Characters / .hack//First Generation

.hack//AI Buster

Harald Hoerwick

Voiced by: Takumi Yamazaki (Japanese); Crispin Freeman (English; Liminality Only) Brian Dobson (English; IMOQ only)

World Identity: Numerous AI avatars in The World's Black Box areas, cryptic at best, and incomprehensible at worst. It's possible that one or more of them represent his actual living consciousness. Morganna destroys them as she becomes aware of them.

Real Identity: Harald is the original programmer of the game Fragment, later "upgraded" by CC Corp as The World. He wrote it while studying the human consciousness in order to create Aura, a true AI: a testament of his love for Emma Wielant, and their daughter in spirit.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, the four R:1 .hack games, .hack//Liminality. What appear to be the very last remnants of him also appear in Roots, before the area he inhabits is deleted...

Tropes associated with him:

• Black Box: He is the programmer of the black box that The World and its reiterations run on.
• Body Horror: His AI forms are all horrible. Combined with his face on every one of them... The tamest one is him sitting on a chair... made out of humanoid shaped flesh, and the chair's arms grasping at the chest.
• Creating Life: Harald's goals: To immortalize his beloved's poetry through The World, to create a true artificial intelligence, and to create the daughter he and Emma would never have.
• Cryptic Conversation: His A.I. copy is prone to engaging into this with players, when it's not rambling to itself.
• Designer Babies: Wishes to create one to replace a child who wasn't even born.
• Dummied Out: Much of the bizarre elements in The World are partially written code from the original game, Fragment. The current programmers don't know how to deal with them, and sort of write around them instead.
• Evilutionary Biologist: The only thing that keeps him from embodying this trope completely is his good intentions.
• Greater-Scope Villain: His attempts to create Aura did involve creating Morganna after all. Although he had no way of predicting that Morganna would rebel the way she did, at the end of the day, all of the .hack universe's problems, with the exception of Pluto's Kiss, can ultimately be traced back to his actions.
• Love Makes You Crazy: His obsession with Emma Wielant - even after her death - has nearly crashed the Internet numerous times, and has placed people into comas.
• Mad Scientist: The fact that he designed an MMORPG as a front for the creation and fostering of an A.I. child with traits of himself and his Unrequited Love should be enough of an indication of this.
• The Muse: Emma Wielant took inspiration from Harald's work in neurobiological theory; Harald was interested in her, but she was romantically involved with another man during her and Harald's friendship, and showed no romantic interest in Harald.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: By the time of Harald's passing he probably didn't give a damn for the real world anymore, but he still likely didn't intend on Morganna's programming to get pissed at the idea that the birth of Aura would replace it. The result causes the entire R:1 conflict, and paves the way for much of the trauma and hell that happens for the rest of the franchise.
• Virtual Ghost: His AI selves. Possibly.

Emma Wielant

World Identity: Emma does not appear in The World, although fragments of her poem appear in places.

Real Identity: A German poetess who wrote "The Epitaph of Twilight", the poem that Fragment was based on, shortly before her death. It told of the end of the gods in a battle between the "Twilight Dragon" and "The Cursed Wave." The original text has been lost, leaving only recovered fragments of the original and various rough drafts.

Mentioned in: .hack//AI Buster .hack//SIGN, the four R:1 .hack games, .hack//Liminality

Tropes associated with her:

• A Lighter Shade of Black: She might've intentionally manipulated Harald into creating Aura, and might be the Greater-Scope Villain of the franchise, but that's the most she's done as a Mama executive. Others after her outright attempted murder in order to further Mama's goals.
• The Faceless: In the game 3D model, she looks suspiciously like having no head at all. In the .hack//Another Birth novel illustration, she has a head, but still...
• Gaia's Vengeance: Was a member of an extremist environmentalist group, "Mama", along with the founders of ALTIMIT, dedicated to halting mankind's activity on earth in order to preserve the planet.
• Gratuitous German: Justified by the fact that she's German. But also gives chance to the game's developers to do this. Her "Epitaph of Twilight" poem and her gravestone epitaph are all in German.
• Greater-Scope Villain: She manipulated Harald to create Aura, and, along with the founders of ALTIMIT, orchestrated the events of the entire franchise to further her organization's Eco-Terrorist goals.
• The Muse: Her poem was Harald's inspiration for The World.
• Muse Abuse: A possible interpretation of her ambiguous relationship with Harald Hoerwick; she was intrigued by his theories of neurobiology, but ambivalent to his affections. Mostly because she was already in love with another man, and thus influencing Harald for her own reasons.
• Non-Idle Rich: As a young heiress to be, Emma worked as a nurse and was involved in environmentalism.
• Parasol of Prettiness: She holds this in The World, to cover her face.
• Posthumous Character: Even though she's long gone, she still affects various events, both through her poem and the MMORPG it inspired. Though the Thanatos Report implies that she may have faked her death.
• The Reveal: In Beyond the World and expanded material, in that she intentionally drove Harald to develop Aura to create a digital goddess for her organization's purposes and is a member of the Eco-Terrorist organization known as "Mama". The Thanatos Report even hints that she's not as dead as the world thinks she was.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: She intentionally used Harald's one-sided feelings for her to give him the idea to create Aura as their "daughter". Unfortunately, no one could've predicted how broken Harald would become by Emma's own "death", how corrupt CC Corp would be in handling his work, or that the AI systems would exceed their parameters, resulting in more calamities that likely clash with her intended plans.
• Walking Spoiler: Knowing anything about Emma spells out Harald's motivations in the original series when it's one of the many mysteries the cast have to uncover. Knowing The Reveal in Beyond the World marks her as a Greater-Scope Villain of the whole series that even exceeds Harald's own status on that front.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: As one of the executives of "Mama", her plan was to create a digital goddess (ie: Aura) to lead humanity into digitizing all human brains, so that humans could live on as data and stop destroying the Earth. Notably, her method of approaching this was downright tame and elusive in comparison to later generations of the organization being willing to kill people to directly achieve their goals.

Albireo

World Identity: Captain of the Cobalt Knights; a group of system administrators. Albireo is tasked with removing Vagrant AI and other irregularities that are the result of the previous games. He witnesses Balmung and Orca's defeat of the One Sin which made them legends. His hunt of a prototype to Aura named Lycoris led him to the discovery that there is far more to the game than he realized; and that the AI are people. This realization led to his deteriorating health and withdrawal from the game. His distraught assistant later becomes Kamui.

Real Identity: Kazushi Watarai, an employee at Cyberconnect, or "CC Corporation" and head of its debug team, the Cobalt Knights; was blamed for the Twilight Incident and forced to resign.

Appears in: .hack//AI Buster, cameos at the end of .hack//Legend of the Twilight Bracelet, .hack//Link

Tropes associated with him:

• Cryptic Conversation: Really, had he just explained things better to his assistant, a lot of problems in .hack//Legend of the Twilight Bracelet would have been avoided.
• Death from Above: His Cross Rengeki in .hack//Link.
• Faustian Rebellion: Averted, Albireo was unknowingly given his spear by Morganna, which had the power to delete AI. Trying to use it on Macha resulted in its destruction. He also tried to save Tsukasa during the events of .hack//SIGN, but was prevented by being Data Drained by Macha before he could come close.
• Meaningful Name: "Albireo" is the name of a binary star in the constellation Cygnus the Swan. Many captains are named after stars in .hack.
• Physical God: As an admin, he's practically a demigod within The World. Didn't exactly help against Morganna.
• Public Domain Artifact: "Wotan" is Odin under his name Anglo-Saxon myth. So essentially, Albireo's wielding Gungnir.
• The Scapegoat: Kazushi Watarai was turned into this by the higher-ups of CC Corporation to protect the company as a whole from complete blame for "Pluto Again." Despite being hospitalized prior to the beginning of the Second Network Crisis, Watarai was held responsible by the company for letting the situation get out hand, leading to his forced resignation.
• Shared Unusual Trait: Kamui based her character's heterochromatic eyes Albireo's own pair, which were originally stylized to go along with his character's name.

Orca of the Azure Sea

World Identity: One of the so-called "Descendants of Fianna", who defeated a supposedly Hopeless Boss Fight called "The One Sin." Orca was actually the original person chosen to receive the Key of the Twilight from Aura; but Skeith got to him first and Data Drained him.

Real Identity: Yasuhiko, a high school boy, and friends with Kite in real life. Him going into a coma is Kite's entire motivation for investigating what is happening in The World. He just wanted to show Kite a cool game.

Appears in: .hack//AI Buster, .hack//R1 games, .hack//Unison

Tropes associated with him:

• The Ace: He and Balmung are considered the strongest players in The World.
• Amazing Technicolor Population: His character model has green skin and white markings.
• Asleep for Days: Put to coma by Skeith.
• Badass Cape: In .hack//Link.
• Been There, Shaped History: Together with Balmung, they defeated The One Sin. And once again, he joins Kite to save The World and the real world too.
• BFS: His weapon of choice is a broadsword, which fits his burly appearance and nicely contrasts Balmung's lighter sword.
• Defeating the Undefeatable: He and Balmung defeated the supposedly unkillable boss, The One Sin.
• Facial Markings: He has a white X-shaped marking across his face.
• Gentle Giant: He may look big and intimidating, but between him and Balmung, Orca is the friendlier of the two, and is willing to help newbies understand how the game works, despite his fame.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: With Balmung.
• Legacy Character: The original.
• Red Baron: He's titled "Orca of the Azure Sea", one of the two legendary "Descendants of Fianna" who managed to defeat The One Sin.
• Right Man in the Wrong Place: He was supposed to get the Twilight Bracelet, but being comatose kinda wrecked that.
• The Roleplayer: Takes his character role as a medieval warrior pretty seriously, adjusting his manner of conversation accordingly.
• Screaming Warrior: Yasuhiko plays Orca like this.
• Mentor Occupational Hazard: He's offed in the very first dungeon of Infection while teaching Kite about the game's system.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: A trait of his chosen character model.
• Younger Than They Look: Is a badass grown-up swordsman in The World, but a high school student in real life.

Balmung of the Azure Sky

Bomb diggity.

Voiced by: Nobuyuki Hiyama (Japanese); Doug Erholtz (English, Infection); Crispin Freeman (English, Mutation onwards)

World Identity: The other "Descendant of Fianna", who was rewarded with customized wings on his character model for dealing the most damage to "The One Sin." He takes his status as a legendary player of The World rather more seriously than Orca does.

Real Identity: A high school student as of SIGN and the R:1 games. Formerly a beta-tester for Fragment, he's been a gamer his whole life. Becomes a system admin for The World between the games and Legend of the Twilight Bracelet.

Appears in: .hack//AI Buster, .hack//R1 games, .hack//Legend of the Twilight, .hack//LINK

Tropes associated with him:

• The Ace: He and Orca are considered the strongest players in The World.
• Aloof Ally: Hoo boy... But later he joins the party.
• Authority Equals Asskicking: In Legend of the Twilight.
• Been There, Shaped History: Together with Orca, he defeated The One Sin. And after a frosty start, he joins Kite to save The World and the real world too.
• Characterisation Marches On: In the R1 games, he's a dead-serious player. Since then, however, he's joined up with CC Corp and lightened up so much that, by the time of Legend of the Twilight, he's done a complete 180. He becomes a goofy, fun-loving admin with a penchant for making really weird events, though he's still has a few solemn moments.
• Chaste Hero: Balmung's real-world player apparently has girls all over him, which he can't understand.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: By Legend of the Twilight, he's gotten a reputation for being rather silly and ridiculous, and you'd be forgiven if, at first, you thought this version of Balmung was a Legacy Character. He is not, and when the chips are down, he is still quite capable of reminding everyone that he is both one of the players that defeated The One Sin as well as stood with Kite during the climax of the Second Pluto's Kiss incident.
• Death from Above: His Cross Rengeki in .hack//Link.
• Defeating the Undefeatable: He and Orca rose to fame after defeating the supposedly unkillable boss, The One Sin.
• Defrosting Ice King: He's downright belligerent to Kite at first, although he never actively tries to fight him. However, he reluctantly starts to work with Kite about halfway through the R1 games, and he slowly but surely warms up to him (and the others Kite works with), becoming True Companions with him by the end. There are a couple hints in Legend of the Twilight that he stays completely true to this, and that he and Kite will be there for each other at a moment's notice if need be. It's hinted as well that he and Balmung went through the same process.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: The aforementioned defeat of The One Sin.
• Feather Motif: He received a pair of angel wings after defeating The One Sin, which becomes a Perpetual Molt in his subsequent appearances.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: With Orca, since they're battle partners (and, like Kite, saving Orca is his main motivation). After he mellows out, and joins the protagonists, he becomes this with Kite as well.
• I Work Alone: He's spent the majority of his time in The World as a solo player until Orca defrosted him. Through much of the R1 games, he's an Aloof Ally, but becomes more friendly towards Kite and company.
• Knight in Shining Armor: Has the looks of one, but he's far more aloof and serious minded than the usual iteration of this character type.
• Knight Templar: At first, he's the player by far most trusting of CC Corp and their desire to stop Kite, thinking that he's a hacker out to destroy The World. He nearly even comes to blows with Kite over this misunderstanding. Thankfully, as he becomes more aware of Morganna and the threat she is to not just the game but the entire Internet, he abandons this.
• Lawful Stupid: In the R:1 games, as his trust is difficult to earn.
• Large Ham: Thank you, Crispin Freeman, for the support.
• Legacy Character: The original.
• Loner-Turned-Friend: According to the backstory, he was a complete loner until Orca started to team with him. With Orca in a coma as of the beginning of Infection, he goes back to being a loner until circumstances force him to work with Kite. His interactions with Kite and seeing Kite's genuine desire to help everyone help him warm up to all of the dot hackers.
• Power Gives You Wings: After defeating The One Sin, he accepted the wings as a customization on his gaming avatar.
• Pretty Boy:
  • His character model is very attractive. In fact, Albiero's first impression of him is that he looks "too handsome", possibly from being self-conscious about his looks in real life.
  • He's implied in R1 and Twilight to be a rather handsome guy with a fangirl following in real life; it's just that he's socially awkward due to being a long-time gamer.
• Promoted Fanboy: In-Universe. By Legend of the Twilight, Balmung's become an administrator for CCCorp.
• Red Baron: Descendant of Fianna, The Azure Sky.
• Totally Radical: Thank you, Unison dub. Even Kite was caught off-guard.
  Balmung: This shindig looks like the bomb diggity.
  Kite: What'd you say?
• Tritagonist: Of the original tetralogy, seeing as though he has motivations similar to Kite's, and is commonly depicted as the third player alongside Kite and Blackrose in their party.
• Winged Humanoid: His in-game avatar sports a pair of white wings, which he won after defeating The One Sin.

