History VideoGame / FinalFantasyRecordKeeper

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: With the entire series to draw on, it is to be expected. As of the first half of 2018, the international version alone has ''220'' playable characters, with an additional six currently available only in the Japanese version, for a grand total of '''226'''.

* MassiveMultiplayerCrossover: The entire point of the game, which is explained by the characters and realms existing within records of famous events and battles. The game pulls from all areas from the franchise, from the first ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyI'', to ''[[VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII Compilation of Final Fantasy VII]]'', to ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'', making for one ''[[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters massive]]'' MassiveMultiplayerCrossover.

** In the game's early days, the developers used signature and/or powerful weapons for each character for Soul Break relics. But as the game kept going and more Soul Breaks were added to characters, this obviously no longer worked for most of the cast. This results in oddities where weapons that were the strongest of their kind in their home games are outclassed by what in the home game was VendorTrash, but here is more powerful.

* YouGottaHaveBlueHair: Characters such as Lenna, Terra, and Lightning retain the improbable hair colors they had in their original games.

* SomethingCompletelyDifferent:
** Some dungeons shake up the usual formula, with a weaker boss in every battle or the boss stage coming first.
** Collection Events have you collect clusters of items dropped from enemies, bosses and completion rewards, to be exchanged for rewards in the event's proprietary shop.
** Survival Events throw players into a gauntlet of single battles against random enemy formations for Memory Shards. With every victory, you get more Shards, and your stash is multiplied depending on the enemy's level. Winning or leaving the dungeon between rounds banks your rewards into Memory Prisms, and the total number determines your rewards; if your party falls, you lose all Shards earned.
** The ''VideoGame/DissidiaFinalFantasy'' events. Rather than traditional multi-stage dungeons, each dungeon in both parts was a single fight against the boss.
** The Crystal Tower events are segmented {{boss rush}}es that can be done in any order--but using a character in one battle locks them out of all others to avert ComplacentGamingSyndrome.
** The "Shinra's Finest" event is a Jump Start gauntlet run of 100 Shinra troopers and mechs, with each wave broken up by minibosses. Unusually, only Sephiroth gets Record Synergy.

*** From ''VII'', Cid, Barret, and Cait Sith, are playable characters and are just kinda average here in their roles. Shelke, a supporting character from the ''Dirge of Cerberus'' spinoff, is considered one of the best Support characters in the game.
*** Echo is just a FairyCompanion to the main character of a ''Final Fantasy'' mobile spin-off, she got a Relic that endowed upon her a Soul Break that gave the entire party DEF and RES boosts '''and''' Hastega. Not to mention this ability could be stacked on top of pre-existing Soul Breaks such as Sentinel Grimoire, which had players scratching their heads at why a basically-unknown side character got one of the best Soul Breaks in the game. This was later rectified pre-release with a quick change that made the buff to be explicitly anti-MAG only, vastly reducing its viability.
** Attacks likewise can fall into this. Ungarmax, Barret's strongest Limit in ''VII'', is merely a ''Super'' Soul Break here.

* BadassDriver: Laws of physics apparently don't apply to the Fenrir; in Cloud's first Burst Soul Break, Fenrir Overdrive, he manages to do several drive-bys with the Fusion Swords, then does ''aerial cartwheels on a motorcycle''. His second BSB, Cloud Cycle, combines this with CarFu, as he jumps off his bike mid-attack, has it zoom around driverless as he slashes at the enemy before finally having it crash into the enemy and explode as he finishes off the attack with a final slash.

