Yes, character deaths. These all happen with the plotline of a JRPG, whether it's a playable character, non-playable ally, or villain that you feel glad for defeating, someone is liable to die. This Top 10 list will count down the greatest JRPG deaths of all time, the ones I think are the greatest. These deaths were graded on the overall impact that they have when they occurred, and are not necessary tragic sometimes. But these deaths and their circumstances are surely memorable. Also one death per game. Major spoilers ahead for these games of course.
10. Bolt - Thousand Arms
You know that some deaths are tragic. You know some deaths were quite deserving for the characters that obviously got it coming. Bolt in Thousand Arms grabs the #10 spot due to how hilarious it is.
Picture this. It's the 2010s. Things have been happening in reality where people often get offended by words and just explode in a fury of anger and triggered bile. Now rewind back to when Thousand Arms was released. You confront Bolt, the first of the five gear theme-named henchmen of the evil emperor of the game and fight him out. But even before that, you see a fantastic weakness in him. He hates big words. In other words, words that are big and not in most everyone's English vocabulary. Now go to the actual fight with the guy. After its done, he starts spewing out these words unknowningly. Then he gets so offended from his own words he actually explodes. It's absolutely hilarious, and a nice allegory of how people "explode" when they get triggered in the modern days.
9. Ghaleon - Lunar 2
It's worth noting that Ghaleon is pretty much a card-carrying villain. He's the guy from Lunar 1 who's an amazingly overpowered mage, only to betray Alex, enslave the power of the White Dragon, and kidnap Luna, driving him to save his girl. There's nothing else you can think of Ghaleon apart from being said girl-napper and dragon-killer. Well, you do see his backstory which is told by Laike later on.
In Lunar 2, the distant sequel of the first game, we see Ghaleon has apparently been resurrected by a greater evil, Zophar, for his own plans. Ghaleon appears next to (a fake) Althena as her champion, and the current Dragonmaster in the game. He's just as overpowering in this game, easily defeating Hiro and his friends when he gets involved in a fight. Yet here's the thing. Ghaleon's actually helping these guys, secretly of course. He's an anti-hero in this game through and through. Despite Zophar could easily remove his life, he shows that he's toughening up Hiro and his group to defeat Zophar. Upon the party actually managing to beat Ghaleon, he now knows that he has given them the strength to win, and even lends Hiro his sword. When he's finally alone, he talks to the skies towards Dyne, whom you know no doubt he used to be friends with, before finally fading away. It's certainly good to know that even the bad ones help out the good people without them knowing.
8. Ray - Breath of Fire 2
Breath of Fire 2 is already a very sad game on its own. The entire Evrai arc of the game is the single saddest part of it. We see the crazed church fanatics cheering on the lynching of Claris, who is killed along with Tiga who's futile attempt to rescue her only did marginal. We see that Daisy, despite being a bitch of a mother to her own son up until that point, decide to actually give her life to save her son in one of the sadder moments. And if the player isn't careful, Ryu may not realize that he ends up murdering his own father, who of course got tied to a machine.
But Ray? Ray's just some friendly guy you meet who helps you deal with a few enemies in a sewer to save some villagers being possessed by parasites. Is this guy enticing? Not really. But then you see that Ray is connected to the Evrai church in a way. He's one of those characters, fighting for the side he believes in, whether or not it's right or wrong. In Ray's case, during the battle with him, you will then come to the conclusion that he realizes that the Evrai church is in fact wrong. Well, you established that fact already seeing as to what happened with Tiga and Claris. The way Ray pays you back is with one powerful attack, which actually grants Ryu his final dragon form, which immediately will end the battle when used.
It's quite sad, as Ray decided at the last minute to help the friends he used to work with so long ago. And he couldn't do it any other time due to his own circumstances of being tied with a much more vile party. It's a tear-jerking send-off to a fierce friend that the player makes.
7. Crono - Chrono Trigger
Ah, this one is one people certainly know. Despite the fact he's the silent protagonist, and also the one who's default namesake resembles the title of the game, which actually is a key item involving him, Crono does die in this game, giving it all against the one-and-only Lavos.
