Cid Highwind

Cid Highwind is a playable character in Final Fantasy VII. He is part of a long tradition of Final Fantasy characters named Cid. He is the most uncouth of the protagonists; he constantly swears and loses his temper, and chain-smokes cigarettes. Despite this, he has a good heart, and is even voted temporary leader of the party at one point. He fits into the archetype of a father type character.

Appearance
In Final Fantasy VII, Cid wears a navy blue jacket over a white shirt with dark green pants. He also wears a pair of goggles with a packet of cigarettes strapped underneath the band. Cid is a chain-smoker, and ends each battle in Final Fantasy VII by lighting a new cigarette. He wears leather gloves and boots and carries his weapon of choice, a long spear. Cid has blond hair and blue eyes, although compared to the eyes of Cloud Strife, they are not as bright or noticeable. He also has a very closely cropped beard.

In Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus, Cid wears a light blue T-shirt with a sweater tied around his waist and his green pants. He also still wears goggles, but his cigarettes and smoking habit are absent in Advent Children. Nomura has said that Cid's appearance was designed with working clothes, and he doesn't care about fashion, and Nozue said Cid's T-shirt was deceptively hard to render. In Kingdom Hearts, Cid wears blue pants with a belly warmer and a white T-shirt. He doesn't smoke in the series, likely due to its younger age bracket, but chews a toothpick to give the same type of imagery.

Character
Cid is well known among fans for his foul mouth (rivaled only by Barret's), and he curses a blue streak at several points in the game, earning him titles such as Cid "Foul-mouthed" Highwind, or "Sir Swears-Alot" from fans. Several of his lines are even "bleeped", appearing as a jumble of symbols like "#*$&#!". As shown in a flashback, Cid was always a bit crude, but not to the same extent. Thus, it seems his attitude and foul language are an effect of him losing his dream of spaceflight. However, Cid does not always mean his insults in a negative way: he refers to Cloud and his allies as "numbskulls" for opposing Shin-Ra, but admits he likes the idea.

Despite his attitude, Cid is not cruel and is actually rather kind-hearted. He is angry over losing out on his dream, but sacrificed it deliberately to save Shera's life. Although he verbally abuses her afterwards, once her concerns about a faulty oxygen tank prove founded, he apologizes. After finally going to space and returning, Cid gives a heartened speech to the party about how he saw the planet as "a sick little kid", and Sephiroth as a disease inside it that it was their job to protect it from.

Story
Since childhood, Cid dreamed of becoming the first human in space. He almost achieved this goal through the Shin-Ra Space Program sometime prior to the start of the game. Aside from his ambitions as an astronaut, Cid designed a number of aircraft and was also a great pilot. Among his designs were the propeller plane Tiny Bronco, and the airship Highwind, both constructed sometime before Final Fantasy VII. Shin-Ra later built a rocket, Shin-Ra #26, fully intending to launch it into space with Cid at the helm.

Before Crisis -Final Fantasy VII-
On the day Shin-Ra #26 was to launch, Rufus Shinra was overseeing the celebratory ceremony, although he found the idea of space travel pointless. Cid accused Rufus of being too cynical compared to his father. At this time, AVALANCHE attempted to steal the Tiny Bronco, and Rufus' bodyguard, a member of the Turks, saved it.

AVALANCHE moved on to attack the rocket themselves, led by Sears. AVALANCHE stole an oxygen tank to stop the launch, and Cid told Rufus and President Shinra to continue the launch even if it wasn't safe to do so. The President agreed, so AVALANCHE resorted to kidnapping Cid themselves. Cid was rescued and the launch proceeded to countdown.

At this time, it was revealed that Shera was still doing a safety check. Unwilling to let the rocket launch and kill Shera in the blast, Cid hit the emergency shut down and stopped the launch. Inside the rocket, Cid silently vowed to take care of the rocket and wait for another chance to launch. However, the failure of the launch and the prohibitive costs caused Shin-Ra to cut funding to the space program, and the Shin-Ra #26 was abandoned. The rocket would eventually become a tourist attraction, which spawned the village Rocket Town.

Final Fantasy VII'
The hot-tempered Cid blamed Shera for destroying his dream, and Shera, being an extremely insecure person, accepted the blame completely. After the incident Shera devoted herself to doing whatever she could to atone for her mistake, although Cid continued to treat her abominably. Cid became increasingly bitter and irate over the years as his dream continued to grow more distant.

