The No-Expenses-Spared Guide to Raising Chocobos
In Final Fantasy VII, Square's first game in the Final Fantasy series to be released onto the PlayStation, just about every common theme used in the series was given a spot of polish. Firmly established favourites such as moogles and chocobos, Ultima and Bahomut, and swords named Masamune all saw inclusion in the series' seventh outing. Of these, it is the chocobos that merit special mention.
Final Fantasy VII increases the humble chocobo's role substantially from previous games. Traditionally one of the games' mascots, chocobos are traditionally used as transport for our heroes, as well as sometimes as a summoned monster. Whilst fulfilling both these roles as before, Final Fantasy VII also offers the player to try their hand at raising their own chocobos, breeding those they catch in the hope of rearing more powerful and skilled birds. It's a little like Pokémon.
Now, raising chocobos is not as simple as just bringing together a Mummy chocobo and a Daddy chocobo who love each other very much. It will take an almost infuriating amount of time, commitment, and most of all gil. If, however, you want to be able to obtain some of the tastiest Materia available, this side-quest is a must. Of course, one doesn't have to do it, but it will make the game much easier (and is practically a necessity for beating Ruby and Emerald Weapon.)
The Chocobo Hunter's Essential Equipment
In order to be able to start the subquest, you'll need to have access to the Highwind, the game's airship, since it involves a lot of globe-trotting. Additionally, you'll need to be able to rent stables from the chocobo ranch. This makes this quest easiest to do on discs 2 and 3. With this in mind, you'll need the following:
- The Highwind. Being able to fly around the world means we can catch ourselves chocobo from specific locations with certain characteristics.
- Chocobo Lure Materia. This can be bought for 2,000gil on disc 1 from the Chocobo Ranch, or found on disc 2 for free at the same place. (Look around the fence) Equipping this allows us to find chocobos - it can't be done without.
- Lots and lots of money. You'll need to buy a lot of items such as Greens to feed your chocobos, and they cost a fair bit. Speaking of which...
- Sylkis Greens. These, when fed to your chocobos, will raise all their stats at once, and cost 5,000gil each. Expensive but easily worth the price. These can be bought from the Chocobo Sage, who lives on the Northern Continent in a small hut. Track him down and buy, buy, buy.
- Three Carob Nuts. These are used for breeding chocobos with. They can be either won from the Gold Saucer, or stolen from enemies - the monster Vlakorados, which can be found on the grass by the Sage's house, carries them.
- You'll also need one Zeio nut. These can be stolen from goblins, which live on an island covered with trees in the North-East of the world map.
- Finally, you'll need to rent some stables at the Chocobo Stables. Each stable can hold a single chocobo, and costs 10,000gil.
If you're in need of a large amount of money (and to buy enough greens costs a small fortune), there are a couple of quick ways you can raise some gil. A mastered All materia, if sold, will net you a huge amount. If you don't feel like selling this rather useful materia, however, provided you have enough Elixirs, you can defeat the Magic Pots in the Northern Cave for vast riches. Having the W-Item materia will make this significantly easier.
Gotta Catch 'em All: Getting yourself a chocobo
In order to be able to catch a chocobo, you need to equip the Chocobo Lure materia (see above for how to get hold of one). The higher its level, the greater your chances are of meeting one, though a freshly-acquired materia will be just fine for our purposes. (If you're desperate, you can master the materia in the usual way for 30,000AP.)
However, just equipping the materia is no good on its own. In order to meet a chocobo, you need to be in one of the areas they lurk naturally. These are shown on the World Map as claw prints; run around them for a while, and eventually you should be drawn into a random battle, hopefully with a chocobo standing amongst the enemies. (The music will also change to the chocobo theme, instead of the traditional battle theme)
These battles act as usual, however, there are some conditions. If you attack the chocobo, it will run away, so you want to avoid any attacks that target all opponents. Also, the chocobo will get bored quickly and simply walk off if you're not careful, so it's in your best interests to finish the battle quickly. (A chocobo can be distracted by giving it greens, which it will pause to eat while you continue fighting; this won't stop it running if you attack it, though)
If you succeed in killing everything but the chocobo, congratulations! You've caught yourself a yellow, oversized bird! Now on to the real fun...
Am I Hot Or Not? Which chocobos to go for
Our eventual aim is to breed a Gold Chocobo. "Why?", I hear you ask. Well, the different colour chocobos have unique abilities which makes breeding them a very tasty prospect.
- The Yellow Chocobo is same as the chocobos you can catch on the World Map, and are good for transport, but not so hot at racing.
- The Blue Chocobo is able to cross rivers and shallow water, and is a better racer than the yellow.
- The Green Chocobo can run up hillsides and smaller mountains that Cloud can't clear on foot, and is better at racing than the yellow.
