I apologize if it seems like I'm starting to rush things at the tail end of this section. I kind of just wanted it over and done with because it was getting TOO DAMN BIG and I promise later sections won't be this way barring maybe one other later on.
Also, using visual aid here to break up the WALL OF TEXT some. And for the record, FF13-2 pics being larger on average than FF10-2 ones has purely to do with how there seems to be an absolute lack of small sized FF13-2 pics around. Yeah, I don't get it either...
CHARACTERSSo…as a natural extension from plot, we go to characters because it is all about writing. I’ll be breaking this down character by character, because it is just easier that way. As such, LETS GET STARTED WITH FF10-2!
Yuna: Ah, the head strong, soft spoken, gentle, mature if idealistic Summoner of the first game…my god what did they do to you? Telling you now, this is going to be one of the longer character analyses! Anyway, I’m willing to buy that her outfit is her just letting herself go and expressing herself, because whatever, that’s the least of her problems. Yuna is basically a mere shell of what she once was. Sure, she speaks in a similar tone, and has the same voice actress, and is the “nice girl” of the trio, but then that’s mostly because Paine is a bitch, and Rikku is…well, Rikku. People have argued that “Don’t you see? This is Yuna after Tidus has rubbed off on her!” to which I say bollocks, because Tidus’ influence would not cause Yuna to act this way. Sure, maybe she’d be more outgoing, maybe she’d be easier to speak her mind, etc., but nothing about Tidus makes me think she’d say “Oh poopie!” That line alone speaks heavily about the effort and thought put into establishing Yuna in the new setting. And the thing is, it’s literally the word “poopie.” Look, there’s a difference between “more outgoing” and “acting like you’re 10 years younger.” Yuna was always mature, that one line is anything but that. Furthermore, it came right after Yuna was going on about “What’s ours is ours! Let’s go!” Again, that’s not outgoing, that’s Yuna being kind of greedy and bloodthirsty (…by her standards.) Now, SUPPOSEDLY, immature acting from an adult woman is considered sexy in Japan, so maybe the “oh poopie” line is a literal translation of that, in an attempt to raise Yuna’s sex appeal by making her act that way too…that’s still really stupid even taking out the culture clash aspect. Why? Because it’s just further displaying how “Fanservice” took priority over everything else in this game.
Anyway, back to my original problem with Yuna is how sudden the transformation is. In FF10, we see she’s still the same person she was at the beginning of the game, just with an open mind (instead of being brainwashed, but that was more a Spira thing, rather than Yuna specifically), and even stronger backbone. Then we have the FF10:I extended ending where, 2 years later, Yuna’s still acting the same way, for the most part. Before someone says “source material stuff doesn’t matter”, remember this is from an actual released version of the game, and it leads directly into FF10-2, so it is hardly the same as saying “Ultimania claims this!” FF10-2 we know takes 2 years after FF10, because the game plainly tells us. This means there isn’t much of a gap between FF10-2 and the extended ending scene. Yes I said this before, but now I explain why it is important! That being any argument about Yuna changing personalities in the time jump between games just sort of dies here. Given she couldn’t have been on the Gullwings for very long, we know her personality, mannerisms, etc. didn’t change over the course of two years of being a “Free Bird”, but rather, it happened in the course of like a month.
She’s clearly inexperienced at the Sphere Hunter thing, which further illustrates that didn’t change her. So what excuse can you use to change her personality? The answer is simply “poor, half assed writing.” You can come up with any plot explanation you want, but none of them really fit the game well, and it is all forced and inconsistent with her character. It completely spits on what was established with her in FF10. At the same time, they keep her external appearance the same that many would not notice just how out of character Yuna acts at time.
There are other instances besides “Oh poopie.” As I said before, the “Give. It. Back.” Line right at the start is not something you expect Yuna to say. Yuna is not filled with rage, and she does not have much of a temper; when she gets angry, she comes off as more emotional than pissed. She’s not the kind to grit her teeth and give an “or else” kind of vibe. That line as I believe I said felt like it existed to say “Yuna’s more hardcore now! Awesome right?” No, not really. Yuna already had some really good moments in FF10, like completely talking down the Ronsos with nothing more than appealing to them logically. Heck, Seymour was doing shit to her the entire game, and Yuna never once spoke out so viciously as she did to Le’blanc. Look, Le’blanc stealing your identity is pretty bad, but when you compare it to the shit Yuna went through in FF10…or hell, just learning all the absolute garbage Yunalesca fed them at Zanarkand, I’m pretty sure that pales in comparison.
