Final Fantasy X

Final Fantasy X is a role-playing game developed and published by Square for the PlayStation 2 in 2001. It was the first numbered Final Fantasy game released on that console and the series' first numbered entry to feature voiced dialogue. Rather than following a party traveling across a conventional overworld map, it traces a pilgrimage through Spira, a world repeatedly devastated by Sin, a colossal creature. Its opening places Tidus, a star player of the underwater sport blitzball, in Zanarkand during a Sin attack. He subsequently wakes far from home and learns that the Zanarkand known to Spira was destroyed a thousand years earlier.

On the island of Besaid, Tidus meets Yuna, a summoner undertaking a pilgrimage to defeat Sin, and joins her guardians Wakka, Lulu, and Kimahri. Auron, who knew Tidus's father Jecht, and Rikku, an Al Bhed girl, later join the group. Their route takes them through Kilika, Luca, the Thunder Plains, and other locations toward the ruins of Zanarkand. Along the way, Yuna acquires aeons from temples, while the party confronts Seymour Guado and the teachings of Yevon. The Al Bhed oppose the pilgrimage's expected sacrifice: using the Final Aeon requires a guardian's life and kills the summoner.

At Zanarkand, the party rejects that cycle and seeks another way to end Sin permanently. Tidus learns that his Zanarkand is a summoned dream sustained by the fayth, and that Jecht became Sin after serving as the Final Aeon for Yuna's father, Braska. The group ultimately defeats Jecht and Yu Yevon, the force that perpetuates Sin by possessing aeons. As the fayth cease dreaming, Tidus disappears, leaving Yuna to address a Spira no longer threatened by Sin. The ending's cost gives the pilgrimage a personal consequence, rather than treating the defeat of a monster as a simple victory.

Final Fantasy X replaced the earlier games' Active Time Battle system with Conditional Turn-Based Battle, allowing players to see upcoming turns and switch party members during combat. Character development uses the Sphere Grid: earned sphere levels move characters along paths where spheres activate attributes and abilities. Blitzball is also playable as a separate team sport, with Wakka connected to Besaid's Aurochs. Nobuo Uematsu composed the score alongside Masashi Hamauzu and Junya Nakano; Uematsu's piano piece “To Zanarkand” opens the game. Square followed it with Final Fantasy X-2, released in 2003, which returns to Spira and follows Yuna, Rikku, and Paine.