Prompto Argentum

Prompto Argentum is a companion of Prince Noctis and a party member in Final Fantasy XV. Although not directly controllable, he is in Noctis's party and the player can co-opt moves with him and issue him commands.

He is a childhood friend of Noctis and wields firearms. Prompto takes photos and wants to save pictures of him and his friends while on the road trip. The player can upload these pictures to social media. It has been said the system was not just "thrown in", but connects to the party's actions and the story.

Appearance
Prompto is a young man of average height and a slender build, whose visage gives off the impression of a youthful punk. He has blue eyes, light freckles and short, unruly blond hair, which he at a point insists "does not look like a chocobo butt." He wears two bands on his right arm, black gloves, a black shirt with a white pattern, and a sleeveless black vest with a dark red flannel shirt attached underneath. He wears dark pants with a faint leopard print. He wears black boots with red soles that are lined with white fur.

Prompto's black open vest has various tags. The one below the collar reads: "It's a beautiful day now watch some bastard mess it up." The middle one on the side resembles the logo. The back of Prompto's waistcoat reads "DEADORALIVE." Like all party members, Prompto has skull motifs to his outfit. The buttons on his jacket have skulls, he has a belt buckle in the shape of a skull, and another skull on the tag on his trousers.

As a child, Prompto was overweight and wore glasses and a two-tone tan T-shirt with a matching wristband. At 30 years old Prompto has grown a goatee, looks more muscular, and wears the Kingsglaive uniform.

Personality
Prompto maintains a playful attitude. He is described as a skirt-chasing mood maker with a chip on his shoulder from a different social status compared to his other friends, and thus feels inferior but wishes to be useful. He makes pop culture references throughout the adventure, mimicking old song lyrics and lines from previous Final Fantasy games.

He is not a combat-hardened warrior, but has a knack for cheering people up and keeping things light-hearted. This stems from having had a sad and lonely childhood, and his outward mannerisms conceal a deep thinker. The developers put a lot of thought into his animations because of this duality, making him always moving and being more reactive than the other group members, exaggerating and overreacting. Prompto is good with machines, and tuned into technology and the latest trends. Prompto claims to being both claustrophobic (fear of narrow spaces) and acrophobic (fear of heights). He hates bugs, frequently commenting on it whenever the party defeats bug-like enemies.

Prompto has an affinity toward animals, although he claims to not be into wildlife and to be "more of a pet guy". He is excited to visit the chocobo ranch at Duscae, and once helped Pryna, one of Lunafreya Nox Fleuret's dogs. Photography has been a lifelong hobby for him and he dreams of becoming a professional one day.

Story
Prompto is a test subject for military warfare from Niflheim Empire. A codeprint is installed in his body, allowing him and the other subjects to gain access to certain secured facilities. His biological father is Verstael Besithia, the leading magitek engineer in Niflheim, but through unknown means he was adopted by a common Lucian family when he was but one years old from where he has his surname Argentum. He would thus live out his childhood in Insomnia, the crown city isolated from the rest of Lucis by the Wall. The Empire has a long-standing conflict with Lucis, and thus Prompto keeps his past to himself, being insecure of others finding out his true identity.

As depicted in Brotherhood: Final Fantasy XV, Prompto was a lone overweight boy who (seemingly) never saw his parents and had no friends. His only joy was to take photos and eat junk food. One day he encountered and treated a puppy with an injured leg, naming it "Tiny". The puppy returned to its home with Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, the former princess of Tenebrae. She noticed the name on the handkerchief Prompto had tied around the puppy's injured leg, and had her companion Gentiana investigate.

Prompto received a letter from Lady Lunafreya expressing her thanks for taking care of her puppy, Pryna. Knowing that he attended the same school as Prince Noctis for whom she had sent the dog, she requested that Prompto befriend him, since Noctis did not mingle much with his classmates. The next day, Prompto decided to approach Noctis, but stumbled. Noctis pulled him up, pointing out that he's "heavy", and left as the bell rang. The event motivated Prompto to lose weight before approaching Noctis again.

