Fill out the following form for each character you intend to play and post it in the comments below (or link to an outside source, if you prefer). Applications are always open. Also note that there is no reserve system in place; characters are taken as they're applied for.
Name: DW Journal: Contact: Current Characters:
Character Name: Canon: Age: Gender:
Canon Point: History: Link to a wikia or write out the history if no information is available elsewhere. Personality: At least a paragraph is required (but by all means feel free to write more/reuse sections from an old application), just to give us an idea of what your character is like. All we ask is that you cover all the bases accurately. Powers: What are your character's abilities? In game physical abilities will be toned down severely and to only a little above the average human level, magical abilities will barely manifest, and psychic abilities will also be greatly reduced. Please explain how they will be toned down along with the explanation of what the abilities are!
Character Name: Cloud Strife Canon: Final Fantasy VII Age: 21 Gender: Male
Canon Point: After Wall-Market History:Bam. Personality: The man we are presented to at the start of this game is self-centred, selfish, aloof, and also fairly greedy man. He has no interest in helping the Planet, Shinra, or really doing anything other than lining his wallet with some nice gil with some easy jobs.
"I don't care what your names are. Once this job's over... I'm outta here."
Cloud spends the majority of his time with Avalanche treating them very, very poorly. He tries to remain cold and distant, but some game dialogue shows that his fellow Eco-terrorists have seen through his cool-guy facade and have started to assume that he really just has no idea how to be a friend. Which isn't too far off from the truth.
Underneath it all, Cloud's a bit of a softie. While he does indeed keep his distance and does a poor job of relating to people, he also does seem to want to connect with the ones around him and can be ordered to do this, that, or the other thing. Biggs is quick to call him out on this. Though sarcastic and more walled off than a Sim house with no doorway, he does open up and trust the people around him given enough time and placed in the correct situations. As he starts to drop or pick up other aspects of his personality or memories, he gradually becomes warmer (or colder, depending on the situation) or weaker or stronger mentally.
He's got a sense of humor and is known to crack jokes around people he trusts. He can be cajoled into strange adventures, side-tracked by sidequests, and snowboards like a doofus. If it means getting the job done, the job will be done – he really is an “anything” sort of mercenary.
But, returning to the original matter at hand, to say that Cloud Strife has a chip on his shoulder would be like saying a mountain is "kind of a hill". From the get-go it's clear that Cloud has two interests - money and himself. The arrogant young man is often seen demanding to know when he's going to get paid and acting incredibly put upon when faced with additional responsibilities or requests from other people. Selfish and self-centred, he cares nothing of the Planet and claims to want nothing to do with the people around him.
Cloud is always "acting cool" and distant from other people, in other words, coming across as very short and to the point. A jerk. As if some how better than them. However, there's a lot more to this story.
"Even with all of that commotion, you went on like nothing happened. You must really been through the mill to get that."
It's no spoiler nowadays that the persona that Cloud has is nothing more than a delusion. All of his exploits, all of his triumphs, his status in Shinra - nothing of it is real. In reality, Cloud had been a shy young man who had been rejected from the SOLDIER program. He was nothing special. He had no friends growing up, with the other kids either remarking that he was never "really one of them" or teasing him mercilessly. He was a lonely boy who found solace in believing himself above everyone else and, of course, saw salvation in becoming a hero.
"If I could get stronger... Then even Tifa would have to notice me..."
But more than that he wanted people to pay attention to him. Much like THE reindeer with an unfortunately glowing nose, Cloud grew lonely with everyone giving him the cold shoulder. If he could grow stronger, Cloud thought that perhaps they might invite him into their games and realize his worth. The entire town blamed him for things that weren't his fault and treated him poorly. He left home with not much more than a dream of becoming a hero, telling everyone and anyone who would listen what he would become and what pride he would bring to the town.
This all came crashing down when Cloud was rejected from the SOLDIER program. Being as mentally fragile as he was, with his low self esteem, low self worth, hair trigger temper and general failure to motivate himself, he wouldn't have made it through the SOLDIER program with any degree of sanity. Along with that, he wasn't compatible with the mako treatments, all in all making him an impossible candidate. Instead he was placed in the infantry. Though he was still proud to put the uniform on, Cloud was understandably devastated.
Crisis Core shows us that once this happened, he learned to deal with some of that anger, but remained ever withdrawn and shy. As a result he didn't have many friends and had considerable difficulty when it came to expanding his tiny social circle. Upon meeting Zack Fair it seems as though he came out of his shell a little and felt encouraged by the older boy's confidence and bright demeanour.
Zack, unlike Cloud, was indeed a SOLDIER and a hero. He was brave, determined, kind, cocky, likable, and warm. He was everything someone like Cloud wanted to be and he made it seem so effortless. Cloud idolized him much the same way he idolized Sephiroth and was quick to try to please and befriend him whenever the opportunity came up.
