No matter how many laps I give it, I doubt that I will end up finding an animal more characteristic of the video game world than the majestic Chocobo. The gigantic yellow chicken from Final Fantasy is not only one of the only recurring aspects of the saga, but also one of the most cuddly and endearing characters that the medium has bequeathed us.
The race to get the Chocobo Golden in Final Fantasy VII is also one of the sweetest moments that I remember in my history as a player and, aware of the extent to which the animal has won the hearts of other players, we have decided to tell where this cute chick comes from.
The origin of the Chocobo
In one of those situations that many of us can take as close, an innocent child comes home from school to discover with amazement that his pet has disappeared. The animal, a Chick that he got in a festival and that had accompanied him during the last months, he was no longer part of the family.
Aware of the size that the animal had acquired and of the cleaning problems that would come upon it as it continued to grow, its mother handed the increasingly developed chick to a neighbor, which probably must have been a euphemism for another rather more traumatic action.
The grief of having lost his little friend is nested in the boy’s memory and, over the years, the idea of take care and share moments with your pet becomes a source of inspiration in one of his early works.
Koichi ishii, designer and director of Square Enix to whom we owe the Mana saga, is the child of that story. And to that traumatic story of a child and his missing pet, we owe the origin of Chocobo.
Pecking at other ideas
After launching the first Final fantasy In 1987 and facing the development of the second installment, one afternoon in front of television gets the creativity bulb to click in his head. On the screen appears the first advertisement for a brand of chocolate bars whose character, Kyorochan, dances to catchy songs.
The bug is an old acquaintance of Japanese children since he made his debut 20 years ago, a nice little bird that, despite having nothing to do with the design of what would later become the giant chicken of Final fantasy, yes it is the germ of onomatopoeia “kweh“That we would later see in the Chocobo. His is also the name, inherited from the Chocoball that gave name to those chocolate balls that Kyorochan announced.
Added to the idea of an animal to accompany you and serve as a mount is the success of Nausicaä del Valle del Viento, turned into an animated film just a few years earlier. Kai and Kui, the great birds that serve as Master Yupa’s mount, would close the circle around the design of the Chocobo.
As expected, the animal becomes a sensation and, after its appearance in Final Fantasy II, it would continue to make an appearance in the rest of the titles of the saga, other Square franchises, and even end up enjoying its own spin-offs. off. What would make Koichi Ishii the most exciting, however, is the collaboration with the mythical Chocoballs that would briefly wear their Chocobos even the boxes of chocolates.