| Barose バロウズ Barouzu (Burroughs) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| I | II | III | IV | V | VI | |||||||||||||||||||||
Barose is a non-playable character who appears in Breath of Fire II. He is one of the individuals who can be recruited as a citizen of Township.
Role in Breath of Fire II
The party visits the Great Wise Tree, Gandaroof, hoping that he can shed light on the sudden appearance of demons throughout the world. However, Gandaroof is himself besest by a demon who is destroying his memory. The party enters the tree's subconscious in order to defeat the demon and while there, encounters three dream cities, which represent the different stages of Gandaroof's life. While in the childhood city, the party comes across Barose, a solitary old man who appears to be a human who has somehow become trapped in Gandaroof's subconscious. Since he subsequently describes himself as Gandaroof's magician, it is possible that he tried to enter his master's mind in an attempt to defeat the demon himself, but ended up becoming trapped. He promises the party that he will teach them magic if they help him escape and allow him to take up residence in Township. True to his words, if the party agrees, he will teach the person at the front of the party their choice of either Thunder, Freeze, Flame, or Missile. However, the character must have 1 HP and 0 AP in order to receive this offer and the spell he will offer them depends on his mood, as indicated by the Dragon Tear. The player can repeat this learning process up to four times. Barose is a potential resident of House 4 whose alternative potential residents include Garber, Karashinikofu, and Locker.
Appearance
Barose's sprite is a palette swap of the sprite used for several old man throughout the game, including Gedd. However, his robe is brown rather than blue like the standard old man sprite.
Etymology
The Breath of Fire II development team named several characters after western writers, especially those that were influential during the 1950's-1970's such as John Barth, Richard Brautigan, Truman Capote, and Thomas Pynchon. Barose's Japanese name appears to be another instance of this, a reference to William S. Burroughs, whose books are very popular in Japan and often explore the narrative potential of dreams. Others posit that the name might be a reference to the character Maggie Burroughs, the protagonist of the sixth entry in the Nightmare on Elm Street horror movie franchise, which was also very popular in Japan and centers around dreams.