I've been replaying final fantasy xv and, other than the poor storytelling, the games worst aspect for me is by far the apparent "romance" between noctis and lunafreya.

I cannot for the life of me invest myself in their relationship. firstly, it feels very forced. the game gives them no substance outside of the words of third parties voicing how much the two supposedly love each other. for instance, a random child runs up to noctis just to tell him the player about how lunafreya felt. there's no escape from this happening either, which further forces their romance into the player's face and down their throat

(image: "she really loved you, prince noctis").

(image: "she was really excited to marry you! she looked so happy the day her dress arrived!")

who are you? how do you, random child, know how luna was feeling and how she reacted to seeing her dress? what purpose do you serve other than to yet again remind the player that noctis and lunafreya love each other?

any well-written romance would have absolutely no need to include ridiculous scenes like this as well-written romances show the audience the love between the characters rather than telling them through random npcs. the fact that the game doesn't go beyond anything other than this to build anything concrete or convincing for their relationship shows not only bad writing, but also lazy writing. quite frankly, it's insulting.

now, noctis and lunafreya met once as children; noctis eight years old and lunafreya twelve. they had no interaction over the following twelve years other than being pen pals. the whole idea of their little notebook is like texting someone from primary school until after secondary then deciding to meet up and get married. it makes very little sense. yes, you can still learn about someone by writing to them, but you won't truly know them as you would with in-person interactions. flaws are pretty much absent due to the writer being in control of the knowledge they give of themselves, which would lead to being placed on a pedestal. without any face-to-face interactions, neither could really know the other. they don't have the chance to see their quirks, what makes them tick, how they treat other people and situations. their love for each other appears to be nothing more than the idealisations they've created of one another. they don't truly know each other; they just think they do.

I'm just going to say it: noctis and lunafreya should've shared a platonic relationship. the fact that they're both nostalgic for the time they spent together as children coupled with luna giving advice and approval like a mother/older sibling gives the relationship a more comfortable fit to be platonic. a big indicator of this is luna's death scene in which the two appear as children.

despite it being a tragic event, it was still an opportunity for the supposed romance between the two to shine through. but instead, the main focus of their dialogue is duty. during the scene, luna does her usual of preaching about his destiny before it shifts onto her dying. noctis begins to cry and tells her "it's not right. all I wanted was to save you." luna then turns into her older, current self, and offers noctis - who is still presented as a child - words of hope and wisdom and tells him that she will always watch over him.

only at the very last second of the scene does noctis become his older, current self when the realisation of the situation sets in and he tries to reach out to her. instead of telling noctis that she loves him, luna simply says "farewell, dear noctis." this scene was not romantically coded at all.

personally, I don't see their personalities being a good match romantically, either. it's a little unfair to say so since luna doesn't exactly have a personality, but from what we're shown throughout the game, I can't imagine noctis having fun or joking around with luna like he does with a lot of other people, even those outside his group. noctis loves to fish, to play games, to adventure and live his life. whilst you could argue that his attitude changed when he seemingly matured after his decade-long nap, he's still human with a personality. to me, luna seems like she would simply spend all day every day devoting all her time and energy to nothing but her role and to her lover, rather than having her own interests and life as well. sure, opposites attract, but sometimes two people are simply too different and are romantically incompatible.

a big weakness of the romance between notcis and luna is that luna is a very bad character. she's given nothing outside of her duty and noctis, which is pretty much the same thing. she's a classic "too pure, too good for this world" character who is presented as perfect and serves as nothing more than a mere plot device for the main protagonist/love interest. she's cast away when the story has no use for her anymore and her purpose is fulfilled. this makes it very difficult to care about her and her fate because she feels like less of a person and character and more of a catalyst for the story. the writers merely use her as a push for the protagonist. from my perspective, luna convinced herself she romantically loves noctis - she has a duty to uphold and it revolves around him and seeing his destiny through.

as for noctis, he clearly cared about luna and they did love each other - but I'm not convinced of it being in a romantic sense. they seemed more reliant on each other for comfort and hope rather than anything in relation to romance.

without the supposed wedding scene between the two, I think I could've swallowed their relationship a little easier (and lived pretending that their love for each other was platonic/familial). but it comes out of nowhere and is shoved in the player's face as if to say "see! they're in love! even though they didn't have to get married anymore, they still did because they really did love each other!" okay, but it doesn't make up for the poor writing, the lack of chemistry and romantic connection and the fact they still don't really know each other. let's not forget the fact that luna is sitting on the floor at noctis' feet like a dog. at her own "wedding"?

the same occurs in artwork in the dawn of the future book where, not only luna, but also their daughter is sitting on the floor whilst noctis and his son sit nice and comfortably on the throne. and the two of them gaze up at them as though their only purpose in life is to love them

why? who thought this was a cute idea? to me, it simply reinforces the idea that luna served nothing more than a role to noctis, whether it was as oracle, his love interest or just a plot device to push him forward.

also the fact that their children resemble noctis and luna exactly as they were as children themselves, down to the daughter being older as well, is just strange...also?? noctis has his hand?? on his wifes head?? she really is a fucking dog huh. I'm not a fan

in conclusion, I think square enix were complete cowards to not have the bond between noctis and lunafreya that of a platonic and/or familial one which, in my opinion, would have been far more suitable. I can't and never will get behind their romance, no matter how many updates, dlcs or books are released in order to fix it. some things are just broken beyond repair, and noctis and luna's romance is one of them.

I think its so rude to reskin Iris with Lunafreya then capture gifs and post them as noctluna love scenes while believing that noctiris is nothing but shit.

Why Lunafreya Can’t Be Fixed (Or... it would be very difficult to actually develop her character properly)

(A/N: Thank you guys so much for liking and reblogging this essay! It took a lot of labor. Please note that I wrote this a couple of weeks ago, before the reveal of the new DLC episodes. Here is a link to a new post that I wrote, where I discuss what I think Episode Luna is going to be about and why this creates new problems in the storytelling sphere. Warning - there be serious retconning ahead!)

Gamers today expect a substantial storytelling experience when playing JRPGs. Aside from immersive world building, a moving soundtrack, and compelling game mechanics, players are expecting a diverse cast and meaningful character development. This is definitely not the case for Final Fantasy XV‘s Lunafreya Nox Fleuret.

Character development assumes that a lead character, supporting character, and at times, even minor characters will undergo a journey of self-discovery of some level, or of some type. This, normally, should especially be true of a major character. In Luna’s case, she is heavily involved in the game’s advertising campaigns, and is assumed to be in a major romantic role with the main character, who undergoes his own extensive character development. She is therefore a major character, who is designed to forcibly tell us that she is important. So, why does she have no substance to her backstory, her character growth, and to her actual relevance in the story? And can she be fixed? This essay is an analysis on character creation from a writer’s perspective, and why she as a whole was not built for the character development that fans are expecting out of her - it is a perspective I feel is lacking in the all of the debates and discussions that are happening about this character. (Warning: spoilers for the Final Fantasy series ahead.) (Also warning: long.)

The essential main theme of character development in Final Fantasy XV is ascension. That is, the characters are growing to be better than they started out with, or are growing up in a physical, emotional, and mental way. For the four main Chocobros, this means growing up to be men, or from childhood/adolescence into adulthood (and for Noctis, becoming King). This is true for three out of the four main characters. The only exception is Gladiolus, who has already achieved manhood at the beginning of the game, and stays the same throughout. However, it can be argued that the Brotherhood anime has introduced some level of character development for him, going from a young teen who at first was displeased with protecting Noctis, into a young man who not only accepts Noctis, but accepts his role as a Crownsguard.

