Why Do I Love Hikari!?

Seems like the few weeks haven’t been very good to me. Make that the last few months actually. I don’t want to get into specifics, but the semester has been rough and I need something to weed my mind off things. Usually when this happens I think about the one thing that makes me happy. Octopath Traveler, both of them. Two of my RPGs ever made and video games of all time. They do have their fair share of problems, but they’re my comfort games and without them I wouldn't have introduced myself to RPGs as a whole. I will die on the hill battling for the belief that these are all time greats. Beautiful, expertly crafted, and a reminder that life can be wonderful. I love Octopath Traveler, I just wish I had more opportunities to talk about it. Yet I don’t really mind how obscure or unpopular these games are to people. I rather love a series that is niche than big, because when a game that is niche blows up it tends to invite the noisiest and unwanted people to man towards discussions. It’s why I now hate the modern wave of FromSoft fans attracted to the Elden Ring. I remember having a discussion with a friend about wishing channels like Fextralife would build videos for Octopath Traveler seeing how these games have so much variety and customization, and then thinking no five seconds later. I like figuring out how to make a game work by myself rather than someone screaming in my ear the right and effective way to do it.

So why am I choosing to write about Octopath Traveler again? This is probably the fourth time I talked about a game series with only two mainline entries and a mobile game I’ll never play cuz the gacha philosophy is predatory. Two words: Hikari Ku. One of the eight travelers in the 2nd game and one of my favorite characters in the series alongside Therio from the first game. In fact I would say just like Therion this noble samurai is one of my favorite protagonists in gaming. A belief I’m not exactly sure why I stand by. I already wrote an essay about Therion a long time ago and why I find him compelling, but Hikari is another case. It’s a case of, “I like this guy and that’s it.” No deep philosophical take as to why he’s compelling, because the truth is Hikari is a simple written character. His journey is straightforward, you understand his motif from the start, and his journey doesn’t take any weird and unpredictable terms like the other travelers of the second game. There was a tweet awhile back where Octopath Traveler 2 fans discussed who the best traveler of the game was, and when I answered Hikari Ku someone responded back on how bland my take was. I wasn’t angry. It just made me wonder why I love a character whose story is as straightforward as a Japanese samurai’s tale can go. Why do I love Hikari Ku!? Hence the odd title of the article and the thing we’ll be discussing today. I don’t want this article to be as complex as the Therion analysis, so I’ll keep things simple. Why do I like Hikari, a reminder as to why I love Octopath Traveler, and a lot of fans like me find he’s so darn hard to hate.

The Kingdom of Ku and Hikari

Compared to most travelers beside Primrose Azelheart who had to work their way up through the world, had something tragic happen to them, or live normal lives Hikari was born into royalty, sort of. Far out in the distant sands on the western continent Solistia is the Kingdom of Ku. What is basically Japanese feudalist society that for a long time was hell bent on conquest and trying to expand their empire. These people have aligned themselves with many clans and those who have tried to oppose their power were thwarted. This is one aspect I really like about Ku as a society. It’s made very clear from the beginning of Hikari’s story that Ku aren’t the greatest people in the world. They aren’t as bad as the Legion in New Vegas, because at least Ku has reasons as to why they do what they do. However, they’re not treated like the good guys and Hikari disagrees with the actions his father and brother have taken. His father doesn’t care about the lives lost, and his older brother doesn’t care about honor as long as he gets what he wants. Ku also has a massive class problem with the higher class looking down on those who aren’t financially stable or fit to the standards of their culture. We see Hikari spend more time with lower income inhabitants than actual people in the palace. We even learn his best friend grew up as a low income citizen.

It’s not just social division that Ku suffers from. They also struggle with outsiders and accepting them. Hence why the kingdom was so focused on conquest for such a long time. Hikari’s brother has always looked down on him as a halfbreed or not purest of Ku blood. Hikari’s mother was an outsider who Hikari’s father was married to for a short time, and during a flashback later on we learn Hikari’s mother was assassinated. We’ll get to that later. I don’t know if I should say this, but Hikari can relate to those who live outside his beliefs. Being looked down upon by his relatives, but still pushing forward in life. Learning it’s best to treat others with kindness no matter where they come from, and this is one of the top reasons why I love Hikari so much. He is a good person at heart. He does what is right even if he gains nothing in return or he gets stabbed for it. For the longest time I’ve had this belief that video game morality should be nuanced. That if a game offers you choice then you should have the freedom to decide what you personally see as morally right rather than have the game tell you. I saw a tweet where a person discussed that a game forcing you to do the right thing is better than thinking it through. I didn’t believe it at first, but the older I got the more I did. Sometimes playing as a person with good intentions, beliefs, and stands for good morals is better than every question having to have consequences. As some players tend to mix up moral decision making with: let’s just be selfish and do what I want.

