Characters of the Final Fantasy XIII series
Final Fantasy XIII - a role-playing game released by Square Enix in 2009 - revolves around the struggles of a group of humans over a predestined fate.
[19][20] Its story and characters were focused around the concepts of mortality and, in Toriyama's words, the "wish for rebirth": the latter theme was directly inspired by the Great East Japan earthquake.
[41] For XIII-2, a tool called Moomle, developed by English translator Tom Slattery and his Japanese counterpart Teruaki Sugawara from their experience with the first game, was used to make sure all parts of the localization process were synchronized.
[43] Carried over from the Fabula Nova Crystallis mythos are the fal'Cie, demigods who work to find a way of bringing their respective deities back into the world.
At the beginning of XIII-2, she is whisked away to Valhalla, capital of the Unseen World,[54] to act as the Goddess Etro's protector, sending messages to her allies and guiding Serah through time to set things right.
After their parents died years prior to the start of the game, Lightning, then still called Claire, raised Serah and set out to become a protector for her, but her devotion to that goal caused tensions between them.
[73] She eventually becomes a teacher in the village of New Bodhum, the town she and Snow help build on Gran Pulse,[74] before monsters invade it three years after the fall of Cocoon.
[85] Yusuke Naora was told to design Serah's new costume like the "plug suit" outfits from Neon Genesis Evangelion and was asked to give her a necklace for plot reasons.
[56][57][58] Snow Villiers (スノウ・ヴィリアース, Sunō Viriāsu) is a 21-year-old human from Cocoon who proposes to Serah Farron two days prior to the start of Final Fantasy XIII.
[100] Over the next five hundred years, he becomes jaded and depressed, brooding on Serah's death and being weighed down by guilt at his inability to stop the world from decaying.
[102] When they next meet, Snow reveals his intention to absorb a massive cloud of Chaos at the center of Yusnaan's palace, transform into a Cie'th and have Lightning kill him as a punishment for his failure.
[32] Snow's personality in XIII, which carried over to XIII-2, was created to be passionate, optimistic and impulsive, opposing and acting as a foil for Lightning's cold mannerisms.
After Orphan's defeat, Hope tells Lightning that Fang and Vanille changed their fate by fulfilling their Focus of transforming into Ragnarok to save Cocoon rather than destroying it.
[138] His early look was, as revealed in the a special Ultimania guide released during 25th anniversary celebrations for the series, very different from his final design, with him being white with long brown hair, and wielding a shoulder-cannon rather than machine pistols.
The two awaken from crystal stasis within the Pulse Vestige containing the fal'Cie Anima thirteen days prior to the start of Final Fantasy XIII, which kicks off the chain of events leading to Cocoon's descent into chaos.
[56][57][58] Noel Kreiss (ノエル・クライス, Noeru Kuraisu) is one of the last remaining humans in a devastated future, and was a friend and student of Caius Ballad before the two grow apart due to the latter's wish to destroy time.
[88] In an interview, Toriyama said that Noel was intended to be a grave young man burdened by a heavy responsibility, but also, because of his upbringing on Gran Pulse, with a naivety about the world Serah and Lightning are used to, and certainly about Cocoon.
[138] Gadot, Lebreau, Maqui and Yuj are respectively voiced by Zack Hanks, Anndi McAfee, Daniel Samonas and Jeff Fischer in English, and by Biichi Satō, Yū Asakawa, Makoto Naruse and Wataru Hatano in Japanese.
This plan involved using the l'Cie-forged beast Ragnarok to destroy Cocoon with the countless deaths from the crash to cause Etro's Gate to manifest in the physical world.
After the battle, Rosch reveals to the party that he knew the fal'Cie were in control, but felt their guidance and anti-Pulse propaganda was the best for Cocoon without realizing their true intentions.
[56] Jihl Nabaat (ジル・ナバート, Jiru Nabāto) is a minor antagonist in Final Fantasy XIII, a Lieutenant Colonel of the PSICOM branch who serves as Galenth Dysley's subordinate and commands the airship Palamecia.
As Serah and Noel encounter past versions of him during their journey, Caius uses his knowledge of the timeline to create various paradoxes they deal with while he battles Lightning in Valhalla.
[170] Lightning Returns reveals that the contradicting desires of Yeul's incarnations have brought Caius back, with his body and soul uniting with chaos and thus making him beyond salvation.
[171] Lightning fights him in the remains of Valhalla before learning of Caius's condition, along with his intention to stay in Nova Chrystalia to serve as custodian of the new Unseen Realm to guide the dead.
Though Bhunivelze attempts to stop corruption, he gradually accepts that Nova Chrysalia is beyond saving and makes Lightning the savior of the souls of those still alive in preparation for the birth of a new world.
He also helps the party escape from Yaag Rosch in Hope's home town and stages a rescue mission on the Palamecia to save Sazh and Vanille.
Chocolina was originally meant to be a waitress in Serendipity, but her design impressed Toriyama enough that he expanded her role into something akin to a shop clerk, and the director wrote a new backstory and new dialogue for her.
[58] In conjunction with the game's release, Square Enix produced a lineup of merchandise including jewelry, action figures and other goods related to the characters.
[219] In 2012, in what Yoshinori Kitase called "a very exciting opportunity",[220] the April issue of Arena Homme+ magazine showed multiple characters from XIII-2 modeling outfits for Prada's spring and summer collections.
[228] GameSpot writers Garrett Martin and Maddy Myers included the relationship between Vanille and Fang in their list of the best love stories in video games, regardless of whether it is romantic or platonic.