However, the same cannot be said for Luna. In all major aspects of the Final Fantasy XV Universe, Luna has not actually developed, nor was she really fully realized as a human being. What I mean to say is that she is the same in Brotherhood, Kingsglaive, Final Fantasy XV, and Royal Edition. While fans may notice behavioral changes between Luna in the film and in the game (and while many may prefer her in the film), her essential character actually hasn’t changed. Her goals are the same. Her emotions (and subsequent feelings for Noctis) are the same. Her commitment to being formal even in the presence of more intimate interpersonal relationships is the same. Her sense of duty is the same. Her obsession with Noctis is the same. Her lack of personality is arguably the same. The behavioral changes in this sense are mainly surface-level. This kind of personality quagmire is the same despite age differences throughout the timeline, as well. In other words, Luna is the same at 12 years old, and at 24 years old. She still is only interested in discussing her religious indoctrination, her duty, and her need to guide Noctis. This essentially means that there is no actual character development for a character that the game tries so hard to convince you is important. She is already grown up at 12 years old, and there is nothing left for her to personally explore. In other words, ascending to her role as Oracle is not symbolic of any character development, like ascending to be King is for Noctis. In the case where people argue she needs more screen time, YouTuber StoryTime** has explained it best: when you see one scene of Luna, you have seen them all. It is not that she needed more screen time - more screen time would just mean reiterations of old material. Case in point: she was given more time and more lines in Royal Edition, only for it to be the same old thing we have heard from her before (and at the cost of breaking one of their established world building rules). Expanding her emotions on the 1.16 update didn’t do anything different for her. It just beat the dead horse on what we already know: that she loves Noctis. What the problem really is is that she should have been planned out differently from the start.

Essentially, the main argument I am trying to make here is that the writers have effectively trapped themselves when it comes to Luna’s development. Let’s discuss the cuts that have been made from her development, and how she is problematically portrayed. There was a leak from a developer of the game who discussed that her childhood abuse story was cut due to anxiety over public backlash to her character. This backlash was assumed to come from a feminist perspective, being that her character would have endured the abuse for the sake of Noctis. This perspective is legitimate, which is another reason why she is problematic: she can’t be human, and be a full character, because her sole reason is to exist for Noctis. This is not just on an emotional level (where this kind of obsession is honestly incredibly self-sabotaging and unhealthy), but also on a plot development level. She is literally a plot device existing for the sake of Noctis’ development, and because of this her own development doesn’t matter. Her death was also for Noctis’ sake. She did not die out of her own convictions, or because her actions were conflicting with Ardyn’s goals. She died because Ardyn wanted to provoke Noctis. Luna’s death therefore does not hold significance for her development, either. This is largely different from Final Fantasy VII’s Aerith, who was murdered by Sephiroth because she posed a direct threat to his plans. Aerith, by comparison, died because she decided to take the world’s fate, as a normal civilian who wasn’t groomed to carry this burden, taking fate into her own hands, and without any religious brainwashing or indoctrination to tell her that she has to.

We do not know if this leak is true. Let’s assume that it is, especially since this abuse was teased in one of the trailers. Adding her abuse story wouldn’t actually add to her character development in a meaningful way. Why? Because she was already devoted to Noctis and to her duty before the abuse. Enduring the abuse for the sake of Noctis’ safety doesn’t change or enhance this devotion. It wouldn’t really be effective in changing Child Luna into Adult Luna. Also keep in mind that if we are to assume the leaks are true, then her motivation to endure the abuse was also supposed to be completely based on her devotion to Noctis. It was said that it was cut because people were going to argue against the notion of a young girl surviving abuse for the sake of a boy she barely knows, instead of for her own sake, or for the sake of the family she has left, etc. Any development that is meant for her is implied to happen for the purpose of existing for Noctis, just like the rest of her character development.

What this means is that from a writers’ perspective, she was created solely for Noctis’ development. Such characters do exist. They are necessary to develop main characters and to act as catalysts for a more natural plot progression. The problem here is that she is one of these throwaway characters, but fans are expecting more out of her role, or out of her existence - and Square is doing them a huge disfavor by advertising her as more than what she actually is.

All of this is exacerbated by the fact that she doesn’t really behave like a normal human being. If anything, she carries herself like Tolkien’s Galadriel, who is thousands of years old by the time the Lord of the Rings takes place. Her personality quirks are one of the reasons why people would argue against a romantic relationship between her and Noctis, and why she is unrelatable for many. Combining a human-not-human with the lack of character development, and exacerbated with a questionable role in the overall plot development creates a shell or a shadow of a human being that barely exists. I would argue here that if she was removed from the story, it would be incredibly easy to fill her void, being that Noctis can be easily rewritten to go after the Astrals and the Armiger weapons without her assistance. If we were to compare her to Final Fantasy IX’s Garnet, it is different. Removing Garnet would have a tremendous impact on the story, because suddenly there is no logical explanation for Zidane’s presence in Alexandria, and there would be no reason for him to go to Lindblum, and so forth. Removing her would garner serious rewriting of the entire game. Garnet’s contribution to the game is tied to the world building and politics that take center stage of the conflict, even though she is not the main protagonist. The same cannot be said for Luna. Her role as an Oracle is questionable: she is meant to be the voice between the people and the gods. But this is challenged repeatedly in the game. If she is needed to speak to the gods, then why can Noctis understand Leviathan during their battle? Why can Noctis exchange a conversation with Bahamut? If it is to be argued that he is also chosen by the Crystal, then what is the proper argument for Bahamut coming down and speaking directly to the Glaives in Comrades? Furthermore, as stated before, removing her would not constitute a huge rewrite. Since Noctis has shown to have no problem talking to gods, then it wouldn’t be a big task to write it so that he takes responsibility of waking them up, as well. It’s no wonder then that Luna has become such a contested character to debate over. If anything, it further deteriorates her character development.

I have to add here that proper analysis of literary characters need to use hard evidence from the primary source. Defense of her characterization from most of what I have seen rely on projection, which is not accurate of what is actually seen of her. This makes validation of her character in a meaningful discourse difficult (in other words, projecting ideals onto her character without seeing the forest for the trees will grant you the very least a “D” in your literature class). Furthermore, adding actual romantic messages on the notebook will not fix her either. The romance between her and Noctis, first of all, is flawed in and of itself, and is a different topic, although development here is necessary. Secondly, if you want to tie the romance to her character development, it cannot be argued that it does anything to *her* development. This is because the romance does not help her in any way, does not encourage her personal growth, and as it stands, does nothing to let us know anything different about her or see a another side of her either.  Since she is already grown at 12 years old, the romance has nothing to do with her ascension, either. Giving her a scene with Noctis as adults is actually NOT ideal either, because Tabata’s entire goal for her was to achieve her as a trophy after hours of chasing her, only for her to be taken away. Her death is written to be devastating because of the amounts of effort that Noctis (and the player) have put into chasing her. Writing a scene for her and Noctis before her death would cheapen and backstab Tabata’s efforts - not that it would do anything for her anyway.