Hikari’s name when translated to English is light, and while that’s a somewhat cheesy name for a protagonist I couldn’t love it any more. He is the light within a society of people who are corrupt. A beacon for what could be a better future. Better standards for what the people of Ku could be. When his father started reaching a dying age and needed to find a new heir he came to Hikari. He admits that he regrets everything he has done before. All the people have been harmed or killed, and if he were to let Mugen, who is Hikari’s brother, take over the cycle would continue. It may even be worse since Mugen is a murderous psychopathic general. He stops caring that Hikari is too good willed or not purely Ku blood. He wants Hikari to end the cycle. To bring true peace. An event that doesn’t happen immediately as this is an Octopath Traveler game and they need to stretch this game out to be more than fifty hours. Mugen kills their father, Hikari is chased out, and now Hikari is labeled as an enemy. Hikari must locate his old allies to fight back against the evil Mugen, but two of his allies are busy doing other things and Ritsu has turned. Hikari’s tale will be rough and long, and he probably has the hardest final fight out of all of the travelers aside from Partitio. Still, this intro chapter is good to me as it shows the good nature of Hikari.

Octopath Traveler 2 from Hikari’s Perspective

It's my boy and his friends!

As I said earlier, Octopath Traveler is my comfort series. The first game is one I dumped more than one hundred hours into with all eight stories beaten twice. The second game I don’t have as many hours in and I haven’t touched in a year, but man I jammed even harder to it. I didn’t get the true ending when I originally covered it, but a few days after I published my original review I did and it was the most emotionally affected I’ve been by a video game. Now as someone who is a big fan of these games I will admit Octopath Traveler doesn’t have the greatest writing in the world. At times it can be really predictable, corny, and stereotypical for a JRPG. Wanna know how stereotypical Octopath Traveler is. Hikari’s allies are named Ritsu, Kazan, and Rei Mei. It is that stereotypical. However, I adore the narratives of these games. They feel good, have great characters, they keep you interested, and play out very well. They have good beginnings, middle, and ends and there was not one I particularly hated or was disappointed by. They are titles about good people doing good things despite it all, and that’s why Octopath Traveler is my comfort series despite what it puts me through.

Hikari’s story isn’t the most nuanced when it comes to both Octopath Traveler and as a samurai tale. If we were to ask what’s the most nuanced story in Octopath Traveler 2 it would probably be between Casitti or Throné. It was a discussion for the most mature story, be it Oswald or yet again Throné. He may not even be the nicest traveler in the game that being Agnea or rooting tooting Partitio Yellowill. Again, this is my essay and I get to talk about why I love Hikari. Once you beat his intro you learn he has to locate his old allies, but through gameplay we learn trying to just run to our main character’s next objective isn’t a good thing. Traveling alone will often get you killed faster, you may stumble into higher leveled areas, and Octopath Traveler 2 carries on the trend of next chapters having absurdly high level recommendations that are around twice of how much you started the game with. I always loved how Octopath Traveler is a series where every party member has a distinct role and they all function better together than separately. Good players who understand the mechanics and know how to build their characters can cheese the hardest battles if they know how to combo abilities.

I always like to imagine the perspective of the traveler you start with as they encounter all these strange folks who they’ll be traveling with. In the first Octopath Traveler my starting traveler is the thief, Therion, a man who has trust issues. So I imagine despite traveling with strangers he opens up to them and begins to view them as family seeing how he doesn’t have one. We’re not told much about Therion, but he's lonely. Maybe he acts like he doesn’t want anybody around, but deep down he doesn’t mind the company. As we explained earlier Hikari is someone who is willing to help others no matter where they come from, so I imagine that’s what happens when he meets the other travelers of the game. He sees the circumstances they’re in, and rather than towards their next goal he sticks around to help. He has empathy for them and wants to see them in a better place. An apothecary who can’t recall who she is. A scholar who was falsely accused of murdering his family and wants revenge. A thief who was tormented all her life, a cleric who seeks the truth that led to the disappearance of loved ones, etc. You can also say this is Hikari trying to find new allies willing to help him reclaim his kingdom. That’s also a very valid point! It’s better to get the help of new friends rather than old ones, because who knows how much they have changed since you last spoke. It’s this I imagine that further strengthens Hikari’s character and makes him a perfect starting traveler. His openness to new ideas, new people, and willing to make new friends. It’s why no one during party banters looks down on Hikari, because he’s just that lovable and respectable of a person. Someone who sacrifices for others.

