Chocobo Anatomy

How much do we know about the anatomy and physiology of chocobos in FFXIV?

I am mostly interested in musculoskeletal structure, because from a mechanical and (quasi-) evolutionary perspective, the point where their wings attach doesn't seem to make sense - it looks like they're attached midway through the spine, or possibly at the top of the pelvis, and that they don't seem to have ample musculature to support their use.

I can forgive their flying because a wizard did it wind aether and such, but I am sorely confused by their anatomy.

Of all the magical creatures and potential anomalies in the game, he's asking about THAT?! FFS, someone get this guy a beer so he'll shut up...

Anatomy of a chocobo = head (makes funny noises), everything else (delicious treats)
Finger licking good!

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Originally Posted by Jamillion

everything else (delicious treats)
Finger licking good!

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No. Don't even go there!

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Originally Posted by Knahli

No. Don't even go there!

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Lol, I've seen a few named dinner and such on Lamia, I won't eat my own chocobro though

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Originally Posted by Jamillion

Lol, I've seen a few named dinner and such on Lamia, I won't eat my own chocobro though

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Don't eat any chocobo!! Don't even humour the idea of doing the quests that endorse the idea! Skip them entirely!

They're akin to emus and ostriches. Funfact: They were originally supposed to have been bald and pink or flesh colored, with a terrible smell. Also, my bird's name is Lunchmeat.

It's modeled after a flightless bird, the Ostrich particularly. They can fly because it's a video game. Moreso, I'd like to see you create a thread about the flying turtle in the upcoming patch as I'm sure that's going to cause you to miss sleep.

"It's modeled after flightless birds."

Cassowaries, emus, and ostriches are large flightless birds, and all of their wings originate more anteriorally/cephalically than the Eorzean chocobo's. Even looking at raptor fossils, their arms/cephalad limbs originate much farther forward on the body. As it stands, I can't quite figure out how a chocobo's wings are attached.

Also, I say clearly in the first post I take no issue with chocobos flying, as they are demonstrated practitioners of magic, and so manipulating wind aether to stay aloft is not a particularly tall order.

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Originally Posted by Jpec07

"It's modeled after flightless birds."

Cassowaries, emus, and ostriches are large flightless birds, and all of their wings originate more anteriorally/cephalically than the Eorzean chocobo's. Even looking at raptor fossils, their arms/cephalic limbs originate much farther forward on the body. As it stands, I can't quite figure out how a chocobo's wings are attached.

Also, I say clearly in the first post I take no issue with chocobos flying, as they are demonstrated practitioners of magic, and so manipulating wind aether to stay aloft is not a particularly tall order.

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And all you need to make a fat chocobo fly is cake.

I had never really thought about it but you're right. Chocobo wings make no sense--they're way too far back in comparison to their spine. A skeleton of our fine feathered friends would look wholly unnatural.

obvious allagan creations

My theory - a deliberately bred in domestic trait, because it made the birds easier to mount. There's room just in front of the bird's wings for a rider's legs. The chocobo's wild precursers would presumably have had wings more conventionally placed further forward, but with enough variation through random mutations that the change could be selected for by breeders.

"Modeled after" in no way implies that they are anatomically identical. If I had said such I would expect a retort such as the one you provided. They clearly resemble one another, except one is an imaginary creature and the other an indigenous East African bird. Inspiration breeds creation, whimsical interpretation aside. Also the term 'cephalo' refers to the head, so I have no idea what bird you're thinking of that has limbs or wings attached to its skull. Check your anatomy and physiology book, please.

I apologize if this response sounded harsh.

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Originally Posted by Jpec07

How much do we know about the anatomy and physiology of chocobos in FFXIV?

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About this much.

http://i.imgur.com/toGgItQ.jpg

lol

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Originally Posted by Judah_Brandt

"Modeled after" in no way implies that they are anatomically identical. If I had said such I would expect a retort such as the one you provided. They clearly resemble one another, except one is an imaginary creature and the other an indigenous East African bird. Inspiration breeds creation, whimsical interpretation aside. Also the term 'cephalo' refers to the head, so I have no idea what bird you're thinking of that has limbs or wings attached to its skull. Check your anatomy and physiology book, please.