Lycoris

World Identity: An AI prototype of Aura. Looks very similar to Aura, but with shorter white hair (with red accents based on Whooper Looper) and dressed in red.

Real Identity: None.

Appears in: .hack//AI Buster

Tropes associated with her:

• The Cameo: She appears in Legend of the Twilight as a data fragment in the Net Slums, unable to rest until Zefie terminates her.
• Cute Mute: Until regaining her voice.
• Driven to Suicide: Considers herself a failure because she cannot become Aura, and so eventually deletes herself using Albireo's spear.
• Flawed Prototype: Hence the reason why she is a Death Seeker
• Death Seeker: Once regaining her memory file she remembers how she is still being hunted by Morgana who's omnipotence allows her to continue tracking her down and won't stop till the deed is done. While it is Albireo who is doing the actual work, and his Colbalt Knights brigade around the first time he "deleted" her Morganna "whispers" her location to admins so they'll delete her.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Survived the first attempt at deletion by scattering various parts of her program. One of the pieces that got lost was her memory.
• Meaningful Name: After her death, lycoris blossoms begin appearing in the game; it's hinted that her code was recycled into this scenery.

Hokuto

World Identity: Hokuto is a newbie Albireo meets while he is in Mac Anu with Lycoris. Childish and restless, she gives Albireo a bit of grief as she forcibly tags along with him on his quest. This personality is eventually revealed as a fabrication; she is actually secondary character of one of the game community's poets and long-time players, W.B. Yeats.

Real Identity: Haruka Mizuhara. Due to her behavior, Albireo assumes that she is a young girl roughly around the beginning of her teen years. She is actually a professional translator several years Watarai's senior who plays online with Hokuto just so she wouldn't get caught by her boss, who knows her main character.

Tropes associated with her:

• Hidden Depths: She's a skilled actor, with her Hokuto persona being absolutely convincing.
• Manic Pixie Dream Girl: In a sense. It's part of the act.
• Maybe Ever After: With Watarai, who moves in with her after the events of A.I. Buster. While conflicting media are unclear whether they stayed together, Mizuhara has a daughter by the time of Quantum named Riko...and Watarai is implied to be the father and is still with her.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Again, the stupidity is part of the newbie persona of Hokuto.
• Older Than She Looks: Older than Alberio, even!
• Too Many Belts: Even her hat has belts!

.hack//SIGN

Morganna Mode Gone

Voiced by: Rie Tanaka (Japanese); Valerie Arem (English)

World Identity: An AI designed to be Aura's guardian until she was complete, but she becomes resentful of her role and actively resists Aura's development in a bid for independence. She manifests as a godlike being; a disembodied voice and psychic presence. Until Aura's birth she's the core of The World and as a result, as she breaks down, so does the game.

Real Identity: None.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with her:

• Abusive Parents: On both ends. Harald created her to compile Aura and was willing to let her cease to exist once she finished. Needless to say, this didn't foster positive feelings for either her "father" or daughter.
• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: She's basically GLaDOS with Data Drain instead of Deadly Neurotoxin.
• Big Bad: She's the main antagonist of every non-Legend of the Twilight entry of R-1.
• Despair Gambit: Tsukasa's despair is all she needs...
• Deus est Machina: Before the full awakening of Aura as the Ultimate A.I. She is occasionally referred to as the "Old God" of The World in-universe.
• Eldritch Abomination: Good lord, perhaps even more so than Cubia. She literally was The World until Aura took over, and as such is mostly unseen for a very Unseen Evil effect. Her method of doing battle with the heroes is through the Phases, who count as lesser Eldritch Abominations themselves. The title "Old God" also rings somewhat familiar in tone to something like "Elder God" as well, an usual Eldritch title.
• Eye Motifs: These are what are used to designate something is associated with her, most prominently being the Eight Phases. When she finally appears through Corbenik, her form is nothing but gigantic eyes.
• False Reassurance: She gives this to Tsukasa to keep him under her control.
• Final Boss: Implied to be the real final opponent of the IMOQ games, overriding control of Corbenik in his final phase.
• Genius Loci: Until Aura takes the reigns at the end of the original tetralogy, she IS The World.
• God Is Evil: She's the de-facto God of The World, and she's also the Big Bad.
• God Save Us from the Queen!: Word of God has it she was originally based on the Queen of Hearts.
• The Faceless: She lacks a physical form to begin with (unless you count the divided components of her program, the Eight Phases), with the exception of the non-canon manga based on the IMOQ tetralogy.
• Meaningful Name: If you consider Aura as the Christ analogue and Morganna as the Old God, their power struggle suddenly makes a lot more sense.
• No Name Given: Never named in series, although the credits (and Balmung, during the first four games) do reveal her identity.
• Offing the Offspring: Her ultimate goal, self preservation through Aura's demise.
• Unseen Evil: Morganna never makes a proper appearance physically, only as a voice and her avatars in the Eight Phases. The most she's implied to ever show up physically is as Corbenik's third form.

Macha

World Identity: One of the Eight Phases (see below) of Morganna. Looks like a humanoid cat wearing a witch's hat and patched clothes, floating in mid-air. Later appears after getting Data Drained by Morganna as Mia in the R1 Games, where she is now much taller, has a more human-like body, and acts like a Player Character rather than an AI as well as no memory of her time as Macha. Once Kite starts defeating the phases she realizes what she was and turns into her True form as the 6th Phase, Macha the Temptress.

Real Identity: None.

Appears in: .hack//Sign, .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with her:

• Cute Is Evil: Subverted. Sure, she was summoned and shaped by an evil being for an evil purpose, but she is definitely not evil by the end.
• Cute Mute: Subverted, she actually has voice.
• Facial Markings: Star-shaped around her left eye.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Macha was simply a tool through which Morganna could manipulate Tsukasa... at first. After Tsukasa shows Macha a bit of kindness, Macha saves him and is Data Drained by Morganna in the process, prompting her transformation into Mia.
• The Scream: When she was killed by Morganna. And that was the only one that has the voice of hers.
• The Unintelligible: Played with. Macha speaks in text-only, which is viewable by characters, not the viewer. Once she becomes Mia, she gains a voice Her text becomes readable in some of the novels.

Aura

Voiced by: Maaya Sakamoto (Japanese); Lia Sargent (English)

World Identity: The ultimate artificial intelligence, the child Harald Hoerwick and Emma Wielant would never have, and the entire purpose for The World's existence. She appears as a young white-haired girl in a simple white gown. By the G.U. games, Aura has left The World entirely to exist elsewhere in the worldwide network.

Real Identity: None.

Appears in: Everything but Roots. And she's referred to in that one, too.

Tropes associated with her:

• A God I Am Not: Eventually she came to dislike of being worshiped as the goddess of The World, so she leaves the Cathedral, hence why her statue disappears from the altar in R:2.
• Apologizes a Lot: She sends a lot of apology e-mails repeatedly to Kite because she got him involved in such a massive conspiracy beyond his comprehension.
• Asleep for Days: In .hack//SIGN before she was awakened.
• Benevolent A.I.: She's a kind and gentle being, unlike Morganna who is practically the definition of A.I. Is a Crapshoot.
• Big Good: She's the one who gave out the Twilight Bracelet, and the only way for Morgana to be killed is for Aura to "be born".
• Body Horror: In her final boss form in Link.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Due to the bugs spread by Tokio unintentionally.
• The Corruption: In where Geist used Tokio to spread bugs all over her.
• Crystal Dragon Jesus: She was even "born" on Christmas Day.
• Controllable Helplessness: In the Final Boss, you try and fight against Aura but in the end she is invincible due to being a god in every sense of the word.
• Damsel in Distress: Thanks to Skeith at the beginning of Infection.
• Deus est Machina: She becomes the "New" God of The World after becoming the Ultimate A.I., and her years of overseeing the game are referred to as the game's "Golden Age." The Jun Bansyoya of the Terminal Disc states that her influence extended not only to The World, but to all the net-based technology in the real world as well. When she disappears at the end of the game's Golden Age, problems around the net began to occur as well, with all affected technology returning to their "normal specifications."

• Expy: Design-wise, to a girl in the movie Angel's Egg by Mamoru Oshii.
• Facial Markings: In her final boss form in .hack//Link.
• Final Boss: In .hack//Link.
• Girls Love Stuffed Animals: A teddy bear is shown on her bed in .hack//SIGN.
• God Is Dead: Seen this way in Roots and G.U.
• God Is Good: The New God of The Worth and so benevolent that her regime is referred to as a "golden age".
• Heroic Sacrifice: Subverted as she didn't die. She shields Carl with her own body from Skeith's body, giving Carl the proof that Aura wasn't the one who caused Sora's abnormal behavior. On top of that, taking a deathblow from Kite at the end of the tetralogy brings an end to Morganna.
• Hope Bringer: Averted only in .hack//G.U. where she can't stop Cubia.
• Incorruptible Pure Pureness: She can't be infected by any sorts of viruses and other anomalies. Though this subverted in .hack//Link.
• Instant A.I.: Just Add Water!: More like "just add players to the game". If Morganna hadn't rebelled, she would have been born using data collected from players.
• Lady and Knight: She acknowledges Kite as her knight. Aww...
• Love Freak: In the end of .hack//Link, in her brainwashed state, she forces the Children to accept her love and go to sleep to be awaken in the next time.
• Motifs: Infinity symbol. Lampshaded in Link where a door leads to her in Akashic Records has this symbol.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: "The Goddess of The World" and "The Ultimate AI".
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: She leaves The World on her own, which leads to problems to the system. Later, when the World R:2 debuts, her absence lead A.I.D.A. to the take her place.
• Nice Girl: She cares for every player in The World.
• Power Floats: Subverted, for most of the time. In "Beyond the World", she walks on the ground.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: In her final boss form.
• Replacement Goldfish: A unique example as there wasn't an original version, rather Aura was what "could have been".
• The Scream: When she was infected with Data Bugs by Geist through Tokio.
• Sealed Good in a Can: What she unfortunately becomes at the end of Infection - despite his every effort, Kite cannot stop Skeith from Data Draining her. This causes Aura to be broken into three fragments that can't do much beyond occasionally send Kite some very garbled emails. Much of the subsequent games involve Kite tracking down these fragments to restore her.
• Turn the Other Cheek: She forgives Morganna, despite all things Morganna has caused. She even still refers to Morganna as her "mother". In .hack//G.U. Redemption, she even addresses the Epitaph Users (which all of them hold Morganna Factor) as the "Children of Morganna".
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Her existence is unknown later in Guilty Dragon. To be precise, in The World: Armed Conflict.

Tsukasa

Voiced by: Mitsuki Saiga (Japanese); Brianne Siddall (English)

World Identity: An antisocial Wavemaster, his only associates being the enigmatic Macha and a Guardian that attacks anyone threatening him. He's the central character of the SIGN series, as his ability to fully experience The World, and inability to leave, is the mystery that drives the plot.

Real Identity: An Shouji, a high school girl who retreats to the game to escape a miserable home life with a deceased mother and abusive father.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, Mutation, Outbreak and Quarantine, .hack//LINK

Remnant data appears in the fourth Game and is fashioned into an AI by Helba and can be added to the party after the game is cleared. Not the real deal of course. They also appear in Ghost Events which re-create the events of SIGN.

Tropes associated with him/her:

• Abusive Parents: Tsukasa's father is shown to be one of the physical and emotional variety, which is but one of the reasons for Tsukasa's angst. He even tries to kill her in the real world in the hospital while she's comatose, but is stopped by the hospital staff and taken into police custody.
• Anti-Hero: Initially fairly hostile and rude to strangers, and rarely acts for what could be called "the greater good."
• Asleep for Days: Was in a coma for at least 6 months in the real world.
• Big Damn Heroes: Subverted. His Guardian will protect Tsukasa from any kind of hostilities.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: In the .hack//Link manga.
• Broken Bird: Due to parental abuse and then heapings of Mind Rape from Morganna.
• Calling Your Attacks: In Versus.
• Color-Coded Eyes: His purple eyes mark himself as a person surrounded by mysteries.
• Cross Player: Due to being Data Drained, not only does Tsukasa have amnesia, but "he" doesn't remember that "his" real life self is a girl. Data Draining has resulted in Tsukasa's mind "feeling" everything in The World, so for all intents, this also functions as a Gender Bender.
• Dark and Troubled Past: An's mother died when she was little and her father was a horribly abusive and rotten excuse of a dad.
• Deadpan Snarker: He is very prone to this before Character Development.
• Defrosting Ice Queen: Initially antisocial and hostile to anyone who tries to reach out to him. He eventually accepts help from others, especially Mimiru, Bear, and Subaru.
• Expy:
  • An Shouji is basically a Gender Flipped Expy of Shinji Ikari. Hell, her given name is written with the kanji for Anzu, it is read as An, which can mean either "copy" or "rough draft". Her surname, Shouji, can mean "devotion"... and so can another Japanese word, Shinjin. Add in the abusive parents, the depression, the escapism, and the inability to connect with people, and recall that Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, who worked on Evangelion and .hack, talked Hideaki Anno out of his initial female character concept for Shinji...
  • Also interestingly, Tsukasa's real-life self looks remarkably like Mana Kirishima◊ from Girlfriend Of Steel, a spin-off game of Evangelion. Given the two series share the same character designer, Yoshiyuki Sadamoto, it's not shocking.
  • Meanwhile, the Tsukasa avatar outwardly looks a lot like Kaworu Nagisa, with his white hair, unusual eye color (purple in this case), a calm demeanor, and lots of mysteries surrounding him.
• Distressed Dude: In the .hack//Link manga, where Trommel kidnapped Tsukasa to get his Chrono Core.
• Energy Weapon: In Versus, his Guardian has one.
• Facial Markings: Two red marks along his cheekbones, as are standard for the avatars.
• Finger-Twitching Revival: Happens to Tsukasa within the first two minutes of the first episode.
• Freak Out: In the .hack//Link manga when he sees the product of other players messing up with Trommel. They become data cubes.
• Friend to All Living Things: Surprisingly. Sometimes, he playfully pokes any animal he encounters.
• G.I.R.L.: Inverted trope. Tsukasa, a male avatar character, is actually played by An Shouji, who is female.
• Guardian Entity: It can Data Drain, so back off from Tsukasa!
• Happily Adopted: Lives with Bear after the events of Sign.
• Heel–Face Turn: To Morganna.
• Hidden Depths: He is able to answer trivia questions about black-and-white era western movies like Roman Holiday due to his mom being a big fan of them.
• High Collar of Doom: In his Xth Form in .hack//Link.
• If It's You, It's Okay: With Subaru. Neither cares what the other's gender is.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: In the .hack//Link manga, he was stabbed by Haseo (B-st form)'s tails ended up PK'ing him.
• Ineffectual Loner: The entire point of the character.
• Jade-Colored Glasses: Tsukasa is quite rude at first, and it takes a lot to get past the defenses. S/he gets better.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Tsukasa is not very nice, at least at the start.
• Lack of Empathy: Due to his ( her, in real life) abusive childhood. Growing out of this is a major part of Tsukasa's character arc.
• Lost in Character: Thanks to Morganna.
• Mind Rape: Morganna does this to Tsukasa when he starts misbehaving.
• My God, What Have I Done?: His expression when his Guardian attacks Bear.
• Myself, My Avatar: Tsukasa's main problem is this and being Trapped in Another World.
• Mysterious Protector: His guardian was given to him by Morganna in order to keep Tsukasa existing and continuing her scheme to prevent Aura from ever becoming the new goddess of The World.
• Perpetual Frowner: Rarely if ever does Tsukasa smile for real. He tends to have a solemn/sad expression, and when he does smile, it's more sarcastic. He eventually smiles more genuinely after opening up to people.
• The Quiet One: He mostly won't do conversation unless someone's started one.
• Reluctant Warrior: In Versus, one of his pre-battle quote is, "Guess I have no choice but to fight."
• Samus Is a Girl: Is revealed at the end to be a girl in real life, but uses a male avatar in the game.
• Sour Outside, Sad Inside: Tsukasa comes off as a Jerkass who spends all his time brooding, moping, and either ignores or insults anyone who tries to engage with him. It's little more than a flimsy, unhealthy coping mechanism for his depression and difficulty either communicating with or trusting people, given his Friendless Background and horrible home situation.
• Squishy Wizard: He faces off with Silver Knight in the first episode and gets beat down pretty fast. It's only the arrival of the Guardian that saves him. Doesn't get much better later on, with Tsukasa mainly filling the role of a support in combat rather than being a frontline warrior.
• Took a Level in Badass: In the .hack//Link manga, he dares to face Haseo whose Level is 200 while his Level is 52. Cool.
• Trapped in TV Land: Before Tokio.
• Walking Spoiler: His real gender, although It Was His Sled downplays this somewhat.
• Weak, but Skilled: In Link, it was shown that although his level is far below Haseo's, he still can keep on without serious injuries.
• White Hair, Black Heart: A very downplayed example, but Tsukasa's avatar has white hair and is incredibly closed off from others, if not downright rude and antisocial. Learning to open up to and trust other people is a major part of his arc.
• Why Couldn't You Be Different?: Her father resented her not only for being a girl but for being alive. He took severe issue with An showing any feelings or even wanting a bra.