Temptation, Control, and Honor

At the end of Hikari’s first chapter we learn he is afflicted by a curse called Shadow’s Hold. This is passed down from generations of Ku family blood. Shadow’s Hold is a demonic version of the honorable samurai we play as. Tempting Hikari to enact violence and slaughter others for not a good reason besides personal gain. Only Hikari can see this and everytime this happens Hikari tries to keep himself under control. Which brings me onto the topic of this section which is honor and what it means to a person. Have you ever played Ghost of Tsushima? Shame if you haven’t, because it’s one of the best games of the current decade. Ghost of Tsushima is a story about an honorable samurai who resorts to guerilla warfare and violent acts to protect his people. He gets into philosophical arguments with his uncle/adopted father, and the whole story is about conflict in belief and what honor means to the individual rather than by standalone definition. That is kinda what Hikari Ku’s story is to me personally. The anime and less violent version of Jin Sakai from Ghost of Tsushima. (Please go play Ghost of Tsushima. I am telling you it is god tier. I am so excited for Ghost of Yotei)

Hikari is tempted into the belief that the only way to preserve peace and prosperity is through violence. That a human being can only keep themselves under control for so long before they go lash out at another person. This is not a narrative device, it's a proven fact amongst people. There is only so much a person can physically or mentally endure before they burst. A little off topic, but I’m someone who really likes the English voice of Hikari. He’s played by Howard Wang and he did an excellent job capturing who Hikari Ku is through his voice. I’m gonna get a lot of flack playing these games in English dub rather than Japanese, but English voice actors need to eat too! I met the voice of Casitti during a convention recently and despite it being a short interaction it was one of the nicest interactions I’ve had in awhile. There’s your flex for the day. Hikari’s voice is a mix between calmness and ferocity, stern if you will. He talks smoothly and kindly as a person, but there’s an underlying tone to it. Like he’s getting to shout what his beliefs are or what he stands for, but he only ever shouts during combat and it’s not too loud. 

You can tell he’s trying to regulate his emotions. Channel his anger and frustration is stronger than lash out like I said earlier. I mean just a reminder, his childhood friend literally betrays him and helps fuel a hunt for his head. Taking two sperated occasions to try and kill Hikari. He always addresses people formally and never talks down to them. He is keeping himself under control so that wherever he has a conversation it’s heart to heart. Down to earth rather than give off this great performance. I always had the analogy that Octopath Traveler has the look of a pop-up book, because it’s trying to look like a play. It still does, but to see a character who can not only act but talk plainly to people is nice. It’s this control that makes Hikari such a lovable character to listen to.

It’s this personal battle with Shadow’s Hold, keeping himself under control, and the real world conflict of reclaiming his kingdom that make Hikari an interesting character to me. There’s so many messed up things happening around him that can emotionally and mentally tear him apart. Yet, he carries on and never lets his goal out of sight. He never lets his beliefs crumble or forget what he stands for. He remembers to be kind, humble, and treat others with respect even if they have wronged or intended to harm him. He believes honor comes from being a good person. This is why Hikari’s display of honor is so noble to me. It’s a reminder as to why I love the stories of these games despite them being stereotypical JRPG stuff. The actions, words, and intentions of a person will speak better on who they truly are. Where they stand in the world they're in.

Separate Darkness and Light

Huge spoilers for Hikari’s story and the ending of Octopath Traveler 2, but you clicked on an article of me explaining why I love him so what did you expect? Hikari locates Kazan, fights his way through an arena, frees the fighters of the arena as it turns out they were enslaved to fight for entertainment, and gains both Kazan and the help of the fighters. Locate the fortress ruled by the clan Rei Mei is part of, learn her clan were the ones who tried to assassinate him and his mother, get a scene where Rei Mei admits to her crimes, and see Hikari forgive her. Run all the way back to Ku and here you are: the final battle. Break through the kingdom gates and prevent Mugen from doing anything worse. Fight Ritsu, see him die, honor his death, and finally face Mugen. It is time to bring an end to this madness, and trust me it’s going to be very f*cking hard.

