Character Spotlight: Vivi

[Unstoppable Pig]

Since EoFF IX has started I think its time to make another CS for IX characters. This time I chose one of my favorites and probably many others favorite mage, Vivi.

I always feel so bad for Vivi. He gets all sort of crap on him but still he manages to stay sane. Even his best friend Puck is sort of jerk.

Vivi is definately one of greatest things IX has to offer, he could have been great main character but I guess main guy always has to be heavy hitter.

[Depression Moon]

Vivi is a great character. He's a representation of the game world and our world. His struggle, his issues are something that most people can relate to. A great character gameplay wise and also story wise. It's just too bad That he met the fate that he did.

[charliepanayi]

One of my favourite characters in the series, his coming to terms with his own origins and then his own mortality in FFIX is one of the best parts of the game. Any scene at the graveyard in the Black Mage Village always moves me somewhat.

[Edgar]

I always liked scenes where Vivi is determined to find out about the truth of his life, and to discover his own destiny. He struggled a hell lot, seeing his own kind being used, die, and retreat into their own forest. He dealt with the truth of himself going to 'stop' anytime pretty well and he grew from a pessimist to an optimist.

It's great that he has a good friend like Zidane to talk to, but this is a Vivi thread, so I'd not delve into it :P

[MJN SEIFER]

I found Vivi to be a likable character is an enjoyable game - plus he's usually pretty effective in fights if he has the right spells.

By the way, since we're on the sunject of Vivi; his name is not based on the roman numurals for 66 (which isn't even "VIVI" anyway) - just incase anyone still thought it was.

[qwertysaur]

:vivi: + :quina: = :love: :bigsmile:

[leader of mortals]

:vivi: + :quina: = :love: :bigsmile:

This man speaks the truth

[MJN SEIFER]

I once read a somewhat over reaching statement, that Vivi is named after the FInal Fantasy series, that's probably wrong, but even that makes more sense than the 66 thing.

I also read that "Vivi" means "Life" - if that's true it's probably the most likeley.

[Old Manus]

Vivi was an interesting concept done very badly. They tried to use him as a vehicle for whatever existential message they were pumping, but ended up turning him into this wristslitting emo kid who did nothing but whinge and moan about not being real or some :bou::bou::bou::bou: for the majority of the first half of the game. The dialogue in the Gizamaluke's Grotto and Burmecia segments just make me want to give him a slap.

[charliepanayi]

Vivi was an interesting concept done very badly. They tried to use him as a vehicle for whatever existential message they were pumping, but ended up turning him into this wristslitting emo kid who did nothing but whinge and moan about not being real or some :bou::bou::bou::bou: for the majority of the first half of the game. The dialogue in the Gizamaluke's Grotto and Burmecia segments just make me want to give him a slap.

Vivi, wristslitting emo kid? I must respectfully disagree. Actually I just plain disagree as I think that's a load of nonsense. the 'emo' term (usually a vague term anyway) is used way too easily for many FF characters (Cloud and Squall especially). Most of them are not emo, and Vivi certainly isn't. There's a big difference between being introspective and being emo. Vivi's journey through the game to finding out his origins and coming to terms with his mortality is one of the best parts of FFIX, and one of the reasons why he's one of the best characters in any FF game. And presumably this emo Vivi is the same one who throughout the game never shirks what he has to do but always stands up and fights. If these are your standards for defining self-pity and someone being annoying, you have absurdly high standards.

[MJN SEIFER]

One of these days this site will learn what emo is...

[jammi567]

Emo - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emo)

[Fynn]

I once read a somewhat over reaching statement, that Vivi is named after the FInal Fantasy series, that's probably wrong, but even that makes more sense than the 66 thing.

I also read that "Vivi" means "Life" - if that's true it's probably the most likeley.

Actually, to be precise, "vivi" means "I lived", which is pretty fitting, actually.

[MJN SEIFER]

I once read a somewhat over reaching statement, that Vivi is named after the FInal Fantasy series, that's probably wrong, but even that makes more sense than the 66 thing.

I also read that "Vivi" means "Life" - if that's true it's probably the most likeley.

Actually, to be precise, "vivi" means "I lived", which is pretty fitting, actually.

Got it. Thanks.

You know, although it's wrong, I still smiled when I read the Final Fantasy one - over reaching as it was.

[Flying Arrow]

Since EoFF IX has started I think its time to make another CS for IX characters. This time I chose one of my favorites and probably many others favorite mage, Vivi.

I always feel so bad for Vivi. He gets all sort of crap on him but still he manages to stay sane. Even his best friend Puck is sort of jerk.

Vivi is definately one of greatest things IX has to offer, he could have been great main character but I guess main guy always has to be heavy hitter.

If IX's narrative focused on Vivi's story as the main thread, I'd say (and mean it) that the game would be the best Square ever put story-wise.

