Strategy Guide - Guide for Final Fantasy 8 Desktop Accessories

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     D  E  S  K  T  O  P       A  C  C  E  S  S  O  R  I  E  S     
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                         F    A    Q
                version 0.87 == October 14, 1999
             ======================================

Final Fantasy VIII Desktop Accessories (Windows CD-ROM) FAQ 
ver.0.87
14oct99

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____________________________________________________________
0. Table of Contents.

0. Table of Contents.
1. Intro.
2. Installation, Part 1. - Mail and Card.
   -accessories
   -mail
   -card
3. Installation, Part 2. - Accessories.
   *or, how to get the accessories onto a machine that's running 
    English Windows...*
4. What's Accessable on the Disk.
5. Descriptions of Selected Files.
6. The Card Game.
7. Mail.
8. FAQs.
9. Outro.
   -versions
   -sources
   -related sites
   -contact

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1. Intro.


Final Fantasy VIII Desktop Accessories is a Windows 95/98 CD-ROM that 
Square released in Japan on Sept. 22, 1999 through their Digicube 
subsiderary. It contains three main sections: The most noteworthy is a 
version of the FFVIII card game, Triple Triad, for play on Windows 
computers. It also contains Final Fantasy Mail, a Final Fantasy-themed 
email program, and FFVIII Accessories, which is a collection of 3 
Windows Plus! themes (including 3 cursors, 8 .wav file sounds, and a 
collection of icons), 4 screensavers, 26 different desktop images, 6 
startup/shutdown images, and more.

Unfortunately, there are a number of problems that will be encountered 
if this program, designed for use on Japanese computers, is installed on 
an English system. This FAQ will examine these problems and look for 
solutions. To date, I have everything except for the 4 screensavers 
working on my English Windows 98 computer, so these problems are by no 
means fatal. However, if you are considering purchasing this program, 
please read through this document to see what all you may be getting 
yourself into. (Please note that the only problems are with the 
accessories portion of the program - the mail and card game work fine.)


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2. Installation, Part 1. - Mail and Card.

When you insert the CD-ROM into your CD-ROM drive, it should auto-play. 
The first thing that you will see is a small FFVIII splash screen, and 
then a box with three text-entry fields and some text (which all looks 
like "_________" if you don't have Win98/95J). Enter the 12-digit serial 
number from the warrantee card (it's in the box at the bottom of one 
side and in the middle on the reverse side, and is formatted like this: 
XXXX-XXXX-XXXX where X can be a letter or number). After that, you'll 
see a dialog box asking what features you want to install (Accessories, 
Card Game, Mail, in order, and all in English). The rest of this FAQ is 
written assuming that you install all three (which is what I did). 


Accessories:
Next, you'll get to decide which wallpaper images you want to install, 
and at what resolution (640x480, 800x600, 1024x768, 1280x960, and 
1024x480 are available, although only 4 WPs are available in 1280x960 (1 
of which is only available at this resolution), and the 6 WPs in 
1024x480 are not available in any other size). Click on the images that 
you want. There will also be four buttons under the resolution box. The 
top is used to select all of the images, and the one under it to 
deselect all of them. The third box is accept, and the final one is 
cancel. Unfortunately, at this point my computer decided to stop the 
installation... So, this part of the disc has garnered it's own section. 
Move down to section 3...


Card Game:
Basically just keep clicking the (N) button and you should be alright.

Mail:
Same here - just keep clicking the (N) button and you'll be fine. The 
final dialog box is asking you whether or not you want to read the 
readme.txt file - click on 'no' unless you want to see a bunch of 
jumbled text (it automatically opens it in Notepad even if you have .txt 
files set to open in something else - you can always open it in NJStar 
or another Japanese WP later).


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____________________________________________________________
3. Installation, Part 2: Accessories


(or, how to get the accessories onto a machine that's running English 
Windows...)