Prompto started jogging and dieting, taking photos of himself to track his progress until he had shed the excess weight. During this period, Prompto would often sniff Luna's scented letter to motivate himself. With newfound confidence, he approached Noctis in high school pretending they had never met before. Noctis, who recognized him, greeted him casually.

At age 20, Prompto accompanies Noctis, Gladiolus and Ignis on their road trip across the land toward Altissia for Noctis to marry Luna, and Prompto is looking forward to finally meeting her. As depicted in Final Fantasy XV Prologue Parting Ways, Prompto comes to the Citadel the day before their scheduled departure to pick up his Crownsguard uniform, which he is to wear for the trip. He is nervous to be meeting the people in charge and affirms he has completed his self-defense training for the journey. He promises to protect Noctis, but is told to concentrate on self-defense. Prompto leaves the Citadel with Gladiolus, Noctis's bodyguard and party of their friend group. Prompto wants to show his parents his new clothes, considering it proof of being worthy to go on the trip. Prompto doesn't see his parents much ever since he was a kid, and when he gets home he finds his parents are not there and he doesn't get to see them.

Night has fallen by the time Ignis, Prompto, and Gladiolus arrive to help Noctis clean his apartment. Noctis's remaining possessions are to be taken to the Citadel, including his comic book collection at which Prompto marvels at. They finish up by playing some King's Knight at Prompto's urging.

He is present when King Regis sees them off, amazed he was allowed at the palace. When the party's car, the Regalia, breaks down, they push it to the Hammerhead service station for the mechanic Cindy Aurum to repair it. Prompto is instantly smitten with her. In Galdin Quay the party discovers the ferry to Altissia is not running and that the crown city has been attacked, with King Regis, Noctis and Luna all announced to have died. They turn back only to find the city blockaded.

Cor Leonis, the Marshal of the Crownsguard, tasks Noctis with locating the Royal Arms of the past Lucian kings to gain the power to reclaim the kingdom. The Empire is building a roadblock alongside the route to Duscae, and the party splits: Gladiolus, Ignis and Prompto create a diversion, while Noctis and Cor defeat one of the imperial army's leading commanders. Afterward Cor departs, and Noctis's party heads to the city of Lestallum to meet up with Gladiolus's sister Iris.

When the Archaean Titan begins calling for Noctis, they gain access to the Disc of Cauthess with help from Chancellor Ardyn Izunia of Niflheim, although they remain suspicious of his motives. Prompto and Ignis are left behind when Noctis and Gladiolus fall into the pit, but make their way to the pair in time to help battle Titan as Niflheim forces attack it. Noctis gains Titan's allegiance and they escape with Ardyn's help, but later must infiltrate an Imperial base to reclaim their car.

They discover King Regis's boat is kept in a secret harbor at Cape Caem, and while collecting mythril for its repairs they join forces with Aranea Highwind, an Imperial commodore for whom Prompto again becomes attracted to. He wonders if Aranea will quit the army due to the Empire's employment of daemons like she is considering.

They take the boat to Altissia where Luna is to awaken the astral goddess Leviathan. Prompto, Gladiolus and Ignis are to evacuate the city as Noctis prepares to forge his covenant with the sea goddess. Niflheim attacks Leviathan and Prompto rides a Niflheim magitek craft to take Noctis to the astral. Noctis is left to fight Leviathan alone, and though he succeeds in gaining her allegiance, he awakens couple days later to hear Luna was killed and Ignis has lost his sight due to an injury. Prompto now usually stays by Ignis's side, helping him.

En route to Tenebrae, Prompto and Noctis ward off an Imperial attack on their train. Ardyn tricks Noctis into pushing Prompto off the train and into Niflheim's custody. While in Gralea, the Imperial capital, Noctis is tormented by visions of his friend, until the party finds Prompto bound to a device in a cell. He is rescued, and uses his codeprint to gain access to the throne room where the device sealing Noctis's powers is kept. Though he struggles revealing his true origins to the others, they readily accept him regardless.