Mimiru

Voiced by: Megumi Toyoguchi (Japanese); Amanda Winn-Lee (English)

World Identity: A brash, energetic, and happy-go-lucky Heavy Blade, and the first person Tsukasa meets after becoming trapped in The World. Unlike many other characters in the series, she plays purely for the fun of it.

Real Identity: Her name is never given. She's a high school student who we can safely assume is much the same in real life as she is in the game.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, Mutation, Outbreak and Quarantine, .hack//LINK

Tropes associated with her:

• Braids of Action: Visible in .hack//Link.
• Breast Plate: It's part of her chosen character model.
• Bunnies for Cuteness: Her Xth Form costume in .hack//Link.
• Catchphrase: Fond of "Roger that" and "What did you just say?" in the dub.
• Chainmail Bikini: Part of the character model she chose.
• The Ditz: Believes herself to be this, but truthfully isn't all that dim. Bear notes this on occasion.
• Expy: If Tsukasa is an expy of Neon Genesis Evangelion's Shinji, Mimiru (a brash, cocky Tsundere) is an expy of Asuka. Although ironically, Mimiru shares Rei's voice actress.
• The Glomp: In .hack//Link, gives this to Tokio at the end of her Xth Form Cross Rengeki.
• Nice Girl: While she can be hot-headed, Mimiru is arguably the nicest and sweetest character apart from possibly Subaru or Crim.
• Only Sane Woman: Seriously, Mimiru is one of the only people who is even remotely normal in the anime, while everyone else is coming from various Dysfunction Junctions.
  • For a long time, she was the only character outside of The World whose full face was shown. Considering in any of the anime that means a person generally has figured out who they are and is okay/reconciled with it, Mimiru was basically the first one to actually have her shit together.
• What You Are in the Dark: An episode has Mimiru exploring a dungeon with newbie character A-20. She at first gets irritated with her and leaves, only to realize she was being heartless with her and come back to rescue her and complete the dungeon. This also makes her reflect on things with Tsukasa.

Bear

Voiced by: Kazuhiro Nakata (Japanese); Paul Mercier (English)

World Identity: A Blademaster of respectable power who considers himself a friend to new players throughout SIGN. He's very much a parental figure (Mimiru has a habit of calling him "Old Man"), giving his adolescent friends sage advice for their personal lives along with help in the game.

Real Identity: Ryo Sakuma, a father, divorcee, and successful author in his late forties. He plays for creative inspiration and to mentor younger players.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, Mutation, Outbreak and Quarantine, .hack//LINK''

Tropes associated with him:

• Badass Bookworm: In the game, anyway. At one point, he seems to resent that his real-life self is less badass.
• Cool Old Guy: Isn't that old, but is a nice and personable older player who serves as a mentor figure to the younger players.
• Expy: Word of God says he was directly based on Mel Gibson from Braveheart
• Gentle Giant: Large as he is, he is one good man.
• Intergenerational Friendship: With Mimiru. More of a parental figure to Tsukasa.
• Parental Substitute: After the events of Sign, he takes custody of An as her legal guardian since her abusive biological father was arrested for trying to kill her.
• Replacement Goldfish: Bear makes up for his failed relationship with his son by meeting and helping other young people. He eventually adopts Tsukasa's player An Shouji in real life and puts her through college; when Tsukasa asks if this is the case, Bear states that yes it is, but might help redeem himself somewhat if he follows through. He does.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: It's part of his character model.

Subaru

Voiced by: Kaori Nazuka (Japanese); Kim Mai Guest (English)

World Identity: A strong-willed yet waifish and soft-spoken Heavy Axeman who commands the Crimson Knight guild in SIGN. With an unwavering sense of fair play, she and Crim founded the guild to stop player-killers and hacked characters from ruining others' fun.

Real Identity: Mariko Misono, a high school girl whose legs were paralyzed in an accident years before, a secret she's kept from everybody but Crim. She plays the game to experience a sense of freedom.

Appears in: .hack//Sign, Mutation, Outbreak and Quarantine .hack//Roots (cameo), and .hack//Link

Like Tsukasa and Sora, she has an AI copy that appears in the fourth game. Notice a pattern?

Tropes associated with her:

• Alliterative Name: Mariko Misono, the player.
• Authority Equals Asskicking: Interestingly averted, considering it's an online game. Subaru's character isn't particularly strong, since she spends so much of her game time governing instead of playing.
• Battle Ballgown: Her original R:1 character model that appeared in .hack//SIGN.
• The Captain: Of the Crimson Knights.
• Chronic Hero Syndrome: Even in a game, she just has to help everybody.
• Gender-Blender Name: Subaru doesn't sound like a name for girls...
• If It's You, It's Okay: Tsukasa became the "Most Important Person" to Subaru, "despite being a girl." Ten years later, in the manga of .hack//Link, they're revealed to be living together and are in a relationship.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Her Cross Rengeki in .hack//Link.
• Last Girl Wins: See above.
• Mini Dress Of Power: Her outfit in .hack//Link.
• Nice Girl: Is a sweet and gentle girl who wants to help everyone, founded the Crimson Knights to stop Player Killers from ruining everyone's fun, and reaches out to Tsukasa, drawing him out of his shell.
• Not So Weak: Subaru. It's considered a major turning point for her when she disbands the Crimson Knights after putting up with their bull for too long and then getting rid of a stalker fan by herself.
• Pink Means Feminine: Her clothes during her early days with the Crimson Knights.
• Power Gives You Wings: In .hack//Link, though she can't fly literally.
• Protective Charm: Sort of. In .hack//Link, she gave Tokio a feather when he's about to save Tsukasa. She gave it to Tsukasa too, later on.
• Quickly-Demoted Woman: Subverted. Subaru starts off as a headstrong leader of the Crimson Knights, but after Crim left as co-leader, she found her grasp of power slipping while Silver Knight slowly asserted himself over the first half of the series. He tells her that she's not cut out for leading the guild and takes control, but she later puts her foot down once and for all by disbanding the guild.
• Sexy Backless Outfit: The in-game persona.
• Shrinking Violet: Subaru isn't outright shy, but she begins to show the common signs associated with one over the course of the series. She finds comfort and happiness in her friendship with Tsukasa though.
• You Are Not Alone: Says this to Tsukasa

B.T.

Voiced by: Akiko Hiramatsu (Japanese); Donna Rawlins (English)

World Identity: A Wavemaster more known for being an information broker rather than an adventurer. She's initially detached and somewhat condescending, treating only older men like Bear and Crim as friends and equals. Of the main characters, she's the last one to fully join in with Tsukasa and friends.

Real Identity: Machiko is the only name given, apparently a single businesswoman in her late '20s, and a former model. Appears to resent her experience in high school, and her attempt at dating Crim's player went poorly.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, Mutation, Outbreak and Quarantine, .hack//LINK

Tropes associated with her:

• Break the Haughty: Despite trying to maintain an aloof and confident image, she is repeatedly killed by other players who hold no respect for her at all.
• Butt-Monkey: She gets repeatedly killed by other players throughout the series, usually by Sora. No other major character gets PK'd even once onscreen.
• Death Is Cheap: Justified since this is a MMORPG. Doesn't make her being a magnet for PKs any less noticeable. Lampshaded in GIFT when Mimiru mentions she's used to dying.
• Defrosting Ice Queen: An entire episode showed her interacting with various characters in the show, as she realizes she doesn't have many, if any friends, online or offline. This realization, combined with Tsukasa showing up to help her when being attacked made her decide to start acting more friendly.
• Does Not Like Spam: B.T. hates the lettuce on BLTs.
• Meaningful Name: Averted. It turns out "B.T." is the name of her favorite sandwich. Hint, she doesn't like lettuce. Mimiru is disappointed by how mundane the reveal is.
• Satellite Character: Somewhat by her own choice.
• Squishy Wizard: She doesn't actually level up much, as she uses the game more for gossip. As such she is frequently attacked by player killers.
• Trademark Favorite Food: The B.T. sandwich. So much that she turned it into an online handle, apparently. (See Meaningful Name.)

Silver Knight

Voice by: Isshin Chiba (Japanese) Douglas Rye (English; SIGN) Trevor Devall (English; Roots)

World Identity: A Blademaster and Subaru's second in command of the Crimson Knights through much of SIGN. He works relentlessly to identify and hunt down player-killers and hacked characters. His passion for justice and fair play is matched only by that of his role as Subaru's knight.

Real Identity: His name is never given. He works in a video store, and is apparently in his early twenties.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, Mutation, Outbreak and Quarantine, Legend of the Twilight Bracelet, .hack//Roots, .hack//LINK, .hack//Quantum

Tropes associated with him:

• Attack! Attack! Attack!: His Cross Rengeki in Link, combined with Large Ham below.
• "Blind Idiot" Translation: Many early fansubs gave him the name "Ginkan." This led to some confusion when his name was officially translated as "Silver Knight," which is what "ginkan" means. Which side is being the blind idiot depends on how literally his name was meant to be read.
• Continuity Nod: Silver Knight (and his player) are the only ones who appear in all three .hack anime series. In particular, at the end of Roots, he's already familiar with Haseo's situation and sympathizes, possibly referring to his own experiences with data draining and player-killers. This could be extra-interesting if he knows who Haseo's player is.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom / Red Eyes, Take Warning: His red eyes peek out of his helmet, and glow ominously if he sights a target of his ire.
• Heroes Prefer Swords: He views himself as a hero and uses a sword.
• Hidden Depths: In Link, he seemed like a calm person, but when you do Cross Rengeki together with him...
• Knight in Shining Armor: What he becomes after realizing what a jerk he's been.
• Knight Templar: What he is at first.
• Large Ham: In Link. "THIS IS FOR SUBARU-SAMA!! - SUBARU-SAMA!! - SUBARU-SAMA!!! - SUBAARUUU-SAMUAAAA!!!"
  • Taken up to eleven in his Xth Form Cross Rengeki.
• Lawful Stupid: His personal vision of justice has little room for empathy or individual judgment, at least until he stops taking it all so danged seriously.
• Unrequited Love Lasts Forever: Of the "declaration of loyalty" variety. He obviously has it bad for Subaru, though he apparently never tells her (and if she knows, she never acknowledges it).
• Screaming Warrior: Notably in Link.
• Serious Business: He takes the game waaaaaay too seriously. Character Development eventually leads him to treat the game more like a game.
• Spikes of Doom: He has a pair of horns on his helmet. In SIGN, it's to distinguish him apart from the rest of the Crimson Knights, who have plain helmets. Ironically, outside of SIGN, it's the major clue he was part of the Crimson Knights at all.

Crim

Voice by: Shin-ichiro Miki (Japanese); Lex Lang (English)

World Identity: Crim the Red Lightning is a Long Arm and one of the game's most powerful characters at the time of SIGN. He's a carefree role-player, an over-the-top wandering warrior of chivalry. After helping Subaru, they founded the Crimson Knights, which he later left once it stopped being fun.

Real Identity: No name or age is given, but likely a corporate businessman. He plays purely to blow off stress, and believes in keeping reality and the game separate, though he did try dating B.T.'s player, and gave Subaru his phone number as a gesture of support.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, .hack//LINK

Tropes associated with him:

• The Dulcinea Effect: Again, it's the way the character's played.
• Honor Before Reason: Not that Crim's stupid... but in a game, he doesn't care.
• Large Ham: When Crim's "in character."
• Only Sane Man: If not in-character, which can hide how much he's actually paying attention to events around him.
• Warrior Therapist: Has a fondness for lecturing people while kicking their asses.

Helba

Voiced by: Yumi Touma (Japanese); Mary Elizabeth McGlynn (English)

World Identity: An infamous hacker, named for one of the principal characters in the Epitaph of Twilight. She plays a heavily-edited Wavemaster, and possibly comes closer than anyone to understanding the secret purpose of The World. Luckily, she uses her talents to help our heroes in the fight against Morganna. Runs a private server known as "Net Slum" which is basically a collection of data deleted from the game proper, it is accessible from the game proper via the proper channels.

