Watch it yourself

Oi vey ~ This would take a lifetime to complete. Maybe I'll return to this blog later.

Watch the full walkthrough of FF7 Here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zthD-kxo0q8

Be sure to download the soundtrack too... Great game... great game...

Toward the Train Graveyard

Jessie sets the bomb ~ it sounds like morse code while Biggs explains that the demolition of sector 01 should keep the planet going at least a little bit longer. Seems like AVALANCHE is a group of rogue anarchists. They have managed to escape the explosion of the mako reactor. Now they have to blow a hole through this tangled knot of electronics and metal tubes. The sea blue-green color keeps us in the realm of the heart ~ the ocean.



Each character hops through the flaming ring... Biggs does a little dance (he seems to have burnt himself leaping through. He's the "fat kid" character). The next desination is established. The hammock in the forefront has no practical function ~ it is a subliminal trigger. Geometrically it provides a pattern of interconnected triangles. The soft line which ties it all together gives the player a sense of temporary rest (carribean flavor) though we can not actually lay down or use this object.

Video games are intentionally limited ~ this is why they are an escape from reality. If I was in a stressful situation like this, I might lay in the hammock and ponder what to do next. Maybe it's not even a hammock... It could be some kind of roped division... Regardless, in FF7 there is no time for mindless relaxation. We can hear the sound of the living flame burning from the door whence we came.



The soundtrack's tempo continue to slow down with each scene. We now hear a string ensemble come in, melancholy, with an image of urban life.. Loveless... 625 (5x5x5x5) spraypaint and imperfection. The same woman on both billboards, a green tanktop evoking heart amidst despairity of midgar.



some hoodlums knock over Aeris (currently unnamed as flower girl). She promptly gets up.. Tough like her spade ponytails yet a symbol of life as the bearer or life amongst dead culture. Tires, brick, can on the brick street, a poster that says "Warning!" and so on. She offers to sell us a flower for one gil, the smallest possible cost in the whole game. I accept and she is grateful. Cloud and Aeris bond for the first time in the game... a precious moment.



It's 3:35 now... an hour and thirty-five minutes have passed since the beginning of the game, when the clockk was positioned at 2:00. We are back at the concentric benben mushroom cloud wormhole and checkerboard floor. Notice how the game designers place meaningless characters around for us to talk to. The player has the option to walk up to any of them and make small talk, but nothing meaningful will come from it. A bit like real life?



Eight soldiers surround Cloud. This makes him Cloud 9 ~ See Lennon for more. The enneagramic personage is arranged between two globes of light. The brick streets, flickering light posts and simulated families passing in and out of the view through the neighborhood's apartment windows... add a sense of reality. The music is not confrontational. We get the feeling that everything is cool, despite the fact that 8 blue meanies surround our character.



Cloud is cornered, so he turns to a large gaping hole and gets ready to leap. He is Aleph ~ The Fool, the blond haired youth leaping into the abyss (dangerous moving train), towards the leading light of the bullet train's orb light. The green light at the top right of the screen has no identifiable source... it seems to echoe the green wreath (vegetable kingdom) wrapped around the Fool's cranium. Aleph is associated with NO-THING or LIMITLESS LIGHT which animates our hero character with unlimited power to do the unthinkable.

The character name Cloud is appropriate in this context ~ Clouds are found drifting in the element of air.. The bass guitar strings on the wall are taught lead us forward. The courage and force within provides the base line (bassline) for all further action during the game. As the player, the FMV makes this leap for us, empowering those who would not intuitively have the courage to make this leap in real life. FF7 is a game of symbolic empowerment ~ This is one reason that the game's music is so charged with emotional value.



Cloud lands securely on the train and it descends rapidly into an underground tunnel. The train is "swallowed whole" by the hole. Lock and load!

DG5638B is the train ID. 56(5-2)(6+2). Redistribution...
Converted into numbers... 4756382 ~ We are missing 1 and 9, the first and last... The input and output of the body ~ Mouth and arse... The train's ID symbolically represents the "passing through" process. A transition stage in the plot of the game. Trans-portation.