Needed: a computer with Japanese Windows 98 or 95
        one of the following:
           - a Zip drive or other large media storage, on both 
              computers
           - WinZip or a similar file-compression program, on both 
              computers, and a single blank floppy disk
           - Internet access on both computers with a site that you 
              can upload data to (minimum of 2.75MB of free space)
        
Well, this was quite a hassle. In order to get the Wallpapers, 
Screensavers, and whatnot installed, you need access to the Japanese 
version of Windows 95 or 98. Install the Accessories onto this computer. 
Now, locate the files in the following places (where 'C' is the letter 
of the JapaneseWin98 computer's hard drive):

   - C:\Program Files\DigiCube\FF8Desktop\FF8Acces\
        this folder should contain: FF8Acces.exe
                                    Readme.txt
                                    WPInst.exe

   - C:\Program Files\Plus!\Themes\
        this folder should contain: FINAL FANTASY VIII theme1.theme
                                    FINAL FANTASY VIII theme2.theme
                                    FINAL FANTASY VIII theme3.theme
                                    FINAL FANTASY VIII Windows.theme

   - C:\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\DigiCube\FF VIII Desktop 
Accessories\
        this folder should contain the Start Menu Shortcuts for the  
         program.

   - C:\Windows
        this folder should contain: FFVIII saver.ini
                                    FFVIII screen saver 1.saver
                                    FFVIII screen saver 2.saver
                                    FFVIII screen saver 3.saver
                                    FFVIII screen saver 4.saver

   - C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da
        this folder should contain: DigiCube.ico
                                    FF8icons.dll (hidden file)
                                    FINAL FANTASY VIII theme1.theme
                                    FINAL FANTASY VIII theme2.theme
                                    FINAL FANTASY VIII theme3.theme
                                    FINAL FANTASY VIII Windows.theme
                                    Winstart.bmp
                                    \SysBitmaps
                                    \ThemeRes
                                    \Wallpapers


Once you've found them all, get ready to do some transferring. First, 
how to transfer. A mass-storage device like a Zip Drive or CD-R drive 
with a drag and drop method is probably your best bet here, but not all 
computers drives such as these. At worst, transferring the files over 
the net is possible, but very inconvienient. 

Probably the most convienient, and also fairly easy, method is a regular 
floppy disk, which is what I used. Many of the files are under 1.44 meg 
(the size of a normal floppy) in size - some, however, are a bit larger 
(up to babout 2.5 meg for the largest .bmp and screensaver files). This 
is where WinZip comes in. Compress the files into Zips that are under 
1.40 meg in size, and then transfer to the floppy. Then, transfer them 
onto your end product computer. It's pretty easy (and it's the easiest 
if you actually have both computers there side-by-side. It took me about 
3 hours to do all of the files except the smallest bitmaps (although I 
was doing other things at the same time, so maybe 2 hours is a better 
estimate). A few side thoughts: I found that I was getting a better 
compression rate for the bitmaps when I did them one to a zip, instead 
of multiple files in the same zip. The 4 screensavers and the screen.ini 
compress from 10 meg into about 500k total, so don't worry there. The 
biggest bitmap files compress to about 700k, so again, no worries. 

Another floppy disk alternative is changing the larger .bmp images into 
.jpg files and then transferring them. The .jpg file will make the 
images much, much smaller (from about 400k and under), so the transfer 
process will be greatly sped up. I know that Paint in Windows 98 can do 
this - it cannot, however, in W95. There are probably freeware/shareware 
programs that can do this as well, but I don't know of any off hand. Of 
course, anything that isn't an .bmp will still need to be zipped. 

Now, let's go through the folders one by one:

   - C:\Program Files\DigiCube\FF8Desktop\FF8Acces\

FF8access.exe is the setupper program, and is a limited edition of 
Microsoft Plus! This lets you switch between the three FFVIII themes and 
the regular Windows default theme. As far as I know, this file isn't 
really needed if you already have Plus! installed on your computer. 
Readme.txt is a readme that is entirely in Japanese, and can be safely 
skipped (it is openable in NJStar and other Japanese word processors, 
though). WPInstall.exe lets you copy more wallpapers onto your hard 
drive - this is another file that really can be skipped, as the computer 
will crash if you try to import more WPs.


   - C:\Program Files\Plus!\Themes\

This folder will probably only have contents if you already have Plus! 
installed on your computer (although I'm not sure). The files are 
duplicates of those found in the folder in the Windows directory, so you 
only need to rename and copy them once. Anyway, these are some of the 
files that have Japanese characters in them, so they need renamed so 
that your computer will recognise them. To be safe, when you rename, 
retype the entire name of the file - some things that look like they 
should be readable, like the 'VIII', actually aren't. Also copy the 
files into C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da\


   - C:\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\DigiCube\FF VIII Desktop 

This folder is just part of the Start Menu, and all the programs can be 
safely skipped. In fact, I deleted them right away (the computer that I 
was using was one at work, and I wanted to hide all obvious traces of 
the program), so I can't even tell you what all was in there... I think 
some renaming is needed though - any time that there is a 'VIII' or any 
Japanese characters, rename them before copying.


