Hmm... Only person I can think of with red hair is Banon.

Seems like she's a normal little girl...who just happens to have high-level Touched powers.

On a hunch, I went and checked a few things. Rydia's mom has red hair. And Mist is in right between a cave and a desert.

Dang, you beat me to it.

It isn't absolute confirmation, but it very strongly supports "the child" being Young Rydia. Also...*cough* "Summon Flowers!"

For those saying it's young Rydia... why doesn't she look anything like Rydia?

Because the Sovereign. She warps perception of herself to an expected form of the viewer...what's to say she can't do the same for the shard-bearer?

Except no one recognizes this girl. Just like no one would recognize Rydia. There's no point in changing one random girl to another random girl, unless the shard is trying to fool us (and I don't think JD is going quite that meta yet).

Although I'm not convinced, myself, I would assume it's a "matching the style of the world" thing. Kid Rydia would look... Comparatively jarring; either her map sprite is there, which is in the wrong proportions, or her battle sprite is there, which looks awfully chibi when placed against FF6's style.

But, of course, we don't know how unusual that would look to in-game characters, anyways.

As I said, it doesn't confirm it, but it is strong evidence in favor of the proposition.

Also, look at it from the other angle. Where in FFVI are we going to find a town that can legitimately be described as being between a cave and a desert? The closest match that the FFVI characters could come up with is South Figaro, but that is a bad match because South Figaro is on the wrong side of the Cave of Figaro. It's between an ocean and a cave, and the closest deserts are either on the other side of the cave or on the other side of the ocean.

There are caves in Mount Koltz.

Definitively kid Rydia.

So? Go look at a map of the World of Balance to see the relative locations of the Figaro desert, the Cave of Figaro, South Figaro, and Mt. Koltz, and you'll see why this doesn't matter. For that matter, go look at a map of the World of Ruin and tell me when you find Mt. Koltz.

My point stands, whichever map you refer to. In the World of Balance, South Figaro is at the southern end of the continent; further south is the ocean. The Cave of Figaro and Mt. Koltz both are north of South Figaro (northwest and northeast, respectively), and the Figaro desert is northwest of the Cave of Figaro.

And in the World of Ruin, South Figaro is at the eastern end of its landmass. The Cave of Figaro and the Figaro desert are both west of it. While there is a desert further east, it is across a rather substantial body of water and thus it would be kind of silly to say that it was between a desert and a cave, because you can't get directly from one to the other.

Compare that to Final Fantasy 4; before Rydia closed the path by summoning Titan, the village of Mist was directly between the Cave of Mist and the desert of Kaipo. You could walk from the Cave of Mist, through the village of Mist, and into the desert of Kaipo.

You guys are missing the fact that there's another rather important desert in the comic.

There's also the fact that all of the FFIV characters didn't consider Marle jarring, and she was twice the height of anyone else (it just served as evidence that she wasn't Rosa). Waiting for an actual reason why Rydia's appearance would change, still (and why it would change THAT drastically... green hair isn't strange in the FFVI world and leotards remain fairly standard attire for females).

Actually, other than Gau's official art/character portrait*, Terra is the only human (well, half-human) character in the entire FF6 world to have an unusual hair color, and, as stated, she's only half-human. Of course, no one ever seems to notice her odd hair color, but it's still true that no one else has it.

* - And, for the record, Terra's official art shows her as a blonde. Gau is kind of a sandy blond in-game.

Anyway,

I can't help but notice that, at least in this comic, maybe-Rydia is talking like a perfectly ordinary little girl. Other than the cries for her missing mommy, she's not acting sorrow-touched at all, despite the purple text and ominous dark aura that somehow our three FF6 heroines fail to notice. Indeed, she's downright EXCITED to be part of the wedding, talking about all the stuff she likes at weddings (okay, I don't know what princesses and chocobos have to do with ordinary weddings, but this is a stereotypical little girl we're talking about here - princesses and ponies are THE stereotypical little girl interests.)

Is her shard giving her the purple text and aura WITHOUT turning her into a raving suicidal loon? Or is there more to the purple text than angsting?

