Final Fantasy IX

""Back to the Roots" has never meant so much fun before"

"Back to the Roots" - that was the tagline when Square announced "Final Fantasy IX" as their final PSOne FF installment. Away from the new gameplay elements of "Final Fantasy VII" and "Final Fantasy VIII", away from the darker scenarios of these two games, and back to a more lighthearted, classic adventure of the old 16-Bit days. Some might think that such a premise for a game might be the equivalent of taking a step back in the evolution of video games and ignoring the newest gameplay mechanics, but "Final Fantasy IX" is the undeniable proof that old school gameplay in combination with a top-notch presentation can still equal an unforgettable milestone in the history of video games...

The story of "Final Fantasy IX" starts in a rather unusual fashion that might confuse gamers who have started playing RPGs with part 7 or 8. First of all, we witness the arrival of the theater airship Prima Vista in the huge city of Alexandria. On board, we meet the hero of the game, a young boy named Zidane, who is part of the theater crew. It is revealed that he and his companions are planning to abduct the beautiful princess of Alexandria, Garnet, for reasons that are yet unknown. The group is going to perform the play "I Want to be Your Canary" in front of countless of aristocrats and Queen Brane herself, while Zidane is supposed to sneak into the castle with one of his companions and to kidnap the princess from there. But before things get going for real, we witness two other individuals and their actions at this moment: Vivi, a young black mage who desperately wants to see the play and manages to sneak into the theater, as well as Adelbert Steiner, a noble knight and loyal guard of the princess. By chance, all 4 of them, Zidane, Vivi, Steiner and Garnet, meet on the Prima Vista as things do not transpire as planned, with the Prima Vista making a daring escape from Alexandria, followed by the Queen`s soldiers, and the airship is eventually shot down over a haunted forest. From then on, you will find out step by step that none of the events and characters are what they first seem to be, and cool plot twists abound. The setting is more fantasy like this time around, which you can already see within the first couple of hours in the city of Alexandria, with lots of strange creatures crossing your way, and the overall tone of the story is more humorous and lighthearted when compared to its predecessors, but I enjoyed this decision by Square greatly, even if the story is not as epic or memorable as in part 7.

It`s not the story itself that is outstanding, anyway. It`s the characters that make the game so unforgettable and charming. Each of them, be it the likable and cute Vivi, the beautiful and well-mannered Garnet or the hotheaded Zidane, all of them get the same amount of attention throughout the storyline, and to some extent, one could say that there is not one main character who is overshadowing everyone else. And it`s not just the fact that the characters receive quite some background information that makes them outstanding; it is rather their very design and their behavior that causes you to like them so much, and this connection between the player and the characters is accomplished via the so called Active Time Events. At certain points throughout the game, for example when you are exploring a city on your own, the ATE message will pop up, and it will allow you to see what the other characters are doing at the same time at different places. Most of these scenes are marvelously humorous, and it is a great stylistic device Square chose for the establishment of the cast.

Since the tagline of the game says "Back to the Roots", you can already assume what to expect from the gameplay: classic, tried-and-true Final Fantasy gameplay that mixes the best elements of the 16-Bit era and the 32-Bit era together into one outstanding deluxe package, so to speak. Since the basic gameplay within the towns and dungeons is virtually the same as always, let us go straight to the most important aspect: the battle system. "Final Fantasy IX" continues the tradition of the series by maintaining the Active Time Battle System, which means that each of your characters has a gauge during the battle scenes that determines when he or she is able to perform a command depending on whether or not the gauge has reached its max - a process which you can fasten by using magic, by the way. Once the gauge has reached the max for a certain character, you may choose an action for him or her, but you shouldn`t waste too much time with the selection of the various commands, since your enemies can attack you at any time during the battle, even when you are determining your upcoming actions. Apart from that, some of you might be delighted to hear that an important feature straight out of "Final Fantasy VII" makes a comeback in this game: the limit break meter, or as it is being called here, the Trance Meter. Whenever you get hit by an enemy, the Trance meter will fill up, and once it is full, your character will automatically go into Trance Mode for a limited amount of time, and in this state, you can perform devastating special attacks on your enemies that will normally be able to kill ordinary foes instantly. However, that is the only problem with this Trance Mode: most of the times, you will go into Trance Mode at the most unfortunate times, during a normal battle when you`d not even need any special attacks, but you don`t have any control over going into Trance.

