Final Fantasy IX Review

After the massive commercial successes of Final Fantasy VII and VIII, Square Enix wanted to return to the roots of the franchise and delve heavily into some of the nostalgia of the series. What they came up with was a game that for the true fan of the series was ripe with references to the series both implied and outright. What they also came up with was a game that took itself far less seriously than its previous two installments and returned to a more simplified mechanic system. Let's get into this game to see how it has held up over the past 14 years since its release.

The story of Final Fantasy IX is as such. A theater group made up of a bunch of thieves called Tantalus is hired to kidnap the Princess of Alexandria named Garnet. Ironically, Garnet wishes to run away as well. They flee to the neighboring kingdom of Lindblum. However, Garnet's mother Brahne, wishes Garnet back, moreso for the amulet she bears than her well-being though. Brahne has begun construction on weapons of war... Black Mages to be precise, her goal is to capture certain artifacts through which she can summon Eidolons, magical creatures of great power. She is able to kidnap Garnet and through a ritual removes all of her latent Eidolons from her. None of the neighboring kingdoms can stand up to the might of the Black Mages or the Eidolons, and soon the kingdom of Burmecia is destroyed. Brahne is being manipulated by Kuja, a mysterious man of unknown origins.  Eventually, after gaining power over all nations, Brahne sets her sights on Kuja himself. However, Kuja pulls out a trump card, he calls a ship with the power to control Eidolons. He turns the most powerful Eidolon of all against Brahne and she is killed.

Kuja soon turns his wrath on Alexandria itself, intent on destroying Zidane, one of the Tantalus members and his friends, who have been defying Kuja. Garnet, who has regained her ability to summon Eidolons, as well as Eiko, the last of a tribe of summoners from the north, combine their abilities to change Alexandria into the Holy Eidolon Alexander. Kuja attempts to take control of it, but for some reason the ship decides to destroy the castle instead. Kuja reveals that the ship is being controlled by a man named Garland. Garland is the overseer of a civilization called Terra. Long ago, Terra was a massive civilization that overgrew its planet. It has since wandered the universe combining itself with other planets to continue its lifespan. Gaia, the planet we are currently on is the latest focal point for Garland.

Zidane and his friends are able to infiltrate Terra and Zidane discovers he and Kuja are something called Genomes, empty husks created to house the souls of Terra. Zidane and Kuja, however, were given a special purpose to basically destroy life on Gaia so that the souls of Terra could flow onto it unimpeded.  Zidane fights Garland, meanwhile Kuja steals Garland's ship and the soul of Queen Brahne, and uses it to gain near unlimited power. Garland tells Kuja he is mortal and so Kuja decides to destroy everything. He uses the Iifa tree, the implement allowing the souls of Terra to infilitrate Gaia to access the Crystal. The Crystal is basically the singularity from which everything was created and also serves as a repository for all memories in the universe. Zidane is able to defeat Kuja and Kuja is unable to destroy the crystal. His death, however, awakens an anti-crystal who's purpose is to end all existence as well... so Zidane destroys that too. Kuja, clinging to life, rescues the party from non-existence and Zidane then attempts to rescue Kuja.

Okay, so you may have noticed, I told the story of this game from the villain's point of view. Basically, that is how I see this game. The heroes are basically going from place to place attempting to stop whatever is going on, but are always unable to do so, and really never do anything to move the plot forward. They're always reacting to something. That is not to say that our protagonists are not engaging characters, they just happen to have very little to do with the plot itself. So, I've decided to go through the plot a second time this time from the protagonist's point of view.

Zidane kidnaps Garnet and heads to Lindblum. He is joined by Steiner, Garnet's bodyguard and Vivi, a prototype of the black mages Kuja is creating. Upon learning of the other Black Mages, Vivi goes searching for his identity and his purpose in life basically. Upon reaching Lindblum, we find out that Garnet's kidnapping was setup by Cid, the king of Lindblum. Also in Lindblum is Freya, a knight of Burmecia and an acquaintance of Zidane's. The group also meets with Quina, a member of a race called Qus who's purpose is to travel the world and learn about the food and cuisine therein. When the group gets to Burmecia they meet Brahne's general Beatrix, the best swordswoman in the world. The group then heads to Treno where they meet Doctor Tot, Garnet's old tutor who explains to everyone about Eidolons. They then learn that the Burmecian survivors are being attacked in Cleyra, an ancient tree surrounded by a sandstorm.