The "endgame" content is permanent and varied. These include Nightmare Dungeons, {{Puzzle Boss}}es that require clever strategy to defeat; Magicite Dungeons, a series of bosses based on ElementalRockPaperScissors that need elementally-focused teams to defeat; and Cardia Dungeons, where each dungeon is themed around a particular realm and the player must bring their best fighters from that realm or suffer stat penalties for off-realm characters. Magicite and Cardia dungeons are tiered in levels of power, with Cardia also being divided into Dream, Torment, and Dreambreaker dungeons, each harder than the last.[[note]]Torments were originally called Nightmare Dungeons in Japan and the Nightmare Dungeons were Abyss Dungeons. Since Nightmare Dungeons was in use in English when Nightmare Dungeons began began in Japan, they were renamed Torment Dungeons and the ThemeNaming was lost.[[/note]] There's also the Labyrinths, where the player must bring three parties to explore a corridor of paintings variously containing treasure, stat boosts, debuffs, and enemies. The Labyrinth has continued to grow every few months with a rotating list of equipment to be found and new bosses added, which are a mix of element-focused and realm-focused. Aside from Nightmare Dungeons, the objective with all of these dungeons is to beat the enemy as soon as possible to reap the most rewards for your victory; a win in under 30 seconds is usually the best time the game will ask for.

* AbsurdlyLowLevelCap: The standard level cap is only 50 and you can reach it fairly easily, at which point you can use Memory Crystals to raise the cap to 65, 80, and finally 99. You have abundant resources to raise dozens of characters this high, and long-time players have raised the entire roster to 99 long ago. However, the late-game content has evolved to the point that Level 99 characters are just assumed, so they'll still pose a great challenge. In response, Crystal Water and Magia let players continue to boost characters' stats even though they can't level up anymore. Overall, the achievement of getting characters to Level 99 is completely meaningless but for the fact it nets you their last Record Materia.

->'''Note:''' Characters in italics are, as of February 2022, available only in Japan.

* '''[[VideoGame/FinalFantasyType0 Type-0]]:''' Ace, Deuce, Trey, Cater, Cinque, Sice, Seven, Eight, Nine, Jack, Queen, King, Rem Tokimiya, Machina Kunagiri

Although the game expects players to keep up with the PowerCreep, as most gacha games do, the manner in which these dungeons are structured and their mechanics designed means that fully built characters are not necessary, a single good relic can be enough for a character to carry their weight. Considering that many characters now have ''dozens'' of relics, the developers thankfully don't expect you to have all of them. Older relics are no longer even offered on some banners and are made available in an in-game shop, where players can trade for them with currency earned entirely in-game. While these Relics and their associated Soul Breaks are outdated, they're not obsolete and can be useful to fill in a character's kit with a key element they were missing. This means that ''Record Keeper'' averts AllegedlyFreeGame very effectively: you won't always get the relics you want to clear content, but with patience and a bit of luck, eventually you can get what you need.

The playable cast spans the entire ''Final Fantasy'' franchise, which stands at 245 at the Global version as of January 2022, with two additional characters yet to be released outside Japan, for a grand total of ''247'', each with their own equipment draw, ability pool, and Soul Breaks with associated Relics.

''Record Keeper's'' dungeons are paintings that represent various ''Final Fantasy'' games and related enemies. The bulk of the content are Realm Dungeons, which have players fight in recreations of iconic battles of the games [[AdaptationDistillation in a rough retelling of the game's events]]. An expansion of this idea are Record Dungeons, where the player controls a party combined of their protagonists and that game's characters and actually plays through the game's events on a short map they explore and cutscenes to watch. The other regular content is weekly Challenge Events, timed events that are themed around a few particular characters and tend to be accompanied by relic banners spotlighting them. Other events may also rotate weekly, including events where the player can play them repeatedly to collect tokens to exchange in a shop, events where the player can fight a particularly powerful boss from the realm being spotlighted in the current Challenge Dungeon, and events where the player must fight a gauntlet of enemies with entirely different parties, or a single party that must have the endurance to beat multiple bosses. As the metagame has evolved, these rotating weekly events are primarily to give players a way to stockpile resources to upgrade their party, and to give newcomers a way to recruit characters.

