Final Fantasy XI
Final Fantasy XI is the eleventh numbered installment in the… Okay, you know what it is, I’m just going to tell you about one of the storylines!
During the Wings of the Goddess expansion, adventurers will be sent back in time to experience the events of the Crystal War, a cataclysmic event that is the foundation for conflicts of the modern-day timeline. Should an adventurer choose to serve the Kingdom of San d’Oria, they will be immersed in the story of the Young Griffons—a group of children who would see themselves knights, many of whom grow into prominent characters later in life.
Among the Young Griffons, the player will find Bistillot, a shy boy who doesn’t like to be seen. With his penchant for engineering, shy demeanor, and lack of combat potential, Bistillot prefers to spend his time inside of an orcish war machine that he was able to repair to working condition.
He is often seen before he is heard, with his signature phrase, “HAAAALLOOOOOOOOO” being used to hail the adventurer. Through the course of the story, Bistillot finds his way, even contributing to the war effort with his engineering skills.
However, when another member of the Young Griffons is kidnapped and taken to the present day, the adventurer must return to the present day and reunite with the Young Griffons’ present selves! The adventurer’s first contact in the present day is Bistillot. When the adventurer hears the signature “HAAAALLOOOOOOO,” Bistillot approaches the player, but what the player sees is… a woman?? She introduces herself as Bostilette, a “friend of Bistillot.”
After the rescue mission, Bostilette comes clean. She is, of course, the very same Bistillot who was a little boy twenty years earlier. She explains that she was very sick as a baby, so her parents gave her a boy’s name so that she would be stronger and survive the illness. Once she overcame the illness, she was comfortable to reclaim her name and gender. Well, that closes the book on that story, except… I’ve decided that’s bullshit!
I have unilaterally decided that Bostilette is trans, the sickness she had was dysphoria, she stayed in the orcish war machine because she was an egg, and I hope you all agree!
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Yeah, i wouldn't say i could strongly identify with it, either. Relate to many of the themes, yes, but emotionally i'd say it was more like giving me a feeling of a hard to pinpoint weariness and melancholy. There's a lot of media that makes me cry, there's a lot of often much more vaguely trans-related horror that either fills me with abject terror or makes me feel empowered in a positively monstrous way and that film didn't do any of either.
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That's in spite of me coming out in my early 40s, so i spent about as much time as an egg as the protagonist has at the end of the movie. I still wouldn't say it really captured my experience, although i get that feeling of never being fully there that is referred to as "just narrating your own life" or smth like that in the movie. And there's other stuff throughout the movie that makes me go "yeah, i understand that", but it doesn't feel like the story of my past. It's not the way i survived, not the way i repressed things and often not the way things broke through and bubbled up to the surface, either. But that's fine, people are built differently and have different experiences.