Music has stopped and all we hear is the train engine... The screen bounces up and down simulating the shaky ride. We hear some preliminary knocks.. the cabin door flies open (notice the yellow line of light outside the train) and Cloud does a somersault into the train. Everyone is shocked, except for Barret (he's annoyed at cloud's behavior).

Everyone is awake... Barret shouts "Wake up!" ~ a phrase that seems directed at the PLAYER. The movie sequence is over, and it's time to reclaim control over your character.



For the first time we have a definite affirmation of cardinal directions. The 8 sectors are now connected to the compass rose. The fool card features the rising sun in the east, animating the young man's actions from an invisible (out of sight) position of ascension. The solar orb at the head of the train is emerging from an underworld location previously out of sight...

Cloud's train announces that it departed from sector eight, last stop sector seven. Thus we know that it is traveling clockwise. Interestingly, sector eight would be adjacent to Sector 1, which means that the Glowing orb BEGAN out of cloud's sight, at the NORTH-WEST position. So we see a kind of perfect inversion from the orientation of sun/fool to cloud/solar orb. This we may attribute symbolically to the fact that the train is underground (underworld) and its cycles move on a horizontal plane rather than a vertical plane (sun in sky from horizon, apex of sky, opposite horizon).

The soundtrack is morose ~ it occasionally reaches and pauses on a major chord before returning to a minor progression. The sound of the train running along the tracks accompanies the music.

It is clear from the characters on the train that AVALANCHE is an intimidating group ~ the punks hanging out scram when Barret walks in, and a business man wipes his brow. The only person left on the train is a homeless guy. The music is sad ~ so is this scene. There is no specific event that makes it so ~ in fact, most of the dialogue is humorous. But there is a definite sadness lingering in the atmosphere. The standing passenger handles are all swinging in unison, unused. The red lights at upstage right and left generate a sense of insecurity, balanced by a yellow electrical line down the top-center of the car. The floor is made of wood ~ Feels old.

Jessie's headband is red. So far ~ Aeris/green Cloud/yellow Jessie/red
Her red is balanced by an affectionate feminine temperament... she wipes of the smudge from clouds face in an earlier scene.



Now Jessie shows us the route of the train... Ooops, looks like we're not going clockwise after all. The train follows some bizarre snake route through the center of the city. The yellow orb is where we are currently located... White dots are our path, and red dot is the ID checkpoint. The frame of the city is highlighted in lazer-green, the "heart of the city" is the most densely green object on the screen.

That's right, FF7 built a RFID Card into the game.



Red Devil ::: The light means they are in the ID security check area.





The blade runner tower seems to have inspired the design of FF7's rotting pizza fused with the underclass/underworld theme in Total Recall.



We cut to FMV sequence, train emerging from cloud's Yellow light... Zoom out to see the train circling around the central collumn of the overworld. No natural light, X beams all over it leave the viewer with a feel of boundary and negation.



We have arrived at the TRAIN GRAVEYARD.

(T)en Minute Limit

We follow our steps back whence we came... The same pattern of 90 degree angles on the capital T, approaching from the left, moving horizontally to center, and climbing up the stalk of the letter. There is a 10 Minute Time Limit



We exit stage right, completing the T shape. Pause to consider the space our minds have just navigated through... Cloud is the vehicle for our consciousness... We move our eyes along with the movement of the character... The path essentially alters between a zig-zag lateral movement and extreme vertical drops. Then the boss... During ascent, we face multiple adversaries and a timed explosive bomb. The gateway, seen in the picture above this text, is a black/yellow horizontal caution rectangle.



A single ring of energetic chain reaction is visualized as a blue movement in a sea of black, contrasting the yellow/white mushroom cloud with a red aura. RED/YELLOW/BLUE against the bronze city. Number 01 has been destroyed, a symbolic "LEVEL UP".

