Chaos (Final Fantasy)/Dissidia



Chaos is the primary antagonist and the Final Boss of Dissidia Final Fantasy and Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy. He is the god of discord that opposes Cosmos, the goddess of harmony, both being equal in power. During the events of Dissidia, Chaos and his forces tip the balance of power in their favor, setting the stage for their victory. Dissidia 012 explores this shift in power in-depth, and the actions taken by hero and villain alike that set the stage for the thirteenth cycle. Chaos is voiced by in the Japanese release, and  in the English release.

As the final boss of Dissidia and Dissidia 012, Chaos is unplayable unless one hacks the game. An alternate form of Chaos, a bestial monstrosity known as Feral Chaos, is playable in Dissidia 012, and serves as the game's superboss.

Appearance and Personality
Chaos's appearance is based on his original artwork by Yoshitaka Amano. He appears as a muscular four-arm fiend in dark red hues, with large wings sprouting from his back and demonic faces on his knees. He has a long tail and several horns, the most prominent of which are two red horns that curve into the air. Chaos wears a loincloth with another face on it, and a red amulet. While using his Utter Chaos attack Chaos changes into an alternate form based on his original sprites in Final Fantasy, coloring his skin a pale yellow-green, and the demonic faces are purple. In this form Chaos wields up to four large black and orange swords, initially appearing as spires stuck into the arena floor. In the opening FMV of Dissidia Final Fantasy, he takes the form of a creature made of magma emerging from the earth, in contrast to the cloudy form of Cosmos in the same cutscene.

While his Final Fantasy counterpart shared Garland's personality during the short time he appeared, in Dissidia Chaos and Garland are entirely different. Despite his monstrous appearance and position as the God of Discord, Chaos demonstrates a calm, collected, and reasoned demeanor when not in combat, speaking in an even tone of voice even to his enemies. He watches over his minions with a light hand, a trait influenced by his time with the Lufenian military when he was forced to fight against his will and came to hate his superiors. Even against traitors and those who neglect their duties to him, Chaos is hesitant to punish their disobedience. However, this attitude allows many of his warriors to turn their backs on him or otherwise plot against him, and only Garland is loyal to his god to the end.

Story
Chaos's history is revealed extensively through the Cosmos Reports and Chaos Reports, which are expanded on by more reports in Dissidia 012. Chaos was the first manikin to be given a sense of self by Cid of the Lufaine, creating a child-like monster imbued with the memories of ten people. Placed in Cid's care for observation, Chaos was eventually taken away by the Lufenia military to be used as a weapon of war to fight neighboring nations that used Omega and Summoned Monsters to fight. Chaos initially refused to fight, but complied when his mother was threatened. When she eventually fled, the Lufenian military used Cid's research to turn a manikin into a perfect clone of her to control Chaos. This manikin would come to be known as Cosmos.

Chaos was eventually rescued by Cid and his wife, though he grew twisted and hateful due to his time with the Lufenian military. However, when his mother was shot during the escape, Chaos's rage caused him to open portal to the Rift which swallowed him, Cid, and the manikin of his mother. In a new dimension, the three are met by Garland, and eventually, Cid makes his pact with Shinryu -- Cosmos and Chaos agree to fight each other in order to eventually open a door to the Rift again, allowing them to return home.

However, over time, Chaos's memories fade, and by the last two cycles of conflict, he has forgotten Cid, whom he grew to hate since being used by the Lufenian military, and his relationship with Cosmos. Garland, entrusted by Cid to guide Chaos to fight the wars, eventually gave Chaos his name, as Chaos reminds him of the demon "Chaos" he is destined to turn into in World A someday.

Twelfth cycle
Wishing to end the cycle for Tifa's sake, Cloud approaches Chaos and attempts to slay the god himself, but Chaos is merely amused by his bravado and annihilates him in a blast of dark energy, dismissing Cloud from his service. As Cloud lays fading, Cosmos senses his benevolent desires to end the cycles and protect Tifa, and saves his soul from darkness to be reborn in the next cycle as one of her warriors.

Later, with Garland at his side, Chaos is approached by the Emperor, who brings Jecht before him and asks Chaos to infuse Jecht with the power of discord, having given up the power given to him by Cosmos to save Tidus. Chaos agrees and makes Jecht one of his warriors for the next cycle.

Thirteenth cycle
After the ten Warriors of Cosmos retrieve the Crystals, they return to Order's Sanctuary as she takes them to the Edge of Madness where Chaos himself appears and incinerates the goddess before the heroes' eyes. But given tentative time by Cosmos's gambit, the warriors have a final chance to strike back at Chaos and end the war for good. As the heroes journey to Chaos and strike down the other villains who are now acting of their own volition, Chaos confides to Garland that he had a dream of a world where he suppressed disorder, and ruled this happy world alongside Cosmos, though he cannot understand its meaning and referred to it as "cruel".