The "endgame" content is varied and permanent. These include Nightmare Dungeons, {{Puzzle Boss}}es that require clever strategy to defeat; Magicite Dungeons, a series of bosses based on ElementalRockPaperScissors that need elementally-focused teams to defeat; and Cardia Dungeons, where each dungeon is themed around a particular realm and the player must bring their best fighters from that realm or suffer stat penalties for off-realm characters. Magicite and Cardia dungeons are tiered in levels of power, with Cardia also being divided into Dream, Torment, and Dreambreaker dungeons, each worse than the last.[[note]]Torments were originally called Nightmare Dungeons in Japan and the Nightmare Dungeons were Abyss Dungeons. Since Nightmare Dungeons was in use in English when Nightmare Dungeons began began in Japan, they were renamed Torment Dungeons and the ThemeNaming was lost.[[/note]] There's also the Labyrinths, where the player must bring three parties in to explore a corridor of paintings various containing treasure, stat boosts, debuffs, and enemies, in order to find powerful character-exclusive equipment. The Labyrinth has continue to grow every few months with a rotating list of equipment to be found and new bosses added, which are a mix of element-focused and realm-focused. Aside from Nightmare Dungeons, the objective with all of these dungeons is to beat the enemy as soon as possible to reap the most rewards for your victory; a win in under 30 seconds is usually the best time the game calls for.

The game is separated into worlds representing each Final Fantasy game, which is then divided into portraits that represent an area or dungeon in each game, and overall [[AdaptationDistillation acts as a summary for each game]]. These compromise the bulk of dungeons, called "Realm Dungeons". Weekly events called "Challenge Dungeons" spotlight a few particular characters and associated story sequences. There are also numerous higher-difficulty dungeons that have less to do with stories and more to do with paintings corrupted by particularly evil forces and house dangerous enemies. These include Nightmare Dungeons, {{Puzzle Boss}}es that require clever strategy to defeat, Magicite Dungeons, a series of bosses based on ElementalRockPaperScissors that need elementally-focused teams to defeat, and Torment Dungeons, where each dungeon is themed around a particular Realm and the player must bring their best fighters from that Realm to challenge the boss across three levels of escalating power.

Gameplay in ''Record Keeper'' uses the old-school Active Time Battle System. Players control a party of five characters, each able to equip two abilities with a limited number of charges, and each being able to equip up to four Soul Breaks, the game's LimitBreak system. As the player completes dungeons and earns rewards, they can use Orbs and Crystals to craft and hone their equippable abilities, use Scarletite and Adamantite to upgrade their equipment, use Motes and Crystal Water to improve characters' stats and even expand their ability pool, and earn Record Materia that give characters unique benefits in battle. They can also equip Magicite, summonstones that call monsters into battle to support the party, and passively grant them stat bonuses.

->'''Note:''' Characters in italics are, as of January 2022, available only in Japan.

* '''[[VideoGame/FinalFantasyXV XV]]:''' Noctis Lucis Caelum, Gladiolus Amicitia, Iris Amicitia, Prompto Argentum, Aranea Highwind, Ignis Scientia, Cor Leonis, Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, Ardyn Izunia, ''Ravus Nox Fleuret''

* ObviousRulePatch: When Dreambreaker bosses were added to the game, they had a mechanic where they inflict Full Break on the party when they phase change, heavily debuffing their ATK/DEF/MAG/RES. Since Dreambreakers allow players to bring one off-realm character without penalty, so they chose Tyro, since he has an Overstrike Soul Break that overwrites the ATK/DEF/MAG/RES debuff. The developers caught onto this because later Dreambreakers began inflicting Stop when they phase changed and were given high enough MND that most off-realm characters who aren't White Mages would be stunned for several seconds (including Tyro). The Dreambreaker boss, Dragonking Bahamut, shutdowns Tyro entirely; if he is ever damaged by a Soul Break or Limit Break from an off-realm character, he instantly counters with Full Break.

The playable cast spans the entire ''Final Fantasy'' franchise, which stands at 245 at the Global version as of August 2021, with one additional character yet to be released outside Japan, for a grand total of ''246'', each with their own equipment draw, ability pool, and Soul Breaks with associated Relics.

->'''Note:''' Characters in italics are, as of August 2021, available only in Japan.

