Statue on the Kilika Steps - X & X-2

[Vivi-Gamer]

Hi,

I've been playing through Final Fantasy X again and I noticed a statue of a best which I thought was quite interesting but I don't think is a monster within the two games:

I also flicked through the enemies of both games and didn't see anything of resemblance:

Final Fantasy X enemies

A gallery of the enemies from Final Fantasy X.

finalfantasy.fandom.com

Final Fantasy X-2 enemies

A gallery of the enemies from Final Fantasy X-2.

finalfantasy.fandom.com

Maybe it's just some type of fancy gargoyle? Does each version of Sin look the same? I don't even recall seeign a past version of Sin in flashbacks.

 

[Miko]

I haven't played FFX-2 to finish myself so I'm not sure if that matters or not. I personally don't think this is a Sin related object, but I do feel like it's more likely a type of fancy gargoyle like you mentioned.


I'm quoting Wikipedia so take that with a grain of salt, but I found this interesting:

Legend of the Gargouille​

Main article: Gargoyle (monster)

A French legend that sprang up around the name of St. Romanus (French: Romain; fl. c. 631–641 AD), the former chancellor of the Merovingian king Clotaire II who was made bishop of Rouen, relates how he delivered the country around Rouen from a monster called Gargouille or Goji.[7][8] La Gargouille is said to have been the typical dragon with bat-like wings, a long neck, and the ability to breathe fire from its mouth. Multiple versions of the story are given, either that St. Romanus subdued the creature with a crucifix, or he captured the creature with the help of the only volunteer, a condemned man. In each, the monster is led back to Rouen and burned, but its head and neck would not burn due to being tempered by its own fire breath. The head was then mounted on the walls of the newly built church to scare off evil spirits, and used for protection.[9] In commemoration of St. Romain, the Archbishops of Rouen were granted the right to set a prisoner free on the day that the reliquary of the saint was carried in procession (see details at Rouen).[10][11]

History
The term gargoyle is most often applied to medieval work, but throughout all ages, some means of water diversion, when not conveyed in gutters, was adopted. In ancient Egyptian architecture, gargoyles showed little variation, typically in the form of a lion's head.[12] Similar lion-mouthed water spouts were also seen on Greek temples, carved or modelled in the marble or terracotta cymatium of the cornice.[13] An excellent example of this are the 39 remaining lion-headed water spouts on the Temple of Zeus.[clarification needed] Originally, it had 102 gargoyles or spouts, but due to the heavy weight (they were crafted from marble), many snapped off and had to be replaced.[14][15]

It makes sense if you think about it considering Killika is where Sin attacked from the water (where we also have that cutscene of Yuna performing a sending on the water.) Also this is where you get Ifrit when you're doing your cloister of trials and I feel like it's horns remind me of past Ifrit versions. I never really looked up gargoyles before this, so I found the bit about the fire-breathing very interesting in the Gargouille reference. The statue in your screenshot definitely looks like it has more of a dragon type face which I feel like we more commonly see the lion-face in games, but maybe that was their way of distancing themselves from the 'evil' aspect of a gargoyle and more into the 'protective' aspect as a means of diverting water (such as Sin's attack prior)

So, I'm not sure! Interesting thread though! I think a Gargoyle makes the most sense and I can see now in the aftermath of the first game why they would install a stone gargoyle. It definitely does look like it was referenced after a monster but I can't think of any that it reminds me of, but it's funny they would put that much detail in otherwise.

 

[Dionysos]

This is the sort of thread I love!


A form of apotropaic sculpture would be my guess.
Gargoyles (or grotesques, since gargoyles typically imply waterspouts) can come in all shapes and sizes, representing all sorts of beasts. The sculptor would sometimes just make it up so long as it denoted a monster (or sometimes a naughty/weird man) and served an apotropaic function. I suppose the Kilika sculpture could fit the bill there, serving to protect the steps leading to the temple where Summoners need to acquire Ifrit.

As far as I am aware Spiran lore hasn't been expanded upon enough for us to know if any mythological / spiritual beings are associated with the religion of Yevon. We know of Yevon himself. We know that former summoners are almost venerated as saint like figures, and then we also have the Aeons and the Fayth that generate them. But no stories of beasts like this, which could be intermediary beings between the gods and mankind, or they could be something else entirely.
Perhaps even a character from a local Kilikan legend?

While draconic/reptilian in form, I agree with Miko that there are some elements that might be deliberately prompting us to anticipate Ifrit. The horns and red spots, at least.

So perhaps the gargoyles or grotesque theory is our best bet for now.

Or perhaps the person who designed this map was given free reign and decided to put that in for a creative laugh.

 

[Vivi-Gamer]

I just wanted to check it wasn't something I had missed! I was 100% I had not seen that creature through my playthroughs of he game before and just felt it was odd for a game to have such detailed monster designs to omit that.

I know through out many Squaresoft developed games they did hire outsourced artists to work on environments - One is called Kusanagi and there are some nice artbooks out there that detail their work on various Games/Anime:

Book Review: 背景画集 草薙 5 | Parka Blogs

www.parkablogs.com

Nothing in there or the Ultimania guide which covers this specific asset sadly.

 

[Dionysos]

I just wanted to check it wasn't something I had missed! I was 100% I had not seen that creature through my playthroughs of he game before and just felt it was odd for a game to have such detailed monster designs to omit that.

I know through out many Squaresoft developed games they did hire outsourced artists to work on environments - One is called Kusanagi and there are some nice artbooks out there that detail their work on various Games/Anime:

Book Review: 背景画集 草薙 5 | Parka Blogs

www.parkablogs.com

Nothing in there or the Ultimania guide which covers this specific asset sadly.

Thanks for this link.
I was aware of Kusanagi Studios creating some of the backgrounds. I've been looking into them for (particularly their work on FFIX) recently for another research project.

I didn't realise that their work had been collected into volumes.

I actually want to know more about them and their precise relationship with Square Enix. Like how much of it was following strict direction from above, or if they had significant creative freedom to add whatever the heck they wanted to these backgrounds. But sadly I'm not sure if that sort of information will ever really become available in full.

Because there are some really interesting background details which fans take to be contributing to the lore or just general feel of the FF worlds, and it would be good to know precisely from whom the ideas came.