The Final Fantasy series is home to an abundance of iconic JRPG characters with unique personalities and backgrounds. Each title follows a somewhat similar story, but the characters that lead the tale tend to be pretty unique in terms of how they interact with the world around them.
Some of these Final Fantasy characters tend to feature unique personalities as a result of something that happened to them in the past; if a character's backstory is full of sadness, their personality will often reflect it in some way. While it's more likely to see a sad backstory attributed to a sad character, it's not uncommon to learn that a cheery and carefree character has undergone something harrowing too.
5 Seymour Guado - Final Fantasy 10
While some villains tend to be evil purely for the sake of it, some are actually given pretty sad backstories to show how they came to form their questionable outlook on the world. Seymour Guado is introduced quite early in Final Fantasy 10, but players won't learn how he became a villain until later in the story.
As a child of a human and a Guado, Seymour was persecuted for being an abomination. To change the world's opinion of him, his mother decided to travel to Zanarkand and became a fayth, which Seymour could then use to defeat Sin and spare Spira a few years of suffering. Seymour's mother hoped that doing this would change how the people of Spira saw Seymour, and though it might have, Seymour chose not to fight Sin, leaving him motherless and predominantly alone. As he grew up, he came to form a firm hatred of the world until he eventually became one of the most iconic villains in the series.
4 Prompto Argentum - Final Fantasy 15
While most of the main characters in Final Fantasy 15 lived relatively happy lives before the events of the game, Prompto Argentum's backstory is an unusually sad one. Unlike his peers, he wasn't born into the world naturally; instead, he was manufactured to serve as a clone in the Niflheim army.
Even though he came to Insomnia when he was quite young, Prompto knew he was different due to the barcode on his wrist. Though he was unsure of what it symbolized, he spent most of his childhood alone because of it. Suspecting he was lonely, Lady Lunafreya encouraged Prompto to make friends with Noctis, which motivated him to lose weight before approaching him. He gained a great deal of confidence as a result of this, but the fact he felt it necessary to change his appearance in order to approach a classmate goes to show just how isolated he felt.
3 Terra Branford - Final Fantasy 6
While most of the main characters in Final Fantasy 6 have a sad backstory, Terra's is one of the saddest. Before joining the Returners, she was enslaved by the Gestahlian Empire, an organization fixated on harnessing the power of Espers. Since she could use magic, the Gestahlian Empire chose to use her to further increase the power it wielded, making her do some truly horrific things in the process.
Though players only get a brief glimpse of Terra's time as an imperial soldier and the baffling power she wielded at the beginning of Final Fantasy 6, they eventually learn that the Gestahlian Empire stole Terra away from her home in the Esper World when she was a baby. By the time Terra regained control of herself in the game's opening, she already spent a large portion of her life enslaved, which left her pretty unsure of her origins and purpose.
2 Vivi Ornitier - Final Fantasy 9
Prior to the events of Final Fantasy 9, Vivi lived a relatively peaceful life with Quan, a Qu he came to refer to as his "grandpa." Though Quan initially planned to eat Vivi, the two formed a strong connection, and Quan became a sort of role model for him. After Quan died, Vivi set out to see the world, where he eventually uncovered how he came to be.
Vivi was manufactured to serve as a black mage for Queen Brahne, but he managed to escape this destiny by falling from the airship he was being transported in. Though he escaped a pretty grim fate, he eventually learned that black mages are designed to live for approximately one year, which meant his life was destined to end much sooner than he thought. Vivi didn't exactly live a hard life prior to the events of Final Fantasy 9, but his origins prevented him from living a long one.
1 Barret Wallace - Final Fantasy 7
Final Fantasy 7 is a game full of loss and suffering, and while each main character undergoes some hardship at some point in their respective journeys, Barret Wallace's backstory is arguably the saddest of them all. Prior to the events of the game, Barret struck a deal with Shinra, allowing the company to build a Mako Reactor in North Corel. When Avalanche attempted to stop this plan from going ahead, however, Shinra launched an attack, destroyed Barret's home, and killed most of the town's population.
Believing his best friend, Dyne, was killed during the attack, Barret searched what remained of his home to find and rescue Marlene, Dyne's daughter. Hoping to find a new place for them to live, they traveled across the world and were often forced to sleep on the streets when they couldn't find a place to stay. Eventually, they found a home in Midgar thanks to Tifa, Jessie, and Marle, but Barret's hatred for the company that ruined his life inspired him to fight back, denying both he and Marlene the peaceful life they deserved.