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icharchivist · 6 months

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like i said. if you wanna suffer ill be happy to watch. but also the only thing i know about ff 15 is that one max0r video which while very funny is probably not 100% accurate to the story

now this is giving me too much power. I'll be happy (and sad) to oblige. And give you a quick overview.

and yeah i doubt that one video is a good description of it. so.

cracks fingers.

One of us is going to end up crying by the end of this. it's going to be me. but you're welcome to join me.

Final Fantasy 15 is the story of Noctis Lucis Caelum, crown prince of the kingdom of Lucis.

The Kingdom of Lucis is facing a crisis as the ever-growing Niflheim Empire is trying to expend and take the kingdom over, at the same time as a sickness called Starscrouge is slowly killing people. When the night falls, daemons come in the dark, and ever since those events have started happening, nights are growing longer in longer.

As the Empire of Niflheim is discussing peace treaty with the Kingdom, a clause is made on their contract to have Noctis marry Princess Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, who's been held captive by Niflheim for about a decade, and who has been Noctis's childhood friend and penpal. She is the Oracle, chosen by a prophecy to be the only person capable of healing the Starscrouge before the sickness takes hold.

King Regis decides to send his son to his marriage-to-be right before the peace treaty is officially signed, accompanied by his three most trusted friends - Ignis Scientia, who's been working as a royal advisor, cook, caretaker ever since they were children, Gladiolus Amicitia, who's been Noctis' bodyguard and royal trainer for a very long time, and Prompto Argentum, Noctis' school bestie who, despite having no relation to the royal family, is the only person outside of it Noctis managed to get close with.

But soon after their departure, the peace ceremony goes array- King Regis is murdered and the Kingdom of Lucis fall to the Empire, now leading a manhunt for Noctis to kill the royal lineage, and recover the Ring of Lucis, a powerful artefact carried through the family that, especially once coupled with the Magic Crystal that is the source of all magic in Lucis, can connect its wielder with the Kings of Old to access tremendous power left by the Gods.

See, there is a prophecy in the Lucis lineage that one day the One True King Of Light, chosen by the Gods, will be able to purge the world of the Starscrouge and Daemons, ending this curse at all cost. and, as you can imagine, this burden will fall on Noctis's shoulders as he goes through his new journey to awake the old gods and reunites the soul weapons of the previous Kings in order to unlock the full potential of his power.

The game mostly plays as an open world where you explore the valley with your besties. There is a lot that is very difficult to communicate that is just about how it feels like a camping simulator. You don't want to stay up at night for too long because Daemons are overleveled and bitch to kill, so you try to level up, do your missions, and enjoy your time connecting with your friends, learning more about them.

From Prompto's insecurities about his place in this journey, to Ignis's unwavering loyalty that would oversee Noctis's protection to the end, to Gladio devoting himself to being the shield even when everything starts to fall apart, you end up caring a lot for this group of misfits who are just trying to enjoy their journey knowing it might be their last.

You spend the game mostly having fun with them. Finding place to camp, new recipes for Ignis to cook, Prompto is constantly taking pictures and selfies to remember the journey by, you stop to every ponds to be sure Noctis can enjoy all of the fishing he can, you meet up with Gladio's little sister, it's really a really heartful game in ways that are very difficult to articulate.

... until shit hit the fan.

You're introduced to the real antagonist of the game, the Empire's chancelor, Ardyn Izunia, who's been pulling the strings all along, while also helping Noctis unlock the powers of the Gods.

And when finally it's time for you to go find Lunafreya for their wedding and hopefully linking the power of the Oracle to the King of Light in order to finally purge it all.....

Ardyn will brutally murder Lunafreya in front of Noctis, killing with her any possibility to stop the Starscrouge and the endless nights around the corner. The death itself is pretty heartbreaking, showcasing Noctis' very difficult time to deal with her loss, and Luna was defined by how she was willing to do everything to carry her duty to the end, so it was really sad.. but Luna was not very well written unfortunately (she appears maybe 15mins in the whole game up until this point) so i don't have as much to say about it :( it was super heartbreaking but yeah... yeah.

During this confrontation, Ignis will lose his eyes trying to protect Noctis, as Noctis was unconscious and Ignis grabbed the Ring of Lucis to ask for the powers of the Gods to protect him, and the Gods burn his eyes off. (it's so hard to properly explain but Ignis becoming blind ends up developping a lot of problems in the plot, of course, but especially in the gameplay. Like you spend the game having Ignis cook all sort of things and exitedly tell you about what he's going to cook today, and then your first campire after this incident you see the only food you can cook is some canned bean and it's just. so sudden in the way to tell you Ignis is changed for ever by it.)

