Forget boxes of chocolates, flowers, and stuffed animals. Those are gifts you should be exchanging every day. No, for me, Valentine’s Day is the kind of day where you and your loved one go out and get Final Fantasy tattoos.
Long-time Kotaku readers might have been here when I got my first Final Fantasy tattoo, the Black Mage. It was my first tattoo ever, and the pain, while intense, was something I could overlook in the interest of body art.
Then I had our readers vote for the next, which resulted in Fighter on my opposite arm, a fine companion for the Black Mage, no matter what Brian Clevinger might think.
http://kotaku.com/384530/my-second-gaming-tattoo-+-readers-choice
Readers might also remember my girlfriend, Emily, from my article on my EverQuest addiction from back in the day. We’re still together, and as we proved yesterday, still capable of being painfully romantic.
Since we’re both inked, we often joke when passing by the local Psycho Tattoo in Sandy Springs, Georgia, that we should stop whatever we’re doing and just get more tattoos. Failing to come up with anything one might consider a normal Valentine’s Day activity, I decided it was time to do just that.
As my Fighter needed some touch ups, I went with the Red Mage this time around, so our tattoo artist, Justin, wouldn’t have to mix too much. As was the case with the first two tattoos, the line work was excruciating, but the end product was glorious.
Emily, being some sort of mutant woman crafted just for me, chose a Black Mage Chocobo from Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo’s Dungeon. She opted to put it on the back of her leg, so she could “hum the Chocobo theme song and run really fast.”
As you can see from the images, Justin works just as well with traditional art as he does with pixels.
So now we both have fresh tattoos. I’m heading back next Sunday to get Thief, to balance my arms out, and Emily is pondering White Mage Chocobo on her other leg for the same reason.
It was definitely a Valentine’s Day I will remember for the rest of my life, every time I look down at my hairy, inked arm. The only downside? Fresh tattoos and cuddling do not mix. You’ve been warned.