Characters introduced in Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- and its Updated Rereleases -REVELATOR- and -REV 2-.

The Captain Ersatz, Expy, "No Celebrities Were Harmed", Mythology Gags, Continuity Nods and Shout-Out references go here.

For May, Millia, Zato, Potemkin, Chipp, Faust, Axl, and Baiken, check the sheet for The Missing Link.
- For Sol, check his sheet.
- For Ky, check his sheet.
For Venom, Johnny, Jam, and Dizzy, check the sheet for GGX.
For Slayer and I-No, check the sheet for GGXX.
For Sin and Raven, check the sheet for Overture.

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Introduced in -SIGN-

Bedman

Bedman (Romeo F. Neumann)

Pitch black, pure white. All the same. Endless, finite. Copy that.

"We talk about survival of the fittest a lot, but all that really means is the skilled live and the unskilled die. Since you're clearly in that second group, maybe pick your fights a bit more carefully? Do you understand what I'm saying? It's never going to matter how much you 'want it' when you're up against someone who can kill you with a sneeze."

Voiced by:
Xrd
JP: Hikaru Midorikawa
EN: Yuri Lowenthal

Playable in: Xrd -SIGN-, Xrd -REVELATOR-/REV 2

Profile:

Height: 5'1" (8'9" including bed)

Weight: 99lbs (1468lbs including bed)

Gender: Male

Blood type: A

Birthplace: Unknown

Date of Birth: Unknown

Hobbies: Unknown

Likes: His buckwheat pillow

Dislikes: The cry of the brown-eared bulbul bird, talkative people

Character theme:
Does the sheep count the sheep?

A comatose young boy (though he certainly sounds much older) piloting a sort of hybrid between a Mini-Mecha and a bed. His purpose and motives are shrouded in mystery. All that is known is that he is the subject of horrific experiments that allow him to trap people in nightmare worlds of his own creation.

The plot of Xrd reveals that Bedman works for a mysterious third party, later revealed to be the entity known as the Universal Will. He serves as the Will's personal hitman and right hand. He has taken countless lives, yet remembers all their identities out of respect, having committed himself to his goal for an "Absolute World" where he can be with his long-lost sister again, along with everyone he has killed being revived. He and his sister suffered from a rare condition that caused their minds to progress faster than their own bodies could handle, thus causing their bodies to "overheat" in a sense. The two had to be put in a constant state of sleep to ensure their survival. His interactions with various other characters showcase his Hitman with a Heart qualities. Sadly, he realizes too late that his ideals and those of his benefactor's are not the same, and he dies tragically betrayed and cast aside by the Universal Will.

In -STRIVE-, however, it's revealed that his mechanical bedframe managed to survive his final encounter with the Universal Will, and is seemingly moving of its own accord. The living bedframe protects his sister Delilah and fights on her behalf, but no one knows why. Is the bed simply following programming that Bedman has given it? Or is it that Bedman himself is controlling it seemingly from beyond the grave?

In-game, Bedman is an aggressive zoner who thrives when engaging opponents on his own terms. Attacking with his special moves leaves a Déjà Vu seal on the ground which he can 'replay' a copy of that move out of, leading to extremely oppressive combos. He also possesses a unique floating 8-way air dash, and a forward dash that will teleport Bedman behind his opponent if he is attacked while doing so. However, he will suffer heavily if he doesn't gain match control due to his large hurtbox, mediocre defensive options and limited movement speed.

Abnormal Limb Rotation Range: It's been said that Bedman himself can rotate his head far more than an average human.
Ambiguous Situation: In -STRIVE-, Bedman's bed is revealed to have survived and is now determined to protect Delilah at all costs, but there's a lot of haziness regarding how it gained sentience without Bedman. Is it Bedman somehow controlling the bed from beyond the grave? Was the bed sentient the entire time and is just continuing where Bedman left off? Or is it all a red herring and some other force wants Delilah for undisclosed reasons? Regardless, nothing is concrete, with even the name "Bedman?" hinting that even in-universe no one knows the answer.
Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: According to Happy Chaos in the Arcade Mode of -STRIVE-, this is actually what happened to Bedman when he "died" at the end of -REVELATOR-. All entities within the world of Guilty Gear are given "physical ID tags", which supernatural beings do not have, allowing them to essentialy exist across multiple dimensions. Bedman deleted his own ID and became a multi-dimensional being.
Alas, Poor Villain: After viewing Revelator's story mode, it's hard not to sympathize with him after his backstory is finally revealed and he dies in one of the cruelest ways imaginable.
All in the Manual: His real name, Romeo F. Neumann, is never said by anyone in the stories of either Xrd or -STRIVE-, only being revealed through his entry in the latter game's GG WORLD and later by Delilah in her Arcade story.
Animal Motifs: He has a hairstyle evoking a sheep, summons a monstrous phantom sheep to stun his opponents as one of his Overdrives, and his leitmotif is titled "Does the Sheep Count the Sheep?". Takes a very tragic turn in -REVELATOR- where we learn he blindly follows Ariels' orders like a sheep, only to be betrayed and killed by her.
Anti-Villain: Is only acting in the effort to enable a world where he and his sister Delilah can be happy. Even the deaths he causes are ones he hopes to eventually reverse.
The Atoner: Likely would have become this after his defeat in the climax of -REVELATOR-'s story mode, had Ariels not revealed her true plan to him.
Battle in the Center of the Mind: His method of killing people is to force them into dreams and kill them there.
Body Horror: Downplayed. It looks like those huge nails embedded into his chest are what keeps him fastened to the bed, but they actually don't. They're still huge nails embedded into his chest, though.
Calling Your Attacks: One of the few characters to completely avert this trope, considering Bedman sleeps through entire matches and only speaks if he wins, activates his Instant Kill, is subjected to the opponent's Instant Kill or gets KO'd.
Confused Question Mark: He technically appear in -STRIVE-, but he's referred to as "Bedman?" due to the uncertainty of whether or not it's really him controlling his bedframe.
Creepy Monotone: Speaks in a deadpan, rapid-fire monotone. It's especially prominent in -SIGN-'s English dub, thanks to none other than Yuri Lowenthal voicing him.
Cuteness Proximity: In his own weird way, this is his reaction to gaining cartoony eyes from Faust's Instant Kill.
Bedman: So... so kawaii! I must savor this; document it. Yes! From the right side, adjust to a 66.6 degree angle of inclination and snap!
Cynicism Catalyst: Being separated from his sister Delilah, who also had powers that made their childhood difficult.
Dark and Troubled Past: He and his sister Delilah were ostracized because of their inexplicably-high intelligence. Unfortunately, their rapidly-growing intelligence was, in fact, a curse. Their bodies could not keep up with how far their minds were growing, and they began to "overheat", so to speak. The only way for them to live was to be put into a state of constant sleep. It turns out that human dreaming is connected to the Backyard, and Bedman happened upon the Universal Will, who promised him the chance to not only see his sister again, but also an Absolute World where he could be able to leave a lasting mark and return the people he'd killed to life, instead of only being able to cause death.
Deadpan Snarker: Drops quite a few zingers if his System Voice is used.
Bedman: [about Millia] The money you spend on shampoo could likely pay another person's rent.
Demonic Possession: The Another Story episode of -STRIVE- reveals that either his spirit or his will still lives on within his mechanical bedframe, as it fights to protect and comfort his sister Delilah seemingly of its own accord. Whether it's actually him or something else entirely is not explained.
Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: A minor example, but he interrupts the machinations of That Man of all people by grabbing him and warping him out of the battlefield during the Cradle assault.
Disability Superpower: Being in a nigh-perpetual coma might sound like a bad thing, but for Bedman it's a blessing since he's at his strongest when he's asleep... which probably still counts as a bad thing depending on who you ask.
The Dragon: To Ariels, ruler of the Sanctus Populi.
The Dreaded: The Story and Arcade leaves every immortal character baffled and every mortal character terrified as he is nearly indestructible, as well as being terribly powerful in combat. Zato on the other hand figures out how Bedman fights very very quickly, and quite bluntly states that he can beat Bedman. This makes Bedman break a sweat and wish that Zato would just go back to being dead.
Dream Tropes: His main motif. One of his Overdrives summons a nightmarish creature to attack his opponents. Ties in with the idea of children being unable to sleep at night due to their fear of the creatures living underneath their beds.
Dream Walker: A particularly powerful one, given that his consciousness exists primarily in the Backyard.
Empathic Weapon: The bed robot moves and acts less like a machine and more like it's Bedman's own body and limbs, reacting quickly and flawlessly with his current demeanor at all times.
Equivalent Exchange: The longer the distance he has to teleport, the more time he needs to prepare. This is eventually used against him during the assault on the Cradle, with Leo and Johnny constantly going on the attack so he can't warp away to stop Faust.
Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He's killed many people all for the sake of seeing his sister again, and is utterly crushed when Ariels reveals the true scope of her plans to him.
Exactly What It Says on the Tin: He's a man in a bed. Well, technically he looks like a kid, but you get the picture.
Expy: Of the two playable puppeteers from BlazBlue, Carl and Relius Clover. He shares both Carl and Relius's creepy mannerisms and has Relius's theme of using their opponents' worst fears against them, but his motivations are more simlar to Carl as he's a Well-Intentioned Extremist who only wants to be with his sister again and will use any means necessary to see her freed from her condition. This is made more prominent in -STRIVE-, where his ghost is seemingly able to manifest inside his bedframe and protect the now-awakened Delilah. However, in this series the roles are reversed, as he's the soul inside the machine who does the main fighting, while Delilah is the human piloting him and sometimes acts as a "puppet" assistant.
Even Evil Has Standards: Ariels orders Bedman to kill Ramlethal now that her purpose was fulfilled. He's alright with this at first, but once he sees that she's starting to develop emotions, he quickly changes his mind and refuses to harm a "little girl", even threatening to quit working for Ariels in his fit of rage. It's implied that his estranged sister was also seen as a tool with no regard for her feelings, which makes his actions understandable.
Evil Mentor: He is so willing to encourage Ramlethal to believe in her own individuality that he does it in the cruelest fashion possible. He kills her dog and immediately offers her a replacement. He already knows she will refuse, and uses that to explain that she too is unique, like the dog she loved.
Genius Bruiser: Matched in strength by his intellect.
Bedman: [post-Mirror Match] A shame. If you really were anything akin to me, perhaps we could have become friends. Of course, you would need an IQ of more than 200 to meet the minimum requirements.
Given Name Reveal: Bedman's real name is finally revealed in -STRIVE- through GG World entries and his sister's Arcade story: Romeo F. Neumann.
Heel–Face Door-Slam: After he's defeated by Venom, he decides to ditch Ariels and atone for what he's done by tending to the victims of his actions while under her command. Cue Ariels showing up and cruelly revealing to him that the "Absolute World" was meant to destroy humanity entirely and that she'd been using him all along, with no intentions of sparing him or his sister from the ensuing omnicide. This prompts him to overload himself in a last-ditch effort to take down Ariels, which fails and results in his death.
Hitman with a Heart: He gets into an argument with Ariels over being ordered to kill Ramlethal, who moments ago had just shown that she was developing emotions. Yes, his method of encouraging Ramlethal was very cruel, but Bedman showed genuine care for her. In -REVELATOR-, he does the same with Elphelt, trying to ease the pain of becoming Justice's core by placing her in a Lotus-Eater Machine. When she tries to free herself, Bedman pleads with her not to, fearing that the reality of the situation will traumatize her.
Hypocritical Humor: His profile says that he hates "talkative people", but he talks a lot himself.
Insufferable Genius: His Motor Mouth habits are bad enough, but then he also constantly rubs it in others faces just how inhumanly smarter than them he is. His Mirror Match win quote states that having an IQ of 200 is the minimum criteria to befriend him.
Intelligence Equals Isolation: His nature as an Insufferable Genius naturally leads to this, since he pretty much has no friends whatsoever. The only person he ever speaks with on equal terms is Ariels, his client, and even then he's not afraid to get testy with her. Given his history and the ostracism he and his sister suffered, this attitude isn't too surprising.
Irony: In Xrd, he was a huge Motor Mouth. In -STRIVE-, he can no longer talk at all because he doesn't have a human body anymore, nor is his bedframe configured for speech.
Jerkass: When he does speak, he's very condescending. Check out his victory quotes.
Jerkass Has a Point: Yet despite the above, sometimes he has legitimate advice for his opponents. He subtly praises Chipp for 'reacting' to him and advises Venom to rely on his sight a little more. And in Xrd, he and Axl have a surprisingly honest heart-to-heart over their similar situations.
Kick the Dog: Quite literally, in the Story Mode, he kills a Magehound puppy that Ramlethal had befriended. Subverted when you take into account that he did this because as she started developing her emotions, he took pity on her and wished to teach her the value of individual life. So in a weird way, it's also an example of Pet the Dog at the same time.
Killed Off for Real: Ends up critically injured by Venom in the story mode of -REVELATOR-, and is then betrayed by Ariels. The last moments of his life are defiantly using the remainder of his life force to cast something in a miniature bubble of the "Absolute World" and then dying by turning into stone. -STRIVE- Another Story makes it clear he isn't coming back (unless Happy Chaos' story of him becoming a multidimensional being is true), though it's heavily implied some of his will remains in his bed.
Knight Templar Big Brother Bedman's desire to make a better world for himself and Delilah is why he became and served the Universal Will.
Lightning Bruiser: Despite his robot's extremely large build, his attacks hit hard and fast, and is extremely fast and flies around just as much as his opponent, though this only applies when he's on the ground.
Logical Weakness: Bedman can use his dream powers to telepathically read people's minds, thus allowing him to predict their movements. Robo-Ky doesn't have a mind he can read because he's a robot, thus putting Bedman at a disadvantage against him.
Made of Diamond: The bed robot is durable to a ridiculous degree, though granted with all the fighting Bedman usually does it's somewhat of a requirement. The only one to ever do lasting damage to it was President Gabriel, which paved the way for it to get more damaged later on.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: His main gimmick is that he can make copies of his special moves come out after using the main versions, as a sort of trap\combo extender.
- He also lacks a traditional air dash. Instead, his double jump makes him pause in mid-air for a split second and he can dash in any direction from there. This leads to some difficulty in adjusting to him. All in all, you get a character that plays more like someone in Marvel vs. Capcom than Guilty Gear.
Mini-Mecha: His subconciously-controlled "Reinforced High-Density Bed Frame", apparently the eighth revision. The bed starts out looking fairly normal until its mechanical parts emerge from underneath it.
Mind Rape: Bedman's MO is to trap his victims in nightmare worlds to kill them in their sleep. His One-Hit KO attack forces the victim to relieve their painful pasts as he watches. That Man is completely immune to its effects, and the Nightmare Theater is little more than a frustrating prison for him to break out of.
Motor Mouth: As seen here. Tomokazu Sugita even lampshades how long his winquote is.
- Slightly less so in the English version as he talks slower, but it's still a mouthful and the subtitles take up three or four lines, and sometimes go on even after other characters have begun talking.
- If Bedman is KO'd and loses the match, he will start speaking as he falls up until the victory animation for his opponent plays.
My God, What Have I Done?: When he realizes The Universal Will wants to destroy humanity with no intention of resurrecting them in the Absolute World, he loses it and turns on her.
Bedman: [starting to cry] How many people do you think I've killed!? How could... HOW COULD YOU BETRAY ME!?
My Skull Runneth Over: What will happen if he ever wakes up. It finally happens in -REVELATOR- when he confronts Ariels, only able to maintain his level of power in the waking world for mere moments before flash-calcifying and crumbling away.
Named After Somebody Famous: His family name is a reference to either John von Neumann or Carl Neumann, both of whom were famed mathematicians. Fittingly, Bedman has an IQ of over 200 and he's able to tap into the powers of the Backyard, which is said to be akin to utilizing a complex computer system and necessitates a myriad of complex equation-esque srtuctures.
Nightmare Weaver: His Instant Kill places the opponent inside of a movie screen and forces them to remember their worst memories (not shown directly to the player — only hinted at through the target's dialogue) before several shadowy demons surround and devour them. For example Chipp laments that he only needed one extra vote to become a president, while Faust has a flashback to the incident that initially drove him to madness.
Not Quite Dead: While Ariels did kill Bedman as thoroughly as she possibly could, his bedframe was left alone by the attack. And come the Another Story in -STRIVE-, the bedframe is now moving on its own, trying to protect Delilah from getting herself killed. The other characters are not sure what is making the bedframe move, but it is clear Bedman's influence is still in it.
Number of the Beast: According to his character page on the Xrd website, the combined weight of the boy and the bed adds up to 666 kg.
Oh, Crap!: At the end of his arcade story in -REVELATOR-, encountering Jack-O' has him breaking out in cold sweat. He very quickly puts together that this woman is That Man's trump card, and vows to stop them from ever reaching Justice lest they ruin everything.
Pet the Dog: His final act is to cast a spell in his small localized "Absolute World" while muttering about how he had to atone. Moments after Ariels leaves, a girl arrives to find his calcified body. The context of the scene and her identical leg markings to his implies that he used his power in the miniature "Absolute World" to allow his sister to exist in the waking world without "overheating".
Photographic Memory: Played for Drama. Bedman's vast intellect makes it easy for him to remember the faces and names of every single person he's murdered, with the intent of bringing them back to life when the "Absolute World" is created. Once Ariels taunts him with the true nature of the "Absolute World" he's crushed by the guilt of what he's done due to vividly remembering every victim and now understanding they're never coming back.
Power Incontinence: According to the Arcade story in -REVELATOR-, the reason why Bedman fights while asleep is because using his powers while awake would cause his body (referred to by him as an "engine") to overload.
Power Limiter: His sleep. If he were to wake up, his power would surge so massively it would overwhelm his bed.
Psychic Powers: Bedman's power quite clearly go beyond killing people in their sleep, enough so to classify him as a...
Reality Warper: He can pop into and out of the dream world at will, which is how he teleports during battles. He can also bring nightmare-created monsters with him, or create mental duplicates of earlier actions he made (specifically his Overdrives in-game; the skill is called "Déjà Vu").
Same Character, But Different: He, or rather his bed, returns in -STRIVE- as the 3rd DLC character, but because of the dubious nature of whether or not it's actually him controlling the bedframe, he is billed as "Bedman?".
Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: His dialogue is this, made worse with Motor Mouth.
Bedman: [After a long off-topic tangent] By the way, I hate long talks...
Sol: [Stomps ground in frustration] At least we agree on that.
Sibling Yin-Yang: As shown by his sister Delilah's appearance in -STRIVE-. The arrow patterns on their heads are on opposite directions and their hair colors are also opposite to one another (Bedman has white hair while Delilah has black hair). Bedman is also the more sociable and talkative of the two, while Delilah has No Social Skills.
Spanner in the Works: His main purpose throughout the plot is to invoke this himself by derailing as many of the protagonist's schemes as possible. For the most part, he's successful. From his perspective, while anyone would be wary of Sol Badguy, he considers Zato to have the potential to be this to him due to Zato immediately figuring out how to counter his powers.
Ah, Conclave, you've really left a mess. I understand that the minute details of your order need not be carried out to the letter, but letting Zato run free is just sloppy. I'm going to have to dispose of him next.
The Speechless: Other than his bed's creepy growling and some rapid-fire monologues when he wins or loses the round, he is completely silent during battles. It's jarring compared to everyone else.
Spikes of Villainy: His bed robot has quite a few spikes on it arms, which also end in spinning, spiked flails. Bashing and slicing with them is his main method of attack.
Tragic Dream: His one and only desire is to see his sister again. From that desire and the actons he was made to undertake per the Universal Will's direction, his dream became a literal "Absolute World" where his thoughts could shape reality and he could undo all the murders he committed. Unfortunately, he ends up betrayed by the Will and is told point blank by her before he dies trying to take her with him to his imminent demise that not only is her idea of the Absolute World different from his (a world where all humans are dead), but that his Absolute World can never truly exist.
Unwitting Pawn: His dream of an "Absolute World" was used by Ariels just to string him along, and he was unaware of her genocidal plan towards humanity until it was far too late.
Villainous Breakdown: When he gets hit by another Bedman's Instant Kill, one of his reactions is genuine fear of being placed into a world he has no control over. Another reaction appears to major mental shutdown, as he blankly recites pi to forty decimal places.
Vocal Dissonance: In Japanese especially, he sounds a lot older and deeper than his appearance would suggest he should. Revelator drops some hints that it's his appearance that might be out of sync due to his sleeping being near-stasis-like, and that he's actually significantly older than he looks and his voice reflects this. Sure enough, once he wakes up mere minutes before he dies fighting Ariels, his mind finally catches up to his body as he unleashes his power, overloading him and resulting in flash-fossilization.
Well-Intentioned Extremist: He wants an proper-noun "Absolute World" where his thoughts would shape reality, rather than dreams. This would allow him to save his sister and all the people he's killed. He's memorized every person he's ever killed, with the intention of resurrecting them.
Wouldn't Hurt a Child: Quite possibly his sole redeeming quality. For all the dirty business Bedman gets involved in, hurting a child is the one line that he won't cross. This even extends to Ramlethal, who Ariels ordered executed, but once he sees that she's on the cusp of developing emotions he adamantly refuses to kill her, thinking of her as a child herself.

