Ages of people who don't have ages.

[Cat Rage Room]

What does the flashback entail?

(please for the love of god tell me i'm fascinated by shinra)

 

[Strangelove]

Spoiler

Rufus has woken up and for a change, found President Shinra was home. He shows Rufus blueprints for the renovated president's office, and Rufus asks him how he would escape. President Shinra tells him that he would wouldn't need to escape, but that he'd add an escape route in for Rufus because while PS wouldn't need one, Rufus might.

10th Anniversary Ultimania says that President Shinra turned the Shinra weapons manufacturer into what it was in FFVII in a single generation, but that doesn't say that he founded the original company. There was a date in Crisis Core for the Nibelheim mako reactor being built (don't remember what that was now), but that (and the history of mako use in general) might give some idea as to how long he is.

Edit; [ μ ] - εуλ 1968 was when they started using the Nibel mako reactor (under the weapon manufacturer name), and [ μ ] - εуλ 1959 is the discovery of mako, which is about 48 years before FFVII.

Assuming he was at least 20-30 when he was president and that the discovery of mako happened early in his reign, that would make him about 70-80 in FFVII?

 

[OneWingedDemon]

I always thought the Turks were in their 30s in the game. I put Reno at late twenties, same with Rufus. I can live with 25 though.

And isn't Sephiroth already confirmed to be around 30 in the game?
I kinda thought the official art made him look like he had a receding hairline

What I always liked about FFVII was that the females weren't like 14 and 15, and *GASP* one was actually older than the guy she was hitting on, even if it was only a year.

...but ja. I was gonna ask, are there ages for ze Turks?

 

[Cat Rage Room]

10th Anniversary Ultimania says that President Shinra turned the Shinra weapons manufacturer into what it was in FFVII in a single generation, but that doesn't say that he founded the original company. There was a date in Crisis Core for the Nibelheim mako reactor being built (don't remember what that was now), but that (and the history of mako use in general) might give some idea as to how long he is.

Does Case of Shinra give any light or insight on this?

(you really gotta put this up by the way)

 

[Strangelove]

I think that one scene was all there was about it in OTWTAS.

 

[Valerious]

Rufus: about 25 (FFVII)~27 (AC).

Spoiler: On The Way To A Smile: Episode Shinra

features a flashback of Rufus when he was 5 years old, which the book says was around 20 years before (the scene being set during the WEAPON attack on the Shinra building).

yayyy!!!

 

[Ravynne Nevyrmore]

The original game actually mentioned something about when the Nibel reactor was built. It was mentioned in the journals Sephiroth read. CBA to find it at the moment.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

Yeah, it was vague shit like X day, X year, etc. It didn't give any actual numbers for dates.

 

[Ravynne Nevyrmore]

Right, but it does give us a time frame because of what other events it was between.

(Cloud enters the bedroom. He passes through a secret door in the
fireplace, down a long spiral staircase, and through a dark cave. He
reaches a secret library, where Sephiroth paces back and forth, absorbed
in a book.)

Sephiroth
"....an organism that was apparently dead, was found in a 2000
year old geological stratum."
"Professor Gast named that organism, Jenova..."

(The camera pans up.)

Sephiroth
"X Year, X Month, X Day. Jenova confirmed to be an Ancient..."
"X Year, X Month, X Day. Jenova Project approved. The use of Mako
Reactor 1 approved for use..."

(Sephiroth walks down a narrow hallway lined with books. He stops and
looks upwards.)

Sephiroth
"My mother's name is Jenova... Jenova Project... Is this just a
coincedence?"

(He looks downward.)

Sephiroth
"Professor Gast... Why didn't you tell me anything? ...Why did
you die?"

So we can deduce it was approved for use after Jenova was discovered and "confirmed" to be an Ancient, and probably shortly thereafter since it's the next bit of info recorded. Seems like it was put into use because of the Jenova Project, maybe to power all the machines they had in the laboratory.

Hopefully Sephiroth spelled "coincidence" correctly though.

 

[wayfarer]

I always imagined Sephiroth to be in his latre 20s early 30s.

