Chun-Li
"I am the strongest woman in the world!"
Class: Fighter
Weapon: Bare hands
HP: Good
MP: Average
Attack: Great
Defense: Average
Speed: Great
Magic: Good
Unlike most RPG heroes, Chun-Li is not the perfectly well-rounded, jack-of-all-trades type of character, but she's not far off. True to her SF incarnations, she sacrifices defensive abilities for amazing speed. This means that although she'll take more damage than most of her teammates (though nothing compared to Seph), she'll almost always strike first.
Her abilities are much like the Monk's abilities in FF Tactics. She has a good variety of powerful offensive (such as several of her trademark SF moves like the lightning kick, kikouken, and the senretsu kyaku) and defensive moves, including the handy-handy Chakra, which restores a decent amount of HP to the entire party at NO cost of Magic Points. Add this to the fact that Chun-Li will almost always get the first strike and this ability will prove invaluable. Chun-Li is, of course, the hero of the RPG, but I'll try and break RPG tradition and allow her to be removed from the party, though.
Chun-Li's story is the game's story. On her way to meet Alucard for a date, she's attacked by wave after wave of Ryu fans who oppose the Chun-Li & Alucard relationship. After finding Alucard and defeating the Ryu fans, Chun-Li and Alucard begin to have concerns that Ryu fans and other flamers are beginning to increase in numbers and act much more hostile.
Further events bring Chun-Li to the conclusion that something is indeed out of place and she sets out to find the source of the recent attacks. Her travels will pit her against many old foes, plenty of new ones, and her relationships with her own peers will be put to the ultimate test as tensions grow between the members of the Crossover Comic Archive.
Alucard
"You have been doomed ever since you lost the ability to love."
Class: Red Mage
Weapon: Swords
HP: Good
MP: Average
Attack: Good
Defense: Good
Speed: Good
Magic: Good
Like the red mages we sometimes see in Final Fantasy games, Alucard will have a good variety of offensive and defensive abilities. Although Alucard will learn more attack spells than healing spells, the power of his healing spells are inferior only to Aya's.
As you might expect, Alucard has a nice, juicy role in the storyline, so you'll be seeing plenty of him. After a certain point in the game where your three additional team mates are of your own choosing, naturally you'll be able to remove Alucard if you so desire, but considering his superb battle skills as well as some great magic attacks, chances are Alucard will be a mainstay on a lot of people's teams.
Alucard joins the team almost immediately, and remains with them for most of the game. His loyalty to Chun-Li is unbendable. However, everything changes for him and Chun-Li as dark secrets from his past come to light.
Aya
"Freeze! NYPD!"
Class: White Mage
Weapon: Pistols
HP: Good
MP: Good
Attack: Average
Defense: Average
Speed: Good
Magic: Great
Although she won't be as weak as white mages typically are, Aya will be lacking in offensive power compared to the more well-rounded Chun-Li and Alucard. In Ash Rigo's RPG, Aya is the hero, and so her skills are more the type you would see a main character typically have. But here, she's a healer, because I think that considering all the Parasite Energy skills she learns, most of them are white magic spells (in fact, Liberation, her ultimate attack, is kinda like the Holy spell cast by White Mages). So she's the white mage. So there.
Aya is the only member of the CCTS to join Chun-Li's team. As their mission first begins, Aya does not have a terribly important role in the plotline. However, as the journey progresses and tensions in the ranks of the CCA's elite continue to rise, Aya is forced into the spotlight as she finds herself caught in the middle of an increasingly hostile conflict.
Tifa
"...I'll smash them."
Class: Chemist
Weapon: Gloves
HP: Average
MP: Average
Attack: Good
Defense: Average
Speed: Good
Magic: Average
In FF7, Tifa's role was that of the brawling martial arts character. Unfortunately we've got a little bit of a clash here, because that's Chun-Li's role now. So instead, I used the fact that she mixes drinks for a living and made her a chemist. In the game, she can mix drinks and serve them to her allies (or her enemies) for various effects. Being the only character to be able to use these skills, needless to say, she can come in handy.
Tifa, no offense to you diehard Lockheart fans out there, is probably one of the least important characters to the game's plotline. She runs the CCA Heroes' Pub and once she joins the party will probably never leave. I haven't even decided on just when she'll join for certain, but I honestly don't see a very important role for her in the game. Doesn't mean she won't get plenty of screentime, mind you! It just won't be terribly important towards the advancement of the plot.
Millenia
"This music makes me feel so... so... what's the opposite of chaotic?"
