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Tifa Lockhart is a female protagonist in Final Fantasy VII. She is Cloud's childhood friend from Nibelheim and a member of AVALANCHE. However, her personality is much more laid back and selfless in comparison, with a motherly streak concerning her friends and her attitude to others. Tifa is quick to hide her true feelings from people, and her shyness is a key aspect of her character, and she is caring and loving to a fault. Tifa also owns a bar called 7th Heaven, located in Sector 7 of Midgar, which also serves as a hideout for AVALANCHE.{|cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" border="1" style="-moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px; -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 7px; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px; float: right; font-size: 90%; width: 300px;"
|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|A.K.A.
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|Tifa Lockheart
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|bgcolor="#234432" width="110" style="color: white;"|Japanese Name
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|ティファ・ロックハート
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|Romaji
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|Tifa Rokkuhāto
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|Weapon
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|Gloves, Knuckles and Claws
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|Birthplace
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|Nibelheim
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|Date of Birth
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|May 3, 1987
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|Age
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|15 (Crisis Core)
20 (Final Fantasy VII)
22 (Advent Children)
23 (Dirge of Cerberus)
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|Height
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|5' 4" / 160cm
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|Blood Type
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|B
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|Japanese Voice Actor
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|Ayumi Ito
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|bgcolor="#234432" style="color: white;"|English Voice Actor
|bgcolor="#b0c4de"|Rachael Leigh Cook
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Tifa is 5'4" with long hair reaching down past her waist and tied at the end in a distinctive dolphin-tail split. In most of her appearances, Tifa's hair is black, but in some concept art it has been deep brown instead. Tifa's eyes are officially addressed as brown, but they have also been depicted as red in some appearances, and she wears white tear-drop earrings. She wears a sleeveless white shirt that bares her stomach with a short black miniskirt and a pair of black suspenders. Her body is slim, belying her great physical strength. In Final Fantasy VII she had large breasts, although some fans believe they have been toned down slightly in subsequent appearances.
In Advent Children, Tifa's hair is shorter for easier animation, and merely reaches partway down her back. She wears a skort with a black ribbon on each short leg instead of a regular skirt. She wears a sleeveless white shirt underneath a sleeveless black vest with a zipper, and when fighting wears leather gloves. Tifa wears this same attire in Kingdom Hearts II. In Crisis Core and Before Crisis, Tifa wears a cowgirl outfit with an orange and brown vest over a white corset with an orange miniskirt and boots with a cowboy hat. She is also seen wearing this outfit in Final Fantasy VII in a photo of her with Zack Fair and Sephiroth, taken during the events of Crisis Core and Before Crisis.
Tifa is a very shy character, which is perhaps best displayed by her last name, Lockhart. Tifa doesn't express her feelings often, and she has trouble doing so. She has a strong motherly streak and helps take care of the other AVALANCHE members in her bar, and she also has no compunctions about using her strength to keep rambunctious patrons in line, if what other characters indicate is true. Tifa is also very caring and helps whenever she can. She often comforts the other AVALANCHE members, and in Final Fantasy VII is often found spending time with Aeris Gainsborough when the party splits up, who is similarly caring and compassionate. She is also close to Barret Wallace, the leader of AVALANCHE. On the Way to a Smile reveals that due to the Nibleheim Incident, Tifa bears a deep-seated hatred of Shinra and Sephiroth, and when the Lifestream emerged at the end of Final Fantasy VII, she metaphorically hoped it would absolve her sins, as she feels horribly guilty over the destruction she and AVALANCHE caused.
Nomura and Nojima had a hard time creating the new Tifa and focused on developing the emotional backbone that her character is to the cast. They made sure to portray her as a modern woman who can function without her man, rather than a clingy one. When Tifa finally tells Cloud what's inside her heart, the original scene had Tifa feeling a little guilty about being blunt. Nojima decided to cut it for time. The final portrayal makes Tifa a positive role model and female lead for women around the world. As she was in Final Fantasy VII, on the outside Tifa is a hard worker and spends her time caring for everyone but herself. On the inside, she keeps the feelings of uneasiness towards Cloud locked up.