Then we have another familiar feature, or actually two of them: the ability and magic system as well as the summon spells. All of them are back in good old shape without any drastic changes from earlier Final Fantasies. New abilities in this game can be learned by equipping weapons, armors and accessories, since each piece of equipment possesses certain abilities you can use once you actually equip them on one of your characters. However, in order to permanently use an ability even without having the required armor equipped, you need to gather a certain amount of ability points for each ability. Ability points can be gathered after each battle along with the good, old experience points, which means that levelling up your characters can be useful in two ways. Fans might recognize this system from "Final Fantasy VI", in which you were able to learn Esper spells that way. Over the course of the game, you will be able to learn countless abilities, I assure you, all of them divided into two sub categories, namely the support (i.e. magic) and active (i.e. abilities that affect your status permanently) abilities. But you cannot equip every single ability you have obtained for one of your characters at once, since equipping an ability requires a certain amount of gems, and there`s a limit to how many of them you have and can eventually use on your abilities, depending on your current level. Then we have the return of the summon spells, with several old companions like Shiva or Ifrit and some new ones appearing. The summon sequences themselves are still pretty cool to look at, but after you summon an Eidolon for the first time, you`ll mostly be able to see a shortened version every time you use the spell afterwards in order to spare you some much needed time. However, it`s not that you really want to use summon spells to such a great extent, since most of them are rather weak, and near the end of the game, your characters will acquire weapons and magic spells that are far more powerful than your summon spells, which is a nice change from "Final Fantasy VIII", where you actually had to rely on summon spells in each and every single battle due to a messed up weapon system.

A returning feature from "Final Fantasy VIII", though, is a card based mini game called Tetra Master. At one point in the game, you will even be required to take part in a Tetra Master tournament, and it is actually quite some fun to say the least. In order to take part in such a card duel, you need cards of course, and you can gain them after almost each battle in form of monster cards. It`s only a mini game, of course, but an enjoyable one nonetheless. Apart from this mini game, there are several others as well, some of which are rather short and gimmicky (like collecting frogs with Quina...), while others are a little more complex and rewarding, like Chocobo`s Hot and Cold.

Overall, the gameplay in "Final Fantasy IX" is extremely enjoyable and user friendly, avoiding to confuse you with too many complex rules like in "Final Fantasy VIII" but at the same time being challenging enough for experts as well, since this game, unlike "Final Fantasy VII", for example, is no cake walk, and beginners might find themselves being frustrated with some of the later boss battles. In the end, the gameplay is perfectly balanced, though.

