Shampoo-Girl's Full Review: Final Fantasy IX for PlayStation 1
When FF9 hit the stores last October, I remembered seeing at least 2 dozen people, mostly gamer-types in their early 20s forming a queue at the mall, anxious to get their hands on the game they had heard & read so much about. In a move to help regain FF's popularity after a disastrous outing with FF8, Square had decided to cut prices by $10, reducing the originally planned $49.95 to a more affordable $39.95. RPG fans who were unable to make it to the mall, fearing a complete sell-out were locked in a bidding war that sent prices sky-rocketing to as high as $60 on ebay & Yahoo. Clearly, no other Squaresoft release has ever had such an impact on gamers since the long awaited Chrono Cross hit the stores a year before. Merchants lucky enough to get hold of a few copies were raking in huge profits on internet auctions, taking advantage of the initially huge demand for FF9.
Putting aside the awesome graphics & storyline, Square's annoucement that this would be their final release on the ageing PSX worked gamers into a frenzy since this would now make the game a 'classic collectible' or a piece of PSX history, so to speak. Old school RPG fans were delighted at Square's decision to scrap the previously 'off-theme' futuristic setting, bringing back classic elements synonymous with the FF series. The lovable moogles, last seen in FF6 make a triumphant return, functioning as save points & item shops to relieve the weary player after hard worn battles. Several of these moogles were strategically placed in mid dungeons or before tough boss fights to prevent frustration on the gamer's part should s/he be defeated on his/her first attempt. Other improvements can be found in areas such as graphics, battle engine, storyline which will be discussed further in the sections below.
Plot
The storyline in FF9 ranks among the best in the long line of RPGs gracing the PSX. Chief planner, Hironobu Sakaguchi & his Square team had done their homework in coming up with a plot that's able to knock out both the previous FFs with a single blow. The game starts off with the planned kidnapping of Princess Garnet by the infamous Tantalus group, a band of thieves working under orders of the neighboring kingdom of Lindblum.
Regent Cid, ruler of Lindblum and a distant relative of Garnet's had planned the whole kidnapping to get Garnet out of the country after hearing that her mother, Queen Brahne ( a.k.a The Elephant Lady ), had gone wacko with her plans on an all out invasion. Apparently, she had been brainwashed by a mysterious pretty boy named Kuja who dresses like a girl, wearing tight mid-riff baring outfits. He's also built like one, possessing a figure that would make even someone like Angelina Jolie green with envy. After succesfully smuggling the princess out of the country, Zidane ( the chief character ) & his party stumble upon Queen Brahne's sinister plan to wreak havoc on the entire continent with her army of black mages.
Zidane takes it upon himself to rid the land of this evil menace but later discovers that Kuja was the head-honcho behind the entire operation. The true adventure begins with Zidane & party rushing from one city to another, gathering clues that would help put a stop to the evil Kuja. Garnet's initial resentment towards the Zidane's brashness turns into admiration & respect as he shows his true self by performing a number of heroic deeds & random acts of kindness. At this point, we begin seeing some chemistry developing between Zidane & the princess, leading up to an unforgettable fairy-tale-like ending. No further details of the ending will be discussed here so as not to spoil the reader's fun.
Gameplay
Solving puzzles & battling in dungeons take up about 80% of the time you spend on the game with the remaining 20% made up of town sequences & FMVs. While on the subject of dungeons, one may notice that some of them can be annoyingly long with an endless supply of monsters to fight before reaching an end. Taking in account the tough puzzles found in certain areas, the frustration level may be taken up a few notches depending on how you look at it. Impatient gamers looking toward a speedy exit will end up being overcome by frustration with such sequences.
On the other hand, if you are looking towards improving your levels & learning new skills, the dungeons are an excellent place to get all the practice you need. Of course if you are unfortunate enough to get stuck along the way, there's always help from gamefaqs.com.
In town sequences, you'll spend most of your time talking to people & gathering information needed to solve certain puzzles. The towns are also a good place to stock up on supplies & purchase new weapons. Like all other FF installments, Square has added a number of side-quests & mini-games to keep the boredom level at a minimum. I found the card game to be the most enjoyable among them as it is sort of resembles collecting Pokemon. You could go up to anyone on the street & challenge them to a game of cards. Winning the game will give you a chance to pick a card you'd like to take from him/her. Losing, of course would result in one or several of your precious cards being taken from you.
The controls are pretty much standard like all the other FF games with the X button being the chief victim to the gamer's thumb. The airship controls are a little confusing compared to the ones you get while on the ground. Although it only takes a couple of minutes to get used to, I still found myself pressing on the wrong buttons every now and then while controlling the airship.
Graphics
Graphics are the meat & potatoes behind the success of every FF game on the PSX. This is examplified with the awful FF8 that would have been the biggest flop of all time if it weren't for its face saving graphics. Compared to FF8, I felt the graphics in FF9 are a huge improvement over the more static ones found in its poorly acclaimed predecessor. The backgrounds were made to look more realistic with characters & objects coming to life, interacting with one another. The incredible detail makes everything look so real after being brought to life by Square's excellent animation work. This is truly about as real as it gets.
Music
Enlisting the services of resident maestro Nabuo Uematsu, Square had taken every step towards ensuring that the near perfection that came with gameplay extended also to its music. The beautifully done World Map Theme which vocalized version would later serve as the ending piece is a perfect display of Uematsu's vast talents in the music department. The music also plays an important role in altering the player's feelings during the game. It adds greatly to the emotional drama & contributes to the invisible bond that forms between player & game.
Battle Engine
The battle engine follows that of the ATB system in which your character's attack gauge fills up in a given length of time before you are able to proceed with a move. Characters take turns at whacking the enemy based on how quickly their attack gauge fills up. Equipping a character with the 'haste' ability will quicken the process, enabling the character to hit more frequently. HP & MP are increased significantly each time a character levels up. The number of ability crystals allocated to him/her also increases. These crystals enable the character to utilize support abilities which prove invaluable during tough battles.
Given the limited number of crystal ability points, you may want to distribute your abilities strategically in accordance to the types of bosses & enemies lying ahead. The magic sequences are as awesome as ever & the great thing about them is that you do not have to sit through the entire summoning process as Square has made a wise choice in greatly reducing the time taken to summon after receiving a barrage of complaints with FF8.
The same old GFs you saw in FF8 are back again, only this time they're called eidolons and are made less powerful to encourage the use of more physical attacks. My only gripe with the battle system is that it takes too far long for the trance gauge to fill up. In the 50 hours or so it took me to beat the game, I remembered Zidane going into trance mode only about 15 times despite fighting hundreds of battles & taking a huge amount of damage. FF9's trance mode is somewhat similar to FF7's limit breaks, the only difference being the amount of damage your character must receive before the bar fills up. Overall, I found FF9's battle engine to be satisfactory, falling slightly short of FF7's materia based system.
Conclusion
Alright, this is one of the best RPGs ever to grace Sony's 32-bit platform. You have to give Square credit for that, but still it does have its share of weaknesses, firstly with the snail-paced trance gauge flawing its combat system & more importantly, some of the bosses were made too easy with the Auto Regen & Auto Potion support abilities. These powerful abilities are always a good thing during battle, however I was expecting Square to up the challenge accordingly by giving the bosses more HP. Overall Rating: 4 stars ( out of a possible 5 )
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