After Brahne is defeated the group heads to the Outer Continent where they come across a village of Black Mages. Here, Vivi tries to learn a little more about himself. They then meet up with a pair of assassins hired by Brahne to retrieve her pendant, one of whom is Amarant, who's decided that Zidane is his rival... and that's about it. They also meet Eiko, whom I said earlier is the last of her tribe... or is she? It turns out that Garnet also originally was from the village and fled when Garland destroyed it when she was a child. Eiko allows the group into the Iifa tree, where Brahne is eventually defeated by Kuja.

Brahne's death hits Garnet hard, and she loses the ability to speak. Kuja captures the group and has Zidane retrieve a stone from the Oeilvert, a library of sorts from the Terra culture. Kuja then tries to remove the Eidolons from Eiko, but she's too young. The group then rescues Cid's wife Hilda from Kuja who tells them about a castle she heard Kuja talking about. The group heads to Ipsen's castle and learns the location of four shrines which must be conquered simultaneously to open the way to Terra. The group goes to Terra and meets the rest of the Genomes. Zidane becomes confused upon learning the reason of his creation and tries to defeat Garland himself. The rest of the group snaps him out of it. When Kuja destroys Terra, the group steals Garland's ship the Invinible and brings the Genomes back to the Black Mage Village since their creations are very similar. They then infiltrate Memoria, a castle created from the memories of the crystal serving as a pathway to it. They are able to stop Kuja and save the world yay.

Personally, I feel the story from the protagonist's point of view is not as exciting. Their story is all one of self-identity. Zidane is searching for himself after meeting the Genomes. Garnet wishes for something beyond the life of a princess. Quina wants to learn more of the world besides the frogs in his marsh. Vivi wants to know his purpose as something created possibly with a limited life span. Amarant sees no meaning in life after losing to Zidane. Steiner must find a greater purpose after learning of the betrayal of his queen. Freya is searching for something after the disappearance of her lover. Eiko, wants to know if it is okay to disobey the wishes of her grandparents who told her to protect the village until she became a teenager.

After this in-depth commentary on the dual nature of the story in this game, I also want to bring it back to the nostalgia factor of the game. The plot of this game actually mirrors that of Final Fantasy IV quite a bit. We have a kingdom being recently taken over by the "brother" of the main protagonist and ultimately being controlled by a higher force from another planet. While in Final Fantasy IV this was outright in Zemus, here it is a bit more subtle with Garland.

The one real problem I have with the plot of this game, is really the end boss. You defeat Kuja and all should be right, right? Well, no. For no good reason, you're thrown into this limbo and fight Necron... the game gives you no explanation of what Necron is other than something else that wants creation destroyed. It is never mentioned before the absolute very end of the game. My best guess is that Necron is actually the "dark crystal" of the world. Pretty much any world in the Final Fantasy series with crystals has had some sort of dark crystals. If the Crystal in this game symbolizes the collection of all memories ever and the beginning of life and existence... its antithesis would be something that would want no memories and the destruction of life and existence. Plus, when you fight it, it really bears the shape of the crystal alot... except with abs...

Let's get into the mechanics of the game. For the first time since Final Fantasy IV, each character has his own set class and abilities without the ability to change it. Characters learn their abilities through equipping items and then gaining AP after defeating enemies. There are two types of abilities in the game, active and support. Active abilities are abilites used in battle such as spells, or stealing, etc. Passive abilities are abilities such as becoming immune to poison or entering into battle with the haste command. Each passive ability you learn has a point value and you have a pool of points with which you can equip some passive abilities that increases as you level up. I tend to group the Passive abilities into two groups. Power ups which will increase the abilities of your character in some way, and Cheat abilities. There are some abilities, such as immunity to different status effects, which you really wouldn't equip unless you knew something else was coming up. I believe their existence is simply for people who are having trouble getting past a certain boss or enemy, and after losing to it, can come back in to nullify an enemy's ability. Also for min/maxers and speedrunners, but I figured that went without saying.

