Kingdom Hearts Fan Plays Final Fantasy for the First Time

🎵 Now it is your destiny to cut up a bunch of keys cuz this is Final Fantasy! 🎵
March Caprice Website: www.marchcaprice.com/
One of the inspirations for this project, EverKey's video discussing how FF is used in KH: • Hearts of Fantasy - An...
My friend Cocoa's Twitch: / hotcocoarock
00:00 Intro
02:40 FF6
09:23 FF7
16:58 FF8
22:41 FF9
27:08 FFX & FFX-2
33:51 Retrospective
38:38 Outro
My Letterboxd: letterboxd.com/CartoonBaffoon/
My Backloggd: www.backloggd.com/u/Cartoon_B...
DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN ANYTHING SHOWN IN THIS VIDEO OR ANY MUSIC USED. ALL IMAGES AND MUSIC ARE USED FOR CRITIQUE AND PARODY ONLY.

[@TheCartoonBaffoon]

If you're hungry for more, here's a short follow-up I made covering The World Ends with You! kzbin.info/www/bejne/j3uyd4Bnmph_eNk

[@sinom]

The biggest thing I realized only after playing FF7 was the symbolism of Sora meeting cloud and Ventus meeting Zack.

[@generaljimmies3429]

Thing is, Vincent was referenced in KH1 through Cloud's tattered cape and gauntlet. Vincent was supposed to be in KH1 being "undead" which would have fit well with Hades but the devs decided to put Cloud because he's more recognized.

[@obeserob5027]

21:20 something to mention, Leon in KH has met Renoa. But he thinks she died (hence the name change). In the credits of kh2 Leon gets a letter from Renoa showing she's actually alive. Side note, in KH2 Sora does the ff8 salute when quoting Leon which makes that scene make way more sense.

[@PrincessNine]

Nomura stated setzer was used explicitly because he made setzer

[@moomanchu608]

Tifa is def clingy, but there is a reason for it. Tifa knows cloud’s mind is fucked ever since they re-met in midgar so she kinda pushes cloud to stay around so she can watch out for him. Tifa is more serious than aerith so it makes aerith look much more “fun” in comparison. At the end of the day though, tifa is the one who saves cloud and is the entire reason for cloud’s journey. Ultimania states both the golden saucer date with aerith and the confession under the highwind are the canon scenes in OG And thus…. Cloud likes both of them

[@playboy_x]

That makes sense. The shipping wars are ultimately silly. You’re gonna like what you like and that’s okay no matter which side you’re on. It’s natural for Cloud to have feelings for them both.

[@TalysAlankil]

fun fact about terra and the name conflict! FF6 terra's name in japanese was Tina, but it was changed to Terra for the north american release by my nemesis, ted woolsey, localization lead at square enix of america in the SNES era. his argument was that tina, as a western name, would sound foreign to a japanese player, so he should change it to something that would sound foreign to an american audience too. why that didn't apply to other characters with english names such as Edgar is beyond me. i think he just felt like changing that one name. (did i mention i don't like most of woolsey's choices in localization? he's a darling in some corners of the internet, particularly with people who grew up with his localizations, but as someone who discovered it all after the fact it feels like terrible choices across the board. stuff like Super Mario RPG's spell to peer into an enemy's thoughts being localized to "Psychopath" comes to mind as extremely weird choices.) Rikku is a similar deal; her Japanese name is Ryukku, and got changed in translation. She was actually supposed to have Yuffie's role in KH1 but they actually did catch the name conflict with Riku that time so she got replaced. You can still find Nomura's concept art of her in the KH1!Yuffie outfit oh also happy march caprice!

[@obeserob5027]

31:15 This can actually be solved by some interviews. 99% of the time the FF characters in KH aren't the actual FF characters, but in the case of Auron he is the actual character from FFX. Meaning there's technically 2 people named Tidus who look the same in KH kinda

[@ThePonderer]

Or Auron has hopped dimensions by dying.