Interestingly, no matter what the outfit, Tifa always wears a skirt of some kind.
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Tifa's childhood is covered through various flashbacks in Final Fantasy VII. Tifa was born in Nibelheim, the same town where Cloud was born. She was out-going, lively, and quickly gained quite a lot of friends. Although she and Cloud lived right next to each other, and were only a year apart, they were never that close. She and the others didn't really know Cloud through most of, or all of their childhood. Tifa's mother died when Tifa was eight years old in 1995, leaving her upset and very confused. Tifa believed her mother had gone to Mt. Nibel, and that she could meet her again if only she crossed the mountain.
Tifa headed off to Mt. Nibel, and Cloud followed to keep her safe, but Tifa fell from the rickety bridge in the mountains. Tifa's father arrived at the scene, and finding her hurt, blamed Cloud for leading her to Mt. Nibel. Years later in 2000, Cloud decided to become a SOLDIER, like his idol Sephiroth, in part to impress Tifa. He called Tifa out to the water tower, a local date spot, to tell her of his plans, and Tifa made Cloud promise to protect her if she was ever in trouble. He agreed, and left to join SOLDIER the following spring. Afterwards, Tifa constantly worried about him, reading the newspaper every day looking for some mention of Cloud, and asking Shinra personnel if they knew him when they came to Nibelheim, but there never was anything, for Cloud only became an infantryman.
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Two years later on September 21st, 2002, at the age of 15 Tifa is working as a tour guide in the Nibelheim mountains and is taking martial arts lessons from Zangan. In Before Crisis -Final Fantasy VII-, she is hired by the player's Turk to lead an expedition from Shinra up Mt. Nibel to investigate a faulty Mako Reactor. The expedition included Sephiroth and a SOLDIER called Zack. During their stay, she drops hints to Zack personally and through his e-mail that she dreams of specifically having a blond-haired SOLDIER protecting her, obviously referring to Cloud. Unbenkownst to her, Cloud happens to be one of two Shinra guards with Zack and Sephiroth, but is hiding his identity due to his failure to enter SOLDIER. Without her knowing it the entire time, he happened to be the same guard that prevented her entry to the reactor, attempted to protect her from a monster attack that occurred shortly after (trying to anonymously keep his promise in the process) with little success, and whom she helped down the mountain.At the reactor, Sephiroth goes berserk when he learns who his mother "Jenova" is, and upon his return to town and spending several days studying, becomes fully insane. On October 1st, he puts Nibelheim to the torch and razes the town, then sets off to the reactor. Tifa's father and others follow, but Sephiroth slays them. At the reactor, Tifa finds her father's corpse with Sephiroth's Masamune. Declaring her hatred of him and Shinra, she rushes into the reactor and attacks Sephiroth, but he disarms her and cuts her down. Tifa falls down the steps of the reactor and slumps to the ground, unconscious. Not long after, Cloud arrives and carries Tifa aside to make sure she will be safe while he fights Sephiroth; Cloud later admits that he thought Tifa's wounds were fatal. Tifa, heavily wounded, would later be carried by Zangan to Midgar for medical treatment. He continuously cast Cure on her to try and heal her, but succeeded only in keeping Tifa alive rather than healing her, and it is implied she has no recollection of the journey to Midgar.
The exact time frame is not given, but at some point after this Zangan leaves Midgar, and Tifa recovers from her wounds and joins AVALANCHE, an anti-Shinra resistance group led by Barret Wallace. She also becomes the owner and proprietor of the bar and restaurant 7th Heaven, which houses AVALANCHE's base in a secret basement.
