i first got into final fantasy when ff8 came out. i'd bought it after a breif play of 7 when i rented it, and not finding a copy of 7 in a store, i bought the newer one. i'd been intrested before in petrification, but little media i had found depicted petrification. being an idiot of course, i'd just leapt into both games not really paying much attention, then through trial and error i managed to eventually reach disc 2 on ff8 at where your party splits. i sent quistis and zell off with selphie, and rinoa and irvine with squall. it was there i fought a glacier eye, levelled enough to use petrify stare on squall...
garden was in chaos. the good news was it seemed quistis, zell, and selphie had done it and stopped the missiles, but the bad news was that for some reason garden had become a battlefield. all squall, rinoa and irvine knew was the faculty seemed to be looking for cid and students were fighting in the corridors as a result. squall needed to find cid as well though, and the only choice was to sometimes get caught up in the fights to try and search for cid. it wasn't a problem though, as the faculty seemed to prefer to use tamed monsters to attack rather than students on their side.
they had reached the quad to see if cid might have been there. he was not, but a member of the garden faculty was.
'some of cid's followers? die!' the faculty member shouted. squall wondered how with an approach that seemed to be attack first ask questions later the faculty even had any student supporters at all.
the faculty member stood back as his bomb and glacial eye moved forward.
'take out the bomb first. if it explodes it'll wreck the quad.' squall instructed. irvine didn't need to be told twice and rinoa didn't hesitate to ready an ice spell. the bomb found itself being shot, frozen, and stabbed before it even thought of blowing up. it was thinking of it now though as it had survived the attacks.
'what about the other thing?' rinoa quickly asked. the other thing had taken a swing at irvine and had been kicked away harmlessly.
'ignore it, it's not as dangerous as the bomb. it just has weak attacks and lower level magic.'
rinoa nodded and used another ice spell, trusting squall to be right. the two seed and one forest owl combined their attacks on the bomb, that caused the creature to fall to the ground dead.
'now we can kill the glacial eye.' squall said, stepping back to get a run up to charge the creature while irvine reloaded his gun.
squall charged, and saw the creatue move like it was about to cast a spell. but then its eye glowed and squall breifly remembered what a higher level glacial eye could do. a petrify stare. he felt himself almost instantly turn cold and stop moving. he had been petrified.
'squall!' rinoa shouted in surprise. she had heard of petrification but she had never seen it happen.
irvine was a seed though, and knew that it was ultimately harmless if someone was there to turn you back. the glacial eye was soon to find out that being shot in the eye was not harmless and was in fact fatal. the faculty member ran off, leaving a dead bomb and glacial eye behind as well as a petrified young seed leader.
'what do we do?' rinoa asked. irvine smiled.
'we use a soft of course. just don't stand in front of him when he turns back.'
as irvine had predicted, squall ran forward slightly before stopping. he looked around the quad.
'well, nothing looks damaged.' he said. just then, three seed dropped down from the rafters. they had assumed squall was on the headmaster's side and were merely double checking...
~~~~~
i then managed to get a copy of ff7 after finishing 8, and this time i went in actually reading the manual and tutorials properly. but i also didn't level up, simply moving through the game. it meant that i was struggling through boss fights, and somehow it meant i wasn't doing much harm to enemies. it meant in the jungle part of gongaga where you fight little frogs and larger lizards, my party was in a little trouble. in this case barret was frogged and the timer on him ran out because i had no softs.
cloud knew what the small frog creatures of gongaga were. they were called touch me's. a strange joke clearly as touching one meant you would be turned into a frog. and cloud hated that status change. at least with mini you had magic other than toad to cure yourself or even fight back, but as a frog, you could only weakly hit the enemy or cast toad.
he didn't imagine they would be a problem if they avoided ambushes, but they hadn't. two touch me's and a gagihandi, a large lizard creature that seemed to help the frogs. the two smaller creatures had attacked barret and tifa, leaving cloud half thankful that he wasn't a victim and concerned for his friends. the lizard had also attacked barret, some sort of stare attack. but barret seemed fine.
