Blitzball
Blitzball is a fictional sport that combines Hockey's 6 man teams and positions - and full contact -, with Soccer kicks and Water Polo water sports in one game. It is played by characters in two games of the Final Fantasy video game series, Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy X-2. The game is played underwater in a large sphere pool suspended in the air. Blitzball is portrayed as the favorite sport of residents of the fictional world of Spira where both Final Fantasy X and X-2 take place.
An Ode to Sports
The game plot provides a very favorable view of Blitzball and sports in general, as it is a blitzball player that, while practicing blitz, sets in motion the events that will culminate with the final demise of the Spira's scourge Sin, a monster that has been killing and destroying for the past one thousand years. In addition, the sport is also shown to foster peace as it is the only place all races and genders are accepted as equals without squabbles. In Final Fantasy X blitzball is also Spira's only mainstream form of entertainment available, allowing citizens to take their minds off the ever present threat of Sin, however briefly. Two of the game's main characters, Tidus and Wakka, are skilled blitzball players.
Overview
Teams are made up of six players a side, of whom one is the goalkeeper. The players swim around, throwing a dimpled ball called the Blitzball to each other in order to throw it into the opponent's goal area, thus scoring a goal. The team with the most goals after two five-minute halves is declared the winner. Also, in X-2, if a team leads the game by seven goals at any point, they automatically win. As players advance through the ranks they learn many new tricks to improve both their offensive and defensive skills.
How exactly the teams manage to hold their breath for such long periods of time is a source of either amusement or confusion among players. Though never stated in the game, it is probable that this ability is the result of serious training on the part of the players, much in the same way that marathon runners train their bodies to be able to run for long distances. In Eternal Calm, a short film set two years after the conclusion of Final Fantasy X, Yuna notes that after much practice and training from Wakka, she is able to hold her breath for over two minutes. The Final Fantasy X Scenario Ultimania guide also states that the magical pyrefly saturated water on the sphere somehow enables players to stay under water for the 5 minutes required for each half-time [1]. There are a wide variety of blitzball techniques, which can be viewed at Wikibooks.
Blitzball teams
| Besaid Aurochs | Luca Goers | Al Bhed Psyches | Ronso Fangs | Guado Glories | Kilika Beasts |
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- Gullwings (in Final Fantasy X-2, Yuna's sphere-hunting group fills in for the Aurochs when Blitzball season starts)
- Zanarkand Abes (Jecht and Tidus played for this team in Zanarkand) (pic)
- Zanarkand Duggles (The Abes played against this team at the beginning of Final Fantasy X) (pic)
- List of Free Bliztball agents at Wikibooks
Gallery
The screen captures below are copyright by the Final Fantasy X game developer (SE) and are being shown here for illustration and discussion purposes only.
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Zanarkand Abes versus Zanarkand Duggles, FFX opening match
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A Blitzball Keeper with the ball
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Victory display after scoring
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Player getting expelled from the sphere.
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Goal!
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Zanarkand Duggles
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Blitzball Pool
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Tidus makes a Bicycle Kick (In Game known as Sphere Shot)
Trivia
- Winning League games and Tournaments will give the RPG players an Easter Egg, i.e., a valuable item that is not essential to wining the game but makes it much easier. Some tournaments offer prizes such as Wakka's Overdrive upgrades, special moves for players or the chance to play against the Zanarkand Abes.
- Blitzball appears to be based on the heavily popular Captain Tsubasa video game series about a soccer team and its exploits.
- Blitzball is unique as it is one of the very few underwater team fictional sports ever described.
Other appearances
- The name Blitzball was first used to describe a fictional sport on the novel A Separate Peace by John Knowles. The novel's sport bears no resemblance to the Final Fantasy X minigame.
- On 2006 fashion photographer Mick Gleissner published a groundbreaking calendar with underwater photography of sports through a fish's eyes. In it there is a series of "Water Basketball" pictures, a fictional sport that looks very similar to Blitzball. Models and photo crew had to practice diving and holding their breath under water while exercising, just like fictional Blitzplayers [1] [2]
See also
- ^ Studio BentStuff, ed. (2001). Final Fantasy X Scenario Ultimania (in Japanese). DigiCube/Square-Enix. p. 59. ISBN 4-88787-010-8.