[@whydatduck662]

Regarding what you said about Tifas and Clouds relationship, and Tifa as a character, the recent ff7 remakes have done so much to make her a more interesting character with a more interesting relationship with cloud. Im currently about half way through ff7 Rebirth and i am genuinely invested in their relationship, which is not something i can say about the original ff7

[@QRM00]

From my perspective, it felt like a one-sided relationship. I felt that Cloud was too busy doubting whether she was actually Tifa for there to be much romance. It seemed like the developers were pushing for Cloud and Aerith. They have 4? dates in Rebirth and seemed like a much more natural fit.

[@moomanchu608]

@@QRM00it was more about cloud and tifa dealing with sephiroth’s meddling. The fact that they still come together in some way shows a lot. Spoilers…….. You can see cloud slowly open up to tifa and they almost kiss even without the affinity system. Cloud is portrayed to like both aerith and tifa

[@NoctLightCloud]

​@@QRM00In the OGFF7, the first half of the game is also more clerith focused

[@qwerty77772]

Agreed that Zack and Auron were the best used of the FF guest list. I'd actully put the cast of The World Ends With You on that same tier. I find Squall, Cloud, and Seifer's group are mostly used well with the rest just being mostly fanservice. I would like to see more 'out there' pulls if they continue to do cameos. I quite liked the Shwartzgeist from Einhander randomly appearing as gummi space boss in KH3. We also almost got Aya Brea from Parasite Eve in KHI, which is crazy since it was an M-Rated game. Biggest request from me has got to be FFV's Gilgamesh in a world based on The Sword in the Stone. A perfect world for the seeker of Excalibur.

[@shinseijuurou6229]

I can't believe i loved a video that completly trashes my favorite videogame off all time (FF8)🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@michaelmunns]

Setzer was in kh2 because namora was the one designed him for ff6, namora likes to put ff and square enix characters he created in kh

[@yodizzle]

Sorry i missed this live. As per usual, this video is wonderful!

[@rossofantasma5657]

Yeah, I *hated* the fairy Gullwings. They made no sense, were completely out of character, and their big achievement of the game was collectively pushing one Heartless off a cliff. As a dedicated X enjoyer, and an equally dedicated Yuna enjoyer, it just burned me to see it.

[@Lemfern]

31:26 I think Hades as god of the dead controls all the Underworlds, including the ones from other universes, being this how he summons the FFX auron (who goes back to the FFX universe after KH2 reviving as an unsent) being this right after the Yunalesca vs Auron thing. It would also explain why Donald and Goofy are looking for him in KH4 Because he can acess to Quadratum somehow.

[@tsp1999]

I bet the battle bassline and victory music are stuck in your head forever now

[@keymo9480]

Nice perspective!!! Earned a sub!

[@JustinW332]

I do think that you should play the first one too because the main theme is about the battle between light and dark and even has a last minute villain twist at the end. I feel like it's the basis for the kingdom hearts plot.

[@18Rada89]

Uh, funny how junctions are my favourite thing about 8

[@gabrielislas8380]

Yeah, I don't get the hate for it either. It's just a numbers game. Imagine being an RPG fan and hating math. And the time spent drawing magic is the time you'd spend grinding in any of these other games anyway.

[@18Rada89]

@@gabrielislas8380 you don't even have to grind draws, just a few triple triad games plus converting cards gets you far better magics than grinding

[@qwerty77772]

FF8's difficulty is very easy to cheese when you know what to do, and it was my first FF after getting into RPGs with KH. Maybe I just clicked with it better?

[@tabbofii]

This is literally the thing we were afraid of back in 2002 when Kingdom Hearts 1 released...

[@christiangutierrez8841]

In case anyone's wondering why Setzer is the only character from FFVI... It's the only one Nomura designed (same goes for the lack of representation of FF IX, Nomura only designed Vivi)

[@gentronseven]

Ff8 is alright but it's one of the few games I'd just play with a guide. I played it 20 years late but I still liked it alright. It's not 6,7, 9 or 10 but it's alright

[@ThePonderer]

I said it in the live chat, but for me Balloon Animal Moogle is the ideal Moogle.

[@boopnoodle6947]

I too started playing Final fantasy after playing through the KH series, tho I am VERY late to the party (only found out KH existed in 2020 lol). I have played FF1 (PR), FF7R and rebirth, 3/4 of FFX, and FFXV and like 5 hours of FF4. This video definitely motivates me to play FF6 after FF4 lol as I vastly prefer ATB over tradition turn based (one of the reasons I had to drop FFX). Loved the video and thanks for keeping it spoiler free! Especially with FF7, I'm holding out on playing the og till the third part drops.

