Watch the Entire Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII Opening Cinematic

Lightning, Lightning, you so need to lighten up. You’re too darned somber in this launch cinematic for Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII.

“When I awoke from my dreamless sleep, I was just in time to witness the end of the world.” What a buzzkill. Yeah, the world’s ending, but didn’t that almost happen in the first game? And if we apply Stephen King 11/22/63 logic, didn’t entire universes blink in and out of existence with all the second game’s manic time-hopping?

That’s just how director Motomu Toriyama has written her (and actress Ali Hillis has voiced her), I suppose. Don’t let that keep you from watching this five-minute, 13-second cinematic plucked from the upcoming PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 roleplaying game (it’s out in North America on February 11, 2014). It’s a Final Fantasy XIII trailer alright, brimming with overwrought architectonics and psychedelic razzle-dazzle, like a Venetian carnival staged somewhere in Tron‘s glowing neon Grid. I have no idea what’s going on here, and the banter’s kind of silly — Toriyama’s no Yasumi Matsuno or Daisuke Watanabe — but, Final Fantasy XIII fan that I am, I want to play this thing.