The cool thing is, that despite being a very simplistic system, the game is very well balanced. Seriously, almost every active ability in the game is useful in some way, either on a particular boss, or just at a certain time, or as an evergreen use all the time skill. Magic fulfills its usual roles... Vivi gaining what you'd expect from a black mage, and Eiko and Dagger gaining what you'd expect from a White Mage. Summoning takes on more of a role in this game in a balanced sense. Dagger uses her summons as attack spells while Eiko gets more utility from her summons. Quina acts as the Blue Mage and acts as a jack of all trades. Early on in the game Quina is a great physical fighter. As it gets more spells, learned by eating certain monsters at low health, it can serve as a buffer, healer, or damager as well. Amarant and Freya are both kind of Hybrids. On the surface they are good physical fighters, their abilities have good utility. Amarant really becomes the best healer on your team once you get Auto-Regen. Freya serves as a dragoon early and gains the ability to heal with regen as well as a few spell like abilities which can be quite massive. Steiner serves as the main debuffer of the game and is almost a pure physical damage dealer.

Stealing serves as a main mechanic of the game. This is the first game in the series I can think of where enemies can be stolen from multiple times in an encounter. This serves two purposes. Almost every boss in the game will have mulitple pieces of equipment stolen from it much earlier than you can attain them otherwise. Also, stealing powers up one of Zidane's abilities which does a set amount of damage to an enemy regardless of defense. This can be frustrating, however, as some steal rates on bosses is incredibly low.

Another simple mechanic that has far greater importance in this game than most are stores. I know, sounds kind of silly, but whereas in alot of the previous games, you obtained most of your equipment through dungeons and kind of filled in the gaps in the store. Here, pretty much every town you encounter will have large amounts of upgrades in gear you can purchase. Also, this game provides the series its first real attempt at a crafting process. Synthesis shops are special shops with which you pay for an item both with gold and with two pieces of specific equipment.

Something that this game backs off of a little bit is importance of pure stats. Where as in the past few games, what you equip can have a vast difference in your Strength or Magic, etc. In this game, you really only get small boosts. This is mostly to promote equipment switching and the continual learning of abilities from your equipment. The game does a very good job of pacing these abilities, so as long as you're fighting random battles, you should really always be able to keep your best equipment on, and maybe just change around an accessory or something without too much of a loss in your stats.

Another interesting mechanic turns up in late game. Assuredly by the end of the game you'll start to learn Auto-regen. This becomes your primary healing at the end of the game. The game ticks very fast, especially when you have haste and so you regain life very quickly. What is interesting about this, is suddenly, it means abilities with long animations suddenly become some of your best healing spells as regen will continue to tick through an ability's animation.

Let's move on to the sidequests of the game. The first sidequest in the game I will talka bout is Tetra Master. After the popularity of Triple Triad in Final Fantasy VIII, Square tried to create kind of the next version of this. Tetra Master... is not as good as Triple Triad. Cards have stats as well as arrows. If you place a card next to another card and the card has an arrow pointing to that card, you get that card. If that card has an arrow pointing back, the cards battle. The stats of the card are basically offense and defense... but the silly thing is there is a randomness on top of it all. The cards battle and sometimes you'll win and sometimes you'll lose. It makes strategy far less of a factor than in Triple Triad. Thankfully, as opposed to Triple Triad, Tetra Master is completely optional. Yes, you have to play it once, but you really don't even have to win. The only reason to play is to collect all the cards. There is a rating system based on your collection, but you don't get any rewards from it.

The next... and certainly more important sidequest of the game is Chocobo raising. Fairly early in the game you get access to Choco. Choco can then enter the chocobo forest and play a game of hot and cold to dig up items. The most important items you can dig up are what are called Chocographs. These are photographs of somewhere in the world, and if you find it you can dig up items... including some of the best items in the game! Choco has a beak level, and basically, the more things you dig up, the easier it becomes to dig stuff up. Also, digging stuff up gives you points with which you can buy a few interesting items with. As you dig up some of the Chocograph items, your chocobo will also transform and gain the ability to travel through different environments... shallow waters, mountains, oceans, and eventually the ability to fly. This sidequest is also mandatory for accessing the superboss of the game.