When Cloud returns to Midgar as a mercenary in 2007, he meets Tifa. Unaware that Cloud was at Nibelheim in the past, but suspecting something is off about his behaviour, she recruits him to work for Barret in order to keep him close to examine him further. Later realizing Cloud knows several things he shouldn't and has forgotten things he should know, and also initially doubting her own recollections when faced with Cloud's own, Tifa decides to keep this information to herself while she tries to figure out the reason behind Cloud's strangely different character and inconsistent memories.
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On December 9th, Cloud's first mission with AVALANCHE was a success, and on the next mission Tifa accompanies them. The bombing is successful, but Cloud is separated from them during the mission. When the rest of AVALANCHE returns to their hideout, they find someone spying on them, who points to the crime boss Don Corneo as a Shinra informant. Tifa allows herself to be kidnapped in order to get close to him. Cloud sees her being taken away, and infiltrates Corneo's mansion with Aerith Gainsborough. In the ensuing confrontation, Corneo reveals that Shinra is planning to drop the Sector 7 plate to crush the slums. Tifa and Cloud race to help Barret defend the pillar supporting the plate while Aeris takes Barret's daughter Marlene to safety. Most of the other members of AVALANCHE are killed, and the pillar is destroyed. Tifa, Cloud and Barret escape while Aeris is captured by Shinra.
The remains of AVALANCHE fight their way into Shinra Headquarters, but are captured. That night, Sephiroth attacks the building, and in the chaos the group is mysteriously released from their cells. After battling various Shinra war machines and the new president of the company Rufus Shinra, the group flees from Midgar to Kalm. At Kalm, Cloud tells the group about Sephiroth's destruction of Nibelheim. His version of events is faulty, but Tifa, confused by his story, does not confront him on these issues both to protect him and because she now doubts her own recollection.
The group travels around the world tracking Sephiroth, with Tifa supporting the other party members when she can. When they arrive at Nibelheim, they discover that the town has been rebuilt, and the villagers (who are really actors hired by Shinra to cover up the Sephiroth incident) do not remember Cloud or Tifa ever living there.When the group reaches the Northern Crater, Sephiroth appears and begins to show Cloud the true events of Nibelheim's razing. Tifa, worried what this could do to Cloud, pleads for him to stop, but Sephiroth's manipulations take their toll. Cloud submits to Sephiroth's will and hands over the Black Materia, a powerful materia that could summon Meteor, then apolgizes to Tifa as the crater begins to shake. Tifa and the Barrett flee on the Shinra airship Highwind as the crater collapses and are captured, with the rest of AVALANCHE escaping another way. Tifa and Barrett were both brought to Junon, where they were to be executed as scapegoats to show that Shinra was still in control as Meteor loomed in the sky.
Tifa is thrown into a gas chamber, while Barret is rescued by the other party members hidden in the crowd. While gas seeps into the chamber, Tifa breaks out of her restraints. Sapphire Weapon then attacks, blasting a hole in the gas chamber, which saves her life. Running to escape the Shinra forces, she climbs up onto the Sister Ray. Scarlet confronts Tifa, and the two girls descended into a catfight. The Highwind then appears below the cannon. Tifa jumps down to the airship and safety from Shinra. She is elected temporary leader of the party while Cloud is gone.
Cloud is later found in Mideel, suffering from an overdose of Mako. Tifa stays behind to watch over Cloud, and Cid is elected leader. Later, the friends decide to check up on Cloud, who is not showing any signs of improvement. However, the Ultimate Weapon suddenly appears, and Mideel is swallowed by the Lifestream, and Tifa and Cloud fall into it as Tifa tries to push Cloud's comatose form to safety.Inside Cloud's Subconscious Tifa uncovers the truth about the Nibelheim incident, and restores Cloud's memories and motivations. Later, in the aftermath of Midgar's siege by Diamond Weapon and the impending chaos of Shinra's destruction, Cloud dismisses the party members, instructing them to find a reason to fight. Tifa stays behind with Cloud, as she had nowhere else to go. Depending on the player's interactions with her during the game, the following scene has two possible dialogue course, either implying a strong romantic connection, or little at all. In the Final Fantasy 20th Anniversary Ultimania Story's section for Final Fantasy VII, however, the more romantic option's text and an accompanying screen-shots are shown, implying it the official or "canon" version.
