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Remember Chort? He’s a sub-boss in one of Final Fantasy 14’s newest dungeons—a magnificent large-and-in-charge lad who rolls up into a ball and charges around the arena like a giant, fleshy Sonic the Hedgehog.
I couldn’t stop laughing the first time I fought him, and I wasn’t the only person to immediately fall in love with how ridiculous he was. He quickly became memed to hell and back—from his goofy name, to the real “Mom, I frew up” stance he’s rocking as he patiently waits for you to enter the boss room and beat him up.
His immense reception came as quite the surprise to director and producer Naoki Yoshida. “I’m really glad to hear that Chort was so well received, but honestly I couldn’t really understand the appeal of Chort,” he said during a press Q&A at the game’s Berlin Fan Festival.
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“Of course, we do understand that he’s very popular and there’s been many memes. But really, I just couldn’t understand like… why.” Yoshida then said he’d love to hear what exactly it is about Chort that people find so appealing, before continuing: “I can understand maybe a little. I mean, this is some huge bulky guy, and then suddenly he’s standing there and then he rolls. So from that perspective, I can kind of understand.”
I’m not quite sure how exactly to tell Yoshida that Chort just sounds kind of funny, at least to my English ears. His large body, small head, and goofy name give me war flashbacks to the reign of Big Chungus, which I have to assume is a similar image for a lot of other players. Also, you know, the fact that he’s in a dungeon called The Clyteum. Yes, Chort is in The Clyteum. I’m not sure if those unintentional saucy undertones translate in Japanese.
But despite not fully getting what made us go crazy for Chort, Yoshida’s just happy to see the community doing silly things with the game. “It’s really fun for us to see,” he told the media. “So, if the people in the community also find some unexpected appeal in any content we produce moving forward, do make your voices heard because the development team is looking at all of the responses on social media, and we very much do enjoy looking at them. We have big smiles on our faces when things like this happen”