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Wow, that is a bit harsh, even despite Jpec's comments and the fact that you are right. Jpec, the chocobo's origins are far far older than FFXIV. It was actually first created back in 1988 for Final Fantasy II by a staff member who doesn't even work for Square anymore (Koichi Ishii). Apparently he based their design both from the mascot of a Japanese chocolate bar, and on the 'horseclaws' from Hiyao Miyazaki's classic anime film Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind - who in turn reportedly took the design for them from the prehistoric diatryma species. A simple Google search would have turned up these pages which have the information you could require (and all the information known about the ideas that went into the species' design).

Really, this game has a nice handy hint in the title... it's fantasy. This is a world with giant dragons-encased in space stations and animal-human hybrid races and intelligent anthropomorphic cacti and god-like psychic powers granted by the planet's consciousness symbolized by a giant sentient crystal (among other things). Leave real-world science behind. Don't think about things like this too much and just enjoy it. :)

Incidentally, I'm sorry if it seems I was being nasty to both of you, I just wanted to point out that you really cannot try to juxtapose real-world anatomical/biological science to a fantasy creature (okay, I suppose you can try, but it's more fun not to, sometimes you just have to turn your brain off and enjoy things for what they are rather than how they are. :)).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eU7EccguAfs

Assuming I linked that correctly, That should be a link to the "Aki's Pixel Pets" Episode on the chocobo.

Mentions the Miyazaki inspiration, their similarities to terror birds (Which they actually aren't), and a general run down on how their anatomy likely works.

They always reminded me most of Dromornithidae.

Amusingly, Dromornis is an ancestral waterfowl. So it's basically a giant 1000+ lb duck.
When I was doing upper division studies in Waterfowl and Gamebird Ecology, the general joke about Anseriformes (waterfowl; ducks, geese, etc) and Galliformes (gamebirds; chickens, pheasants, etc) were that they're really just "Tastegoodiformes." And, since Chocobo taste good, they must be in one of those closely-related orders.

Yep. Sound logic, if I do say so myself.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...omornis_BW.jpg

Hey, that might be a good base for the swimming chocobo variants in final fantasy. Instead of Giant Chickens they're Giant Ducks. lol

Oh, belatedly, for the more anal about anatomy. Spoilered for those who hate science in fantasy.

The biggest problem with the XIV Chocobo design is their legs. They drive me crazy.

The general rule in all birds is that the farther the legs are back on their body the worse they are at walking and running. As a runner, the Chocobo's legs should really, really be towards the middle of their body. Birds with legs that far back would be terrible at escaping predation on land.

Now, Galliformes can get away with legs relatively far back on their body because they're usually very strong burst fliers. They can get into the air quickly due to their short, strong wings. Galliformes aren't going to be running to escape a predator.

Since someone mentioned an Ostrich, look at how centered their legs are in comparison to their body and compare that to the XIV Chocobo design up there. And going off my Anseriform example above, compare the leg placement of a Snow Goose and a Western Grebe (Grebes are a pretty extreme example, though, and also not an anseriform). Snow Geese spend a lot of time foraging and nesting on Land, and Grebes are basically water-only divers.

So I'm guessing then that the longer neck wouldn't server as a counter Ballence?

Physics isn't exactly my strong suit.

At the same time, with the exception of Bandersnaches and possibly some Dragons, Chocobos don't seem to have very many natural preditors.

And it seems Bandersnaches may be primarily ambush preditors since it seems to be an Eorzean varient of a Big Cat. And Dragons being Aireal Alpha Preditors there's likly not much you can actually do to keep one from getting you if it wants to eat you.

So a Chocobo likely wouldn't have much use for speed and is likly more of an endurance animal seeing as how its often used as a beast of burden.

Bandersnatch, Bears, and Dragons would absolutely be their predators. Also, Miacid and possibly Hippocerfs? I kind of saw Hippocerfs as the coyotes of the area. I'd go with Bandersnatch as the primary predators, though. Bears aren't really the "chase down the flighty, high-stamina prey" type predator (actually due to their feet! They have the same plantigrade foot morphology as humans do, compared to the digitigrade morphology of canids and felids, which do chase down prey. The more you know!).

Ecologically speaking, the Chocobos seem to have been outcompeted in the grassland area, where they were replaced with the mammalian Loaghtan, either because of a heavier weight or a greater ability to defend itself. Another reason this may have occurred is because aerial predation on something as large as a chocobo is extremely difficult in dense foliage, letting them gain a foothold in the forest regions. Or because SE wanted enemy variety.

Really, even just birds that commonly walk on land would have their legs closer to the center of their body, it doesn't matter if they're intended for running or not. Given there's no alternative prey in the region, you can bet that Chocobos are a primary prey animal for just about every large predator in the Forelands, so yes, they would need to escape and be able to move decently on land.