Ramlethal Valentine

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ramlethal.png

All things are made of Heart and Heart.

^Xrd

"I'll create... the future."

Ramlethal voiced by:

JP: Megumi Han
EN: Erin Fitzgerald (Xrd -SIGN-), Laura Stahl (-STRIVE-)

Lucifero voiced by:

JP: Tomokazu Seki
EN: Sam Riegel (Xrd -SIGN-), Derek Stephen Prince (-STRIVE-)

Playable in: Xrd -SIGN-, Xrd -REVELATOR-/REV 2, -STRIVE-

Profile:

Height: 5'6"

Weight: 115lbs

Gender: Female

Blood type: Unknown

Birthplace: The Backyard

Date of Birth: June 3rd

Hobbies: Pondering about the meaning of things

Likes: Almost everything

Dislikes: Arthropods

Character themes:
Diva of Despair

, Necessary Discrepancy

The main boss character of Xrd -SIGN-. A mysterious girl who comes from the Backyard, another dimension that is said to hold immense knowledge and power. Roughly a year after the "Baptisma 13" incident in Guilty Gear 2: Overture, she appears in the sky above Japan and declares war against the entire world, intending to pass judgment upon those who she views as unworthy to inhabit it. The announcement sends mass panic throughout the world, as the instigator of "Baptisma 13" also went by the name of Valentine. Like her predecessor, she wields a strange balloon-like familiar called Lucifero.

The story of Xrd reveals that she is actually a pawn for the Conclave, the advisors to the Pope of Rome, who are orchestrating events from behind the scenes. She and her sister Elphelt, along with the first Valentine, were created by the Universal Will based on her previous host body: the Commander Gear Justice, who in actuality was Sol's lover Aria. Unlike her sister and the first Valentine, Ramlethal was specifically created to not have or show any emotion, instead being stylized in a more bestial manner with shark-like fangs for teeth. Defeated by Sol and Elphelt, she is taken in by the Illyrian government for questioning. Over the course of the story, it's shown that although Ramlethal herself was not given emotions and has no sense of self, she still has the capacity to develop them, and her interactions with Sin and Elphelt slowly but eventually result in her growing out of the "doll" persona her Mother designed her to be, gaining true humanity and sentience. On her own will, Ramlethal rebels against the Universal Will and vows to protect those she cares about, promising to save her sister when she is taken hostage by the Will. In a true show of her newfound humanity, she sacrifices herself during an ambush so that everyone else can escape. Saved and resuscitated by Raven, Ramlethal now lives peacefully within the Kiske household.

She was a time-released secret character in the Arcade version, first available on April 8th. In console -SIGN-, she was a launch character, and moved to the launch roster for all versions of -REVELATOR-.

Confirmed as a returning character in -STRIVE-, now sporting a more military-styled hat with a four-leaf clover adorning it and a more elaborate cloak.

Taking inspirations from 3D fighting games, Ramlethal is a hybrid between a set-play and a combo-oriented character who relies on sending out her slow-but-powerful giant swords to lock the opponent down with disjointed attacks, before moving in for mix-ups with weak-but-fast punch and kick combo chains. However, this results in a distinct lack of proper Gatling Combo routes and poor normal attacks without her swords (which give her both reach and power) by her side, resulting in her struggling when it comes to neutral situations. In addition, Ramlethal getting hit before or during sword swings causes them to return to her side without completing the attack. This makes proper management of her swords and situational awareness a necessity.

In -STRIVE-, Ramlethal's gameplay has undergone a significant change. Though still rooted in 3D fighting games conceptually, she has traded in her chain combos and set-up attacks with her swords for much stronger mid and long-range options. In essence, her weaknesses have effectively been switched. She can now control the neutral space extremely well, but struggles in close range situations.

