Final Fantasy Resonance mod adds Ariana Grande and 1,300 other Brave Exvius characters to the demo

More than a month before Final Fantasy Resonance launches, modders have already cracked open its demo and stuffed it full of characters Square Enix left behind — including the game's most famous absentee, Ariana Grande.

The FFR Vision Studio mod, available at ffbe.luminest.io, brings nearly 1,300 Final Fantasy Brave Exvius units into Resonance's demo as Visions — the in-game mechanic that lets you summon characters from across the series' history to help in combat. That roster covers every guest character from the now-defunct mobile game, meaning Sora from Kingdom Hearts and 2B from Nier Automata are both in, alongside Grande herself. The mod is still a work in progress: the developer has published a roadmap and says they're improving animations, building a skill dictionary for Brave Exvius abilities, and potentially adding side quests tied to specific Visions. Producer Keisuke Nakashima told Kotaku that Grande "unfortunately" wouldn't appear in the official release, adding that "Ariana Grande's character would not fit within the vibe that we've created for Final Fantasy Resonance."

Final Fantasy Resonance is a heavily reworked version of Final Fantasy Brave Exvius, the free-to-play mobile RPG that ran from 2015 until it shut down in 2025. It's the franchise's first HD-2D entry and uses Brave Exvius's story as a foundation, though Square Enix describes it as something more than a port or a straight remake. Grande originally appeared in Brave Exvius back in 2017 — complete with a pixelated version of her Dangerous Woman bunny outfit — alongside other pop star crossovers like Katy Perry that divided the fanbase at the time. The Visions system in Resonance already includes series mainstays like Cloud, Lightning, and Cecil, so the mod is essentially extending that same framework to cover the mobile game's full roster.

Because the demo carries progress over to the full release, characters unlocked now could theoretically persist into launch. Final Fantasy Resonance hits PC, Nintendo Switch, Switch 2, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S on October 22, 2026.