It's just an issue with the designer not really understanding bird morphology. Which is fine. We can't expect them to know all science.

Belated edit!
Now with an amusing movie demonstrating leg placement:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcXIoG2gRdE

as much as our feathered alies are like a family dog to us doesnot make them any lest apetizing to an outsider, so to leave this here for fun: Kupotucky Firaga Chocobo (mental insert of a pic of a moogle dressed as Con. Sanders here)

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Originally Posted by The_NPC

as much as our feathered alies are like a family dog to us doesnot make them any lest apetizing to an outsider, so to leave this here for fun: Kupotucky Firaga Chocobo (mental insert of a pic of a moogle dressed as Con. Sanders here)

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Be more akin to eating your horse. You might consider eating a wild horse, but eating YOUR horse is almost always out of the question.

yes if you treat "you're" horse/mount as family then of corse it would mentailly be outa the picture, but the same can't be said if u treat it like a tool to be used & discarded/replaced when not needed, just becuse it sounds wrong doesn't mean someone somewere wouldn't do it at some point, isn't RL chicken nuggets are made from live baby chickens with a vacum meat-grinder? (almost threw up when I saw a video of that... but I still eat them) just make sure their sacrifice wasn't in vain... thou to be fair if you can just make sure it doesn't come down to that then you're good. I do apologize if it came of as insulting or obserd I just wanted to with this reply point out it can happen & its possible someone might make a FF-style KFC using them (wether they get far with it is questionable)

back on the point thou they just seamed like a big flightless bird that SE used as a sudo-horse in FF to me, never really looked that close or new enouf to care more

edit: also ant there a dish made from house cats... anyway if u really want I'll go back to surfing the forms this is just 1 of a few posts I ever make cause the "saltlyness" on here can be right up crazy

Actually, Chocobos aren't flightless since the Ishguardians mention that some wild Chocobos do still retain their ability to fly. Most domestic ones just don't.

Turkeys are the same way. Wild ones can fly (to an extent) but domestic Turkeys usually lack the ability.

By definition they should be flightless and carry the wing scale of an ostrich. Not to many people ride ostrich's, so the wings may be placed to prevent clipping and allow them movment that doesn't go through the riders legs. Otherwise most of their anatomy is more closer to Moa, Elephant Birds, and other large extinct flightless birds like the terror bird.

Otherwise Id like to hear a better anatomy or mechanical explanation as to how Chocobos can fly with the same flightless wing size.

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Originally Posted by The_NPC

edit: also ant there a dish made from house cats...

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China other rual parts of Asia and some pacific islands (dog) in the region. Or even in the anchient past in the west. When sources of food becomes a problem for dense populations and there's an over abundance of strays and rodents, snakes, monkeys, predators etc.. The saying is; "If you can cook it, you can eat it". Authentic and especially rural Chinese cooking uses meat from what ever is readily available and is nothing close to what folks serve in the west for cultural and legal reasons. Medicinal beliefs isn't real science unless its been tested to be more than tossing salt over your shoulder. Otherwise it creates poaching. That's oddly how they rediscovered a lizard that was assumed to be extinct living near a town in rural china. When a researcher was eating a couple local kabobs.

I'm assuming this is for the eating chocobo reference. Well you don't eat your horse unless it was absolutely necessary. There are places over seas that do sell them in markets. Then again we also used cattle/Ox for more than milking and we still grill them for dinner. That's why farmers usually don't get to attached to livestock that is meant to be sold on market or if they need to feed the family. Hence why the hunters used Chocobos for everything and try to maintain their wild populations with strict seasonal and poaching laws.

In context, I think it was equated to the balance of nature in that you don't let things go to waste or take in excess what you don't need. Hence why we were tracking that poacher in the first place and broke the news about that missing bo that guy was raising.

There is no real life explanation for their ability to fly, the wing load would just be too high for them to get off the ground. It would be further impossible to carry a solid Spoken while flying. Even carrying small prey items like fish and moderately sized mammals is hard enough for predatory birds. Other than the Lalafell, the Spoken they carry should almost weigh more than the Chocobos themselves, especially when armed and armored. Even ratites have pneumatic bones.

I agree with the idea that we have evidence of them manipulating aether, since your companion has Cure and Regen (both wind-based spells), they're probably just using aether currents for flying.

tl;dr
****'s magic, man.

When in doubt...

http://cdn.meme.am/instances/500x/63079599.jpg