Considering that Tabata has expressed his commitment to making her “stronger,” his new track record in Royal Edition does not encourage any trust in his goals. Giving her speaking powers in ghost form (which conflicts with her previous appearances, where it seems like she cannot speak - this also conflicts with earlier design choices and artistic goals of creating a sense of permanence in death), and creating a non-problem that has no significance to the actual story which also contradicts Ardyn’s motivations (the wall over the Lucian citadel) for her to “fix” (when Noctis has no problem summoning Astrals), especially when there is no physical cost, danger, or threat to her well-being (since she is already dead), does not really do Tabata’s need to convince players that she is strong any justice.

So how can she be fixed? A realistic answer would be that she can’t. To elaborate on this, I will assume that the three episodic DLC’s were planned ahead, which is why there are major plot holes in the base game. This means that the free additions to the story, and including the Royal Edition, were not originally planned. This includes the 1.16 patch, where she was given a couple of more lines of crying, the Astral backstory (which has been argued to contradict what was previously known about the Astrals) and the Chapter 13, verse 2 patch update. These examples do not excel in the writing department (the latter was very verbose and awkward in dialogue that seemed unnatural to the base game, even for fancy standards - and it did not actually answer any questions about Ravus’ character development - this was clearly planned for Episode Ignis instead). Basically, from the new additions to the story, the designers did not do a stellar job in showing that they can handle the expectations that fans want, nor are the writers confident in bringing in new material, especially in a short amount of time.

A good example of this is her Royal Edition appearance. Many were disappointed that there wasn’t anything meaningful in her only adult interaction between herself and Noctis. Why is this? Why couldn’t they give us something? This is because the writers do not know what they are like as a couple. They never had to write or think realistically about what their dynamic would be like. The writers are also pressured by the severe time constraints that come with game development. It takes a lot of resources to create such a short scene between the two of them. Good writing isn’t just talent and effort - it is time consuming, which they do not have. Believing that they will create something substantial in such a short time period for previously unplanned story DLC is unrealistic of their abilities. Episode Prompto and Episode Ignis were satisfying because those stories were planned from the beginning, as shown from the deliberate plot holes that they have set up, knowing that they will fill them in. Or, think about it this way: they had an actual story to tell with Prompto and Ignis. This is something that we all knew, being that the base game has given us teases. (Episode Gladio couldn’t be as satisfying because, as stated before, Gladio didn’t have any development in the game.) What about Episode Ardyn? I do not believe that the designers were anticipating such passionate interest in Ardyn’s development, and have genuinely screwed up in his build-up, too (hence why different language dubs will have contradicting information during his reveal to Noctis). As a writer myself, I do not have the intuitive belief that the writers knew that Ardyn had a brother who betrayed him, or where the name Izunia came from. When developing characters, a rule of thumb that all writers must follow is to know their characters’ backstory. This is why when Ardyn’s new brother was introduced to be named Somnus Lucis Caelum, it comes off as retcon-y. No effort was put into studying more Latin terms, so they went with the first word that came to be associated with Versus XIII, as homage to the origins of this game (since he is Founder King). That may seem pleasant from a symbolical standpoint, although it is sloppy. Consider that all names in this games have symbolic meaning. Somnus (”sleep”) means nothing in the final game, so there is no symbolic significance in naming Ardyn’s brother this way (i.e., it wasn’t planned before).

Let’s take a quick look at Aranea, by comparison. She has far less screen time than Luna, yet 100 times more character development. In her first major appearance, she is an enemy, working for the empire. In her second, you find out she is just a mercenary, and that she questions her commitment to the empire. In her third, she has decided to dump the empire and provide help to the survivors in Tenebrae. Aranea has undergone three stages of character development in her only three scenes. This was planned well. They knew who Aranea was and what she will become.

What this means in the long run for a possible Episode Luna, which is previously unplanned, is that the writers will have A LOT to work with in such a short amount of time. We do not know yet how they will handle such a responsibility, since Episode Ardyn is not out yet. Now, Ardyn is a much easier character to flesh out by comparison. He would have to have been young once, idealistic and willing to help those in need. The descent into hatred and anger is, understandably and expectantly, tragic and dramatic. Writing these themes would be easy for the writers to adapt. In other words, his story is already written by assumption just because he is the antagonist of the story, and because he was previously anointed by the Crystal.

In Luna’s case, however, this is not true. As stated before, Luna is the same at 12 years old, before the Niflheim invasion, as she is as an adult. As stated before, adding her abuse story would not be effective character development because of this. If they add this abuse, they risk drawing the ire of peeved fans who do not want to see her as just a sex dumpster for Noctis. All additions added for her so far was meant to convince us that she loves Noctis, which is already obvious. So what is there to do? I do not have proper advice in this case. She should not have been published in this state. Getting her interested in things that have nothing to do with Noctis would be a decent start, so that she can seem human enough. But here is the new catch-22: changing her too much would then betray our existing knowledge of her.

What this means is that if we witness her acting like a normal human being, they risk undermining our understanding of her. Suddenly, it is not one Luna, but two (or, if you think she is that different in Kingsglaive, it will become three Luna’s). If she is not comfortable behaving less formal in front her brother, in front of Regis, and IN FRONT OF NOCTIS EVEN, then how are we going to accept her behaving differently in front strangers? New friends? Servants? And this is only if they decide to delve into her backstory. This is not guaranteed. The massive survey conducted by Square teased that Luna’s story would not really be childhood backstory. It was framed as seeing her actions during Noctis’ story (in other words, her duty to waking up the Astrals). What this means is that Episode Luna would, therefore, exist for Noctis’ sake, too.

And what kind of story, exactly, are they going to tell in Episode Luna when they have shown repeatedly that they do not have a story to tell? I mean, REALLY, IF THEY HAD MORE CONTENT FOR HER, THEY WOULD HAVE ALREADY SHOWN IT. The reason why we keep getting scenes that do nothing except repeat what we already know is because they don’t have more content. I am trying to express here that a natural character progression or outline for Luna doesn’t really exist. Let’s flesh this out. The only scene we see where she is directly at conflict with her inner goals is when she is at the brink of giving up, and asking Ravus to take the ring. However, we see this scene after her death, when her character progression has effectively ended which is a problem on its own. Furthermore, this scene serves her less than it does for Ravus. This scene was introduced specifically for Ravus’ development, not hers. It is the first time in the base game the audience was even remotely aware that Ravus has mixed goals. On her side, the effectiveness of this scene in making her seem human is questionable. Why?

It is because we know that she is not realistic in her behavioral patterns. She shows no realistic reaction to her duties, which would logically come out in two ways: one, she would be angry at the gods for demanding such sacrifice from her when the entire Starscourge was their fault to begin with; and two, she would (AND SHOULD) be upset that Noctis, someone she supposedly loves, is going to die, too. But, she’s willing to allow him to die. Compare this to Final Fantasy X’s Yuna, who over the course of her journey, goes from a summoner who is willing to die to save the people from Sin, continually struggling to accept her decision to sacrifice herself as she forms a relationship with Tidus, and then becoming a warrior who decides to stop the cycle of abuse that keeps harming her people, while still maintaining traits that keep her familiar to us. In other words, Yuna’s development is about her being involved with religious and political conspiracies which lead her to then question her faith, only for her to stay steadfast in her own self-confidence and then risk her life to find a different method to save the world. Her refusal to sacrifice her friends is proof of this. There is a clear beginning, middle, and end to her development. Luna, on the other hand, decides to behave in all the ways the gods demand her to, instead of choosing her own fate. This effectively means that all chances the writers take at directly telling us that she “has a mind of her own,” or that her decisions are “her choices” (which is not what she actually says in the Japanese version), are basically smoke and mirrors, completely at odds with normal human behavior and previous world building efforts. She does not have direct will of her actions. Her will to give up temporarily, then, is an inorganic attempt to bring some character development into her, which happens only once, and it happens too late. At best, it is a weak attempt. At worst, it is disingenuous. Either way, this questioning of herself is not a proper method for character development, because her story has no beginning, middle or end. It’s a broken record throughout.

