Another great Final Fantasy game, but not as good as previous Final Fantasy games.
User Rating: 8.8 | Final Fantasy IX PS
Final Fantasy 9 is a great game, but it didn't shine as one of the greatest RPGs like FF7 and FF8. Even though FF9 isn't as great as previous Final Fantasy games, it is still one of the top RPGs out in stores. In FF9 you start out as Zidane, a member of a rogue group. In the Kingdom of Alexandria your rogue group, Tantalus, is on a mission to capture Princess Garnet. Meanwhile a young black mage named Vivi is trying to sneak into a romance play. During the play, Zidane and the rest of Tantalus capture Princess Garnet. This alerts Adelbert Stein, Garnet's bodygaurd. Steiner tries to save Garnet, but is not successful. Garnet does not try to get away because she wants to be kidnapped. So that makes Zidane's job easier. Garnet wants to get away from her mother, Queen Brahne. Her mother has been attacking other kingdoms and Garnet has been upset. The story for FF9 is not as good as previous Final Fantasy games, but is still very good. The gameplay has improved quite a bit in FF9. First of all, instead of having only 3 members in battle, it has increased to 4. This makes the battles a little bit easier and more fun. Also, each character has a certain class, such as a theif, black mage, a knight, etc. This means certain people specialize in certain things such as black magic, white magic, or just hand to hand combat. There are trances in the game which are the limit breaks of FF9. Every time you receive damage your trance meter goes up. Once it's full you start glowing and your attacks get stronger and you have a special atttack that you can use. Also, when you equip weapons, you can learn a certain ability. The battle system is the same as the last two Final Fantsy games, so it's still great. The graphics are very good. A litlle bit of an improvement for the last game, but not much. Personally, I didn't like how the characters looked. It looked like the character designs downgraded from FF8, but that's just me. The characters are small. They don't look that normal unlike FF8. It's okay though, it doesn't take me out of the game. The music's good but nothing close to FF7 and FF8. The music goes pretty good with the enviorments, but it's just not as revolutionary and amazing as the last two Final Fantasy games. Once again, Nobuo Uematsu is back for FF9. He is still a legend, but I was not very fond of his music in FF9. I say I'm not very fond of the music, but Nobuo Uematsu is still my favorite video game music composer of all time. Overall, Final Fantasy 9 is another great Final Fantasy game. It may not be as revolutionary as the past two games, and it may not have as good of a story as previous Final Fantasy games, but it is still an RPG that be bought by anyone who likes Final Fantasy or RPGs in general.