[@kennethchia4194]

I was thinking who in FF6 was in KH? Forgot about Setzer

[@EmeraldKeys]

You should definitely try TWEWY. I'm curious on what your thoughts are on the series coming from KH, due to the DDD cameos and the 104 building in Quadratum being an homage to it. Also because TWEWY and NEO TWEWY are great games

[@BarnabusBarbarossa]

I think it's notable that KH2 implies that the Sephiroth you fight may not be the real deal. There's a bunch of lines that suggest that he's just the manifestation of Cloud's darkness, and Cloud's "dark memories". By the same token, the game kind of implies Tifa may not be real, in that she seems to be positioned as Cloud's light in the way that Sephiroth is his darkness. I kind of got the vibe from the game that KH's Cloud defeated the "real" Sephiroth at some point in the past and the "dark memories" that KH Sephiroth is preying on have something to do with those events. But I doubt we'll ever get concrete answers at this point.

[@ThePonderer]

Ok, wacky theory; X and X-2 both occurred in some fashion between KH1 and 2, the Gullwings decided to keep treasure hunting cause they liked it, met Maleficent, didn’t realize she was evil, and Maleficent used her magic to transform them into fairies so they could be better spies.

[@sinom]

Ff6's protag was called Tina, Terra was just her name in the translation

[@davidmiles1741]

To make the "Terra, Terra, and Terra" and "Rikku and Riku" confusion even funnier- Terra, Terra and Riku, of course mean "Earth/Land" and are used in that context, but "Terra and Rikku" are only like that because a translator thought the original would sound weird to western ears. So you have at least three thematic instances of the repeated names making sense, but two additional instances of those same names coming about by accident.

[@jarrellfamily1422]

The ps1 pre rendered backgrounds are amazing don't @ me

[@lukasthelucario6938]

8:13 to answer your question here from what I understand every character that's been ever added to Kingdom hearts from the final fantasy series is a character that numora has worked on. Now whether that's a rumor that's been thrown around and it's not actually true. I can't confirm on that but, that's what a lot has been being said these days. ^•^

[@ronaldood4678]

Cool video. Nice to stumble on this. Probably mentioned, but for FF7 perhaps its biggest issue is its translation. It truly ruins what was a beautifully written story. Your complaints with characters like Tifa for example are put into an entirely different context. Not a perfect game for sure, but it’s a shame it’s only representation outside Japan is a half baked translation. Same arguably goes for FF8, Rinoa has more subtle dialogue and Squall/Leon was more polite and came off professionally cold rather than edgy. Thanks for sharing this journey.

[@katsand92]

Yet another KH and FF fan that was KH first and was intrigued. I have now played almost all of them including the spin offs. I have to say, if you don't like the ATB system...I wouldn't recommend any outside FFXV and XVI. All of them use the ATB system lol. XII and XIII especially. Also, the whole "The original was made on the brink of the company's death" is a myth. They wanted to name it something that would be shortened to FF.

[@daemonskycloak6818]

It wouldn't of mattered what game came after FF7 any game would have lived in the shadow of that game.

[@lulu_TheWitchBoy]

I also played kingdom hearts first. So far I played ff7 orginal and remakes, and 10. My next game is 13 after I finish rebirth.

[@solareclipse3520]

Man I was excited to see this video play out…. Literally pessimistic takes after pessimistic takes.

[@sollato0293]

Final Fantasy fan here, I find your thoughts on those games pretty interesting (and I appreciate that you also love FF9, my second favorite RPG ever), as for the games you didn’t tackled, well for one most of the other protagonists in the series will probably not do much for you, Lightning, Noctis & Clive fall into the edgy category through varying degrees whereas Vaan definitely fall in the annoying category (and oh boy, if you found Zidane & Tidus annoying, you’re not ready for Vaan). And moving forward the games will drastically change gameplay and your opinion on them will depend on if you enjoy similar type of games. You might like FF16’s gameplay as it’s an action RPG so much like KH only even lighter on the RPG side, if you like Xenoblade you’re gonna enjoy FF12’s gameplay, and FF4 is a simpler FF6. I’m curious to know your opinion on the FF7 Remake games as they do a fantastic jobs at fleshing out the cast of the original and their gameplay might be good for you.