Shortly afterward, Ardyn will create illusions that will push Noctis to push Prompto off from a moving train, resulting in Prompto getting kidnapped and experimented on by the Empire.

all while Gladio is losing his faith in Noctis because everyone is expecting so much from him, that they're their only hope, and yet Noctis is so lost in his grief that he doesn't focus on the bigger picture, while everyone he loves is losing everything around them.

When you finally decide to take down the Empire's HQ to get Prompto's back, is when a lot of truth starts to unravel.

You learn that Prompto is the clone of one of the highest funding members of the Empire, who was created to become one of the mindless drone enemies you fight the whole game, but has been smuggled out of the labs before he could be turned as such - only keeping a mark on his wrist reminding him of who he truly is. As much as Prompto always wanted to be Noctis' friend, he always feared that him being a clone, a failed weapon made by the enemies, would eventually disgust Noctis, and he feared all his life that Noctis would turn against him. so you can imagine the panic for Prompto when Noctis did attack him due to the illusions.

Most importantly though, you learn that Ardyn Izunia is actually Ardyn Lucis Caelum - one of the prince of Olds, the first person who was prophetized to be the King of Light. Bahamut himself, god of gods, gave him for missions to purge the Starscrouge, and Ardyn did just that, and took all of the Starscrouge in the world inside of his body, eradicating it from this world... and when he came to ask what he was supposed to do now, the Gods turned on him and left him to his fate, as he was not the one to actually serve to finish this prophecy. (if i recall correctly they legit say it wouldn't be narratively satisfying. Fuck the Gods, fuck Bahamut, all the homies hate Bahamut no matter the universe.)

Then, as the gods refused to clean him from the scrouge, his brothe, Somnus, tried to kill him before locking him into a magical prison and a magical slumber for the centuries that followed. Somnus became known as the Savior of Lucis, he took the credit for the actions of his brother, and build his kingdom on his ashes, continuing his royal line until Noctis' birth out of it.

When the Niflheim Empire started to come to power, they freed Ardyn, and figured out how to be able to use his power -- Ardyn could unlean the Starscrouge inside of him and have it spread into the world.... and we learn that people who "die" from the Starscrouge actually become Daemons, creature of the night, and the more people become Daemons, the longer the night will last.

And so Ardyn unleashed all of his power, all of his suffering, but himself has been turned into a Daemon at this point due to the sickness ravaging his body for centuries. He only feels pain, and he cannot die, for the sickness made him immortal. So while the Empire woke him up to use him, Ardyn decided instead to use the Empire to take revenge on the descendant of his brother, destroy the world he had sworn to save, and finally by the end, being killed by the True King of Light in the way the Gods will find narratively satisfying.

And finally, as our four companions are trying to escape the forteress, Noctis finds the Crystal, and with all the power he has gathered since then, and prompted by Ardyn telling him that the only way for him to know how to defeat him, Noctis approached it... and was taken in by the Crystal.

In there he met the Kings of Old who told him about the prophecy. The King of Light will pure the world of the Starscrouge and the Demons by taking out Ardyn for good.... but since Ardyn cannot die, his soul will always come back into his body, the King of Light must die as well in order to kill Ardyn's soul in the afterlife once its there.

Noctis therefore learns that by the end of his journey, the only thing that awaits is his own suicide in order to finally put Ardyn to rest.

The Crystal kept Noctis in it for about ten years. For ten years Noctis could do nothing but wait, as the Night fully took the lands over and destroyed everything. Only small camps here and there managed to survive and fight -- and his three friends have been trying to do their best for the people's survival, while being torn apart at the sudden loss of Noctis that day.

When Noctis finally returns, he can meet with his friends one last time. And tell them what awaits him.

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For one last time you team up with your dearest friends, all of them having to be aware that they're walking you out so you can kill yourself to finally bring peace.

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Before entering the final room to the final boss fight, Noctis turns to his friends, and ask Prompto to give him one of the pictures he took. You go through all the pictures you took as Prompto as you decide which picture Noctis will hold on in his last moments, holding on knowing they were the people who brought him on this journey to start with. In there Noctis will share his final words with them.

And finally you leave your friends behind. Finally it's time to fight Ardyn as he himself only awaits for death. Two dead men giving each other a last fight, two pawns by the prophecy made by the Gods, tool in a narrative that never saw them as humans, no matter how hard they clang to their humanity and to the people they loved.

One last final fight, finally killing Ardyn. And watching Noctis climbs on the throne of his father, and empale himself with all of the swords of the previous kings, in order to finish this fight in the afterlife.