Ambiguously Brown: She's not even human in the normal sense. And it's a sign of how heavily she's been modified from the template of her genetic forebear, the stridently-fair-skinned Aria. Ramlethal looks more like Aria with her sixth color palette.
Animal Motifs: Her hat resembles a pair of cat ears, and her crouch animation has her going down on all fours, and she acts in a distinctly feline manner in battle. Some have even noted that she resembles Taokaka.
Badass Cape: Her cape has... fangs(?) growing from the outer rim; she can weaponize it to slash at opponents with her normals.
Because You Were Nice to Me: Sin's earnesty and kindness are what help her break away from of her stoic and detached attitude (also cuz he bought her burgers), and she begins to cherish him as one of her closest companions.
BFS: Has two of them, which are carried around by her familiars, and naturally provide a ton of range and damage on her attacks.
Big Bad: Declares war on all of humanity in Guilty Gear Xrd, bringing her into conflict with the game's various protagonists. Later heavily subverted in that she reveals she's only a pawn after certain characters defeat her in their arcade modes (canonically, Sol's) and any antagonist role she could have is finished as soon the -SIGN- story mode starts.
Bilingual Bonus: Most of her moveset is in Esperanto, what was supposed to be a Universal Language.
Boring, but Practical: In -STRIVE-, her Mortobato is nowhere near as flashy as Calvados, among other supers. That said, for reasons Rooflemonger explains, it's one of the best. Appropriately, its name translates to Deathblow.
Character Development: Perhaps one of the most heavily-developed characters in the franchise, and she's only been in two games! Her changes in attitude get reflected in updates to her animations in -REVELATOR-.
- One example is her victory animation. In -SIGN-, she takes off her hat, pats it down a little, and then orders Lucifero to eat her opponent, with us getting a cutaway of her evil-looking Slasher Smile. In -REVELATOR-, she takes off the hat like she does in -SIGN-... and then gives her opponent an introspective look and comment, and if she's friends with her opponent (like Sin or El) she even tells them to focus now on recovering from their bout.
- In -SIGN-, Ram tends to be very dismissive of her opponents in her win quotes. In -REVELATOR-, because she's developing actual emotions and isn't fighting to kill, she shows a lot more curiosity about many of them.
- Even her stage reflects her development to some degree. In -SIGN-, it's the huge crater of Japan, with the background basically being a terrifying hellscape caused by the Cradle hovering ominously in the sky, with huge sinister hands manifesting in later rounds. It's the same area in -REVELATOR-, but now it's a clear sky at early sunset, and the seaward rim of the crater has become a kind of waterfall which catches the sunset in a gorgeous manner. It all reflects how, while Ram is still rather strange and intimidating, there's an inner beauty to emerging from her.
Clothing Combat: She can control her cloak (which seemingly has razors at the edges) to attack her foes…until you look at her intro and realize that those "razors" are teeth.
Comically Missing the Point: In -STRIVE- during one of the conversations she can have with Lucifero within a taunt, he will try pressing Ram into talking about her developing emotions, specifically if she has a crush on someone now, first Lucifero is direct in his question about who Ram likes but she doesn't quite understand the difference in liking friends, family and love, he then asks direct biological responses Ram may be going through, like feeling hot whenever close to a potential special one, or just the sound of their voice instigating a reaction, etc. Ram takes those questions too literally, answering Leo is the one who makes her feel all of that but in response to his very bombastic presence as she finds him to be cool, not exactly in a romantic manner, Lucifero is puzzled by the exchange, not getting the answer he wanted.
The Comically Serious: Throughout the story modes of both Xrd games, her non-emotional nature is used for humor, such as whenever her puppy bites her finger, resulting in a flat "ow", or her... difficulties in understanding exactly how smiles work.
Covert Pervert: Lucifero, despite being her familiar, very obviously has the hots for Ram in how he not-so-subtly implies he'd like to get with her.
Cuteness Overload: Ramlethal seems to have a small weakness for cute things.
- It's her growing relationship with her puppy in the story mode that causes her to develop more emotion.
- She'll react this way to seeing her own face if Faust uses his Instant Kill on her, and only if she ends up with the cute Black Bead Eyes. Otherwise, she'll either not care or react with Dull Surprise.
  Ramlethal: How...how cute.
Dash Attack: Two of them:
- "Dauro" is a fast lunging palm strike, allowing her to end combos or juggle airborne opponenets.
- "Sabrobato" has her lunge forward with a powerful overhead strike using her swords. Without the swords, she'll instead attack with an arm swipe.
Deflector Shields: Her blocking animation is her putting up a green, small rectangle-shaped barrier.
Defrosting Ice Queen: Part of her story arc in Xrd's story mode is this, thanks to Sin and her sis El, it actually works. She's a lot more emotive in -STRIVE- because of this.
Demoted to Extra: In -STRIVE-'s story mode, making no appearance outside of a cameo with the Kiske family in the epilogue, despite being part of the game's base roster and having a major part of the story of Xrd. Another Story features her as one of the main protagonists.
Disney Death: She was unable to escape from the Antimatter Gear's explosion after saving the little girl, causing everyone to think she died. However, at the last second, Raven saved and healed her just in time to save Elphelt in the last chapter. Happens again in a more figurative sense in Another Story, where she is teleported away to parts unknown along with Baiken and Delilah.
Dogged Nice Guy: Lucifero often acts this way in taunts where they converse with each other, often not-very-subtly implying he'd like to get with Ram. For her part, Ram has zero interest in these advances and often reacts to them with a simple "Self-Destruct", inciting Lucifero to bitterly back off.
Dual Wielding: She has one sword tied to each of her slash buttons. This becomes important in Xrd because deploying the sword will tie its commands to the respective input. Ram will also have to resort to fighting hand too hand with that button until the sword comes back.
Dull Surprise: Her reaction to everything. Except for watching her puppy get killed and seeing Elphelt get forcibly transported back to the Backyard. Only then does she cry.
- Or, if you're on the Japanese voice track, when she catches Faust's Kancho she lets out a very distressed squeak.
- And in -STRIVE-, when hit with Faust's Overdrive, she reacts just as much as the rest of the cast (save Zato).
Emotionless Girl: More of a blank slate that has at most two basic expressions: a completely neutral one and a maniacal one. That slowly changes over the course of the story. Though even after she realizes her own capacity to feel emotion, she's still somewhat reserved when it comes to expressing them.
- Because of this, she Cannot Tell a Lie; her inability to outright tell whether something will help or hinder her often has her blurt out vital info.
Eyeless Face: Lucifero resembles a little winged orb with a big mouth for a face, unless Ramlethal's secret taunt is triggered.
Eyes Do Not Belong There: The Diva-like thing in her stage background has three eyes on each of its numerous hands.
Family of Choice: Curiously enough Ram starts to consider herself as Sol's daughter with her status as a Valentine, being born out of Justice's mold, as she says in one of her conversations with Lucifero in -STRIVE-.
Fangirl: For Leo, of all characters, in -STRIVE-. She calls him "So cool" in her intro line against him and one of her secret taunts has her talking to Lucifero about guys she might like in a romantic way, with her answer being Leo.
Fanservice Pack: Inverted with her appearance in -STRIVE-. She originally wore nothing but a strap over her chest that exposed a lot of Underboobs, but in -STRIVE-, she's switched that top out for a comparatively more modest double-breasted vest.
Fire-Breathing Diner: Sin puts hot sauce on her pizza, telling her it's delicious. She's then shown with a burning red face and supremely puffy lips.
Four-Star Badass: She's recruited by Ky and Leo as a brigade leader in the Illyrian army come -STRIVE-, and she's still just as powerful as she's always been.
Friendly Enemy: Exclusively to Bedman. The first thing she does when he appears to attack is thank him for helping her gain true emotions and sapience.
Guest Fighter: Appears in The King of Fighters All Star as part of their collaboration with Guilty Gear.
Hades Shaded: She's notably darker-skinned than the other Valentines, likely due to her origin from the Backyard.
Heel–Face Turn: Goes from the Big Bad of -SIGN- to one of the main heroes of -REVELATOR-, with this continuing into -STRIVE-.
Heroes Love Dogs: The sign of her heroic side is her love for puppies. She bonds with a puppy throughout Xrd's story, signaling her growing appreciation for love and expressing feelings. -STRIVE- brings this back in her win animation where a similar puppy jumps up and licks her face.
Heroic Sacrifice: Saves a little girl from an Antimatter Gear's explosion and after a Phalanx soldier cornered them she had Lucifero carry the girl to safety.
Legacy Character: Serves as the second "Valentine" in the series, after Valentine in Guilty Gear 2: Overture. Considering that the first one singlehandedly brought a kingdom to its knees within a few weeks, everyone takes her intentions seriously.
Like Brother and Sister: Her friendship with Sin has shades of this, being marked by friendly banter and hanging out over fast food like kids after school. Then there's the revelation that both Sin is Sol's paternal grandson and Ram is a clone of Aria, Sol's lover, meaning the two of them are basically akin to cousins.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter: To an extent, she plays like a Mortal Kombat character (in that her moveset involves MK-styled single-or-dual-button-mash combos as opposed to the all four/five-input combos of most GG characters, with her specials also behaving in a slightly more MK-esque fashion). On top of that, she has different properties depending on whether or not one or both of her greatswords are deployed (with her only able to use certain Overdrives depending on whether she has her swords equipped or deployed).
- -STRIVE- removes this auto combo mechanic from her entirely, streamlining her to fit other characters mechanically. She does keep the swords deploying mechanic to an extant though, being unusable after using Bajoneto briefly and having to rely on her body as a hitbox.
Ms. Fanservice: She's not as busty as her sister, Elphelt, but underneath her cloak, she wears hardly anything, leaving most of her very toned body completely exposed. Particular emphasis is given to her long and athletic legs. -STRIVE- tones down the Stripperiffic aspects of her outfit a lot, though her bare legs are still prominent and even given slight jiggle physics.
Musical Nod: Being the second Valentine, her Xrd theme is very similar to Valentine's "Diva" from Overture.
Nerf: Going from Xrd to -STRIVE-, Ramlethal's moveset received a massive overhaul that removed or replaced a lot of unique mechanics from her. In Xrd, she plays like an unconventional mix of a Puppet Fighter and Stance System tools, either controlling space with her swords to space out her opponent or deploying them like controllable assistants to attack independently of her, creating a vortex of individual attacks to block. Her punch and kick buttons also operate on an entirely different combo system than other fighters, giving Ram a ton of unique options and a high-skill floor for those picking her up from the rest of the cast. ^{other abilities} -STRIVE- overhauls a lot of that; gone are her unique three-hit-strings on the punches and kicks, as is the ability to deploy her swords like traps. Her fundamentals of working towards cornering and overwhelming the opponent are similar, but incredibly simplified from before, becoming more centered around using the swords for her normals.
Never the Obvious Suspect: Invoked. Ramlethal's initial (and brief) campaign against the world was simply a ploy by Ariels to get everyone's eyes on her pawn, so that her defeat would make everyone think the latest Valentine crisis was already over. Ky surmises — correctly — that the actual crisis hadn't even begun.
Polar Opposite Twins: She and her sister Elphelt seem like complete opposites to each other; Ram is stoic, unemotive, and fights brutally and efficiently with her giant swords and energy attacks. Elphelt meanwhile is sweet, bubbly, and uses firearms bizarrely crossed with wedding accessories like a bouquet.
Power Floats: Can float in mid-air, as a sign of her power.
Precious Puppy: Sin brings her a magehound, which she subsequently befriends as part of her development in learning emotions. Furthermore, her new win animation in -STRIVE- has a puppy coming to pounce on Ram and lick her face.
Primal Stance: Her crouching animation is feline-like, complete with her "hissing" blowing her cloak up like a standing-up fur.
Progressively Prettier: Though she's given a slightly less revealing outfit in -STRIVE-, her design overall has softer features, particularly her face. Her sharp teeth are also given less prominence. It does further emphasize that she's now on the side of good.
Puppet Fighter: Xrd Ram fights by deploying her swords across the stage and inputting commands to have them attack independently. Combined with her feral autocombos, she can trap her opponent in a whirlwind of damage.
Red/Green Contrast: The green to Elphelt's red.
Sailor Fuku: Wears a green one in the story mode after she's been captured by the heroes. Still sans shoes, though. She keeps it as her everyday-wear once she joins "the team" in -REVELATOR-.
Single Woman Seeks Good Man: She has a crush on Leo, whom, under that bluster, is The Good King, and A Father to His Men.
Slasher Smile: Makes shark-toothed grins whenever she's about to attack... or most other times she grins, for that matter, to hilarious effect in the story modes of both -SIGN- and -REVELATOR- (her moment with Leo in Rev being especially memorable). In fact it seems that's either the only smile she was taught how to do by Mother, or the one that is biologically easiest for her to do.
Significant White Hair, Dark Skin: She is a clone of Aria Hale, but unlike the original Aria she has bright white hair and dark skin to make her stand out from most of the cast, especially her sisters Elphelt and Jack-O'.
Small Name, Big Ego: Lucifero gives off these vibes in some conversations, describing himself as handsome or desirable in a very transparent attempt to win Ram over.
Small Role, Big Impact: Another Story shows that had it not been for her actions, the events of the main story might have played out very differently.
SNK Boss: In Xrd where she's final boss of arcade mode. Not only does she continuously build tension meter, but both her Calvados and Trance overdrives do vastly more damage and last longer than her normal, playable version.
Soundtrack Dissonance: Her theme, while still a driving rock track true to the spirit of Guilty Gear, opens with and centers around a very airy, calming guitar riff, and in general is rather more upbeat than you'd expect for the theme of someone who bills themselves as a murderous Big Bad. This would be due to the fact that her true inner nature is more heroic than anything.
- This continues into -STRIVE-. Again, though it's still clearly rock, the style of it is quite unusual and unique to Guilty Gear's soundtrack. Rather than being traditional hard rock or heavy metal, it's a prog rock song with non-standard time signatures and more of an emphasis on techno elements and keyboards.
Stance System: She has different properties depending on whether she has both greatswords equipped, one equipped and one deployed, and both deployed.
Stripperiffic:
- Her cloak can potentially cover it up, but underneath it she's very much exposed. She's got Underboobs, bared midriff and barefoot going on beneath that cloak. It's even a subject of conversation between her and Lucifero in a secret taunt.
  Lucifero: Look, I don't know how to say this, but don't you feel kinda...exposed? You're just like the last Valentine, what's the deal with you ladies?
  Ramlethal: Not your business.
  Lucifero: Damn, look at those legs. You like showing that sexy stuff off, huh?
  Ramlethal: Shut up.
  Lucifero: Hey, you have a thing for me, dont'cha?
  Ramlethal: Go die.
  Lucifero: Yes, sorry.
- Her design in -STRIVE- dials backs a lot of these elements, making her outfit still revealing but conservative by comparison.
Supermodel Strut: Downplayed. During her walking animation, her upper-body keeps mostly still, but her legs move as if she's strutting, with her placing one foot directly in front of the other in a purposeful and confident manner.
Sword and Fist: She alternates between fighting with her massive swords to tearing you apart with her bare hands.
Taking You with Me: Tried to do this with Sol, but was stopped by Elphelt.
Three-Strike Combo: In Xrd, her punch and kick buttons can be pressed up to three times to perform an advancing combo unique to each. Coupled with her swords puppeted elsewhere, Ram can trap opponents in very damaging combos. This is done away with in -STRIVE- and instead replaced with her "Erarlumo" special, a more straightforward "rekka"-style move that can be delayed between each strike for mix-ups.
Through Her Stomach: One of Sin's attempts to get Ramlethal to smile was by feeding her a burger. It actually works.
Throwing Your Sword Always Works: Taken to the extreme; her Bajoneto special fires her swords off like missles which then pin into the wall and explode. She has to wait for the swords to reform before using them again.
Took a Level in Kindness: After befriending Sin and Elphelt in -SIGN-, she learned about kindness and gained dramatic character development by -REVELATOR-, where she acts more respectful to her friends and the people she meets. And her kindness and respect continues on in -STRIVE-, where she even misses being with Elphelt and friends while working with Leo, whom she considers as a cool boss.
Trademark Favorite Food: Hamburgers quickly became a favorite of hers after Sin introduces her to one. One of her digital figure poses involves her contemplating one; a scene in -REVELATOR-'s story mode has her comment that she's not hungry, but she starts following Sol and Sin after the former comments that they're going to Danny Missiles while walking away; and her unique pre-fight interactions with Sin have the two arguing over what they should have for dinner, with Ramlethal advocating for a burger.
Virtuous Character Copy: To Nu-13. Both are nonhuman Rei Ayanami Expy clones of a woman who is significantly related to the main character (Saya for Ragna, Aria for Sol), use giant swords in combat, and debuted as the main villains in their respective introductions. Whilst Nu-13 remained a villain all the way to the end and required what amounted to a near-Death Equals Redemption and massive rehabilitation by her sisters Noel and Lambda to even finally turn face, Ramlethal goes face very early after her debut. Nu-13 showing to be batshit insane and off her rocker post-defrosting and her extremely one-sided, obsessive and toxic relationship with Ragna stand in stark contrast with Ramlethal being far more stable post-defrosting and having a much more positive relationship with the man she yearns for Leo. In short, Ramlethal is basically Nu-13 if she grew up in a less cynical, more forgiving world.
Wave-Motion Tuning Fork: She uses her swords as this for her Gamma Ray super, covering the entire stretch of the screen in a laser.
What Does She See in Him?: Lucifero has this reaction when Ram claims she likes Leo in -STRIVE-.
When She Smiles: Slasher Smile notwithstanding, she actually smiles a tiny bit after trying a burger. As of -REVELATOR-, she now gives a genuine smile instead of a Slasher Smile during her win pose. And of course, she gives a small, genuine smile before her "death" halfway through Rev's story mode.
Yin-Yang Bomb: Uses both a black and white Lucifer weapon in battle.

Elphelt Valentine

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/image_3628.png

I fell down a lot, I hurt a lot, I was laughed at a lot. But then I realized, I just need to weed it all.

^{Click here to see her classic appearance}

^{Click here to see her -REVELATOR- appearance}

"My dream husband is waiting...!"

Voiced by:
JP: Aya Suzaki
EN: Cassandra Lee Morris

Playable in: Xrd -SIGN- (DLC), Xrd -REVELATOR-/REV 2, -STRIVE- (DLC)

Profile:

Height: 5'6"

Weight: "Dreamy"

Gender: Female

Blood type: "Mysterious"

Birthplace: The Backyard

Date of Birth: December 25th

Hobbies: Romantic discussions, pretending to be a bush dog

Likes: Smiling faces, saving up for a bush dog, anything sweet

Dislikes: Bugs, killing, loneliness

Character theme:
Marionette

, Extras

Ramlethal's sister, sent to be a sleeper agent that malfunctioned and gained emotions during her infiltration, outing her identity and leading to her capture by the Illyrian Army. A lovestruck girl who wears a wedding dress and wields a shotgun-rifle combination. She tries her hardest to be the pinnacle of femininity, but usually ends up failing. Elphelt is called upon by Ky as their "ace in the hole" against Ramlethal, incapacitating her and allowing her to be captured by the Illyrian government for questioning. She grows close with Sol, Ky, and Sin, convincing them to spare Ramlethal once it's discovered she's just the Conclave's pawn and trying to get her to feel emotions as Elphelt does. After the Conclave's defeat, however, it's revealed that she actually didn't malfunction as a sleeper agent, and was simply programmed to wait until the opportune moment to retrieve the revived Justice's corpse. Sol and a newly-awakened Ramlethal are able to get through her programming, but she ends up captured by the Universal Will, who attempts to drive her into despair and then use her as the new core for Justice, intending to use it as the vessel to end humanity once and for all. Sol is able to save Elphelt at the end of -REVELATOR-, and she eventually settled down in the Kiske household as a maid alongside her sister.