   - C:\Windows

Well, this is the last remaining problem child for my installation. The 
names have Japanese characters in them, and so does the .ini file that 
goes along with them. OK. Let's get them on the English computer first. 
Rename them, same as above - the 'VIII's and the katakana (Japanese 
symbols) in the names need renamed. Copy to disk, copy to English 
computer. Simple. Unfortunately, now you have an .ini file that has a 
bunch of jumbled symbols in it, and some screensavers that don't know 
what to do. 

Problem #1: The .ini  - OK. Open the .ini file in NJStar and save it as 
rich text format (.rtf) (this format will allow you to open it in 
Wordpad or another English word processor with the Japanese intact) but 
make sure to type .ini at the end, or you'll have a .rtf file instead of 
an .ini. After doing this, the system still saw an .ini file, but it had 
the original Japanese characters in it as well. All is good in the world 
until...

Problem #2: The changed file names - This is where I get stuck (although 
I haven't really tackled it much...) I'm guessing that the screensavers 
refer back to the .ini file, but with it's original name. Since you had 
to change the name to copy the file, it's all confused... Possible 
solutions are to rename the .ini using the correct double characters 
(which would make it look something like this: 'FFu% W%-du&%w.ini' - 
those are just random symbols, though, and not the correct ones...) - 
this is a long shot, though... The other possible solution is to find a 
program that creates and alters .scr files - again, I haven't even tried 
to do this (but will sometime in the future...). Anyway, I'd copy the 
files anyway, as zipping them greatly reduces the size (over 10meg of 
files into about 500k - if you're worried about hard drive space, this 
will _easily_ fit on a floppy...), and you never know if they will 
eventually become usable.


   - C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da

This is the meat and potatos of the programs install. You'll pretty much 
want everything in here. Let's start off with the root \FF8da directory. 
I don't know if you really need the Digicube.ico, which is just an icon 
of the Digicube logo, but I copied it anyway (I really doubt that you 
need it...). If you were following my instructions, the four .theme 
files should already be here - if not, rename them to remove the 
unreadable characters and copy them. I'm not quite sure what the 
Winstart.bmp is, but I copied it anyway. The FF8icons.dll is a hidden 
file - to be able to see it, you can do two things - make the system 
files unhidden by opening up Explorer, and then going to View\Folder 
Options...\View. From there, click on 'Show All Files', which is in the 
Hidden Files folder, which is in the Files and Folders folder. Copy it 
to the English computer. Now, on to the sub folders:  


   - C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da\SysBitmaps

This folder should have six .bmp files, from Onoff_01.bmp to 
Onoff_05.bmp, and Onoff_07.bmp (there's no _06). These are for startup 
and shutdown screens (I believe). However, to me they seem rather... 
disproportionate... Anyway, they're small (127k each), so I'd copy them 
just for kicks. I'm not sure if Windows will resize these when they're 
actually startup and shutdown pics (and for that matter, I'm not sure 
how to make them startup and shutdown pics)...


   - C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da\ThemeRes


These are the parts of the themes. Everything is name-friendly (ie. no 
renaming needed) and small enough to fit on a disk.  


   - C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da\Wallpapers

These are the wallpaper images, and he files within will differ 
depending on which ones you installed.  To get one of everything, you 
need to install all of the 800x600s or the 1024x768s, all of the 
1024x480s, and number 5 from the 1280x1024s. Anyway, this is another 
pretty easy folder to do - you just need to either zip up the larger 
files (the Wp_00L.bmps and the Wp_00r.bpms) or convert them to .jpgs - 
they're too large to fit on a disk any other way. 