The writers therefore are going to have a difficult time logically creating a character outline for her progression and ascension for a possible Episode Luna. What exactly are we going to get here? What would her journey mean? Are we going to get repeated scenes of her questioning her strength when she wakes up an Astral because she is getting sicker? Rinse and repeat for every Astral she wakes up? What is the point here, when she didn’t even die because of her own pursuits, or because of her own deteriorating health? I would think that her DLC might be useful in learning more about the Astrals, about Tenebrae, or about the Empire. If that is the case, then that has nothing to do with her development, either.

That is not effective character development. There isn’t enough evidence to show any strong sense of optimism in this case. Maybe the writers will have some creative ideas to add to her story that will genuinely be surprising, although having her be a magical badass would then contradict certain elements of the Universe (such as her lack of magic in Kingsglaive). If she is only a healer, then that means that she needs another character to fight for her in her DLC (gee, poor Luna truly can’t do anything for herself). If she fights, then it’s a WONDER WHY SHE NEVER FOUGHT BEFORE, ASIDE FROM HER CONFRONTATION WITH LEVIATHAN. All in all, she’s messed up in general. I suspect that the reason they have not officially announced an Episode Luna yet is because they are struggling to create a proper character outline for her, as well as discussing ways to flesh out game mechanics without making her seem useless or terribly contradictory. If anything, the writers need to know her well before they can add anything. If they don’t even know how to get her to communicate with Noctis, when they have spent so much effort in building believable and meaningful dialogue and connections between the Chocobros, then I have no confidence in them knowing who she is, and therefore, no confidence that they will provide anything of value to her character in the future. TL;DR: Luna sucks and may not be fixable. No, I mean, really. I do not know, as a writer, how to fix her while still staying canonical to the published story, maintaining her relevance to the plot, and proving with little challenge that her actions are vital to the story’s development. **Please check out StoryTime’s video comparing Luna to Princess Zelda from Breath of the Wild. I have also noticed these severe similarities between the two of them. I would add that Breath of the Wild did much better in establishing symbolism in the silent princesses (the flowers). The sylleblossoms by comparison don’t have any significant meaning.

So... maybe someone should mention to SE, that creating a wedding invitation to an afterlife/dead wedding and having the characters talk about it still doesn't do squat for an undeveloped, practically non-existent romantic relationship. It's pure fan-service for the people who ship them and nothing more. Honestly, I feel like SE did this solely because they legit realized they made two other recent duo's look more canon than what was actually supposed to be the canon one in the game. Also, how did the bros know they got hitched in the afterlife? And why was this the majority of what they said revolving around it? You wanna let them have a proper goodbye to their friend, I'm all for it -- but don't use such a big and important moment to keep forcing that poorly handled romance down our throats.

When you start doubting your own ship that you gotta go into the anti tag to bitch. 

I don’t have to convince anyone that Lunoct was absolutely dull lmao. It completely contradicted itself throughout the first half of the game. But hey, if you want to keep shipping what I consider a crap ship and a disgrace to all previous FF romantic plots, then you do you.  

It’s been months now, it’s okay to admit that this game’s story was mediocre at best (it’s only saving grace was the main cast’s relationship). 

There’s a lot that gets me about the love story in FFXV and how it relates to the characters, or rather, what gets me about the characterization and how it relates to the love story, but it’s going to be a long read.

TL;DR the characterization tried to lift tropes from previous Final Fantasies ( particularly VII and X ) but XV’s version just seems like a hollow echo that takes the tropes on the surface without actually figuring out why they worked for the characters and their plot, instead banking on telling us that everything is supposed to work out and be coherent and letting nostalgia pull some weight. It also didn’t help that any use of those tropes was completely shot to pieces by the story being a forced tragedy requiring ( in my opinion, unnecessary ) character deaths to be “touching” ( read: edgy ) and playing that tragedy straight instead of subverting it, exposing the writing as having a juvenile lack of vision.

First off, Luna’s character is badly written. So is Noctis’s -- he got “the most” development from being the main character, but he still suffered from terrible writing and his “I matured into a man by taking a ten year nap and interacting with 0 people” thing was... it just was. But let’s just talk about Luna. Characters within the game tell us that she’s doing amazing things and we see brief glimpses of the aftermath of her actions. Characters also tell us that she loves Noctis, or that she must love him because she did X Y and Z. 

That doesn’t come close to being a proper substitute for good writing nor is it a sub for actual development of a love story, starting with “she must have loved him/been strong because she did things”. She did things and was imbued with the standard “strong willpower and determination” typically found in characters that in reality have zero agency of their own in order to affect their destiny and are usually made to suffer.  

She's basically the shadow of a strong woman - she's what people THINK strength should be, in she’s only around to briefly pay lip service to the idea of a strongly-written character yet she’s more or less completely powerless where the actual strength is needed, but the fact that she puts faith in something “greater than herself” to guide her actions and is “determined” to stay the course and effectively be a pawn to these forces and “sacrifices” something that the story is taking from her to begin with ( her happiness, her life ) is what makes her Pure and Good and Strong. Basically “she’s strong because the story guts her and she takes it with a smile”. A mule can carry a load and take a beating too, but people generally do not respect beasts of burden. They’re used until they die, and people breed more of them to repeat the process. 

The extent of just what she did is only hinted at, leaving plenty of room for exaggeration ( as in, people frame Luna forming covenants as if she were in physical combat with the Astrals the same way Noctis was doing, instead of just talking to them ) or otherwise overblown or completely undermined by the plot itself. Such as Luna deflected Leviathan’s attack in Altissia and it looks badass, but then she immediately defaulted to “Noctis will come and settle things!” which, okay, it sure is easy to talk shit and “be strong” when ultimately someone else is coming to sort out the issue.

Even if narratively speaking, “Noctis couldn’t have done a lot without Luna’s intervention, he saves the world because of her”, that’s to be expected when Luna’s character is that of a walking plot device whose purpose is wrapped entirely around Noctis and getting him ready to do his duty. This is what highlights the difference between story and plot. Story is what happens around the characters, plot is what happens because of the characters. The story dictates that Luna acts in ways that directly benefit Noctis and prepare him for his ultimate role. She’s supposed to succeed in this regard because the hero needs to vanquish the villain. Luna’s character in particular has nothing to do with the direction the story goes in and neither does her “strength”, in the sense that she’s not personally pushing everything to go in the direction it went into because of her own interests. She’s pushed by the story to behave in that way. It’s in her role as Oracle, dictated to her since before she even became an Oracle. Anyone else could have had her job and they’d have to do the same thing. (1)

Luna’s role is not just “helping Noctis”, but doing so to her clear detriment and not expecting anything in return. Since people still haven’t let go of stuffing women in fridges like that’s a valid thing to do in storytelling, here comes unnecessary death number one ( Noctis makes the second ). The entire plot was set up to kill her when she was done doing her duty and not a moment sooner. Luna was done story-wise after Altissia, and needed to die to a) heighten the sense of drama and b) make Noctis sad and facilitate “character development” (2). Tellingly, we have no clue who she is as a person outside of whatever she was doing for Noctis, so they probably literally ran out of anything for her to do in the case that she’d lived. 