After Noctis is absorbed inside the Crystal, the world plunges into perpetual darkness with roaming daemons. Prompto, Gladiolus and Ignis return to Lucis to wait for the prophesied day when the King of Light returns to banish the darkness from the world. Prompto often hangs around Cindy hoping to get her attention, but she is always busy with her work.

After a ten-year slumber, Noctis returns and is reunited with his friends. After a final meal at camp, they head into the ruins of Insomnia to challenge Ardyn who has revealed his true identity as that of an immortal embodiment of the darkness. During their way, they are confronted by Magitek and daemons, whom they easily defeat due to their ten years of training, or in Noctis' case, accumulating his magic. Though knowing Noctis must sacrifice himself to return the light to the world, Prompto tries to remain cheerful. As they head to the throne room Noctis asks for one of the photos Prompto took during their journey to take with him. He asks his friends to "walk tall and take care of the rest". As Noctis goes off to offer up his soul, daemons emerge from the ground. Noctis's friends are with him in spirit when he erases Ardyn from the world, and the sun finally rises.

Gameplay


Prompto equips firearms as his primary arm, including handguns and shotguns. Prompto's secondary arm is machinery, which allows him to equip tools like Auto Crossbow and Bioblaster. He can co-opt moves with Noctis and has the lowest HP of the party. Prompto has five Techniques. He can take photos, an aspect of many quests in the game, and the player can set various filters for him. Prompto can be fought during training sessions at campsites.

Creation and development
Prompto's design went through an overhaul during development since he was first unveiled for Final Fantasy Versus XIII, which ended up being reworked into Final Fantasy XV. His hair was straightened, spiked up, and changed golden blond from its curly dirty blond inceptions, and his facial features were modified as well to give him a more rugged, masculine look.

His face was again redesigned from the version unveiled at E3 2013 when the game was re-announced as Final Fantasy XV. Prompto's hair and facial features were altered after receiving negative feedback so that users around the world would better receive the game. Yusuke Naora is one of three art directors on Final Fantasy XV, and one of his early tasks on the project was to update the look of the characters from their incarnation in Final Fantasy Versus XIII.

It was originally envisioned all party members would be playable with Prompto able to manually aim firearms that could be used to target enemy weak points. However, the battle system was later changed to make only Noctis directly playable.

Director Hajime Tabata has explained that black has historically been treated as a special color in the kingdom of Lucis. Thus the attire of the royal family, and those in occupations closely tied to it, wear black. The art staff wanted to make it easy to distinguish the characters even though they all wear black. The team wanted to make them come alive both in technical and artistic ways, and ways to make the characters relatable were discussed endlessly. At the beginning of the development, a special unit was formed to create the cast's personal traits. The team also paid attention to feedback from players, especially in Prompto, whom many found annoying for the contrast he'd behave compared to the others. The team decided to emphasize certain parts of Prompto's character to make him more likeable.

A Final Fantasy XV animator, Toyama, shared some details on how Prompto was animated via official social media. Using motion capture, the animators filmed their own movements either in special mo-cap suits, or in what the characters actually wear in the game. The recorded data was polished by adjusting the poses and movements, adding finger animations, etc. before the animations could be implemented. The animators checked how the character movements flowed in-game together with the clothes, which were controlled via cloth simulator. Aside from animations, a variety of things needed also to be checked, such as SFX and VFX.

Voice
Prompto is voiced by Tetsuya Kakihara in Japanese. In Brotherhood Final Fantasy XV anime, his younger self is voiced by Aki Kaneda. In English he is voiced by Robbie Daymond.

Merchandise
Prompto is available as a Play Arts -Kai- figure.

Gallery

 * Final Fantasy Versus XIII

Etymology
Thus, Prompto's name may have been an incorrect attempt to translate "quicksilver" into Latin.

Trivia

 * Prompto is Akio Ofuji's favorite character.