1. Yuna (Final Fantasy X / X-2)

Though Yuna doesn’t get to be on the box of Final Fantasy X, she is undeniably the main character of both it and its sequel Final Fantasy X-2. Her journey from a selfless summoner willing to put herself through the gristmill of Spira’s battle with Sin requires her to confront a lifetime of deeply ingrained beliefs. Once she begins to question everything she’s ever been taught, she pulls an entire world into a new era by destroying Yevon and dismantling the oppressive systems it put in place.

But that’s only the beginning of her story. In Final Fantasy X-2, she takes that newfound freedom and decides for herself who she is in a world that once required her to relinquish everything. She turns from a sacrificial lamb to a free spirit, no longer shackled by the expectations of a world that sought to keep her locked in a cage for slaughter. Final Fantasy X-2 is often lambasted for its shift from the original game’s melodrama into something more upbeat and campy, but it embodies a freedom its heroine finally gets to experience. It is the conclusion of an arc of a universe and the character in its center.