In Final Fantasy XIV, when you get to level 40 you get the "Assassinate" skill, which makes sense, since you are going from the Rogue class to the Ninja job, but, at level 56, this action changes, "Dream Within a Dream", Ninja has a lot of parallels with the Naruto franchise and takes inspiration from it's Jutsus and techniques with some direct refferences, like: Katon, Hyoton, Hyosho Ranryu and Goka Mekkyaku. When thinking about this I initially concluded that it was a parallel with Itachi's Mangekyo, being stuck in a 3 layered dream ("Dream Within a Dream" japanese name is "3 Layered Dream") destined to suffer in that illusion that you can't wake up from. Whoever, since I last looked into this, I grew up, I studied more, I played other games, I experienced more, I read more, and... and now, I think it's more than that, I think it goes beyond assassinating someone, and it is also the reason why we don't get that action in PVP and only in PVE. I think it is about Waking Up.
Waking up is a concept that is used in several different meanings and manners, literal, getting throught an obstacle, discovering the truth, being reborn, and sometimes... dying... realizing that you can't return to that place that never existed, longing, in it's every form, it requires you to accept something, and accepting somethings can be tought at times, accept someones death, that times have moved on, or that you moved on. A game that depicts this subject in an interesting way, is OMORI, but first, I want to talk about Ocarina of Time.
I'm a big fan of the Zelda franchise, but, I've recently been drawn away from the more recent games, them being BOTW and TOTK, but this is no surprise, I don't really enjoy true open world games.
I wrote the phrase above about a month ago, and I don't quite remember where was I going with it, and I think this is going to make this much more interesting, as you are going to follow me, in my dive into my own mind and try to understand what I was trying to develop.
In Ocarina of Time (or OOT for short), you are once again in the shoes of the hero of time, Link, a Hylian kid living in the Kokiri forest, and once again, he wakes up to his fate that he was doomed to follow, but, not for the last time in the game, even though he wakes up at the beggining, he wakes up as a kid, unprepared, so... He prepares himself the best he can, and almost like that was not bound to happen in that era, somehow, something changes, and Ganondorf takes advantage of it. He wasn't prepared, he was too late. In a desperate measure, Link goes into the temple of time, and opens the door, wields the Master Sword, and 7 years in the future, he, once again, wakes up.
He once again have failed, Ganondorf has taken control, he has lost the place and people that he knew, lost his time, and wakes up from what seemed to be a bad dream, into a worst reality. Or, did he? At the end of the game, if we follow the perspective of Link in the timeline where he defeats Ganon and save Hyrule, he goes back to his childhood and is once again forced to live a life that he hasn't choosen, back to a tima where he knows people, or rather, knew... This is no longer his time, he got to know people on the Adult Era, he got to know people when they are grown up, people that weren't even born, and people that will never become who they did. If we look at Zelda for example, without Ganondorf and his plans, Zelda has no reason to become Sheik, she has no reason to become the warrior that she did, she is a different Zelda, a Zelda that will most likely become a Zelda closer to her version of Twilight Princess, a ruler. Although she will always carry the Tri-Force of wisdom, much like Link will always carry to Tri-Force of Courage, they will develop differently, and Link... Having the chance to know the Zelda that became Sheik, has now to see a new Zelda grow up and develop, a happier Zelda maybe, but not the Zelda that he saved, not the Zelda that fought by his side, not the Zelda that he grew so attached to...
Even with all that, Link is not completelly alone, there is still one person that remembers what happened and shares memories with him, that person, or rather, that someone, is Navi. His loyal fairy that helped him across challenges and time. Is the only one that actually remembers what happened in both timelines. But now, Ganon is not a threat anymore, Navi has no reason to stay besides Link, there is no purpose, Link is not a Kokiri, Link is Hylian, he doesn't have a fairy partner destined to follow him and accompany him. So, Navi leaves.
Instead of accepting and living his childhood like a normal kid, Link goes after Navi and ends up having another encounter with Skull Kid, but with Majora's Mask by his side, and I think we all know what happens next. If you haven't played Majora's Mask and got to known Termina, I really recommend, it is also very fitting with the concept of waking up from a dream but still being stuck in a probably worst nightmare. But if I'm going to talk about Majora's Mask, I rather talk about it in it's own article/thesis/page/study. But my point with Ocarina of Time; In that game you wake up in a reality that isn't meant to be what it is, wake up 7 years in the future, and at the very end wake up in a reality that isn't your reality. Link is never in a comfortable place, always somewhere he doesn't wish to be, it's almost like he is always trapped inside his worst nightmare, a place where he is a stranger to his own home, own friends, and sometimes himself.
But as I mentioned before, there is another game I wanted to talk about that also cover this kind of subject, about waking up to a worst nightmare, a worst reality.
This section contains Spoilers for OMORI.
Omori is a shortened version of Hikikomori a term that defines someone that is in isolation of society, someone that doesn't wish to interact with other people and is often living only in online spaces. Our protagonist, Omori, or, Sunny, whichever you preffer. Is a Hikikomori that shut himself after an incident that happened in his friend group, but he wasn't the only one to be affected by that incident, Aubrey became a deliquent, Kel became less confident, Hiro became depressed, and Basil h̵̭͚͓̰̫̘͆̽̔̌͠a̷̧̧̢͍̣͚̲̲͚̭͑̋͜͝d̶̨̜̯̟͈̖̍̈́̈́́͝ ̸͙̤̭̯̣̣̩͚̔̏́́́̒̏̚͘ś̵̢̨̛̜̦͇͈͈̺̏̄͝o̶̢̯̟̪̭̙̪̼̮̠͋̿͑͆̅͠m̴̧̛̦͉͍͖̠̆̏̑̌̾͗̂̆̿͐e̶̛͍̩͖̿́́́̈́͂̄͋́̕t̷̝̻̤̰̼̙͙̝͕̗͍̄͊h̷̨̰͉̯͚̻̥͔͗͆̊́͠į̷͙̻͖̼͉͉̘̤̠͉̾͋n̶̞̾̇͌͂̚͠͝g̶̼͇͈̪͛̈̀̉̌͐̅̐̂
.
At more or less the middle of the game, Aubrey, during a breakdown, reveals that the "incident", was related to Aubrey's best friend, Hiro's Girlfriend and Omori's Older Sister, Mari. Kel and Basil had, compared to others, weaker connections to Mari than the rest of the group, but the effect that the loss had on Hiro, would also affect Kel, but Basil... Basil was different, where most were affected because they never saw the suicide coming, Basil knew what happened... So did Sunny...
In a certain night, Mari was arguing with Sunny about the recital practice they were having, Sunny wasn't practicing hard enough, he wasn't practicing long enough, he wasn't good enough. Sunny, filled with anger, having picked the violin as a hobby in order to spend more time with his Sister, that was getting more busy as time passed, pushed her away, not wanting to have to deal with her, however, she was a little too close to the stairs and feel, breaking her neck in the process in amidst the tragedy, Basil walks in and watch Mari's death, Basil believing that his best friend wouldn't do something so bad with her sister, helps him make it look like it wasn't Omori that caused her death. Basil suggests that they make it look like a suicide, and the two boys go to the backyard and hang her up in the branch of their tree house. Their safe space.
The news regarding Mari's death spread like wild fire and in no time everyone knows about it, the suicide of the bright girl with a perfect future... They grieve, lose contact with each other, and Sunny, shuts himself. Alonside Mari's death, someone else is born, someone that would protect Sunny from this traumatic and tragic event, he would give birth, to Omori.
Omori is a mechanism of defense that Sunny creates to shield him from the memories of the event...
To be continued...