Garland (Final Fantasy)/Dissidia (PSP)

Garland is one of the villains fighting for the side of Chaos in Dissidia Final Fantasy, a man consumed by battle and conflict. He wields a large sword that can freely transform into various weapons, from a destructive axe to twin blades. Due to his connection to Chaos, Garland is one of the game's higher-ranked villains. His position as Chaos's right-hand warrior can be seen as analogous to the one his rival, Warrior of Light, has with Cosmos.

He is set to return, along with the other characters from Dissidia, in Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy.

Attire
Garland's original outfit is based on his in-game sprite from the original release of Final Fantasy. Garland wears a dark blue cape with silver armor set with blue jewels, and wears his distinctive horned helmet. Tetsuya Nomura has stated that, because there were only in-game sprites to draw from, he had trouble designing Garland as a character, as in essence, it was designing a new character rather than redesigning an old one. Garland's alternate outfit colors his cape burgundy and his armor gold, to resemble Garland's battle sprites in the remakes of Final Fantasy.

Garland's sword appears to be entirely original. It is a crushing weapon capable of taking versatile forms. In addition to the default "greatsword" form in which it is regularly carried in, it is able to transform into an axe (by folding the blade forward), twin swords (by removing a smaller portion of the back of the blade), a lance (by extending the blade's plated portion), and a whip form where the blade extends from the handle by a long chain.

Garland's Manikin version, False Stalwart, is blue.

Destiny Odyssey
Early into the Warrior of Light's journey, Garland arrives and challenges him to battle. Garland is defeated, but he tells the Warrior that fighting back is pointless, and fades away. Believing Garland dead, the Warrior of Light journeys on, but Garland survives. Sephiroth questions Garland about the memories they have lost, and asks about a dragon with an unearthly glow he saw when he awoke, but Garland does not answer him.

Garland confronts Ultimecia about her manipulations of Squall, and she reveals she has her own plans separate from the Emperor, and asks Garland to assist her. Later, when Cloud defeats Sephiroth and claims his Crystal, Garland speaks to the Emperor, and the two agree that Sephiroth may become a threat to the Emperor's plan. Later, the two meet again to discuss Terra's shaky alliance to Cosmos due to her lack of light, and Kefka's plans to make her turn to Chaos.

Squall arrives to battle Ultimecia and Garland approaches, intending for Squall to fight both of them. Zidane appears and fights Garland so that Squall may face Ultimecia. Squall defeats Ultimecia, but Garland only thanks Zidane for the battle and leaves after Ultimecia falls. After, the Warrior of Light defeats the Emperor and Garland appears before him, telling the shocked knight he cannot be defeated, and invites the Warrior of Light to follow him to discover the war's true nature. Before their final battle, Garland lectures Kuja about fate, telling him they all share the same destiny, including Ultimecia. He also speaks to Sephiroth again, who questions Garland's ability to be revived despite numerous defeats.

When the Warrior of Light arrives at the Chaos Shrine, Garland tells the Warrior the reason he came back to life was because of Chaos, and that as long as Cosmos and Chaos are alive, the never-ending struggle between good and evil will never end. Garland encourages the Warrior of Light to submit to the cycle of war, but he refuses and the two battle again. Garland is defeated and the Warrior of Light claims his Crystal, but Garland goads him, telling him the Crystals have the power to stop the cycle, and even the gods cannot foresee what would become of the world if the Crystals were brought together.

Shade Impulse
After Cosmos's death at the hands of Chaos, Garland oversees his god's slumber. Garland tells Golbez the world is a testing ground for the ultimate weapon, Chaos, and that the war was arranged by Garland himself under the Great Will's instruction. Sephiroth also questions Garland about the lost memories he has regained, asking what Garland's desire is once Chaos is destroyed. Garland rejects the idea, claiming he is a prisoner to the cycle of war and has no right to desire anything else.

When Chaos awakens and describes a peculiar dream in which he governed the world harmoniously with Cosmos, Garland reveals to Chaos that such was the way things were before the conflict between harmony and disorder, and that he himself had instigated the conflict in accordance to the Great Will. Garland also tells Chaos he is predestined to be sent 2,000 years into the past by Chaos where he becomes the god of discord himself — Garland and Chaos are one and the same, their meeting and Garland's actions in the war actually serve as a paradox to ensure Chaos's birth and the resulting destruction to occur once Cosmos is killed.

As the Warriors of Cosmos approach Chaos's realm, and Cloud and Squall vanquish Sephiroth and Ultimecia respectively, Garland stands as the final villain alive before they find Chaos. Garland is again defeated, and tells the heroes that with Cosmos dead, the world has no further meaning to Chaos, and he now plans to destroy all existence with the cycle finally broken. Though the heroes question Garland's acceptance of this, Garland tells them his spirit will endure the world's destruction, and eventually he will find another cycle. Garland fades away into the past, laughing that he and the heroes will meet again.

Battle
In battle, Garland is described as a "Nemesis", and uses his huge sword to crush opponents with powerful attacks, transforming the blade into various different forms as he fights. Some of his attacks vary depending on the timing of the button inputs, allowing Garland to chain his attacks together. Garland is most powerful in melee combat, but he has several charging attacks that allow him to attack ranged opponents. A drawback is that Garland is a slow ground mover.

Boss
Garland is fought in Destiny Odyssey I and IX, Shade Impulse, Distant Glory, and Inward Chaos.