Of course, this would have depended on whether or not Square would have had the stones to not pull any punches with the little guy's ending.

[Wolf Kanno]

Vivi is probably one of my favorite characters in the series and I really loved his story and what he brought to IX. My only problem with Vivi is that I never felt he got a proper resolution to his problems. He sorta just accepts what's happening off screen after getting caught up with the Black Mages returning to Kuja and then he's sorta cast into the background until the writers decided to screw his story over a second time by killing him off screen.

I guess I felt he needed to have an actual epiphany and the one I'm guessing the game tried to give me didn't give me a satisfactory answer. I kinda feel the writers tried to cover up his story towards the end cause it was getting too deep and they were afraid they may lose their audience.I wasn't looking for Vivi to come to some answer cause their really is no answer to his problems but at the same time I never felt like Vivi reached some ill defined purpose to believe in that he can use to help find an answer. He just sorta was left off in total confusion about what to with his situation.

[Shiny]

Vivi was the first FF character I liked. Who couldn't love that lovely black mass of nothingness? Well, apparently Old Manus.

[scrumpleberry]

Actually, I'm on Manus's side. As far as I'm concerned, he is one of the most overrated Final Fantasy characters ever. "Vivi's journey through the game to finding out his origins and coming to terms with his mortality" is very poorly written. I feel like he doesn't get anywhere. His adventure with his mortality and trying to fit in is predictable and dull. Most of his sequences and dialogue are dull and excruciatingly drawn out. He doesn't add anything to the overarching message of the game. As a character, I think he's an ill-fitting and hastily written device who really doesn't fit in the narrative, and trying to double it up with making him a ~CUTE AND SHY AND INNOCENT LITTLE BOYYYY LEARNING ABOUT HOW TO SURVIVE IN THE WORLD just multiplied his irritating factor. The incredibly low sense of self-worth they injected him with to try and make his personal battle seem even more tragic and struggly just made it feel like trying to find any development with the character was like waaaading through tarrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Seriously, I get that his life is tough and situation is tragic and that what he's trying to come to terms with is like, woah, totally deep man - but I couldn't empathise with him because he was not anything new, he did not bring any interesting or fresh concepts to the board, which as the PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN NATURE CHARACTER it was his job to do. Poorly, sloppily executed.

However he will always be on my team with Steiner for kicking ass :bigsmile: He is so invaluble in battle.

[charliepanayi]

*Wrongness meter is going haywire!*

So which character(s) in games or otherwise do execute this idea well then? I'm getting the impression that however Vivi had turned out you wouldn't have been satisfied.

And 'ill fitting'? 'hastily written'? Sorry I don't see that at all, Vivi and his character arc is an intrinsic part of the game, it clearly hasn't been dropped in there as an afterthought.

There are some aspects of FF that I love but I understand why others don't (Quina in FFIX, pretty much anything to do with FFVIII) - but Vivi, I don't understand how anyone could actively dislike the character.

[Old Manus]

never shirks what he has to do but always stands up and fights.Unfortunately not. The first Prison Cage fight? The whole thing in Dali?

[Quindiana Jones]

Those examples being the situations that he learned from to become the little kid that never shirks what he has to do but always stands up and fights. Well done for finding the bits from the first few hours of the game, though. It wouldn't be called character development if the character was the same at the beginning of the game as he was at the end.

[Old Manus]

Yeah he stops being so annoying after the first disc.

[bigguy]

I love Vivi; he's probably my 2nd favorite character in the entire series. You'd think I'd grow out of it, but every time he falls flat on his face I laugh a little bit.

That being said, I do think that they did a poor job of wrapping up his story. My main interest in the game was to find out what's going on with Vivi's story, and what happens to all the black mages in the end, but they didn't really cover it much at the end of the game. :|

[Rantz]

I think Wolf Kanno kinda hit the nail on the head regarding my main problem with Vivi. He's not my favourite character in the game, but he's nonetheless lovable and a more than worthy inclusion in the cast as his inquisitive nature sets focus on issues otherwise usually left alone.

[Roogle]

I liked Vivi more than most of the cast. I think that a lot of people might feel the same way, so that when you think of Final Fantasy IX, you'll think of Zidane, Garnet, and Vivi since most of the other characters are more bland like Amarant and Quina. Vivi had a pretty intense background story that encompassed the whole game — whether it was well-written or not — and followed through to the ending.

[Goldenboko]

I once read a somewhat over reaching statement, that Vivi is named after the FInal Fantasy series, that's probably wrong, but even that makes more sense than the 66 thing.

I also read that "Vivi" means "Life" - if that's true it's probably the most likeley.

Actually, to be precise, "vivi" means "I lived", which is pretty fitting, actually.

Oh Latin :heart: