Kratos' personality is one of the most generic and overused Anime personas out there. Hes much more akin to the "cool, caluclating" villian's personality who proves to be oh-so mature and always berates the hero because they are a snot-nosed teenager with a women's voice who gets emotional. Off the top of my head is Slade from TT. HOWEVER,  he is a good guy, though, so I guess its kind of neat that he isn't the bad guy in Symphonia, that does make him a bit unique.

I'm sorry but Kratos, as far as I've played is just a dick. Know that I have never finished Symphonia though.

^Kratos is like Slade? Slade was crap.

I can't imagine a JRPG character that plays a main part in the story as a protagonist being like Slade.

Do you even understand what i mean with the whole confronting backstory? If you did you would know that unless you get kratos back later in the game he does not confront it as well as Yuri does. A back story can be good but if a character never confronts it it won't be very compelling in the end.

Yuri gets fed up with the rules but never allows that to control him or his actions. He has never once just acted on emotion without thinking things through like just about every JRPG lead does. Which gets to my next point--

He is Vesperia's LEAD. What is the most important thing with him isn't that he's simply an all-around badass character in both actions and words, but that he is the MAIN badass. While you play the tearful Luke from Abyss, the obscenely emotional Lloyd from Symphonia or the pouty Sennal from Legendia, you play a character who lets emotion cloud rational thought and lead to indecision and mistakes, which is something Kratos does NOT have going for him. To be fair though, very little JRPGs out there do. Which makes Yuri even more special.

Yuri doesn't make mistakes that can in any way be prevented.

His war on society is much more then simply being fed up with rules and going Vigilante on society. Its a process, one he thinks through before approaching. He doesn't allow strong emotions to cloud his judgement, but at the same time realizes that sometimes the harshest methods of saviour(i.e. in Estelle's case, he knew exactly what to do while all his friends thought he would simply kill her like she had asked for.) aren't neccesarily the only ways to do what he has to.

And throughout the whole emotionally endearing process of the game, he keeps a cool head and stays on top of things, speaks frankly to both normal people and his friends (refusing to make any substantial decisions for the supporting cast, but rather helps then to make their own decisions.) and does what he has to. Even when he murders Cumore and Ragoe, he doesn't do what Lloyd or most other JRPGs leads would; he covers up any trace that he is the murderer, and while ANY other JRPG cast would have had some long discussion with them before killing them, Yuri simply walks up to them even as they beg, puts them down, and covers up his tracks.

Simple, cool, rational, and still absolutely endearing and witty. Yuri is all this and more

Uhh, Kratos DOES confront it. Getting him back in your party is just as canon as Yuri's story. It was VERY compelling for Kratos to go against Mithos and reconsider his past and come to terms with his son. I have no clue what you are talking about.

Did you listen to what i just said? If you DON'T do the whole affection system right you won't get him back thus he won't confront his back story. And you have to admit that Yuri was 100x more badass the Kratos. To say Kratos is more badass then Yuri is like saying Colette is the best rpg character ever.

 You didn't even play ToV so your making a weak arguement.

I think I can solve all of our problems...

G-value, stop beating on Symphonia.

Soriku, go play Tales of Vesperia.

linkthe2nd, you play Symphonia.

Riot of blood, go apologize to poor Estelle >_<

Shadowblind, go finish Symphonia already

We good?

Soriku - You really shouldn't be attacking ToV's characters, and their progression when you haven't played it. That's like saying that Oblivion's story is as great as Mass Effect.

Go buy or rent a 360, then get Vesperia, and try it. I've been playing JRPGs as long as you've been alive, and I can honestly say that Yuri is one of the best JRPG leads ever. Not as good as some WRPG ones, but easily the best JRPG one.