It's a death that probably could've been prevented, and one that could potentially seem like a stupid sacrifice, but it's memorable enough to belong here due to Crono being the main hero, the one who never would leave the party. What happens afterwards is a very remarkable change of pace, and that's what puts this on here. You can choose to revive Crono, which most players actually do, but after his death is where the game just opens up completely. You've got a ton of quests that can be done, with the largest one of course involving the steps to his revival. But before that the game was pretty linear despite all the timeskips you do in them. Here, said death was not only one of the most memorable deaths because the player loses the hero, but a whole lot of stuff can be done after it and it's quite worthwhile to check everything out.
6. Teo - Suikoden
The Soul Eater in Suikoden 1 consumes the souls of the people closest to the bearer. Though in Suikoden 1, that really doesn't entail a whole lot. Unlike, say, Suikoden 4's Rune of Punishment, we don't actually see the rune having any major adverse effects on Tir McDohl apart from him using it in a few circumstances in the storyline. And it certainly doesn't actually consume the living souls of those directly around him. But it does take in four dead souls to power up the rune's main abilities. One of those souls is Teo.
It's definitely hard for me to pick which of the four dead souls that power up the Soul Eater is the most tragic death. I decided that Teo is the most memorable for several reasons. For one, Teo is Tir's father, as has been established at the very beginning of the game. Second, he's a Scarlet Moon general, one of the Five Great Generals in fact, so he has a major status. Third, his own son, due to the circumstances involving the Soul Eater, finds himself as the leader of the Liberation Army, the freedom fighters fighting the Scarlet Moon Empire. This of course brings us to the eventual conflict between father and son. The final aftermath does involve the son winning a duel against the father, but because of this, he's on the verge of death. Teo's actually happy about his son, how he has managed to surpass his father, the way most sons should follow in their father's footsteps. Teo's simply on the other side of the war fighting for it, and lends his lieutenants to serve under his son as a final farewell.
5. Maxim & Selan - Lufia II
It sucks that Lufia 1 shows us the end of Lufia 2. As cool as it is for most of us to play overpowered heroes against the main villains, watching cutscene powers take over which results in the death of one of these heroes (Selan) would be quite enough to shed a tear. Of course, because of this death, we watch as Maxim stays behind as the Fortress of Doom falls, meaning he perishes as well while Artea and Guy escape.
These two deaths don't really become sad until you play Lufia 2. All the way through. Given that the main character is none other than Maxim, you watch as he gets to know the environment he inhabits and meets his friends along the way. Selan is one of those, an experienced general who is said to be really skilled. Like any woman though, she's got a soft side, crying in joy after Maxim gets back from defeating Gades the first time. Said joy eventually ends up in an actual marriage between the two, both having a happy year and actually bearing a child named Jeros. Then when disaster happens it's pretty obvious that the fighting couple is back into the actual plot of the rise of the Sinistrals, continuing all the way until their final moment. It's really sad in this game due to actually experiencing the adventure these two embarked on all the way to the very end.
4. Mami - Breath of Fire 4
This was a real hard one to get. I was torn between this one and Elina's death, which involved Cray mercy killing her due to her apparent abominable status. But I settled with Mami's death due to how some people may have missed the memo for it and for how it impacts the other main protagonist.
Mami's not really anything too special. She's a random country girl in a town who happens to stumble upon a wounded Fou-lu, which is that said protagonist I mentioned. He's taken into her company and sort of just given a home. Basically speaking, she's a good samaritan, completely unaware that Fou-lu was of some status that his own empire wants, and ends up giving herself up. This has some extreme consequences when Lord Una actually decides to use her against Fou-lu, by having her as ammunition pointed straight at the guy. When Fou is hit, he sees the bells, the same ones Mami wore, and this causes him to outright snap and hate all of humanity because of this. She was basically the last floodgate keeping the dragon god sane and not outright villainous to everyone, and due to the circumstances, he's now a full-fledged villain. It's more blatant in the manga for Breath of Fire 4, which unfortunately no one really looked at.
