The Man In The Mirror: Personal Transformation in Final Fantasy IV

This trial is one of my favorite fights in Final Fantasy canon. Cecil, now dressed as a Paladin, stands in front of a mirror image of himself as a Dark Knight only for the Dark Knight to attack him. Cecil is used to doing damage to himself. Fighting his mirror image should be no problem, but Cecil’s transformation cannot be earned by following the same patterns he did as a Dark Knight. Dark Knight Cecil continues to attack Paladin Cecil, but if the player responds with violence, they’ll lose this fight. It can’t be won by attacking. Instead the player must use the command “Defend” to negate damage. They can also use Cecil’s newly unlocked healing spells to keep his health up. The game forces the player to change the way they interact with Cecil, and in doing so, changes the way Cecil interacts with himself.

Cecil’s guilt and self-harm serve no one save perhaps his own ego, but they can feel seductive when compared to the hard labor of genuine atonement. The former requires only pain, the latter needs a transformation which is much harder to come by. Until he becomes a Paladin, Cecil hasn’t changed the way he engages with the world around him; he’s simply found a new target. Once he passes the test, Cecil and the player’s experience of him are fundamentally altered. He no longer has a powerful sweeping attack that can defeat all enemies on the board at once and he’ll never get something like that back. To replace it, he gains healing spells to keep him and his friends fighting, as well as the special ability “Cover” which allows him to take hits for party members who would otherwise faint from damage. In this way we see Cecil shift from the powerful aggressor he has been into something else. We see him become a build designed to protect. Moreso, his menu portrait changes. Where once we saw the demonic helmet of a Dark Knight, we now see Cecil’s long white hair and somber face revealed for the first time. He’s not hiding behind a mask any longer.

This scene takes less than a minute of actual gameplay, but the game conveys this transformation so elegantly, using its mechanics to support and impact its narrative. It pulls the player in to make these decisions along with Cecil, and fails them if they try to stick to old destructive patterns. I think of a more modern example of a transformation scene in Final Fantasy XVI where main character Clive realizes not only that he is the Dark Eikon, Ifrit, but also that he murdered his own brother. This is handled by one of the most laughable prompts I’ve ever seen in gaming, “(Press L3+R3 To Accept The Truth),” which is more or less the condescending illusion of choice as nothing will happen until you push those buttons. No decision is made. It may as well be a cutscene. Even after you press them, Clive doesn’t change, he doesn’t grow, he just gets a cool new fire mode. 

Some might prefer Clive’s explosive transformation, and that’s fine, but I’ll always find myself partial to the subtle immersion of Cecil’s, where he learns that causing himself pain does nothing to remove the pain he has caused others, and where he comes face to face with his past and decides to learn from it rather than try to destroy it.

Dave Tomaine is a comic writer and musician from Philadelphia. You can find him at @cavedomain and @FFBedtime on Twitter.