Garland then reveals to Chaos that he was the one who guided him to begin the war in order to perfect Chaos's power, and that Chaos will send Garland into the past to become Chaos himself. Garland also claims he did this to serve the purpose of the "Great Will", also known as Cid.

After Garland is sent back into time to fulfill his predestined fate, Chaos begins to be overwhelmed as he regains all of the lost memories of the conflict and before, giving him true understanding of the conflict and a maddened urge to destroy everything to cope with Cosmos's destruction. By then, having been a neutral figure in the conflicts before, Shinryu gives Chaos his power to purge all existence. Shortly after this, the Warriors of Cosmos arrive at Chaos's throne, having dispatched his own warriors. In the final battle, Chaos is defeated, and the warriors return to their own worlds as the god is consumed in fire, the cycle of conflict ending with his death.

Battle
In battle, Chaos is described as The Master of Bedlam, and fights with long, powerful fire and earth-themed combos that do massive damage. Due to his sheer size, and the small size of the Edge of Madness arena, even his melee strikes have considerable range. They are executed quickly and do high damage, while his magic attacks are slower and easier to dodge or block. During the battle's third phase, Chaos's attacks augment in power and grow stronger. Chaos wears customized equipment whenever fought in any way, with stat boosts that change depending on his level, usually equal with the strongest equipment pieces usable by the player at Chaos's current level.

These four equipment pieces are the Chaosbringer, Entropy's Aegis, Bedlam's Crown, and Havoc's Carapace. Chaos has access to the unique summon Shinryu, which can be summoned multiple times in one battle and has varying effects during the three rounds, ranging from locking Chaos's Bravery to doubling it instantly. He has no EX Mode and no EX Gauge, but can pick up EX Cores and EX Force, and in Dissidia 012 has no Assist gauge. Chaos can also dash, dodge, and block like all other characters.

Chaos is fought as boss three times in Dissidia, as the final boss of Shade Impulse, and Inward Chaos, and the Time Attack sub-mode in Arcade Mode. In Dissidia 012 he is the final boss of the Epilogue chapter of Light to All, and is fought in Report 7 using Cloud. In any battle except the Report battle, Chaos must be defeated three times in succession for the player to win; if the player's character is defeated in any round, he or she must start over from the beginning. When fought at the end of Light to All in Dissidia 012, the three phases are separate battles fought in the format of a party battle, and when the player's current character is defeated the next party members continues the battle in their place.

Fighting Chaos
One general strategy for Chaos is to jump into the air and wait for him to dash up, blocking him and attacking when he staggers. With the small arena it is advised the player try to use Wall Rush HP attacks when possible to maximize the damage done. If possible the idea is to use any blocking HP attack and/or Chase effect Bravery attack, to prevent Chaos from attacking with his brutal attacks as much as possible and limiting him of his would-be fatal arsenal of attacks. Staying on the ground leaves the player vulnerable to all of Chaos's attacks and minimizes their dodging options, so it is safest to be in the air.

While his Bravery attacks can be difficult to anticipate and defend against, Chaos's HP attacks can all be avoided with proper timing as explained above. Divine Punishment is easily his most difficult attack to avoid due to the very precise dodging required, but if it is dodged Chaos is highly vulnerable as he is immobile while completing the attack.

The player is only able to use their summon once during the three-part battle, so it is highly recommended they save it until they badly need it. Defensive summons like Demon Wall, Mandragora or Alexander are advised - between his HP attacks inflicting Wall Rush and his Shinryu summon increasing his Brave even more, if the player is inflicted with Break status then Chaos is likely to kill them in a single hit. Since Chaos must be beaten three times in a row, and the player is defeated after losing only once, using EX Mode is not recommended until the final round, unless the player's selected character is low on HP and needs Regen, or the player is using an equipment set-up that lets them quickly refill their EX Gauge.

Unique to the Edge of Madness stage is that EX Cores vanish if not picked up quickly, so the player should do so if they wish to receive the boost to their EX Gauge. Resin-type items remain active during all three battles, so items like Arcane Resin are very helpful to start every battle with a full EX Gauge - a timely entrance into EX Mode to block an attack can save the player's life. In Dissidia 012, EX Revenge will not function when being attacked by Utter Chaos - the EX Gauge will drain and EX Revenge will be initiated, but it cancelled immediately and Chaos continues attacking. It will function normally against his other attacks, however.