Still, when time came to return to Nibelheim, he was still far too ashamed to show his face. Spending most of the time feeling useless and reminded of his failure to achieve SOLDIER status, Cloud spend most of his time avoiding the people he knew. The one person he showed his face to was his mother, who simply seemed to express her disappointment that he hadn't settled down with a nice country girl. And, of course, Zack, whom he invited over for dinner.
Then. Well, that's history. A town in flame, a horrified SOLDIER-wannabe running around trying to find survivors. A climatic battle fought in the reactor that started it all. Cloud, somehow, overcoming all odds and killing the mighty Sephiroth with a sword embedded in his chest with nothing but his own grief and anger fueling him.
Could you imagine, after five years of solid torture and experimentation, trying to pull yourself together enough to find something worth living in that life? Cloud didn't. His mind was fractured. His identity nullified. What Cloud became was nothing more than an empty shell, with no trace of his former self left to be found. Mako poisoning is, essentially, the result of millions and millions of souls touching a person and losing ones sense of self in the confusion that comes with that. It leaves the afflicted person in a catatonic state, either muttering nonsense or completely robbed of their ability to speak. All in all, it leaves a person lost in their own mind. Cloud was not expected to recover.
It was Zack Fair who gathered up the pieces. Thanks to his refusal to give up and constant speaking and acknowledging Cloud as there, and the JENOVA cells inside of Cloud, the two eventually worked together to bring him out of his befuddled state. But not soon enough to help his friend. It's only after Zack has been fatally wounded that he really starts to wake up, and then he's left completely on his own with no idea what he's meant to do or where he was going. Had the Cloud who had gone into Nibelhiem that day awoken and realized everything, he most likely would not have had the strength or know-how to survive the trip to Midgar alone. After all, he'd lost everything - he'd never achieved what he'd wanted to, and had spent the past several years as a labrat to be tortured and experimented on as Hojo pleased.
Still, though he was beginning to awaken, it takes Cloud an additional two weeks of wandering around aimlessly and the reunion with Tifa Lockhart to awaken his new persona.
Upon seeing her, he goes through a radical change. Thanks to the experiments and the JENOVA cells which are designed to copy, Cloud unknowingly makes a new persona for himself and a new set of memories to replace the ones he can't (or simply doesn't want to) remember. Rather than a boy who was rejected from the program, he was accepted and rapidly rose through the ranks to become a 1st Class SOLDIER. All that Zack did, he believed he did. Along with Zack's memories, he took things that he thought to be true and added them into his personality. He believed a SOLDIER would be cool and aloof, as Sephiroth was, so he became cool and aloof. Using Zack's stories, Tifa's memories, and his own misconceptions about things, he was able to place a buffer between himself and all the terrible things that had happened and become a stronger person.
By “stronger” we of course mean “absolutely insane” and kind of a jerk.
Cloud has the body of a SOLDIER. This means that he can do a lot of crazy things with his strength that normal people shouldn't be able to, including wielding a sword nearly as tall as he is and jumping around like a cricket on steroids. It's pretty damn cool.
If Cloud sets his mind to do something, it will be done. No matter what consequences might crop up. Even when faced with the most dire of circumstances he doesn't back down, instead rising to the challenge and fighting his way through. He may not always like it, and he may act put upon, but he's a reliable warrior and earning his trust is a surefire means of gaining an excellent warrior and a trusted friend.
"Gotta admit he was a strange dude. Just when you thought he was smart, he'd show how stupid he was. Everything about him from his movements is his speech were kinda odd."
Cloud is not confident. He is not brave. He isn't a great hero. The torture and experiments he went through in Nibelhiem shattered his already fragile mind. Given the proper time, it's possible he could have recovered and regained a proper sense of self... but that's not how things went. Cloud was left on his own and had the choice either to die, or to become a stronger person to keep himself alive. It sounds like a good thing, right?
But that's where we start hitting problems.
Though he thinks he is, in the end he's simply mimicking a great man. All of the things that he believes he's accomplished are actually the achievements of someone else. Though Cloud tries to walk the walk and talk the talk, he's only going on what he's heard and so everything falls flat and looks a little strange. Everything from the way he moves to the way he speaks belongs to another person - not all exactly the same person, but rather a mismatch of people Cloud admired and his misconceptions about how a SOLDIER 1st Class would act. So, Cloud has big, gaping holes in his memories. And along with that, he knows things he shouldn't know and doesn't know things he should. All in all, he's a very strange person to watch and talk to.