To further illustrate her out of characterness in one last example? “I don’t like your plan. It sucks.” There are people who actually PRAISE this line because “OMG! It’s a tribute to what happened in FF10 and Yuna saying she’s not going to stand for it!” Oh please, don’t give me that. First off “It sucks” is not something Yuna would ever say. Secondly, the entire speech is just awful because it is going on about things that were clearly NOT taken into account in FF10. The entire speech is whining about a plan that WORKED PERFECTLY to prevent a far worse fate. Sacrifices must be made; that’s what FF10 made clear. To achieve something as big as they were striving for, something must be lost. Furthermore, in FF10’s case, part of the point of the ending was the role reversal. A large part of the game, Tidus is trying to figure a way to beat Sin without losing Yuna. He absolutely forbids to go through with a plan that will have Yuna lose her life, to the point of whining like a little kid about it (he himself basically admits he’s acting childish here, so I’m not trying to take pot shots at Tidus), but when the alternative requires he die in her stead? Beyond a disappointing sigh, he’s totally fine with it. He’s totally cool with sacrificing himself to save Spira, and he isn’t even a citizen of Spira! This is part of what makes FF10’s ending work. In FF10-2’s case, the scenario is completely out of left field and “oh, it’d be fitting for Yuna to say ‘no’ to this plan! SHE NEEDS TO HAVE A HEROIC SPEECH!” I understand they wanted a big epic final boss, and the plan would have prevented that, so to that I simply say “why not just skip the plan entirely and just go with what you guys did?” What did Nooj’s “I WILL SACRIFICE MYSELF!” accomplish if Yuna’s just going to say “sorry, no, that’s stupid” in a melodramatic fashion? Especially since the plan Yuna comes up with is halfbaked and shaky, and only succeeds because “HEROES ALWAYS WIN!” </Snow Villers>, while Nooj’s sounded pretty fool proof, and he was a broken man to begin with, and there could have been a sense of atonement in his actions. It’s like FF10-2 is spitting on the one attempt to develop one of their NEW characters by instead forcing out themes from FF10 to try and make Yuna sound more hardcore. Also, this needs to be brought up, but “brings full circle from how she was willing to self sacrifice” claim? Is not addressed at all, and is the one thing that could have maybe explained the speech well. Don’t say “it is implied” because it is based heavily upon what they actually did do, not on options Yuna didn’t explore. She never once says “I was willing to do the same as you were, thinking I had no choice, but then I realized that was wrong! So what makes this case any different?” In other words, what the scene is really trying to do is make us feel for Yuna’s loss for Tidus and nothing more. That is literally her entire argument; “The people who should be here aren’t here!” So the one point that allegedly makes this speech truly powerful is not even addressed, instead she focuses entirely on the useless things and her speech just comes off as being 100% wrong too, because the truth was, there was literally no other way to beat Yu Yevon. The team DID explore every possible option, it was a given fact that “So long as Aeons exist, Sin exists, and so long as Sin exists, Yu Yevon cannot be killed.” Also, again, Yuna had no clue that killing Yu Yevon would result in Tidus’ death until they were at a literal point of no return. Oh, and the best part? “Plan B: LOVE!” Seriously, that’s a huge kick in the nuts. You can’t take a game seriously when it tries to sell a “LOVE CONQUORS ALL!” solution to beating the big villain, when the theme of Love was NOT the primary focus of the game. It not only is stupid relative to Nooj’s simple “Bait Shuyin into body, blow self up,take him down with me”, which ALSO prevents Vegnagun from awakening, but her plan requires beating the SIN LEVEL THREAT HEAD ON, then running in with a halfbaked plan she didn’t really put thought into. I mean, had she arrived on the spot with a power dampener or knowledge of Vegnagun or something Nooj didn’t have, then her argument holds water. As it stands, it is just PREACHING, nothing more.
The last thing I need to address with Yuna is her narrative. Not quite a character thing, but don’t know where else to put this. Yes, it is a follow up to FF10, I understand that. The problem is it does absolutely nothing for us other than Yuna remind us of things that literally just happened, or go “Do you remember this? Were you watching us?” Tidus’ narrative actually was quite nice, because it gave us a dual perspective with Tidus, in a sense, and there was the Flash Forward aspect. We see the game both through the eyes of Tidus as they are happening, and the eyes of him reflecting on the events, taking into account the retrospective. We can see Narrator Tidus is more grown up and understands a lot of things he didn’t before, and it gives us extra insight on the character, serving as somewhat of an inner monolog that we don’t get from the Tidus we’re playing as. It helps contrast his character growth throughout, and works with the story, rather than feeling forced. Yuna’s Narrative in FF10-2 does not have any of these advantages. It is simply “we need the main character to narrate the game, so let is have her do so!” The only time the Narrative actually felt appropriate was when she’s introducing the cast on the Celsius. It is also worth noting how the narratives are structured. Tidus’ narrative is talking literally to the player, or at least gives this illusion. He’s telling us “his story”, which is appropriate given how he loves to say “This is my story.” Yuna’s narrative, she’s clearly talking to Tidus in some sense, and as the player, you don’t feel as engaged in what Yuna is saying. It adds nothing to the story, does not help further develop Yuna’s character, and basically just more padding. It’s an example of “we used this in FF10, lets reuse this here! PEOPLE WILL LOVE IT!”
The worst part about all this though? Yuna is arguably the best character in the game. Despite being poorly written, out of character, half assedly developed, etc., her competition is less than stellar, to say the least. I’ll let you stomach that for a bit.
*5 minutes later*
NEXT CHARACTER!
Rikku: The other returning PC, Rikku doesn’t require much introduction…except sadly she does. See, if Yuna’s a case of writing someone out of character running them, Rikku’s a case of writing them IN character and ruining them in-spite of this. Rikku is not so much out of character as much as FF10-2 completely missed what made Rikku work in FF10. In FF10, despite Rikku’s eccentric and immature personality (to be fair, she’s younger than the other characters), she never showed signs of being stupid or incompetent. That’s something I liked about Rikku; hyperactive but clearly not the team moron. She was an added perspective to the team, that being the Al Bhed one, and kind of a middle ground. On one hand, we had Tidus who knows nothing about Spira, and thus can pick apart everything wrong with it; on the otherhand, we have the other characters who grew up with Yevon’s teachings and are somewhat brainwashed. Rikku being Al Bhed knows Spira and Yevon rather well, but at the same time, isn’t brainwashed by them, instead follows the Al Bhed’s teachings, so she can relate with Tidus far better. Combine that with Wakka, who is Rikku’s foil in the sense of he’s the Zealot to Rikku’s Heathenistic ways, and we have a strong 3 person chemistry among them. And THIS is what really made Rikku work in FF10:
An actual cast that complimented her character, letting her interact and do things besides “be hyperactive.” She worked well at her role, and was a nice compliment to the cast.
