Why is Final Fantasy IX so slept on?

It's not underrated because it is critically acclaimed, so that wouldn't be the correct term. I don't get why it's always overshadowed by Final Fantasy VII when IX is more critically acclaimed (it's the highest rated PS1 Final Fantasy game on Gamerankings).

FFVII is the most well know game of the franchise but that doesn't make IX overlooked imo. Tons of people have played it and I've often seen it on best RPG lists.

IX is my favorite Final Fantasy game. I think VII is so popular because it's had the most hype....I have no idea. It was on Nintendo for so long and the first to be in 3D. I guess it was a big deal.

Timing is an issue. It came out after the PS2 launched, so the masses missed out on it or just ignored it altogether. That and it didn't have the hype of FF7.

FF IX is great.

But FF VII was a revolution.

IX is my fav too.

When FFVII came out, the cut scenes blew people's minds. Non-RPG fans bought it just because the trailers looked so good. It's funny to think because they are sooo dated now, but at the time we'd never seen anything like it. IX was probably the better game, but VII brought the whole genre from niche to mainstream. Hard to compete with that kind of hype.

FFIX gets so much love that it might be time that we start calling FFVII under appreciated.

FFVIII is almost universally ignored now it seems which is a shame as I think it has the most interesting combat out of the three.

Every FF community I go on, people always claim that FFIX is the best game in the series while the game is not really that great.

Nobody rates it so low to begin with. How can something getting praised to the moon and being underrated at the same time? Doesn't make any sense. It clearly is more overrated than FFVII. I haven't heard many FFVII fans going around shouting it's the best in the series in a very long time. It used to be like that around 10 years ago but now it's FFIX fans replacing those people.