Map Analysis Part 7 -

The 7th and final part of an analysis of all the prerenders found in Final Fantasy VII. Some of the text is too small to be seen without zooming in and some of the pictures are larger than can be displayed on this page, so click here to download them for yourself or here to view them one by one in full.

You can see from this shot that the middle room is a greenhouse. Wonder who’s been taking care of the plants?

A strange skeleton. Is that human? I can’t really tell.

X-keeper says: VII appears in the bookshelves.

What a neat angle!

X-keeper says: VII appears here as well.

There is a year written on the top of this reactor as well. The “1997” here is pretty easily to read! There’s also Greek writing which reads “smkins” (σμκινσ), a reflection of the filename. Robert has a very interesting analysis of this writing over at his blog.

That roof has got a healthy snowpack!

Never fear, the “REST ROOM” is easy to find.

The map is called SNMAYOR. Does this mean Gast is the mayor of Icicle Village?

I guess Gaea has deer, since one unfortunate individual got his head mounted on the wall.

A “STR” sign advertises the weapons shop, and you won’t have trouble finding the “INN”! Nice snowman, by the way.

“WELCOME STR” reads the mat.

Imposing!

These circles lead to the debug rooms. Each has written on it the first character of a developer name. Starting from the top, going clockwise:

“Kita” (北)
“No” (野)
“Tori” (鳥)
“Matsu” (松)
“Chi” (千)
“Aki” (秋)
“Yoshi” (吉)
“Kyou” (京)

Debug rooms for the event planners, director, and story writer of FF7. Missing is a debug room for event planner Kazuhiko Aoki.

The way to the “BRIDGE”.

TRACKIN2 shows us the developers’ best efforts at spelling “truck”.

Beautiful.

Reminds me of the doorway-blocking lasers in Beyond Good & Evil.

“DANGER”!

luksy says: The shop sign has kanji reading “Materia” (魔手理亜).

Black sign:
“Heaven Sword” (天刀)

Sign on left:
“Arms” (器銃)

Fence on left:
“No Trespassing” (立入禁止)

Left wall:
“Bargain” (買得)

Ceiling on Left:
“Bayonet” (銃剣)

Mat on Floor:
“Fire” (火)

Purple sign:
“Power” (力)

Calligraphy on left wall:
“Full House” (大入)

Right-hand calligraphy on right wall:
“Immersed in forest” (森林浴)

Welcome mat:
“Turtles Forever” (亀万年)

luksy says: The screen reads “Earth” (地).

The calligraphy reads “Heaven” (天).

luksy says: On the screen left of “Heaven” is a symbol for hot springs.

The bedspreads read “Man” (男) and “Temple” (寺).

luksy says: The wall scroll reads “Heart” (心).

The bedspread reads “As fast as the wind, as quiet as the forest, as daring as fire, as immovable as the mountain” (風林火山). The calligraphy on the floor reads “Unequalled” (天下無敵).

The center of the mat reads “Sword” (剣) and the four corners read “Flesh” (肉), “Cut” (切), “Bone” (骨), and “Break” (断), a short form of the expression “Let your enemy cut your flesh, and you will break his bones,” (肉を切らせて骨を断) a Japanese way to express the idea of allowing yourself to be hurt in battle in order to do more damage to your enemy.