Hikari’s final boss is a three phase boss fight and this being a JRPG if you die once you have to start the whole thing over. First phase is simple. You just tank blows, heal whenever you can, and retaliate back. Slash away at Mugen enough and Shadow’s Hold will intervene. It wants absolute control over Hikari’s body and mind, and this is when Hikari finally stands up for himself. He will not let temptation get the best of him, and so he chases Shadow’s Hold back. This frees him of the curse, but Mugen was aware of its existence. Soon he transforms into a worse version of himself and this commences the final-final boss of Hikari’s tale, the Enshrouded King. This guy is relentless. He will do whatever he can to kill you and your party members quickly. Using a variety of weapons to change up his strategy. Hopefully you are prepared for this and you’ll now notice Shadow’s Hold has become Light’s Hold. A new mechanic introduced to the second game is Latent Abilities, and these allow you to activate a quirk. For Hikari it’s one of three powerful abilities and before this moment it’s seen as letting the bloodlust out. With Light’s Hold you now see it as him channeling his anger and frustration for good will. To give it everything he has to make sure he comes out alive. So that the battle can end and see good prevail. To end the madness before it can accumulate.

Defeat Mugen once and for all, claim your right as king, and bring upon a new age for Ku. Then it turns out Hikari never truly dreamt of being king. He wants the people to work together and to govern themselves. See each other as equals rather than the rampant division that roams streets every night. Isn’t that a wonderful ending to a samurai tale? See the hero declare what honor has meant to him all along and wanting the people to follow not his influence but good deeds. That is amazing. We’re not done yet. Complete all eight stories and trigger the endgame mission and the final chapter of Octopath Traveler 2, The Journey for The Dawn. Now this is where I ramble a bit about both games and how the first one quite didn’t get it. The first game had a problem with connecting the eight stories near the end and the final mission being a boss gauntlet. Where you fight bosses you fought before, get some documents of a character you probably didn’t care for, and then fight the true final boss. Dying once has you start the whole thing over, and the reward for completing isn’t wasn’t even worth it. Not even a thank you or ending scene. Just a speech from an NPC you probably forgot you helped. There’s denying that the final section for the first Octopath Traveler was rushed. It was obviously the section of the game developed last and it clearly shows with the reuse of assets and how small the final dungeon is. If given more time I feel the devs would've been able to make a better endgame. I blame Square Enix for how little they do to help support these games, and I'm still shocked Octopath Traveler 2 ever got green lit. With how the first game was a financial flop, but it did and I was so f*cking happy.

Octopath Traveler 2 is different. It does a better job connecting the eight stories with the crossed path tales every now and then, and of course the final mission. Where the game reveals there was a secret society all along who were trying to resurrect an ancient demonic creature named Vide. Each member was someone you encountered in one of the eight tales with their leader being the mentor of Hikari, Kazan. He never wanted to help the kingdom prosper or bring peace. He just wanted everything to fall into place so that Vide could be resurrected, but it took longer than he hoped as some members went against his orders. Imagine what’s going through Hikari’s mind. Realizing someone he looked up to was not what they seemed. That what was practically a 2nd father to him turned out to be selfish and never cared for you. That they never cared about seeing you grow as a person and become who you are now. I can imagine it being awful, but seeing how far they’ve come Hikari stands firm. Chasing back the evil once more and bringing peace for everyone. Shortly after the party disperses. They state how happy they are to meet each other and that they’re ready to continue living their lives. Weeks later Hikari is reunited as Agnea hosts a show thanking all who helped her. The journey she went on, the friends she met, and that despite all that happens in life she chooses to go on. To live, to travel. “To live is to travel.” That is one of my favorite quotes in a video game now and it’s one I get a little teary eyed for. To keep on going despite how messy life can be. That being a good person can still get you far.

This is why I love Hikari Ku so much and it’s why both of the Octopath Traveler games are two of my favorite games of all time. To see good will still remains in humanity.

To live. To travel. Thanks for reading and enduring my ramble everyone.