Elphelt returns in -STRIVE- as part of the 3rd season of DLC, now sporting a drastically different design. Although she had grown accustomed to her new job as a maid, Elphelt wasn't very good at it and as a result she started to feel out of place. With her sister Ramlethal joining the Illyrian military, she wondered how she could make people happy, culminating in her picking up a microphone. She's now the lead singer of a death metal band, embracing her past as the former love interest of a rock star and taking center stage to reach people's hearts through her music.

Elphelt was a originally console-exclusive DLC character that came free with first print copies of -SIGN-; in -REVELATOR- she became part of the main roster in all versions. She is a versatile character with a strong pressure game, using various tools that forces her opponent to respect both her approach and offense. Many of Elphelt's special moves involves entering a relatively immobile aiming stance and using either her Miss Travalier shotgun at close range or Miss Confire rifle (the latter she actually has to aim manually) to snipe her foe. if the situation doesn't favor her, she can cook and throw a Pineberry grenade either to ward off opponents in neutral or to set up a knockdown combo (okizeme) On the negative side, her lack of reliable reversals means she has difficulty breaking out of a opponent's offense without using up her Tension (Super meter) or Burst mechanic.

Returning to the series in -STRIVE-, Elphelt remains a flexible mix-up machine but with several key components from Xrd replaced like her firing stances and grenade cooking. In exchange, she comes packing with new zoning and cross-up tools like a tracking gunshot, a somersault that rolls a grenade towards the opponent, and a string of unique melee strikes that she can freely chain together to force block mix-ups. She can also latch a belt of grenades onto the opponent as a new Overdrive, blowing up seconds later and letting her follow up with combos and pressure.

All Love Is Unrequited: All love from Elphelt, anyway: some of her victory quotes have her learning that her opponent already has eyes for someone else (Ky and Slayer are married, Venom doesn't want a wife and is in love with Zato, Zato only wants Millia).
Ambiguously Bi: Contrary to assumption, Elphelt doesn't show any possible signs of attraction to women outside a very occasional comment, but it's contradicted by her belief that two women can't married to begin with, and seems to hold no fantasies about finding a wife as much as she is interested in a husband. While there could be an argument as to her finding women attractive, she never makes anything explicit like she does with men.
Animal Motifs: Like the other Valentines, Elphelt's outfit, primarily her hat, bears a resemblance to a kind of animal. In her case, a rabbit. Even her personality is like that of a rabbit's (she's lovesick and her profile states that she hates being lonely).
Anti-Villain: The only reason Elphelt is an antagonist in -REVELATOR- is because the Universal Will forces her to be, which is not only something she's completely unaware of being in the first place until later on, but very much does not like. It's to the point that once they have a clear picture of what's going on thanks to Ramlethal, not a single character in the cast blames her for the ongoing events and outright try to rescue her.
Badass Adorable: She may be cute, clumsy, and sweet, but she is a Valentine and, as the game's Story Mode shows, more than capable of holding her own in battle.
Bait-and-Switch: One of Elphelt's taunts show her getting ready to go One-Winged Angel... only for it to be revealed that she was fantasizing about going One-Winged Angel.
Boldly Coming: Invoked; her reactions to being abducted by a UFO in Goldlewis's win animation is excitement at marrying an alien.
Bottomless Magazines: The fact that Elphelt's guns never need reloading is kind of taken for granted in Xrd, but it's especially apparent in -STRIVE-. This is because the only other primary gun wielder, Happy Chaos, has a reloading mechanic which is intrinsically built into his playstyle while Elphelt is much more focused on Gun Fu with no reloading required.
But Not Too Bi: Zigzagged. Elphelt can be perfectly content with marrying someone regardless of gender (or sexual orientation) as per her instant kill, but she only makes comments about marriage and/or has fantasies about husbands rather than wives or partners, and never actually proposes marriage to any female character is Haeyun due to her male disguise.
Brick Joke: In Xrd, Elphelt reveals that she first discovered love through a rock musician, and the two would have been Happily Married if the Universal Will didn't activate her programming. Come -STRIVE-, and Elphelt has become a rock idol herself.
The Cameo: Shows up alongside the Kiskes in the ending cutscene of -STRIVE-.
Careful with That Axe: Her -STRIVE- match victory animation has her giving a metal growl.
Cleavage Window: She would be the Token Wholesome if not for her revealing cleavage.
Crosshair Aware: Whipping out Elphelt's rifle brings up aimable crosshairs. Of course, the opposing player can see them, too.
Crush Blush: Her face has a perpetual Blush Sticker in her victory pose when going on about her wedding with the defeated.
Cute Clumsy Girl: Her attack animations show a general sense of incoordination such as tripping while using normals or her air-throw leaving her flailing in panic. And her taunt in Xrd has her happily thinking about tripping and thus throwing a wedding cake in someone's face. Strive continues the trend by having some of her moves involve her weapon malfunctioning or her tripping over nothing (incidentally hitting the opponent), or her not recovering properly after a move.
Dash Attack: "Bridal Express" has her fly forward atop a huge bouquet to knock down opponents in front of her. -STRIVE- replaces it with a similar move called "Out of Repair" where she instead flies using the recoil from her gun.
Extreme Omnisexual: Played for Laughs. While she only rhapsodizes about being married to male characters, she doesn't hesitate to use Magnum Wedding to instantly infatuate men, women, those who are already married, part-Gears, vampires, parasites, boys on mechanized beds, her own sister or even anyone from her extended family. One of Elphelt's lines if she's on the receiving end of the Magnum Wedding even lampshades this:
"I-I'll just take anyone!?"
Evil Costume Switch: By -REVELATOR-, her clothes have changed from white and red to black and grey, complete with a spiked collar, spike gauntlets, and devil horns.
Fainting: Of the emotional variety; in Xrd she gets a bit too excited about marrying her defeated opponent and faints with a nosebleed in her win animation.
Family of Choice: Elphelt starts to consider herself as Sol's daughter due to her status as a Valentine, being born out of Justice's mold, as she says in one of her conversations at the epilogue chapter in -REVELATOR-. This is demonstrated in -STRIVE- with her redesign costume, which takes a lot of cues from Sol's wardrobe but is more pink.
Femininity Failure: A variation in that she's not a tomboy, but she still fails at being feminine due to her clumsiness and her penchant for using firearms. This continues in -STRIVE-, where she's now the vocalist of a metal band, a musical genre not considered traditionally very feminine.
Foil: By -STRIVE-, Elphelt has become this to I-No. Both of them are rock musicians with a prominent red color theme and immensely powerful creations of the Backyard, but Elphelt is a lovestruck klutz who still retains her innocence and love of life despite all she goes through. I-No, by contrast, is more overtly sexual in her mannerisms, and gave into despair and depression a long time ago. Even their choice of instrument shows their differences. I-No, being a guitarist, is more inclined to keep to herself and express her true feelings of anger and sadness through her guitar. Elphelt, however, is the main vocalist of a band, being willing to express herself more openly through her singing.
Friend to All Living Things: She loves people, animals and nature, with a particular fondness for bush dogs.
Foreshadowing: She keeps talking in her sleep about "eliminating all redundancies", just like Ramlethal. You may think she's having flashbacks... this is a sign that she is still being controlled, and that the backstory she gave is false.
Girly Bruiser: Actively tries her best to be as much of a Proper Lady as possible, but when left with no other options, Elphelt is ready to bring out the heavy artillery.
Girly Girl with a Tomboy Streak:
- She's a cutesy, highly feminine and buxom woman who dresses in a cross between a Pimped-Out Dress and a Playboy Bunny outfit and is obsessed with love and marriage, and yet she uses guns as her primary weapon and can be quite fierce when confronted. -STRIVE- leans more into this, giving her a redesign which while still obviously very feminine also incorporates aspects of her new job as a Death Metal vocalist, itself a very un-girly occupation.
- Her Image Song in -STRIVE-, "Extras", also demonstrates this rather succinctly. Despite the roaring death metal vocals, a feminine voice still rings out from beneath it talking about love, showing that despite the events of Xrd, Elphelt is still the cutesy marriage maniac we all know and love even if she's toned it way down from -SIGN-.
Girly Run: Blatantly done in her win pose.
Glass Cannon: The number of ways she has to open up your defenses and blast you is quite impressive, but she suffers from a poor disadvantage state as a trade-off, having to rely on universal mechanics rather than being equipped with strong getaway moves.
Glowing Eyes: Her eyes have a rather noticeable cybernetic-like glow to them. Likely due to her status as Valentine.
Godzilla Threshold: Ramlethal's plot is the threshold, and Elphelt HERSELF is Godzilla.
Gratuitous English: In -STRIVE-, she always sings in English regardless of the language settings, particularly at the end of her "Juganto da parleo" Overdrive, where she screams "DIE!!!"
Gun Fu: Her fighting style involves her both shooting her opponents with her guns, using them for acrobatic maneuvers and just straight up hitting with them as blunt weapons.
Homing Projectile: "Miss Charlotte" fires an energy bolt that pauses briefly and then beams straight to the opponent.
Hopeless Suitor: In -STRIVE-, she makes heavy advances toward Nagoriyuki and Faust, of all possible people. Nagoriyuki is a famously aloof and inscrutable Nightwalker who barely understands Elphelt's rambling, and Faust at that point in the story has distorted all his limbs and become a spindly abomination as well as reverted back to his old Dr. Baldhead identity. Not only are neither of them are actively pursuing romance, but they would also be bad choices for Elphelt to marry to begin with.
Incompatible Orientation: She'll propose to anyone, even the canonically-gay Venom.
Innocent Innuendo: Her theme in -STRIVE-, "Extras", is laden with innuendos, befitting her Love Freak characterization.
Interface Spoiler: A very rare glitch in the game which allowed players to select Shadow and Gold color palettes from past games revealed that the color palette for her One-Winged Angel form is her Shadow color.
Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: She has no issues duking it out in a full wedding gown.
(announcer Slayer) "Elphelt. You wear that dress beautifully."
Laser-Guided Amnesia: In -REVELATOR-, due to Bedman's Lotus-Eater Machine abilities.
Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Her taunt in -STRIVE- has her tell each member of the cast what type of song she'd write for them... most of which sound dangerously close to describing their actual themes in the game.
Locked into Strangeness: Following the events of Xrd, she has been left with white hair, pale skin and pale blue eyes after she was taken by Universal Will. These changes remain even after she is back to normal.
Love Freak: Loves to think about love and marriage.
(as announcer) "Let's go find love!"
Love Potion: Her Instant Kill is basically a firearm version of a cupid's bow and arrow.
Marked Bullet: The bullet she uses in her Instant Kill has a heart shot by an arrow engraved on it.
Meaningful Name: Naturally shares her surname with the commercial holiday, but she also shares it with the holiday's namesake; St. Valentine, who was an advocate for keeping the institution of marriage in the Roman empire.
The Mole: Was intended to be this, until a very intense wedding party overloaded her programming and awakened her true "self". It turns out that she is actually a Manchurian Agent, Elphelt's programming having been kept secret from her so she could fulfill it. Her true role is that of a spy sent to observe Sol, allow Justice to be revived, and prevent Sol from "awakening".
Motor Mouth: Both her winpose and winquotes are so long that they put Rufus to shame. She pulls out a marriage certificate and then starts rambling on about something before getting a nosebleed and falling over.
Ms. Fanservice: Her huge boobs and cleavage window definitely qualify her for this. It still applies even after her -STRIVE- redesign: while the cleavage window is gone, she is visibly not wearing a bra under her shirt and her animations feature a lot of Gainaxing. She also shows more skin than her previous design thanks to her exposed thighs.
Musical Nod: Like Ramlethal (and later Jack-O'), her theme "Marionette" references Valentine's theme "Diva" from Guilty Gear 2: Overture, but in a way that's different from Ramlethal's "Diva of Despair."
Named Weapons: "Miss Confire and Miss Travailler", are her rifle and shotgun respectively. In -STRIVE- she replaces both with a new rifle named "Miss Charlotte".
Navel Outline: Her skintight leotard in -STRIVE- gives her one of these.
Nosebleed:
- Her nose starts gushing as she envisions a future with her opponent in her win animation.
- She gets a little too excited about holding hands in one victory dialogue.
- Bizarrely, she also gets one when Sin describes the love of his father for him and his mother.
Nice Girl: Unlike the other Valentines, she happens to be very sweet, friendly, and kind.
One-Winged Angel: In Xrd's story mode when her true programming is awakened, as it was actually revealed that Dr. Paradigm warned her not to fight, due to her fighting limit is too weak, and easily being manipulated by Bedman and Ariels into exceeding her fighting limits, turning her into a mindless Gear. Once her threshold has been exceeded too much, her body becomes black, her hair glows white and her personality is overwritten with one resembling the other Valentines. Sol manages to beat her back to normal.
Perky Goth: Her -STRIVE- design taps more into heavy metal aesthetics, with dark eyeliner, an emphasis on leather and lots more spikes, all while still retaining Elphelt's pink-pastel palette and lively attitude.
Pink Is Erotic: Her choice of color ties into her romance motif.
Pink Is Feminine: With her lacey, florally attire and lovesick personality, Elphelt's association with pink fits her characterization.
Pistol-Whipping:
- She can bash her opponents with her shotgun.
- -STRIVE- has her regularly using her rifle as a blunt weapon.
Red/Green Contrast: The red to Ramlethal's green.
Reverse Grip: She does this with Miss Charlotte when she's singing, as the rifle has a mic built into the butt. Sol's not the only one who can emulate Freddy Mercury's way with a mic stand, it seems.
Rose-Haired Sweetie: Her reddish-pink hair in -SIGN- fits into her sweet, romantic nature. She loses the pink hair in -REVELATOR- though after her brainwashing takes over. -STRIVE- adds a very slight pink tint back into it as part of her new redesign.
Sexy Backless Outfit: Both of El's dresses show off portions of her back.
Shipper on Deck: She wholeheartedly encourages A.B.A and Paracelsus to be with each other and helps them to come to a better mutual understanding, even saying she'll be waiting for her wedding invitation.
Short-Range Shotgun: Miss Travailler is mainly for blasting at close range, and she can also bash people with it if they get even closer.
Shotgun Wedding: The theme behind Miss Travailler. And there is her winning animation, where she tries to convince her beaten-up opponent into signing up the marriage contract; and her One-Hit KO attack, which she dubs a "Magnum Wedding", wherein she fires a bullet that forces her opponent to fall in love with her.
Sickeningly Sweethearts: How Elphelt imagines her future with her opponents or their male friends is overly saccharine, like she's basing it all off a romance novel.
Significant Wardrobe Shift:
- Elphelt has received a drastic redesign for -REVELATOR-. Her hair is now white, her outfit has been modified to add a spiked collar around her neck, and said outfit now has a black-and-white color scheme in addition to being torn in certain areas. It's also been inscribed with depressing messages like "Nothing Matters", "No One Cares". Though she still acts the same, it is hinted that her appearance has something to do with Bedman's powers.
- Elphelt's new design in -STRIVE- is almost a complete departure from both of her Xrd designs. She's completely ditched her bridal gowns and flowery bouquets and has now taken up a wardrobe befitting a rock idol, making her almost look like an inversion of I-No.
Singing Voice Dissonance: In her return in -STRIVE-, she becomes a singer—a death metal singer, surprisingly, ala BABYMETAL. Her singing voice is appropriately very deep and nothing at all like her regular voice.
Small Name, Big Ego: She doesn't seem to notice the fact that her band has only sold nine tickets, and keeps waxing poetic about how she's going to go on a world tour/honeymoon with her husband and be adored by millions even though none of the characters in-game seem to have even heard of her band.
Something about a Rose: Her dress bears a rose motif and she wields a full bouquet of them as a melee weapon. Downplayed but still present in -STRIVE-, as her skirt still has a very flowery pattern.
Stance System: In addition to her normal stance, she has a versatile Shotgun stance and a more limited Rifle stance.
Start X to Stop X: She is sent to subdue Ramlethal using the link they share as Valentines. When Elphelt tries to self-destruct, Ram uses the same link to stop her.
Stealth Pun: The name of her band in -STRIVE-? Speothos Venaticus. It's the scientific name for "bush dog", Elphelt's favorite animal.
Thinks Like a Romance Novel: Many of her win quotes consist of giddily romantic marital scenarios about herself and her opponents.
Three-Strike Combo: "Chain Lollipop", introduced in -STRIVE-, is a Rekka move that lets Elphelt link four unique attacks into any order she wants, up to two times per attack. With this her close-ranged pressure is vastly boosted as she forces the opponent to block accordingly to each attack.
Throw Down the Bomblet: She can cook a strawberry-shaped grenade with a three-second timer and then throw it (or not, causing it to blow up in her hands).
Token Good Teammate: She IS a Valentine after all who are all created as human weapons. But she's a very sweet and friendly one. This is downplayed, and then Zig-Zagged, after both Ramlethal and Jack-O' both turn face, and Elphelt's brainwashing briefly turns her into an antagonist instead.
Unnecessary Combat Roll: She can perform a diving roll in and out of using Miss Travallier, being able to dodge under most attacks with it to surprise you with a face full of buckshot.
Vapor Wear: Her -STRIVE- outfit visibly has no bra, which likely contributes to all the Gainaxing which occurs in her animations.
Victoria's Secret Compartment: She retrieves a fairly large marriage certificate from there in her winning animation. It's also where she keeps the Marked Bullet for her Instant Kill.
Visual Pun:
- She wields guns and her clothing bears a rose motif.
- Her Instant Kill has Elphelt shoot the opponent through their heart.
- She's a shotgun bride, in both her looks and mannerism.
Walking Armory: There doesn't seem to be a limit to how much heat she's packing. She's got handguns, a shotgun, a rifle, explosives of all kinds, and even a sword for slicing cake.
Why Am I Ticking?:
- Her throw in Xrd sees her sticking a grenade onto the opponent. In -STRIVE- she instead shoves a boombox onto them, blasting them away with sound.
- One of her supers in -STRIVE-, "Bomb-Bombnnière", has her grab an opponent and latch a belt of explosives onto them that detonates after a few seconds. This forces even more pressure onto the opponent and can extend combos for El.
Yank the Dog's Chain: Her programming ends up undone to a degree, but she is teleported away by the Universal Will. And in -REVELATOR- it's shown that her programming is now right back to where it was before. She gained human emotion only to have it taken away from her... Almost. While her colors did dull out and her default in -REVELATOR- makes her look like a true Valentine, she actually didn't lose her memories or emotion. She is happily reunited with Ramlethal at the end of -REVELATOR-'s story mode as the exact same person she was at the start of Xrd.