The story then tried to insult the player and justify Luna’s murder by presenting her as “doomed from the start”-- after she dies we get a scene that reveals that the contact with Astrals was physically draining for her-- a.k.a., nothing anyone could have done would have saved her, short of her not carrying out her divinely mandated role and instead putting the rest of the world in danger, so that’s just the way it had to be. How convenient! It’s addressed absolutely nowhere else and Noctis himself never learns about it, so it was just for the audience. I guess so we feel less bad about Luna? Or more bad about her? Or act like her killing herself in service of a boy she met 12 years ago is proof that she was such a “Strong Character” and that she “loved him”? I don’t know. Considering the game already told us that she was set to die no matter what because it was her job, even if she’d never met Noctis at all she would still need to do it. Trying to argue in that instance that she had to have been in love would be asinine. Noctis himself dies in the end for all of Eos and arguing a romantic love between him and every person in Eos would be just as dumb.

Then the game further tried to present it as a good thing that Luna died, because if not, then she wouldn’t be in the Astral Realm to pop in and touch Ardyn for a grand total of one second to weaken him conveniently and then fuck right off to nowhere. She could’ve been omitted from that ending and left it as Noctis pulling off his Knights of the Round summon with the Lucian Kings, and not a single thing would have been wrong with that, firstly because we received no word that Luna even was supposed to be in the Astral Realm or able to act in that way, and secondly because if it only took one second of arm-holding to paralyze Ardyn after all, what was she doing with the other thirty the first time around, when she was dying? Just fucking around with him and having herself a giggle? He was more offended about her trying to heal him than wounded from it. 

Anyway, she pops in just in time for Noctis to deal the finishing blow ( and again, the brief glimpses of her doing things open themselves to exaggeration, so when fans try to sell that Luna was particularly strong because of this scene it’s framed by fans as if she were a major character in the party or that she was waiting for Ardyn to show up so she could kick his ass, like she was cracking her knuckles with a smirk on her face, or something ). We literally do not see her with a presence in the Astral Realm beyond “help Noctis” and later on “marry Noctis”. She has no individual personality, no ambitions, no presence unless Noctis needs it.

In my mind, none of this could go hand in hand with a love story. If a love story is what the game wanted to get to with Luna’s and Noctis’s interactions, it is poorly told. Luna’s character as a person took a backseat to her other roles which are ( again! ) wrapped around Noctis’s other roles. Oracle? Serves the Chosen King. Princess? Marries the Prince ( at least by the time of FFXV, because there’s no word on previous Nox Fleurets having married Lucis Caelums ). Luna is committed to fulfilling both roles and has been ever since she was a child (3), and all of her actions were based on the roles to the point where I’d be hard pressed to say that any of that was actual proof that she loved Noctis in a romantic sense, or that she loved him in a special way that would have followed him no matter what role he was in that wasn’t already chosen for him by birth. Even if the story did need the romance for Luna and Noctis, it didn’t necessitate that Luna have no individual personality of her own in order to benefit Noctis’s story. Unfortunately for us, the characterization and writing behaves as if the previous Final Fantasies didn’t happen. Obviously not in a narrative sense but in terms of tropes. Luna’s characterization is a mix of Aerith and Yuna, except individually, Aerith and Yuna were better written. 

Like, Yuna had to form pacts with summons too, with the ultimate purpose being to attain the Final Aeon and defeat Sin. There was also a sense of “doom” in the story in that the Final Aeon would kill the Summoner that used it, bringing peace at the cost of their life, and Yuna knew that and had come to terms with it by the time she set out on her pilgrimage. That was her story. But her plot was different than that, thanks to her characterization. She was portrayed as self-sacrificing, but to a clear point. When it turned out that the Final Aeon thing was more or less a hoax and that she needed to effectively kill one of her friends in order to defeat Sin and then die anyway, she rejected the Final Aeon ( unlike the Summoners before her ) and she and her party set out to change fate and bring the Eternal Calm. We see Sin die for good, and the Aeons disappear because they’re not needed anymore, but we’re left with a prosperous people ready to finally live their lives without fear of Sin ever coming back. (**)

In contrast, XV’s heroes simply accept that they need to die because they’re told that it’s a permanent solution to the Starscourge problem, but we are shown no evidence that they did anything except turning the lights back on in a landscape devoid of people and that’s it. Everything is empty. Sunny, yes, but empty. It obviously can’t be permanently daytime, so nighttime would have to fall. But we are shown no instances of existing daemons burning up and dying, or of people afflicted with Starscourge recovering ‘miraculously’. There’s no reason we can’t just think everyone is fucked as soon as the sun goes back down. There is no more King or Oracle, no protective Wall, and Insomnia is still in ruins. That’s happy?

Like Luna, Aerith was also tasked with powers passed down by her bloodline, and was the last of her kind. She died at the hands of the villain that showed up out of nowhere. The world wouldn’t have been saved without her actions, and she also had some kind of presence post-death. The key difference was that her presence lasted longer than one second in the afterlife at a convenient moment to the hero (***). She controlled the lifeforce of an entire planet to stop Meteor when Holy didn’t work. She showed up in spirit and gave Cloud the last boost he needed to defeat Bahamut-SIN. She pulled off Great Gospel in order to cure Geostigma ( first Cloud, then eventually all the people in Midgar exposed to the healing rain ). Yes, Cloud fought Sephiroth physically and that’s important, but in both the game and Advent Children, fighting Sephiroth alone did not solve the entire issue/danger of the story. Defeating him in a swordfight didn’t reverse the course of Meteor or eradicate Geostigma. Aerith was the one who performed the actual world-saving contributions, so it was more like Cloud and the rest of the party was there to make it easier for her to do her thing. 

And even though Aerith, like Luna, was killed by the villain of the plot and it made the hero sad, Sephiroth stabbed Aerith because she was literally the only person in the entire world capable of thwarting his plan. Luna wasn’t particularly threatening to Ardyn -- at that point, no one in the story was a real threat to his plan given his absurd OPness. Luna’s ability to keep the Starscourge and its darkness at bay wasn’t a real concern because of the plot revelations that happened on the side (4). He stabbed her to spite Noctis when the story put her on death’s doorstep anyway and felled her with an inconvenient coughing fit. Not even the healing touch was of real threat to him outside of the one-second sneak attack in the ending. Luna held on to Ardyn’s arm for a good half minute in her last living moments and he wasn’t reeling from her touch. He backhanded her so hard she turned back into Stella Nox for a second. That’s the opposite of threatening. 

Anyway, XV forgot that a love story involves people. If we don’t care about the characters as people, we’re not going to be as involved in the romance which will inevitably feature more of them. And Luna wasn’t a person. She was a plot device, with a forced tragedy that made the whole thing pointless.

