In the Galbadia Missile Base control room, while in the "Equipment" section of the launch configuration panel, you can simultaneously press V/B/Up/Down (PC version) or Triangle/Square/Up/Down (PlayStation version) to view animations of an Elite Soldier and a G-Soldier dancing. Rinoa will laugh and comment on each animation.

According to a 1998 Famitsu interview with the game's director Yoshinori Kitase, he stated that when the game's development started, character designer Tetsuya Nomura suggested for Squall & Laguna's stories to end in a way that would have tied them together. This idea was scrapped for unknown reasons and forgotten about completely.

According to a 1998 Famitsu magazine interview with the game's character designer Tetsuya Nomura, preliminary meetings to plan out Final Fantasy VIII with the game's team, including director Yoshinori Kitase, began immediately after the completion of Final Fantasy VII's development.

During one of the conversations, Kitase said that he wanted to use a character that Nomura drew 3 years ago, before Final Fantasy VII, which was the sorceress Edea Kramer.

He added that although the Final Fantasy series has the word "Fantasy" in its name, it had become routine for them to feature technological civilizations and machines, and he felt the fantasy aspect had steadily weakened its presence. Therefore, Edea was added to the game to genuinely counteract those growing technological aesthetics: "a full-on, high-fantasy sorceress".

Among Japanese RPG fans, there is a group of female characters that are generally disliked by the audience, being referred to as "The Three Great She-Devils of Square". The reasons why these characters are disliked varies, but largely revolve around them betraying the main hero(es) in some way. The two generally agreed-upon members are:

• Princess Yoyo from Bahamut Lagoon, the childhood friend of protagonist Byuu and set up as his love interest, only to instead get together with another character, General Palpeleos.
• Alethea from Live a Live, who due to the machinations of the chapter's villain Streibough, came to believe the protagonist Oersted (who she was meant to marry) had abandoned her, and commits suicide after witnessing him murder Streibough. This leads to Oersted becoming the game's overall antagonist, Odio.

There is some debate as to who the third member of the group is, but the list of candidates include:

• Mileille from The Final Fantasy Legend, who was introduced as the leader of a resistance group alongside her twin sister Jeanne, only for it to be revealed that she had been working for Byak-ko the whole time.
• Rinoa from Final Fantasy VIII, largely due to her personality and lingering feelings for her ex-boyfriend Seifer, though she ends up with protagonist Squall in the end. Note that this pick might be due in part because of how divisive the game is in general.
• Catholine from the PS2 Hanjuku Hero games, due to her ugly and obnoxious nature, as well as constantly forcing herself onto the hero.

The group term would later be referenced in SaGa: Scarlet Grace - Ambitions, which featured an enemy team named "Lady Power", that consisted of three female demons with names that reference Yoyo, Alethea, and Milielle (though the former two were known as "Jojo" and "Alicia", respectively).