#ziekfried

[thewapolls]

So a weird quirk is that, in April of 1996 the arcade fighter, Soul Edge was first released. In it the enduring franchise long protag Siegfried was introduced, and in the Bad End of his story mode, he is possessed by the malicious supernatural sword, The Soul Edge, and in epilogue becomes the new nightmarish wielder of the cursed blade(s). And in his ending cutscene he is seen in a corrupted suit of armor. That armor is itself a variation on his Player2 alternate skin in the game, and is also a secret playable character that can be unlocked: "Siegfried!"

Then the Original Wild Arms came out December of that same year (1996) and this(↑) is what the villain "Ziekfried" looked like... No big deal, totally dissimilar. But note his neat fleshy spear with the big bulging eye...

So, then in 1998, Soul Calibur debuted Nightmare's first official design as a distinct character. I feel like the obvious angle was that he was supposed to be wearing black armor, but the metalic sheen and associated artwork kinda gave the impression it was blue, notable because later redesigns would lean into the blue armor much more explicitly.

Like in Soul Calibur II in July of 2002...

But in Wild Arms 3, which came out in March 2002, "Ziekfried" returns with this new redesign. And like????

So, in the same year the initial Soul Edge featured a grotesque fusion of flesh and metal but no eye at all; and a variation on Siegfried with red corrupted armor and the GramZamber was introduced in Wild Arms, with a similar gruesome bio-metal look, and a broad blade and singular eye; and Ziekfried here has blue armor with a sweeping backwards crest/horn.

And a few years later we get Nightmare with a forward horn on his helmet, a giant claw hand, and the first instance of the Soul Edge with a big honkin' eyeball, just like Ziek's GramZamber.

Another couple years and once again, in the same year, we get both new Nightmare with now distinctly blue armor, and Ziekfriend[sic] returns with a new forward facing horn helmet, a big claw arm, and an admittedly less organic looking GramZamber.

I don't actually have a point I'm getting at here. I went to dig up some details and quickly found that the things I thought would sort of slide into place as I went, didn't. A lot of things got misremembered in my head, and I sort of assumed the original Soul Edge had the eye. I assumed original Nightmare had more obviously blue armor. I thought a few of these games came out in different years than they did, and in a different order... So, is there a link between these two characters? It doesn't appear to be the case. But, like, at a glance it feels like there should've been something there, right?

They do of course both reference the Siegfried/Sigurd of the real world Volsung Saga. But its not like he had blue armor, a helmet with a big horn, or a blade with an eyeball on it, so it isn't as if that shared reference accounts for anything ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[antimnemonic]

Zed: my abusive boss, who was eaten by a black hole and his own hubris and presumed dead texted me this

Ziekfried: I̸̡͖̹̘̞̚ ̴̛̩̳̼̼̥̌́̓͌͌͜L̸̥̻͔̣͛̋͆Ì̵̧̯͈͔͈͕̈́͠V̸̺̖̗̤̼̆͒̓̈̓͂͜͠E̷͔̞̫̭̬͙̋̊̂̈́̏D̷̢̗̭̮̯̻̍͌͒̿̋ ̶̡͓͉̯̣̙̟͌̏̒̂̓͆B̸͖͚͘I̸̳̬͚̯͙̭̐̀͋̋̈́̌̔T̸̜̂̔̂̒̔̀C̶͇͈̽͂͊͑͝H̷̞̿̚

[destroynineball]

Something is fishy here

Zeikfried (As seen in Wild ARMs 3)

Siegfried

(A.K.A Nightmare of Soul Calibur franchise)

Their debut games released barely a year apart.

[antimnemonic]

i do genuinely enjoy thinking of ziekfried al and berserk as like. a trio of brothers lol

[antimnemonic]

i make lots of impassioned posts about the heroes of wild arms striving against the impossible or whatever but the truth is that ziekfried's little squad was fucked from the start. harken was the only responsible one and they had to brainwash her!!