Class: Black Wizard
Weapon: Crossbow
HP: Good
MP: Good
Attack: Average
Defense: Average
Speed: Good
Magic: Great
For those of you who don't know her (and that's probably quite a few of you), Millenia is from Grandia II, one of the greatest RPGs ever made. For those of you who have a Dreamcast, I highly recommend it.
Anyway, the only reason Millenia has never appeared in any of my comics is because pictures of her are impossible to find. There are one or two good official pictures of her, but that's it, and, as far as I can tell, there's no fan art of her anywhere. The best way I can think to describe Millenia is a cross between the best of Morrigan Aensland and the best of Shayla Shayla. Millenia initially appears in the game as a bossy and spoiled demon from the underworld who is quick to lose her temper at somebody who irritates her. Despite her hellish origins and short temper, Millenia eventually proves to be a good person at heart.
Millenia's role in the game should be an interesting one. I haven't really decided just exactly where she'll come into play, but I suspect she'll get no small amount of screentime. As a party member, Millenia wields a well-rounded arsenal of attack spells.
Dan
"I hate the art of fighting, but I want to be king of fighters!"
Class: Mediator
Weapon: All kinds of stuff
As you may have noticed, I haven't decided just what kind of stats to give Dan yet, but he has various Talk Skills like FF Tactic's Mediator class that can boost various stats of his peers and enemies, as well as boost his own MP and inflict various status effects on his enemies. His weapons include things like a megaphone, a sign post, and even a Nerf Ballzooka. ^_^
Like most joke characters, Dan's role in the plot is mostly comic relief. He really doesn't do anything that serves to advance the plot, but considering the humor level in this game aims to be high, Dan should still get plenty of airtime.
Sephiroth
"Don't... push... your luck..."
Class: Dark Warrior
Weapon: Masamune
HP: Average
MP: Good
Attack: Great
Defense: Poor
Speed: Average
Magic: Great
Sephiroth's a tricky character to design for. I want him to have serious potential, but I'll be damned if I make him one of those characters that, once you obtain, make the rest of the game so easy that it's actually boring (Like TG Cid, Mewtwo, etc.). So I took some steps towards balancing him out.
Sephiroth wields only one weapon throughout the entire game: The Masamune. It's all he ever needs, too. It's not as powerful as the ultimate weapons of characters like Chun-Li or Alucard, but he gets it much earlier. When his peers eventually surpas him in terms of attack power, Seph will have learned some seriously powerful magic. To balance out this extreme power, I took a good chunk out of his speed and drastically reduced his defensive abilities. Not only is his defense rating the worst in the game, but he can only equip wristwear like in FF7. There is no armor-type or helmet-type equipment that he can use. Sephiroth is an offensive character through and through. When you use him, make sure he has backup.
Sephiroth will probably be the last character to join the party. When Chun-Li and her friends first encounter him, he is working on a mission as an agent of the AGSF Special Forces to retrieve an ancient artifact of extreme importance. Sephiroth has no intention of so quickly rushing to the aid of the woman who defeated him once before already, and in fact when their paths cross, they find nothing good to say to the other. In fact, it turns out Sephiroth and Chun-Li are after the same item, and neither can afford to leave without it. The two sides duke it out, and after the first truly difficult battle of the game, Sephiroth returns to the Elders empty-handed. It isn't until a little later that he is ordered to join Chun-Li's gang, and it isn't for a long time that they learn to trust each other.
The Hidden Character
That's right, I plan to include a hidden character in the lineup! I haven't decided on who it'll be, though...
Mega Man, Charlie, and Claire Redfield are all worthy candidates, but having so many Capcom characters already working their way into the game I'm not sure if I want to add another one to the lineup, and having three Square characters already you can bet I definitely will NOT be using any more of their characters.
Of course an obvious candidate would be Mr. T, but I just know some idiot would get all flustered because Mr. T's supposed to be invincible and all that garbage, so I probably won't want to go there.
Considering how long it'll take me to complete the game there's a very good chance some rookie will come along and make so many good comics that their hero quickly becomes one of the CCA's most popular heroes. Hey, it worked with Tifa and Dan. So the option of making a newer hero be the hidden character is a viable option.
Finally, I may decide not to make the hidden character have ANYTHING to do with the CCA. At first I thought Millenia might be a good hidden character, but then I decided I just loved her too much to not give her a nice big role in the game. ^_^ If I had an ego the size of Dick Cheney's medical bills I might consider letting myself be a hidden playable character, but perhaps instead my strongest lizard warrior or some other original creation would be joining?
I DO have a current top candidate for the hidden character, and it's nobody who I've listed here. Who is it? Can't tell you, it's a seeeecret. ^_^ Besides, I don't want to get anyone's hopes up on who it is. Only time and the rookies of the CCA can help make the decision of who I'll ultimately use.