 

[Masamune]

Spoiler

Rufus has woken up and for a change, found President Shinra was home. He shows Rufus blueprints for the renovated president's office, and Rufus asks him how he would escape. President Shinra tells him that he would wouldn't need to escape, but that he'd add an escape route in for Rufus because while PS wouldn't need one, Rufus might.

Haha! ...Subtle.

 

[Valerious]

a little off topic here..

by reading to spoiler.. i cant help but wonder if Rufus was an angsty kid?
someone who had always been planning to overtake his father since young cant be any happier hahahaha

 

[Cat Rage Room]

I wonder if Rufus' mother is mentioned in Case of Shinra.

 

[Strangelove]

I don't remember anything about her there.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

There seems little point in objecting to the ages of people in what is, after all, a fantasy. Nobody ever gets any older, either, although I'll admit Reno looks very, very slightly younger in the promotional posters for Before Crisis. I guess it's all the mako. But if you want to think of it as realistic, remember that they live in a less civilized world than ours; a couple of hundred years ago in our world people were considered adults at the age of 13; in many parts of our world, 13 year old girls are mothers and 13 year old boy are seasoned soldiers. From what I can work out, Sephiroth was fighting in the Wutai war when he was 12, Zack joined SOLDIER when he was 15, Cloud ran away to Midgar when he was 14, and Reeve was designing Midgar when he was all of six years old. Lucky for them Shinra didn't have a Children Protection Agency! Since there don't appear to be any schools on Gaia anyway, what does it matter?

 

[Cat Rage Room]

I don't think you're supposed to look THAT deep into it. I can assume that people age like real life humans on Gaia, and as far as the military aspect goes, it wasn't unheard of for people in World War II to join the military at 14/15/16 years of age, because there was a gigantic world consuming war going on, and they needed all of the manpower they could get. The Wutai War was such a war. However, I don't think Sephiroth was 12 on the front lines. He was young, though. But I don't think 12.

And no, we just don't SEE any schools. There are definitely schools. Hell, they've even mentioned a few times in the Compilation.

 

[Ryushikaze]

There seems little point in objecting to the ages of people in what is, after all, a fantasy. Nobody ever gets any older, either, although I'll admit Reno looks very, very slightly younger in the promotional posters for Before Crisis. I guess it's all the mako. But if you want to think of it as realistic, remember that they live in a less civilized world than ours; a couple of hundred years ago in our world people were considered adults at the age of 13; in many parts of our world, 13 year old girls are mothers and 13 year old boy are seasoned soldiers. From what I can work out, Sephiroth was fighting in the Wutai war when he was 12, Zack joined SOLDIER when he was 15, Cloud ran away to Midgar when he was 14, and Reeve was designing Midgar when he was all of six years old. Lucky for them Shinra didn't have a Children Protection Agency! Since there don't appear to be any schools on Gaia anyway, what does it matter?

The Wutai war started 8 years before CC. It doesn't say Sephiroth was active for the entire war, and it makes sense in a way that his deployment lead to the end of the war and hence his fame.

Also, Reeve would be four or less when 'designing' Midgar. Then again, he does have the power to bring inanimate objects to life, so...
Or FAR more parsimoniously, Reeve 'designing' Midgar refers to his job as head of Urban Development and PLANNING THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE AS OF YET INCOMPLETE UPPER PLATE.

The SOLDIER ages are legitimate, certainly.

Oh, and there are schools on Gaia. Cloud actually went to a Military Academy as part of his MP/ pre-SOLDIER training.

 

[Cthulhu]

and as far as the military aspect goes, it wasn't unheard of for people in World War II to join the military at 14/15/16 years of age, because there was a gigantic world consuming war going on, and they needed all of the manpower they could get.

Just adding that this varied by country - the States had a minimum age of 21 (dropped to 18 after Pearl Harbor), but there were some soldiers that lied about their age and got in at 16. Germany was at 16 and had the Hitlerjugend, which were pretty much boy scouts, and Britain had a minimum age limit, although some parts of the army (navy etc) allowed younger folk to join up.