"Ooooh, shiny!"

Other than the figurines displayed at Jump Festa, we haven't really seen any other Final Fantasy XIII merchandise. And this time, they're accessories you can carry on your person and not something to be ogled at from the other side of a display case (unless you're that type of collector).

Here are Square Enix's first round of merchandise accessories for the upcoming PS3 and Xbox 360 RPG. No, they're not Vanille's pig-tails. And no, it's not Sazh's afro either. They're actually based off of Snow's tattooed symbol on his arm.

There's a pendant and a Zippo lighter. As these collector's items go, they're rather expensive. The pendant is JP¥ 16,000 (US$ 167), while the light goes for JP¥ 16,000 (US$ 136).

 

While that's all and good - and at this point in time I've got no interest (i.e. cash) to buy any of Snow's merch - what's gotten my curiosity here is the significance of Snow's symbol. If you look at Square Enix's other game merchandise (Squall's Lion Heart, Cloud's Wolf emblem, Sora's Keyblade, etc.), they usually put out items that are connected to the lead character. I wonder why they're not getting anything from Lightning instead? Does Snow's symbol have any significance in the story enough to warrant it as iconic?

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Related articles:

• Square Enix figurines: Lightning, Shiva-cycle, Dissidia, KH at Jump Festa
• Three to tango: new batch of Final Fantasy XIII screens show more of Team Nora