In the game's ending in late January 2008, Tifa stays behind to help Cloud to safety as he descends into the Lifestream for a final battle with Sephiroth, and is caught by him as he returns to his own body, and the two stay near each other throughout the remainder of the ending.
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Tifa is the focus of Case of Tifa in On the Way to a Smile, examining her life after the events of the game. Tifa, Cloud and Marlene become something of a family in the newly built city of Edge, and Tifa runs a bar there. Her life with Cloud is initially happy, but Tifa becomes increasingly concerned with Cloud's secrecy and growing depression. Tifa tries hard to maintain a sense of family unity and the concept of a "normal family" itself throughout. She considers Marlene, herself, Cloud, and later Denzel, as a family and yet Cloud continues to grow distant from her as time goes on. As the novella ends, Cloud has left 7th heaven with no explanation, despite briefly showing signs of happiness again. Tifa calls his cellphone several times but eventually the answering service takes over. Shortly thereafter, the events of Advent Children begin.
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Tifa plays a large role in Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, taking place one year after Final Fantasy VII in 2009. In it, she serves as Cloud's emotional support. She once again runs a bar called 7th Heaven, this time rebuilt in Edge, and cares for Marlene and Denzel alone; apparently, she also handles the business side of Cloud's delivery service.
While taking Marlene to Aerith's church to find Cloud, she discovers that Cloud has Geostigma. Loz shows up, hoping to find Jenova's head under Cloud's care. Instead, he finds Tifa there, who he begins to duel. Though she puts up a good fight, Tifa is eventually defeated after Loz begins to use his superhuman speed and pile bunker, Dual Hound. Cloud finds her later, unconscious in the church, and prepares to hunt down Marlene, but is stopped by a bout of pain from his Geostigma. Cloud first turns down Tifa's request to go to the Forgotten Capital to get Marlene and Denzel, fearing that he will be unable to help them, but Tifa gives him a speech about his apathy and self-loathing, talking him into going.
The next day, when Loz and Yazoo have mind-controlled the children with Geostigma (after they drank the water tainted with Kadaj's will) into going to the memorial in the center of Edge, Tifa attempts to save Denzel from them. She is knocked out by Bahamut SIN while protecting Denzel. Waking up quickly, she joins the battle with the remaining members of AVALANCHE against Bahamut SIN, and is the last person to physically help Cloud — with Aerith providing support from the Lifestream — into the air to deliver the final blow to Bamahut SIN.
She appears on the Shera with the members of AVALANCHE while Cloud fights Kadaj and Sephiroth, and arrives in the church with Denzel to heal his Geostigma, and share a shy smile with Cloud as he relaxes with the children in the pool of Lifestream purified water.
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Tifa only appears briefly during the game which takes place one year later in 2010. The first is during the ground assault on Midgar, leading the tanks with Barret and Cloud. The second is when the gang is cheering on Vincent towards the end when he is "saving the world", and the third is at the end, when Yuffie enters 7th Heaven to inquire about Vincent. She is still running the 7th Heaven bar, and lets Shelke live with them. She can also be heard during a phone call to Vincent during his descent into Midgar's underground, but this is audio only, she does not actually appear.
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Tifa is a Monk, and thus has high physical stats and equips Claw and Glove type weapons. However, stat differences in Final Fantasy VII are unnoticeable for most characters. Only a handful of Tifa's gloves have higher-than-average strength, but the two that do are exceptional. One, the God's Hand, has 255% accuracy, meaning Tifa will never miss, and the other is her strongest weapon, the Premium Heart, which grows stronger as Tifa's Limit Break gauge fills. Both of these weapons also boost her magic power. Also notable is the Master Fist, which does not have a particularly powerful strength rating, but which gets significantly more powerful for each status effect Tifa is under while it is equipped, and even outclasses several final weapons if Tifa has numerous ailments afflicting her.
