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Thursday, May 23, 2019

Fascination



Some enemy attacks in RPGs always cause status effects, others have variable degrees of likelihood depending on player stats.

One enemy skill that always works (as long as the player does not have an accessory to prevent it) is "Fascination" used by a number of enemies in Final Fantasy 7 and primarily Jemnezmy. 

"Fascination" is a move in which a scantily clad, attractive, young female fiend blows a kiss or something at your party, and all of a sudden all the male characters are inflicted with the status effect of "confusion".

I have never forgotten about this enemy attack! 

As a 7 year old boy the move is rather strange and you don't quite understand what the big deal is, but as you change into a man, and also as you read theology, you understand how correctly the makers of FFVII designed this enemy. She is somewhat like the Siren of Greek mythology, her beauty is a trap, it makes you lose your mind, you completely forget your goal, your telos and the Siren destroys you.

"Fascination", it is from the Latin which can actually mean confuse, but also charm or bewitch. Some might argue that fascination is a really dodgy translation or whatever the Japenese is- presumably something more like "charm" or "entice", something that evokes more clearly both that you lose your mind, and that losing your mind is as a result of the vice of lust.

All men have experienced "fascination" and what a killer it is.
St. Thomas Aquinas describes "fascination" as one of the effects of the vice of lust, we read:

"Now carnal vices, namely gluttony and lust, are concerned with pleasures of touch in matters of food and sex; and these are the most impetuous of all pleasures of the body. For this reason, these vices cause man's attention to be very firmly fixed on corporeal things … [As a] consequence man's operation in regard to intelligible (obvious) things is weakened,
[This is caused] more, however, by lust than by gluttony, forasmuch as sexual pleasures are more vehement than those of the table. Wherefore lust gives rise to blindness of mind, which excludes almost entirely the knowledge of spiritual things."

Lust makes you forget eternity, heaven, hell, salvation, the truths of the Faith, the Crucifixion of the Son of God, your own immortal soul, your vocation, your state in life- absolutely everything can so easily get forgotten about in the grip of "fascination".

What wakes you up from confusion? In FFVII it is actually being attacked! Physical pain, and the ascetic tradition says the same. Take your USB charger wire, remove your shirt, and apply a few strokes to your back, that will wake you up! Take a cold shower! Sleep with the heating off in winter! Deny yourself the pleasures of taste, and, above all, alcohol. 

In the game world there are accessories to prevent confusion from the spell of fascination, in life, for some men, there ain't any accessories that will help you, there's no tactics to defeat this enemy, and so, when you see that Jemnezmy appear on your screen, hold L1 and R1 and get out of there.


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