EX Mode
Soul of Chaos 7zHkmYShKdw Garland's EX Mode is Class Change, where his armor turns silver and white and his cape is covered in runic patterns. This is meant to symbolize Garland's appearance as a heroic knight before he turned to evil. While in EX Mode, Garland's health will regenerate over time, and he gains the ability "Indomitable Resolve", preventing him from flinching or being knocked back by an opponent's attacks while executing an attack of his own. He still takes damage from the opponent however, and is only immune to flinching when hit with a Brave attack; HP attacks will still knock him back.

In his EX Burst Soul of Chaos, Garland charges himself with energy and unleashes a barrage of attacks that utilize all five forms of his weapon. To execute it perfectly, the player must press the button repeatedly to charge a gauge up to its maximum within a time limit. A visual distortion and a chiming sound indicate each level of power attained.

Equipment
Garland is able to equip Greatswords, Katanas, Spears, Axes, Shields, Gauntlets, Helms, Light Armor, and Heavy Armor.

Allusions

 * At the start of Destiny Odyssey I-5, Garland's quote "You will meet your end here, and I will live forever!" is based on what he says in Final Fantasy before the final battle after transforming into Chaos.
 * In his battle dialogue with Kuja, the two make reference to Kuja's antagonistic relationship with the Garland of Final Fantasy IX. Garland says, "I sense you are haunted by your fate," referring to the mortality Garland placed upon Kuja. His dialogue to Zidane, "I will erase you and your soul," refers to when the Garland of Final Fantasy IX attempted to destroy Zidane and take back the soul he had given him.
 * Garland's introduction to Tidus is, "Better you fall down fate's spiral," referring to Sin's cycle of destruction and rebirth in Final Fantasy X. His quote to Jecht, "Another prisoner of fate," refers to how Jecht became trapped within the cycle of Spira, similar to Garland.
 * Garland's EX Burst is named after the Soul of Chaos dungeons in the Dawn of Souls and 20th Anniversary editions of Final Fantasy. His three exclusive weapons are all weapons found in the Whisperwind Cove, another bonus dungeon in the aforementioned releases, and are named after a subset of axes that do additional damage to giant-type enemies.
 * Garland is the only villain fought twice in the same storyline. He is fought as a boss both at the beginning of Destiny Odyssey I and at the end - reflecting his role as the first and, in essence, final boss of Final Fantasy. Furthermore, Garland is the last villain fought in Shade Impulse before Chaos, in Chapter 3-5, again reflecting his role in Final Fantasy.
 * In Garland's conversation with Chaos in Shade Impulse, he states that he was sent 2,000 years into the past to become Chaos himself, directly paralleling his actions in Final Fantasy. In Final Fantasy, Garland says he will lose all memory of the past in 2,000 years, reflected in Chaos's amnesia in Dissidia.
 * The forms Garland's sword transforms into reference the Four Fiends from Final Fantasy. The axe represents Lich, the twin swords represent Marilith, the lance represents Tiamat, and the whip represents Kraken. Garland's HP attacks each use one form of the sword and correspond to the Fiends' elemental affinities - Earthquake uses the axe, Blaze uses the twin swords, Tsunami uses the whip, and Cyclone uses the lance. Garland's HP attacks are all attacks used by Chaos in the original Final Fantasy.
 * Garland's fighting pose is the same pose he takes right before fighting the Warriors of Cosmos in the opening FMV. This is also the same pose as his enemy sprite in the original game.

Trivia

 * The sample voices the player can purchase for Garland in the PP Catalog are of him speaking the names of the Four Fiends and Chaos.
 * Both of Garland's voice actors (English and Japanese) also voiced Alex Louis Armstrong from another Square Enix project: Fullmetal Alchemist and its reboot Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood'.
 * Garland has the highest base Attack and Defense in the game, with 112 Attack and 113 Defense at Level 100.
 * Unless one considers Garland and Chaos in Final Fantasy the same being, Garland is the only villain in Dissidia that uses absolutely no moves used by his original counterpart. This is because in Final Fantasy, Garland used nothing but normal physical attacks and had no special attacks to speak of. He is also the only villain whose EX Mode is entirely original and not based on an ability or form from his original game.
 * Garland is plagued by several graphical errors while in his EX Mode in his normal outfit. While in his Alternate form, his EX Mode does not possess any of these graphical problems.
 * The texture for Garland's eyes is mistakenly placed on his smaller set of horns.
 * The textures for the jewels on the elbow area of his gauntlets do not meet up: a black stripe appears at the back where the textures do not connect.
 * The textures near the bottom of his boots do not wrap properly: white stripes along his ankle appear where his feet meet the ground.
 * Errors appear on his rear end in the form of a white stripe along his butt and yellow on his crotch.
 * At the front and back of his metal skirt, there are blank areas similar to the graphical error on his feet.
 * His belt also "shrinks" to half the width that it appears in all other forms.
 * His "earrings" change slightly from regular to EX Mode, in Normal form; the lower yellow gem disappears, along with the face on the skull. The upper blue gem is lowered and surrounded with four metal loops, two above and two below.
 * A jewel graphic appears on his mantle just behind his head. It appears identical to the graphic of his belt.
 * Garland is the only character whose EX Mode effects differ between versions. In the original Japanese version, his attacks increased in power, but in the English, PAL, and Universal Tuning releases, he simply gains immunity to flinching when attacking.
 * Garland's manikin version, False Stalwart, appears thirty times in Story Mode, more than any other manikin.
 * Garland's weapon could be a reference to the webcomic 8-bit Theater, in which one character is attempting to develop weapons that are a combination of swords and nun-chucks dubbed Sword-Chucks. Garland's weapons in some forms are a combination of chains (from nun-chucks) and swords.

Gárland (Final Fantasy)/Dissidia