Guard Scorpion - First Boss

The machina scorpion has three main moves, two of which are pictured above. Before attacking, the scorpio always uses its "search scope" ~ a lemniscate figure eight of neon lights in tracer motion. Scorpio is the eighth sign in the zodiac. According to wikipedia, scorpio is associated with the colors Black, Red, and Maroon. This is the color of the scorpionic boss machine.

Unlike previous battle scenes, this arena is decidedly marked by a single line-division. "Us vs. It". When we talk about these characters in terms of "bosses" I am reminded of bosses at work... Bigger salary, bigger social "status", bigger car, etc. The machina scorpio is physically bigger than cloud and barret combined.

The defeat of the scorpio(n) is marked by its dissolution into a red gridwire shell.. The player is made aware of the fact that this is a computer game.

"Attack while it's up" is actually flawed advice.. If you attack while the tail is up, Guard Scorpion will counter-attack with a powerful lazer strike. This may be taken as a symbolic cue. The scorpio does not sting aimlessly ~ first it scans to lock on and then it strikes. If a zodiacal scorpio has their "tail is up" (defensive and aggravated) hold back until the tides have settled to make your move.


Each character gets a level up (not for every gamer... Going on syncs here) thus we find ourselves at the "Next Level"... although this game is not actually divided into specific numbered levels like Super Mario et all.

Assault on Mako Reactor No. 1

The first fight takes place between the main character - name unknown - currently "ex-SOLDIER" against guards armed with machine guns. This is a battle between sword (close distance, strength of attack depends on he who wields the sword) and the armed gunman (power-weapon, we do not identify as easily with this method, anyone can fire a gun).



It is a rigged battle. Cloud always wins and get's a level up at the end of the fight, which is a kind of magic trick on the part of the game designers to boost the player's confidence. All successful battles are symbolized by a sword twirl in the air. Given the graphics of this game, you can deliniate 4 positions of the sword during rotation, and 4 full rotations. This resonates synchromusickally with 4/4 time signature and the 16 spokes on the train's wheel.



Our character exits by our will to move the "JOY"stick on the playstation controller. Notice how both guards lie beyond the cautionary safety lines now. They diagonal yellow/black lines on the left or a perpindicular reflection of the gunmen casualties. This is area 1-0b (where is 1-0a?). If you investigate the guard closest to the screen, you find he has two potions... Thus in the first stage of the game there is a reward to the player who actively searches for hidden treasure behind the visual veil. Notice the Arch doorway motif on the left of the screen.



We emerge from.. you guessed it, an Arch between two pillars. Green lights animate the city, keeping our heart chakra open as we continue to move. Other team-mates await in the upper right section of the screen. Below us is the train area.. Thus we have just ascended to the "next level" or "Level Up" in a physical sense and a statistical sense.


We learn from the conversation that two magic words (uppercase) are SOLDIER and AVALANCHE. We also learn the names of the main characters.

Shane has identified the Gematria for these character names:

• Main characters name is Cloud, KLOD (124)
• Avalanche, AVLNCh (95)
• Soldier, SLDR (294)
• Barret, BRT (602)
• There target is a Mako Reactor (Mako=Egyptian Mythos), MAKO (131)
• Money is Gil, GL (33)
• Wedge, WDJ [VDY] (20)
• Jessie, JSY [YSY] (80)
• Biggs, BGS (65)
• Cloud mentions Shinra, ShNRH (555)



The characters run through the gate, and a quick FMV sequence occurs. Cloud looks up to the large mako reactor and japanese name "SHIN-RA". The same that we saw earlier during the opening FMV sequence. The position of this symbol above cloud's direct line of site foreshadows the "Next Level" will involve the conquering of this monument.



We pass through a gate that flashes red (looks like a manila folder tab) and a yellow flashing sign that says INTRUDER in capital letters. This is a portal.. We are opening a "file" as we move through it, toward the top left area of the screen. Entrance to the next room is a small isolated box. The bluegreen neon light pouring over it is kept separate from the rest of this zone... It is like a womb, yet the door itself is a gaping black hole. All is not safe yet.