Leo Whitefang

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/leo_ggs.png

My voice withered away, llimbs can't hear my commands, but still, I can see the way home; I am the Reaper, I took my friends to the netherworld, That's why I have to go home.

There are only two entries in my dictionary for inimitable: your mother's apple pie, and my skill.

Voiced by:
JP: Tetsu Inada
EN: Jamieson Price

Playable in: Xrd -SIGN- (DLC), Xrd -REVELATOR-/REV 2, -STRIVE-

Profile:

Height: 6'5"

Weight: 183lbs

Gender: Male

Blood type: A

Birthplace: Germany

Date of Birth: July 1st

Hobbies: Editing his own personal dictionary

Likes: Records, his own pride

Dislikes: Pickles, those more capable than he is

Character themes:
Stolz

, Hellfire

One of the three ruling kings of the United Kingdoms of Illyria, the Second King, and a veteran of the Crusades alongside Ky. He assists Ky and the heroes throughout the story, and eventually takes charge in combating the Conclave and their machinations. Confirmed as a DLC character for -SIGN- on November 4, 2014, he was made available for purchase on December 18, 2014 in Asia and on December 23, 2014 in North America. As of -REVELATOR-, he is part of the main roster, leading the charge on the rescue mission to take back Elphelt. Returns for -STRIVE-, with shorter hair and now sporting a more formal suit with a bomber jacket.

Leo is a high-damage, high-defense rushdown character who can seamlessly switch between a normal stance and the defensive, backward-facing Brynhildr Stance to launch very punishing left-right mix-up combos. On the other hand, he practically has no zoning tools making him ineffective at mid-far range, and also only has a short dash, making it difficult to quickly approach an opponent who is on the other side of the screen.

The Ace: Since his youth, Leo has been exceptionally skilled at everything he did. Then Ky showed up.
Animal Motifs: His name, long mane, sharp teeth and strong sense of pride is reminiscent to that of a lion. His Instant Kill in Xrd also morphs his blades into a big metallic lion head that mauls his opponent.
Anti-Air: Like a classic Flash Kick, "Eisensturm" is a strong reversal that can shut down airborne opponents. It has a stronger variant performed with Heavy Slash that does an extra hit at the end.
Badass Back: His alternate stance, the Brynhildr Stance, has his back turned from the opponent at all times, only leaving his weapons facing the front.
Badass Boast: Frequently uses these as a way of displaying his superiority, especially after winning a match.
(Xrd) "Attempting to analyse your defeat would be an utter waste of time. The truth is painfully simple: you lost because you aren't me."
(Strive) "The reason you lost is you fought against me!"
Badass Long Coat: A fur-lined one that even adds on to his lion-themed appearance.
Barbarian Long Hair: He's not much barbarian in the present, though, as he's an (mostly) articulated gentleman. However, when battle starts...
Baritone of Strength: A tall and strong war hero with a fittingly rich voice.
Beneath the Mask: You couldn't tell from how he acts in the present, but Leo carries heavy Survivor's Guilt over all the comrades he's lost in the Crusades.
The Big Guy: He's the tallest "NORMAL" guy, at 6.4 ft.
Book Dumb: When Ky explains the Information Flare phenomena, he adds on a bit after his fist explanation which is, apparently, practically a magical equivalent to basic addition or subtraction, and Leo didn't get it despite that. It took Zappa severely dumbing down the explanation for him to understand.
Break the Haughty: In his younger years, he was an arrogant jerk who looked down on others. His being shown up by Ky, and then his earnest efforts to better himself in order to surpass Ky, eventually turned him into a decent man.
The Chains of Commanding: The lyrics to his -STRIVE- theme, beneath the jaunty-sounding tune, suggest he suffers from Survivor's Guilt over all the soldiers under his command that were killed in action.
Charge-Input Special: An odd case for the archetype associated with charges. "Gravierte Wurde" and "Eisensturm" function like a standard charge projectile and anti-air respectively. In contrast to the typically defensive archetype associated with charge inputs, Leo's defensive moves can seamlessly transition into a very aggressive rushdown style that makes him a beast at close quarters.
Chekhov's Skill: In -STRIVE-, he boasts to Daryl and Ky that he's "a video surveillance fiend" after I-No meets Ariels, claiming that he could track a flea to the end of the world while pointing out that I-No had destroyed the security footage. It's hearing Giovanna's comment about the US Secret Service dress jackets and the difference in the badges - her superior wore the version that had a cartoony star, versus her fellow agent Udo's more normal one - which tips him off that the "Happy Chaos" the US forces were arresting at the moment wasn't the real one when he rechecks the body camera footage, and that the real Happy Chaos was still at the White House.
Chick Magnet: Ramlethal and Giovanna find themselves very attracted to Leo's personality and physique.
Close-Range Combatant: Zig-Zagged; Leo's blades and projectile actually do give him some decent range in his base stance. But when switching to Brynhildr Stance, he can overwhelm his opponent point-blank thanks to his super quick and chainable attacks. The last thing you want is to be right in front of Leo after he's swapped.
Does Not Like Spam: He hates pickles, so much so that Bedman's Instant Kill which reveals a character's worst fears and nightmares shows Leo screaming about how much he hates them.
Dual Wielding: Wields two BFSs.
Extra-ore-dinary: While it's not outright stated, Leo's metal swords grow and retract in a distinctly fantastical manner, with them growing even larger and being topped by a roaring lion's head in his Instant Kill, suggesting that Leo's using some kind of magic to control the dimensions of his weapons.
Face Death with Dignity: In gameplay of course, as he withstands his opponents IK's without fear, and with pride.
- That is, his face looks like he doesn't really care, as if he knows that it's not really going to hurt him. Averted when it comes to Faust's IK, where his expression is one of the more horrified ones.
A Father to His Men: In one of Bedman's Instant Kill animations that's clearly exploiting Leo's affection for his soldiers and one of them apparently dying to exploit the fear of My Greatest Failure, he yells:
Leo: "Don't die on me, that's an order!"
Flash Step: He actually has this trick on his dislikes list, mainly the teleportation kind. It makes sense, given how Leo's fighting style relies on his opponent remaining in one place. This is how Bedman manages to take Leo out.
Friendly Rival: A friendly political rival of Ky's.
Grapple Move: -STRIVE- gives Leo "Glänzendes Dunkel", a piledriver he can use only in Brynhildr Stance to mix up his foe. It does have a lengthy startup though, so he has to be careful just throwing it out.
Gratuitous German: His special moves, Overdrives, Instant Kill and leitmotif are all named using German words.
Heroic Self-Deprecation: When he reminisces on his first time knowing Ky during the Crusades, and about how Ky changed him and his outlook on life.
Leo: Still, if I had to grade myself, I'd probably say C. C-.
Hidden Depths: The lyrics to his theme in -STRIVE- imply that he, beneath his Boisterous Bruiser behavior, is a man suffering from immense Survivor's Guilt over the lives of all his men who were killed in action throughout his reign as king. Consequently, this also casts his famously aggressive playstyle as (in the vein of Serious Sam) him throwing himself headlong into the frontlines recklessly in hopes of, if not victory, having The Last Dance; redeeming himself from his own perceived sins via a warrior's death.
Hunk: While Sol is Tall, Dark, and Handsome with a Heroic Build, and Axl and Ky are blond bishonens, Leo is tall, blond, has an awesome mane, possesses a larger, thicker build, and is a king, supporter and rival to Ky.
It's Not You, It's Me: The formerly number one, now number two, words that Leo never wanted to hear.
Kavorka Man: He's not traditionally attractive like Sol, Ky, Sin, Axl, etc., with Lucifero calling him a "big, bear-looking gorilla." That said, both Ramlethal and Giovanna have shown interest in him, with Ramlethal seeing him as a cool boss and Giovanna seeing that he fits the bill as a potential partner. Heck, this might even extend to Millia, since one thing she can say, in a taunt, to him is "I'm taking you home today."
King of Beasts: Naturally, since he has a lion motif, he's also one of the three kings of Illyria.
Large and in Charge: He's a king just like Ky, and towers over most of his subjects.
Large Ham: As large as they come.
Leo: [during his Instant Kill] These royal blades are ten times stronger than any other! My strength is ten times that of any other man! Since I feel generous I'll DOUBLE their multiplied power, for two-hundred times the force!
Lightning Bruiser: Zig-Zagged; at first his mobility seems a bit sluggish compared to other fighters, only having a simple dash instead of a full run and walking rather slow. But his dash attacks grant really fast burst movement and allow him to switch to "Brynhildr Stance", letting him shimmy all around his opponent on foot and even slip behind them. All of this is paired with impressive strength and durability that let him take a good hit before retaliating.
Manly Man: Leo is a strong-built, lantern-jawed king covered in facial hair who frequently boasts about how strong he is. However, he has some Hidden Depths like his fascination with language and his obsession with studying security camera footage, of all things.
Morph Weapon: His swords, as they can freely change size and shape, up to combining with each other to form a much larger lion-shaped drill/lance during Leo's Instant Kill.
Number Two: Specifically called "Second King Leo". If you didn't guess it yet, the First King is Ky.
Oh, Crap!: Leo reacts this way in Strive's Story Mode when he realizes that Happy Chaos is still onboard the White House.
Personal Dictionary: His hobby is making a dictionary with his own definitions. He writes into it during a match as a taunt, along with consulting it after winning a match.
Pride: It is even inscribed on his belt (like "Free" and "Hope" for Sol and Ky, respectively). He was once a very proud man who hated people who were better than him. Meeting Ky changed him for the better, but now he's got legitimate reasons to be prideful.
- That said, he still indulges in his ego from time to time. For example, his winning animation is for him to wait for a giant soldier to bring a throne for him to sit on. His stance system involves turning his back to the opponent, which is both supremely arrogant and showcases his utter confidence in his own skills.
Royals Who Actually Do Something: He's a king and an ally of Ky Kiske.
Sibling Rivalry: One of the definitions for the word "Devil" in his personal dictionary? His sister's name.
Sliding Scale of Gameplay and Story Integration: He's The Ace, except that he's a bit on the Book Dumb side. Appropriately, he's a Gorilla/Unga Bunga (and the trope namer for the latter), the type of Rushdown character in fighting games that specializes in massive amounts of pressure meant to overwhelm the opponent, and break through their defenses.
Sore Loser: In regards to his former jealousy to Ky, though he compensated for it by working harder to improve himself.
Stance System: By changing into his Badass Back (Brynhildr) stance, he gains altered normals, the ability to go dash behind his opponent, and gains a shield move that reflects projectiles and stuns the attacker for a follow up. Leo is able to go for an incredibly aggressive and damaging offense in this stance.
Super Special Move: "Stahlwirbel" is an even stronger version of his "Gravierte Würde" projectile, firing several times faster and dealing a huge chunk of damage.
Survivor's Guilt: His theme in -STRIVE-, as well as his reaction when defeated by Bedman's Instant Kill in Xrd, reveal that he suffers heavily from PTSD after a mission where his entire squad was wiped out.
Your Mom: Astonishingly enough, he makes a G-rated version of the joke for one of his victory quotes.
(Xrd) There are only two entries in my dictionary for inimitable: your mother's apple pie, and my skill.
(Strive) Only two things in this world are insurmountable: a mother's recipe, and my genius.

