🔗 Share this article

This FF series features numerous iconic places. Starting with Elfheim in the original Final Fantasy, Midgar in Final Fantasy 7, all the way to Limsa Lominsa in Final Fantasy 14, every one has earned a special place in fans' hearts, who celebrate the distinctive idiosyncrasies that make these locales so special. However, if one location that deserves greater attention than the rest, it is undoubtedly Balamb Garden from Final Fantasy 8, not only because of its elegant design, but also for being a absolutely bizarre school.

The Pure Blockbuster Moment

Before, let's highlight the obvious. Balamb Garden transforming into an flying vessel and fleeing from a missile attack was pure cinema. This place was not just designed to be a training camp for mercenaries. It is a mobile base that enables them to create new plans and reposition, based on the demands of those in charge. I easily regard it as one of the coolest airship creations in the franchise, alongside Final Fantasy 10's Fahrenheit and some of the Final Fantasy 12 military airships.

This transformation of Balamb Garden into an airship remains one of the most memorable moments in gaming history.

The Initial View of a Brooding Home

As we begin playing Final Fantasy 8 and watch Quistis escorting Squall out of the medical wing, we get our first view of the environment this gloomy-looking teenager calls home. A panoramic shot begins from the floor of the school and ascends to focus on the awe-inspiring scale of the building. Balamb Garden has a design that feels advanced, but also angelic. The rounded structures evoke a specifically late ‘90s idea of how the future would look. Conversely, because of the gilded features on the building and the long beams of light emanating from the immense glowing ring on top of the school, Balamb Garden evokes a giant angel. It was built to be a tranquil place — too peaceful for an institution that turns teenagers into mercenaries.

An Memorable Theme Song

Complementing the serenity that the appearance of Balamb Garden portrays, we have the school’s soundtrack. One of the dearest memories I have from my youth is walking around the central area of Balamb Garden, seeing those aquatic statues spurting water, and hearing to the lullaby-ish theme song. The problem is that it keeps playing in your head indefinitely. Whenever it comes back to my mind, I’m forced to look up on YouTube for a extended “Balamb Garden” song video. The only way to end playing inside my head is to overdose of it.

• Gentle melody that sticks in your mind
• Central courtyard with fountain features
• Sentimental feelings for countless players

A Intriguing Institution

Balamb Garden is fascinating as a location and also an establishment. For starters, it accepts kids from 5 to fifteen years old to mold them into mercenaries, but it looks like a massive 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 Philosophy

When you use the Balamb Garden Network via one of the game terminals, you learn that the credo of the academy is “Work hard, study hard, and play hard.” Apologies, but I never have the sense that those teenagers preparing to be mercenaries are “playing hard” — except for Zell. But, given that the training area, where students find living monsters they can defeat, is the sole place in the whole school available at all hours during the day, perhaps that’s what they mean by “playing.” While training is the most important part of a student’s life in Balamb Garden, their nutrition is terrible, since students are eating so many hot dogs that the faculty have no other response to say except “No more hot dogs today.”

Tight Policies

Students are governed by a strict set of rules, which, for one, we should anticipate from a combat school, but conversely seems strangely amusing. First, there’s not a dress code in the school, but they can’t leave their rooms in the evenings, unless it’s for training. A student may be dismissed if they lag in their curriculum, for violent acts, and for… “sexual promiscuity.” It might not seem like it, but Balamb Garden is really concerned about its students’ relationships. The school officially advises that students “take time to think things through before starting a relationship.” (After all, the real threat of being a student of Balamb Garden is love affairs, not fighting with weapons and slashing each other's faces like Squall and Seifer were doing in the opening cutscene.)

Greater Than Only Good Looks

From the elegant advanced design of the building to the paradoxes and debatable practices of the institution, there are many elements of Balamb Garden to admire. We all like to make fun of Squall, but Balamb Garden serves to remind us that there’s more to Final Fantasy 8 than simply surface appeal.