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The pacing of disc two of Final Fantasy 8 is a little more uneven than the first disc. I've never quite finished this disc until now, because many of the adrenaline-pumping sequences have their share of problems.
I still enjoyed this section of the game, because it made the entire story of Final Fantasy 8 more and more unpredictable.
It feels odd to start disc two of Final Fantasy 8 with a flashback sequence from the perspective of Laguna. After an epic assassination mission, I expected to play as Squall or some of my other typical party members. This transition into the mind of Laguna introduced me to Laguna's rural town sweetheart, Raine. It also featured a little girl named Ellone.
It seemed like a meaningless flashback at first, but it turns out that Ellone happened to live in our headquarters at the Balamb Garden. She apparently has the power to make people fall conscious, so that they can witness some sort of flashback. It seems like a lot of pain and trouble to make my characters suffer through flashback insanity, but she said that we're her only hope. Whatever.
Anyhow, the game switched back to Squall and his magical knights, who are stuck in some desert tower prison. After an epic escape from the tower, the party watches as an enemy base launches missiles at Trabia Garden. This was the home of one of my fellow members, Selphie. She decided to break off from the group with two members, so that she could destroy the base.
For a long time, my party seemed to transition through a wide range of strange new tasks. Selphie snuck in and destroyed an entire missile base. Squall transformed his headquarters, Balamb Garden, into a flying mothership. He reunites with Selphie and the gang, who managed to hitch a ride on a busted-up boss robot.
This entire disc was longer than it needed to be, in my opinion. Yet, some of the moments in this game were very touching. My favorite section took place when Selphie finally visited her home, Trabia Garden. It's devastating to see Selphie mourning the death of all her friends in a big graveyard. At the same time, I was glad that some people actually survived the Galbadian missile attack.
Then the game finally tried to make sense of the convoluted story. Irvine Kineas, the gunslinger who transferred into our group, finally revealed that my party members were members of the same orphanage. The group's enemy, Sorceress Edea, was actually the matron of the orphanage.
I still had no idea where this game was taking me anymore, but I still enjoyed it. For most of this section, I never felt especially bored. My party was always doing some sort of insane new task. The most exciting sequence took place when I had to fistfight a soldier while I was dangling on a rope attached to a flying robot. It was a cheesy cutscene, but the CGI background made the entire battle look like an epic Lord of the Rings battle.
I have a big gripe about the fighting system. In the final area of disc two, I finally reached a limit to the amount of magic my characters could hold. Unfortunately, there wasn't any real way to convert debuff spells, such as Sleep and Berzerk, into a higher-level spell. I thought I had to use up my entire stock of useless debuff spells in battle. I could have just pressed the square button to discard my magic.
SquareSoft probably should have created a tutorial to make this magic management easier. The final section literally took about eight to 10 hours, because I didn’t know about the square button technique. By the time I finished manually depleting my debuff collection, I was tired of this entire magic system.
Thankfully, the final battles were exciting. I loved snagging the new rare items and summon monsters from the bosses. With my new Alexander guardian, my characters can convert mid-level elemental spells into high-level spells. They can now create Firaga and every other ga spell they'll ever need.
The final sequence of disc two was the most confusing cutscene. Rinoa fell to the ground, unconscious. Seifer wandered off somewhere. And Sorcerer Edea apologized for causing us so much pain and suffering.
Seriously, where is this game taking me? I hope disc three reveals what the heck is going on in the story.
What are your favorite memories of disc two of Final Fantasy 8? How does the messy battle system stand up to other games in the series? Post your thoughts in the comments below.