In terms of the graphics, there is only one possible way to describe the visual appearance of "Final Fantasy IX": this game features the best graphics in any PlayStation game along with those found in "Chrono Cross", period, no doubts there. Just like in the sequel to "Chrono Trigger", Square pushes the PSX hardware to its absolute limits and offers an amazing visual performance that should put any other PSX developer of the early 2000s to shame. First of all, we once again have the trademark of Square Soft, namely the impressive cutscenes, and as unbelievable as this might sound at first, they actually are a step ahead of anything else we had seen before 2000, surpassing even the groundbreaking cinematics of "Final Fantasy VIII". The characters, despite their more comical appearance are incredibly detailed and match the quality of actual CG movies, and the same goes for their presentation: the editing, the pacing, the action...they`re everything CG sequences in video games are supposed to be, and instead of being more like a gimmick, they help to tell a wonderful story in this game and to highlight some really impressive and fast action scenes. The transition between the cutscenes and the in-game graphics is once again excellently done and almost seamless, even more so than in the game`s two predecessors. As for the in-game graphics themselves, they are every bit as amazing as the FMVs and nothing short of breathtaking (for a PSOne game, of course). The second visual trademark of Square games is yet again to be found in "Final Fantasy IX", and these would be the prerendered backgrounds. I know that a lot of people have problems with prerendered backgrounds, since they do not allow players to change the camera perspective manually, but if these backgrounds have been done with the same craftsmanship like those in "Final Fantasy IX", then there is hardly any reason to complain at all: not only is the art design of the backgrounds stunningly gorgeous, they also feature far more animated objects than before, making them seem less wooden and stiff and more life-like, and the characters fit into them wonderfully. The characters themselves are a huge leap forward in terms of quality, especially when you compare them to the blocky characters of "Final Fantasy VII". This time, the character feature countless visible details that make them feel "alive", and their animations are incredibly fluid for a PSOne game. But hey, it`s a Square game we are talking about. And if there is a single developer in this world who can push any game system to its limits as far as the technical aspects go, then it is Square, and "Final Fantasy IX" lives up to the company`s reputation in this regard.

While the musical scores in the previous two PSOne Final Fantasies have been either good ("Final Fantasy VIII") or totally awesome ("Final Fantasy VII"), there is no denying that the sound quality itself was slightly lacking, especially in part 7, with the midi tracks hardly doing the compositions any justice at all. In that regard, "Final Fantasy IX" marks an undeniable improvement over its predecessors, with each track sounding crystal clear and CD-worthy. But of course, not even the best audio quality alone can ensure a good rating for the music, and fortunately, the sound goes hand in hand with an awesome new soundtrack by Nobuo Uematsu. A lot of the tracks stay true to the "Back to the Roots" concept of the game, which means that we still have the classic victory fanfare or that the main battle track is now reminiscent of those in the first six parts of the series (at least the opening part of the battle track), for example, and fans of "Final Fantasy VII" might be surprised to hear the return of a particular theme from the seventh part of the saga in a rather humorous form. However, it`s not the countless nods to the soundtracks of the old games that make the musical score so outstanding. Nobuo Uematsu has indeed managed to come up with the most exciting, exhilarating and even moving themes of the entire PSOne Final Fantasy era, at least in my humble opinion. One important reason for this aspect of the game to succeed certainly is the fact that the score fits the more lighthearted atmosphere of the entire game wonderfully and that again, each track fittingly accompanies each situation or area, even the darker scenes near the end of the game. I can`t even say what my favorite piece of music in the game was in the end, because I enjoyed listening to every single one of them, but I think that one can easily point out the last two boss battle themes as outstanding examples of this beautiful musical score. Like in most of the other "modern" Final Fantasies, part 9 also features a theme song by a famous Japanese artist. This time around, it is a beautiful love song named "Melodies of Life" by Emiko Shiratori, and you will encounter several instrumental variations of this theme throughout the entire game, and once again, it`s really beautiful to listen to. In the end, the music is worthy of the Final Fantasy name and of AAA quality - absolutely no complaints here.

If there is one thing "Final Fantasy IX" is perfect proof of, then it is that Square definitely knows how to make an exit on any console. "Final Fantasy VI" on the Super Nintendo, "Final Fantasy IX" on the PlayStation or most recently "Final Fantasy XII" on the PlayStation 2 have all been worthy swansongs for the series on the system they were released on, and all of them amazed players by introducing innovative features (FFXII) or by combining the best elements of their direct predecessors - like "Final Fantasy IX". The gameplay might not be groundbreaking and classic fare instead, but if the gameplay is as close to being perfect as here, and if the story is being presented with such an incredibly beautiful technical execution, then there really is little reason to complain. "Final Fantasy IX" might not be the best game in the series, yet it still is one of the best RPGs of all time and one of the best titles for the old PlayStation, and it remains a game no avid video gamer, RPG fan or not, should miss. Another masterpiece by Square from their glorious PSOne era.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 04/13/07