This post has been edited by HeroicJay on Nov 30 2011, 07:46 PM

So... one of the characters in the game has green hair (depending on if you go by sprites or official art) and no one ever comments on it as odd.

I think my point is still valid. Besides, this girl looks NOTHING like Rydia. It's more than just "Whups, her hair is too weird, better change that", it's a completely different sprite.

Also, wasn't the whole reason adult!Rydia sent Marle into Nexus to find aforementioned child-with-shard-that-we-presume-to-be-child!Rydia?

Why would she randomly be in FF6-ville instead of Nexus?

Because videoland is weird.

I think I can explain the art change from kid Rydia to random FF3 sprite. It is mentioned by Daos, upon his meeting with the Mask, that the Mask's form would, to a lesser being, change to something that the being could comprehend easily. This is evidenced several times, from Roy's claim that she looked like Princess Peach, to the several eye-witness accounts of the Sovereign talking to Mrs. Squaresly. It's possible that the Shard has this power upon its carriers as well, even though they already have forms. The FF3 gang simply perceive young Rydia as a random little girl sprite because the only other little girl sprite there is in FF3 is Relm, and she's standing right there.

EDIT: Also, I find it odd that in the half-panel Terra notices the newly-summoned flowers, Rydia?'s aura sort of fits the form, while in the rest of the panels, the aura is round. I also love how Rydia? is being vague, intentional or not, about herself. I mean, the only thing she's mentioned is that her mom has red hair and her town is between a desert and a cave.

Here's a thought: If the kid is Rydia, it explains why she ties weddings to princesses. After all, the only weddings in FF2 were between royalty. It might explain the chocobos, too, due to mounted knights or some such.

This post has been edited by aturtledoesbite on Nov 30 2011, 09:30 PM

Who said this didn't happen before the events in Nexus? There was a four-month period between when Bob lost the Shard and the 'present' of the comic.

Also, if the girl is carrying the Shard, then who is to say that the Shard could not be causing the different appearance? The Sovereign had the power to appear as a different person to everyone who saw her. And Daos said that the wearer of the Mask might appear different to other people as well. It follows that the Shard could have a similar power.

As I said earlier, this isn't confirmation, but it does support the idea of this being child-Rydia, or at least the child who has the Shard of Tears. There's some additional circumstantial evidence for her being child-Rydia, as well, such as the fact that she remembers her mother but doesn't know what happened to her (whereas adult-Rydia doesn't remember her mother but presumably knows that she died).

First up:

WoR Kohologen. Granted, said cave is a tomb and said desert is merely a sliver enough for Figaro Castle to surface but it's there. Fail on Celes' part for not thinking of her new husband's hometown!

Next: At first, I was in complete agreement with Mordain's point. There's no need for the deception against us/Ryan. Unless Alex is wanting to demonstrate something him (and us). Or just play around with him. By the way, we're looking for the Rydia with a bib, not the Rydia with a snake-hood and leotard.

EDIT: Then again, Turtle makes a good counter-point. Still, presuming that this is the shard bearer, this is the first time we've seen either of the Sovereign's forms directly. Also, we (and Ryan) are seeing it in flashback, just as Magus only encountered her through another's mind and Alex only thus far saw her through Lisa's flashback...

Hm... there may be a point here. Granted, the first was most likely the Mask; the second we don't quite know. Doesn't confirm stuff, but like was said before, doesn't rule it out... /EDIT

Finally: Notty raises another good point which trumps the most recent argument that jaime is trying to make as to "what's to say Kid!Rydia didn't come here first?" To quote myself from a previous thread:

I added a link within the quote. The linked comics demonstrate that the portal is from Damcyan to Nexus. Neither this comic, nor the Chrono Trigger source, have demonstrated any stable portal's ability to relocate in any dimension. (Neither physically, Chronologically, nor trans-dimensionally. The main CT portals are implied to be running on equal time and the End of Time is essentially a point at infinity, so it's point relative to the presnts is the same. Sort of a non-Euclidian Geometric reference.)



This post has been edited by Sir Donald on Nov 30 2011, 11:38 PM