Final Fantasy IX
PlayStation
The first Final Fantasy game I ever played was Final Fantasy VII for the PlayStation one. The game completely blew me away. I've played it more times than I can count, and even after all these years it may still rank as my favorite video game of all time. I found VIII to be quite disappointing, however. As a result, I only ended up renting IX when it came out as opposed to actually buying it. I didn't want to waste another 50 or 60 bucks on a game if it was only going to pale in comparison to the Final Fantasy that I knew and loved.
I played the crap out of the game over the weekend that I had rented it. Yet still, I didn't even make it through the first disc. I didn't love the game, however. It was a little too child like for me. I told myself that I would either just keep renting it until I beat it, or I would buy it some day once it had gone down in price.
Years passed, and I never bothered to pick up the game again. It wasn't until the Blockbuster in my old neighborhood went out of business and this game went on sale for mega cheap that I picked it up again. I was drunk and high a lot during this portion of my life. I know I started over from the beginning and beat the game. I KNOW I did. But for whatever reason, I can literally remember nothing about that play through.
This was around 2005 or 2006. It wasn't until this year when I started doing this blog that I got it in my mind that I had yet to review an RPG for the blog. What better place to start than Final Fantasy IX, a game I could barely remember anything about?
I was familiar with the beginning of the game. I knew all about the play, the kidnapping of Garnet, the drama in the forest where the ship goes down. I remember the game pretty clearly up until the part where you make it to the village where Black Mages are being made. After that, it was like playing the game for the first time ever.
Admittedly, I started playing this game at a pretty poor time. I knew that RPGs were long and required dedication to see them through to the end. Yet I started playing this right before my July vacation. And then I got back and got hooked on Breaking Bad on Netflix. I got caught up in a string of birthdays, parties, and family events that took away my free time and kept me out of the house through almost the entire month of August. during this time I also reconnected with an old friend from grade school that I like to hang out with on the weekends. Then I hosted an ORG (online reality game) in September. Then football season started... The point is, I started playing this at a pretty busy point in my life.
I would play for a few hours one day, and then not pick the game up again for two weeks. Then I'd play it for a few days and it would be another month before I picked it up again. I just really couldn't get into the story line at all. I'd forget where I was supposed to go, what I was supposed to be doing - and then have to use an online guide to get back into the swing of things again. It just isn't the same when you are having to look up and down from the computer to the game, and back again. This is a title that requires a certain amount of immersion to truly enjoy, and I never really felt that level of immersion.
This is solely my fault, not the game's. But its rating is going to suffer because of this. Just so you know and are aware of this and don't track me down to kill me after reading this. I know this game has a loyal following and I don't mean to disrespect anyone for liking it so much.
Final Fantasy IX feels lot different from Final Fantasies VII and VIII. Both of those games were very dark, and had kind of a cyber punk feel to them. This game definitely puts the "fantasy" back in Final Fantasy. Expect a large, grandiose world full of mystic and magic. This world is teaming with many different kinds of life. Humans, people with tails, talking animals, elf-like creatures, and many other fantasy style characters abound everywhere you turn.
Technology is limited. Magic rules the world. The game definitely has a much more comic feel to it than previous FF games. Expect a lot of goofy characters, oddball conversations, and humorous situations going on here. If you come into this expecting something dark and serious, as in the previous two titles, you are going to be completely shocked. Tonally, this game is much different from anything in the series.
The game itself is very linear. True, all Final Fantasy games follow an intricate story line and are linear to an extent. But in FF VII and VIII, you could at least go around and explore things on your own time. Sure these games were probably just as linear as this one, but they didn't FEEL linear. This game feels linear all the way. You are guided from point A to point B to point C, etc - with little to no room for exploration.
It isn't until nearly the end of the game that you get an airship and are able to explore the landscape of the game. But by this time, you have already explored everything there is to explore. And there isn't much point in going back and checking things out yet again.