'i'll get the lizard, you get the frogs. kill them and you turn back.' cloud said. the two frogs nodded, but barret seemed a little stiff to move. cloud ignored it and sliced the head off his target,
however, tifa and barret barely even bruised their target frogs. they then struck cloud. realising they would need to use items to get this over, cloud and tifa quickly used maidens kiss. barret took a few seconds longer, but no one noticed how sluggish he was.
cloud and tifa both ganged up on one unlucky frog, killing it quickly. the second leapt past them and jabbed barret once more, turning him into a frog. tifa saw it out of the corner of her eye and kicked it as it bounced back. it flew off into the sky, going on the fastest and final journey of it's life. then they realised barret seemed to be missing.
'where's barret?' tifa asked. they looked around, seeing no sign of him. then they saw the rock. the frog-shaped rock.
'oh. do we have any soft?' cloud asked. tifa checked.
'...no.'
cloud sighed.
'well, at least as a petrified frog he's lighter to carry into town.'
~~~~~
the first time it caused game over though was with ff7 shortly after that. i'd got yuffie and decided to try levelling up after barely getting out of cosmo canyon. i ran into jellyfish things called crown lances. i tried to win (honest!) but i hadn't been buying much soft. they counter with deadly needles if you attack them sometimes, and rather than ko, it petrifies. irony is i had a lot pf phoenix down.
the three creatures floated up from the sands and cloud cursed. crown lances. he should have remembered they hid below the beach to ambush people passing by. he'd also forgotten what else they could do and hadn't planned. yuffie was attacking before he could warn her and red xiii about them.
'make sure you kill them on your first hit!' was all he shouted as yuffie hit the first creature.
'why?' red asked, pausing for a second.
it was a pause that ultimately cost them dearly as rather than attacking the monster yuffie had just wounded, it had a chance. it struck cloud with it's deadly needles. instead of killing, they petrified. cloud barely even opened his mouth to reply when he was turned to stone instantly by the fast acting poison. red stood in shock. they had just come from cosmo canyon and the true fate of his father was fresh in his mind.
'oh no... cloud!' he yelled.
but yuffie hadn't even noticed when she attacked and killed the creature she had previously struck. shaking his head and remembering that cloud could at least be cured if they could get a soft somewhere, red leapt towards the second. he was dismayed to only wound it. it retaliated.
red yelped as the needle struck him, but like his father, he too was turned to stone by venom. though in his case it could be cured since there was so little of it, yuffie had been distracted by seeing cloud petrified. she had made the same mistake red had earlier, but this one was greater. she struck the creature a weak blow that didn't finish it and failed to catch her boomerang when it returned. it turned to face her.
'oh gawd... look, i'm sorry, i didn't mean to annoy you...' she pointlessly begged. it was dazed by the wounds but still focused. it readied the needle and struck. leaving three petrified travellers on the beach, slowly sinking into the sands. even though the others looked, they never found their missing friends, for by the time they had reached the beach the tides had cause the dry sand to become sodden with water. the ideal, or worst, environment to allow petrified victims of the crown lances to sink out of sight...
the next one was deliberate. i simply fought a cockatrice in ff8 and let it go nuts
all that was left was a cockatrice. just a weak cocaktrice. so why couldn't they kill it?
squall tried again to strike, but felt himself feel somehow unable. he looked at irvine and selphie. they shook their heads.
'why can't we attack? what's stopping us?' selphie said. they had been here for five minutes, unable to attack as the cockatrice vainly pecked at them. it didn't do any damage but sooner or later it would either use it's petrify stare or cause slow petrification.
'i don't know. it's not like we want to be statues, is it?' irvine said.
'whatever is stopping us from attacking does.' squall remarked as he felt himself ignore another chance to attack no matter how hard he tried.
the cockatrice wasn't being stopped by anything, and this time it didn't peck, it stared. squall knew that somehow he would never be turned back as he felt the instant icy cold of petrification lock him away.
selphie and irvine stared in surprise, and reached for their items... but stopped.
