Yuffie Kisaragi

Yuffie Kisaragi (ユフィ・キサラギ) is a fictional character from Square Enix's Final Fantasy series. Designed by Tetsuya Nomura, she was first introduced in the 1997 role-playing video game Final Fantasy VII as a young female ninja princess and thief. She can become one of the game's player characters after finishing a special sidequest. Yuffie reappears in the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII series, expanding her background and showing her after the events of the original game.

Yuffie has also been featured in other Square Enix games, most notably the Kingdom Hearts crossover series, voiced by Yumi Kakazu in the Japanese versions of the games. In the English versions, Christy Carlson Romano provides her voice for Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, and later by Mae Whitman for Kingdom Hearts II and Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII.

The character has achieved a high level of popularity in Japan, but the English language media reception has been more mixed.

Final Fantasy VII
One of two secret characters in Final Fantasy VII, Yuffie is a 16-year-old ninja (her martial arts style is called "Ninjyutu" ) and a thief who wields an oversized shuriken. A fiercely patriotic daughter of Godo Kisaragi (ゴドー・キサラギ), the leader of Wutai (ウータイ), a culture based on real-world East Asia, Yuffie feels her country has lost its former glory and become nothing more than a resort town. After losing the war against Shinra Electric Power Company, Godo began to turn Wutai into a tourist attraction. This did not suit Yuffie, who began running off, stealing the magical Materia from unaware travelers in hope to someday become strong enough to change this situation. Sneaky and arrogant, Yuffie has a tomboyish and charismatic personality and obsessively steals and collects Materia. She also tends to be short-tempered and is prone to motion sickness. Gameplay-wise, Yuffie possesses the special ability "Throw", enabling her to thrown almost any item from the player’s inventory at enemies during combat.

Yuffie is introduced when she ambushes the protagonist Cloud Strife and his allies in a Wutai forest, appearing as "Mystery Ninja". If the player defeats her in combat and then chooses the correct series of dialogue choices, she introduces herself and joins the player's party as one of player characters. However, once in Wutai Village, Yuffie steals the party's Materia and hides, but is kidnapped by a Midgar crime lord, the lecherous Don Corneo. When the group rescues Yuffie, she returns the stolen Materia and continues working with the party. In another sidequest, she proves herself by fighting the bosses of Wutai's five story pagoda, the last of these battles against Godo. These fights, and the sequence of conversations following, enable both father and daughter to understand the other's actions and to come to a mutual respect. At Godo's request, Cloud officially takes Yuffie (who obtains her level 4 Limit Break, called "All Creation" ) with him on his quest.

Compilation of Final Fantasy VII
In the 2005 computer animated film Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, Yuffie reunites with her Final Fantasy VII allies to fight against the summon creature Bahamut SIN. In the On the Way to a Smile novella "Case of Yuffie", which is set between the end of Final Fantasy VII and the beginning of Advent Children, the disease Geostigma spreads to Wutai, and Yuffie sets out to find a cure.

In the 2004 action role-playing game Before Crisis: Final Fantasy VII, set six years before Final Fantasy VII, Yuffie encounters Shinra's agents called the Turks in Wutai and unknowingly works with them against the eco-terrorist group AVALANCHE. In the 2006 third-person shooter Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII, set one year before Advent Children, Yuffie leaves home and joins the World Regenesis Organization, where she is placed in charge of espionage and intelligence gathering; Yuffie infiltrates Mako Reactor Zero deep within the ruins of Midgar and shuts it off when the ex-Turk Vincent Valentine defeats the Shinra remnant Deepground. The nine-year-old Yuffie also makes brief appearances in the 2007 prequel action role-playing game Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, where she fights against Shinra following their invasion and takeover of Wutai; after meeting Zack Fair, she enlists his help to find treasures in several side missions.

Other appearances
Outside the Final Fantasy series, Yuffie has also been featured in the Kingdom Hearts series. In the first Kingdom Hearts, a younger Yuffie acts as a supporting character in Traverse Town, helping to defeat the Heartless who had destroyed her world. Yuffie's appearance in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories is a projection from Sora's memories in Traverse Town. In Kingdom Hearts II, she aids Leon and the others as part of the Hollow Bastion Restoration Committee, this time appearing in her Advent Children attire. In both Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II, Yuffie is additionally featured as an opponent in the Olympus Coliseum, while Kingdom Hearts coded features a virtual simulation of Yuffie. She also appears in the manga adaptations of Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts II and Chain of Memories published by Gangan Comics and Tokyopop.