If it’s not obvious, guess what FF10-2 lacks? That’s right, characters that compliment Rikku. While her character isn’t really changed, she lacks anyone for her personality to really bounce off of. Instead, she’s just the “Hyper Happy Girl!” of the crew. Yuna and Paine do nothing to really compliment this personality other than “be different.” Why? Well, for starters, Yuna, despite what I said earlier, is NOT outgoing much in this game, and Paine is your typical “emo” character. So now Rikku is by far the most outspoken character. In FF10, both Wakka and Tidus were outgoing characters, not afraid to speak their minds and converse a lot. This is why Rikku worked with them; outgoing characters complimenting outgoing characters! It lets actual conversations exist, and not just “Rikku says something, it’s happy and childish!”
It doesn’t end there though. Rikku is clearly an incompetent in this game. She’s constantly messing up, does absolutely nothing worth noting plot other than “exist”, makes up words like Disasterific (which at the time, didn’t seem so bad, more just the writers having fun…), and don’t get me started on her battle quotes. Before someone says “that’s the exact kind of stuff Rikku would say in battle!”, go back to FF10 and tell me if Rikku ever says anything on par with “Booboos be gone!” It is pretty sad that having aged 2 years, Rikku lost about 5 in maturity. As a result, Rikku has gone from a likable, fun, energetic girl to a massive annoying girl that you just want to strangle every time she opens her mouth.
For the record, pretty much all of Yuna’s out of character moments would have been very in character for Rikku. That just helps display how off those moments of Yuna actually were, given Rikku’s personality is nothing like Yuna’s at all. Also worth noting that her swimsuit in the “hot springs” scene actually covers more of her body than her normal clothes do. I really shouldn’t have to explain what’s wrong with that. Also, I don’t think I need to cover her outfit in this game because it SPEAKS FOR ITSELF.
I’ll end with one last statement for Rikku: If there is ever a single aspect of FF10-2 that is a microcosm for everything that is wrong with this game, it is Rikku. You can find a little bit of everything that FF10-2 screwed up in Rikku.
Paine: “Hey guys, I got a great idea for a character. We take Squall, make him a chick, and then do nothing else with the character whatsoever!” That’s pretty much exactly how Paine came to be. First off, anyone who says she has a sense of depth is just looking for something that isn’t there. Paine goes through no genuine development, her scenes regarding the event at Project Mii’hen offer no growth to her character, and are more a convenience for explaining Nooj, Gippal and Baralai. She doesn’t really “open up” anymore in the game, partially because she was never really “closed” the way Squall was. So in truth, she’s like a massively watered down female Squall. Ignoring Disc 3 and 4 in FF8 for a moment, there was a clear evolution of Squall’s character from “wants nothing to do with anyone” to slowly coming out of his shell, and evolving into a head strong leader who isn’t afraid to actually talk to people. I don’t get this with Paine, and there’s often indicators that she’s not shielded from others, just “doesn’t speak much because it makes her seem tougher.” Classic example is “Give Me a Y!” “Give me an R!” “…give me a break…” (though I will admit that one is actually amusing because Paine was basically saying exactly what I’m sure a lot of players were thinking.) The point is…she’s too “friendly” to actually pull off the introverted thing, and her very presence in the game is mostly because “they needed a 3rd female, and wanted to introduce a new character.” This is exactly what happens when you introduce a new character and don’t put any effort into the actual development of this new character.
The thing that really hurts Paine is how her entire development, plot connection, etc. is found through optional spheres scattered about, and even with them, they don’t add much. At best, they say “This is why she is the way she is”, and you just shrug and move on. I’ll give credit to the Paine Sphere for being a moment of actual half decent writing among her and the trio, but her role in the Crimson Spheres is so pointless. It basically just solidifies she was there, and it focuses very heavily on the other three. It does not really give us much of snapshot of what kind of relationship she had with the trio other than “she was their friend.” Yes, this section is relatively short compared to Yuna and Rikku, but remember that Paine lacks a first game to base things off of for starters, and when it comes down to it, there is just so much less with Paine’s character to talk about, which is pretty bad seeing as she’s sort of central to events that happened in the game’s backstory.
Brother: What’s to say about Brother other than WHAT THE FUCK WERE THEY THINKING!? Who seriously thought a guy whose entire character is being an over the top boss who lusts on his cousin, with the IQ of about 50, was a good idea? Oh sure, he’s from FF10, but all he did there was pilot the ship, and speak Al Bhed. The one scene where he DID speak in common tongue was actually kind of nice in that game, because it made the statement at least try to have meaning, and showed he cared. He was a minor character (and an awesome Blitzball player) in the first game, and that’s all he needed to be. FF10-2 decided to turn him into a consistent 2ndary plot player, the “Charlie” to the Gullwings’ Angels. I think they wanted him to be comic relief, but in the end, he’s just plain annoying and gives these constant ‘SHUT UP ALREADY” moments. He’s basically the result of the game trying to be more “fun and light hearted” and thinking “cheap comedic relief” is enough. I guess it could be in short doses…thing is Brother has way too many scenes, so he gets tiring…VERY FAST.
Buddy and Shinra: Not much to say on these two, they basically exist. Buddy practically lacks a personality, and Shinra…well…”I’m just a kid” is basically everything he does. Shinra of course was tossed in since Square-enix thought it’d be cool to have a legitimate linking of FF10 and FF7 like that (and yes, at least back then, Square-enix seriously tried to sell us on the connection between the two games. One can hope they gave up and the connections are merely cute nods and nothing more.)