Once they're on the English Windows machine, you can place them as 
desktop images easily, but they won't be able to be opened in Photoshop 
or any other programs, with the sole exception of Paint. To be able to 
alter them/etc, you need to open them in Paint, save them as .jpg (only 
available in W98, I believe), then open them in Photoshop (or any other 
image editor) and then resave them as .bmps, if desired (I only resaved 
the ones that I really liked...). Also, you might note that some of the 
files aren't of the greatest quality - some have blacks that aren't 
really black (the pic of the Ragnarok was where I really noticed this) 
and some of the colors are kind of faded... Anyway, this is pretty 
easily fixed in Photoshop. Also, note that saving them as .jpgs degrades 
the quality a bit, so if you're not going to alter them at all and don't 
care about the size, I'd leave them as .bmps. 


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____________________________________________________________
4. What's Accessable on the Disk


Well, for those of you that don't have access to a Japanese Windows 
machine, you can still get at parts of the disc. Unfortunately, it's not 
much. Here's a look at what you can still enjoy from the disc.

If you browse the disk you'll find four file folders. The 'Card' file is 
obviously the Card Game. 'praa' and 'bbit' both seem to contain parts of 
the Mail program, and each has one openable archive file, ff8_0001.lzh 
or ff8_0002.lzh (.lzh files are openable with WinZip with the proper 
add-on - don't ask me where to get it, because I don't remember. Just do 
a search for lzh...). Unfortunately, all of the bitmaps contained within 
are scrambled... There are also a couple of .txt files, two all-Japanese 
readme files and an English version file that doesn't have much in it. 
'Setupper' is the setup program for the Accessories, and contains six 
folders. 'Data' is just that - a bunch of data files. 'Res' contains 8 
playable .wav files, 13 cursors/animated cursors, and 3 unparsable (non-
openable) bitmaps. 'Sys' and 'SysL' each contain 6 openable .bmp files, 
with the files in Sys being half as wid as they should be. The files in 
SysL look fine, though. 'ThemeRes' contains 9 unparsable .bmp files. 
'Wp' contains 20 different .bmp files in what is probably different 
sizes, as they have different final letters (things like s, m, and l). 
Many of these are openable, but very small. There are also matching .dat 
files for most, so I'm guessing that this will eventually enlarge them 
or something. None are nearly large enough to use as Desktop images... 
Note that all of the files ending in 'c' are unopenable... In the root 
'Setupper' folder are three .exe files. FF8Acces.exe seems to be or run 
Microsoft Plus!. Setupper.exe runs the Accessories setup program (not 
the Mail or Card Game), and WPInst.exe goes right to the wallpaper 
installer. Both of the latter two crash after selecting OK...


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5. Descriptions of Selected Files.


I'm including descriptions of some of the files not to taunt you, but in 
case some people are thinking of purchasing the disc and want to know 
what's on it...


   - C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da\SysBitmaps\

Onoff_01.bmp  - A pic of Squall and Rinoa having a 'moment', with the 
                "If you wait for me..." dialogue from the opening 
                surrounding them. It's really a shame that this is out 
                of proportion...
Onoff_02.bmp  - A side view of Rinoa falling into Squall's arms.
Onoff_03.bpm  - Squall holding his Gunblade, hiding half of his face, 
                with the lion on it flaming.
Onoff_04.bpm  - This is the split 'screen' Squall and Laguna portrait, 
                where they are both looking up at the moon...
Onoff_05.bpm  - A pic of the lion head from Squall's necklace (although 
                just the head itself - it's been cropped...)
Onoff_07.bpm  - Squall's gunblade, side view, with the flaming gunblade 
                logo.


   - C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da\ThemeRes

Wp1.bmp       - The render of Squall from the FFVIII US cover, with the 
                lion, in red tones, in the background. This is one of 
                the pics on the cover of the package.
Wp2.bmp       - Same as above, but Rinoa in blues. Feathers and a 
                single wing in the background.
Wp3.bmp       - See above, substitute Seifer. Black tones, with black 
                feathers and his cross sword in the background.
FF1_xx.cur    - A series of five cursors, with Squall's gunblade as the 
                central theme. You have normal, waiting, thinking, 
                help, and prohibited versions.
FF2_xx.cur    - A series of four cursors. Tonberry this time, though... 
                Again, normal, waiting, help, and prohibited versions 
                (no thinking, as this one is probably the same for all 
                of the three themes...)
FF3_xx.cur    - Another series of four cursors, this time of the hand 
                from the FFVIII menus. Same as above - normal, waiting, 
                help, and prohibited versions are included.
FF_0x.wav     - Of the 8 .wav files included, I know that the fanfare 
                is one, and that some of the menu sounds are included 
                as well... I'll go through and list them all later,  
                perhaps...