[@TheCartoonBaffoon]

So a little after I beat FF7, along with watching Advent Children and a Crisis Core long play, I did seek out a long play of Remake and recently I did this for Rebirth as well (I was curious about what they were like but didn’t wanna drop a ton of money on a game that, for all intents and purposes, isn’t actually done yet). I have A LOT of mixed thoughts on all of that, it could probably fill it’s own video if I really wanted to do that, but in all likeliness I’ll hold final judgement until I play the whole trilogy myself in like a decade when they’re all out and hopefully get some kind of price drop 😅.

[@gentronseven]

Gotta do mogiri mod on ff9 it looks amazing

[@tsp1999]

Terra is an aroace icon!

[@allygator7080]

Hi Baffooon!! I missed the premiere sadly but wanted to say love your video! So glad you loved FF9! That one is my favorite FF ever and I loved seeing Vivi in KH2. I will respectively disagree with your take on FF8. Idk I just like it and I can see the growth Squall goes through but I can see why you don't like him at all and that's valid. I'm the same way with FF10, I never got past the first hour of gameplay since I hated Tidus so much. I plan to give the game another go at some point tho for Sylle and Pat's sake. FF7 I beat for the first time a few years ago and I don't remember any of it. As someone who hyperfixates on games that I like, this is not a good thing that FF7 didn't leave any impact on me at all. But I'm glad you enjoyed it and gave all of these games a shot. This is a very interesting video idea! If you want to play more, I would recommend FF15, mostly for context on Yozora moving forward with the KH series and the lovable main cast. Idk if that knowledge will be needed moving forward but it can't hurt right? Also another one I recommend to people who also like FF is Legend of Dragoon. Wonderful cast and story and fun gameplay mechanics. Again, thank you for the video and I'm so proud of you and all that you do, friend! :)

[@TheCartoonBaffoon]

Thx so much Ally! Admittedly I played up the FF8 hate a bit for the vid lol, nothing but respect for the FF8 fans! 15 is def on my radar, but I probs won’t get to another FF for a while (a bit burnt out on it if you can imagine 😅). Appreciate you taking the time to watch, and of course, I LOVED your writing piece for this year’s March Caprice, stellar work!

[@bradhorowitz2765]

A cool video looking back at the ff references!. And you’re right that those appearances DID introduce people to ff. Now..personally, i think at this point it’s a detriment. Mostly because kingdom hearts is now effectively its own thing. I read on an article somewhere and I certainly can’t remember the name, that said that kingdom hearts took ff because at the time the classic ff games were in memory. Which makes sense, but now? The series dosnt need them for various reasons. This means that any appearances nowadays seems like filler or rather “oh yeah we forgot those characters…well here they are.” I mean cloud, tifa and sephiroth aren’t even in kingdom hearts 3.

[@TheCartoonBaffoon]

Yeah, totally see where you’re coming from there!

[@bepstein111]

Idk, I don't think it was a great idea to force yourself to play in active battle mode if it made you enjoy the games less. They're games. They're supposed to be fun. They were designed to be fun, first and foremost, which is why the developers included the option to change modes in the game, instead of leaving it a dev option that needed gameshark codes or something like that. maybe it's my age (i'm 31) but with the abundance of games to play and the lack of time to play them, I feel like when you do play a game, you should be enjoying it fully, and if not, you should move on to a better one.