Nooj: Leader of the Youth League, apparently he is “unkillable” but despite this has tried to get himself killed multiple times. You really do not get a sense of this at all without the Crimson Spheres, as otherwise he just comes off as a rational, intelligent leader. He was also the one that Shuyin possessed initially, but there really isn’t much that is done with this other than “tainted past” which they try to resolve by his “I will commit suicide and take out Shuyin with me.” Of course, that plan never comes to pass because Yuna whined about it. Nooj is a problem character because you need to devote a lot more time to make us actually care about him (and no, LeBlanc’s crush on him doesn’t count), and understand his motives. Furthermore, the whole “He never dies thing!” is kind of brought up out of nowhere, like he was a famous hero of the past who joined the Crimson Squad but we NEVER HEARD OF HIM BEFORE THIS. He’s not a genuine character as a result, more just a shell that fills a void because we need that token “smart guy.” I guess to be fair, a cute reversal thing is that despite being the oldest of the three, Nooj represents the “new” ways, leading the “Youth League.” Honestly, there is a lot that could be done with Nooj, but FF10-2 was not a game designed around building his character, because it places too much emphasis on Yuna’s end, despite how Nooj is one of the real central figures in the plot.
Baralai: The 2nd problem character, for the same reasons as Nooj, only there’s even less to his character. He’s about keeping the values of Yevon that were good but then he gets possessed by Shuyin for the latter half of the game kind of loses all meaning. See, when Nooj was possessed, at least Shuyin laid dorment and we met the real Nooj, such that it only awoken for one scene. Baralai gets taken and never returns until the ending. I think they were trying to have this angle of “Baralai has skeletons in his closet, like knowing about Vegnagun” and that’s why there was a boss fight with him, but there’s so little done with the character. Oh, but we see he met Seymour and sort of became his pupil, so he was naturally kind of corrupt or something! Yeah, sorry, you can’t cheap out an excuse for shady activities with a scene that exists for a pure cameo like that. Again, like Nooj, Baralai is someone who needed actual time and effort put into him, and the game needed to focus on him a lot more than it does to justify his existence. Sadly, again, FF10-2 thinks it is about Yuna, so all the focus is put on her instead of him, and his two buddies.
Gippal: Problem character #3. His special sphere tells us nothing really about himself other than he met Auron, and didn’t give away his position to the Al Bhed. Gippal’s role was clearly to be the neutral side of things; doesn’t care about the Youth League or New Yevon, just about his business as a digger. It’s really just kind of a mess, and his entire connection to both characters is the Crimson Sphere nonsense. One of his factors was that he’s an Al Bhed, so he has problems joining Yevon based groups, hence why he joined the Crimson Squad. Sadly that’s really all we get out of him. As a running trend with these three characters, again, he needed a lot more work and screen time put into him. It can’t be stressed enough; FF10-2 sort of killed these characters potential by trying to sell us on “it is Yuna’s story.”
Lenne: Not really a character, more just a plot device. As a result, there’s not much to say about her. Mostly just mentioning her to acknowledge that I remember she existed, and because she’s important to the villain.
LeBlanc Trio: The Rivals of the mains who aren’t actually bad guys, they’re basically Team Rocket, except not nearly as amusing. You fight them way too often in the first half of the game; I was reminded that you literally fight them 3 times in one dungeon, and the result is always the same. We get it, they’re quirky, incompetent and are immoral relative to the team, but not actually bad guys, just rivals. The game just does nothing with them beyond that other than the inevitable obvious “Team Up” later on. Ok, they infiltrate the Celsius somehow because it has the security of a children’s Tree House, and steal the AWESOME SPHERE which one has to question why the Gullwings cared so much about it since they knew the info on that sphere wasn’t that-…you know, I should just stop, because now I’m analyzing a plot point that clearly had little thought put into it.
Shuyin: “Hey, you know what would be awesome? If Tidus was the MAIN VILLAIN of the game!” “That’s stupid…let’s instead make an EVIL Tidus whose not actually him but identical in every visual way and fights just like him, and has all the parallels!” “Ok, that works too! So what do we do?” “Give him a tragic backstory where he and his lover, who by the way is also a Summoner that happens to live in Yuna’s Dress Sphere, which Paine and Rikku never access despite using the same spheres, and then make up a new kind of ‘unsent’ that can possess people!” I swear the meeting for creating Shuyin went something like this, because dear god is it such a stupid point. Yes, he’s the answer to all the Tidus Sphere problems, but they handled it such stupid way. He comes out of nowhere, talks about Lenne, apparently tried to use Vegnagun to destroy the world, then got killed alongside Lenne. He fundamentally fails as a villain, because see, there’s a point where “going too far” means you lack sympathy for a character, and Shuyin definitely goes there. They don’t play you up to hate him, they play him up to “Awww, he had a hard life, lets appeal to him!” Then they give him limited amount of screen time, force his role into Crimson Squad and…well, shit, you know what the problem is? He’s a 3rd plot line forced into the story altogether. Again, FF10-2 doesn’t know what it wants its plot to be. It can’t tell if it wants to be a YRP adventure story about Yuna “coming out”, if it wants to be about the conflict with the Crimson Squad, or if it’s meant to be a story about the Ghosts of Spira’s past coming back to haunt the work, and they need to resolve the issues (Shuyin being basically just an icon for that, which would be fine if they DEVELOPED HIM); so what does the story do? Combine all three! Yeah, that’ll work well. They didn’t even do a good job making Shuyin feel like a Tidus parallel who went down a dark route. Oh sure, he was fighting for Lenne’s sake, like Tidus was for Yuna, and failed to save her and died in the process, but that’s kind of a surface level parallel, and nothing more. We don’t know enough about Shuyin’s past other than being a Blitzball player who was in love with a famous singer who happened to be a Summoner, and during the war with Bevelle, he tried to steal their ultimate weapon, but Lenne tried to stop him and they both died. Since then, he’s been vengeful for 1000 years until a random door got opened. I know this sounds like it could work, but it’s so disjointed that…well, yeah, its FF10-2 doing its usual thing: Taking what could be a good idea and handling it such a halfassed way, any decency it could have had is just thrown away.