Cloud Strife and his party met with Cid in Rocket Town during their search for Sephiroth. Their visit coincided with a visit from Rufus Shinra, now President, who Cid hoped was planning to restart the Space Program. However, Rufus wasn't interested in the Space Program at all, and merely wanted the Tiny Bronco to track Sephiroth. Cid refused to give up his airplane, and joined with Cloud's party to fight his boss, Palmer. They jumped on the Tiny Bronco to escape, but the plane was shot down by Shin-Ra soldiers. His hopes dashed anew and having no reason to return to the town, Cid decided to join Cloud and his allies. Cid continued to travel with Cloud, until he was separated from the group at the Northern Crater, and the rest of the group was held captive in Junon. Cid commandeered the Highwind for the party's usage and under Tifa's guidance, began to look for Cloud. When he was found, Tifa left the group to care for him, and Cid was appointed leader in her place.

Shin-Ra was planning to load Huge Materia onto Cid's rocket and launch it at Meteor, hopefully destroying it. Cid spearheaded an attack on two reactors to stop Shin-Ra from collecting the Huge Materia there, then returned to Mideel to see Cloud. After an attack by Ultimate Weapon, Cloud recovered, and Cid let him take back the leader position.

Unwilling to let Shin-Ra go ahead with the launch, Cid attacked them, and was stuck aboard the rocket with Cloud and Shera as Palmer launched it. Finally relishing his dream realized, Cid and the party went to an escape pod, when an oxygen tank exploded. Realizing Shera's fears had been founded, Cid apologized for his rude treatment of her, and the group returned to earth safely.

Cid joined with the party to finish Sephiroth off in the Northern Crater, and took the Highwind's controls to escape the fall of Meteor.

Novellas
In On the Way to a Smile, Cid made an appearance in Case of Barret. He and Shera were now working on his new airship at Rocket Town, and Shera was in charge of operating a refurbished oil drilling rig to provide fuel. Cid acted as a confidante of sorts to Barret, helping him find a new purpose in life. Barret also suggested that Cid could use his new airship to help people with Geostigma reach medical attention, which Cid agreed to if a suitable fuel for the ship could be found.

Advent Children
In Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, Cid was now a legendary pilot who flew his new airship Shera, and helped out Cloud in the battle against Bahamut SIN.

Dirge of Cerberus
The following year during the events of Dirge of Cerberus -Final Fantasy VII-, Cid worked as the leader of an airship division with support from the World Regenesis Organization and participated in the Battle of Midgar against Deepground and Omega while helping out his old friend Vincent Valentine. It was revealed that at some point prior to the game, he married Shera.

Equipment and Stats
Cid's weapon of choice is a spear and thus is a Dragoon. Though it's unnoticable, he does have high defensive stats. Cid's spears have high power, and one of them, the Scimitar, is one of only two equipment pieces in the game to give Triple Materia Growth.

Limit Breaks

 * See videos of the various Limit Breaks here

Kingdom Hearts
Cid makes an appearance in Kingdom Hearts as a Gummi Ship expert. His first appearance is in Traverse Town when he meets Sora in his accessory shop after Sora lands in the town after the destruction of Destiny Islands. He owns an accessory shop in the first few parts of the game and turns into a gummi block shop for Sora to purchase new parts for his gummi ship. In Kingdom Hearts, Cid's story was changed as a savior to Squall (Leon), Yuffie, and Aerith when Hallow Bastion was taken over by Heartless, although he still remained a pilot and appears to have toned down on his infamous swearing. His cigarettes are also replaced with a toothpick.

Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories
Cid returns in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories in the memory of Traverse Town. Although it's just a memory of Cid he still is savior to Leon and friends. He doesn't remember Sora at first, but in some segments he remembers Sora and friends from their adventures from the first game.

Kingdom Hearts II
Cid returned in Kingdom Hearts II again as a savior to Leon and the gang. For the most part, he is seen working on a computer in Merlin's House, which Merlin criticized as "ruining the atmosphere" of his humble abode. When Sora and friends came back to Hollow Bastion in the later part of the game to fight the MCP, who had taken over the town with the aid of the Heartless from Space Paranoids, Cid was working on an "MCP eradication program" which would've been done sooner if it "weren't for the old loon's magic," which offended Merlin to such an extent that he damaged Cid's computer with a spell just a split second after the eradication program was finished and given to Leon to aid Sora. After the MCP was defeated by Sora and co., he, along with the rest of the gang, remembered the town's true name of Radiant Garden.

Cid Highwind