3. Alicia - Live-A-Live
The antagonists of Breath of Fire 4 and Live-A-Live are a lot alike. They were both characters the player would have experience working with. They both had to go through a hell of a lot of hardships. There was one character that was really that last hope for them. In the case of Oersted, that was Alicia.
The reason this death ranks over Mami was because this was Oersted's one goal in his one quest. This was what he was fighting for, and after being exiled for being a demon, it was his only hope left. He was quite the knight in his heyday, winning the tournament and the right to marry Alicia, who of course gets kidnapped. As I said in my look back at Live-A-Live, the cliche plot gets completely deconstructed, when Oersted actually kills the king in an illusion, making everyone hate him. He finds and fights Straybow, his former friend, and then it happens. Alicia decides that she loved Straybow more because of the pains of not being the winner all the time, or something like that, and commits suicide right in front of Oersted. You watch this, and then you see Oersted declaring himself as the demon king in the way that it makes perfect sense why he would become a demon. All because of her. In fact, it's so bad, that when you fight his last incarnation, one of his attacks, Saint Alicia, shows a woman who's visage goes horrifying, implied to be how Oersted sees Alicia now.
2. Galuf - Final Fantasy 5
I value character development a lot. Unfortunately none of those characters in Final Fantasy V proved to be really interesting at all. Bartz is really just an adventurer. Faris is a cross-dressing pirate and a secret princess. Both Lenna and Cara/Krile are princesses in their own right. Galuf? Well he's an amnesiac hero. You've probably seen such heroes. Also he's the oldest of the group as well.
Still though, it's admirable how they decided to give Galuf his memory back, giving him far more development than all of the other playable characters combined. He goes from being an amnesiac to a general, one of the original four heroes along with two of his other friends (apparently Bartz's father died before the story began). He's with the main party when he can, and when he confronts Exdeath, that's when the death becomes memorable. He's managing to fight the battle completely solo, and with zero health too. It's the power of love and friendship, and as cliche as it is, he manages to beat Exdeath and save his party and granddaughter. Of course he dies this way. But it's what makes this death very special, and beats every other Final Fantasy death out of the water. As he dies, we see the party actually making an attempt to revive him with the Phoenix Down or Life spells. And it doesn't work. You look at other famous deaths in the franchise and potentially wonder if it is possible to revive characters in the plotline a similar way. Final Fantasy V actually makes that attempt and shows that it isn't actually possible. Of course this is due to the way Galuf fought Exdeath, but they managed to excel in making a character die and prevent his revival.
1. Luca Blight - Suikoden 2
Deaths in RPGs tend to be tragic when they happen to the hero, while an accomplishment for villains. Although some villains are really just tragic characters in themselves as well. Luca's an interesting case here.
His tragic backstory is honestly only really seen in Suikoden lore and in one cutscene in-game. Watching his mother get raped while his father cowardly doesn't help is what drove him to utter madness and a lust for killing "pigs". You don't see this lore anywhere else, you just see Luca as a villain who's pretty much knows his villainous deeds. The whole plot of the game up to his death is mostly running away from the guy, since he's too powerful to contend with, as well as formulating strategies against him and his Highland woes. And even then, there needs to be some outside help from the traitor Jowy, who unbeknownst to the Dunan Army, is secretly helping them plot against Luca and his misdeeds.
And then there's the matter of Luca Blight actually falling dead in the famous night raid. Surely enough, this guy is clearly made of iron. Those arrows kill his soldiers and his horse, causing him to fight one group of freedom fighters. He then runs and then confronts another group, and then the hero's group. While he does manage to run from each fight he's involved in, he doesn't get so far before the jar of fireflies gives him away to even more arrows. And yet again, he's still got the stomach to engage the main hero in one final duel, despite him being at half strength. Only then, does he die. It took all of what I just said in this one paragraph to kill the almighty Luca Blight, the scourge of Suikoden 2.
And the best part? Luca is fully human. Granted, he's certainly a strong archetype of a human, but he doesn't have any lame true-form transformations like other JRPG villains. He's just that resilient. The game really isn't over after Luca's fall, but in a way, it feels like the worst is over for every Suikoden II player once they finally defeated this madman.
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