One thing I didn’t talk about but deserves noting is Paine’s Sphere. This is the kind of thing FF10-2 lacks pretty much the entire game, and again, illustrates there were competent people working on the game, just nowhere near enough effort or heart put into it. Paine’s sphere is kind of a useless little moment in her life with the 3 guys on a ship, so why is this a good thing? It is just a nice little moment of character interaction that has them all bouncing off each other. With lines like Nooj saying “I’d work you all like dogs!” and everyone cracking up, it comes off as genuine chemistry, and actual interaction among friends. Instead, though, FF10-2 thinks the better way to handle “character interaction” for most instances is stuff like, say, the Hot Spring scene where it’s just girls in swimsuits playing a splash war, because “oh look, they’re friends tee-hee ^_^.” They put a lot more emphasis on that kind of character interaction (the cheap “Oh look, they’re playing!” moments I mean), instead of giving us a sense of them being actual friends. True, FF10 didn’t have a lot of those scenes either, but it also handled its serious plot with far more dignity that the characters felt a lot more organic and thus we didn’t need these kinds of scenes. FF10-2 is a game well suited for these brief instances, and it doesn’t take advantage of them at all.
So what about FF13-2? Well, FF13-2 has an advantage of actually having a notably smaller core cast (roughly half that of FF10-2), and thus being able to just devote more time to everyone, as well as definitely having a better understand of what it wants to be. That said, lets dig into the cast!
Serah: In FF13, Serah was mostly a backstory figure who “dies” early on and is the motivation behind Lightning and Snow’s actions, leading to them ultimately saving her. So naturally, let’s turn her into the protagonist of this game! It is a random decision but it actually was an interesting angle. Serah’s important in FF13 in the same way Zack is in FF7, and we get decent amount of flashbacks with her to establish something of a personality, as well as her relationships with various characters, so she has some ground to work with. FF13-2 deals more with trying flesh Serah out as a full character, by giving her own game. Serah is handled actually fairly well considering, as she definitely feels consistent with her FF13 self, and the game even displays she’s not much of a fighter initially, but she wants to get stronger so she can find Lightning and Snow. Right from the start, FF13-2 establishes all the important details about Serah that were not established in FF13, mainly the 3 year time gap. She’s the only person who remembers FF13’s REAL ending, and is certain that is what happened, but all evidence says she’s wrong, she’s been living in New Bodhum this entire time, working as a School Teacher and her relationship with the children in New Bodhum even reflects this, and she’s been waiting patiently for Snow to return with good news about Lightning. She’s been waiting patiently for 3 years, and naturally, finally something DIFFERENT happens and sounds like a lead to finding Lightning, so she naturally gets curious. One interesting thing to note is that because she has an established lifestyle in New Bodhum, she’s initially reluctant to go, despite Noel insisting they’ll find her, but after encouragement from her friends, students, etc. that looking for Lightning is the right course of action, it makes sense she’d be willing to let go of it.
From here, Serah remains a central figure for the entire game; at worst, she becomes a Co-Protagonist alongside Noel. This is a big deal because unlike Yuna who never feels genuinely central, just sort of nosing her way into events, Serah feels like she’s actually moving the story along. You’re not witnessing events from the sidelines then spontaneously intervening when a giant monster appears, but rather acting upon problems as they come along, and we see Serah slowly grow. Furthermore, despite Serah being upgraded from “Damsel in Distress” to “Protagonist capable of defending herself”, they never tried to make her seem more hardcore the way Yuna does. She keeps the same cheerful, optimistic expression the entire game, is generally nice and when she’s angry, it doesn’t come off as vicious like Yuna’s “Give it back” line. It feels like a genuine extension of what we do know of Serah from FF13.
Also, this is a personal thing, but one thing I liked about Serah is how she is NOT defensive about everything. For example, when Noel is ranting about how horrible a person Snow, her lover, is for being so reckless, her basic response can be summed up as “Yep, and that’s why I love him!” She acknowledges that Snow is flawed, instead of trying to cover it up, and this gives a stronger sense of validity for their relationship. She loves Snow, not only for his good qualities but for his flaws too. Regarding Serah’s chemistry with Noel…I’ll cover that in his own section which is coming up…right now!
Noel: The other main character of FF13-2, and an original guy. Noel comes from a completely opposite end of the spectrum than Serah. He both knows more and less about the situation than Serah does. He grew up in a destroyed world, knowing only the essentials for what it is to survive, as well as any folklore about the past. It’s a nice contrast to Serah who, being someone from the past, either has never heard of a lot of Noel’s lores, or takes a lot of things for granted that Noel finds intriguing. Take Cocoon, for example; to Serah, that was her home for 18 years, and now it’s a symbol of the events that transpired in FF13. It is kind of just part of her life and taken for granted. To Noel, Cocoon was a part of his history, and he could only picture what it was like, so finally being able to see the legendary Cocoon being held up by the Crystal Pillar was naturally a huge reality check moment for him, and “I’m actually in the past!” Basically, the two come from completely different worlds, and they bounce off each other as a result.
