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A return to some of the gameplay from past times, the ninth Final Fantasy is a solid game which manages to be a return of sorts to the style of earlier Final Fantasies and at the same time another step forward in the direction of a cinematic gaming experience. In comparison to the previous game, FFIX offers a bigger and more detailed world to explore, even more FMV, and pushes the PSX hardware to its physical limit - yet it also pays its toll for all the detail, since battles take much more than in FFVIII to load all that extra detail in the backgrounds, monsters and characters. This is, by the way, one of the games that looks best with the new PS2 features, and it's extraordinary how little you can see that the textures are just filtered and not created with post-Psone hardware.
There are two major reasons for me not liking this game as much as the other Final Fantasy games I've played. First of all, the development of abilities is more or less on rails and not very flexible, and thus the game offers no chances to mend a mistake made during a party change. But, this is only a minor issue, as in this game most party swaps are predetermined and take into account what the programmers thought your abilities would be. All in all, you can't but be led by the game on rails, whereas in FFVIII you were the one deciding, not only on the strenghts and weaknesses of the party, but indirectly also on the monster level, encounter rate, and magic available. The second weakness is that there seems to be something lacking to the story and the character design, though it's not enough to ruin the game or anything - it's just that Zidane is neither Cloud nor Squall, and so most of his companions. The FFVI, FFVIII and even FFIV crews were in my opinion much better, even if characters like Vivi, Steiner and Garnet herself keep the show up. Still, compared to past general standards, they're very well defined, have a personality and speak realistically, something that they must be given credit for. Still, much of what has been released after FFIX is at about that standard, and latter games probably crush that as well - take the main characters in FFX as an example. If you though that the PSX had been pretty much exhausted with FFVIII, Chrono Cross proved you wrong and FF9 confirms that Square's employees really do know how to make those crazy pre-rendered backgrounds. Though taking place mostly in empty environments, as in FFVIII, the lag only a bit behind Chrono Cross most of the time, but take ages to load, something that only the increased character number and polygon count can be blamed for. Still, one comes to think that maybe Square overdid things there. On the other hand, the prerendered field graphics really kick ass, and you'll find yourself gazing in wonder most of the times, be it for the Chocobo shed in a certain village up north, or for some gigantic setting you walk through. Alexandria is a phantastically detailed and lively town, and the same applies to all other locations, from Treno to two "not of this world" places. Character design is a bit weird, but the in-game execution is excellent, so it's really just a matter of taste. FMV quality is improved even compared to FFVIII, as are the menu and field map load times, making one wonder even further if it was necessary to have such long battle load times in a game that relies on battles that much. Probably, the only thing making FFIX look oldschool is the huge number of battles you have to fight, unlike the reduced encounter rate in FFVIII or the ability to run away or around in Chrono Cross. To make up for the long load times and ridiculously low enemy number (sometimes just one), battles, relying once again on the Active Time system, are both slower and against harder enemies than we're used to, a deadly combination. There seems to be a pretty long lag between the command and the execution, so that often the course of the battle has dramatically changed in between, maybe making the magic you're about to cast useless. I guess it was this way to make it more engaging and strategical (since the battles in FFVIII were considered too easy with the proper junction), but it only managed to frustrate me, as most of these enemies can be beaten by repeated application of the same commands, so that the only thing really thrilling is the acquisition of items through Zidane's steal command, almost mandatory as the bosses hold much of the game's finest items (the other being acquirable by the means of the Chocobo based minigame and through merging different weapons at the synthesist's shop. Looking at the way battles work in FFVIII and FFIX you really can see how the battle system in FFX came to be, and why that one is by miles superior to both of its predecessors. Apart from the annoying battle frequency not mended by cartridge load times and fast execution, one has to wonder why exactly this game has to be considered oldschool, since the amount of cutscenes and talk has increased, and the game is even more linear than the ones before it. The next step is questioning if FF has ever been oldschool at all, but that's not a territory to venture in here. To cut a long story short, FFIX is filled to the brim with quotes and jokes about the FF legacy, many of which require a knowledge of FFI to FFIII (Japanese), and most of which are better discovered on your own, so I won't bother you with it (although there are not many people who have still to play FFIX). Sadly, not even the music effectively manages to feel oldscholl, becoming a bit more medieval but lacking personality but for a few tracks (especially the crystal theme and a few of the "weird" themes). Most of the score just flew by anonimously, inlcuding the Melodies of Life remixes and spin offs, which is sort of disappointing considering what fine music Uematsu has produced. It's not like it's bad music, it's just that you have to listen to a soundtrack to notice 80% of the tracks were even in the game. I could hardly think of an RPG that's more different in comparison to FFVIII (except the evergreen Valkyrie Profile and Xenogears) in terms of actual gameplay and structure. More than just superficial aspects (characters are more specialized and all get involved in very balanced, though slow, battles), various deeper issues are at hand, starting from the basic structure. In FFVIII you ought to fights as little "useless" battles as possible and NOT gain exp, while the gameplay itself was more or less "Squall + 2 others" on screen and most vital decisions were made in the abstract junctioning menu. In FFIX there are still a lot of options, but you are more or less required to gain EXP, buy or steal items, have a balanced party (when possible), and battles themselves gain the upper (slow) hand. Abstractedly speaking both systems were refined and had their strong and weak sides, so in the end they both deserve A grade, even though I still prefer the more flexible and exploitable junction system and FFVIII battles, which were quicker to load and where characters acted much faster and responsively. |
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