Real Identity: Unknown, and for good reason: after the "Pluto's Kiss" incident, hacking has become a capital crime.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with her:

• Ambiguous Gender: It's unknown if Helba is a guy or a girl in real life. Or for that matter, if the player is even a single person or a group. There are hints dropped in .hack//GIFT that Helba is a solitary woman; namely, the one dancing in a catsuit in the opening to .hack//SIGN.
• Anti-Hero: She's treated like this by the more straight-laced people that work with Kite, like Balmung and Lios, as she's openly a hacker in a society where hacking is a capital offense. This is Deliberate Values Dissonance, as Helba never does anything villainous, and players are more likely to just see her as a white-hat hacker.
• The Archmage: With maxed out stats, she is the most powerful Wavemaster.
• Big Good: Only a little less than Aura, as she regularly aids Kite, with two interventions critical to Kite's continued ability to fight against Morganna (saving him from Data Drain early in Infection and using Net Slum to function as Omega root town Lia Fail when the original was too corrupted to use).
• Dark Is Not Evil: She is the Queen of Dark according to Emma Wielant's Epitaph of Twilight poem.
• Enemy Mine: Reason for her team-up with Lios, though they seem to get along fine afterwords.
• The Faceless: Her online avatar. The Upper half of her avatar's face is obscured at all times apart from one non-canon manga.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: Proof that Helba is as good of a hacker as is claimed? When Helba becomes recruitable (after defeating Corbenik in .hack//Quarantine), she's at max level and all of her stats maxed (which a player will note isn't possible without hacking). She literally broke the game and allows the player to break the rest of the game with her.
• Noblewoman's Laugh: At the end of her Cross Rengeki in Link.
• Playful Hacker: She's like this throughout most of the R1 Games. She gets serious, however, when trouble escalates.
• Power Floats: In .hack//Link.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Subverted; her eye color is unknown, but her visor has red "eyes".
• She Who Must Not Be Seen: Her real life self. Her player(s?) face(s?) is (are?) never seen.
• Stripperific: Her outfit can be accurately described as a sexy space-pope.
• Squishy Wizard: Averted. Many may think her this when she comes to your party. See above.
• Token Evil Teammate: She's a criminal hacker working with the good guys. Where she falls depends on which of the other characters is speaking of her.
• Trickster Mentor: She gives assistance and clues to Kite and his friends, but only as she sees fit and almost never provides a straight answer.

Sora

Voiced by: Hiroshi Yanaka (Japanese); Dave Wittenberg (English)

World Identity: A Twin Blade player-killer, and the strongest character in SIGN aside from Crim. Wild and immature, he loves nothing more than screwing up other people's plans just because he can, though he's also fond of assaulting female characters and demanding their contact information.

Real Identity: Ryou Misaki, a fourth-grade student. Seven years later, he'll create the character of Haseo in The World R:2, with ironic consequences.

Appears in: .hack//SIGN, .hack//R1 Games, .hack//LINK

Like Tsukasa and Subaru, has an AI copy that appears in Quarantine.

Tropes associated with him:

• Blade Below the Shoulder: The only Twin Blade in all of .hack who uses spring-loaded blade gauntlets instead of just holding his weapons.
• Blood Knight: He loves to PK so much.
• Kids Are Cruel: The reason he's such a Jerkass is because he's a lonely 9 year old in an online game where he doesn't have to worry about being scolded by his parents, teachers, or other Reasonable Authority Figures. Thankfully, he grows out of that seven years down the line, though not exactly through simply just maturing and with a lot more personal tragedy of his own.
  • Irony: In seven years, he himself will be menaced by a kid the same age as he was as Sora, but is far, FAR worse than he ever was, in malice, motivations, and threat level.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: The obvious and unsubtle way he goes about that eventually reveals to the others he's not just an immature jerk. He's a little kid in a world with no restraints on him.
• Griefer: Comes with the territory of being a Player Killer.
• Good Scars, Evil Scars: Presumably what's on his cheeks.
• Heel–Face Turn: After being a secondary antagonist and even aiding the Big Bad, Tsukasa's offer to be friends with him causes him to turn on Morganna and help out the good guys. Morganna puts him in a coma for it, leaving him trapped inside her enforcer Skeith for years, until the heroes of the first game series put a stop to her. And then there's the matter of his further character growth in his teenage years, ironically and unwittingly bringing Skeith along for the turn...
• Mind Rape: From Morganna when he betrays her by helping Tsukasa and Aura escape.
• Platonic Life-Partners: With Carl. Or at least he thinks so...
• The Rival: Eventually seems to regard the "old school" Crim as a nemesis.
• Tomato Surprise: You only find out he's a fourth grader in the last episode of SIGN, after Skeith data drains the poor kid and puts him in a coma for years.
• Too Clever by Half: One of The World's most powerful characters and skilled players, with maxed-out level and attributes, and he's fully aware of how good he is while being insufferably immature about it all.
• Younger Than He Looks: Has an adult avatar in the game, but is a young kid in real life.

.hack//Infection-Mutation-Outbreak-Quarantine and .hack//Liminality

Kite

Voiced by: Sayaka Aida (Japanese); Mona Marshall (English)

World Identity: A newbie Twin Blade, and the main character of the R:1 games. He's introduced to The World by his best friend Orca, who soon gets data-drained by Skeith. Kite receives the Twilight Bracelet from Aura before Skeith catches her, giving him the power to fight Morganna and her agents, and save Orca and Aura.

Real Identity: A junior high school student and best friend of Orca's player. Enjoys soccer and sci-fi literature.

Appears in: .hack//IMOQ, .hack//Legend Of the Twilight (cameo), .hack//Link, .hack//Versus

Tropes associated with him:

• Alliterative Name: One possible name for him is Kaito Kuramochi.
• All There in the Manual: There was a web novel released that's basically his version of Another Birth, going through a loose retelling of the games while delving into his real life self. An ongoing English translation of this novel can be found here.
• Audience Surrogate: You actually name Kite and his real-life self whatever you want to, as the games go out of their way to never say either name to make it easier for the player to self-insert. He's far from a blank slate, however. As an added bonus, importing your IMOQ save to the G.U. games results in Azure Kite's character data using your old save's name since Aura copied his data directly from R:1.
• Badass Bookworm: In the real world. He loves science fiction novels, and he has read his favorite ones "like a million times".
• Been There, Shaped History: By having his place alongside Orca and Balmung. And his character template was the most used by the newer generation players.
• Big Damn Heroes: To Tokio in .hack//Link.
• Blade Run: In .hack//Link.
• Brought Down to Badass: He and BlackRose destroy the bracelet to take down Cubia during the final bits of the story. He still succeeds in the end despite that.
• But Now I Must Go: Canonically, after the IMOQ series ended Kite's player would go on to study in various languages so he could travel the world abroad and meet many new people, all thanks to The World giving him the inspiration to. Explains why Natsume had a hard time following him in the seven years that followed.
• Calling Your Attacks: Every time he does Sansoenkon.
• Canon Name: According to some official archives, several proposals for his possible real name were Daichi, Riku, Kaito, and Yutaka (with the constant being the surname Kuramochi).
• The Captain: Of the Twilight Knights in .hack//Link.
• Chick Magnet: If BlackRose, Natsume and Ryoko Terajima are any indication. Cello in .hack//LINK also shows signs of having a crush on him after he saves her from a monster in X'over mission #3.
• Character Development: Subtle, but there in the IMOQ games. At the start of the story, he's Just a Kid and way in over his head with the greater Data Bug threat, Aura and Orca's coma. While he does push for solving the mysteries, he's notably hesitant and even somewhat scared in extreme circumstances even if he'll still dive right in to help someone. Seeing Skeith at the end of the first volume has him horrified as it Data Drains Aura before he resolves himself to settle the score, and witnessing Cubia for the first time leaves him in terrified silence. As the story progresses, and especially starting in volume two, Kite bucks up fast and starts being much more outwardly determined to save The World, no matter what Morganna and the Phases throw at him, nor does the growing instability of The World slow him down despite his guilt for the damages.
• Chronic Hero Syndrome: He takes time to help a lot of different people during his quest to save The World. On the plus side, it does get him a small army of grateful allies for the final battle.
• Composite Character: A strange example in that he's composed primarily of himself. In the fighting game .hack//Versus, he takes after various versions of himself across the continuity. His design is based off his original look from the first four PS2 games, and his normal attacks are based off the basic Twin Blade skills from those games. His standard battle pose is based off one of Azure Kite's poses from one of G.U.'s cutscenes, and his Exceed surrounds him in an aura of azure flames. Finally, his special skill during Exceed mode is Sansouenkon, Kite's signature attack from .hack//Link. For added effect, Ovan will have different reactions based on which version he's fighting against and whether or not it's the real thing.
• Deadly Upgrade: His Data Drain can either bring advantages or disadvantages to the party. In the worst case, it can induce a Game Over.
• Distressed Dude: In .hack//Link.
• Energy Bow: In his Xth Form in .hack//Link.
• Expy: Design-wise, Yoshiyuki Sadamoto said that he designed Kite's proportions based on Naruto.
• Featureless Protagonist: Played with. While Kite the character has a definite character, Kite the player was originally represented by the player (to the point where you can change his name if you wish).
• Giving the Sword to a Noob: The Data Drain bracelet is the "sword" here. Kite wasn't the first choice that Aura had to receive The Bracelet; it was actually Orca. Unfortunately, just before she was about to give it to him, Skeith Data Drained him, putting him into a coma. Kite (who literally had just logged into The World for the first time) was, for better or worse, the only other option Aura had before becoming Data Drained herself.
• Healing Hands Using Repth and its variation skills.
• The Hero: In addition to his role in the original games, he's considered to be a legendary hero in The World a decade after his exploits. He's constantly referenced in .hack//Versus by Ovan, who has different pre-battle quotes depending on whether he's fighting the real Kite or one of his expies.
• Innocent Blue Eyes: Lampshaded by Piros, who refers to Kite as "He of Fair Eyes".
• In the End, You Are on Your Own: During the climax of the Final Boss of the original tetralogy, Morganna-posessed Corbenik has used Drain Heart to take down the rest of the .hackers. After he's the last one left, as he's about to be Data Drained, he bum-rushes Corbenik to deliver the final blow.
• Kid Hero: Presumed about fourteen years old and in junior high, Kite's player is just a kid looking to have fun with his best friend before he gets wrapped up in The World's chaos. Despite his surprising rate of adapting to the role of a leader, reminders of his age show occasionally, like a cheeky comment or his responses in email conversations.
• Jack of All Stats: Twin Blades are capable of using magic and also attack with melee faster than other classes, but ultimately don't stack up to dedicated classes in their crafts and aren't exactly high on durability, either. Unlike Haseo, Kite actually plays this straight; the main reason he keeps up with other party members is because he's player-controlled and you'll probably gear him more efficiently than other characters do for themselves outside of gifts. There's also the Bracelet, which is able to rewrite the code of the game and helps contribute to Kite's capabilities. Without these boons, Kite would be fairly subpar. Later works play up his legend by making him so skilled a player that he makes up for his theoretical shortcomings.
• Lady and Knight: Knight to Aura's Lady. Even she acknowledged this.
• Legacy Character: He's the original. So far we have Kite himself, Shugo, Azure Kite, Sakuya, and Kite (Sora).
• Lightning Bruiser: In .hack//Link he evades all of Flugel's attack without problem.
• Love Dodecahedron: He doesn't realize he's in the middle of a Love Triangle between BlackRose and Terajima Ryoko. And there's Natsume on the side, who knows him in real life. The series never resolves who, if anyone, he ends up with, likely due to his Audience Surrogate nature.
• Marked Change: He initially wears olive green in-game. However, receiving the Key to the Twilight permanently changes his avatar to be wearing red with orange markings - said shade of red (and markings) aren't available for character creation when Kite receives it, and it shows that he's special within the game. Unfortunately for him, it also makes it look like he hacked his avatar to get an otherwise-illegal appearance, so CC Corp is out for him. At first.
• Meaningful Name: Two of his possible first names, Kaito and Daichi, have more meaning than they initial seem. Daichi means Earth, making him an unofficial Azure Earth to complement Balmung's Azure Sky and Orca's Azure Sea. On the other hand, Kaito, meaning Phantom Thief, references the game originally being a fantasy epic starring one (plus, it justifies his player name, as Kaito can be romanized as Kite).
• Mistaken Identity: In .hack//Versus where Haseo thought that he's Tri-Edge due to the uncanny resemblance.
• Nice Guy: He's kind, compassionate, and always willing to lend a hand to anyone who needs it.
• No Name Given: His player doesn't have an official name. Likewise, the in-universe reason why he calls his character Kite is never explained. According to official archives though, he was given possible names in the form of Daichi, Riku, Kaito, and Yutaka (with the constant being the surname Kuramochi).
• Playing with Fire: In his Super Mode.
• Red Baron: Kite the Azure Flame.
• Red Is Heroic: He's the only one in The World allowed to wear red (due to Aura's interference; otherwise, even he wouldn't), and he's the one she chose to save not just the game, but the entire Internet.
• Scarf of Asskicking: The legendary leader of the .hackers, and he has a stylish muffler on his avatar.
• Signature Move: Sansoenkon. Even copied by Ovan to accuse Azure Flame Kite to be Tri-Edge due to their similar appearance.
• Super Mode / Wreathed in Flames / Battle Aura: In azure flames in .hack//Versus.
• Sword and Fist: His combos in Versus also incorporates kicks alongside his slashes.
• Took a Level in Badass: Literally starts at level 1 in the first game, and rises up to be the number-one combatant against the challenges and threats that occur within R:1 games. There's a reason why he's got the longest-standing legacy in the entire franchise.
• The Unchosen One: Aura originally meant to give the Twilight Bracelet to Orca but then Orca got Data Drained, leaving Kite as her only other option.
• Wolverine Claws: Some of his weapons are these.

BlackRose

Voiced by: Masumi Asano (Japanese); Wendee Lee (English)

World Identity: An aggressive and confrontational Heavy Blade. She's new to the game, and after meeting Kite and hearing his story, quickly allies herself with him.

Real Identity: Akira Hayami, a young high school girl whose little brother also went comatose from playing The World. She's exceptionally talented at tennis, which got her placed on a team with jealous upperclassmen who bully her.