One thing I liked about Noel from the get go is he’s pretty open about anything he knows. He doesn’t keep secrets, and only reason he doesn’t say something is either because he didn’t remember it (I’ll cover the “Forgetting memories bit” later), or because it just wasn’t relevant until then. He makes it pretty clear “ask me anything, I’ll answer it best to my knowledge”, so the basic assumption is that if Noel doesn’t say anything, it’s because Serah didn’t ask him. He’s also pretty optimistic for someone who has every right to be afraid of people leaving him. Remember, everyone he’s ever known literally died right in front of him, and he’s the last surviving human, so if anyone has a good reason to be worried about getting close to someone, it’s him. Yet, he has no problems forming an immediate connection with Serah, and this leads to some nice chemistry between the two. They really do bounce off each other well.
I know several people think Noel is bland and boring, and from the perspective of development, yeah he doesn’t get much, but he’s got a clearly defined personality and there’s definite motivation for his character. He has kind of two foils in the game as well, one in Serah whose a foil in the sense of coming from a totally different world (Serah coming from the “beginning” and Noel comes from “The end”), and Caius who is basically the typical “Shonen Rival” style villain to Noel in this regard…we’ll get to him later of course! He has a clearly defined past, and seeing what was essentially the “last day of his life” in the dream sequence I thought was a powerful moment for him. Even when the only living humans are Yeul and Caius, he’s still got a cheerful disposition, despite there being a definite sense of depression.
Another thing Noel has going for him? Knowing the outcome of everything is going to end with him as the last human means we don’t have to learn exact motivation of his actions, because they write themselves. He knows everything is going to end horribly, and is going to do everything in his power to change it. Yes, he’s naïve, but he is also kind of that “Adventurous Main Character” archetype though at least he has a legitimate reason to go on said adventure, more so than “ITS FUN!” He has a mission to fulfill, and we have every reason to believe he’s fully serious about seeing it through to the end. In some regard, he has both nothing to lose but his life, but at the same time, he has everything to lose if he fails…weird little paradox of time travel shenanigans there…but then isn’t that basically the very core plot element of FF13-2 <.<?
There is one thing that feels force, ill-used for significance, and that's Noel's lack of memory. When it was happening, at first I thought it was Noel losing his memory because his past is being erased, and his existence too. Serah being from before these events means she's unaffected, but Noel, being from the future, each event could conflict with his very existence. Fair enough, but FF13-2 only kind of hints that this is what's going on, then the ending sort of says the complete opposite. Noel's memory deteriorating, as a result, comes off as forced plot device for why he isn't telling you everything. As I said earlier, Noel makes it clear he's willing to tell Serah everything he knows, so how do you come up with an in-character way for him to go back on this? Convenient Memory Loss! If he doesn't remember it, he can't tell you, so he's not going back on his word! Kind of cheap because they went out of their way to avoid giving him amnesia, only to turn around and say "selective amnesia when it's convenient." Honestly would have preferred Noel not bringing these things up simply because "Serah didn't ask him."
Alright, I’ll just bite and say it’s hard to really defend Noel beyond “Do you like him, yes or no?” As I said, there’s not a lot of development in him, so there’s a lot you can say about him. His best quality is his chemistry with Serah, which honestly is more than you can say about FF10-2’s main PCs if you ask me, and beyond that, you just kind of like him or you don’t.
(Apologies for the weird face he's making in this pic; it was not intentional)
Hope: Ah, Hope…you can basically ignore whether you liked or hated him in FF13 because he’s practically a completely different in this game. Sounds like a bad thing right, from a writing stand point? Well, not really, because Hope has a legitimate excuse for this: He’s 10 years older. To put it differently, look at yourself in High School. Now compare that to yourself when you got out of college. You’re going to have some notable changes in your personality, rationality, etc. That is what happened with Hope here, obviously. He went from being the 16 year old kid to a 26 year old adult and leader of the Academy. By extension, when you think about it, this means Hope kind of RULES THE ENTIRE WORLD. No, really, think about it. He’s director of the Academy, and the Academy is basically the closest thing FF13-2’s world has to a ruling government, so by extension, he’s basically PRESIDENT OF THE PLANET. Anyway, Hope mostly exists as a plot device in this game, as the contact to the Academy, and being that “Smart Science Guy with a plan” doing things behind the scenes that is boring stuff. You’d suspect he was up to something if not for the fact that well, he’s Hope; you KNOW he’s a good guy and has the good intentions in heart, we just assume his stuff is boring and thus why it’s off screen. Game uses some silly plot devices like HYPER TIME SLEEP or whatever to get him appearing in multiple eras, but honestly in a game like this, it’s hard to care. His plans are mostly “save everyone by building a new Cocoon and find a way to restore Fang and Vanille.” Yeah, there really isn’t much to talk about Hope for this reason, as he’s mostly the “Smart Science Guy” in the game, though this is by no means inconsistent with his FF13 self. Different, sure, but that’s to be expected after 10 years of SCIENCE!!!