AP Farming
In Dissidia, Chaos is the best enemy in the game to face to amass AP, and doing so is simple. The player should equip their character of choice with a Diamond Ring, three pieces of Diamond equipment, the Beckoning Cat accessory, and fight Chaos on their Bonus Day. Enter Quick Battle and set Chaos to Level 1, as his level has no impact on how much AP the player earns. Provided they earn the AP Chance for each of the three battles, the player will earn a total of 108 AP at the end of the third battle.

In Dissidia 012, this strategy still works and earns even more AP than before, due to the AP Chance going as high as +3 AP if the player is lucky, and the addition of the Diamond Studs and Diamond Earring which also raise the AP gained. However, it is much more difficult to pull off, as if the player sets Chaos to Level 1 the AP Chance will usually require the player to amass 9999 Bravery before using an HP attack. Furthermore, the AP Chance takes effect only if Chaos does not damage the player first, regardless of if he uses a Bravery attack or an HP attack.

Thus, while the player can still earn a lot of AP using the above method, they may need to build up 9999 Bravery and avoid taking any damage from Chaos, which is highly difficult but can be made easier by creating custom rules. Diamond accessories cannot be purchased like the original, making obtaining them much harder as their break-ability is still 100%. Thus the player is encouraged to equip a Super Ribbon for this, which will slightly lower the chance of the Diamond accessories breaking. Also if the player has an artifact, there's a chance the artifact will give an ability that increases the percentage of additional AP you receive. Since any of the four equipment slots can obtain this ability when you make an artifact it can prove more useful than the Diamond equipment set.

Music
The theme used for the battle with Chaos is named simply "Chaos", performed by Your Favorite Enemies. It is divided into three parts for each phase of the battle. These tracks can also be selected for random battles once Chaos is defeated for the first time.

Allusions

 * Chaos's eventual madness in Shade Impulse and his transformation into Feral Chaos are references to the Ivalice summon Chaos. His ultimate attack Brink of Delusion, involves four swords that stab the arena in a manner similar to the Chaos of Ivalice.
 * The finishing segment of the Utter Chaos attack is called Brink of Delusion, which is a synonym for Edge of Madness. Both of these names can also be considered to be approximate synonyms for Final Fantasy.
 * The white circles of energy that appear at the end of Brink of Delusion resemble the portal of energy that consumes Chaos upon his defeat in Final Fantasy.
 * When the Warriors of Cosmos confront Chaos on his throne, he is sitting in the same pose as Yoshitaka Amano's original artwork of Chaos in Final Fantasy.
 * In several instances during the story, Chaos's eyes flash in the same way his eyes flash while using Blaze, Tsunami, Tornado, or Earthquake in the later remakes of Final Fantasy. The attack he used to kill Cosmos, as well as the lava-like background from the Edge of Madness stage, is very similar to his Blaze attack from the Dawn of Souls release.
 * Chaos's amnesia of the past cycles of the war is a reference to Garland's words from Final Fantasy before he transforms into Chaos, where he states he will forget his memories after 2,000 years.
 * His quote whilst fighting Garland in the original game is "Let us close the infinite cycle," which is a reference to the time loop within Final Fantasy.

Trivia

 * Although Chaos's official artwork depicts him facing to the right, as the artwork of the other villains do, his logo artwork and in-game character icon face to the left, as the artwork of the heroes do. Similarly, Cosmos's art faces to the right.
 * Though he is not a playable character, Chaos can be played using hacks. There are a few problems with this though - Chaos has no Victory Pose, no EX Mode, while using him the opponent's HP bar will not appear, and when using his Utter Chaos attack in an arena other than Edge of Madness the camera angles will swing through and inside the arena floor and walls.
 * If made playable via hacks, the game keeps track of Chaos's records in the Museum, such as the total damage he has inflicted, like any other character. The game also allows the player to save replays of the fight normally.
 * After completing Shade Impulse, the player can purchase Chaos in the PP Catalog to fight him in Quick Battle mode and Arcade Mode. However, like the Shade Impulse and Inward Chaos battles, Chaos can only be fought at Edge of Madness and the save replay function is not available.
 * The player cannot save a replay of a battle with Chaos in Dissidia. In Dissidia 012, they can save a replay of a battle with Chaos when facing him in a storyline fight, but not in Quick Battle.
 * When Chaos is faced in story mode in Dissidia 012, he does not speak when beginning and ending Utter Chaos.
 * The battle against Cloud from Report 7 in Dissidia 012 is the only time where Chaos is fought in one round instead of three. In addition, this is the only time when Chaos's default music does not play.

Chaos (Dissidia) Chaos (Dissidia)