I see him as a crybaby as a child, buyt you have to remember that he didn't exactly have the loving fatherly influence that he had hoped for.
In the gameplay though, he gives up everything he has when he is sucked into a foreign world apart from everyone he knew, and forced to help save a world from evil corruptness and destruction. Sure he may have an annoying laugh and voice when he gets excited, but at least he's passionate about what he's gonig after. Even when he knows in the end he will lose it all once again.
Tidus is my hero.
Whenever I'm sad and lonely, I whistle. Hero. No diggity.