   - C:\Windows\DigiCube\FF8da\Wallpapers

(note - unless specifically listed as being different, images with the 
same number are simply different sizes: ie, Wp_01L.bmp and Wp_01m.bmp 
are the same image, but L is 1024x768 and m is 800x600. This basically 
only applies to the L, m, and s images. For further reference, s is 
640x480, C is 1024x480, and r is 1280x1024)

Wp_01L.bmp    - The FFVIII logo on white.
Wp_02L.bmp    - The FFVIII logo, text only, on white.
Wp_03L.bmp    - Squall and Seifer standing in a field of flowers, with 
                Rinoa diving for a feather in the middle.
Wp_04L.bmp    - Squall with a flaming Gunblade. Same as Onoff_03.bmp 
                from \SysBitmaps\
Wp_05L.bmp    - Squall in the same pic as Wp1.bmp from \ThemeRes\
Wp_06L.bmp    - A close-up of Squall, facing forwards. Possibly from 
                the first FMV?
Wp_07L.bmp    - Side view of Squall from the raid on Dollet FMV.
Wp_08L.bmp    - Squall and Rinoa dancing, looking up at the fireworks, 
                from the SeeD dance FMV.
Wp_09L.bmp    - Rinoa, hair blowing, from one of the Garden FMVs from 
                Disc 2.
Wp_10L.bmp    - Rinoa in the same pic as Wp2.bmp from \ThemeRes\
Wp_11L.bmp    - Rinoa in a field, looking up at a blowing feather - 
                from the opening FMV.
Wp_12L.bmp    - Rinoa pointing, from the SeeD dance FMV.
Wp_13L.bmp    - Squall and Rinoa dancing, from the SeeD dance FMV.
Wp_14L.bmp    - Seifer in the same pic as Wp3.bmp from \ThemeRes\
Wp_15L.bmp    - Edea, from the FMV at the end of Disc 1?
Wp_16L.bmp    - Edea about to give a speech - from the FMV at the end 
                of Disc 1.
Wp_17L.bmp    - Zell, with his fist clenched, pointing at himself. From 
                his introduction FMV.
Wp_18L.bmp    - Irving, gun resting against his shoulder, from his 
                introduction FMV.
Wp_19L.bmp    - Selfie, tongue extended, from her introduction FMV.
Wp_20L.bmp    - Quistis, from her introduction FMV.
Wp_01r.bmp    - A really nice collage featuring Squall, Seifer, and 
                Edea that I've never seen before (one of the few pics 
                in the collection to have this honor).
Wp_02r.bmp    - The same pic as Wp1.bmp from \ThemeRes\
Wp_03r.bmp    - The same pic as Wp2.bmp from \ThemeRes\
Wp_04r.bmp    - The same pic as Wp3.bmp from \ThemeRes\
WP_01C.bmp    - A pic of Squall with the lion head and the words 
                'Sleeping Lion Heart' in blue. Black background.
WP_02C.bmp    - A pic of Rinoa with her wing symbol and the words 'Wing 
                Heart' in blue. Black b/g.
WP_03C.bmp    - Seifer swinging his gunblade with his cross sword 
                symbol and the words 'Cross Sword' in blue. Black b/g.
WP_04C.bmp    - Squall's gunblade with the flaming logo. Black b/g.
WP_05C.bmp    - A great render of the Ragnarok, with logo. Black b/g.


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6. The Card Game


Luckily, this is pretty easy to play, and works well. When you boot the 
game up it will ask if you want to play the computer, or play another 
person over LAN. The next screen asks which rules you want if effect - 
the instruction book shows this screen, so refer to it to see what each 
says (a translation is coming later). After that, the game will start. 
You start out with a pretty large dialog box that shows the cards that 
you number of cards you own, both total and unique (how many out of the 
total 110). Beneath that is the box that lists which cards you own and 
how many of each. Click on the card title to display the picture to the 
right. To add the card to your hand for the next game, click the box 
beneath it. To distribute a random (?) hand, click on the box beneath 
that, and to clear the entire field, click on the box beneath that. To 
clear a card that you've already selected, click the box beneath it. 
There are three buttons at the bottom as well - the leftmost is 
obviously 'OK', the middle is to start a random hand, and the last is 
quit.