'we can't even cure him?' selphie moaned. like squall the reality of this strange situation had hit. the cockatrice was back to pecking though and this time it caused selphie to gradually petrify. irvined tried again in vain.
'selphie , we have to cure you and squall!' he said. she tried too, even as slowly her skin and dress turned greyer and greyer and her movement slowed.
'i know... but we... can't...' she said. she tried again, but frozen mid way reaching for the item. she had the bottle in her grasp and had thought that if she just took the stopper out she could cure herself and then squall...
'selphie!' irvine yelled. he had been forced to watch as whatever stopped him from attacking also stopped him saving her. he'd had so much to say to her too. so much to say to all of them. but now he knew he'd never say it. he'd never leave this forest. he and his two friends would stand here as statues for eternity or until they were smashed to rubble. he looked at the cockatrice. it stared back.
~~~~~
in ff9, it wasn't a basilisk or a petrifying stare that petrified first in this game. i'm not counting blank and the forest, because that's just cheating. but it wasn't a party member on the reciving end. it was an unlcuky alexandrian soldier who got hit by a needle fork quina had with add status... and i'm aware of the irony that i spend most of the time with these 6 scenes talking about an enemy not a member of the cast!
a qu, a rat, a small black mage and a monkey. well, she and the others would defeat them, maria thought. she, rosa and terra were alexandrian soldiers and the alexandria army would wipe out any opponents. besides, these ones might warn the rats up at the top of the tree. it wouldn't matter of course, but enemies were enemies. rosa and terra jumped down first and maria followed. she was stunned to see the monkey and the rat kick her friends down before they even attacked. so stunned she didn't see the qu attack and prick her with a fork.
'ow!' she said despite herself. four little pin wounds on her sword hand had caused her to drop the blade without thinking. then she realised her mistake and quickly tried to pick it up...
...but she couldn't move
what? what's happened to me? she thought.
then she saw the fork in the qu's hands. she knew it from her mother's resteraunt. a needle fork. it was designed to petrify snails and frogs when they were jabbed. it was a delicacy, to eat a petrified snail . she had never understood it. why pay so much to eat snails in the first place then pay more to turn them into pebbles? that was why she had joined the army. much simpler than a complicated resteraunt and far more useful. she was defending her country against enemies.
but now she had been petrified. why did the qu have that fork here and why had it stabbed her with it in such a... unless...
they're going to break me up and eat me?!
'maria!' rosa yelled.
the two others stared in horror at their petrified comrade and then looked at vivi. freya and zidane had backed off for a moment. they saw vivi's hands glowing with magic energy.
'oh no, the mage has petrifying magic! run!' terra said and fled. rosa hesitated but a glance at the statue that had once been maria that was cradling her wounded hand made her think again. she followed.
'that was easy.' zidane said.
'too easy.' freya said.
'um, what about her?' vivi asked. zidane and freya had almost forgotten the soldier.
'oh, right... well, she's pretty cute... quina must think she was good enough to eat or s/he'd not have speared her with the fork.' he said.
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! maria screamed thinking her fears were confirmed.
'we can't leave her though. but if we turn her back she might attack.' freya said. maria was too terrified to notice that the qu that had done the deed to turn her into a statue was simply wandering around sniffing at mushrooms while the others spoke. if she had, she would have presumed they intended to find mushrooms as part of their strange meal.
'nah, she'll run. have you ever been petrified, freya?' zidane asked
'yes. but i still doubt you have. it's the most rediculous story i've ever heard...' freya said, shaking her head.
'what story?' quina asked.
'zidane says he was turned into a statue and put in a gallery once.' vivi said. quina stared.
'that impossible. they use soft on statues in case they petrified people.'
'which is why it's a rediculous story.' freya said.