Yuffie is an unlockable playable character in the PlayStation version of the fighting game Ehrgeiz: God Bless the Ring, appearing alongside other characters from Final Fantasy VII. She is also one of the playable characters in the board video game Itadaki Street Portable for the PSP, in a chibi-style design that is similar to her model during the exploration gameplay mode of Final Fantasy VII. In addition, Yuffie makes a cameo appearance in the 2008 action role-playing/fighting game Dissidia Final Fantasy, as a tutor of the in-game manuals; in this game she also has an unlockable friend card.

Creation and development
During early development of Final Fantasy VII, Yuffie was envisioned as a 25-year-old ex-SOLDIER now working as a bounty hunter, seeking both the game's protagonist Cloud Strife and its antagonist Sephiroth, while also having a bounty on her own head. Her job class was originally listed as "ninja (assassin)" and she was intended to be a daughter of the long-deceased Kasumi Kisaragi. The Wutai sidequest present in the final incarnation of the game was significantly different. Her age and description was different for each of the several wanted posters; what Yuffie looks like, as her level, is determined on the last wanted poster viewed. She would also encounter the party in a random encounter, or attack Cloud when he is sleeping in an inn. The Wutai scenario required Yuffie to be recruited to complete it.

During later development of the game, the Final Fantasy VII team thought about removing both Yuffie and Vincent Valentine due to time limitations, but both were made as hidden characters. Having a close attachment to Yuffie's character, Final Fantasy VII event planner Jun Akiyama was responsible for the large number of cutscenes featuring her and her actions during fights. Mae Whitman, who voiced Yuffie in the English versions of Kingdom Hearts II and Dirge of Cerberus, said she was not "aware of the extent to which people were familiar with her character already." In a 2012 interview, Whitman recalled Yuffie as "bubbly and bright and nice. But still super cool!"

Merchandise
Two large Yuffie action figures were released by Square Enix as part of the Final Fantasy VII Play Arts Vol. 2 series in 2008 (in her original game attire), and Final Fantasy VII Movie Advent Children Series 2 in 2009 (in her film attire). Other merchandise include a small super deformed figurine version as she appears in Itadaki Street Portable, from 2009's Final Fantasy Trading Arts Mini Vol. 4, a 1997 plush doll and a keyholder figurine by Banpresto,  a 2001 garage kit figure by Kotobukiya, and a wallscroll poster in Final Fantasy Poster Vol. 5.  Her theme music in Final Fantasy VII, "Descendant of Shinobi", is included in a vocal form on the album Final Fantasy Song Book: Mahoroba as "Walking in the Road, After the Rain" by Nobuo Uematsu and Yuji Hasegawa.

Reception
Yuffie Kisaragi has received a positive reception in Japan, having placed as the 42nd best PlayStation character in the 2007 "Den-Play Awards" by Dengeki PlayStation. In 2010, readers of the Japanese magazine Famitsu voted her as the 48th best video game character of all time. According to Edge, Yuffie, being one of characters that are "are brands in and of themselves", "created a new anime stereotype -- the, uh, giddy girl ninja."

David Smith from IGN ranked Yuffie seventh on the 2008 list of top ten Final Fantasy VII characters, stating that she "belongs in the Wacky Sidekicks wing of the RPG hall of fame." Although commenting that Yuffie can sometimes be "a pain in the neck," Smith said that she became such an appealing sidekick character that Square would go on to use the "Yuffie formula" with Rikku from Final Fantasy X. In 2012, Becky Cunningham of Cheat Code Central ranked her as the fourth top ninja in video games, stating that despite her "cocky, brash, and slightly abrasive personality," Yuffie is "also a compassionate person with an impressive goal," serving "as both comic relief and unlikely hero, a seemingly self-centered sneak thief who always does the right thing in the end." UGO.com featured her in the 2011 list of 25 most sexy ninja girls in all media for her appearance in Advent Children, adding "that third-dimension certainly adds something." In his review for Advent Children, James Mielke of 1UP.com called her "as cutely jailbait as ever."

However, some of the reception was more negative. In her character profile, IGN wrote called her "both impressively useful and incredibly annoying." In 2010, Scott Sharkey of 1UP.com placed her in the category "The Perky Idiot" alongside Rikku and Selphie while discussing the top five character types in the Final Fantasy series. That same year, GamesRadar's Mikel Reparaz included the appearance of Yuffie among the other Final Fantasy VII characters in Ehrgeiz on the list of the 55 best character cameos in video game history, but called her "hyper-annoying". Adam Thomas of Ranker called her "sort of a Final Fantasy Jar Jar Binks, but she's a cute teenage girl so people give her a pass," and blamed her for paving the way for Rikku, Final Fantasy VIIIs Selphie and, especially, Final Fantasy XIIIs Vanille. Joe Juba of Game Informer included her among "Final Fantasy's particular breed of annoying female companions, like Selphie and Vaan".