Corel Valley is a field map in Final Fantasy VII located in the Icicle Area. It is on the northern continent in the Icicle Area, north of Bone Village. A pathway leading down into the southern side of the valley exists beyond the Sleeping Forest. The Corel Valley Cave (サンゴの谷洞窟, Sango no Tani Doukutsu?) appears on the north end of the valley and exits out into another part of the Icicle Area where the Icicle Inn can be traveled to on foot. The main feature of Corel Valley is the Forgotten Capital, a past settlement of the Cetra.
The valley is visited during "Parting with Aeris". The player can access it only after obtaining the Lunar Harp in thr quest and traveling through the Sleeping Forest. The Corel Valley contains only one location, the Forgotten City, and the player can travel to Corel Valley Cave by traversing a large conch shell from the abandoned settlement. The coral terrain in the valley is the only type of ground the Highwind can land on other than grass.
Layout[]
The world map location of Corel Valley in Final Fantasy VII, indicated by the crosshair.
Corel Valley is an area on the world map, but also includes a couple of areas traveled through after the Sleeping Forest but before entering the world map. The world map area can be accessed after exiting the field areas, or by an exit in the Forgotten City. The Highwind can land on the coral ground, and this area of the world map is also notable because there are no random encounters.
Forest Exit[]
Forest Exit.
The forest exit is a large area, referred to as "Corel Valley" in the menu. The exit at the bottom of the screen leads into the Sleeping Forest while the exit at the top of the screen leads to the descent area.
The area features two floors. The lower area is on the bottom-half of the screen, and if the player heads up and underneath the tree log, they can find a chest containing the Water Ring, an accessory that absorbs Water, useful for an upcoming boss battle who only uses Water-elemental attacks.
A slope on the left of the screen takes the player between the levels, who can travel through the hollow tree log to get to the other side.
One of the area's notable features is a cave entrance and a vine leading down from it; however, neither of these things can be interacted with.
Descent[]
The descent area is a straight path, referred to as "Corel Valley" in the menu. The exit at the bottom of the screen leads to the forest exit area, while exiting at the top leads onto the world map (the southern portion of the valley), and from there a direct path to the Forgotten City.
The screen has nothing on it bar random encounters. This area overlooks the valley and the exterior of the Forgotten City, but due to the movement and zoom of the camera and the orientation of the screen, most of the background is not seen.
Corel Valley Cave[]
Climb.
The Corel Valley Cave is at the end of the valley, and reached via the Forgotten City. The valley-side entrance sits high above ground-level, accessible by a climbable conch shell. The entrance at the other side leads into a snowfield where Icicle Inn is located. The cave is vertical, as it connects the land above the valley to the bottom of the valley.
All areas of the Corel Valley Cave are referred to as "Corel Valley Cave" in the menu.
Climb[]
The large rocky wall is traversed by climbing between cracks via multiple pathways. The exit in the bottom-right leads out into the Forgotten City, while the exit in the top-right leads to the cave's exit.
With the unclimbable cracks and inability to see the entire area at once, this area can be difficult to navigate. A chest in the upper-left contains a Bolt Armlet armor. Due to the large interaction area of the chest, it can also be opened from the ledge below. A chest in the lower-right contains a HypnoCrown accessory. A chest in the upper-right contains a Megalixir.
At the top, the player can climb down a ladder to pick up the Magic Plus Materia from a secluded area.
Snow Fields Exit[]
Snow Fields Exit.
The exit onto the snowfields is a small cave area. The exit at the top leads out onto the Snow Fields part of the Icicle Area, while the exit at the bottom leads into the climb portion of the cave.
A chest in the bottom-right by the exit contains a Power Source item.
Snow Fields entrance.
Quests[]
Main scenario[]
The Corel Valley's main area is visited during "Parting with Aeris" only when the player has the Lunar Harp from Bone Village. The party simply passes through the short dungeon on the way to Forgotten Capital, the main objective of the chapter.
The Corel Valley Cave and the path to Icicle Inn is then visited in "Beyond the Snowfields". Here, players must navigate the climb to reach the snowfields.
[]
Annotated screen showing how to navigate the area.
The Climb area of the Corel Valley Cave is a vertical cliff-face the player needs to navigate. There are chests in various areas and cut-off.
The way to climb to the top (ignoring chests) is to go "left" at ①, "right" at ②, "up" at ③, "left" at ④, "up" at ⑤, and "up" at ⑥. Conversely, if climbing down (which is never necessary), it would be descending the ladder, then "right" at ⑤, "down" at ④, "left" at ③, "down" at ②, then "down" at ①.
The first approachable item is the Bolt Armlet chest on the left. This can be picked up from two areas, the area left of ②, or the area up from ②. This chest has a wide-enough interaction area that the chest can be opened from beneath it. The quickest way to get the chest would be to go "left" at ②, then go either "up" or "down" at ②, then go back to ② and go "right" (because all the options are not given at the same time—if approaching vertically the horizontal options are given, and if approaching horizontally the vertical options are given). Alternatively one could go "left" or "right" at ②, then go back to ② and climb "up", then get the chest, climb "down" and select "right". This takes longer.
The second approachable item is the HypnoCrown chest. This can be acquired by going "down" at ③.
The third approachable item is the Megalixir chest. This can be opened by going "right" from ④.
The fourth approachable item is the Magic Plus Materia. This can be gotten by going "down" from ⑥.
Encounters[]
Corel Valley battle background.
| Encounters | Areas |
|---|---|
|
Forest Exit (72%) |
|
Descent (72%) |
|
Corel Valley Cave (72%); both screens |
- ↑ Covered by Boundfat B
Death Sentence is an E.Skill learned from the Boundfat, who uses it as a final attack to being killed with the Magic or Summon commands (other E.Skills do not count). Boundfat can also be used for farming Dazers for use against Ruby Weapon.
The Forest Exit screen is an excellent place to level up Limit Breaks, and broadly speaking can be good for level grinding as the enemies are easy to kill and give a lot of EXP for this part of the game.
Items[]
| Item | Location |
|---|---|
| Water Ring | Forest Exit |
| HypnoCrown | Corel Valley Cave / Climb |
| Megalixir | Corel Valley Cave / Climb |
| Bolt Armlet | Corel Valley Cave / Climb |
| Magic Plus | Corel Valley Cave / Climb |
| Power Source | Corel Valley Cave / Snow Fields Exit |
Musical themes[]
"In Search of the Man in Black" plays in both Corel Valley and Corel Valley Cave field areas.
Behind the scenes[]
On the game's data, the areas pertaining to Corel Valley are referred to as sango (Japanese for "coral"). "sango1" and "sango2" are the first and second areas referred to in the game as "Corel Valley", while "sango3" is the giant conch shell, which is referred to as "Forgotten City" in the menu. No random encounters are fought in Forgotten City areas except the conch shell area.
In the first area of Corel Valley has a cave with a vine dropping down from its entrance. The vine cannot be climbed, nor does the entrance have any data associated with it. Unused texts in Bone Village suggest that someone there would give a tutorial for aspects of the Ancient Forest. The field files also order the Ancient Forest fields after the Sleeping Forest, but before the Corel Valley screens. This suggests that the Ancient Forest was planned to be accessible from the Sleeping Forest, and the cave at the end of the Ancient Forest would have exited out of the cave found in Corel Valley.[1]