- The Black Chocobo combines the abilities of the blue and green chocobos, and is significantly better at racing than the blue or green.
- Finally, the Gold Chocobo can run anywhere on the World Map - even over oceans. It's also the fastest available racer.
Each of the coloured chocobo, bar the yellow, are able to access areas of the map that are unaccessible normally; these are typically hidden behind walls of hills, and on terrain the airship can't land on. Hidden in four caves on the World Map are unique materia, which makes going for the Gold Chocobo a significantly rewarding quest.
So how does one breed a Gold Chocobo? It's all in the genes...
Important: Save your game before you mate a pair of chocobos! If you don't get the result you want, you can always re-load and try again instead of having to wait for your chocobos to recover. It may take several tries, so be patient.
- Our first step is to catch a pair of chocobos from the Gold Saucer area. These should be "good" chocobos - when you move them into your stables, Choco Billy will say "This is a good chocobo", or something similar, but will explicitly say the word 'good'. If he says something else, discard that chocobo and catch another. We want a male and a female good chocobo.
- Next, head to the Mideel area, and catch another pair of chocobos - one male, one female, as before. This time, however, they need to be "great" chocobos. If not, keep trying until you've caught them.
- Feed each of your new chocobos 10 Sylkis greens, to raise their stats significantly above the base.
- Now, race your four chocobos at the Gold Saucer. Raising a chocobo's class will increase the chance that desirable genes are passed on; it will take three wins to raise a class, so after 6 wins you should be able to get a freshly-caught chocobo to class 'A'. Ideally, you want all four to reach 'A' class, but the "good" chocobos may only be capable of making it to 'B' class.
- Time to play matchmaker. Mate your "good" female and your "great" male chocobos, giving them a Carob nut. This should result in a freshly-hatched Blue chocobo! If not, reset and try again. Once you've got your blue chocobo, you can release the parents.
- Next, mate the "good" male and "great" female, again giving them a Carob nut. This time, you should be the proud owner of a brand new Green chocobo. Release the parents.
- If the genders of your new chocobos are not opposites, we won't be able to breed them, so if they're not, reload and try again.
- Again, feed the blue and green chocobos 10 Sylkis greens each to raise their stats, then race them up to 'A' class. Since the blue and green chocobos are significantly better racers than yellows, you should have much less trouble getting them up to 'A' class. Again, six wins apiece will be enough.
- Mate the blue and green chocobos, giving them - you guessed it - a Carob nut. I don't know quite what's in these nuts, but if you're lucky, you should be presented with a baby Black chocobo for your efforts. (If not: lather, rinse, repeat) What you do with the blue and green chocobos is up to you now; you can let them go or keep them.
- Feed and race your Black chocobo. This time, once you've gotten to class 'A', keep racing - three more wins will raise it to 'S' class, the pinnacle of chocobo development.
- Time to hop into the Highwind again - you need to catch one more chocobo. This needs to be a "Wonderful" chocobo, which can be found on the Northern Continent.
- Feed and race the Wonderful chocobo, bringing it up to 'S' class like the Black.
- Finally, save, and mate the Wonderful and Black chocobos, this time using the Zeio nut. If you're very, very lucky... a Gold Chocobo will be yours. Hurrah!
I've Got Chocobos
Now you're the proud owner of your chocobos, what do you do with them? Well, now you can go treasure hunting, since you now own a chocobo that can go everywhere.
As said before, there are four materia caves on the World Map that can be accessed by your Gold Chocobo. (3 of them can also be found using a blue, green, and black chocobo, but having the gold means you can get all four in one trip.)
- North of North Corel, there is a river seperating a small piece of land with a cave entrance. Head there and enter the cave to find the HP<->MP materia.
- South-East of Wutai is a mountain blocking a small peninsula with a cave entrance; in here, you'll find the Mime materia.
- At the very far-East of the map, there's an island with a cave on it. Head inside and grab the Quadra Magic materia.
- And finally, in the North-East of the World Map right at the top, there is a small island the Highwind can't land on. Inside there's a cave; walk inside to find the ultimate summon, Knights of the Round.
You can also use your Gold Chocobo to obtain
Vincent's ultimate weapon and
limit break. On the continent with the Gold Saucer, there is a waterfall that can be accessed by submarine; stroll up to it on your chocobo, dismount, and enter the waterfall via the left to find
Lucrecia's cave. Come back after about 10 minutes, and you'll obtain
Chaos and the
Death Penalty.
The Other Way To Do It
There is another way to get a Gold Chocobo, however this may prove all but impossible without having already gotten one: defeat Ruby Weapon. This will net you the Desert Rose, which can be traded with a man in Kalm for a Gold Chocobo. This is not an easy thing to do at all.