(no subject)

Socksmakepeoplesexy.net has a great explanation for how FFVIII came to be such an interestingly psychotic game. Here's a sample from the middle of the article:  

I imagine the events leading to Final Fantasy VIII's inception went down something like this: every Monday morning, Sakaguchi would call Kitase (director), Nojima (scenario writer), Hiroyuki (battle designer), Nomura (character designer), and Uematsu (composer) into his office and sit them all down. He'd remind them that the wildly successful sequel to Final Fantasy VII wasn't just going to make itself, and the clock was ticking. "Stop pussyfooting around it," he'd tell them, "and make it happen already."

All of them were reluctant to even get started. They knew what kind of pressure they'd be dealing with. They knew the standards being demanded of them would be impossible to meet. You can't blame them for being intimidated. Most of them would just retreat to their offices and whittle the days away, sulking and procrastinating while sipping Sapporo and surfing the Internet for Final Fantasy VII Geocities fan pages and Tifa + Cloud + Sephiroth hentai.

Eventually, Sakaguchi was fed up. He had Kitase, Nojima, Hiroyuki, Nomura, and Uematsu all dragged into a conference room, supplied them with a week's worth of bottled oolong tea, Oronamin C, shrink-wrapped convenience mart sandwiches, and cigarettes, then locked them in, telling them they had three days to either come up with a plan for Final Fantasy VIII or tender their letters of resignation.

What nobody knew at the time, however, was that there was a gas leak in this particular conference room.

DAY ONE, HOUR THREE: Nomura sits in corner, surrounded by a pile of crumpled-up character sketches. No matter how much he tries, he can't come up with a hero who doesn't look like Cloud or Ramza. Nojima has just spent an hour plotting a story together, only to realize that he's just rewriting Final Fantasy V with more robots. Uematsu has been playing chopsticks on his Casio keyboard since Sakaguchi locked the doors.

DAY ONE, HOUR FIVE: Uematsu and Hiroyuki claw at the door, screaming to be let out. Kitase has already eaten half the sandwiches himself out of self-pity. Nojima is pacing and chain-smoking.

DAY ONE, HOUR TEN: Nomura has drawn a quick doodle in his notebook of Mickey Mouse dressed in a trench coat. For some reason, he can't stop staring at it. Hiroyuki asks Uematsu if he smells something funny. Uematsu says no, but then bursts into laughter and can't quite say why.

Read the rest here.