'well, we need to figure out what to do with her. since as you point out we won't be able to sell her to a gallery...' zidane said, but quina solved the problem by bumping the petrified alexandrian. she teetered for a second, and the three others stood as stiff as her for a second. quina blundered on and knocked her over completely.
oh no! maria thought. she thought it would be her last thought. then she realised, what if it wasn't. what if she was still awake if she smashed to bits and was eaten shard by shard by these freaky stone eaters?
she instead landed on the tree bark on a spot that had been rotten for some time. the heavy petrified soldier smashed straight through but was undamaged herself. she landed safely in a pile of sand below, upside down and in the dark, but safe. zidane stared down at the statue.
'...oh good, she didn't smash. i don't even want to think about what that would mean...' he said.
he also noticed that the soldier had a cute butt. why oh why did alexandria's female army be so hot and wear those strange green leotards or swimsuits or whatever. did he fight them or ask them out? no wonder they'd invaded so easily, even the burmecians must have had the same dilemma...
'we move on. if the alexandrians are attacking they'll help her.' freya said. zidane nodded and the party left
down below though, maria thought the worst.
oh no... i'm splinters. everything's dark... she thought. she lay there imagining the four were slowly eating the splinters of her body. she could feel herself like she was intact but slowly she was sure little parts of her weren't there any more. she hoped it meant she might not be trapped as shards of stone in their bellies or worse.
then after a while she heard a strange rumble and felt herself moved. light filled her eyes for a second and she saw... smoke? where was she? was this heaven? that wasn't smoke. those were clouds...
...it was smoke, she realised as it slowly cleared. the dust that had been cleyra faded a day later and she saw the stars above. she had been lying here a day, petrified. they hadn't eaten her at least. and she didn't feel like anything was damaged. she didn't know it truly, but apart from being covered in dust, she was fine. then she wondered where the top of the tree had gone. and then she wondered something more important.
wait. is anyone ever going to help me
she had a long time to think about that. after the first month she had a feeling the answer was probably no...
~~~~~
after that i admit i was going to try and abuse the weapon a little but i played on and passed by, and lost quina for a while. when i got it back, i decided to just keep playing on. it took me a whole disc to actually get a character petrified after that!
oeilvert wasn't kuja's kind of place. it wasn't eiko or vivi's either. or quina's. and dagger had a lot on her mind. luckily, armarant, zidane, freya and steiner didn't need magic to handle it. all they needed were potions. zidane had a feeling the native monsters hadn't been told about the no-magic thing because there had to be some magic involved in how one monster, the epitath, seemed happy to copy the party and have the doppleganger fight them.
right now, one had copied freya. they'd learned when one had copied armarant that the copies liked to try and kill the original quickly. armarant had been revivied with a phoenix down and a few potions but he was still a little dazed. the copies seemed to hit really hard. so they were trying to kill the copies first and then the epitath.
'the creature is casting a spell!' steiner yelled as the copy charged at freya. the burmecian dodged and left her mirror image bewildered for a moment
'okay, they're definetly cheating!' zidane said. but the copy of freya was still a threat. hopefully the spell wasn't too dangerous.
all three of them hit the copy while the spell was cast. the target was the original freya. zidane was surprised to see freya stop moving and turn to grey stone instantly. the copy wasn't even stopped by their attacks and was trying again to attack freya.
'you shall not pass!' steiner yelled, diving in the way and striking the copy with his sword. the mirror image vanished, but freya was still petrified and the epitath was still there.
zidane looked at freya for a moment. he knew that since steiner had stopped the mirror image she would be fine, but he could remember two things apart from both his own somewhat voluntary stints as a statue. blank being petrified in the evil forest and the alexandrian soldier quina had petrified somehow. he wondered what happened to the soldier. he knew blank was fine, but he had a feeling the soldier might not be intact any more. odin had destroyed the whole tree of cleyra.
'what are you doing? we can assist freya later!' steiner was yelling. armarant was quick to reply
'it's not for her.' he said, throwing it at the epitath. the stone creature let out a scream and began melting and cracking apart. now zidane thought about it, it was pretty obvious.
'bravo! my apologies for doubting you!' steiner said. zidane got a second soft out, this time for freya. he thought idly for a second that blank wasn't so lucky to be saved so soon. and neither was the alexandrian soldier.