Powers: What are your character's abilities? How will these abilities be tuned down to suit the game? Cloud has what all SOLDIERS have - superior strength, superior reflexes, and an incredible reaction time. Though he will still possess above-average strength, he will not be able to swing the buster sword with as much ease as he has before. The materia equipped to his weaponry will also be rendered inert, leaving him without any magical capacity whatsoever.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Cloud Strife | FFVII
DW Journal: circusafro
Contact: zaiphon @ plurk, starstocross@aim
Current Characters: madoka kaname, shuri oak, shizuo heiwajima, dirk strider,
Character Name: Cloud Strife
Canon: Final Fantasy VII
Age: 21
Gender: Male
Canon Point: After Wall-Market
History: Bam.
Personality: The man we are presented to at the start of this game is self-centred, selfish, aloof, and also fairly greedy man. He has no interest in helping the Planet, Shinra, or really doing anything other than lining his wallet with some nice gil with some easy jobs.
"I don't care what your names are. Once this job's over... I'm outta here."
Cloud spends the majority of his time with Avalanche treating them very, very poorly. He tries to remain cold and distant, but some game dialogue shows that his fellow Eco-terrorists have seen through his cool-guy facade and have started to assume that he really just has no idea how to be a friend. Which isn't too far off from the truth.
Underneath it all, Cloud's a bit of a softie. While he does indeed keep his distance and does a poor job of relating to people, he also does seem to want to connect with the ones around him and can be ordered to do this, that, or the other thing. Biggs is quick to call him out on this. Though sarcastic and more walled off than a Sim house with no doorway, he does open up and trust the people around him given enough time and placed in the correct situations. As he starts to drop or pick up other aspects of his personality or memories, he gradually becomes warmer (or colder, depending on the situation) or weaker or stronger mentally.
He's got a sense of humor and is known to crack jokes around people he trusts. He can be cajoled into strange adventures, side-tracked by sidequests, and snowboards like a doofus. If it means getting the job done, the job will be done – he really is an “anything” sort of mercenary.
But, returning to the original matter at hand, to say that Cloud Strife has a chip on his shoulder would be like saying a mountain is "kind of a hill". From the get-go it's clear that Cloud has two interests - money and himself. The arrogant young man is often seen demanding to know when he's going to get paid and acting incredibly put upon when faced with additional responsibilities or requests from other people. Selfish and self-centred, he cares nothing of the Planet and claims to want nothing to do with the people around him.
Cloud is always "acting cool" and distant from other people, in other words, coming across as very short and to the point. A jerk. As if some how better than them. However, there's a lot more to this story.
"Even with all of that commotion,
you went on like nothing happened.
You must really been through the mill to get that."
It's no spoiler nowadays that the persona that Cloud has is nothing more than a delusion. All of his exploits, all of his triumphs, his status in Shinra - nothing of it is real. In reality, Cloud had been a shy young man who had been rejected from the SOLDIER program. He was nothing special. He had no friends growing up, with the other kids either remarking that he was never "really one of them" or teasing him mercilessly. He was a lonely boy who found solace in believing himself above everyone else and, of course, saw salvation in becoming a hero.
"If I could get stronger... Then even Tifa would have to notice me..."
But more than that he wanted people to pay attention to him. Much like THE reindeer with an unfortunately glowing nose, Cloud grew lonely with everyone giving him the cold shoulder. If he could grow stronger, Cloud thought that perhaps they might invite him into their games and realize his worth. The entire town blamed him for things that weren't his fault and treated him poorly. He left home with not much more than a dream of becoming a hero, telling everyone and anyone who would listen what he would become and what pride he would bring to the town.
This all came crashing down when Cloud was rejected from the SOLDIER program. Being as mentally fragile as he was, with his low self esteem, low self worth, hair trigger temper and general failure to motivate himself, he wouldn't have made it through the SOLDIER program with any degree of sanity. Along with that, he wasn't compatible with the mako treatments, all in all making him an impossible candidate. Instead he was placed in the infantry. Though he was still proud to put the uniform on, Cloud was understandably devastated.
Crisis Core shows us that once this happened, he learned to deal with some of that anger, but remained ever withdrawn and shy. As a result he didn't have many friends and had considerable difficulty when it came to expanding his tiny social circle. Upon meeting Zack Fair it seems as though he came out of his shell a little and felt encouraged by the older boy's confidence and bright demeanour.
Zack, unlike Cloud, was indeed a SOLDIER and a hero. He was brave, determined, kind, cocky, likable, and warm. He was everything someone like Cloud wanted to be and he made it seem so effortless. Cloud idolized him much the same way he idolized Sephiroth and was quick to try to please and befriend him whenever the opportunity came up.