Now the bad part about the card game. It's hard. Really hard. I'm no 
newcomer to the game - I've acquired every card that is available to me 
at my current state in the full PSX game, and have a collection of over 
well over 200 cards. The computer version is quite a different story. 
You start with 13 cards (always the same ones) and you lose them pretty 
fast. Whereas in the PSX game you can choose your opponents and reset if 
you lose a good card, you can do neither in the computer version.  Your 
opponents get good fast, and always tend to have more powerful cards 
than you do. And if you shut down a game in progress, you lose all five 
cards that you were playing with. Ouch. Needless to say, I was quite 
disappointed.

If you want a more in-depth guide to the card game, Triple Triad, please 
chek www.gamefaqs.com for card game FAQs - there are plenty out there, 
and they are all applicable to the Windows version as well.

For translations of the different play styles, for now please refer to 
the FFVIIIDA instruction manual - there is a picture in it that shows 
the style selection screen. As for actually reading it if you don't know 
Japanese, look on yahoo.com or a similar search engine for a beginning 
Japanese tutorial or a kana chart - both are important, and will make 
your life a lot easier, if you're playing lots of Japanese games... I'll 
try to add a translation chart in a later release (althoug I'm not 
promising anything...)


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____________________________________________________________
7. Mail


Although it looks pretty, I can't get the mail program to actually send. 
Any help with this would be appreciated. (How do you enter your POP and 
SMPT addresses? Ack! This might be an error on my part when I was 
installing, though...)

Anyway, more in this section (possibly) in future releases...


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____________________________________________________________
8. FAQs.


Q: Do you have this disk/program/game?
A: Yes, obviously. This question is usually followed by...

Q: Where did you get it?
A: Family Mart (7-Eleven didn't have their copies out yet...). 
Seriously, I live in Japan, and bought it at a local convienience store.

Q: How can I get it?
A: Well, the only way that I currently know of is to fly to Japan, and 
visit a Family Mart or other convienience store, and buy it. I don't 
know what online retailers, if any, stock the program. I'd say that your 
best be for buying it online is either NCS [http://www.ncsx.com] or in 
an eBay auction [http://www.ebay.com]

Q: Can you post the card game on a website so that I can download it? 
Q: Will you zip the card game up and send it to me?
A: No. Two reasons - a: that would be piracy. Piracy is illegal. I don't 
want to go to jail (as AV of the late, great Square.net once said, 'Life 
outside of a jail cell suits me fine.') Besides, I bought the program 
(and it wasn't cheap for what you get) so you can too. Also, b: the card 
game needs the CD to load any cards, so even if I was to send it to you 
(which I won't) you wouldn't be able to play it...

Q: OK, so I need the CD to play the card game - will you burn it and 
send it to me?
A: See reason a: of above question. Plus, I don't have a CD-R drive (of 
course, if you want to give me a CD-R drive (a decent, working one, to 
keep) to do the above operation, I'll even buy you a copy of the game 
and send it to you... :)

Q: How much does the CD cost?
A: 4980 Japanese yen, which is about US$46 as I write this. Although 
this seems expensive to those of you in the US, keep in mind that all 
computer stuff is expensive here in Japan, and normal games cost about 
8000-9000 yen (about US$75-$85), so it's really not _that_ bad...

Q: You said that to get most of the accessories, I need access to a 
computer with Japanese Windows on it - how am I supposed to find that? 
A: Well, good luck... If there are foriegn exchange students at your 
school from Japan, ask them. Maybe a college in your area has a Japanese 
program - ask the professor... Just ask around, and see if you can find 
one. I can't really be of much help on this one... I can tell you this 
much - the accessories part of the program takes up about 85 meg of hard 
drive space (for everything except for the 640x480 wallpapers). It's 
easily deletable/uninstallable, and shouldn't be any kind of problem to 
have on someone's computer for a few hours. Keep in mind that to be 
legal, you should install the stuff and move it to your hard drive, then 
deinstall and delete everything from the original Japanese computer.

Q: Is there any other way to get the stuff from the accessories part of 
the disk?
A: As far as I know, no, there isn't. Sorry. If you come up with an 
easier way to get to them, please let me know!

