FF8 has some of the most sumptuously rendered beds in a PS1 game, and also some of the most uncomfortable beds ever designed.
Let’s talk about the good ones first, because I don’t think FF8 gets enough credit for how good its furniture looks. Considering how plasticky most pre-rendered video game graphics still looked at this time, Final Fantasy VIII put a lot of care and attention into the texture and material of the world.
First off: the bed in Zell’s room in Balamb Town. It’s not the most comfortable bed in the world, but it definitely looks like a teenager’s bed. It looks like an Ikea-style low-profile bed with a mattress on a short wooden frame. But it still looks pretty comfortable! That pillow looks like it holds its form pretty well. I would take this over sleeping on a couch, which is about the level of bed you would buy Zell if you were his parents. Well-rendered.
Next, look at the bed at the house in Timber. I chose to embed this video because I love that someone made a video of just this room.
That’s also a pretty nice-looking bed! I love that it’s not a straight-up rectangle. There’s a little sag on the sheets and the comforter, just like you’d expect from an actual bed. So far, so good!
But now here’s the best one: the beds in Raine’s house in Winhill. Maybe it’s the soft light coming in through the windows, but those beds look FANTASTIC. Look at the plushness of the headboard, or the extremely good tuck jobs that Raine did. Or all the other upholstered furniture. But for my money, these are the best beds in Final Fantasy VIII, and arguably the comfiest room in the entire game.
The point is that the artists for FF8 clearly knew how to make comfortable-looking beds, and so did the artisans within the world of FF8. It is very possible to have good beds in this world.
I hope you are now prepared to see what a bad bed looks like.
Yikes! This is a cot in Dr. Kadowaki’s infirmary in Balamb Garden. I have to assume this is a triage bed, because this looks about as comfortable as sleeping on the floor. It looks like the headboard I have on my actual IRL bed, which is to say, NOT a replacement for a bed. I’m going to cut Dr. Kadowaki a little slack here because this could be an intentionally shitty temporary bed for dealing with overflow, which she definitely needs given how many of her patients are students who murder people for a living. But we’ve seen the more permanent beds in the infirmary, and she can do much better than this.
But here’s something that isn’t excusable.
GOD. Look how well-furnished the rest of Rinoa’s room is, and then look at that fucking foldout bed. My issue here is that it seems to have minimal if any support. It’s not like it’s a wooden frame with a mattress on it. That looks like solid wood with a veneer of padding on top. Considering how much space she has and how upscale this room is (it’s for the “princess,” after all), they MUST have been able to get a better bed than this.
I’m also alarmed that there’s no support in the middle, hinged portion of that folding bed. After a tough day out on the field, Rinoa throws herself onto the bed and it immediately breaks in half.
This bed was a choice. It’s not like Timber is incapable of making decent beds, but this is what they do with futons and folding sofas. If I was a frequent traveler in the Galbadia region, I might welcome Edea’s takeover if it means we got some better sleeper cabins.