This FF8 Icon Warrants Greater Appreciation
The Final Fantasy series includes numerous iconic places. Starting with Elfheim in the original Final Fantasy, Midgar in Final Fantasy 7, to Limsa Lominsa in Final Fantasy 14, every one has earned a cherished place in players' hearts, and they admire the distinctive details that make these worlds so special. However, if one location that warrants more attention than the rest, it is definitely Balamb Garden from Final Fantasy 8, not only because of its beautiful design, but also for being a truly bizarre school.
The Pure Movie Scene
Before, let's highlight the obvious. Balamb Garden turning into an airship and fleeing from a missile attack was absolute cinema. This location was not only designed to be a training camp for mercenaries. It is a moving base that allows them to establish new strategies and reposition, depending on the demands of those in command. I readily regard it as one of the coolest airship concepts in the franchise, together with Final Fantasy 10's Fahrenheit and some of the Final Fantasy 12 military airships.
The change of Balamb Garden into an airship remains one of the more memorable moments in gaming history.
A First View of a Gloomy Home
When we begin playing Final Fantasy 8 and watch Quistis leading Squall out of the medical wing, we get our initial glimpse of the location this sullen-looking teenager calls home. A panoramic shot begins from the ground of the school and rises to zoom in on the staggering magnitude of the building. Balamb Garden has a design that makes it feel advanced, but also somehow angelic. The flowing structures evoke a distinctly late ‘90s concept of how the future would look. Meanwhile, because of the golden details on the building and the extended trails of light coming from the immense glowing ring on top of the school, Balamb Garden evokes a massive angel. It was designed to be a tranquil place — excessively peaceful for an institution that transforms teenagers into mercenaries.
An Memorable Soundtrack
Matching the calmness that the appearance of Balamb Garden suggests, we have the school’s background music. One of the dearest memories I have from being a kid is walking around the central area of Balamb Garden, watching those fish statues spraying water, and hearing to the soothing theme song. The problem is that it continues playing in your head constantly. Once it returns to my mind, I’m forced to look up on YouTube for a 3-hour-long “Balamb Garden” song video. The sole way to end playing inside my head is to overdose of it.
- Lullaby music that remains in your mind
- Central courtyard with fountain features
- Nostalgic feelings for countless players
A Intriguing School
Balamb Garden is intriguing as a location as well as an institution. For starters, it enrolls kids from five to 15 years old to transform them into mercenaries, but it appears like a giant church. There are a lot of military schools in RPGs, like in Trails of Cold Steel, but not one look less like a militaristic than Balamb Garden.
A Paradoxical Slogan
If you use the Balamb Garden Network using one of the in-game terminals, you find out that the slogan of the institution is “Work hard, study hard, and play hard.” I’m sorry, but I never have the feeling that those teenagers preparing to be mercenaries are “playing hard” — only Zell. But, given that the training center, where students encounter real monsters they can defeat, is the only place in the entire school accessible at all hours during the day, maybe that’s what they intend by “playing.” While combat preparation is the primary part of a student’s life in Balamb Garden, their nutrition is terrible, since students are devouring so many frankfurters that the personnel have nothing else to say except “No more hot dogs today.”
Strict Rules
Students are governed by a strict set of rules, which, on one hand, we should anticipate from a combat school, but on the other seems strangely humorous. For example, there’s no dress code in the school, but they can’t leave their rooms in the nights, except it’s for training. A student can be expelled if they fall behind in their curriculum, for aggressive acts, and for… “sexual promiscuity.” It might not look like it, but Balamb Garden is genuinely worried about its students’ romantic activities. The school officially suggests that students “take time to think things through before starting a relationship.” (After all, the true risk of being a student of Balamb Garden is love affairs, not battling with gunblades and cutting each other's faces like Squall and Seifer were doing in the opening cutscene.)
Greater Than Just Appearance
Starting with the elegant futuristic design of the building to the contradictions and questionable actions of the institution, there are countless features of Balamb Garden to appreciate. We all like to make fun of Squall, but Balamb Garden reminds us that there’s greater depth to Final Fantasy 8 than just aesthetics.