Alyssa: Now for an ORIGINAL NPC! She’s sort of abruptly introduced and sort of helps Serah and Noel out because she just does. Then becomes Hope’s side kick, and mostly there so you have two people to talk to, and is all happy and cheerful compared to Hope’s general more driven look (if he’s still clearly got somewhat of a smile on.) I honestly don’t know what they were trying with Alyssa, truth be told. She feels very incomplete. Early on, she goes into details about how she dreams she and her best friend whose dead swapped places, then this never comes up again. The implication is that Alyssa actually did die in the real timeline, but the change in FF13-2’s timeline that the game is all about caused her to swap places with her best friend. Later, she betrays the team with some trap set up by Caius, because she doesn’t want to stop existing herself. Honestly, I think she’s just a poorly done character. She’s a result of the changed timeline, sure, but the game isn’t really doing a good job at establishing this. She’s someone who should have had a larger impact on the story outside of one trap set up by Caius that only gets really explained in an alternate ending (and even then, the reason why is kind of iffy.) She’s definitely someone I wasn’t exactly fond of, and felt was just shoved in for the sake of “New NPC!” The fact that the game basically writes her out of the continuity in the grand scheme of the events shows how meaningless she was actually was.
Snow: Another returning character, only this time he’s actually pretty much the same guy as he was in FF13. Honestly, his role in this game mostly exists to give Serah a 2nd incentive outside of Lightning to go on her quest. They do have what feels like an unresolved plot thread in the “he becomes a l’Cie! Again!” which kind of amounts to nothing as Serah’s actions sort of erase Snow’s existence in that era and uh, yeah, he’s mostly just there for the “OMG ITS SNOW!” factor. Sure, he’s fun while he’s there, and it’s nice to see an actual scene with Serah and Snow together that ISN’T a flash back to help develop their relationship, but he’s not much beyond that. I guess the way he contrasts Noel, in that the two are actually very similar in terms of their approach to things but Noel’s completely unable to recognize it (though Serah definitely does) despite acting completely differently and…look, its freaking Snow. What else do you want me to say? …oh, right, forgot! HEROES NEVER BACK DOWN! STEELGUARD!! There, happy?
Lightning: Last of the returning FF13ers who actually DO SOMETHING, Lightning mostly exists to be the game’s”Ace.” She’s the super badass “better than the protagonists at everything” character who is NOT going to heroically save the day because of other factors. She’s the first character we’re introduced too, being all awesome and such, then she disappears outside of a few narrative moments, only to appear in the end of the game and finally explain what the hell is going on. There’s not much else to say about Lightning because she’s more of a macguffin for a large part of the game than an actual character, but what we see of her is consistent with her end FF13 self, so I guess props to that. I feel the game went out of their way to insure Lightning was not the game’s protagonist, and wanted to make sure she wasn’t accidentally stealing the role from Serah, but at the same time, wanted her to stay relevant with the game as a whole, and this is kind where it ended up. Not sure what to make of her, outside of “well, she is stylish” or something.
Yeul: Another walking plot device of sorts, FF13-2 seems to like characters being less than characters and more convenient plot devices, doesn’t it? Well, besides Serah and Noel. Conceptually, Yeul could have been neat. A character who is forced into a constant cycle of death and reincarnation, who sees the future, and manages to be “different” on personal levels in each life time despite being pretty much the exact same person. The problem? We don’t meet any of the individual Yeuls in a scene more than twice, and most get shown once at best…and we only see so very few too. Doesn’t help that her personality is basically unchanged each game, and she’s the “Soft spoken, stoicy, and intellectual” type. I guess she’s got that “aww, I wanna protect her” woobie thing but really, she’s just there for the Noel/Caius nonsense, and so there could be a multiple era character whose not actively trying to kill you but MYSTERIOUS!!! At the same time. A fine case of wasted potential if you ask me, also kind of gives Damsel in Distress vibes without actually being one of those (though It’s not because she’s competent, it’s because the nature of the villain kind of prevents her from being in those scenarios)
Mog: Yes, I’m talking about this late, why? Because shut up, kupo! Anyway, Mog is just there to be a 3rd character for the crew whose kind of an encyclopedia with a personality. No, really, that’s what Mog is: The convenient referential guide book in the form of a floating cute thing with magic powers. This is not necessarily a bad thing as Mog is kind of amusing, being funny and the fact that you get to throw him around like a ball to get objects while he’s complaining about it just adds to the hilarity. So yeah, if you’re going to have a character who exists purely for information, you might as well make them funny, kupo!
Chocolina: Ok, if there ever was a case of a character made just because the designers wanted to cut loose and have fun and serves no other purpose other than to be silly, its Chocolina. The plotless wonder who runs all the games shops and appears in every time era, and…you know, Chocolina is a thing that needs to be experienced. She’s got a sense of amusement and works for lightening the mood, and in some cases, the fact that she horribly CLASHES WITH THE MOOD adds to the silliness. The game did itself a favor in insuring she was just there for silly shop moments, and not being an actual plot figure.
Caius: You know, when I first saw Caius and heard his voice, and saw a lot of Dragon related stuff, I immediately thought he was an example of Nomura’s obsession with Kain. Apparently, Nomura just designed the face and someone else designed the rest of his body, allegedly basing that off Leon from FF2, who is basically Proto-Kain! I’m not sure how this is relevant to anything, but anyway, ONTO THE VILLAIN OF FF13-2! Caius is someone who could have actually been good, but they screwed him up in a number of ways. First off, things they get right about him? Well for starter, Stage Presence. When Caius appears, the tone of the scene changes completely, and its often accompanied by his theme song which is rather distinct and just sounds like an ominous villain music. It is exactly what a villain like him should be, in that regard, and he plays this up well. He also feels like a genuine threat, being shown as strong enough to hold his own against Valkyrie Lightning, and giving Noel and Serah a hard time (though, rarely are they completely outmatched.) Basically anything that involves him from a design or presence stand point, he actually works well with.