Appears in: .hack//IMOQ, .hack//Legend of the Twilight (cameo), .hack//Link, .hack//Versus

Tropes associated with her:

• Academic Athlete: In the real world. She likes physical sports, she loves swimming, and she also joins tennis club in her school.
• Breast Plate: It's part of her character model.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Her final attack in .hack//Versus.
• Deuteragonist: She's Kite's longest lasting party member (Orca doesn't count, since he got Data Drained in the beginning), his Second-In-Command and closest confidante, his possible Love Interest, and she's the star of the "Another Birth" novels (which retell the original tetralogy from her point of view).
• Expy: Of Mimiru, as their characters are based on the same MMORPG template. She even shares some of the same lines as Mimiru in an Ironic Echo; however the meanings behind them are completely different in context. She and Mimiru bicker about their characters resembling each other in Unison.
• Demoted to Extra: Subverted, she was actually planned to appear again in .hack//G.U., but due to time constraints and her indifferent look, the developers cancelled the idea. But if you still have the .hack//Quarantine save data, you will receive an e-mail from her.
• Friend to All Living Things: In the real world.
• Grin of Audacity: Can be seen in a flash in her final attack in Versus.
• Heroine of Another Story: The point of the "Another Birth" novels in a nutshell, they show the events of the first four games from her point of view.
• The Lancer: To Kite.
• Legacy Character: She's the original of which Rena and Mary's characters are based.
• Love Triangle: She and Ryoko immediately don't like each other and compete for Kite's affections (not that he realizes this). Amusingly, she seems to have no hard feelings whatsoever for Natsume by comparison, likely due to no attempt at competition and the pair becoming good friends.
• Meaningful Name: She chose it based on a recurring nightmare she'd been having.
• Mighty Glacier: Before Orca can come back to your party, she's the tank.
• Official Couple: In the G.U. games, Haseo can obtain a copy of a very old e-mail from BlackRose that was sent to Kite at the end of the R:1 series, where she confesses her feelings for him before proclaiming it was a joke. It's never confirmed if they did get together, however.
• Phony Veteran: BlackRose tries to pull this on Kite, but gets almost immediately shut down.
• P.O.V. Sequel: A series of novels known as "Another Birth" retell the games from her point of view.
• Spikes of Doom: In her Xth Form in .hack Link.
• Spin Attack: One of her attack in Versus.

Elk

Voiced by: Mitsuki Saiga (Japanese); Brianne Siddall (English)

World Identity: A Wavemaster who looks nearly identical to Tsukasa. He is very shy and socially withdrawn, and the only real friend he seems to have is Mia, without whom he is rarely seen.

Real Identity: Kaoru Ichinose, a middle school student. Just as socially awkward in real life as he is in The World, he mainly plays to make new friends. Later creates the character of Endrance in The World R2.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with him:

• Crazy Jealous Guy: He will do anything for Mia's sake and to stay by her side always. In Infection, he tricks Kite to come with him to an area alone to make give him the Bracelet to get Mia's attention back.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: Elk is very much obsessed with Mia, to the point where if you can't contact Mia to form a party, you probably can't add Elk. Very few exceptions exist.
• Grew a Spine: When he throws himself in the way of Corbenik's Drain Arc.
• Heroic BSoD: When Mia dies. Implied to have happened again, albeit offscreen, around five years after when Jyotaro Amagi deletes Mia in front of Elk's very eyes for the Restore Aura Plan, explaining his massive abandonment issues as Endrance.
• I Just Want to Have Friends: His whole reason for playing the game. Seen occasionally in some of his in-game quotes wandering around a field or dungeon, which are quite sweet and supportive considering how shy and nervous he is in most dialogue.
• Shrinking Violet: He's a rather shy and soft-spoken kid who signed up on the game to make friends.
• Took a Level in Badass: A Squishy Wizard Dandere in R:1, becomes an Arena Emperor and an Epitaph User in R:2.
• Undying Loyalty: To Mia.

Mia

Voiced by: Minami Takayama (Japanese); Debra Rogers (English games); Kari Wahlgren (English Unison and End of the World)

World Identity: A Blademaster who takes the form of an anthropomorphic, purple, female cat. Due to this unique character design, many believe that she is a hacker who extensively modified her avatar. She is very good friends with Elk, and has a fondness for a completely useless item called "Aromatic Grass". Is in actuality Macha, reincarnated after being Data Drained in SIGN.

Real Identity: None, as she's an AI disguised as a PC.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with her:

• Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Well, if you see her thoroughly.
• Back from the Dead: Aura recreates her after the end of Quarantine.
• Cat Folk: She looks like an anthropomorphic cat.
• Company Cross References: In the Japanese versions, Mia's weapon is called the "Kuronekodan no Ken" or "Black Cats Gang Sword." The Black Cats Gang is the main antagonistic group in Tail Concerto, the first game ever developed by CyberConnect2.
• Go Mad from the Revelation: A large portion of her scenes towards the end of Outbreak and the start of Quarantine are her acting drunk off the data bugs popping up everywhere. She also does NOT like the fact that she's a Phase.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: She remembers nothing about being Macha. Additionally, after she is reborn at the end of Quarantine, it is shown that she remembers Elk and nothing else.
• Mind Rape: Want to know why she's absent from GU? She was used as the template for the eight Epitaph PC's by Project GU... which meant that she underwent the digital equivalent of vivisection, and the Mia personality was Killed Off for Real. She still exists in the form of the Avatar Macha, however.
• Tomato in the Mirror: She's Macha, one of the Eight Phases.
• Yellow Eyes of Sneakiness: Fitting her catlike appearance.

Mistral

Voiced by: Atsuko Enomoto (Japanese); Sandy Fox (English)

World Identity: A very cheerful and somewhat childish Wavemaster who likes hunting rare items. Initially ignorant of the real purpose behind the conflict (even after fighting Skeith), she's just in it for fun and for seeing Kite use the Bracelet, by which she is fascinated.

Real Identity: Mayumi Kurokawa, a woman in her late 20s, pregnant with her first child. She and BlackRose form a friendship in the real world, after she stops playing out of fear for her baby, the future Mirielle. She returns for the finale but Balmung forces her to the sidelines for the final battle due to said pregnancy. Her husband is one of the security guards in Liminality. By the time of Legend of Twlight, she's quit her unspecified admin job to be a full time housewife.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games, .hack//Another_Birth .hack//Legend of the Twlight Braclet

Tropes associated with her:

• Cheerful Child: Her online persona.
• Cute Little Fangs: In .hack//Link.
• The Ditz: She always burns her dinner. Given that she's playing a game, this means she's leaving her cooking unwatched.
• Emoticon: Sometimes she uses these in her speech.
• Genki Girl: Very cheerful and optimistic.
• The Glomp: Give this to Tokio at the end of her Cross Rengeki.
• Hidden Depths: Her offline self is touched upon more in "Another Birth", a retelling of the games from BlackRose's point of view. The two strike up a friendship and later meet offline, leading to her becoming a Cool Big Sis type to BlackRose. She's shown here to be mature and dependable, a contrast to her online persona.
• Older Than She Looks: In the real world, she's a grown woman.
• Onee-sama: To BlackRose in "Another Birth".
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Kite knows immediately that Mistral is dealing with something major when she emails him at the beginning of Outbreak and the tone of said email is completely different from her usual self. He meets with her in-game and that's when she reveals that she's pregnant and she's taking a break because she doesn't want to risk being put in a coma with a child on the way.
• Put on a Bus: She's absent for all of Outbreak and most of Quarantine because she doesn't want to risk a coma while pregnant with her first child. She's Back for the Finale, rejoining the fight right before Corbenik is confronted, with her child now born.
• Something Only They Would Say: Near the end of "Legend of the Twilight", Mireille falls asleep, letting Mistral take over the character. Balmung identifies her by "Mireille's" sudden hidden depths and the minor differences in their online persona. She confirms it by calling him "Baltan", her nickname for him.

Piros

Voiced by:

World Identity: An overly dramatic Heavy Axeman.

Real Identity: Hiroshi Matsuyama, a graphics designer working for CyberConnect Corporation.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with him:

• Affectionate Parody: Of the real Hiroshi Matsuyama, president and CEO of the real CyberConnect2, and himself a graphics designer.
• Antiquated Linguistics: He often speaks like a character from a medieval fantasy story.
• Butt-Monkey: Always falls for Mia's trolling, resulting in his character model turning into a shade of color each time.
• Ink-Suit Actor: The Ragtime novel set during the G.U. era reveals that his real self looks exactly how Piros does here (albeit a skinny dude).
• Large Ham: He's over-the-top in his dialogue.
• Sitcom Archnemesis: To Mia
• Top-Heavy Guy: His top armor is ridiculously huge, and the way its opening for head is oriented, it makes him look like a Tiny-Headed Behemoth.

Natsume

Voiced by: Lia Sargent (English)

World Identity: A naive, brash Twin Blade.

Real Identity: Natsume Ogoro, a girl in her last grade of middle school that started playing The World to help overcome her social awkwardness. She knows Kite's player in reality.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with her:

• All Love Is Unrequited: It's never explained or spelled out, but it's heavily implied that BlackRose was the one that ended up with Kite, or at least in the best position to. Considering that seven years later she's supposedly become a Stalker with a Crush for him, it makes sense.
• Badass Normal: Kite and BlackRose have to rescue her at the bottom of a unique and particularly tough dungeon - which she soloed her way through up to that point.
• Eyes Always Closed: A part of her character model, seeing as A-20 is basically a palette swap. When this gets averted with Red Eyes, Take Warning in the R:2 games, series veterans were likely to be caught off-guard.
• Love Dodecahedron: She's in love with Kite, as is BlackRose and Terajima Ryoko, and would arguably have a leg up thanks to knowing him personally in real-life. Piros implies in the R:2 games that she became something of a Stalker with a Crush, though she feverently denies it.
• Naïve Everygirl: She's sweet but naïve and socially awkward.
• Optional Party Member: Kite gains her member address by following up on a request on The World's message board.
• Ship Tease: She clearly has a crush on Kite, and even confesses as much by the end of the R:1 games. Though at the same time, she also accidentally sends him a mail intended for BlackRose, where she admits that she feels like BlackRose is more liked by him than she is.

Gardenia

Voiced by: Yumi Touma (Japanese); Carolyn Hennesy (English)

World Identity: A Long Arm that loves flowers, and the target of a very energetic fanclub.

Real Identity: Her name is unknown, but she is a high school senior that's president of the Naginata club.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with her:

• Even the Girls Want Her: Her aforementioned fanclub has these admirers.
• Optional Party Member: Kite only gains her member address after helping her fan club deliver a letter to her.
• The Stoic: She's always speaks with an even tone.

Sanjuro

Voiced by: Yasunori Masutani (Japanese); Steven Jay Blum (English)

World Identity: A Heavy Blade following the path of the samurai, even though he's not Japanese.

Real Identity: A teacher of the Japanese language from South Dakota, who plays on the Japanese servers of The World to interact with fluent speakers and improve his own language skills.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with him:

• The Big Guy: In Legend of the Twilight, his stats plus his experience from the IMOQ games means he's this along with Ouka.
• Legacy Character: A weird one, as he's a recurring character and friend of Shugo later on in Legend of the Twilight, but one you have the possibility of skipping over entirely in the original IMOQ games.
• Occidental Otaku: An American who loves Japanese culture.
• Optional Party Member: Kite only gains his member address if he helps Sanjuro search for a rare katana in a dungeon.
• Pop-Cultured Badass: Email conversations with him reveal he has a love of Akira Kurosawa movies.

Nuke Usagimaru

Voiced by:

World Identity: A Long Arm showman.

Real Identity: Mr. Usagimaru is a young man that wants to be a stand-up comedian. He knows Rachel's player in reality. Following the events of Quarantine, they form a comedy duo called "New Creatures" that eventually becomes popular.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with him:

• Camp Straight: Acts rather flamboyantly and his avatar has pinkish hair and a brightly colored outfit, but he's presumably heterosexual.
• Large Ham: Comes with the territory of his desired profession.
• Optional Party Member: If Kite can stick it out for his entire show, Nuke thanks him with his member address.
• Plucky Comic Relief: Plays this role.

Rachel

Voiced by:

World Identity: A Blademaster that focuses on earning money.

Real Identity: A teenaged "freelancer", working part-time odd jobs, that wants to become an Editor in Chief of something just because she likes the title. She knows Nuke's player offline, and eventually forms the comedy duo "New Creatures" with him under the name Rei-chan.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with her:

• Optional Party Member: If Kite helps her settle a problem at a trading convention, she gratefully gives him her member address.
• Valley Girl: Speaks like one.

Moonstone

Voiced by:

World Identity: A Twin Blade that seldom speaks.

Real Identity: Although little is known of his offline self, he is as obsessed with becoming stronger in reality as he is in The World, setting an intense physical training regimen for himself.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with him:

• Optional Party Member: One connected to other optional characters, at that. If Kite sees him while journeying with Nuke, Rachel and Gardenia, he'll send Kite a message with a dungeon to check out along with his member address.
• The Quiet One: Usually is this. When he does talk, it's in short and blunt sentences.

Marlo

Voiced by:

World Identity: A gruff Blademaster.

Real Identity: A Junior High School student that doesn't enjoy becoming attached to others, feeling that he can't be his true self around other people. Little else is known about him, as he prefers keeping his online and offline identities separate.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with him:

• Jerkass: Is often hostile and rude to others.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: One of his sidequests has him lead Kite to a room full of chests with powerful items in them. He lets Kite have all of them, no strings attached, and all of them are completely safe to open.
• Optional Party Member: He issues a challenge over The World's message board. If Kite takes him up on it, he forgets why he issued it and gives his member address in consolation.

Wiseman

Voiced by: Steve Blum (English)

World Identity: A powerful Wavemaster who is well-known as an information broker and trader of rare items. After getting caught up in Kite's quest, he becomes one of the strategists of the group, often coordinating their plans with Lios and Helba, though he will fight on the front lines if asked to.

Real Identity: Takumi Hino, an elementary school student, in stark contrast with his very mature, knowledgeable online self. Plays soccer and collectible card games, and does not like carrots. Later goes on to create several characters in R2: Naobi, Yata, and Nala.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with him:

• Knowledge Broker: Has a great deal of information contacts, including Helba, and quite possibly knows more about the Epitaph of Twilight than any other single person.
• The Strategist: It's him who comes up with the ideas for the group's offensive tactics against the Wave.
• Wise Beyond His Years: Is an elementary school student in real life, but has the persona of an old knowledgeable sage in the game.
• Younger Than He Looks: His in-game avatar is an old man, but he's actually a young kid in the real world.

Terajima Ryoko

Voiced by:

World Identity: A female Heavy Axeman. She is a relatively new player by the time she meets Kite and quickly becomes infatuated with him after receiving assistance.