Q: Will this be released in America/Canada/Europe/Australia/any other 
country or region that I haven't listed?
A: As far as I know, no, it won't be. However, with the popularity of 
all things Final Fantasy VIII related (not only the game, but the 
figures/etc. as well), I wouldn't rule out the possibility...

Q: If I send you money for the game, as well as postage to my respective 
country and any other costs, will you buy the program and send it to me?
A: Well, unless you a: are a personal friend or b: have done some 
greater good for mankind, unfortunately, no, I won't. Although I'd love 
to help everyone out, I simply don't have the time or energy to do so, 
nor do I want to become a clearinghouse for Japanese stuff. Also, there 
are only so many convienience stores in my area, and since all of them 
only stock 1 copy of the program, my supplies would be extremely 
limited... :) However, if you do think that you've done a greater good 
for mankind, will otherwise feel that you have a good reason that I 
should do the above (like, say, you want to donate a digital video 
capture device, CD-R drive, ACID Pro 2.0 or other cool computer 
hardware/accessories or programs... :), or obviously are someone that I 
already know well, feel free to give me an email... 

____________________________________________________________
____________________________________________________________
9. Outro

ver.0.87 (14oct99):
  Finally got the bulk of the program installed, so finished the 
  document, cleaned it up, and prepped it for public consumption...
ver.pre  (22sept99):
  Prerelease. A total mess.


Needed:

If you can provide any of the following, it would be greatly 
appreciated!

- A way to get the screensavers working.
- An easier way to get the accessories data from the disk.


Sources:

A lot of fooling around with the CD on various computers (ie. personal 
experience.)


Related sites:

The Gaming Intelligence Agency [http://www.thegia.com] - Aside from RPG 
and adventure game news and coverage, the GIA also has box, disc, and 
book scans posted for FFVIII Desktop Accessories. (I believe that they 
are in the Sept. 1999 News Archive...)

Square Co. Ltd. [http://www.square.co.jp] - Makers of Final Fantasy 
VIII.

DigiCube [http://www.digicube.co.jp] - Distributors of Final Fantasy 
VIII Desktop Accessories.

GameFAQs [http://www.gamefaqs.com] - Hosters of this FAQ and many, many 
more...

WinZip [http://www.winzip.com] - Makers of the wonderous file 
compressor, WinZip. One of the programs needed to get the accessories 
data from the disk onto an English language computer. Also good for 
lots, lots more... 


Legal:

Square, Squaresoft, Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy VIII, Final Fantasy 
VIII Desktop Accessories, Triple Triad, Final Fantasy Mail, Squall 
Leonhart, Rinoa Heartilly, Seifer Almasy, Zell Dincht, Quistis Trepe, 
Selphie Tilmett, Irvine Kinneas, Laguna Loire, Kiros Seagill, Ward 
Zabac, Edea, Cid Kramer, Fuujin, Raijin, Raine, Ellone, Sant' Angelo di 
Roma, Balamb, Dollet, F.H., Esthar, Timber, Galbadia, Centra, Trabia, 
Garden, SeeD, Ragnarok, GF, Guardian Forces, Ultimania, and any other 
FFVIII-related names/etc. that I haven't listed, but may be applicable, 
are copyright 1998-1999 Square Co. Ltd. and/or DigiCube. Sony and 
Playstation, are copyright Sony. Windows, Windows 95, Windows 98, 
Windows 95J, Windows 98J, and Paint are all copyright Microsoft. WinZip 
is copyright WinZip, I think. Photoshop is copyright Adobe Systems. I 
have no idea whose copyright Family Mart is. 7-Eleven is probably 
copyright 7-Eleven, but I don't really know. All other trademarks are 
copyright of their respective holders. 

This document is copyright J.T.Kauffman 1999 and cannot be reproduced 
for profit in any form. It can be freely distributed over the internet 
as long as it is unaltered and is only distributed on free (i.e. non-
subscription) sites. If you do choose to post this document on your 
site, please email me to let me know. 

The author of this document can not and will not be held responsible for 
any damage that you may do to your computer hardware, software, or 
accessories through the use of any techniques found in this document. 
All information is are provided for use AT YOUR OWN RISK, and is thusly 
labeled as such. All information is provided at your own risk.


Contact:

J.T.Kauffman
[email protected]


Since Sept.22, 1999
Shibata, Miyagi, Japan
jt.



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