Also, for the first three discs of the game, the story falls flat for me. You just basically follow the same group of characters around from one destination to the other. You react and adapt to the situations the game puts in front of you, but you never really get the feeling that you are driving the story line whatsoever. And - you really don't have any idea what the story line even is. There is a lot of stuff going on; all happening at the same time. You get the idea that some kind of dark master plot is going on behind the scenes. But what this plot is, you don't find out until the very end of the game. So the majority of the game is basically scrambling from one destination to the next, reacting to bad things happening around you. Every once in a while you will go on a random fetch quest for some character or another.
Again, maybe I get this feeling because I played this game in such a disjointed manner. Three hours one day, and then I wouldn't pick up the controller again for another three weeks. This is very possible. Even so, I didn't enjoy the story much. Once you get to the end of the game and things start to come together, this situation drastically improves though. But not much. This is probably the weakest story line of any Final Fantasy game I have played. It didn't make a whole lot of sense, and I just didn't really care what was going to happen.
One thing I will give the game credit for is its gameplay. I like the things the game does. I have always been a fan of turn based combat in RPGs, and this game does it better than almost anybody. For sure, this was much more enjoyable than FF VIII and its horrendous draw system. The game is not too difficult either. There is one point early in the game where the enemies seem to be a little overpowered for the level of characters you have, but once you get through that, it is smooth sailing.
I do have to gripe that the level of random encounters in this game is a bit much. I got extremely frustrated trying to navigate some dungeons in the game because I would get attacked every 4 steps I took. Some of these dungeons are big and have a lot of puzzles. They require a lot of exploring. And so it was just irritating to me that I was constantly getting attacked so many times.
Another thing that this game does right is its big, complex world. It took me a little adjusting to get used to the tone of the game, but once I got past its silliness I was really able to appreciate just how amazing the world in this game is. As I stated earlier, this title puts the fantasy back in Final Fantasy. And I think that was a much needed thing for the series. The graphics aren't particularly mind blowing, but all the characters are pretty nicely detailed. The enviroments are well drawn and immersive. The musical score is not as memorable as, say, Final Fantasy VII - but it still holds its own. I had no complaints in that area. And the cutscenes are great. Definitely the best in the series up to this point.
The cast of characters is very strong as well. None of your party members are ignored, and you finish the game really feeling like you know each and every character in the game. This game also forces your party to separate at multiple points on your journey, so there really aren't any characters that you can avoid playing as. In previous Final Fantasy games, there have been characters that I never used, such as Cait Sith, Vincent, and Irvine. In this game, everyone has their moment to shine. I like balance in my party, so once the game got to a point where my party was whole again, I mainly rolled with Zidane, Steiner, Vivi, and Garnet. My two biggest neglected characters were probably Freya and Amarant.
I think if I had played this game in a more condensed time frame, I would have enjoyed it more than I did. Instead, it took me about 5 or 6 months to get through this. Which is about 4 months too many. At nearly all times I felt kind of disconnected from the game and its story line. I really wanted to dive into this game head first and let it completely immerse me, but for multiple reasons, it didn't. It is not necessarily the game's fault, but at the same time it is. If it had been better, I would have wanted to beat it quicker. Instead, I had no problems setting the controller aside for weeks at a time in between playing sessions.
Maybe some day, I will pick the game up again and give it a more fair shot. I am the first to admit that the game does a lot of things right. The combat, the characters, the colorful world, the epic musical score, the great cutscenes, the large areas to explore. A lot of hard work was put into this game, and it shows. But the weak story line, goofy tone, nonstop random encounters, and the linearity of the whole thing are stong points against it. It just wasn't as fun as it should have been. And in the end, fun is all that really matters. And if you are not going to be that fun, at LEAST deliver a great story line.
Did I hate the game? No. Did I have a blast playing it? No. I was just kind of neutral on it. So a neutral grade is exactly what it is going to get. Don't hate me, FFIX fanatics. I am really not a terrible person.
Overall:
C
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