His problems though, are his motives. In short, he wants to destroy EVERYTHING, including time itself for the sake of one girl who is forced into a cycle of reincarnation. Ok, I can understand obsession over Yeul; that’s legitimate, and could work as a villainous angle. The problem is the game makes the stakes way too high for someone like that, and even tries to pretend “oh, he’s not really a bad guy, just misunderstood! Just stop him from succeeding at his motives!” Seriously, it’s just asinine. As far as I’m concerned, if “destroy everything” is the motive someone comes up with, the reason needs to be absolutely sold. For example, Fou-lu’s ultimate goals are pretty excessive, but at least it was a logical progression towards that motive that we can sympathize and understand WHY he’s that way. A simple “He’s been betrayed by humanity enough as is, therefore thinks Mortals are flawed evil beings that must be destroyed.” Cliched concept, but the game goes out of its way to give us every reason to believe Fou-lu could come to that conclusion, even to the point of temporarily compromising his “Mortals are evil” beliefs only for it to be spat back in his face. This is something that while we can’t really support, we can at least feel bad about what happens to him. I cannot say the same about Caius; he strikes me as having some similarities to Sephiroth, once I thought about it, except for one major crucial detail that really changes the scenario:
Sephiroth is never once treated as someone you’re supposed to sympathize with. The entire game makes it clear he’s despicable, evil person that needs to be stopped, and will even take pleasure out of torment too (he definitely gives a sense of having fun playing with Cloud’s mind.) Yes, his backstory can be considered tragic, but at the same time you do get a sense of “everything is his fault, he’s not a victim of fate” so beyond morons who think making him TRAGIC SYMPATHETIC makes him have more depth, there's a clear sense that the game wants you to hate him, and continues on this note the entire way. Caius doesn’t have this…or at least, the game tries to act like this. Before someone argues that Caius was intended to be evil, this is actually something the scenario developer has spoken out about, and stated he didn’t want Caius to come off as a “Bad Guy”, but a bewildering one. Well, ok, he’s bewildering but not in a good way; the game definitely makes him come off as “THIS GUY IS EVIL! STOP HIM BEFORE HIS EVIL PLAN IS UNDERWAY!”, but then goes “but he means well because he’s doing it for one girl! Please pity him!” THIS IS NOT A SYMPATHETIC VILLAIN. This is a cop out for trying to add more depth to a bad guy than he actually has. Furthermore, his primary goal being “save Yeul” doesn’t really save his character, but rather makes it that much more absurd. “Save a character by destroying the world!” is never justified. There’s so easy ways to just make him work as a generic world destroying villain from the Yeul thing. Like just say something like “consistent failures of protecting Yeul throughout the ages made Caius lose his mind, and decide that if Yeul should perish, the entire world with her!” Doesn’t make him good, but it doesn’t lead to a massively hypocritical stance either, and makes it clear what angle we’re supposed to look at Caius at (eg hate.)
Caius also has another missed opportunity thing, and that’s the fact that being immortal, we can see his presence in multiple time periods. The problem is, he appears exactly the same in all time periods and it is like he’s been resigned to his fate for a while, and just waiting for the right moment. Personally, they could have used this to display Caius’ progression from “Noble Guardian” to “Genocidal Zealot”, as meeting him in one of the earlier eras makes him come off as somewhat friendlier and nobler as a person, but as we get closer to that 500 AF moment, he clearly is compromising that factor. That could have been a really interesting angle to work with given the nature of the character, but sadly, Caius is just treated as the game guy in all eras despite his “I am not the Caius you once knew” claims.
In the end…Caius has two different levels. Stylistically, he works fine. He’s got presence, threat, definitely plays a role in the plot, etc. He’s got all the necessary attributes for being a genuine character. Once you start looking into depth, though, Caius just really starts falling on his face and begs the question of how the developers thought this could work. The game does do a decent job of making it clear he cares for Yeul, but the angle in which they used this as a motive just kind of clashes with the way he acts the rest of the game.
Gonna say this now, compared to Shuyin, I’ll give Caius the nod over him, but only because Caius has actual presence and succeeds on SOME merits as a villain. Shuyin is more of a plot device whose motives could actually work if they, you know, bothered to give him screen time, but it’s clear they couldn’t be bothered to actually develop him. Basically, Caius gets points for effort.
Overall, FF13-2 definitely feels like it tried harder with the cast. Each character has at least something above a surface level personality, and their main plot points are discussed in the primary story (as opposed to missable side stories.) The primary advantage FF13-2 has on FF10-2 is being able to keep a clear head in that the story is about Noel and Serah trying to fix time, and Caius is the ultimate complication in the mix. It knows what it wants, and is able to keep itself focused, and deviations from this are treated exactly as that; deviations. It does not come off as 3 completely different stories that somehow got merged into one to make everything seem relevant. FF13-2’s cast is not a strong cast by any means; again, look at how there are several “walking plot device” style characters, and the issue of Caius working well stylistically, but failing on any sort of substance, it is hard to say this cast is actually good. To its credit, none of the characters do actively annoy, but then having no one really comparable to Brother or Rikku does that…outside of Chocolina…whose not actually plot relevant anyway (or perhaps, the TRUE hero (Villain?) of the game.) In FF13-2’s case, I feel like it was more a budget thing than a lack of care thing. They clearly didn’t have the resources they had in FF13, and had to get as much in with what they could, whereas in FF10-2 it comes off as “ok, we got the idea, put it into the game. I don’t care how, just do it.”
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Next Time On Meeple Rants:
Meeple analyzes a section of the game that most people actually agree upon for FF10-2…and in a POSITIVE way at that! Also FF13-2 gets discussed <_<
