Whether Tis Nobler

The Genesis Effect. Before the Wutai mission and meeting Genesis in Banora Village, Zack is a proud SOLDIER. He adheres to orders. Overtime, this tenacity fades as Zack learns the true nature of Shinra Corporation. The people responsible for taking Genesis, Angeal,and Sephiroth's humanity. The people who would go so far as to have Banora Village burnt to the ground to cover their misdeeds. These same people that Zack gives his all for to serve, through pride and honor, to become a SOLDIER, experiments on him and his friend, Cloud, and hunts them down like animals. Zack left Gongaga to become ahero, and in the end, to do this he had to work against Shinra, which had been the antagonist the whole time.

Hero?. During forum crawls,a lot of people argued that if Zack had not got in Genesis' way... Had he left Cloud behind, and gone to Midgar... Both these events have a ripple effect. Had he let Genesis have his way, the Shinra Corporation would have been dismantled, which may have halted Sephiroth's madness and the events of FFVII. Had he left Cloud, Sephiroth could have never used Cloud as a puppet to bring the Black Materia to summon Meteor, which resulted in Aeris' untimely death. There are a lot of 'what ifs', but Zack walked the path which he believed his mentor Angeal would have taken. For Zack, SOLDIER was who Angeal was, not the lapdogs of Shinra as Genesis claimed. Years of Angeal drilling into him that tobe a hero, one must have a dream and most importantly, never let go of their pride.