Introduced in -REVELATOR-

Jack-O'

Perfection can't please me.

^{Click to see her previous appearance}

"Sol Badguy... I see. You're only half complete, too."

Voiced by:
JP: Hiromi Igarashi
EN: Nicole Tompkins
KR: Ah-yeong Yoon

Playable in: Xrd -REVELATOR-/REV 2, -STRIVE- (DLC)

Profile:

Height: 5'5"

Weight: 99lbs

Gender: Female

Blood type: O

Birthplace: Unknown

Date of Birth: December 13th, decided by herself (As of -STRIVE-)

Hobbies: Thinking of new methods

Likes: Candy, memories, novel ideas

Dislikes: Scientific ideas

Character themes:
Juno

, Sky Should be High

, Perfection Can't Please Me

Originally introduced as 'Jack-O' Valentine'. A mysterious woman with multi-colored red-white hair, a ball and chain in the shape of a jack-o'-lantern, a metal jack-o'-lantern mask, and a halo of light floating above her head. It is soon revealed that she is in fact the long-unidentified "third associate" of That Man alongside I-No and Raven seen briefly, heavily robed, in certain XX endings. In -REVELATOR- she finally takes center stage as she tries to put a stop to the nefarious plans of the Greater-Scope Villain of series, the Universal Will, encountering and eventually teaming up with Sol and company along the way. Come -STRIVE-, having fulfilled her original purpose, she's now working alongside Sol as a bounty hunter.

While the "final bosses" of -REVELATOR- tend to be a bit more varied due to the nature of its Arcade Mode (and lacking any Story Mode fights), Jack-O' is the most common final boss among the character routes and so is the nearest thing the game has to a "final boss". She was included with the release of both the arcade and console versions of -REVELATOR-, and made her return as a playable fighter in -STRIVE-'s first DLC pass.

Jack-O' is an unusual summon-type character, with the developers themselves describing her moveset as "comical". Much of her gameplay revolves around putting down 'houses' that continually spawn a horde of Servants who automatically upgrade themselves and move toward the opponent to attack them (a la MOBA minions) to start her pressure game and attain match momentum, while using her limited normal and poking Dust attacks to keep locking her foe down.

Her play style was reworked in -STRIVE- to give the focus more to Jack-O' herself rather than her minions, giving her the ability to summon her minions directly to her hands, command them to attack and defend with certain special moves, and even use them as makeshift projectiles.

