She is the one who defied fate. The servant of the goddess Etro. The Warrior Goddess. The Paradigm Commando. And now, Claire “Lightning” Farron must become the savior in the finale to her story, “Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII”.

Writer’s Note: This contains heavy spoilers for the Final Fantasy XIII trilogy. If you don’t want to be spoiled, skip the following paragraphs.

It has been five hundred years since Serah’s death and time itself was destroyed. Lightning has awaken from her crystal stasis in a new world known as Nova Chrysalia, where everything is now immortal, stuck in the state they were before the time crash. The world is set to be destroyed in thirteen days and reborn into a new one. There, the god Bhunivelze choses her to become the savior, who would free mankind’s souls from suffering and let them enter the new world, in exchange for Serah’s revival. Lightning accepts, and soon discovers that her allies are not the people she once knew.

Snow is depressed at his fiance’s death and no longer the outgoing guy he was. Noel is now a vigilante who believes that he is the one who will defeat the savior to fulfill a prophecy. Vanille is now revered as a saint by a group known as the Order of Salvation. Fang has become the leader of a group of bandits. Mog now leads a village of moogles, tormented by what happened to Serah. Dajh is in a coma, and Sazh is now bitterly turning everyone away. And Caius, the man responsible for all of this, waits in the ruins of Etro’s temple, with nothing but the incarnations of Yeul’s soul for company.

With only Hope (who has mysteriously de-aged to this teenage self) as her ally, Lightning must fight off her doubts and guilt to be the savior and lead her friends to the new world to have her sister back. Standing in her way are the monsters of Chaos and Lumina, a mysterious girl who bears a striking resemblance to the departed Serah.

Although the time limit for the game seems intimidating, several elements have been added to make the game still feels like a classic RPG like all Final Fantasy games were. Yuji Abe, the game design director, commented that “One of the things we got for players is a New Game+ function, where they start from the beginning, but keep all of their skills and items. So for them, they can just carry on there.” Unlike the other entries in the trilogy, Lightning is the only character playable in the game. Yet, she gets a full treatment that makes her able to be customized and ready for any situations.

Nobody expected that Lightning’s story would evolve into such a phenomenon like his, but fans have been clamoring for more since. She gets to fully interact with the world in the game, from passing through various obstacles to using stealth abilities. The developers wanted an open world that you would be able to reach everything you see with no load times. With a new battle system familiar to the previous games, changeable outfits that each come with their own unique abilities, and the already amazing presentation of the Final Fantasy series, Lightning is ready to become the savior her world needs and players will be able to do it with her.