* '''[[VideoGame/FinalFantasyXI XI]]:''' Shantotto, Ayame, Curilla V Mecru, Prishe, Lion, Aphmau, Zeid, Lilisette, Naja Salaheem

** '''Dual Awakening Soul Break:''' The next step up from normal Awakening Soul Breaks, they only deal 7 hits on use but have an innate level of damage cap increase, making it easier to break Savage modes with them. Like their name implies, they work in two stages: they start off in Mode I after use, which generally has similar effects to that character's existing Awakening but with the doublecast being upgraded to triplecast and no infinite ability uses for their duration, which, while initially seeming like a downgrade, also makes them work properly with Syncs. Once in Mode I, you can switch to Mode II at any time, with the switch action itself being instant and filling the character's ATB gauge, meaning you don't lose any time when doing so: once in Mode II, the character generally gains another level or 2 of damage cap increase and another buff, but their triplecast is downgraded to a doublecast, which might not make the switch worth it for most characters. Unlike the default 15 second duration, the duration of Mode II is dependent on the number of turns spent in Mode I: if switched to after 1 or 2 turns in Mode I, it lasts for a maximum duration of 3 turns, with every turn spent in Mode I after that lowering the duration by 1, meaning Mode II ends instantly if switched to after 5 turns in Mode I.

** '''Chain Soul Break:''' Applies a timed "chain" effect to offensive skills of a certain element to multiply their damage for each successive hit. These come in 3 main varieties: the first type deals damage on their own and gives some sort of party-wide support effect as well as a 20% boost to all damage of that element and the ones that don't give any supporting effects, deal twice the number of initial number of hits, while the second type trades the extra hits and damage for a strong party ATK/MAG buff, a 50% boost to all damage of that element and a higher max chain count of 150 compared to 99 of the older types of chains. There's also a third type of Chain Soul Break that's not as much of a direct upgrade to the second type of chain: they only have a max chain count of 99 like the first type of chains, but they retain the second type's ATK/MAG boost and larger base boost to elemental damage and in exchange for the lower max chain count, they cast instantly and also provide the party an additional 20% increase to the damage of that element, allowing the party to potentially deal more damage at lower chain counts but also having lower maximum overall damage during the chain. In addition to elemental Chains, there are also Realm Chains which have largely identical hitcounts and base damage boosts and instead of working off elemental damage, they instead boost all damage of characters belonging to that realm and the entry effect also either grants the party an Attack and Magic buff and Haste or an ATK/MAG/DEF/RES buff to counter Dreambreakers' perioidical Full Break and the removal of cast time for a turn.

** '''Arcane Dyad:''' Another variant of Arcane Overstrikes, they, like their name implies, essentially function like 2 Soul Breaks in one and provide more functionality than just "lots of damage all at once": the first use of one essentially functions like a Glint+ and costs no SB bar to use, providing the character a stacking En-Element, an increase of their damage cap and a status with no time limit that keeps track of number of attacks used or total damage inflicted. The second use takes 3 SB bars to use and essentially works like a 20+1 hit version of an Arcane Overstrike, but with each hit having up to double the potency of normal Arcane Overstrike hits and the weaker hits being able to deal up to 29999 damage each, both of these being determined by dealing enough damage or attacks after using the first part of the Arcane Dyad.

The playable cast spans the entire ''Final Fantasy'' franchise, which stands at 240 at the Global version as of August 2021, with one additional character yet to be released outside Japan, for a grand total of ''246'', each with their own equipment draw, ability pool, and Soul Breaks with associated Relics.

->'''Note:''' Characters in italics are, as of February 2021, available only in Japan.

The playable cast spans the entire ''Final Fantasy'' franchise, which stands at 240 at the Global version as of August 2021, with one additional character to be released outside Japan, for a grand total of ''246'', each with their own equipment draw, ability pool, and Soul Breaks with associated Relics.