Action Bomb: Her Countdown special sets her servants on a timer, that ends with them exploding and damaging Jack-O''s opponent.
A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Discussed. In -STRIVE-, she claims she's nothing but an artificial personality designed to inhabit the body until Aria's consciousness returns. She further claims that she's unable to feel, despite the obvious signs of her growing emotions and a Tulpa of her old self insisting Jack-O's own life and feelings are entirely real and valid. In point of fact, Jack-O' is much closer to a Reincarnation of Aria who inherited the emotions and feelings that Aria wanted to go on even after her mind irreversibly shattered, with Jack-O' insisting she's fake and artificial due to her own doubts in herself.
Always Save the Girl: The climax of -STRIVE- reveals that Sol is fine with putting the world further at risk if it means getting to be with her, and involves her breaking out of her mindset of putting aside her personal feelings for the sake of the world by admitting she would do the same if allowed to embrace her own feelings. Of course, it helped that Sol had already prepared a backup plan that didn't involve sacrificing her, so it's less about her callously throwing the welfare of the world aside and more about not treating herself as a Sacrificial Lamb by default.
Ambiguously Human: Come -STRIVE- she's said to be human again... but also still has some of her more than human abilities like being able to fuse with I-No to control I-No's powers.
Artifact Title:
- Her having the surname of "Valentine" at all. As That Man himself alludes to, she's not an actual Valentine, as rather than being a copy of Aria Hale, she's ostensibly the genuine article, formed of her human soul, and the "Valentine" appending was little more than a thematic holdover. In -STRIVE-, it's no longer even a part of her listed name, having been reunited with Justice and become, at least mostly, human.
- Downplayed in -STRIVE-. She drops the jack-o'-lantern mask in the story due to becoming "complete" and not needing the mask anymore, but she continues to use the name to distinguish herself from her past self Aria and she still wears it by default in battle (although you can take it off with a taunt).
Ascended Extra: The "third associate" of That Man who barely appears in XX becomes one of the major story focuses in Revelator and -STRIVE-.
Assist Character: In -STRIVE- her servants gain the ability to attack on command, giving her a versatile set of combo and pressure options. Though she can only have three of them out at once as opposed to the spawning army she had in Xrd.
Attack Reflector: The Defend Command in -STRIVE- lets her servants counter an opponent's attack and put them in a stunned state, allowing Jack-O' to follow up with additional attacks.
Badass Adorable: With her sweet personality, attractive design, and Cute Clumsy Girl animations, she really leans into this trope. Her servants count as well, being essential to her fighting style while still looking like little cartoon mascots.
Badass Biker: She's typically riding the sidecar on Sol's motorcycle, which can detach, and be driven as a bike itself.
Battle Couple: Starts joining Sol on his bounty hunt outings in -STRIVE-, much to his concern as the events of Revelator had made her into a normal human. Interestingly, this ends up inverted by the game's end, as Sol himself is turned back into a normal human as well, and the two of them eventually settle down in Iseo to live a more idyllic life.
Be Yourself: Her character arc in -STRIVE-. Even though Jack-O' fused with Aria in Xrd, rather than having her consciousness replaced with the "real" her, it just made Jack-O' herself a permanent existence with many still incomplete memories due to the trauma her other half suffered. This causes her to deep down feel like she's a fake who failed to live up to Frederick's expectations by remaining herself rather than becoming the person she used to be. And because of this, she ends up denying her own personal feelings: her love for Frederick. In the climax, Frederick reminds her that he has not called her Aria even once, and that even if she isn't the same person anymore, he loves Jack-O' all the same. Similarly, when she accepts her own feelings, her and her Tulpa of Aria begin to speak in unison.
Become a Real Boy: At the end of Xrd, she merges with Justice and becomes Aria truly reborn. As of -STRIVE- her child personality is gone, with her acting purely like an amnesiac Aria, as though Aria's soul and memories are complete again, portions of them still remain dormant.
Beware the Silly Ones: Don't fooled by her strange attack moves and whimsical round win animations, she can handily kick ass and take names.
Bootstrapped Leitmotif: This happened in reverse to the theme Sky Should be High. It started off as Jack-O's boss theme, but became the loading theme for a match in -STRIVE-. The load is short enough that most people who play -STRIVE- don't even know it has lyrics.
Brought Down to Badass: Come -STRIVE- she's lost the god-like power of the Scales of Juno, one of the two master keys to the power of the Backyard, and is described as very much human and mortal again to the point Sol is concerned about her welfare on his bounty hunts... this doesn't stop her from demonstrating the same Super-Strength, Summon Magic and Fusion Dance abilities she had in Xrd though.
Call-Back: A lot of elements of Jack-O''s character call back to Justice, but often "reversed" (usually for comedic effect), which isn't surprising, given Jack-O''s purpose and who she "is".
- Jack-O' commands a small army of adorable ghostly servants. Justice commanded a large army of murderous corporeal Gears.
- Jack-O' is a very silly woman who sometimes gets more serious and contemplative. Justice was a very angry individual who occasionally got more contemplative, especially when confronted by honorable humans like Kliff.
- Jack-O''s primary outfit color is white, with red as a secondary color. Justice's primary outfit color was also white, with blue as a secondary color.
- Jack-O' airdashes forward by using a spurt of jet power from her metal jack-o'-lantern. Justice used the large jets on her armor to airdash as well.
- Jack-O''s stage is titled "Heaven's Edge". Justice's traditional stage, while not explicitly named, is the Stairway to Heaven.
- With Jack-O' and Dizzy, it can feel like the game's slipping a bit into Only Six Faces territory, as they look really similar, down to having the same eyes. That's the point; Jack-O' is the most similar Valentine to the original Aria, who pretty much was Justice. As a result, she resembles Dizzy a fair bit because she looks like what Justice would've looked like as a human. We can see that Dizzy inherited her mother's eyes, among other things. The plot summary comic for -STRIVE- that covers X further hammers this commonality home.
- Jack-O''s crouch Slash behaves pretty much exactly like Dizzy's, just with a leg instead of wings. Like mother, like daughter, after all.
- For that matter, in general Dizzy and Jack-O' have a similar concept when it comes to combat and both fight in a somewhat similar fashion. Both rely on servants and familiars to assist them in combat - Dizzy's are just attached to her body as wings, while Jack-O' has a pseudo-familiar chained to her leg and her other helpers come from little houses. And they both rely on filling the screen with secondary targets, either in the form of Dizzy's various bubbles and attacking jaws or in the form of Jack-O''s Servants, and playing a bit of keep-away to allow them to set up to go aggressive. The details are a bit different again, but ultimately mother and daughter rely on similar combat styles.
- A call back of a different sort comes from her movelist; one of her specials, Zest, has the same name and behaves similarly to a move Valentine had in Overture, and her Overdrive, Calvados, shares a name with one of Ramlethal's, though Jack-O''s Calvados behaves a bit differently. She is, after all, a Valentine, just one created by That Man instead of the Universal Will.
- In -STRIVE-, the outside of Jack-O''s hair color becomes red while the inside becomes white, inverse from her original appearance of white hair on the outside with red on the inside. Justice also had red hair, given that she's Aria.
Clone Angst: As her full name Jack-O' Valentine implies she is another sister to Ramlethal and Elphelt, as well as another clone of Aria. She has Aria's face, and half of Aria's soul, i.e. that portion of Aria's memories Asuka managed to salvage from the Universal Will's attack on Aria's mind, and is intended to be a Sacrificial Lamb "physical patch", in the software-update sense, for Justice. -STRIVE- heavily plays with this, with her dealing with insecurity that she hasn't become the perfect recreation of Aria that she thinks she's supposed to have become, believing that her only purpose in life was to be a Sacrificial Lamb who should be disappearing for the sake of the real article. On the flip side, Sol treats her in pretty much exactly the same way he would treat the real Aria, but she believes he's doing it out of Loving a Shadow and that she doesn't have the right to love him back because she doesn't fit the ideal of what he wants. The real answer is somewhere in between: her supposedly "artificial" emotions are representative of everything Aria wanted to leave behind in her memory, so even though Sol recognizes her as a distinct person, he's at peace with the idea of the Aria he knew being gone for good, and the fact Jack-O' still has the same feelings and emotions her prior self did means she's no less entitled to act on them and build a new life with him.
Composite Character: In -STRIVE-, on top of having a more streamlined version of her MOBA-esque fighting style, being a Set Up character who can use attacks to launch stuff at opponents, she's also a Expy to Venom.
Cool Mask: Sculpted in the shape of a typical jack-o'-lantern. The reason she wears it is because she has the same face as Aria, confirming her as a Valentine. Interestingly the mask and lollipops also serve to keep her body functioning prior to her merge with Justice making her "complete".
Cute, but Cacophonic: Subverted: she normally speaks in an extremely high-pitched tone... But her voice switches to a lower, smoother tone when she gets serious or contemplative. It's easier for her to stay focused like that when around Sol/Frederick, as shown in the latter part of the Story Mode, and she drops this entirely after merging with Justice.
Death from Above: Her Instant Kill is a drop kick from orbit.
Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: She thought she was a Sacrificial Lamb who would disappear after she fulfilled her original purpose to fuse with her "other half". However, -STRIVE- reveals that's not how things worked out at all, and the very much still here Jack-O' is left wondering what she should do with her life now that it turns out she's not a temporary existence whatsoever, since she's convinced that her only "roles" she's supposed to play are bringing Aria back (which isn't possible in the way she believes is necessary) and "protecting the world" (even if it means having to do a Heroic Sacrifice). Sol berates her multiple times for prioritizing her supposed "role" over what she wants to do for herself, and her personal story involves coming to terms with the idea that she's allowed to have her own personal desires outside of those perceived duties. It's because of this confusion over the meaning of her life that she ends up empathizing with I-No's troubles.
Difficult, but Awesome: In her -STRIVE- incarnation, Jack-O' is a fighter with a very unorthodox means of play; her pressure and damage potential are all heavily tied to her servants whom she needs to manually summon and keep track of. And then they disappear if she takes any damage, creating even more pressure to stay ahead of her opponent. Combined with very few reversal options and limited specials, she takes a lot of work to fully get moving. With servants deployed however, her ability to overwhelm her opponent drastically increases, having uniquely powerful tools for locking down and racking up damage, like trapping her opponent between herself and a servant to attack from both sides or firing her servants off like big canonballs.
Emerald Power: Her jack-o'-lantern attacks all emit a bright green light, as do the eye-holes in her and her servants' masks.
Enemy Summoner: Can summon three little houses... which three types of mooks can come out of.
Epic Flail: She has a ball & chain attached to her leg that she can use to attack from afar. It seems to be fairly similar to Lucifero, being a familiar named Dorpos that assists with combat, it's just non-communicative.
Expressive Mask: The mouth and eyes on her metal mask can move to match her emotional state... when she's wearing it, anyway.
Expy: Borrows heavily from Noel Vermillion from fellow Arc System Works series BlazBlue, being an Artificial Human clone of the main protagonist's Cynicism Catalyst who after fusing with a major antagonist becomes the functional Reincarnation of that person.
Fastball Special: In -STRIVE-, she's capable of either throwing or kicking her servants at her opponent.
Flip Personality: She alternates between a bubbly girl and a mature woman who is a lot closer to the original Aria. In a number of spots, she does this mid-sentence.
Foreshadowing: If Dizzy defeats her in Xrd, she'll comment on how her scent is "nostalgic," hinting at Jack-O''s true nature as a reincarnation of Aria, Dizzy's mother.
Friendly Address Privileges: In -STRIVE-, she's the only one besides That Man who calls Sol by his original name of "Frederick", which he notably doesn't seem to mind much compared to how he usually reacts when anyone else calls him that. It's an early hint that she's not as distinct from the original Aria as she thinks she is, and that he considers her a worthy successor to her legacy.
Friendly Enemy: The first final boss of the franchise that wants to fight for fun (and candy).
Fusion Dance:
- As a Valentine her ultimate purpose is to fuse with her "other half", the revived Empty Shell of Justice. In her case it's more to repair Justice/Aria's broken mind rather than take control of her as the Valentines created by the Universal Will were meant to.
- In -STRIVE-, it's revealed that, as a Jack-O' unit, she's also capable of doing this with I-No to nullify her Time Master powers, but doing so would result in her erasing her own existence.
Genius Bruiser: Some of Jack-O''s in-game quotes hint at her having a pretty good understanding of physics. During her Instant Kill, she might bring up that she has to override a drag coefficient to successfully deliver a kick through the atmosphere, and one of her responses to May preparing to launch her from a cannon has her ramble on about all the different principles involved in firing a cannon accurately. She may also gush about the specs of the cannon itself, or discuss philosophy. Not too surprising when you consider that she's the closest of the Valentines to being Aria, who was herself a scientist.
Guest Fighter: She has guest appearances in several mobile games like Chain Chronicle, Seven Knights, and Elemental Battle.
Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: She has this dynamic with her boyfriend,Sol. While Sol is an oppresive Rushdown character who's one of the franchise's biggest Gorillas, Jack-O' is a Zoner who has her Servants do a good portion of the work.
Heroic Safe Mode: Played with. In -STRIVE-, her own consciousness not being overwritten by the "real" her at the end of Xrd makes her consider herself a temporary AI steering Aria's body until she "comes out", insisting that she can't feel real emotions because they were artificially constructed, and that the "real" Aria is due to return someday. On the other hand, both Sol himself and Jack-O''s Tulpa representing her ideal image of her previous self believe otherwise, considering her to be a part of Aria's heart that she wanted to leave behind in her memory. In the end, Jack-O' admits that she does have proper emotions, up to and including inheriting Aria's love for Sol, but didn't want to admit it because she felt it would be a hindrance to Sol's future with "the Aria he wants".
Heroic Self-Deprecation: Much of -STRIVE-'s story mode has her dealing with the fact she feels like an imposter who failed to become Aria due to her full memories not awakening as she expected them to after Xrd. This despite Sol and her partially dormant other half both insisting she is and always was the person she'd wanted to become, and encouraging her to live a happy life in the present rather than worrying about the past.
Holiday Motif: She's themed around Halloween, her name being a play on "jack-o'-lantern''. She dons an iron mask with a jack-o'-lantern design-something that's also on her minions and ball-and-chain weapon, has a deep love for sweets and candy, and is a twofold reference to the holiday as well as the power metal band Helloween.
Holy Halo: Has a glowing white halo floating above her head, to visually denote both her Physical God level power and her ultimately well meaning nature as the "good" parts of Justice/Aria. Although it initially disappears at the end of Revelator when she recombines with Justice, she retains it throughout -STRIVE-, albeit with a crack in it; it's implied that she could take it off if she wanted to, but refuses because she still considers herself too much of an Artificial Human to do so. It also resembles the hat that Aria wanted to leave behind for Frederick as a memory of her existence, and, after Sol helps Jack-O' come to terms with the fact that she's similarly a living incarnation of Aria's last wish instead of a failed replacement, she stops wearing it in the epilogue.
Hoist by His Own Petard: Self-destructing minions can and will damage Jack-O' herself, so players need to keep a fair distance from them if they initiate the countdown.
I Am Not Him: Jack-O''s character arc in -STRIVE-, she has been harboring deep self-doubts about her actual identity; she was the Valentine unit created to essentially bring Aria back to life. And at the end of Xrd Rev 2 that was accomplished to an extent. But that lingering feeling of something still missing makes Jack-O' think she's nothing but a fake, unworthy of her old identity or of Sol's love. In the end, Sol keeps insisting Jack-O' should just accept herself for who she is now, and he doesn't care about being a carbon copy of her old self. He is happy for Jack-O' the way she is and she should be too, with that said Jack-O' accepts herself and remains at Sol's side.
I Know Madden Kombat: Her version of the Calvados Overdrive, in Xrd, involves volleyball-spiking an ball-like energy charge from Dorpos to create a huge gout of flame. Likewise, in -STRIVE-, she can punt her servants like she's playing Association Football.
Image Song: In -STRIVE-, she has "Perfection Can't Please Me"
I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: An odd variant where it involves "competing" with oneself. In -STRIVE-, despite hanging around with Sol and making some occasionally flirtatious remarks with him, she constantly tries to put a stop to him getting too emotionally invested in her because she considers herself to be a temporary replacement for his "real" lover Aria. Eventually, it turns out that Jack-O' inherited her previous self Aria's love for Frederick/Sol, but refused to act on it because she felt that Sol wanted a future with the old Aria he knew and loved and not the "temporary, replacement personality" she is now, not realizing that he'd already come to terms with losing the Aria he once knew and loves her back for who she is now.
Kick Chick: A large portion of her normals comprise of flexible kicks in conjunction with her ball-and-chain, particularly her heavy slash where she performs a spinning handstand kick.
Leitmotif: In Xrd, she has "Juno".
Like an Old Married Couple: She takes up bounty hunting with Sol in -STRIVE-, and the two of them banter comfortably to the point where he noticeably is much happier and more comfortable than usual around her. One sign that she's taken on much more of Aria's spirit than she initially thinks is that her banter with him is shown to be very similar to the way he and Aria bantered back when they were dating.
Literal Split Personality: Played With. Though her body is a magical clone, her personality and memories are those lost by her "other half" Justice/Aria after the Greater-Scope Villain of the series made her original self Brainwashed and Crazy.
Loss of Identity: In -STRIVE-, one major reason she still identifies as Jack-O' instead of Aria, despite technically being a complete reincarnation of the latter, is that her memories are still fragmented. It's because Aria's mind was shattered so irreparably during the Crusades that restoring her in the exact way she was before has become impossible. According to her at the beginning of the game, Aria is still locked up somewhere in her head. Sol, on the other hand, believes that "Aria" is not in her past (her head and memories) but in her present (her heart and feelings), and recognizes Jack-O' as a successor to Aria's memory even if she's not exactly the same person.
Magikarp Power: Her Ghosts (the houses that she can deploy) have an invisible timer that gradually upgrades them up to level 3, increasing their durability (requiring 5 hits to destroy them at max level) and the number of hits each minion can deal during its attacks. Most of the time, it is a good idea to not let these houses stay on the stage for long.
Male Gaze: Her win animation is an extremely gracious close up of her butt, complete with a panty line. Safe to say that she makes the rockin' world go round.
Mask of Power: Her iron jack-o'-lantern mask allows her to use her abilities while she's still in an incomplete state. It tends to light up whenever she uses strong attacks like Overdrives. Her servants in -STRIVE- can also be equipped with masks using an overdrive; using this command grants them damage reduction.
Mechanically Unusual Fighter:
- Her fighting style can best be described as Overture-style. According to Word of God, her style is based on the Real-Time Strategy genre (what with her summoning minions), similar to how Elphelt's gameplay design was based on the First-Person Shooter genre. In addition to that, the range of her basic normals are a lot shorter than the standard, to the point where she cannot chain the usually chainable attacks like crouching kick to crouching slash. What she gets in trade are a lot of easy-to-execute specials (instead of complex inputs, most of her specials just involve direction+Dust, and even her overdrive input is what would be a simple special on other characters) that use up a tiny bit of Tension to make the moves stronger (and connecting with them will usually result in a full "refund" of spent tension and then some).
- The aforementioned mechanics are toned back significantly in -STRIVE-. She no longer creates houses to spawn servants, instead only being able to summon three servants to the battle, who she can then command to attack or defend. While they still operate on their own resource meter, there are lot less variables for Jack-O' to track compared to her last appearance, making her still unusual but more in line with the mechanics and fundamentals of other fighters.
Mood-Swinger: It's stated in the story that she has a very odd personality that almost changes on a whim from being childlike to serious. It's because she isn't fully "born" yet, and she develops a more consistently mature personality after merging with Justice to become "complete".
Mook Maker: The servants in Xrd will constantly spawn out of the houses she sets up around the stage.
Ms. Fanservice: Jack-O' is a pretty lady wearing a tight suit with cleavage exposed and plenty of emphasis on her shapely legs and rear end, particularly with her crouching animation.
Mundane Utility: You know that cracked halo of hers? She can use it as a hula hoop, it seems.
Musical Nod: Like Elphelt and Ramlethal, part of Jack-O''s theme "Juno" references Valentine's theme from Guilty Gear 2: Overture, "Diva." (Compare the start of Juno to the part in Diva about 16 seconds in.) All four of them are in some way pieces of, or copies of, Aria.
Navel-Deep Neckline: Her one-piece suit is cut pretty deep in the front.
Not Quite Dead: -STRIVE- reveals that her fusion with her "other half" didn't quite fix everything mentally, with Aria's full soul and memories still being dormant due to the same trauma that left the revived Justice unable to even bring herself to move in Xrd. Thus she continues to identify and act as the mature version of Jack-O', still in a limbo where part of her memories are missing. By -STRIVE-'s ending, she has accepted that old Aria is never coming back, and that she is her own individual rather than a temporary copy.
Odd Friendship: During her brief stint as a runaway, she strikes a camaraderie with Jam of all people during the latter's arcade story. They travel together for some time, discussing philosophies and Jack-O''s meaning for existence.
Official Couple: With Sol by the time of -STRIVE-.
Pet the Dog: Sol noticeably is much softer and more cheerful in her presence in -STRIVE-, and also expresses concern for her welfare distinct from that of "Aria" despite her insistence that she's just a temporary stand-in AI inhabiting her body. This is because he's already accepted the idea of the "Aria" he once knew being long gone, and considers Jack-O' to be just as much of an important person in carrying on her feelings and memory, so he's unhappy with the idea of her being so flippant about her own existence in comparison to an "ideal" version of herself that isn't there anymore.
Pumpkin Person: She has a jack-o'-lantern motif (most obviously with her metal mask), fitting her name.
Punny Name: Outside of the possible Michael Jackson reference, her name sounds like "Jack O Lantern".
Puppet Fighter: Her play style in -STRIVE-. Instead of putting down houses and letting her minions Zerg Rush pressure her opponent, she can summon up to three minions total and directly command them to do various things.
Really Was Born Yesterday: After becoming "complete" at the end of -REVELATOR-, since Aria's consciousness and memories never quite formed together for real, by the time of -STRIVE-, she's still inexperienced in knowing about the world since she'd technically only been fully "born" less than a year ago. Since she's technically an Artificial Human, she acts like a mature woman and has many of Aria's personality traits and feelings, but Ky has to give her advice on understanding human nature and tells her that there's still more she needs to learn about the world before she can try to save it.
Red Baron: She is known as The Scales of Juno.
Reincarnation:
- Despite being a newly born Gear, Jack-O''s mind could be considered half of Aria Hale's "soul". Specifically, she contains the memories and personality traits not in Justice, that That Man managed to save when the Universal Will invaded Justice and corrupted her mind to use as its puppet.
- Reinforced in -STRIVE-, where Jack-O' has to grapple with the fact that she's not a Sacrificial Lamb for Aria as she expected, but her own individual self, simply with inherited feelings and memories from her past life. Much of her arc has her learning to accept she doesn't have to become a perfect copy of her old self either, free to embrace her own feelings and desires.
Replacement Goldfish: In -STRIVE- she sees herself this way, thinking that she's failed to live up to everyone's expectations by not becoming a perfect copy of the person she used to be i.e. Aria like she believes she was intended to. Throughout the story, she insists that Sol wants his Aria to return, and reminds him at the beginning of the game that she's only supposed to be a temporary stand-in. Notably, nobody else treats her this way at all, and Sol often talks to her about her own well-being distinct from her old self. In fact, Sol never saw her as a replacement to begin with, pointing out that he'd never called her "Aria" even once; he's perfectly at peace with the idea that the Aria he knew will never return and that Jack-O' is a distinct person, but still considers her an important person who represents Aria's feelings and desire to leave a part of herself behind in memory.
Ridiculously Cute Critter: Her Servants are insanely adorable; they resemble little robotic companions with screen faces, tiny bat wings, and a similar color palette to Jack-O'. (Naturally, they become punching fodder for the tutorial mode.)
- Her Servants, curiously, are totally absent in Story Mode.
Rose-Haired Sweetie. Her hair in -STRIVE- changes to red like Aria's, and she's no less bubbly and sweet.
Sacrificial Lamb: Raven establishes the plan in Revelator is that Jack-O' will switch places with Elphelt as Justice's battery, effectively making her purpose to die. Turns out, the actual result was a fusion which resulted in the resurrection of Aria, and the fact she didn't end up this way leaves her unsure about her purpose and unaware that her importance to everyone around her has upgraded her to full-on potential Sacrificial Lion.
Sadistic Choice: Go after Jack-O' herself at the risk of the upgraded minions snowballing the fight in their favor, or kept destroying houses and leaving Jack-O' free to run safe poke or unblockable offense against you.
Self-Sacrifice Scheme: In -STRIVE-, the possibility of her merging with I-No to nullify her Time Master powers at the cost of her own existence is repeatedly brought up. Everyone around her is obviously against it, but Jack-O', who sees herself only as a Sacrificial Lamb meant to pave the way for the return of "Aria", only sees this as a "sacrifice" in the sense that it would prevent Aria from returning. In the climax, knowing that it's now impossible for the "Aria" Frederick once knew to ever return, Jack-O' tries to pull it off because she sees herself as a failure at her duty to resurrect Aria and believes sacrificing herself for the world is the only way left for her to fulfill her purpose in life, but Sol eventually stops her by telling her that she doesn't need to be the same person as Aria, and that she's free to live her life as Jack-O' with her own desires and feelings.
Sensual Spandex: She wears an extremely tight white jumpsuit that clings to every curve of her body. It's to the point her panty line is even visible in one of her win poses in Xrd. It gets a bit weird once you realize that it must be That Man himself who put Jack-O', basically half of Aria, his old friend, into that outfit.
Second Love: Sort of. -STRIVE- reveals that, while she's a sort of reincarnation of Sol's old fiancée Aria, her memories and consciousness are fragmented enough that she technically counts as a distinct entity. She carries the same feelings for Sol that her past self did, and Sol treats her in pretty much exactly the same way he treated Aria in the past, but in the end he reveals that he's aware that "Aria" is gone for good and has accepted this. He's fine with Jack-O' not being the same person as Aria, because she's still carrying on her feelings and memory, so she's no less important to him.
Spanner in the Works: She's the only Valentine not created by the Universal Will. This means that neither Bedman nor Ariels account for her existence until it was too late, letting That Man steal the resurrection of Justice (and thus Aria) from right under their noses.
Spinning Piledriver: Her Overdrive, "Forever Elysium Driver", has her transform her ball-&-chain into an iron maiden-like device to grab an opponent and perform a powerful piledriver. It's does a huge amount of damage expected of an SPD.
Split-Personality Team:
- Her child and adult personalities are in fact both active at the same time, to the point Jack-O' claims there's no real distinction between them on the inside and everything she did in Revelator was ultimately a choice on her part, not a sudden flight of childish fancy.
- Similarly in -STRIVE- her still partially dormant memories manifest in her mind as a ghostly Tulpa of her old self, encouraging her to accept herself for who she is now and pursue her desire to be with Sol.
SNK Boss: Notable for the fact that the trope is largely averted; she's actually not nearly as bad as any previous series boss, and is definitely not on the level of Ram from the previous title. While she does gain constantly-charging tension and a more powerful Calvados (spawning three flame pillars instead of one), between the difficulty being both selectable and variable in Rev's Arcade Mode, and the AI struggling a little bit to fully utilize her unique playstyle, even on harder difficulties, she's vastly more manageable than Justice, Dizzy, I-No or Ramlethal were. And there's simultaneously some irony and story logic to the first comparison - yeah, without her armor and armed only with a ball-and-chain familiar, Justice probably wouldn't be nearly so dangerous.
Stronger Than They Look: Her build doesn't seem like it'd suggest strength, yet she's so strong that even Sol is utterly shocked at how she could keep up with him. Her Instant Kill in Xrd has her dropkick an opponent so hard that it creates an explosion visible from orbit.
Summon Magic: She summons her servants in Xrd by placing small strucutres around the stage that spawn the latter to advance towards the enemy. Come -STRIVE-, she can now only summon three servants, one at a time, but has a more robust set of commands that they can perform to aid in attacks.
Sweet Tooth: From her intro and victory scenes she really likes her lollipops, and she needs to eat them to keep her body going when not wearing her mask. By -STRIVE-, recombining with Justice and becoming "complete" means she's no longer dependent on this, but she still seems to have a taste for hot chocolate.
Tangled Family Tree: Her relation towards her family is simultaneously much simpler than Sol's and much more complicated depending on what consensus said family reaches as the series moves forward; strictly speaking she is a Valentine unit, thus Jack-O' is Elphelt and Ramlethal's sister as all were born out of Justice's mold, but Jack-O' doesn't share their desire to consider themselves Sol's daughters for the very obvious reason Jack-O' is a special Valentine, made solely with the purpose of bringing Aria back to life, thus Jack-O' was to be Sol's lover for all intents and purposes, and by a stretch she would Elphelt and Ram's "mother" in a sense. Elphelt herself in Xrd brings this confusion up by wondering if she should call Jack-O' her sister or her mom, Jack-O' just says it is complicated. Jack-O''s arc in STRIVE is her coming to terms she can't actually be Aria in absolute terms, she shares all her memories and some personality traits but in the end they are different people, even if their love for Sol is undeniably the same; Sol does everything in his power for Jack-O' to accept she is a different person and he likes her the way she is and all ends well in that front, however, nothing in how Jack-O' sees herself when relating to Elphelt, Ramlethal and even Dizzy is discussed further than Xrd did, which is to say not all.
That Man Is Dead: Inverted at the beginning of -STRIVE-, where she insists that the original "Aria" is still in her head and that Jack-O' is just controlling her body for the time being until she "returns". It's ultimately revealed that it's impossible for Aria's mind to ever return to the way it was before and that Jack-O' will never be the exact same person as her, making it more of this trope.
There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Her Instant Kill is so powerful, the results of it can be seen from space.
Tower Defense: Her gameplay is based around protecting various towers that spawn insanely adorable servants to kill people with.
Tulpa: In -STRIVE-, she visualizes her still dormant "other half" as a ghostly version of the old her i.e. Aria back in the 2010s. This despite the ghost her outright saying they are equal parts of the same woman and in the climax both Jack-O' and her other half beginning to speak in unison to express their shared desire to be with Frederick.
Walking Spoiler: Needless to say, the fact that the game's promotional material and initial intros and whatnot don't offer up much information about her necessitates this entry looking a bit like a CIA document, as quite a lot of information about her is saved for Wham Episodes at climax of Arcade Modes or the latter portions of Story Mode.
Womanchild: Her child personality makes her out to be this. Several of her taunts and intros lean into her playful, immature side. She'll teeter atop her ball-and-chain, stick her tongue out to taunt oppoenent, and throw all sorts of Halloween lingo into her dialogue.
Wrestler in All of Us: One of her grabs transforms her flail to a Iron Maiden to grab the opponent... which she bulldogs. Elphelt actually comments on this in her win quote against Jack-O'.
You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Throughout -STRIVE-, she continually treats herself as a "temporary, replacement personality" housed in Aria's body with no purpose to be alive than to fulfill her "roles" of protecting the world and eventually disappearing to pave the way for Aria "coming back". Throughout the game, it becomes increasingly clear that nobody else sees her this way, with both Sol and Ky urging her to do things for herself and stop with her tendency to consider her existence as disposable as she thinks it is. In the climax, she tries to sacrifice herself to stop I-No while considering herself a "failure" to others' expectations, even though it's obvious that everyone around her is horrified at the prospect. Sol eventually has to yank her out with assurance that he never saw her this way at all.

