LogFAQs > #936073507

Hey, top 25% ain't too bad considering how many enjoyable characters there are in this series!

#22 - Rita Mordio (Vesperia)
I dont have any family, so I dont But I kinda like, you know, how we are.

Even before I started replaying games with this ranking in mind and putting the proverbial pen to paper for it, I obviously had a rough idea of where a lot of characters would finish. Some turned out to be pleasant surprises that rose way up on the final list. Others left me scratching my head a bit and wondering what it was that made me initially think so highly of them. Rita is one of the latter category. As you can tell from her placement here, I dont mean to say shes bad, by any means. I still quite like her. But I figured shed be competing for a top ten spot, and that wouldve been quite a stretch.

The biggest point in her favor is that shes my favorite dedicated caster in the series battle-wise. I love a good mage, and everything about her just feels good. Shes got a great repertoire of spells, particularly once she starts getting altered artes thrown in, with fun incantations. Spamming some of the bigger ones in Over Limit, especially with the famous blah blah blah shortcuts that fit her character perfectly, is immensely satisfying. The expressive twirls and little dances she does while casting are some of the more enjoyable casting animations Ive seen in an RPG. And sometimes its fun to just run up and smack a giant monster over the head with a book. Ritas a mainstay in my Vesperia party - I hardly ever take her out.

Personality-wise, I think she gets too much hate from some camps and too much love from others. Her detractors really dont like the way she treats Karol and, to a lesser extent, Raven for the majority of the game, but that never bothered me much. Karol almost got her killed within an hour of their first meeting and its a long time before he starts really pulling his weight, so I dont blame her for not liking him. Plus, I get a kick out of the karate chops she gives him, probably because the exaggerated SMACK sound effect makes the whole thing so delightfully slapstick, and Ive always loved slapstick humor. And with Raven, I think its pretty well established that she actually likes him quite a bit and the abuse is just her awkward form of affection.

But its that aggressive nature that seems to be the basis for her popularity among some more passionate fans, and that doesnt seem right either. At her core (pun intended), shes a misunderstood teen genius with tsundere tendencies, and weve all seen that plenty of times if weve played JRPGs or watched anime.

Theres enough nuance thrown in there to keep her from being excessively tropey, though. Early on, when Karol teasingly needles her for being lonely, she doesnt smack him or even protest. She knows shes lonely. Shes hyper-aware, probably to a fault, that she doesnt relate to other people very well. Its nice to watch her gradually open up and find a family with the rest of the party, and I would argue that she has the best-explored relationships with the other main characters than anyone else in the game, aside from Yuri. The writers were good about throwing in reminders every once in a while that, while its easy to forget, she is still a kid, like the odd superstition she has of writing her name on gald so that itll always come back, or her massive fondness for cats, which will always endear someone to me. By the end of Vesperia, shes even able to find common ground and empathize with Zagi, of all people.

Ultimately, though, her personal arc isnt that different from most tsundere characters, so as nice as it is, the lack of uniqueness drags it down some. Looking back, I was 13 years old when Vesperia first released and I think I probably had a bit of a crush on her to have such strong memories of the character. Solid? Most definitely. One of the best in the series? No way.

TL;DR: blah blah blah TSUNDERE TEENAGE GENIUS BUT, LIKE, A PRETTY GOOD ONE

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