Selphie

Selphie is a minor character in the Kingdom Hearts series, originally from Final Fantasy VIII. The official Kingdom Hearts website states that she is thirteen years old at the beginning of Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories and fourteen during the events of Kingdom Hearts II.

Kingdom Hearts
''A spunky girl who lived on the Destiny Islands. She is rather impulsive, and quite the romanticist. Nobody knows what happened to her after her island disappeared.''

"Final Fantasy VIII"

Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories
A perky girl from Sora's islands.

''Selphie is assertive and tends to leap before she looks. She also has a romantic side.''

Kingdom Hearts II
Final Fantasy VIII

''A girl who lived on the same islands as Sora. She always played with Sora and the other boys.''

Selphie's whereabouts were in question after Destiny Islands vanished some time ago, but thanks to Sora's help, she was able to return home.

Kingdom Hearts
Selphie is a resident of the Destiny Islands and a friend of Sora, Kairi and Riku. She spends most of her time with Tidus and Wakka.

She is one of three to ask Sora a question that helps determine his leveling pace during his Dive into the Heart in the Destiny Islands area. Her question, "What is most important to you?" can be answered with either A) being number one, B) friendship, or C) my prize possessions.

Like Tidus and Wakka (also from the Final Fantasy games), you can challenge her for exp. She uses a jump rope (a would-be toy counterpart of her original incarnation's weapon, a nunchaku) to attack, and is probably the fastest out of the three. However, her attacks are easy to block and counter, which means more exp. However, her speed may annoy impatient players, as she sometimes dodges attacks easily.

When the Heartless destroyed Destiny Islands, her whereabouts were unknown. The most possible answer to this is that she disappeared along when the islands were destroyed. But thanks to Sora she was able to return along with Destiny Islands.

Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories
A memory-based version of Selphie appears within Castle Oblivion in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories. Sora briefly speaks to her along with Tidus and Wakka when he goes to Destiny Islands. When Riku goes there she also appears with Tidus and Wakka, but quickly disappears. In the ending credits of Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories, the real Selphie is shown playing on the beach with Tidus and Wakka while Kairi looks at the Small Island.

Kingdom Hearts II
Selphie is the only other islander apart from Sora, Riku and Kairi to appear in Kingdom Hearts II. Like the other characters, she is shown to have forgotten Sora as a result of Naminé's manipulations. She is a schoolmate of Kairi's as she is seen wearing the assumed school uniform. She offers for Kairi to go to the kids' island after school one day and Kairi reveals that she promised herself not to go to the island until she remembers the boy's (Sora's) name. And although Selphie has no memory of Sora, she does believe Kairi's story of his existence. This also hints that Kairi has romantic feelings for Sora, because she can't bring herself to "betray" Sora by going to the island when she can't even remember his name.

Kingdom Hearts coded
A data version of Selphie appears in Kingdom Hearts coded, alongside Wakka and Tidus, all of them made of data. She tells the Data Sora to destroy the block and gives him a Hi-Potion for doing so.

Appearance
In Kingdom Hearts, Selphie has almost the exact same appearance as in her original game, Final Fantasy VIII, albeit she is younger here. She wears an odd, yellow dress with overall straps and a large pocket on the chest. Minor changes to Selphie's appearance include her original brown boots changing to sandals and the black electrical tape she originally wore on her left wrist being replaced with a loose, blue beaded bracelet. Selphie's eyes are green and she uses a jump rope as a weapon (referencing Selphie's original weapons in Final Fantasy VIII, Nunchaku). She also retains her peculiar hairstyle; brown hair styled into one large curl on the back of her head and two more on either side.

In Kingdom Hearts II, a slightly older and noticeably taller Selphie is briefly seen in a school uniform similar to the one Kairi wears. However, Selphie wears her uniform straight, with the T-shirt worn simply as a T-shirt, unlike Kairi, who rolls her sleeves up into a makeshift tank top. Selphie wears a short-sleeved white polo shirt, a plaid, sky blue tie, a pleated skirt of the same color, navy blue knee-high socks, and black shoes. She also wears a small brown belt (possibly a watch) around her left wrist in lieu of her bracelet. Another accessory of hers is the "moogle bag," which she is seen with for a mere moment in Kingdom Hearts II.

In Kingdom Hearts Re:coded, Selphie's thighs are noticeably larger, giving her "quite an adult impression". This is due to a mistake among the developers, though they ultimately decided to keep the change.

In all of Selphie's appearances, she dons a small bracelet on her lower arm. However, this bracelet changes throughout its different incarnations. In Kingdom Hearts, her bracelet is on her left arm, in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, it is on her right arm, and in Kingdom Hearts II it is brown, contrary to the other games in which it is blue.

Personality
Selphie seems to be a typical "girly-girl", as she is carefree, fights very scarcely with her jump rope, and overall acts like a little girl. She also seems to be a romantic of sorts for when you talk to her a second time on Destiny Islands she mentions how romantic the Paopu Fruit legend is. Her romantic nature is heightened when Kairi (After talking about Riku) tells her she is sending a letter to the "other boy", who turns out to be Sora - Selphie is rather charmed by Kairi's idea.

Origin
Selphie Tilmitt was originally a major character from Final Fantasy VIII, in which she is a classmate of Squall's at Balamb Garden, having recently transferred from Trabia Garden. She is active and energetic, although slightly clumsy. She participates in many extracurricular activities, such as planning the Garden Festival and running the school's website. She wields Nunchaku in battle, and her Limit Break, "Slot", allows the player to cast a random spell numerous times. She is obsessed with trains and other vehicles, and she ended up being the pilot of the team's starship. Selphie first shows up when she runs into Squall while late for class. Later, during a field exam in Dollet, she joins Squall's team after Seifer runs off. She later graduates to SeeD with Squall and Zell, and the three are assigned to the same team, which is given a mission to free the small nation of Timber from the giant Republic of Galbadia. During the game, she recovers her childhood closeness with Irvine, who serves as her copilot on the Ragnarok.

Selphie was the second character that Nomura drew, after Squall, intentionally giving her an impractical hairstyle. When he first designed Selphie, Nomura drew her in overalls; however, he realized that none of the characters would be wearing a skirt. In the end, he gave Selphie a mini-skirt and let Quistis have pants.

While Selphie is not the only character from Final Fantasy VIII to appear in the Kingdom Hearts series, she never meets Leon, Seifer, Fuu, or Rai, due to living on different worlds, breaking Selphie apart from her former castmates to coincide with the Kingdom Hearts series' theme of multiple franchises and works combining.

Notes and references
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Selphie