PIRATES

Shiver me timbers! Splice me mainbrace! Hoist the Jimlad! The information on pirates which I've gathered is in the entry below, so I'll be using this space to shed light on an oddity in Final Fantasy's translation which has caused some confusion. In the Japanese version of FF1, the green men Bikke sends after you (Captain Bikke and his band?) were called "kaizoku", Japanese for pirate, while the blue men you fight at sea were given the English name "pirates" (yes, each individual blue man was called a "pirates" - the Japanese language uses the same word as both singular and plural, which would probably account for this slip-up). In the English translation of the NES version, green men were called "pirates" (the singular), and the blue men were, bizarrely, renamed "kyzoku". The English translation of FF1 included in Final Fantasy Origins, however, called the green men "pirates" and the blue men "privateers", which makes much more sense. Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!

Buccaneer -- Pirate -- Pirates

BUCCANEER, PIRATE, PIRATES

Video piracy is a crime, please help us to... oh, sorry. Today, the most famous nautical pirates were the ones who raided Spanish ships in the 17th - 18th century Caribbian, and this is the look used in FF2 (the term "buccaneer", by the way, is used chiefly for these pirates). FF1's pirates, however, resemble stereotypical Vikings; Viking seafarers from 1000 years ago were infamous for raiding ships, and so are often considered pirates.

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