Real Identity: Terajima Ryoko is a Junior at the all-girl Saiba High School.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with her:

• All Love Is Unrequited: She clearly has a crush on Kite, but he doesn't notice it.
• Expy: Her design is clearly based on Subaru's.
• Optional Party Member: She issues a request on the message board that Kite can accept. When they escape from the dungeon together, she gratefully shares her member address.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: Is the latter to BlackRose's former.

Lios

Voiced by: Tomomichi Nishimura (Japanese), Bob Papenbrook (English)

World Identity: The head system administrator of The World. His avatar is an NPC shopkeeper, although, being an admin, he has numerous powers unavailable to anyone else, such as the ability to outright delete AI and character data. He is highly distrustful of Kite and especially Helba, but very reluctantly joins them after he's convinced that they are working to fix the problem, rather than aggravate it.

Real Identity: Unknown, although it is known he is an employee at CC Corp.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games

Tropes associated with him:

• Enemy Mine: Although Lios is definitely on the heroes' side, he sees his partnership with Helba as this, since she is an illegal hacker and exactly the kind of person he's supposed to oppose.
• Malicious Misnaming: Helba seems to take great delight in taunting Lios, often referring to him as "the pig-head". Other characters (including, hilariously, Balmung) start calling him this from time to time as well, to his consternation.
• Meaningful Name: He is named for the King of Light described in the Epitaph of Twilight, also known as Apeiron. In the story of the Epitaph, the King of Light is forced to ally with the Queen of Darkness, Helba, in order to combat the Cursed Wave. Helba (the PC) amusedly notes the similarities of their situation to those described in the Epitaph when they first team up to oppose Morganna. He seems unaware of this meaning until Helba tells him and it is hinted that CC Corp assigned the name to him.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: He's naturally suspicious of anything in the game that isn't under his control, but once he realizes the situation proves to be one of the greatest allies the heroes could ask for.

Sieg

Voiced by: Takahiro Sakurai (Japanese), Anthony Pulcini (English)

World Identity: A powerful and popular Blademaster seeking to surpass the "Descendants of Fianna" in fame. While showing the game to his girlfriend Mai, he's attacked and data drained by Skeith.

Real Identity: Tomonari Kasumi, a high school boy. He runs his school's gaming club and appears to be a fairly ordinary kid. He later goes on to create Kuhn in The World R:2.

Appears in: .hack//Liminality

Tropes associated with him:

• Meaningful Name: He named his character "Sieg" to express his intent to dominate Balmung. In Richard Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung, Siegfried is the hero and Balmung is his sword.
• Unknown Rival: Balmung's one of the few high-level characters who's never heard of Sieg.

8 Phases in General

Your guess is as good as ours.

World Identity: The Eight Phases as spoken of in the "Epitaph of Twilight" are the agents of the Cursed Wave that threatens all. For whatever purpose Harald originally created them, Morganna has usurped them to serve as her own agents. Each takes the form of an unbeatable game monster, some with literally indescribable appearances. In order, they are:

• Skeith, the Terror of Death
• Innis, the Mirage of Deceit
• Magus, the Propagation
• Fidchell, the Prophet
• Gorre, the Machinator
• Macha, the Temptress
• Tarvos, the Avenger
• Corbenik, the Rebirth

Real Identity: Themselves. As they are virtual entities, they don't physically exist in the real world.

Appears in: Sign (Macha, and Skeith, briefly), R1 Games, Roots (sort of), GU, Link

(For tropes associated with Macha, see Macha in the Sign section and Mia above in this section. For Skeith and Corbenik, see below.)

• Alien Geometries: A recurring thing with the Eight Phases is that they can be summed up as very, very odd shapes, some less than others. Upon being Data Drained, they also appear as an arrangement of Epitaph Stones that vaguely resemble their silhouettes.
• Badass Boast: Fidchell likes declaring these with each of his strongest attacks.
  "All will be flayed alive by my electric fury."
  "All will burn by the fires of hell."
  "All will freeze by the biting chills of my wrath."
  "All will tremble under my terrible will."
• Battle Intro: The only bosses to have these, and boasting some of the most unnerving boss intros at that.
• The Blank: Only Macha averts this by having anything resembling a proper face. Skeith and Tarvos's "facial features" are holes punctured through their faces, Magus is in a similar boat but to a point they likely aren't at all, Fidchell and Innis barely have anything resembling heads and their eyes feel inanimate. Gorre subverts this; initially they are flat tablets, but grow faces when they talk or attack.
• Boss Banter: Fidchell and Gorre do this, though the others remain silent or simply make weird noises.
• Defeating the Undefeatable: Literally, in the games, since all of these guys have infinite HP. Of course, there's a way around that.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Skeith for Infection, Magus for Mutation, Gorre for Outbreak, and Corbenik as Final Boss proper for Quarantine.
• Eldritch Abomination: Not to the same extent as Cubia, but they're definitely Eldritch when you consider how much they break The World when they're around. Helps that they usually look extremely bizarre, too.
• Eye Motifs: The sole unifying trait of them all is they have at least one eye somewhere on their body to represent Morganna.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Fidchell and Gorre talk in deep voices, especially the former. Innis and Tarvos don't speak but still have very low and guttural vocalizations.
• Eyes Do Not Belong There: The symbol for Morganna is an eye, so all of the Phases have eyes on them; Gorre is the only one who has them in a normal place, though how they show up sure isn't.
• Flunky Boss: Innis subverts this. Despite having 3 variations of it's Invisible Doll attack that summons different monsters, they're launched at targets for unavoidable damage instead.
• For Doom the Bell Tolls: Not quite a church bell, but there's a specific melody of bells that plays in all of their themes.
• Hell Is That Noise: The static from the corruption of The World heralds their appearances, something actively acknowledged by Kite (and later Black Rose) when Skeith and Innis show up. Their intros also all have static at various points, but in particular they open up with the Game Over sound effect.
• Hope Crusher: Fidchell serves as one. In line with it's role as the Prophet, it speaks of a doomed future to destroy spirits. When fighting Kite's group, it talks strictly in intimidating quotes, and upon defeat recites a nihilistic excerpt of the Epitaph of Twilight that confuses and unnerves Kite.
• Leitmotif: Rather, a unifying instrument and progression - all of the Eight Phases, in their battle themes, have a frenetic bell playing at some point.
• Meaningful Name:
  • The keywords for the levels featuring one of the Phases are connected to the Phase in question. Some are more obvious before the fight, while others make more sense in retrospect.
  • Additionally, some of them have actual meaning from where they get their names from.
    • Skeith is named after the Skeith Stone, a mysterious carved stone close to Kilrenny, a village in Fife, Scotland. Notably, one part of the stone has a cross carved into it.
    • Innis is either derived from the Old Irish word inis (meaning either "island" or "tell"), or the Latin word inanis (meaning "empty").
    • Magus is derived from the Latin word magus.
    • Fidchell is named after fidchell, a board game of Celtic origin, the board (of the same name) being the design basis for Fidchell.
    • Gorre is named after Gore, a place in Arthurian legend ruled by King Urien.
    • Macha translates to "plains," and is also a sovereignty goddess associated with the province of Ulster.
    • Tarvos, which means "bull," is also the namesake of the divine figure Tarvos Trigaranus.
    • Corbenik is named after Corbenic, the castle in which the Holy Grail is kept.
• Mind Rape: All of them are capable of using Data Drain; on a human target, this can put them in a coma. It's suggested that Kite's Twilight Bracelet mitigates the effects of it on him and his party, merely halving their HP and afflicting them with every status ailment.
• Monster of the Week: Aside from Skeith, and to a lesser extent Macha and, ultimately, Corbenik, all the phases are like this.
• Our Monsters Are Weird: As stated above, these are just about the most bizarre-looking things ever, and their behavior matches to boot.
  • Skeith is easily the least esoteric, being a rather thin and silent golem. Even so, calling him humanoid would be a disservice, given his floating body parts that consist of segmented arms and rod-like legs, and a featureless head save for black holes punctured through it, and a pair of thin, asymmetrical horns. Morganna's eyes are also dotted in orange around his thighs, shoulders, forearms and chest. Skeith also carries around a large, red cross-like weapon that he both uses as a sword and crucifies people with to restrain them.
  • Innis is a wall, one that seems haphazardly lifted off from an ancient building and black, nondescript murals plastered over it, the only consistent ones outling eye shapes on it. A large hole is also prominent on Innis, which very vaguely resembles a horned humanoid like Skeith, with which one of Morganna's eyes hovers above. Innis actually does vocalize too, making low gurgling sounds and being capable of using illusions to make copies of itself.
  • Magus is a rod-like being of stone with nothing more than a sphere with holes for a head, and six pairs of leaf-like wings with Morganna's eyes on them, resulting in a very vaguely plant-like or insectoid thing that flies low to the ground and drops its leaves that eventually unleash a massive attack. The wings are purely decorational too, considering it still hovers around even when they're all deployed.
  • Fidchell is, at least according to Black Rose, mask-like, describing the orange, ornate wheel with yin & yang symbols that serve as eyelids for four eyes, and extending from it is a rock-like mass with tubes that vaguely give the impression of a tail or kanji, the end of which having another wheel which it uses Data Drain from. Fidchell is the first Phase that can outright talk, speaking in a slow and deep voice and a purported doomsayer.
  • Gorre are a pair of flat, floating oblong-shaped tablets that display symbols resembling Fidchell and Macha and a vaguely reptilian being below it. These tablets can also grow a pair of faces, with large yellow eyes and a row of sharp, chattering teeth set deep in their mouths. They also talk in deep, brutish voices with eachother, finishing their statements like Single-Minded Twins.
  • Macha has a female form from the stomach up, albeit one that looks decidedly off with natural gloves, cat ears and soulless eyes. Below that, though, is nothing but a large "dress" of her skin that furls around her into an onion shape and is covered in eyes. Macha sings the same melody in a voice layered through plenty of vibrato, and whose identity had been masked for the longest time, leading to a rather unsettling transformation into her Phase self.
  • Tarvos is another being of stone, albeit one with a worm or snake-like shape whose face (which consists only of three empty holes) cries and vomits blood, and who has six eyes of Morganna on his middle section. Most strikingly is a large stake punctured through it's head and midsection, which can remove itself to fly at and strike someone. Tarvos also communicates - and it's entirely in loud, angry screaming.
  • Corbenik is.. a lot. Initially, it starts out as nothing more than a bean-shaped plant seed with eight eye spots lining its sides, before it grows out into a large dry leaves that entirely replace it's older form. In his final form, he follows up all the Eye Motifs - by manifesting as nothing but large eyes surrounded in darkness, floating around a space that can only described as a brown, chaotic skybox. Morganna's direct involvement is implied to be the reasoning why it appears as such.
  • Becoming Avatars in G.U. somewhat fixes this, with all of them having more humanoid forms resembling their Epitaph PCs. Macha, in particular resembles Mia with a veil and a giant rose for a skirt. Their aesthetics also look more clean and colorful.
• Non-Indicative Name: Tarvos means "bull," yet manifests as a snake.
• One-Hit Kill: Two of them.
  • Magus's Death and Rebirth becomes an entire Total Party Kill if allowed to set up.
  • Tarvos has a more traditional, single target OHKO move, but the target cannot avoid it.
• Percent Damage Attack: Thanks to the Bracelet, Data Drain when used by the Eight Phases against Kite and his group is rendered a current HP-halving attack, albeit one that also applies every status in the game.
• Red Baron: Each Phase has its own epithet beyond its actual name. Skeith, the Shadow/Terror of Death is the most memorable for most folks.
• Sinister Geometry: Most of them are best described as floating objects that barely look like they even serve a purpose for anything.
• Theme Naming: They're all named after something at least somewhat of Irish/Celtic or Latin origin, as detailed above.
• This Cannot Be!: Gorre reacts this way upon defeat.
  "NO! I CAN'T, I CAN'T, I CAN'T!"
  "Why me? Why me? How..?"
• Total Party Kill: Magus' Death and Rebirth attack will instantly kill Kite's party if none of his leaves are destroyed before they detonate.
• Wings Do Nothing: Downplayed. Magus's boat oar-like wings certainly do something, and something deadly at that, but it doesn't need them to fly.

Skeith

Voiced By: Takahiro Sakurai (JP, G.U.) Yuri Lowenthal (EN, G.U.)

The Terror of Death, the first of the Phases encountered.

• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Sort of overlapping with You Don't Look Like You, Skeith is massive in SIGN.
• The Bad Guy Wins: From the start, Skeith's objective was to Data Drain Aura, which would've normally been game, set and match for the story, and he manages to achieve this at the end of Infection. He also brutally shut down Tsukasa at the end of SIGN and was all but unopposed by even the strongest of The World's players — until Kite finally confronts him with his own Bracelet to use Data Drain. The following games then have the heroes working damn hard to undo the proverbial wildfire that Skeith had kickstarted.
• Breakout Villain: Easily one of the most well remembered things from the series, as the single, lone but scarily ruthless Phase in both SIGN and Infection. He went on to become the Avatar of choice by Haseo in G.U., and shown up in more material than any of the other Phases, even getting to show up in Project X Zone 2: Brave New World.
• Cannibalism Superpower: As stated, Skeith's power in his third form comes from having devoured a piece from each of the other Phases, represented by his sword wings. This is significant when this causes Skeith and Haseo to become a Key of Twilight, both recreating Cubia and establishing contact with Aura.
• Climax Boss: He has the most lead-in of all the Phases, and is the final boss of the first game.
• Cross Attack: His main weapon in R1 was the Red Wand, a staff with a celtic cross on the top. It was bowlderized into a line in the western versions.
• Dark Is Evil: For the same reasons explained down in the Names to Run Away from Really Fast example.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Slowly averted along with Haseo, taken to its logical conclusion by doing away with the dark Grim Reaper color scheme altogether.
• Disc-One Final Boss: A literal case, as he's the Final Boss of the first game, and especially if you take all of R1 as one game split between four discs (which it technically is). Skeith also tics all the other boxes, as up until his defeat and the sudden surprise appearance of Cubia paving the way for the rest of the story, he serves as the personal motivation for Kite to press on, turned Tsukasa into a Lost One, and even Data Drains Aura, but no hints had been dropped yet of the bigger picture.
• Don't Fear the Reaper: Downplayed as Avatar Skeith. He hasn't really changed, and Haseo initially isn't that great, but Skeith fights on behalf of The Hero.
• The Dreaded: A universally feared Hero Killer in all of his appearances. His cross so much as showing up in Quarantine causes Kite to instantly have flashbacks to when Skeith killed Aura and audibly sounds terrified.
• Final Boss: Of Infection, but for the R1 games as a whole, he's a mere Climax Boss.
• Fusion Dance: In Reconnection with Corbenik. The design is surprisingly similar to Omegamon.
• Grim Reaper: Ovan even refers to Skeith as such.
• The Heavy: Skeith is the one phase that, due to rendering Orca comatose, is a direct Arch-Nemesis to Kite, and it's the Final Boss, and only fought phase, in Infection.
• Hero Killer: Though technically none of his victims were outright 'killed', he still fulfilled this role in the eyes of the cast; he served as Morgana's method of punishing Tsukasa and Sora, and also took down Sieg, Carl and Orca among other characters that he personally Data Drained. It was pretty much assured that every time Skeith appeared, someone was going down, and Aura ends up being his last victim in his last appearance - which causes no small amount of hell for the heroes for the rest of the R1 games.
• Humanoid Abomination: Barely, but he's much more human-shaped than the rest of the Phases, his horns and segmented arms notwithstanding.
• Light Is Not Good: Downplayed in Redemption. At this point, Skeith and Haseo have become united, so the former no longer goes berserk and now has an angelic form.
• Mid-Season Upgrade: For Haseo, as he awakens Skeith in his 2nd Form. Skeith himself gets this when Haseo gains his 3rd Form.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: "The Terror of Death"? And even Skeith's basic name means "shadow" in Old Scottish.
  • He's also known as the "Shadow of Death" in the epitaph. And to go one further, the area he resides in has the keywords "Chosen Hopeless Nothingness." Must be a nice place, right?
• Pintsized Powerhouse: Avatar Skeith is oddly the smallest of the Phases in G.U. This is probably to emphasize the typical size dissonance between playable character and boss monster.
• Power Gives You Wings: His third transformation, upon Haseo gaining his Xth Form, renders him as a bizarre angel-of-death-like form. His wings come in the form of seven (eight in the official artwork) swords, each representing the pieces of the other seven Phases he's Data Drained.
• Promoted to Playable: In the R2 games, kinda.
• Red Is Heroic: Though he's absolutely not this at first, he becomes genuinely heroic thanks to Haseo's influence.
• Screaming Warrior: During his fight with his brother Magus in Rebirth, once Haseo loses control of him, Skeith starts roaring and savagely beats Magus and Kuhn to an inch of their lifes until he finishes him off with a Data Drain, to Haseo's utter horror.
• Sinister Scythe: Averted in the R1 games, as his weapon is a large wand with a Celtic cross, (altered to be Q-shaped in the English versions). Played straight in his G.U. incarnation, to further emphasize the theme of death that both he and Haseo embody. While Skeith the 3rd no longer has a physical scythe, he can conjure an energy one.
• Split-Personality Merge: Apparently with Sora, and then eventually with Haseo.
• Suddenly Voiced: Audibly proclaims "I have found you!" when Haseo awakens him, with the other exception(s) being Fidchell and possibly Innis. Later on, he reappears before Haseo in a white version of his 3rd Form, but speaks in a manner not unlike Sora. It's heavily implied to actually be Sora, or rather the fragments of his data and Ryo/Haseo's memories absorbed by Skeith.
• Super Mode: His third form, However it's closer to being an 11th-Hour Superpower, as it's only playable against Cubia's outer shell.
  • He later gets the even more powerful Unison form by fuaing with Corbenik.
• Superpowered Evil Side: For most of Rebirth, he's this to Haseo, prone to going out of control as Haseo abuses his power.

Corbenik

• 11th-Hour Superpower: Supreme Defense and Drain Heart
• Final Boss: Of the R1 games and Reminisce.
  • Climax Boss: Of Redemption.
• Eldritch Abomination: His R1 forms are the weirdest of all the Phases. His first form looks like a peanut-shaped seed, the second resembles a dry leaf with holes and his Final Boss form is a set of disembodied eyes with metallic pupils.
• Fusion Dance: In Reconnection with Skeith. The design is surprisingly similar to Omegamon.
• Kaizo Trap: Plot-wise, after losing, he unleashes Drain Heart and would have hit everyone, Kite included, and put them all in comas had not Elk intervened.
• Marathon Boss: Thought the bosses took long enough? Corbenik is basically three in a row, with cutscenes every now and then.
• Nigh-Invulnerable: Notably, he averts this trope, unlike every other boss besides Cubia. Then he puts Supreme Defense up...
• Red Right Hand: The extra arm Ovan grew after Tri-Edge/Kusabira infected him also carries over to Corbenik, resulting in the Phase having three arms, with the AIDA arm being bigger than the others. It grows to encompass his entire left arm into a giant Arm Cannon in the rematch.
• Sequential Boss: Three forms.
• Villain Override: It's implied Morganna hijacked him after his Supreme Defense was destroyed.

Cubia

Nightmare Fuel at its finest.

World Identity: An inexplicable destructive phenomenon often taking the form of a massive skull-faced, somewhat shapeless monster. Called an "anti-existence", it's a shadow born of the light of the Key of the Twilight, with proportionate power. Cubia is created from the use of the Twilight Bracelet in the R:1 games, and from Haseo's Xth form with fully-powered Avatar in the G.U. games. Takes a player-character form in both XXXX and LINK.

Real Identity: None, though Cubia's existence wreaks havoc throughout the internet.

Appears in: .hack//R1 Games, .hack//GU, .hack//XXXX. .hack//LINK

Tropes associated with him:

• Adaptational Heroism: The version of Cubia in the XXXX (pronounced X-Fourth) manga is one of the protagonists. He doesn't want to work under Morganna, and he desires the bracelet in order to Screw Destiny.
• Dark Is Evil: Definitely associated with darkness, to the point where it's commonly, and aptly, referred to as a shadow to the Key of Twilight, whatever form it may be in. Not to mention how it seems to really like skulls. Also, some attacks it uses in G.U. definitely seem to revolve around darkness motifs.
• Eldritch Abomination: Cubia, aka Cybernetic Cthulhu, aka D-Reaper on digital steroids. While many things in the .hack// series look bizarre, Cubia has a definite Eldritch feel to it. And that there is just one of several forms it takes. Some are alien, and others are just plain wrong.
• Evil Counterpart: In G.U. to Haseo's Xth Form.
• Facial Markings: In his PC form.
• Final Boss: Of the R2 games.
• Heel–Face Turn: As his PC form.
• Hijacked by Ganon: In G.U., Cubia awakens after Ovan, the Big Bad, is defeated, taking Corbenik with him.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: "The Anti-Existence"
• Nice Guy: In his PC form.
• Nigh-Invulnerability: It cannot be killed. Period. Not while the Key of Twilight exists. Problem is, the Key is usually what the heroes are relying on to solve whatever crisis is afoot this time.
• Outside-Context Problem: A recurring one at that. In the original games, Cubia's existence was not discovered until the end of the first game, where it literally just appeared with no warning. Even learning how it came into being doesn't help the heroes that much. In the G.U. games, it only appears after Ovan's master plan was achieved and it once again was an unintended side effect that not even he could see coming. It is subverted in the Terminal Disc for G.U., however, where stopping another Cubia from appearing was the reason Jun Bansyoya sabotaged the original Project G.U. by stealing Tarvos, though sadly it led to a whole list of other problems.
• Sinister Scythe: In his PC form in LINK.
• Raven Hair, Ivory Skin: In his PC form.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: In G.U.
• Supernatural Gold Eyes: In R:1 games.

Mai Minase

Voiced by: Sanae Kobayashi (Japanese); Michelle Ruff (English)

World Identity: Sieg(2), a copy of her boyfriend's character (see above) as well as her own unseen character.

Real Identity: A high school girl with no interest in video games, she was nonetheless convinced to give The World a try by her boyfriend. She went comatose along with him while playing, but woke up several days later. She joins Tokuoka as they search for clues about the coma victims in the real world.

Appears in: .hack//Liminality

Tropes associated with her:

• Big Ol' Eyebrows: An usual example of a female sporting these. Noticeable, but rarely mentioned in the OVAs.
• The Cameo: She appears in G.U.'s Crimson VS mode as the Melody Pursuer card.
• Chekhov's Hobby: Her training as a musician allows her to discern a tone that sounds whenever a Phase is about to show up. It was hearing this sound that forewarned her of Skeith's approach and allowed her to avoid the worst of the Data Drain.
• Cross Player: She controls Sieg(2).
• Hero of Another Story: She's the protagonist of the Liminality OVAs, which run concurrent to the R1 games.
• Knight in Shining Armor: Her online persona.

Junichiro Tokuoka

Voiced by: Masashi Ebara (Japanese); Jamieson Price (English)

World Identity: Tokuoka does not have a character in The World, however, due to his work for CC Corp he is familiar with almost all aspects of the game and knows many backdoors into the game's system.

Real Identity: A 34-year-old divorcee who has worked for CC Corp. He becomes concerned when several players of The World begin falling into comas and decides to investigate.

Appears in: .hack//AI Buster, .hack//ZERO, .hack//Liminality, .hack//Another Birth

Tropes associated with him:

• Mistaken for Pedophile: His approaching Mai, a high-schooler, does get him nearly branded a creep, but once it's clear that isn't the case, Mai quickly teams up with him.
• Must Have Nicotine: Is a habitual smoker throughout the OVA series.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: Despite being warned by CC Corp not to look too much into why several players of The World were falling into comas, he persisted, all the while knowing the danger it could put him in.

Cyber Connect, or "CC Corp"

World Identity: None, although G.U. represents admins as these statue-like robed figures whenever they check on Yata.

Real Identity: The company that manages The World. While they are supposed to be in charge for maintaining the stability of the world, more often than not, they end up causing more problems than solving them, not to mention hampering the actual progress of those who actually have the power to help. To say they are negligent, results-oriented, and saving their own hinds are understatements...

Appears in: All media in one form or another.

Tropes associated with them:

• Corrupt Corporate Executive: SWEET MERCIFUL AURA ARE THEY EVER!!! Across the franchise, they've gotten in the way of the heroes for the flimsiest of reasons, only caring about simplistic and FAST results, and what benefits THEM. They were willing to shut down the servers during the .hackers' battle against Corbenik, just to be rid of the problem, unknowing, but likely uncaring that doing so would have doomed the six comatose players. Jun Bansyoya lays out his frustration of their callousness and greed in his Apocalyptic Log, especially when he details the events of the original games.
  • The very existence of The World R:2 is a result of this, as rather than attempt to restore the lost data of The World, they simply just reworked it into an initially very shoddy new game, to much outrage, full of errors that needed constant maintenance.
• Company Cross References: Cyber Connect also appears in Solatorobo: Red the Hunter (their logo can be seen in The Futzu Tower), implying that they are one of the reasons why that game's Earth had to go through a Reset.
• Greater-Scope Villain: Though they aren't active villains, an astounding amount of grief and frustration could have been avoided by numerous characters across the franchise had they not been such corrupt, negligent, and greedy bastards.
• Head-in-the-Sand Management: What else do you call replacing Yata, who was making slow but significant progress in solving the AIDA crisis, and who they SPECIFICALLY got BECAUSE was a former .hacker and a literal hacker and information broker, as leader of Project G.U. with an obviously AIDA-infected and completely megalomanaical Sakaki because they weren't seeing eye-to-eye with him and they'd given up trying to solve the crisis and just fob off all responsibility to a ten-year-old who claims to control it!?. That's just ONE example. This is on top of covering up numerous comatose patients and making scapegoats out of individuals to deflect blame from themselves like Kazushi Watarai (Albireo), Jun Bansyoya, and Masato Indou (Ovan). Plus, they seem to be hellbent on covering up the role and existence of the .hackers, specifically Kite and BlackRose, simply because of the former's illegal nature.
  • Didn't Think This Through: One consequence of the above trope. Best example probably has to be specific example above, as it becomes clear to them that Sakaki's methods, such as the PK Tournament, are not doing any more good, but they have no one else other than themselves to blame for giving him the power to do so, as he effectively has them by the balls. Future installments, however, show they didn't learn from this at all.
• Self-Deprecation: CC Corp is obviously a stand-in for the real company CyberConnect2, even using their old pre-2001 name, and yet they are consistently portrayed as some of the worst aspects of Japanese corporations, so it must be this trope. It's also telling that Piros, based on the real company's president, Hiroshi Matsuyama, is portrayed as one of the heroes, but is simply a graphic designer (his job prior to being president), not even any kind of executive.

.hack//Zero

Carl

World Identity: A female Heavy Axemen who runs into Aura and Skeith/Sora, who eventually Data Drains her for protecting Aura.

Real Identity: Junka Nimura, Junichiro Tokuoka's daughter. She lives with her mother and grandmother and her father is only referred to as "Mr. T"

Appears in: .hack//Zero

Tropes associated with her:

• Battle Ballgown: Black one.
• Blood Knight: She enjoys destruction and chaos wherever she goes. Anyone?
• The Corrupter: She plays the game to spread some ill will to The World.
• Can't Spit It Out: It seems that she slowly develop feelings for Sora. But until her story ends, she has no chance to tell him that she likes him, also because Sora was already Data-Drained by Skeith.
• Damsel in Distress: In .hack//Link, Tokio must save her from Skeith
• Deadpan Snarker: To anyone else, except... Sora.

.

• Good Is Not Nice: She PK's whoever annoys her. But she didn't have pleasure to do it.
• Leitmotif: "Carl's Theme". Can be obtained in .hack//G.U. as the desktop BGM once you cleared Redemption. The song also appears for some boss battles' BGM in .hack//Link. [[spoiler: The song was actually contains Carl's feelings to Sora, but Sora never notices her feelings.
• Perpetual Frowner: ALL of her official artworks depicts her as this.
• Person of Mass Destruction: See above.
• Platonic Life-Partners: With Sora. But then, subverted.

.hack//Legend of the Twilight Knights

Shugo

Voiced by: Junko Minagawa (Japanese); Bryce Papenbrook(English)

World Identity: He retains his real name even in The World; he's only in it for fun...at first...

Real Identity: A middle school kid who gets roped into playing the game by his twin sister, Rena. He finds himself whisked into a plot set by by Aura near the end of R:1 after he finds Aura's daughter, Zefie, and is accused of being an illegal player.

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet.

