Gameplay:
Combat:
I should start by saying that Final Fantasy IX has THE MOST balanced combat in the entire series since Final Fantasy IV (the game which I consider to have the most balanced combat in the entire series). No spamming limit breaks to win, no exploitable junction system, no job system that you can use to make your party overpowered, just your skill at using the party members you have to their fullest potential for each given situation. Every party member in Final Fantasy IX has an assigned role in battle (such as Thief, White Mage, Warrior, Black Mage, etc.) and limits you too those roles so you have to swap out characters to help you get through each situation the game throws at you. The game goes out of it's way to make sure EVERY party member is Unique but also useful and important in battle. It also helps that this game brings your party total back up to four members at a time instead of three, meaning you can actually experiment with your party instead of constantly having to rely on the usual 'three jack of all trade' members or the usual team of 'Tank, Healer, Mage' though that is still a good strategy to fall back on.
On top of how well each character is balanced, the battles in this game can actually be quite challenging. For the first time since Final Fantasy V, I was actually worried I might see the game over screen. THIS IS A GOOD THING. The victory feels really hollow when you know how easy it was to get it, and this game fixes that. Despite the challenge, it is very rare that you need to grind in this game (well for experience anyway, but I will get to equipment and ability learning in another section).
The game is also intelligent in how it makes you fight your battles. Yes you can just spam your most powerful attacks against bosses like in most rpgs, but it is very rarely your best solution. There are some incredibly interesting tactics at work here, like the ability to cast reflect on your party and then bounce a spell off all your members so that it does quadruple the damage when it hits your opponent. It's this kind of tweaking that really makes for a more interesting gameplay experience.
I do have two minor problems with the games combat though, the first is that the battles are REALLY slow. Do yourself a favor, as soon as you start the game, turn the battle speed all the way up, you will need it. Through most of the game I really didn't find it an issue because you have to be very careful with how you select your commands (and WHEN you select your commands, unlike other games in the series, in FFIX you will find it very beneficial and sometimes even mandatory to hold off on selecting a chain of commands for your party) so the timing felt about perfect for the four person party structure, but in the moments where the game leaves you with less than four people, the sluggishness really becomes apparent.
The other thing I don't like about the combat is the Steal rate. The programmers were really smart about this, since your main character is a thief they went out of their way to make stealing an integral and very beneficial part of the experience. On the other hand, they made some of the steals ridiculously difficult to get (up to a 1/164 chance). It wasn't THAT bad, there were only about 4 times throughout the entire game where I really had trouble stealing the items I wanted, and there are abilities you can get for Zidane that make stealing easier, but those few times when I did have trouble getting what I wanted were downright painful. On the other hand, ALMOST every item you can steal you can buy in shops later in the game, so stealing in the first place is optional... how much can I bash the game on an optional feature?
Trance:
This will be a much smaller section, but I know that a lot of people don't like how trance was handled in Final Fantasy IX (Trance being this games version of 'limit breaks). In this game when your trance bar is filled you automatically go into the mode. It gives you about three rounds of combat in which your character has better attributes or special abilities depending on the character. The thing people don't like is that it is automatically activated, so you can't save it for bosses, it was an intentional design choice to keep people from abusing them in these situations. Honestly as I've played these games I've realized that I hate the limit break system in general in ANY form for the exact reason the programmers do. It completely breaks the game and makes every situation far too easy because whenever you get stuck you can simply go out, fill up the meters, and then enter a boss fight to do multiple attacks that will likely do max damage. Frankly I like how FFIX tried to handle it by making it random, it made me actually use these abilities in random battles when I got them instead of hoarding them, and it's the best solution they could have come up with without getting rid of them all together. There are also story segments where you are automatically put into trance, and I thought these were used to great effect. Anyway, moving on.
Exploration:
My god... Final Fantasy IX has the most beautiful, interesting, varied and living world in the entire series up to this point. (and actually I can say that it may be the best in the series, depending on your opinion of Ivalice from Final Fantasy XII). There is not a single location in the entire world that looks bland or boring. Everything is colorful, everything is well planned and designed. Almost all of the NPC's have something interesting to say in regards to what's going on around them or about the world at large. JRPG creators everywhere need to look back at this game and see how it's done.
On Top of that, the dungeons are often unique and varied as well, and a few of them even have really interesting puzzle elements that make them fun to traverse through. For example, one area has an anti-magic field making it so your main fighters are the only ones who are useful while another is 'upside down' making it so that your most powerful weapons are useless and you will only do strong damage by equipping the weakest weapons in the game. I love it when games put these limitations on you and make you think outside of the box to solve problems. There are also other places that make you go through the standard switch flipping puzzles and such, but it really adds to the feel of the world as a whole.
Equipment/Abilities:
Final Fantasy IX has an interesting system when it comes to growing stronger. You gain levels with exp which is normal for the Final Fantasy Series, but what is different is the way you gain abilities. In this game you only get abilities through equipment. Each piece of equipment (of which you can have five equipped on each character at a time a weapon, helmet, armor, glove, and accesory) has abilities attached too it that you can use once you are equipped with said item. As you battle with that piece of equipment equipped you gain AP towards that ability, and once the ability is mastered you can use it without the piece of equipment equipped. It's actually a great mechanic that keeps the game well paced, it doesn't matter how much you grind, you aren't going to get abusive abilities until you are far enough in the game to get the corresponding piece of equipment. The AP system is what lead me to do the grinding I did, mostly because I'm OCD and wanted everyone to learn every ability they could as soon as I got the new equipment, but it is not required. It's nice though because it gives you a reason to equip weaker items at times to learn new abilities, so you aren't constantly using the item that has, say, the most 'defense'
The equipment is interesting in it's own right as it is very common for the equipment to have special abilities such as halving the damage of a certain element, making it so often the 'best' equipment isn't the best choice for each given scenario, really allowing you to make the game much easier or harder on yourself depending on if you are paying attention to all the little details.
Tetra Master:
I guess the only other thing to talk about as far as gameplay is concerned is the card game Tetra Master, a relic that carried over from FFVIII. Now in my FFVIII review I mentioned it was the best part of the game, sadly that is not the case for Final Fantasy IX. In the previous game, the card game was fun and interesting in it's simplicity, and it had 'real world' rewards. In Final Fantasy IX however, they have made it needlessly complex and you are never rewarded for playing. It is just a simple diversion. To be fair, it's not a huge detriment to the over all game since you are only required to play it three times (and only have to win twice) but the game does stop until you finally win. It's not that hard to get through (I didn't lose at all) but it is something people like pointed out to them.
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