Emerging from the bottom right of the screen (a brilliant yellow light and very large door.. seems to contradict the exit from the prior room) we move towards the center and up the T. The T-shape is upside down and slanted.. in a way we are squaring off our consciousness as we move the character down the narrow pathway at a 90 degree angle. The door we move towards is also shining a brilliant yellow light and features the diagonal caution lines.. the T bridge and diagonal lines slant in the same direction, giving the entire space a sense of imbalance.



For the first time since we got off the train, the music changes. It is much more somber now, with a steady, slow tempo beating. Notice the golden stairs... the first platform is a 3x4 unit rectangle and is not as steep as the five steps that follow. This resonates the initial "LEVEL UP" followed by a series of steps which are soon to come. The first levels are easier than the following. Yet as he climbs the steps, he soon finds himself "on the level" with other characters in the room.

Barret (short for baretta gun which is permanently attached to his arm) tells us (Cloud) that we are in a Mako Reactor. Make is the life blood of the planet and Shinra (the evil corporation) is sucking all of the Mako out of the planet for profit. Cloud replies that he's "Not here for a lecture" ~ he consistently takes on a passive aggressive attitude during this portion of the game.



Jessie puts her hand up against these pink double-circles (remember cloud's sword?) and deciphers the codes, granting access to the next rooms. Notice two circles emiting yellow light at the left part of the screen. These are fixed shots built into the game.



If you veer away from the pack and into this octagonal room, there is a treasure box (phoenix down - revives dead characters during or after battle). Dual TV Screen motif first enters (top right of the screen).



We join back up with the group and walk through a door. On the other end is this elevator. Down button is pink and the left, pink circle has the greek symbol for PI inscribed on it. The up button is blue and is connected to the blue circle which reads the arabic numer "5". This is a strange bit of symbolism which is not explained at any point in the game.. Notice the four-spoked wheel in the bottom-center of the screen shot, forming an X. Cloud's spiky hair points toward the pink circle, which is the button that we are forced to press.



As players in the cosmic game, do we "choose" which buttons to press? Is our higher self playing this body like a video game? Does the video game of our life have a script that we are unaware of? Anyway, the blue circle turns to the number 7 later on, echoing the 5/7 mystery. five vowels (aeiou) and two hidden (yw) or the five weekdays, two days of the weekend. Synchromusickally, the pentatonic/diatonic split.





More cautionary black/yellow diagonals. We begin our descent down the red stairs. Each staircase consists of 16 steps, and there are three cases. Thus 16x3 = 48. This number (48) resonates two twenty-four hour (full day) cycles, and thus also resonates the opening FMV sequence of the soundgate clock positioned at Two-Oclock. There is a brilliant light-blue light coming from the bottom right corner ~ feels like a bright blue day and promises freedom in the near future. But not quite yet... this area is still out of bounds.



Every so often you have to enter into battle ~ This was always my least favorite aspect of this game. The battle sequences arise spontaneously so you never know when you're going to be delayed by some weird robotic creature. The Entrance into battle is marked by a psychadelic tye-dye twist fading into pure blue and then fading out into black.



The white glove makes its first in-game appearance during battles. Barrett is on our team. Caution lines are built into the fighting display. The ground is quartered off into square sections, with what appears to be a maroon, four petaled flower at the center. Notice that both teams are always arranged across from one another.. This fight scene echos the masonic square, in a new configuration. White/White to Black/Black (team to enemy) within the four squares.



We come out the other end at 19G. This number is ambiguous. is it 1-9-G as in A-I-G or is it 19-G as in S-G? The G in compass comes to mind, perhaps as a musical key of G. The soundtrack is centered around the key of B flat minor. Is G to be converted to the number 7? 19+7 = 26... The game was released in 1997... 1+9+9+7 = 26.