(1) Luna as Oracle and as Princess had a duty to help the Prince and Chosen King and help him become the True King of Light. If it’d been literally any one else in Noct’s shoes as the Chosen King like, say, Prompto, Luna would still have to do her quest because of destiny, not because she loved the guy. She’d still be expected to heal people of the Scourge, to awaken the Astrals, to protect the King from the Astrals if need be. None of that requires a love for Noctis or even for Noctis to be Noctis, nor for Luna to be Luna, or for the bond between them to be a love story. Let’s say it this way: the story could have been about their parents. If events transpired so that Regis had to go on the quest and Sylva was the one to go around awakening the Astrals, the story would be that Sylva would have to do Oracle things regardless of whether she loved Regis or not unless the plot seriously wanted to make their kids into stepsiblings. That’s what Oracles do.

(2) one strike in particular against Lunoct is how Luna’s death was handled and Noctis’s character development was framed in light of it. Frankly, the way the scene was presented didn’t seem like he lost Luna as someone he loved and thought of as a peer, but that he lost Luna as a parental figure who shielded him from the rest of the world’s evils. They’re shown as children, then Luna suddenly transitioned into an adult, and Noctis remained as a child. So her death was more like him losing his sense of safety and being orphaned, forcibly unmoored from his innocence and made to “finally grow up/become an adult”. Their unmatching mental states were so obvious that Noctis had to be aged to 30 before he and Luna ( now perpetually 24 years old ) looked like “an actual couple”. Also, Luna never even got a proper funeral. She got stabbed, she drowned, and then her body was conveniently lost at sea because the story stopped giving a crap about her.

(3) the second strike is that the story is set to kill these characters right off. Luna was “dead no matter what” thanks to the Astrals’ covenant taking a toll on her body at the tender age of 24 even though Regis had a literal “age yourself to death” plot device in his use of the Ring of Lucii and still lived to, like, 50 while constantly maintaining a Wall. Anyway, Noctis was also fated to die and short of him not doing his divinely mandated task to wipe Ardyn and the Starscourge off the map and instead dooming the world to a hellish landscape with daemons running loose, there was nothing else he could do. It was a suicide mission. It’s one that not only Regis, but Luna knew about and didn’t tell him, robbing him of the chance to come to terms with it as she undoubtedly had. He thought he was going to be a King and retake/rule over Insomnia only to find out in the eleventh hour that he was actually a pig led to the slaughter. No one stops to think about how ethically fucked up this all is. It just seems like tragedy for the sake of tragedy that’s not earned nor treated like what it is by even the characters within the game ( you have to hunt down the Dawn trailer to see Regis actually mourning his son’s fate, because otherwise, not a damn peep about it. But he knew ). I don’t know about you, but if I loved someone and knew they were going to die, I’d let them know about it. It’s understandable if Luna withheld information about her own death from Noctis because it’s her life and not his, but withholding information about his death? No. Unacceptable. This doesn’t make any sense unless we just assume that no one has particular feelings around death and suicide to begin with.

(4) Not that we find out this detail in any immediate place that would show its importance even though it was set up in the beginning that way, but the problem of the nights getting longer and the days shorter came about from the least likely place -- a friggin’ note in Takka’s diner. Killing daemons would release the photophilic particles of the Starscourge into the air, thereby spreading the darkness instead of making it better. That’s it. Now, the Empire's been manufacturing demons and Magitek soldiers in great numbers, even prior to the start of the game. They were going it so much that 30 years before XV took place, it overwhelmed the 112th King of Lucis and forced him to shrink his wall to being just around Insomnia instead of covering all of Lucis, in order to preserve what was left of his lifespan. Then the Crystal being moved from Insomnia during Kingsglaive also caused longer nights. So, with absurd amounts of daemons being forcibly made, the daemons that already existed possibly attacking people, the removal of the Crystal, the killing of daemons, and even the Oracle’s ( by FFXV’s point, obligatory ) death all contributing to the darkness basically made sure that the Oracle’s living presence alone meant absolute piss all in terms of combating it, and ultimately it’s Noctis who used the Light of the Crystal to banish the Scourge completely. Until he did, Ardyn stuck everyone in a lose/lose situation that made Luna’s contribution meaningless as hell outside of, of course, whatever benefited Noctis. So it’s hard to argue that Luna’s task of staving off the darkness was especially hard considering the story itself tries to make it meaningless.

(**) Mentions of Tidus are completely absent in the comparison between Yuna and Luna because none of Yuna’s plot required using her power as Summoner to serve him specifically, nor did the story go to great lengths to portray him as the Only Chosen One to defeat Sin. They both did it. The story presented them more or less as equals. We’re also given a chance to view Yuna as a person and see that while she’s possessing of good traits-- kind, loyal, and full of conviction-- we also see her flaws, or even the way those good traits backfire on her. As Auron said, “she’s naive, serious to a fault, and doesn’t ask for help”. She’s overly apologetic. She’s secretive. She doesn’t allow herself to show negative feelings in front of her friends. We eventually see her show anger and disgust, and in both X and X-2 she openly challenges the plans of other people who think they know better than she does and with it the idea of senseless self-sacrifice and the constant hammering of “There’s no choice”. 

(***) None of what Aerith did necessitated “being useful to Cloud” or serving his story-mandated “higher duty to save the world”, with this obligation passed down through generations. She saved the world, and Cloud just happened to be living in it. There was the brief scene where she visited Cloud in his headspace more or less, and that was honestly optional on her part. We also learned about her as a person throughout FF7 and witnessed her virtues and vices. She was kind and forgiving and playful, but she also expressed jealousy, uncertainty/doubt, a reluctance to find out more about herself ( at least in the beginning ), overconfidence, stubbornness, and meanness/insensitivity in certain moments. And they at least waited until the sequel movie to make her into Jesus 2.0 instead of canonizing her out the gate, so there’s that. Luna’s characterization in contrast was just a collection of good ideals and virtues, with the one scene of her actually expressing doubt/reluctance in her role amounting to “I might not be as useful to Noct as I’m supposed to be, maybe Ravus should take the Ring to him instead”. And I suppose that one scene in Kingsglaive where she pulled the bafflingly stupid stunt of jumping out of a moving plane and nearly getting herself killed in the process for no reason. That too, I guess.

literally no one looks happy about this union

Prompto: Wow. Still can’t believe you’re actually tying the knot dude. How does it feel now that it’s finally happening?

Noctis: Fine, I guess?

Prompto: Ahh come on! You can’t fool me! Any guy would be over the moon to marry her.

Noctis: No big deal.

Prompto: Yeah… Whatever.

Throughout the beginning of the game, we get these wedding talks. This is one of the few audios I’ve come across without any background noise to interfere. Before I begin,  ignore this if you are extremely sensitive.

I want to say that if you’re PRO-NoctLuna, read this with an open mind or, I repeat, just ignore this if you are extremely sensitive with your ship.

For me, I get the overall feeling that Noctis isn’t all that interested in his own wedding or anything romantically-related to Lunafreya. The first time that I played this game, I was baffled by his nonchalant attitude. He’s not opposed to the wedding, but yet, here he is, just brushing off the wedding as if it’s “No big deal”. Uh, Noct. A wedding IS a big deal. You’re going to spend your entire life (or a portion of it) with someone who can or cannot deal with your baggage. You’ll have to live with that person and it can make or break you. In Noct’s case, it’s an arranged marriage. Both parties aren’t complaining, but the romance is one-sided.

Some may argue that it’s his personality to be cool, but NO. 

Noctis is not cool. 

He’s not reclusive or distant like Cloud Strife from FFVII. Tabata wanted to make Noctis cool like Cloud, but he didn’t (thank Six). 

