Magic's best argument for Universes Beyond might be Tidus from Final Fantasy 10

One of many cards that feels so true to Final Fantasy

Magic: The Gathering’s Final Fantasy crossover set is a smashing success for so many reasons. Not only does it cater to nostalgia by showcasing beloved games and characters from across the series’ 38-year history, but the painstaking way Wizards of the Coast designers approached designing the set makes the mechanics feel like stories we remember from the game.

So many card designs from the set are pitch-perfect representations of various characters or moments from the series, and one that clicks really well for me — and one I include in every white-blue artifact deck — is Tidus, Blitzball Star.

After a cryptic and somber opening sequence, Final Fantasy 10’s proper beginning sees Tidus walking through the metropolis of Zanarkand while his adoring fans cheer. You take just a few steps before a cute girl asks for his autograph. Kids worship him as their idol. He’s cocky and a total flirt. And in the cinematic that follows, he backs up that arrogance with an incredible performance in a Blitzball match. Tidus’s entire identity at the start of the game is all about being a Blitzball prodigy. When Auron shows up and gives him a sword, he’s clumsy at first and his battle stance is casual, almost awkward.

In interviews, the Final Fantasy Magic: The Gathering lead set designer Gavin Verhey has described something called a “snapshot method” the team took to designing cards based on characters.

“Trying to distill any given character down into a single color or two colors is really tough,” he told Comics Gaming Magazine. “So what I did was what I call the snapshot method, where you take a picture of a character at a specific moment in time, and then design a card around that.”

So who is Tidus, Blitzball Star?

In Magic, he’s a 2/1 creature that costs one colorless, one white, and one blue mana. Every time an artifact enters the battlefield, he gets a +1/+1 counter. And every time he attacks, the player taps a target creature an opponent controls.

In a blog post from Wizards about the set written by designer Yoni Skolnik, she outlined some of the foundational color themes at play. White is the color of heroes, while blue invokes items and technology. White–blue, the color pair Tidus inhabits in the main set, is the artifacts archetype.

On some level, we deeply associate Tidus with the color blue: Blitzball is a water-based sport and water itself takes on a prominent symbolic meaning throughout FF10. A ways into the game, Tidus also gets the Brotherhood, his iconic sword that appears to be made out of water (or at least have magical water swirling inside of it).

So this is a card built around how players perceive Tidus at that very first “snapshot moment”: as a dazzling athlete in a futuristic city, navigating the stardom and fan culture surrounding a high-tech water sport that basically looks like magic. In the Vision Design blog, Skolnik repeatedly emphasizes the team’s desire to capture the experience of playing the games, not just referencing them. It’s why blue became the home for “items and technology” and why white-blue together emphasizes artifacts so aptly. Tidus fits neatly into that ecosystem.

There’s also another obvious color scheme to consider here: Like this Tidus card, the blitzball itself is white and blue.

A Blitzball also appears in the Magic set as an artifact that taps to add one mana of any color. Or, you can sacrifice it to draw two cards if an opponent was dealt damage by a legendary creature this turn.

Together, these two cards tell a story, one that has deep roots in the plot of FF10 and the mechanics of the Blitzball mini-game within it. Tidus resents his father Jecht, who was also a major Blitzball star, for being an abusive drunk who seemingly abandoned his son. Jecht had a signature move called “Jecht Shot mk. 3” where he bounced the Blitzball off defenders (and/or the goalpost).

In a pivotal moment for Tidus, while the party sets sail to the city of Luca for a blitzball tournament, he can interact with a blitzball on the deck while reminiscing about his father bullying him. If he succeeds, he learns his father’s skill. That translates to an incredible maneuver within the Blitzball mini-game, where Tidus can knock out two defenders to prevent them from blocking his shots.

It makes perfect sense that Tidus’s Magic card would tap an enemy creature every time he attacks, making it feel like every attack is a Jecht Shot on goal. This is exactly the kind of subtle flavor that makes the Final Fantasy crossover a dream for fans.

While it’s not a literal recreation of Blitzball, it carries the same sensation. As Skolnik explained, the team wanted to “communicate” the memories players have rather than overwhelm them with references: a perfect target for expressive mechanics rather than rigid translation. Because the Blitzball is an artifact within the set, Tidus’s synergy with artifacts makes even more sense, especially when its secondary ability — sacrifice to draw two cards if an opponent was damaged by a legendary — is tailor-made to work with Tidus, Blitzball Star. Because he’s tapping a potential defender, he’s going to hit the opponent far more often than other legendary creatures.

That’s not even the only “snapshot” we get of Tidus either. He takes the lead in one of the set’s four commander decks, reappearing as Tidus, Yuna’s Guardian.

At the beginning of combat each turn, he can move a counter from one creature to another. And he also has “Cheer,” which lets the player draw a card and proliferate (you give any number of permanents another counter of each kind they already have). Together, it echoes Tidus’s role in FF10 as the party’s emotional anchor and Yuna’s morale booster. Interestingly, this card picks up the color green, a color associated with growth, in addition to white and blue.

In an official blog post breaking down the approach to all four Commander decks, lead designer Daniel Holt wrote about how the team approached each one, including this version of Tidus.

“With Final Fantasy 10, I knew I wanted a counters theme and for Tidus to be the face commander,” he wrote. “The game's Sphere Grid leveling system uses visual markers to gain abilities and stats, and I knew I could do that physically with +1/+1 counters and keyword counters.”

This sheds light on why counters are such a focus for both versions of Tidus. “Cheer” is also a nice callback to one of Tidus’s best abilities in FF10. While in battle, it buffs the strength and physical damage resistance of all active party members, up to a stack of five. Proliferate functions as a pitch-perfect manifestation of that very same mechanical vibe.

Considering the design of both cards reveals something subtle but powerful about the entire Final Fantasy set: the cards reflect a character not as a flat cameo, but as someone who’s lived a life with distinct phases. The designers at Wizards didn’t just slap some Tidus art on a powerful creature card and call it a day. They looked at the rich history and development of the character, the game mechanics at play in FF10, and adapted them in rich, meaningful ways that trigger an explosion of nostalgia.

The Blitzball star and the Guardian aren’t contradictions, but snapshots. And Magic’s ability to let both coexist on the table is exactly why this Universes Beyond set works so well.