While Final Fantasy titles are generally well known for featuring vibrant and lovable casts of characters swept up into intriguing plots across immersive fantasy worlds, experienced fans know to prepare their hearts for a beating before getting emotionally invested. After all, the games have also got a reputation for suddenly and unceremoniously skewering one of those characters with a katana of impossible length.
But what’s a little emotional scarring, so long as it’s endured for the sake of a great story? Here are the ten tastiest bits of emotional trauma the Final Fantasy series has seen fit to inflict upon its dedicated fandom over the past twenty-two years. It should probably go without saying, but this is a spoiler rich environment. Proceed with caution.
10 Final Fantasy XV: Lunafreya’s Sacrifice
With a list like this, it’s usually a lot more about the story and emotional impact than it is about the graphics. But a little bit of visual spectacle at the right time can magnify that impact ten times over, and that’s precisely the case with Lunafreya’s death in Final Fantasy XV.
The dream sequence that accompanies Lunafreya giving her life to protect Noctis is nothing short of spectacular, and Noctis’ genuine distress as he struggles to reach her towards the end of it is uncomfortably memorable.
9 Final Fantasy V: Galuf’s Death
Some of the earlier Final Fantasy titles had difficulty conveying genuine distress through their characters’ dialogue and actions earlier on in the series, but really started to nail it around the fourth and fifth installments.
Galuf’s passing after his bout with Exdeath in Final Fantasy V is a prime example, with his granddaughter, Krile, going into absolute hysterics as he shuffles his way off this mortal coil. It’s touching (and a bit convenient) that she’s able to inherit his stats afterwards, just to ensure that the player isn’t deprived of the time they’d sunk into him.
8 Final Fantasy X: Tidus Fades Away
Final Fantasy X’s ending is the epitome of bittersweet, with Yuna having broken Spira’s never-ending cycle of death and thus creating a brave new future for its people, while dream boy and key love interest Tidus fades away before the audience’s very eyes.
Refusing to process the idea that he needs to fade away from existence, Yuna rushes towards him, only to find that she can’t even hug him goodbye since he’s practically incorporeal by then. To cap it all off, their budding romantic arc was one of the most sweetly-written the series had ever produced up to that point.
7 Final Fantasy VIII: Laguna Visits Raine’s Grave
Final Fantasy VIII has what is probably the most surreal and interpretation-heavy endings in the entirety of the series’ history, which is saying quite a bit. Even with the multitude of theories that have spawned from it, the inescapable fact is that it’s all pretty sad.
While there’s a silver lining in Ellone’s appearance towards the end of Laguna’s segment, the player is run through a beautifully rendered flashback of Laguna proposing to Raine as he visits her grave. After the jarring and cerebral sequence they’d gone through with Squall, a lot of players just weren’t ready for such an emotional scene.
6 Final Fantasy VI: Celes’ Attempted Suicide
Final Fantasy VI definitely told one of the bleakest stories across the entirety of the series. The villain essentially achieves his goals, it’s peppered with several momentous character deaths, and the entirety of the expansive cast experiences loss and the subsequent emotional turmoil very deeply.
The perfect example of this is given if Cid dies when he’s marooned on the island with Celes after Kefka brings about the World of Ruin. Unable to cope with the apparent loss of everything she holds dear, Celes throws herself off of a cliff, shedding sparkling tears the entire way down.
5 Final Fantasy IX: The Black Mage Village
Arguably the most adorable depiction of a Black Mage yet, Vivi seemed built to win over fans’ hearts with his powerful magic and affable, innocent demeanor. Unfortunately, that innocence is born from being a manufactured super-weapon, and Black Mages at large don’t seem well equipped for actual lives.
Vivi learning that he likely doesn’t have long to live is sad enough, but it’s made clear that most Black Mages don’t even understand the concept of death. When Number 56 indicates his lack of understanding concerning why his friend had to be buried after he “stopped moving,” he expresses a childlike innocence in saying that he’ll wash him off in the nearby pond when he pops back out.
4 Final Fantasy Type-0: The Ending
Type-0’s overarching themes are death, war, memories of the fallen, and more death, so it was likely made apparent that players would want to have a box of tissues at the ready for the finale.
Almost the entirety of the now-doomed Class Zero, wounded and confronting their imminent mortality, manage to ward off their fear and intensifying existential dread by making impossible plans for the future they won’t have. While it manages to stave off the characters’ tears, it prompts nothing short of ugly crying on the part of the audience.
3 Final Fantasy Tactics: Delita & Ovelia’s Ending
The story of Final Fantasy Tactics is pretty tragic, all things considered. But even with the game being totally riddled with gut-wrenching plot twists, the crowning moment is easily the final scene between Delita and Ovelia.
Unable to reconcile the ultimate cost of Delita’s Machiavellian machinations, the now-queen Ovelia stabs Delita, who kills her in turn. Though achieved for noble cause, his pursuit of power required so much sacrifice that his humanity seems to have slipped away, and he simply wonders if Ramza achieved his own ends as he bleeds and Ovelia dies behind him.
2 Final Fantasy VII: Aeris Dies
For a lot of gamers, this might have been the first time that a video game actually made them cry. If not for the emotional toll of Aeris’ death, then for the fact that they’d been relying on her as the main healer and now needed to rope a different party member in for the job.
It may not have been the first time they decided to kill off a central character as we looked on helplessly, but it’s unlikely there’s a Final Fantasy fan in existence that isn’t familiar with the heartbreaking moment Sephiroth suddenly popped up and murdered our beloved Flower Girl. Reliving that trauma in the remake should be lovely.
1 Final Fantasy VI: Realizing You Could Save Shadow
Escaping the floating continent is a frantic affair. Kefka has ascended to power, the whole thing seems to be exploding, and just in case that wasn’t enough, an ominous timer counts down towards oblivion from the corner of the screen. The player isn’t made to feel like they’ve got time to wait once they finally make it to their airship, but they’re nonetheless given the option to do so.
Seemingly losing the enigmatic ninja Shadow after he heroically saves the party would’ve been wounding enough, but a player realizing that they could have actually saved his life if they’d waited just a bit longer before jumping onto the airship is totally soul crushing.
NEXT: 15 Final Fantasy Villains That Are Overpowered (And 10 That Are Weak)
