF, they return to where they came from until someone else comes to claim them. I wish the game had explored this!
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