Tropes associated with him:

• Ascended Fanboy: In his backstory, he did say he always wanted to be a hero... To Aura. Who set the whole situation up to fulfill this and to keep herself from getting bored.
• Big Brother Instinct: For Rena. Balmung and especially Komiyan can just keep the Hell away.
• Blessed with Suck: Aura resurrects him and gives him a Data Drain bracelet at the beginning of the story. It rarely works for him and actually attracts the attention of the Cobalt Knights, which causes all sorts of crap for him and his team.
• Chick Magnet: Downplayed. He's surrounded by beautiful girls, all of whom have affection for him (though not necessarily romantic), but in Komiyan's head this gets exaggerated — he imagines Shugo lying around like some pimp while all the other girls fawn over him. And then there's Aura and Zefie, who've both kissed him. (Yes, that Aura kissed him).
• Chivalrous Pervert: His first real moment of interest in the game is when he realizes that female character models use bump-mapping. While he initially expresses dismay at how skimpy Rena's outfit is, he has less of a problem indulging in the odd fanserviced-up vision of her in his own head (one can surmise that he's more attracted to her character model than the actual her). It helps that he's on a team full of beautiful women.
• Dismotivation: His primary character trait in the beginning is his desire to simply just make it barely through life. The entire manga is largely about getting him out of this slump.
• Divergent Character Evolution: In LINK, to differentiate himself from Kite beyond being a kid version of him, his hat is baggier, and his Anime Hair is curved. He also otherwise lacks the alterations to Kite's LINK design. Also, even before he gets it in the story, Shugo permanently has the nut-like Twilight Bracelet front and center, just to be absolutely clear which character this is.
• Dual Wielding: He's a Twin-blade player.
• Expy: Of Kite, which is obvious since he won Kite's character design.
• Flanderization: In the manga, he's less than thrilled about Rena's skimpy outfit, but after he gets used to the World, he's more or less content to indulge in the Fanservice surrounding him (even a little from her). In the anime, they ramp up the Brother-Sister Incest Subtext by making him enamored with her.
• Got Volunteered: He never really wanted to play the game, has little enthusiasm for it except for his own prurient interests. And then he got killed by a Level 40 Golem within his first ten minutes of gameplay, got resurrected by Aura and given the Data Drain bracelet.
• Jumped at the Call: Inverted. See Got Volunteered above.
• The One Guy: And informally the leader at that.
• Took a Level in Badass: This keeps pace with his Character Development throughout the manga.
  Ouka: Quite the stud all of a sudden, isn't he?

Rena

Voiced by: Mai Nakahara (Japanese); Allison Keith (English)

World Identity: Retains her real name. She plays what appears to be a chibi-fied version of Blackrose She just wanted to spend more time with her brother. And then Zefie came into the picture... Unlike Shugo she's an experienced player, having previously played a Blade Master named Bridget.

Real Identity: A middle school kid who gets her brother to join The World after she wins limited edition costumes of the dot hackers Kite and Blackrose. See Shugo for more details.

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet.

Tropes associated with her:

• Ascended Fangirl
• Clingy Jealous Girl: A platonic variant, as she's a bit teed that her brother is thinking more about Zefie than about spending time with her. The "platonic" part is questionable in the anime.
• Damsel in Distress: In the anime adaptation, when she falls into a coma.
• Divergent Character Evolution In LINK, to differentiate herself from BlackRose beyond being a kid version of her, she has a dark purple rose on her choker, and a braid on her right side. Her breastplate is also simpler in design, more like a Chainmail Bikini top and lacking the gold ornament on the top of each plate.
• Expy: Of Blackrose, which is obvious since she won Blackrose's character design.
• Fanservice: As skimpy as her normal outfit is, there are a few Side-Story Bonus Art scenes where she strips down even further, in justified scenarios like a bikini at the beach or nude in a hot spring... and one fairly gratuitous image of her posing nude with her BFS.
• Genki Girl
• Incest Subtext: It's the last summer before High School exams kick in, and Rena really wants to do something together with her brother. Problem is, Shugo doesn't really want to go along at first, and when he finally does get involved, all these other girls (like Ouka and Zefie) show up and start distracting him.
• Little Sister Heroine: Technically, they're twins, but this is how she treats herself. Incidentally, Zefie is The Rival for her in this regard.

Mireille

Voiced by: Yuki Matsuoka (Japanese); Sandy Fox (English)

World Identity: She's a wavemaster who takes on her mother's avatar and joins Shugo and Rena on their adventure; she provides the two a hangout for them to meet and discuss in.

Real Identity: She's the daughter of Mistral. She's actually about 4 years old.

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet.

Tropes associated with her:

• Adorably Precocious Child: When you learn how old she really is, you begin to understand why she and Zefie seem to get along better than the other girls.
• Celebrity Resemblance: A few in-the-know characters mistake her for the Dot Hacker Mistral. This is because she is Mistral, after a fashion, not that she knows it. She was given the original Mistral account by her mother and plays it under a different name.
• Child Prodigy: Exageratted — she's a preschooler, but you wouldn't know that if you met her online.
• Expy: Of her mother Mistral, which is expected as her character is her mother's account with a name change.
• Genki Girl: Like her mother, she's perky and energetic.
• Mobile Shrubbery: The first time she's seen, she's following Shugo and Rena while hiding inside a barrel.
• Randomly Drops: Her hobby is collecting rare items. It doesn't matter if it's useful or not; even if your reward is clothes; if it's rare, she wants it.

Ouka

World Identity: A powerful player who enjoys fighting monsters and believes that people should get stronger the honest, old fashioned way, rather than resorting to cheating. Is famous among other players and called "Ouka the Divine Fist". She plays a "Werewolf" class charcter which is mentioned as a speical class added for high-level players in an expansion pack. Originally she was a un-named fist using class that was added in the same expansion pack.

Real Identity: A college student by the name of Sakura Ootori. She's is in fact Mireille's babysitter and Tutor, and is somewhat of a withdrawn mousey woman in reality.

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet.

Tropes associated with her:

• Big Friendly Dog: Generally behaves like one in wolf form, subverting any expectation that she'd be fiercer that way.
• Blood Knight: Gentler example than most, but she's usually the first to get into a fight, and likes the idea of combat in general.
• Bowdlerize: The manga has her wearing a sling bikini that doesn't cover all of her breasts and in some frames, she looks like as if she's going around topless. The anime gave her a sleeveless purple tightsuit that cover most of her upper body.
• Marshmallow Hell: During the final arc of the story, Shugo hesitates to meet with the group because it might mean trouble for them, only for Komiyan to lose patience and kick him forward... headlong into Ouka's cleavage. The instant she realizes it's Shugo, however, Ouka seizes him in a bearhug and wedges him in even further.
• Ms. Fanservice: Played straight most of the time, but amusingly subverted at one point when the characters are at the beach and Ouka arrives belatedly. Shugo's thrilled at the opportunity to see Ouka in a bikini... but she appears in wolf form.
• Nice Girl: Her teasing of Shugo aside, Ouka is perhaps the nicest and least sarcastic character in the party outside of Hotaru. Given she's The Big Guy, also tends to overlap with Beware the Nice Ones given most of that is put to Shugo's defense.
• Our Werewolves Are Different: Ouka can transform into a straight wolf if she desires.
• Sexophone: Her themesong is called "You Want to Have Me as Your Pet, Don't You..." and heavily features a saxophone really playing up the seduction angle.
• Sexy Mentor: Ouka helps Shugo level up and learn the game along with Mirielle and Rena. She doesn't seem to mind Shugo's developing hormones and plays along with it.
• Spell My Name With An S: Early English-language printings of the manga romanized her name as "Orca." The anime's English subtitles got a little closer with "Ohka" which at least sounds similar to the original Japanese, but still not quite right.
• The Tease: She first appears to Shugo in wolf form, and he naturally takes her for a "doggie" and even gives her a collar. When it's revealed she's a beautiful woman, she keeps the collar as proof that she considers Shugo to be her "owner" and starts teasing him mercilessly, humiliating him and causing Rena to be infuriated with him.

Komiyan III

World Identity: A "handsome prince" who goes everywhere accompanied by his loyal Grunty, Oscar. He is obsessed with winning Rena's heart and despises her brother Shugo.

Real Identity: Komiyama, a geeky 14 year-old boy who attends Shugo and Rena's math class. He and Shugo are rivals, though ironically enough, neither of them are very well-liked by others in their class.

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet.

Tropes associated with him:

• Annoying Laugh: It's what gives him away to Shugo when they first meet in the World.
• Gratuitous French: Acts like he's a French nobleman.
• Heel–Face Turn: He joins Shugo's party in the manga.
• Jerkass: Though he seems to become a Jerk with a Heart of Gold after his abovementioned Heel–Face Turn, actually defending Shugo and Rena from the administrators at personal risk.
• Large Ham: He loves to make long-winded introductions, giving himself an assortment of titles.
• Malicious Misnaming: Upon re-encountering him, Shugo refers to him as "Komiyan the Turd, Crown Prince of Grunty Poop."
• The Rival: To Shugo.

Zefie

World Identity: The daughter of Aura; she gets separated from Aura in The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet and asks Shugo and the others for help. Despite being so adorable, she can really be a handful, constantly teasing the gang (she even went as far as giving them afros at one point).

Real Identity: n/a

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet, Terminal Disc LINK

Tropes associated with her:

• Adapted Out: She makes no appearance in the anime, and as such, the plot is vastly different.
• Adorably Precocious Child: Shugo and Mireille seem to think she's this. The other girls... not so much. Zefie herself actually tends to zigzag between naivete and incredible depth of expertise depending on the subject.
• The Cameo: Though unnamed, she appears to Jun Bansyoya during the last day of The World R:1, revealing to him Aura's desire to abandon her godhood, hence her disappearance.
• Precocious Crush:
  • Downplayed with Shugo, whom she takes as her big brother... which causes no small conflict between her and Shugo's real little sister, Rena.
  • Subverted with Komiyan III. When she moves to fix his face, she leans forward and makes as though she's going to kiss him.
  Close your eyes... AND TASTE MY FIST!!
• Reality Warper: Zefie has authority over The World, much like her mother, and can override things like character designs and administrative prisons.
• Red Boxing Gloves: Less formal overrides are often enacted by Zefie punching someone in the face.
• Troll: She has a clear lack of respect for anyone on the team who isn't Shugo (her "big brother") or Mireille (to whom she's neutral), and will often go out of her way to get under Rena's skin.
• Undying Loyalty: To Shugo.

Kamui

Voiced by: Sakiko Tamagawa (Japanese); Melodee M. Spevack (English)

World Identity: Leader of the Colbalt Knights after Albreio and Lios, and a ruthless AI killer who believes all anomalies in The World should be destroyed, even Zefie and Aura.

Real Identity: Little is known about her real self, except that she worked with Albireo and was upset that he got fired, believing that the A.I.s were to blame, hence her reason for wanting to destroy them. She serves as the Big Bad for The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet. Her real name is Saki Shibayama.

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet. Minor appearance in .hack//AI Buster but only offline.

Tropes associated with her:

• Big Bad: Of The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet, being a constant antagonist to Shugo and co.
• Break Them by Talking: She goes after Shugo's team with this, pinpointing Mireille's, Ouka's, and Hotaru's weakpoints in order and threatening them with losing their accounts. She also manages to do this indirectly to Rena, who gets sick and tired of being treated like a criminal and decides to log out before her account is deleted.
• Eyes Always Shut: When she first appears to the team, she looks like this... which actually makes her look much less assuming and aggressive, given her character design.
• Heel–Face Turn: She develops a sort of respect for Shugo in the end, and ultimately lets them go.
• Hero Antagonist: All things considered, she's just doing her job.
• Knight Templar: She's The Leader of the Cobalt Knights, and is quite fanatical in her lawfulness.
• Manipulative Bitch: When the gang is looking around for information on Vagrant A.I.s like Zefie, she appears and feeds them information on the Net Slums and suggests that one of the ways to get there is by cheating. Given that she's effectively Police Chief of the World, she comes very close to nudging honest players into committing straight up crimes.
• Shared Unusual Trait: Kamui took a particular cue from Albireo's character: his heterochromatic eyes. Unlike Albireo's reason for having them, her pair symbolizes her connection to him.

Magi

"Even if it kills me... I will not let you interfere with my mistress."

Voiced by: Asako Shirakura (Japanese); Amanda Winn-Lee (English)

World Identity: Kamui's second in command.

Real Identity: A CC Corp Employee named Asako Saito and Kamui's personal assistant.

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet.

Tropes Associated With:

• Cross Player: Her avatar is a standard male CC Corp avatar, but her persona remains female.
• Dude Looks Like a Lady: Even with her standard male avatar, Magi's fairly easily recognizable as female, especially since Long Hair Is Feminine is in effect.
• Facial Markings: A tapering red stripe under her right eye.
• Hidden Depths: She first appears as a Shrinking Violet, but then when she appears before Reki to relieve him of some data she's so ice cold about it that it's almost terrifying.
• Jurisdiction Friction: She participates indirectly in Kamui's JF with Balmung. In an omake she wrings a rag of dishwater into the real world Balmung's coffee.
• The Rival: She seems to develop this relationship with Ouka during their PVP match near the end of the story.
• Shrinking Violet: She's this in her first appearance, flustered and apparently struggling to keep up with her workload. However, she's really nothing of the sort.
• Squishy Wizard: Subverted. She's apparently good enough to fight Ouka to a standstill.

Reki

Voiced by: Soichiro Hoshi (Japanese); Derek Stephen Prince (English)

World Identity: Balmung's assistant.

Real Identity: A young CC Corp Emplyoee named Satoshi Fujio.

Appears in: The Legend of the Twilight Bracelet.

Tropes associated with him:

• A Degree in Useless: He has a History degree.
• Beleaguered Assistant: Balmung's not the best boss to work under.
• Butt-Monkey: As mentioned above, Balmung's not the best boss to work under.
• Face–Heel Turn: In the anime, he joins Kamui; a stark contrast to in the manga.
• Facial Markings: A tapering blue stripe under his left eye.
• Foil: To Balmung; he tries to be strict and professional... unlike his boss.
• Heel–Face Turn: Not long after the formentioned Face–Heel Turn in the anime, he realizes he made a big mistake.
• Hypercompetent Sidekick: Balmung's. Balmung so hard to deal with that Reki refers to him as the toughest boss at CC Corp. .
• Jurisdiction Friction: As event characters, Shugo and Rena are technically under his and Balmung's supervision... except Aura gave Shugo the Data Drain bracelet and Zefie the Vagrant AI has latched on to him, which the Cobalt Knights take as sufficient reason for them to step in. (It's also implied that CC Corp didn't even run the event. Aura did to help Shugo fulfill a promise he made to her while messing around on a character belonging to Kazu)
• Vitriolic Best Buds: With Balmung.

Kaz

World Identity: A powerful Wavemaster who knows the Dot Hackers intimately. He appears during the final stages of the Legend of the Twilight to provide aid to the heroes.

Real Identity: A young man and family friend known by Shugo and Rena as Kazu, who used to live in their apartment building with his older sister but their family moved away .

• The Cameo: Indirectly. He's involved with the Dot Hackers and briefly mentions to Balmung that "big sis" says "Hello". He's BlackRose's little brother, after awakening from his coma.

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