Aqua (Kingdom Hearts) - Creation and Development

Creation and Development

For Aqua's first appearance in the secret ending Kingdom Hearts II, director Tetsuya Nomura stated he still did not design her appearance, having focused on what her story would be. While unwilling to explain her identity, Nomura pointed that Aqua's, Terra's and Ventus's scene occurred prior to the events from the first game. Following the release of Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix, Nomura revealed more details about Aqua such as a connection with the character Xemnas, wishing gamers to hint more about them. He also revealed her name as said by the Lingering Sentiment in Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix and explained that her name follows the "water" theme brought by Kairi's name. However, a connection with Kairi was not intended, but rather with the series' main characters whose names bear various themes.

In contrast to Terra and Ventus, Aqua did not have a base to design her, leading Nomura to call a completely new character. Her outfit was based on Terra's Japanese-inspired clothes which are meant to expand the student-and-teacher bond shown in the game. Aqua's outfit was altered three times during the game's development. Since Nomura felt that the outfit she was wearing during the Tokyo Game Show 2009 was too revealing since her entire back is exposed when she jumps in the air, he modified her outfit to create a design that was neither too conservative nor too revealing. As with Terra and Ventus, the making of Aqua's outfit brought issues to Nomura due to how she would be able to summon her armor. Therefore, an "X" was added to their clothes as a means to activate the armors. When designing her, Nomura was worried about her possible lack of popularity due to her lack of connections with other Kingdom Hearts characters unlike Terra and Ventus. Therefore, he decided to make her a strong girl as he mentions he did the same with Xion for Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days but in a different way; while Xion was made a brave girl, Nomura wanted to keep her feminine despite her strength. While still unsure how she would be received, Nomura later stated she became popular within fans, remarking Megumi Toyoguchi's work as her voice actress. Toyoguchi had already worked with Nomura in Final Fantasy X-2 voicing Paine, one of the game's protagonists; while Toyoguchi used a low tone with Paine, she used tone closer to her original voice when voicing Aqua, something which Nomura praised due to her representation of the character.

Ever since the game started development, the staff decided it would be divided in three scenarios, with Aqua's being the last one written. The original ending of her scenario showed her trapped in the Realm of Darkness, but said part was moved to the game's "Last Episode" playthrough in order to reduce the dark tones from the three regular endings. In gameplay perspective, Aqua was designed to be a character gamers would take some getting used to, and recommended them use her as the last one in order to understand the game's story better, as he points that scenario with the intention that Aqua would be the last character to leave the Land of Departure. The staff had in mind which when developing her movements, while her personality was described as a serious and dignified young woman.