Inconclusive.




Another battle spontaneously happens. This time it fades into pure yellow, and again into black. Is this new color fade due to the different kind of opponents? Is it randomly generated regardless of the opponents which I face? Why do my characters (Cloud and Barret) fade in from nothing to transparent ghost figures and finally into solid 3d forms? Shouldn't they be solid from the start? They're not teleporting in to the fight from another dimension are they?



Although we are seeing this from a different perspective, Cloud is again moving at a right angle (T-Shape) from the same branch of the horizontal bar, then turning and moving down the vertical pipe. Notice is 01 cleverly masked in the rusty brown tone of the pipe. The color scheme of this area seems as thought it could almost be an underwater section... some kind of lost atlantis. Diagonal Yellow/Black Caution at the non-functional boxdoor at the bottom of the ladder.

Notice also the cluster of dangling vertical bars in groups of six on the upper left/middle part of this screen shot. They direct our consciousness downwards, as we can not clearly see the upper parts of these bars, just the lower points... We continue the descent.



We move South-East across a bridge. The brilliant blue-sky colored light source is now revealed. It is mako energy being harvested and sucked up by Shinra's pipes.





The metal beams echo the red number four spray painted on the wall. Barret explains that we're going to blow this place up. Cloud has a flashback, the screen flashes red, and a high pitched sound fades in and then out as the red goes away. This is our first encounter with cloud's mako poisoning. It disables him temporarily as he receives a psychic vision that "this isn't just a reactor". Cloud hurries up and approaches the four-spoked wheel. He dials the number codes and arms the explosive device.. The boss comes.



Wow... Some visual hypnosis going on here eh?

FMV ~ Opening Sequence

The fmv opens with a sound that resembles a cross between wind blowing and a resonating gong. It starts at a low pitch and rises up, evoking images of a launching space craft. The camera moves through a 3d visual space of light points (stars) for about 30 seconds. There is no music, only noise, occasionally distant echoes fade in what sound like construction workers soldering metal. Near the end of the 30 seconds there is a definite tone ~ an undulating rhythm like a wave or binaural beat. Possible Brain entrainment? Gongs are associated with ceremonial marking points.



Stars fade into green sparks in front of Aeris' face. Green is associated with the heart chakra, emotional empowerment, forgiveness, unconditional love, letting go, trust, compassion. An "E" note comes in delicately in the form of solo violins. Interestingly, the violin is a four stringed instrument and E is the highest open string. So we have the sense of Green (heart) and open tied to Aeris. The violin is of course a delicate instrument with a curvy figure that resembles the idealistic "hourglass" shape of a woman's body. The word violin comes from Vitula, meaning Roman goddess of joy. Her eyes are green.



We see Aeris in red, pulling her hands upwards towards her heart. Behind her is total darkness, in front of her is a green light, sparks, and rusty metal. She seems to be gifted with creative vision and imagination... She can see the whole cosmos in a few sparks, despite the cold dead iron which surrounds her.

"As long as you still experience the stars as something "above your head" you lack the eye of knowledge" - Friedrich Nietzsche

Aeris knows that the whole cosmos exists in her heart. As above so below, and Aeris is an anagram for Aries, the first astrological sign of the zodiac (the ram). Aeris is one of the "star" actresses/characters of this game.



Her hair is tied with sharp bows that resemble spades... She lives in the heart, but she is not a wimp. The large basket of flowers is a symbol of life that carries her heart-resonance on after we leave the initial green-dowsing. Notice yellow wristbands, resonating the increasingly popular yellow bracelets pushed by cardiovascular athlete Lance Armstrong (heart resonance).

NLP eye accessing cues applied to Aeris's focus as she leaves the building imply a Auditory /Digital thought. She is leaving her private life and entering the busy streets. High pitched bells with disonance (E-B-D#) enter. Her footsteps echo and the soundtrack features a rattle/shaker which creat the auditory equivalent to visual "tracers". Car engines roar and people are walking through the city labyrinth.