And so the game ends. Ardyn is dead. The Starscrouge and Daemons are purged from this world. the Kingdom of Lucis can live on and see better days. And Noctis is dead as well, standing on the throne of his father.

In the last moments of the game you see him in the afterlife where he reunited with Lunafreya. He's holding the picture you picked in the previous scene. Looking over his friends one last time.

And then in case it's not enough you have the DLCs. Ardyn's DLC tell you more about how the Gods set them up for narrative satisfaction to start with. Then you have all three friends' DLC, set at points in game when you don't know what happened to them. But all of them ends with some final goodbye of some sort.

Gladio's DLC is the most underwhelming one in general so i don't really know what to say about it, and it doesn't really have a big payoff.

Prompto's show how he felt, abandonned in the snow when Noctis almost killed him. Having to wrestle with his existence as a clone, and figuring out if Noctis even wants him by his side. This DLC ends on a last conversation between Prompto and Noctis right before Noctis entered the crystal, in which Noctis tells Prompto he hopes he'll be by his side as he'll try to be a good king. Prompto promise he will be, always.

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And then. Ignis' DLC. god that fucking DLC.

You really see the events in which Ignis stole the Ring to try to protect Noctis there, the event that rendered him blind. You see how much he fights out of devotion for Noctis. And you learn that when he put the ring on, the Kings of Old told him Noctis was going to die. Ignis spent his life protecting Noctis. In fact, you go through various flashback of their first meeting. Ignis has to learn that the kid he's protected his whole life, is going to die, and there's nothing he can do about it, because this is the fate that has been drawn on him.

On the first ending of the DLC, There is one last goodbye. Where Ignis wants to follow Noctis to the end and Noctis has to stop him, telling him that he wants him to live on.

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(so that's the scene where i was crying so hard i ended up tripping in the stairs)

BUT THEN Ignis's DLC has an alternative ending. an ending where when Ignis hears the plans the Gods had planned for Noctis, he tells them, screw you. I'm never going to let it happen to him. I'll fight all of you if i have to and i'll save Noctis from this cruel fate you have planned.

And so in this ending, Ignis doesn't let Noctis walk into the Crystal and they work together, in an alternative way, until they can save him and put him on the throne.

and let me be clear: this ending is impossible by the game's lore. It's purely a fanservice fix-it ending, a what if, Ignis' ultimate proof of love that is enough to screw over the prophecy hundred of years in the making.

Where Ignis manages to save Noctis so Noctis can actually live on as the King he was raised to be. For ever at his side.

SO. WELL. WELL. I NEVER RECOVERED.

(and i am in fact crying as i'm writing all of this)

all of that while the main theme of the game is a Stand By Me cover by Florence + The Machine that will forever rip your heart and will leave you crying your eyes out as you finish this game, especially after the true ending, watching Noctis' die, and then hearing this fucking damn song.

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Anyway i never fucking recovered from it. Like, never.

Like, even a summary doesn't do it justice. My first playthrough took me hundreds of hours. I spent hundred of hours with those kids. Enjoying their banters, seeing them protect each other, fight with one another. There's so much of their dynamic that is so deep into the gameplay, the way your companions will check on you during a fight, the moments they'll pause to have a high five, those moments of pure happiness where you know they're having fun by each other's side.

and Noctis being such a good character you really get to love and for what. And for what!!!!!!!! to get him killed by the end???? like for crying out loud. literally.

So yeah that's the speedrun of what FF15 is about. It's about tearing my heart out of my chest, that's what it is. (and others themes but you get my point)

Anyway. Yeah. Here you are. Here you know FF15's story.

and btw there was a little webseries set right before the event of the games, telling you how each of those friendships started. if you ever goot curious through reading all of this, i definitely recommend it. (the playlist is from newest to oldest though so be sure to watch on the right order)

was it worth it.

#*puts hands on my face and starts screaming*#i started a replay not so long ago #it's fun when you try to pretend the ending isn't there #but then you remember the ending in every fucking things you do and you cry :)#any mistakes in the summary is due to me being an emotional mess if i ever did anything wrong #ichareply #ichafantalks ffxv #anonymous #sorry i gave up and posted videos but you will watch them. you will get me. you're welcome.#also if you're here from gbf all the seiyuu are in gbf #in japanese noctis' is Aglovale's seiyuu. Prompto's elmott. Gladio's Deliford. And Ignis is Mamoru Miyano (not in gbf. yet. but you know hi #im more used to the english bc i played in english tho #(mostly bc the subs kept jumping and some banters weren't subbed so i had to compromise)#(the english cast is very good tho)#but yeah. yeah.

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