Short answers, pulled from the story.
Final Fantasy XIII-2 follows Serah Farron and Noel Kreiss as they navigate a fractured timeline to find Lightning, who was erased from history and pulled into Valhalla. The story involves time travel, paradoxes, and the struggle to prevent the collapse of reality while searching for Lightning, who exists only as a ghost story to everyone except Serah.
Final Fantasy XIII-2 was officially announced in January 2011 and released on the 15th of December 2011. The game was added to Xbox One backward compatibility in November 2018 and received support for FPS Boost on Xbox Series X/S in November 2021.
Final Fantasy XIII-2 was developed by Square Enix's 1st Production Department with Motomu Toriyama as director and Yoshinori Kitase as producer. The team included character designer Tetsuya Nomura, art director Isamu Kamikokuryo, and Japanese studio tri-Ace, which assisted with game design, art, and programming.
Combat in Final Fantasy XIII-2 uses the Chain Gauge and the Paradigm system to allow players to queue actions and customize character roles. The Chain Gauge increases when enemies are struck, multiplying damage and eventually staggering enemies, while the Paradigm system lets players program six roles including Commando, Ravager, Medic, Saboteur, Synergist, and Sentinel.
The Historia Crux serves as a hub connecting multiple regions and time periods, allowing players to explore locations like Oerba in 200 AF and 400 AF or Sunleth Waterscape in 300 AF. This non-linear structure enables players to revisit regions, uncover the truth about the timeline, and experience how locations change over time.
Final Fantasy XIII-2 sold 524,000 copies in its first week in Japan and reached 3.1 million copies worldwide by January 2013. The PlayStation 3 version was the highest-selling game for the system in Japan, and the game was the fifth-best selling game of 2011 in Japan.