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Tifa's Limit Breaks are unlike most Final Fantasy VII characters'. Instead of selecting a move from a list, Tifa's Limit Breaks consist of consecutively hitting the opponent with each move adding on to the previous. Each move deals physical damage to a random opponent. The Limits are selected through a selection process similar to the Slot skill from Final Fantasy VI. Each time the reel hits "Yeah!" damage is doubled, but each time it hits "Miss", the attack does not connect. Stopping the reel on "Hit" allows the attack to connect, but doesn't increase its power. The player stops the reel, and later skills have "Yeah!" harder to hit and surrounded by "Miss". {|cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2" border="1" width="100%"
!bgcolor="#234432" width="2%"|Level
!bgcolor="#234432" width="10%"|Name
!bgcolor="#234432" width="40%"|Obtaining
!bgcolor="#234432" width="30%"|Action
!bgcolor="#234432"|Image
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!bgcolor="#b0c4de" rowspan="2"|1
|Beat Rush 掌打ラッシュ
Shōda Rasshu
|Already known
|Runs up and punches the enemy a few times, dealing 1.25 times normal damage to a single target.
|[22]
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|Somersault サマーソルト
Somāsoruto
|Use Beat Rush 9 times
|Somersaults in the air while kicking the enemy, dealing 1.375 times normal damage to a single target.
|[23]
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!bgcolor="#b0c4de" rowspan="2"|2
|Waterkick 水面蹴り
Suimengeri
|Kill ~96 enemies with Tifa.
|A circling sweep kick accompanied inexplicably by water, dealing 1.5 times normal damage.
|[24]
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|Meteodrive メテオドライヴ
Meteodoraivu
|Use Waterkick 7 times.
|Picks up the enemy in a vertical suplex position and drops, slamming the enemy to the ground, dealing 1.625 times normal damage.
|[25]
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!bgcolor="#b0c4de" rowspan="2"|3
|Dolphin Blow ドルフィンブロウ
Dorufin Burou
|Kill ~96 enemies with Tifa after learning Waterkick.
|Uppercut accompanied by water and a dolphin, dealing 1.75 times normal damage to a single target.
|[26]
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|Meteor Strike メテオストライク
Meteo Sutoraiku
|Use Dolphin Blow 6 times.
|Picks up the enemy, spins it around, jumps high into the air and flings it downwards, dealing 1.875 times normal damage to a single target.
|[27]
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!bgcolor="#b0c4de" rowspan="2"|4
|Final Heaven ファイナルヘヴン
Fainaru Hevun
|Play this note sequence in Tifa's House in Nibelheim: [28], [29], [30], L1 and [31], L1 and [32], [33], [34], [35], L1 and [36], [37], [38], [39], [40]
|Creates a giant energy blast with a punch, dealing 2.625 times normal damage to a single target.
|[41]
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Tifa uses some of her Limit Breaks in Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, during her fight against Loz in the Sector 5 Church. The Limit Breaks used are, in order of appearance, Beat Rush, Somersault, Meteodrive, and Meteor Strike.
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Tifa was originally planned to be a supporting member of AVALANCHE rather than a field operative, and to be partly responsible for the formation of the group which would have started in her bar. In a plot point cut from the final product, Tifa was intended to be attacked by Cloud and have a scar on her back from the assault. The circumstances for this are not stated, but Tifa would have had amnesia of the attack, implying this may have taken place during the Nibelheim Incident, or have been an altered version of her childhood injury for which Cloud was blamed.
Tifa's diary was also originally meant to be found in the game, in which she writes about her early relationship with Cloud. In it she names some of her freinds from Nibelheim: "Wel", Dan", and "Meiday", all of whom asked her out to the water tower, just as Cloud did, showing her immense popularity in the town. She also mentions that Cloud started to get into fights with the other kids by 8-years-old, the same year her mother died.