Another interesting sidequest involves Quina. Around the world exist four different marshes, each containing a pond. The ponds contain frogs which you can catch. Catching frogs powers up one of Quina's Blue Magic spells as well as getting you more respect from another of it's tribe named Quale. Quale will give you more items the more frogs you catch. Catching 99 frogs gives you the ability to fight Quale and get Quina's best weapon.

The superboss of the game is named Ozma... For a game based on nostalgia, strangely, we have a superboss with no nostalgia value whatsoever. He is merely described as an otherworldly being but not a spirit or ghost. It's a freaking orb. That said, it is very very powerful. Its power comes from its crazy speed. It also has access to *almost* all of the best spells in the game. It requires a massive amount of preparation to nullify as many of its attacks as possible... and even then it can cast Meteor and just deal 9999 damage to everything sometimes. It also can heal itself very quickly, and thus requires a steady stream of damage to kill it. It is a pretty epic fight... but it is an orb... and is easily the silliest super boss this series has ever seen. The accomplishment level you feel by taking it out is still pretty good though.

One thing I want to note here, is this is one game where the end boss may actually be as hard as the superboss. This is really due to one thing. Necron has an attack called Grand Cross. Grand Cross can apply any possible status to your characters... This includes some statuses which you cannot nullify including Zombie (which will kill you due to Auto-regen), and just flat out killing you by applying Death. You could be way overlevelled and due to just flat out bad luck die to a Grand Cross. It is incredibly frustrating.

Finally, let's move onto graphics and sound. I want to begin by talking about the graphical nostalgia of the game. The game gives costumes to many of the characters that refer all the way back to Final Fantasy I. Freya has the garb of a red mage, Dagger wears a White Mage cloak when you first meet her. There are 8 million black mages. Eiko's character sprite actually refers to the first appearance of a summoner, which if you remember was Final Fantasy III. Also appearing near the end of the game are Lich, Marilith, Kraken, and Tiamat who of course were the guardians of the elemental shrines in Final Fantasy I and bear what are basically updated versions of their graphics from the earlier game.

Final Fantasy IX has finally mastered the technique they've been using ever since VII. At many points the game will combine the character models on top of an FMV and does it very seamlessly here to great effect. It helps that the characters share the same quality as they did in VIII, except with far less of an emphasis on realism. The game also contains more cutscenes than ever before and they are all beautiful. Not really much to say, it is the typical Square brilliance with FMVs.

The music of the game is really wonderful. It has a far different feel than the previous couple games. Where as Final Fantasy VII and VIII's themes were very militaristic for the most part. This uses a far more symphonic and playful palette, with heavy use of woodwinds and varied use of a lot of different string sounds including harp, mandolin. Where as many of the previous games drew from Japanese culture, this one draws from a more European culture, including Spanish, English and Gaelic. This is seen in its castle arcitecture as well as instrument selection. There are many standout tracks on the soundtrack. Some of my favorites are Valla Allo Flamenco, Battle 1, Rose of May, Tantalus' Theme, and Garland's Theme.

In conclusion, this is one of my favorite games in the series. It is a game in the same vein as Final Fantasy IV with the updated polish and sheen the team had gained from doing its previous games on the Final Fantasies. It did well to incorporate alot of nostalgic items and themes into the game. The irony, however, is with all the commercial success had by VII and VIII, this nostalgic throwback was not completely understood and enjoyed by some of the people who hadn't played anything prior to the first PlayStation releases. Any true fan of the series, however, will enjoy this game. It is a game, heavy on plot and character development, without being bogged down by an overly complicated mechanics system. The sidequests are all very enjoyable, except maybe the superboss doesn't live up to the same level as some of the others. That being said, this game holds up extremely well, and to a fan of the series or even JRPGs in general is still amazingly fun to play today.