[@bepstein111]

also, just got to "diet cloud" and I think I just died laughing

[@wren7195]

Dude you've... got some slick sick jokes FLYING past folk, outpacing their neurons. Me? I've got attention for days. I can sit here and absorb tons of mostly self-deprecating nuance alongside some sly zingers or even narrative puns. I'm not toopid. (BTW Selphie IS best girl)

[@bahamutskingdom]

The odd thing with Tera as a name......if properly translated from Japanese, her name SHOULD BE Tina. When they finally did the proper translation in the GBA version, we had known Tera here for over a decade. Leave the name alone lol. Crusty of the PS1...... I can, as someone who owns damn near every system (in working order) from the NES - PS5, there is still a ass-ton of appreciation for the Atari systems. I know where my PS5 comes from. Just as I know Final Fantasy XVI, or even VII Remake/Rebirth could not have come without the very first Final Fantasy on the NES. For anyone who wonders......VI has Espers, VIII has Guardian Forces, IX has Eidolons, and X has Aeons and so on. If one payed attention to the story of those games.....the summons are pivotal in the story. Summons in VII have nothing to do with the story......thus being called summons. Play Final Fantasy VIII. It is a stellar game. And the story, when understood, is epic. And spoiler......the Final Fantasy characters were put in Kingdom Hearts to remove the "kiddie game" worry. That was initially why. No one who had played Final Fantasy games was about to touch a game of Disney characters. Also cannot throw a FF storyline in a Disney product. Disney won't allow it. C'mon they made Square remove Cid smoking.......seriously.

[@bahamutskingdom]

And the reason behind naming Final Fantasy as such is a myth. Please re-research the reason it is called Final Fantasy.

[@jaydenjohnson4221]

Play the pixel remasters

[@m4ur1r4g3]

KH2 predates crisis core by 2 years, zack also appears in the og FF7 🤣 It's still crazy to me how taste differs, FF7 & FF8 are my favs of the old games and FF9 was the worst for me. I really hated the design of the characters, they all seem like dwarfs and just look ugly. + The fights took forever to load🤣

[@TheCartoonBaffoon]

Zack didn’t appear in KH2, he appeared in BBS and that game’s journal credits Crisis Core as the FF game he is based on.

[@StewNWT]

why on earth did you bring up crisis core and TWEWY of all things??

[@DrWorm76]

I don't think you were paying much attention. Hes doing this series based on which characters appear in Kingdom Hearts. Zack appeared in KH Birth by Sleep and is based on his characterization in Crisis Core. As for TWEWY, the main cast showed up in KH Dream Drop Distance.

[@zanderlaitinen7109]

Don't play the "Remakes" first!!! They are sequels.

[@awsomeboy360]

You can play ff7 remake first lol.

[@david-jonballinger6638]

@@awsomeboy360you really can’t, I know people enjoy it but itself but the original FF7 has so many references that are used in the remake series and it’s really a special experience if you know them beforehand. Not to mention as the person above wrote, the Remakes are literally sequels.

[@sinom]

Playing the remakes first is like watching the rebuild movies before watching evangelion

[@kyle101547]

I personally played ff7 remake first. I loved it so much it made me play the OG, crisis core, and even watched playthrough’s of Dirge of Cerberus. Also watched advent Children. I also grew up playing Kingdom Hearts and saw Cloud and them but never cared to play the actual game they came from funny enough. That being said remake sucked me into ff7 and before Rebirth came out I caught myself up with every spinoff I could find and the OG itself. Makes me wish I couldve been a fan sooner.

[@nomuru2d]

Your confusion over Auron's situation betrays how you disregard all the Ultimanias and canon side-materials for KH. If you hadn't, you'd be aware of the focus on "world lines" a.k.a. full-on alternate universes, and would be aware that it's heavily implied that FFX is a different world line from which Auron actually hails. Also taking the attitude portrayals of the Seifer trio, Vivi, and Setzer seriously also betrays how you didn't take into account the artificial nature of the KH2 prologue since it's a fake world.

[@alexappsapp1332]

Too much wrong information on this video 👎

[@StewNWT]

So why did you start with FF6? It would have been much much MUCH better if you started at FFIV - THE prototypical FF game that defined virtually everything in the modern JRPGs. You should definitely go back to FFIV.

[@StewNWT]

You 100% need to go back and play FFIV. It's the best one

[@StewNWT]

you're right to hate ff8 it's total garbage

[@aureateseigneur5317]

The reason most of the GF characters made it into any of these games was cuz Nomura designed them. He was pandering to himself the FF7 and 8 fans. Thats why The World Ends with You made it into one of these games. Bomura directed thay game and made the characters. Hes got a bit of an ego.