Noctis is a complete dork of a prince who tells Prompto that he’s “Sharp erryday” “50% Absolutely Certain” and even told Nayvth that his name was “Noct Gar”. He’s very dorky and very open with his emotions. It’s really easy to tell if he’s happy about something or not, and the wedding is definitely something that he’s clearly uninterested in.

The fact that he said “No big deal” tells me that he’s just going with the flow (and he really is throughout the entire game). There isn’t any positive emotion or feeling in his words when it comes to the talk about the wedding. I don’t have audio of all of the wedding talks, but most of them do not have Noctis sharing his thoughts or if he is talking, he’s not putting the romance as his top priority. The wedding is the last thing he will ever think about or want. 

It’s the guys who are more excited about his wedding than him and that is one of the many flaws of this “romance” part of the story. 

This audio clip is one example.

Prompto says, “Any guy would be over the moon to marry her.” 

He’s clearly happy for his friend to be able to marry someone as most friends would.

Noctis replies with, “No big deal.”

What sort of groom-to-be says that? 

A groom-to-be that doesn’t hold romantic feelings towards the other party.

There was no point in time where I, as the player, received any ideas that Noctis thought of Lunafreya as a lover. After beating the game three (almost four) times, I looked deeper into the cutscenes involving the “love” story between these two. Their interactions as children can be seen as children having fun or two obedient children who are only doing what the elders have been telling them to do, which is become close to one another purely as friends at the ages of 8 and 12. You can interpret that there may have been a crush developed by either parties, but that is just mere conjecture since nothing was explicitly stated or subtly shown that such a thing existed. Both were told to become friends, to have a good relationship. That didn’t mean a romantic relationship, no. To me, she felt like she was more of a sister to him, informing him the lore of the Chosen King, Astrals, etc.

Everything about this pairing is implied, open, and very short-lived. 

I don’t want to argue more about why I hate this canon ship and the messed up characterization of FFXV Lunafreya that we got, so if you read this far, read more from @rsasai and her extremely well-written explanation about the horrible mess that is this canon pairing.

What Episode Luna is Going to Be About (Or... how to drastically change a character)

This post is going to be a theory, a critique, and a follow-up of my previous post, Why Lunafreya Can’t Be Fixed. In this previous post, I go into some serious detail about how a character like Luna is not possible to fix based on how the writers have designed her. After the new DLC line-up reveal, I maintain this position, in light of my own three theories about what this episode is going to be about. I do not think that my theories are of tin-hat-conspiracy quality. Professionally, I believe in organic and deeply human writing and storytelling, (I can’t help it, I am classically trained and hold degrees in writing and literature), and I try to maintain this standard in my theorizing. I will discuss what my theories will be about, what this means for her overall character “growth” or “development,” and what this means for the direction of these new DLC from a writer’s standpoint.

TL;DR: Luna is going to get seriously retconned, and this is the only way for the writers to pitch a meaningful story to tell about her.

1) Ghost Luna

I wanted to get this one out of the way because it is the most far-fetched, yet the easiest to tackle from a technical development standpoint (because they do not have to write an alternate reality where she lived, which takes more resources). The statement that her fate is something that “not even death can free her from” really bothers me here. What is the reason to include this statement in the episode description? Ravus goes as far as to mention this in Episode Ignis. Does this mean we are going to play Ghost Luna? How is that going to play out exactly, what are the game mechanics? Are we going to fight pre-demons in the Astral plane? How does this mesh with her ghostly appearances?

Keep in mind that her ghostly appearances have already been retconned in Royal Edition, although there is no indication as to what the limits of her appearances are. Before, it seemed like her appearance was unnatural, hence why she disappears so quickly. In Royal Edition, we suddenly have a talking ghost with magical powers, and no discernible reason why she would disappear then.

Then there is the story arc in this option. A ghost, by normal folkloric standards, will continue to have ties to the earthly realm because of deep-seated regrets, or unfinished business. If she has unfinished business as an Oracle in death (and has the power to make shit happen) then.... why didn’t she do anything for the 10+ years that Noctis was asleep? If she regretted leading Noctis like a lamb to a slaughter, why support him in Royal Edition? All of these options would mean a serious retconning of her by illogical standards.

Now let’s discuss two more believable options...

2) This is a story about her activities during the events of Final Fantasy XV

In other words, this is going to be about what she is doing during the base game. I have already discussed in my previous post that there isn’t much of a story to tell in this aspect, which means that this would require some serious retconning, in light of this sentence: “Her battle to save the one she loves overturns the destiny dealt to the Lucian king.” This statement REALLY bothers me.

First of all, we do not see her make any action to save Noctis from his fate in the game. His fate was to die. She didn’t do anything to thwart this, and IF ANYTHING, egged him on in Royal Edition. This is also emphasized by the fact that she knew he was going to die (I mean really, her crying about never seeing him again, Gentiana talking to her about how Regis cried over the fate of his son, Pryna carrying the prophecy of him dying, etc.). She knew, and she lead him to slaughter anyway (that is not love, btw).

So what does it mean that she wants to save the one she loves, and this overturns his fate/destiny? If we are to keep the canon of the original game, and if this takes place during the same timeline as the game, then this means that she didn’t know he was going to die and has decided to do things behind the scenes that we didn’t know about to stop his fate. Which would be the most bullshit retcon on this list (SINCE SHE KNEW) and quite defiant of the logical understanding of her character and her role in the game. This leads me to discuss some of my intuitive (and possibly my most tin-hat) thoughts about her character development, and how she was built the way she is (from a writer’s perspective). This is where I will strongly criticize the approach that Hajime Tabata has taken with her.

I do believe that Tabata is very sensitive about criticism over Luna. It’s why all of the recent additions and changes to her address her most vocal critics. One of the most vocal criticisms is that she and Noctis are not in love, so he has to hammer away at a dead horse to the point of obnoxiousness (such as giving her the cover of Royal Edition, the repetition and literal spelling-out of her love for Noctis, the update of her train scene with Noctis where Tabata felt the need to make it more dramatic, naming songs attributed to NoctxLuna like “Lost Love,” “True Love,” and “Moonlit Melodies,” etc.), and his marketing decisions that suggest this major role that she does not have in the game (Luna edition of the PS4, song lyrics that mention her, her strong appearance in most official art, Luna edition of the NVIDIA harddrive, and on and on and on...). It’s almost as if her PR is what emphasizes of her importance in the story, because the actual story does a shit job of doing it. Another common criticism of her is that she is evil for leading Noctis to his death without telling him. Keep in mind that Luna is essentially designed to be perfect and free from criticism. Tabata tries to legitimize this by making everyone in the world either adore her, or hold her in high regard. This is not a creator that understands human complexity, and the way he keeps throwing her in our faces and plastering her in all of the advertising, especially in Royal Edition, when she had four minutes of screen time, and when she is still inconsequential, is an ego trip on his part. A writer/creator/director is not supposed to do that. Furthermore, the fact that he felt the need to spell out her love for Noctis is insulting to the player - yes, we can tell that she loves him, we aren’t dumb. Spelling it out doesn’t validate their love or convince critics that it’s real.

I do not think, therefore, that he can tolerate such criticism over her and her relationship to Noctis. Which is another problem with this retcon: if she still knew that Noctis was going to die in this story arc, and decides to save him from it, then she ultimately makes a giant turnaround against her religious indoctrination and defies the gods, which is in strict contrast to what we know of her.