In cut conversations Tifa was to talk with Aeris over Cloud's strange behavior, and even shows the picture taken before the Nibelheim Incident, which she keeps in a locket. Tifa was also to meet her old master Zangan again. She would also give Cloud mouth-to-mouth resuscitation in Mideel after going through his subconscious.
The original plans for Cloud and Tifa's moment under the Highwind were far more suggestive. Following an unseen event between the two, Cloud was to walk out of the Chocobo Stable on board the Airship, followed by Tifa while she was checking around. This idea was rejected for being too "extreme", and a less explicit 'toned down' version of the scene replaced it.
During early plans for the game, Tifa was to have the "Shooter" Job Class.
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For more information, see Kingdom Hearts Wiki:Tifa
Tifa appears in Kingdom Hearts II, looking around Hollow Bastion for Cloud and helping Leon defend Hollow Bastion when the world is invaded. Tifa, as Cloud's light, wishes to help Cloud fight Sephiroth, his darkness, by providing him with the power to combat Sephiroth's influence. She eventually interrupts a battle between the two of them, and gives Cloud the power of light to surround and bind his darkness, causing him to shine brightly, after which he and Sephiroth depart to places unknown. Tifa all the same thanks Sora for his help and gives him the Fenrir keychain. She later appears as a boss in several cups in the Underdrome Colosseum.
She may or may not also be a human resident of Hollow Bastion, and the ambiguity of her nature was deliberately inserted by Nomura in order to generate discussion from the players.
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Tifa also appears as a playable character in Dragon Quest & Final Fantasy in Itadaki Street Special, as well as Dragon Quest & Final Fantasy in Itadaki Street Portable.
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Tifa is an initial playable character in Ehrgeiz: God Bless the Ring. Her moveset includes Somersault, Beat Rush, and chargeable energy blasts. A third costume can be unlocked, depicting her as the "cowgirl Tifa" from the Nibelheim flashbacks. Her title in Story mode is "Summoner", and she can only be fought by successfully defeating "Guardian" Cloud.
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In an Easter Egg in Xenogears, the player can spot a poster of Tifa on the wall. Her stance is the same as her Artwork.
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| Final Fantasy VII menu portrait. | Sketch of Tifa's Cowgirl Outfit | Advent Children artwork. | Advent Children costume artwork. |
| Super-deformed Tifa in Itadaki Street Special. |
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Final Fantasy VII 10th Anniversary Ultimania, a book made with much input from the staff of Final Fantasy VII, states that "Tifa" is a shortened version of the name Tiffany. In Japanese, Tiffany is written as ティファニー - the same way that Tifa is spelled, only with '-ni' at the end. Tiffany in turn comes from a Greek word that means "manifestation of God". Despite this, Tifa's name is pronounced with a long "e" (Tee-fa) rather than a short "i", as Tiffany is pronounced. Tifa's last name, Lockhart, might be a reference to Tifa's hiding away her feelings for Cloud, "locking" them within her heart, or alternately, to her role in unlocking Cloud's psyche later in the game.
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- In Crisis Core -Final Fantasy VII-, Zack can speak to a man building a bar, who asks Zack what to name it. When Zack suggests "7th Heaven", the man loves the name and suggests getting "a young girl with a big bosom and long legs" to work the bar, obviously referring to Tifa.
- Tifa appears in Monty Oum's Dead Fantasy in her Advent Children attire, along with Rikku, Yuna, Rinoa, Kairi, and female Dead or Alive characters. She is in both parts of this series, sparring with the other Final Fantasy females against the Dead or Alive characters.
- The entire fighting sequence between Loz and Tifa in Advent Children has been duplicated in the music video for the Korean pop singer Ivy MV's "Temptation of Sonata", albeit with minor changes, such as small parts of the fighting choreography being altered due to the absence of Loz's Dual Hound, and Tifa's victory by snapping Loz's neck at the end.
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