Are we talking just about looks and clothes or is the personality also a thing in this thread? If so, then I want to say how much I was impressed by Primrose, the dancer, from Octopath Traveler.
Her backstory is super dark. She witnessed how her father was betrayed and killed when she was a young child. Traumatised by this event she swore revenge on the three killers, ending up years later in a shady... let's call it a theatre... where she is forced to dance half-naked to scummy men. Her father was once the leader of a very noble family and enjoyed a high reputation among the citizens. After his death, however, his legacy was spat on and his house was dishonored. The men in the dance club mocked her frequently for her heritage and yet she still had to dance for them. She endured the constant abuse and suffered through it for years, hiding her disgust for all of this, as long as it could bring her closer to the killers. During her quest to hunt them down she has to suffer even more, when her closest friend from the dance club gets killed right before her eyes and Primrose herself even gets severely wounded later on. Eventually, she finds the leader behind all of this and tracks him down. As if things weren't dark enough already, it is one of her former allies from back then when times were good. A person she used to trust and even considered a friend is actually the killer of her father. Turns out he is a sadistic fucker that feels immense enjoyment when others crumble and suffer in pain and tears, or even lose their life. He lured her into all of this just so he could enjoy her fury, the fire in her eyes and even her burning desire to kill him.
The final battle against him starts. It's a two phase battle with a long cutscene in between where he still keeps on insulting and mocking her, twisting her thoughts and questioning herself about what her father would do in her shoes and if he really would want all this blood shedding. As the player of the game, you fucking beat the shit out of him. Twice.
After that, he demands for the climax. He is already on the verge of death and asks her to finally drive her dagger into his breast so she could get her oh so sweet revenge at last, and ... that's exactly what she does. Yet, in the epilogue, we can see that this didn't give her any satisfaction at all and it didn't fill her heart. She is still lonely and she lost all her drive now. She doesn't know anymore what her motivation is.
This is by far my favorite campaign in Octopath Traveler because of the insane intensity and emotional impact it left on me. How much morale is in this story, how deep can you fuck a person up until it is broken, how much can you fire up the desire to kill someone. I watched it on Youtube again so I could write these lines and I just want to say this: to witness again how much of a disgusting piece of shit this final boss is enrages me much more than it should do. It's just a video game, yet I truly hate this character from the bottom of my heart. I remember when I beat him on my run and he finally got what he deserved, I was actually let down because of how little it was displayed. In fact, we only see Primrose walking up to him and then the scene fades away. We don't see her dealing the final blow, and this truly dissapointed me. I wanted to see him die and rot like he deserved it. 95% of her entire campaign is nothing but constantly building up the tension to this very moment. But I didn't get my satisfaction, the game refused to give it to me. The game refused to celebrate his death in any way. I really was dissapointed. But it took me quite a while to realize that this was actually the best way possible to end her story. This same blue balled feeling I felt is the exact same that she supposedly felt afterwards. Yes, he is gone now, revenge is served. But it still did nothing. It is hollow and dull. Revenge doesn't heal. I love this subtext, it moved me.