I mean, we are talking about a character who is so involved with her religious indoctrination that she gives a speech to a public, telling them directly that the gods are watching over them, minutes before she wakes one up and it destroys the city and subsequently kills a bunch of people. We are talking about a character whose religious indoctrination is so important to her, that this is THE ONLY THING SHE TALKS TO NOCTIS ABOUT - as children, in her death scene, and in their new reunion. Despite the Astrals’ abuse of the people, she still has delusional blind faith in their protection anyway and in spite of obvious evidence to the contrary, so it doesn’t make sense for her to defy them.

I also think that the development team does not have the resources to address the quagmire that is the Astrals, which is why they have already been retconned. Attributing all of the ills of the world to the Astrals, and blaming them for the Starscourge (being that their falling out was thought to be the cause of it) cannot be an acceptable criticism, because then it means that the development team would have to explain why Noctis would decide to die for them when he was commanded to. They don’t have a good reason for this if the Astrals are depicted as the cause of the whole problem. So the blame was shifted to Ardyn in the 1.16 patch, and Ifrit became more of a sympathetic figure.

And here is where I touch upon another flaw in her overall character design that I did not touch upon in my previous post. Blaming the gods for the Starscourge also puts blame on Luna for having faith in such abusive figures, which is also unacceptable because she is designed to be perfect. It is not acceptable to question Luna’s beliefs because the game paints her to be a character that is righteous about everything that is happening around her, and she has to be correct about the prophecies (and Florence + the Machine’s song “Too Much is Never Enough” hammers this away by saying that Luna is “right” for doing what she did). Nyx is the only character to criticize her and Regis, and she “corrects” him by implying that the countless sacrifices made in Insomnia are needed for the good of the world. The concept, then, that she will defy the gods is very strange. Ravus defies her beliefs, and look what happened to him. The Glaives in Comrades defied the gods by abandoning their king, and are called heretics or the like in need of redemption. You don’t defy the gods, which means that Luna, as their official bitch spokesperson, cannot be wrong. In other words, Luna defying the gods in the canonicity of the original story can’t happen without it being a terrible contradiction.

Which leads me to...

3) This is an alternate reality where Luna is the most retconned

By alternate reality, I can mean different things. She either lives in Altissia, or she makes different choices by defying the gods altogether and not go down the same path that she did in the game (although, defying the gods in this alternate timeline will then open its own can of worms that will have fans debating about their use and purpose in the original...).

This is arguably the easiest way to make her consequential to the plot (for more on her lack of importance to the story of Final Fantasy XV, please read ooc-but-stylish’s post on her plot progression, which is much more eloquent than I can ever hope to be). It is interesting here how her DLC is titled “The Choice of Freedom,” another sensitivity to the criticism that Luna had no actual choice in the game because she behaved as a pawn to the gods, and just kind of did whatever the plot told her to. I address her lack of choice in my previous post, as well as ooc-but-stylish.

I do believe this is also a reaction to fans’ desire for her to be selfish (which is strange - it is already selfish of her to not tell Noctis anything, which she had many chances to do so because they shared a notebook). People were expecting her and Noctis to defy their fates because they were unfair, and find another way to bring light back into the world. If the option to defy the gods is what fans want though, then they are asking for a retcon. I have discussed the possibility of putting Luna in a catch-22 in my post, where she is changed beyond what is already understood of her.

This kind of suggests that if we were to make her consequential to the plot, and take action that would seriously change the events of Final Fantasy XV, then this means that she will be changed to the point where we stop recognizing her as the Luna we know, and change into a completely different Luna (and not in the organic-character-development-way).

Looking back on my previous post, I realize that Kingsglaive Luna was very reckless and suicidal, which makes no sense in comparison to Game Luna, who is concerned about completing her role as Oracle (nor does it make sense... how does losing Regis and Insomnia mean that she lost everything if she knew that Noctis had already left? If she died being so reckless, wouldn’t that mean that she can’t do her duty?). Anyway, I am trying to say that if she changed that much, and being that she will continue to change so much, we will certainly have a third Luna in our hands, as opposed to a character learning throughout her journey and making changes to her own priorities.

I said in my previous post that it is not possible to develop Luna for proper character development, and I do believe that this option is the only way to attempt this. This doesn’t help her apparent uselessness, however - if she is still inconsequential to the original plot of FFXV, then this retcon does not justify it, nor will it fix her. 

This option also supports the concept of coming close to a grand finale that supports an idealized ending for the characters, although it will take the most work. This option would therefore be the build-up to the payoff that will then become Episode Noctis (meaning, Episode Luna is going to put all of the alternate new plot into place that Episode Noctis will solve).

So then, here are the common themes that address all three options...

Her relationship with Noctis will still need some serious work, and spelling it out isn’t good enough. There’s a good reason why there are so many Nyx and Luna shippers out there - it is because they have what fans interpret to be sexual tension between them, and they collaborate with each other. I have already discussed in my previous post why a relationship between her and Noctis will not add to her development because it isn’t possible to develop her based on her character arc. At the same time, I do not believe that putting more time and effort into building their relationship will make much difference, because then it continues to repeat certain things that we already know: one, that she is obsessive over Noctis, and two, that she cannot exist outside of Noctis. The former means that her relationship with Noctis is toxic and abusive: rsasai has an amazing post about why this relationship is psychologically damaging, and making them more romantic is not going to change this. I do not believe that the writers will have the resources to address their most pertinent problems, either. 

And shall I repeat that she cannot exist outside of Noctis? Holy shit, every single official description of her is tied to Noctis, from game manuals, to the official website, to the movie description, to the Ultimania. The idea that Episode Luna is therefore necessary to her character development is a bit too optimistic in my opinion, considering that it is truly going to be about Noctis anyway.

Furthermore, fans are optimistic because Terada will be directing these new DLC. This is fair, and yet, unfair. Yes, Episode Ignis was amazing. However, I cannot attribute writing credits to Terada’s involvement because Ignis’ story arc was already decided before Episode Ignis went into production - it has to be, in order to start the actual pre-development process. What can be attributed to Terada is the alternate ending... which most of us can agree has a serious degradation of writing quality in comparison to the main storyline, and seems like it was rushed.

I also have to emphasize that I personally believe that Episode Luna, and therefore, Episode Noctis, are going to be the alternate reality that the developers are alluding to. Which means that my initial post about her being un-fixable, and having no story to tell, is essentially on point. They didn’t have a story to elaborate about her in the canonical storyline, so they were forced to write up an alternate ending in order to make sense of her character and bring in some development. When you contrast these two vague episode descriptions with the detailed ones of Episode Ardyn (yay!) and Episode Aranea (as long as Ravus is in it, I’m good - but no, seriously, what is lacking in Ravus’ development is knowing what exactly his relationship was with the empire), then it really pushes my belief that Luna and Noctis will be the alternate reality.

All in all, she is still a mess, and retconning her like this will not decrease her controversial standing in the fandom.

Sorry but why the hell are we still arguing about ffxv relationships? If you love noctluna/lunoct and don't like OT4 or lunyx, etc., why do you go into those tags? And why, if you like OT4, etc., why are you going into their tags? If you flame against any pairing, you're an anti but why the hell cant you just let someone enjoy their pairing? Say something nice about it or don't say a fucking thing, yeah?

lol thought you said you tried to like nyx but couldnt, and you even have reblogged posts from an anti lunoct blog and pro lunyx, curious

What’s this? Detective anon digging up the dirt?