Still, when time came to return to Nibelheim, he was still far too ashamed to show his face. Spending most of the time feeling useless and reminded of his failure to achieve SOLDIER status, Cloud spend most of his time avoiding the people he knew. The one person he showed his face to was his mother, who simply seemed to express her disappointment that he hadn't settled down with a nice country girl. And, of course, Zack, whom he invited over for dinner.
Then. Well, that's history. A town in flame, a horrified SOLDIER-wannabe running around trying to find survivors. A climatic battle fought in the reactor that started it all. Cloud, somehow, overcoming all odds and killing the mighty Sephiroth with a sword embedded in his chest with nothing but his own grief and anger fueling him.
Could you imagine, after five years of solid torture and experimentation, trying to pull yourself together enough to find something worth living in that life? Cloud didn't. His mind was fractured. His identity nullified. What Cloud became was nothing more than an empty shell, with no trace of his former self left to be found. Mako poisoning is, essentially, the result of millions and millions of souls touching a person and losing ones sense of self in the confusion that comes with that. It leaves the afflicted person in a catatonic state, either muttering nonsense or completely robbed of their ability to speak. All in all, it leaves a person lost in their own mind. Cloud was not expected to recover.
It was Zack Fair who gathered up the pieces. Thanks to his refusal to give up and constant speaking and acknowledging Cloud as there, and the JENOVA cells inside of Cloud, the two eventually worked together to bring him out of his befuddled state. But not soon enough to help his friend. It's only after Zack has been fatally wounded that he really starts to wake up, and then he's left completely on his own with no idea what he's meant to do or where he was going. Had the Cloud who had gone into Nibelhiem that day awoken and realized everything, he most likely would not have had the strength or know-how to survive the trip to Midgar alone. After all, he'd lost everything - he'd never achieved what he'd wanted to, and had spent the past several years as a labrat to be tortured and experimented on as Hojo pleased.
Still, though he was beginning to awaken, it takes Cloud an additional two weeks of wandering around aimlessly and the reunion with Tifa Lockhart to awaken his new persona.
Upon seeing her, he goes through a radical change. Thanks to the experiments and the JENOVA cells which are designed to copy, Cloud unknowingly makes a new persona for himself and a new set of memories to replace the ones he can't (or simply doesn't want to) remember. Rather than a boy who was rejected from the program, he was accepted and rapidly rose through the ranks to become a 1st Class SOLDIER. All that Zack did, he believed he did. Along with Zack's memories, he took things that he thought to be true and added them into his personality. He believed a SOLDIER would be cool and aloof, as Sephiroth was, so he became cool and aloof. Using Zack's stories, Tifa's memories, and his own misconceptions about things, he was able to place a buffer between himself and all the terrible things that had happened and become a stronger person.
By “stronger” we of course mean “absolutely insane” and kind of a jerk.
Cloud has the body of a SOLDIER. This means that he can do a lot of crazy things with his strength that normal people shouldn't be able to, including wielding a sword nearly as tall as he is and jumping around like a cricket on steroids. It's pretty damn cool.
If Cloud sets his mind to do something, it will be done. No matter what consequences might crop up. Even when faced with the most dire of circumstances he doesn't back down, instead rising to the challenge and fighting his way through. He may not always like it, and he may act put upon, but he's a reliable warrior and earning his trust is a surefire means of gaining an excellent warrior and a trusted friend.
"Gotta admit he was a strange
dude. Just when you thought he was smart, he'd show how stupid he was. Everything about him from his movements is his speech were kinda odd."
Cloud is not confident. He is not brave. He isn't a great hero. The torture and experiments he went through in Nibelhiem shattered his already fragile mind. Given the proper time, it's possible he could have recovered and regained a proper sense of self... but that's not how things went. Cloud was left on his own and had the choice either to die, or to become a stronger person to keep himself alive. It sounds like a good thing, right?
But that's where we start hitting problems.
Though he thinks he is, in the end he's simply mimicking a great man. All of the things that he believes he's accomplished are actually the achievements of someone else. Though Cloud tries to walk the walk and talk the talk, he's only going on what he's heard and so everything falls flat and looks a little strange. Everything from the way he moves to the way he speaks belongs to another person - not all exactly the same person, but rather a mismatch of people Cloud admired and his misconceptions about how a SOLDIER 1st Class would act. So, Cloud has big, gaping holes in his memories. And along with that, he knows things he shouldn't know and doesn't know things he should. All in all, he's a very strange person to watch and talk to.
Powers: What are your character's abilities? How will these abilities be tuned down to suit the game? Cloud has what all SOLDIERS have - superior strength, superior reflexes, and an incredible reaction time. Though he will still possess above-average strength, he will not be able to swing the buster sword with as much ease as he has before. The materia equipped to his weaponry will also be rendered inert, leaving him without any magical capacity whatsoever.
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