In contrast to the heart-centered Aeris, we see a dark urban slum and read the words "FOBLINS BAR" and an ad for the My Bloody Valentine album "LOVELESS" released on 6/25 (no year provided to create a sense of timelessness). 625 is numerically equal to 5x5x5x5 or "Five to the Fourth Power". This evokes the 25 unit canted square of the nazi swastika (perimeter of 20 units). We are having the comfort of the heart torn away from us as the camera swiftly zooms out from Aeris and into the heart of the city.



The camera moves quickly, but if you pause and look, the viewer is actually moving through a C-shaped Sound-Gate/Stargate which leads onto a checkerboard floor. Hovering above the arch is father time, evoking the 12 signs of the zodiac. Who is the man on the left, standing on the porch? Is he watching over us? The clock is specifically positioned at Two... Two Pillars with a GATE in the middle?



What's this? The Benben stone of Heliopolis amongst Freemasonic Checkerboard floor and two large buildings? Bluegreen maco energy sits at the center, with concentric wormhole rings surrounding the little fountain pool.

The checkerboard is connected to the number FOUR as it is a repeating pattern of alternating binary configuartion (Black square/White Square against White square/Blacksquare)



A flaming blue comet. Is that our planet? Some other celestial body penetrating our atmosphere and gaining momentum? Apocalyptic Blue fire... The main theme enters.. The first note is sustained... It is an "E" note again, but an octave lower than the initial entrance with Aeris. Thus Aeris synchromusickally resonates a higher octave than the Main Theme.. She is an angelic force. We hear timpani alternating, musically very similar to the discovery of the monolith in 2001 Space Odyssey.



8 Spoked wheel is called "Dharmachakra" in Sanskrit.. It is the Buddhist "wheel of dharma" Buddha's teaching to the path of enlightenment. In tarot it is the wheel of fortune... Synchromusickally, the eight spoke wheel refers to the common division of a whole note into eighth notes or a fully diminished scale of eight notes within an octave. Later in the game, characters refer to this space as the rotting pizza, a tribute to the division into eight slices (city sectors). The two neon-blue spotlights toward the bottom of the screenshot resonate the two materia holes of cloud's buster sword. The searchlights coming from the center of the city may be the mysterious origin of light from the opening menu-screen. They shine into total darkness. Who or what are they searching for?

There are capital M letters painted red all over this rotting pizza. They probably stand for MAKO.



The camera begins to zoom into a different portion of the rotting pizza, but this flow downwards is cut with brief shots of a train closeup. We hear the metallic roar of the wheels, which are 16-spoked.



We continue to zoom back in and see the Japanese Corporation's name "SHIN-RA" and the number 01. Thus we have returned from 2-4-8-16 back to ONE. This is our destination, as we near the end of the opening sequence.



The phallic bullet train has entered the station, with two soldiers dressed in red guarding the entrance. The yellow/black diagonal lines imply CAUTION to the gamer. We see rails and handlebars, giving something for us to "hold on to" as the steam engine hisses and the melodic bass line moves chromatically around a d minor triad.

WATCH THE OPENING SCENE HERE.

Menu Screen

A large blade with a small handle... revealed from its surrounding darkness by a spotlight (origin of light unknown). White glove, reminiscent of Mario, points index finger to two option. NEW GAME or continue. Notice caps vs. lowercase. Capital letters are authoritative and powerful. Your first choice as you begin this game is one symbolized by hidden power and capital letters.

This is the main character's (Hero archetype) weapon, officially called the "Buster Sword". The two holes on the blade, toward the red handle, are there to store materia. They are currently empty. So we are looking at STRENGTH POTENTIAL.

As I move between options, I hear a brief, high-pitched "cute" sound which peaks at C#. When I make a selection, the sound is has more sustain and reverberation. The selection sounds like crystals ~ three tones are sounded in a quick-arpeggiated roll of F#-G#-B in the same range.

+Ezra