* '''[[VideoGame/FinalFantasyXV XV]]:''' Noctis Lucis Caelum, Gladiolus Amicitia, Iris Amicitia, Prompto Argentum, Aranea Highwind, Ignis Scientia, Cor Leonis, Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, Ardyn Izunia, 'Ravus Nox Fleuret'

The playable cast spans the entire ''Final Fantasy'' franchise, which stands at 240 at the Global version as of June 2020, with an additional five yet to be released outside Japan, for a grand total of ''245'', each with their own equipment draw, ability pool, and Soul Breaks with associated Relics.

* '''[[VideoGame/FinalFantasyXV XV]]:''' Noctis Lucis Caelum, Gladiolus Amicitia, Iris Amicitia, Prompto Argentum, Aranea Highwind, Ignis Scientia, Cor Leonis, Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, Ardyn Izunia

** Magicites are designed to be the hardest persistent content the game currently has to offer: they have massive stats that can't be lowered to any meaningful degree with Breaks and require you to either completely focus on the element they're weak against, make use of strong non-elemental abilities to do damage or reduce their resistance to an element you can capitalize on the best. They also do massive amounts of damage as expected, with 3000-4000+ being the average amount of damage you take from 4* Magicites' strongest attacks even with full mitigation and resistance to their main element, and if you take too long to kill them, they become enraged and spam their strongest attacks every turn until either they or your party are dead. Finally, almost all of them have some kind of a gimmick that you need to prepare for in addition to having good sources of damage and healing, such as extremely powerful counters, being able to temporarily avoid your attacks, using {{Standard Status Effect}}s that are hard to avoid due to having to use an accessory slot to reduce their massive damage, a LastDitchMove, a powerful opening move or reducing your offensive stats while increasing their own. 5* Magicites naturally take this to the next level, with much higher overall stats and an Enrage mode that they enter periodically, the effects of which depend on the specific Magicite, but it'll generally make them much deadlier and/or harder to deal damage to and can only be cancelled by attacks that deal 5-digit damage to them.

** There are also certain Support Abilities which are Physical attacks with {{Status Effect}}s tacked on instead. Unlike Spellblade, a much wider range of characters can use Support Abilities.

** As usual for ''Final Fantasy'', any ability concerning {{Status Effect}}s is useless, but this game makes it more noticeable. Since characters can only equip two abilities, it's never worth bringing a status-inflicting ability along over other, more useful abilities. And for status healing, the game has not only Esuna, but Ultra Cure, which heals HP and heals status ailments, so the lower-rank White Magics that heal specific statuses will never see use.

* ArbitraryMissionRestriction: Dungeons have a "Mastery" ranking system, judged by damage taken, KO'd party members and number of actions taken. All boss stages are ranked on whether ''any'' party members were knocked out, with additional requirements like "exploit X's weakness to [[ElementalRockPaperScissors a certain element]]", "inflict a certain StatusEffect on X", "defeat X before it uses its SignatureMove", etc.

* SpellLevels: Present, of course, being Final Fantasy and all. The standard [spell], [spell]ra, [spell]ga, and [spell]ja tiers exist, mainly for the standard [[FireIceLightning Fire, Blizzard, and Thunder]] trio and the Cure line, although other spells like Water and Gravity get second tiers, like Watera and Gravija. Some spells like Protect have just a -ga level which affects the whole party instead of just one character like the basic version, while StandardStatusEffect spells like Slow have a -ga version that is a lot more accurate.

* StandardStatusEffects: The usual Poison, Blind, Paralyze, etc. status can be applied by both your characters and the enemies. However, they avert the usual UselessUsefulSpell the series is known for; a lot of bosses are weak to a couple of status effects, as well as Paralyze and Slow, making some abilities like Intimidate ''very'' useful. The game actually encourages players to use status effects against some bosses to get a Mastery ranking. This, unfortunately, can turn boss battles into a drag [[LuckBasedMission if the player is unlucky]] and his attacks don't activate the desired status.

** '''Limit Break Glint:''' Glints that use the Limit Break bar instead of Soul Break to perform, they take a single segment of the Limit Break bar to use and unlike normal Glints that only affect the user, they can provide similar effects to the entire party, such as granting everyone an Elemental Infusion.