Kum Haehyun

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/kum_image_2.png

琴全カ

"Power is meaningless before a tuner."

Voiced by: Hideaki Tezuka (Jonryoku), Unknown (Haehyun)

Playable in: Xrd -REVELATOR/REV 2 (DLC)

Profile:

Height: 8'1"

Weight: 439lbs

Gender: Male (actually female)

Blood type: A

Birthplace: Korea

Date of Birth: December 5th

Hobbies: Trimming "his" beard, making accessories

Likes: Humanity and justice, the chain fitted on "his" arm

Dislikes: People who don't try their best

Character theme:
The Tuner

A new character initially introduced in the Arcade Mode of -REVELATOR-. Kum Haehyun, also known as Tuner, is the latest descendant of the Kum family. While Haehyun's outward appearance is that of a large, powerful elderly man named Kum Jonryoku, it's actually a disguise - a robot suit piloted by a young woman. She is being sought out by Leo and Johnny in order to obtain crucial information about the Japanese, their colony, and Ki energy, in Johnny's case largely for the purpose of helping May. Haehyun was a first-print bonus DLC character like Elphelt for the console version, and was later patched into the arcade version.

In-game, Haehyun is a balanced ground-based fighter, boasting intuitive special moves but relying on links instead of the Gatling Combo mechanic, similar to the cast of Street Fighter. The Tuner can launch controllable Tuning Ball projectiles for space control and knockdown (okizeme), and has strong and simple poking attacks at her disposal. However, the large hurtbox of the Jonryoku suit and its relatively slow movement makes Haehyun weak to harassment by the opponent.

Bigger on the Inside: Haehyun's win animation reveals that her robot shell's interior is much larger than its dimensions would suggest.
The Cameo: Shows up eating at Jam's restaurant in the ending cutscene of -STRIVE-.
Ejection Seat: In her win pose, she accidentally activates hers and begins to comically panic.
Finger Poke of Doom: Her Instant Kill involves Jonryoku flicking the opponent away with tremendous force after immobilizing them.
First-Name Basis: Kum is her family name. Everyone, including the game's announcer, refers to her as just Haehyun.
Glamour Failure: In May's -REVELATOR- arcade mode, Johhny mentions that Haehyun refuses to go through official border checkpoints equipped with "modern" magical cameras, since those can see through the Jonryoku suit without issue. She has her photos taken with old cameras that rely on film, since they just take a picture of what's there.
Ki Manipulation: She is a master of ki techniques, to the point where she has earned the moniker of "Tuner", as in "tuning fork". She's so powerful, in fact, that she can even manipulate the energy of her surroundings to the point where the opponent becomes unable to lift a finger to stop her, as her Instant Kill shows.
Kneel Before Zod: Said Instant Kill begins with Haehyun immobilizing the rival and forcing them on their knees, before she gives them a Breaking Speech and then a Finger Poke of Doom that sends them pretty much flying.
Mini-Mecha: The robot is the size of a large human.
Mobile-Suit Human: The real Haehyun is the girl piloting the robot.
Pink Girl, Blue Boy: Jonryoku's outfit is a grayish blue, while Haehyun has dark pink hair and a hanbok with magenta accents.
Powered Armor: Jonryoku is functionally a suit of power armor that she pilots to do the fighting for her.
Power Levels: All of her win quotes are Haehyun assessing her opponent's level in string instrument terms, usually comparing them to a guitar or something appropriate for the character to match her musical tuning theme. As an example, Sol apparently has 7 strings that are Gauge 80 with two heads, which makes Haehyun question if Sol's a monster. The outliers are the Valentines, who are compared to wind instruments; Axl and I-No's alien natures makes them unreadable (at the very least, I-No appears to be compared to her own guitar); Raven is so ancient that she is unable to appraise him and Jack-O' is, to her surprise, described as cut in half.
Remember the New Guy?: Haehyun and the Kum family were never mentioned in prior entries of the series, and suddenly everyone is talking about the Tuner in -REVELATOR-. Johnny reveals that he's old friends with Haehyun, Sol recognizes that the current master of the Kum family shouldn't be so old yet, etc. An established family that knows how to manipulate ki to this extent, in a world where ki is both very powerful and yet still barely understood decades after its discovery, should have been rightfully famous. The remaining Japanese are essentially kept in gilded cages to both prevent them dying out and to study their ki. Other characters who can merely get it to work at all without being Japanese either get widespread recognition for the feat or get targeted for nefarious reasons (e.g. Kliff Undersn, Chipp Zanuff, and Jam Kuradoberi). It still feels weird that even -SIGN- or the old side materials never so much as hinted at their existence.
Samus Is a Girl: The shell, Jonryoku, takes on the appearance of an elderly man. The pilot of said shell is a much younger woman.

Introduced in REV 2

Answer

Enough is Enough

"Hello, Answer speaking..."

Voiced by:
JP: Tomokazu Seki
EN: Derek Stephen Prince

Playable in: Xrd Rev 2

Profile:

Height: 6'0"

Weight: 143lbs

Gender: Male

Blood type: A

Birthplace: Eastern Chipp Kingdom / South Africa

Date of Birth: September 8th

Hobbies: Visiting secret hot springs

Likes: His current way of life

Dislikes: Unforgettable memories, losing connection

Character theme:
Enough is Enough

Adjutant to self-proclaimed President Chipp Zanuff. He is blessed with a preternatural memory and can remember any fact after hearing it only once. Some refer to him as a human database. When Answer first met Chipp, he was poor and had fallen in with a rough crowd. He found Chipp's incessant preaching irritating, and challenged him to a duel which he then proceeded to lose spectacularly. It was at that moment that he fell under the sway of Chipp's charisma. He has since put his memory to good use in Chipp's service and has sworn to put Chipp in office.

Answer is a footie/set-play character who controls the neutral game by setting up scrolls and business cards which allow him to teleport towards the cards and perform air dashes in-between the scrolls. He shines on the attack with great frame traps, safe pressure, and a command grab where he can truly frustrate the opponent. However, he has a noticeably low damage output and is heavily dependent on the Tension resource and set-ups in order to score knockdowns, and is heavily reliant on the aforementioned scrolls and cards to truly damage the opponent.

The Ace: Calm, cool and collected. Doubles as a human database while being efficient in combat (while not even paying full attention).
Ascended Extra: Previously an NPC who simply appeared alongside Chipp. Now a fully playable character who will have his own Episode Mode scenario.
The Beastmaster: He is capable of summoning a giant toad as well as a giant snake in his dust and IK respectively.
Beleaguered Assistant: Is one to Chipp. Whenever Chipp causes a political mess due to his own brashness, such as in his -REVELATOR- Episode Mode intro, Answer is left to clean it up.
The Cameo: Shows up working as Chipp's assistant in the ending cutscene of -STRIVE-.
Deadpan Snarker: His response to a lot of Chipp's sillier antics.
Doppelgänger Attack: A part of his main moveset.
Excuse Me While I Multitask: In a match, he's on the phone the entire time he's fighting his opponent.
Improbable Weapon User: As shown in his profile art, he weaponizes business cards.
Ki Manipulation: Incorperates it into his attacks, though he is not as good at sensing it as the true masters.
The Lancer: To Chipp, he's the brains supplementing Chipp's charisma.
Master of Illusion: Can create shadow clones- which somehow also duplicates his phone.
Meaningful Name: He "Answers" the phone, and can answer lots of questions due to his superb memory.
Motor Mouth: He never stops talking in a match, since he's taking a business call.
Ninja: The second Ninja to join the series as a playable since Chipp.
Photographic Memory: A defining trait, Answer can recall anything after only hearing it once.
Promoted to Playable: A minor side character that later became part of the core cast.
Shout-Out: His theme is named "Enough is Enough" referencing Enuff Z'nuff and connecting him to Chipp further.
- It may also double as a shoutout to Irish rock band "The Answer".
Spinning Piledriver: As befitting a ninja, he has an Izuna Drop.
The Spymaster: One of the many roles he performs for Chipp. He keeps an eye on the movements of all major players and reports back to Chipp to devise a strategy when a response is warranted.
Street Punk: Started out as this, until his fight with Chipp changed his life.
Summon Magic: See The Beastmaster.
Third Eye: While he doesn't have a third eye per say- Answer's glasses have a third lens above the other two where a third eye would be located, which instead has a diamond-shaped marking.^note

Characters / Guilty Gear Xrd

Introduced in -SIGN-

Bedman (Romeo F. Neumann)

Ramlethal Valentine

Elphelt Valentine

Leo Whitefang

Introduced in -REVELATOR-

Kum Haehyun

Introduced in REV 2

Answer

Alternative Title(s): Guilty Gear Jack O

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Characters / Guilty Gear Xrd

Edit Locked

Introduced in -SIGN-

Bedman (Romeo F. Neumann)

Ramlethal Valentine

Elphelt Valentine

Leo Whitefang

Introduced in -REVELATOR-

Kum Haehyun

Introduced in REV 2

Answer

Alternative Title(s): Guilty Gear Jack O

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