Final Fantasy IX - What's new in the PC Version?

Suzy Lu explains some of the new options and features of the Final Fantasy IX PC version:

WHAT'S NEW? Final Fantasy 9 PC Review

On April 14th Final Fantasy 9 came to Steam. I am a huge Final Fantasy fan and wanted to see exactly what new features we have on this remaster and I am impressed. If I missed out anything I do apologise. I hope you guys enjoy this review and if you want more like this in future then let me know in the comments below.

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More information.

Someone sell me on this game (I have played and completed ff7 and ff8)

I like it so far, nice story and charming characters and it's looking quite good for a year 2000 game.

@HiddenX
Charming characters is good. I don't get that impression from the newer final fantasies. Good story too? Okay I'll give this one a try as thats pretty much what I look for from these games.

What about the music through? Is it on a par with ff7 and ff8?

It's on par with FF7 - I never played 8.

FF9 one of my favorite FFs (probably second after FF10), and I played it like 2 years ago.

For me, it's one of my least favorites. The characters are charming, but in a Disney-like manner. It wasn't my cup of tea at all.

I think it's made for very young gamers.

JDR13 said:

For me, it's one of my least favorites. The characters are charming, but in a Disney-like manner. It wasn't my cup of tea at all.

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Yeah thats what I perceived way back - the cartoon like character appearance but I wasn't sure. FF7 and FF8 characters weren't realistic but they were grounded. So FF9 is Disney characters; maybe I should wait until its on sale.

Silver said:

Yeah thats what I perceived way back - the cartoon like character appearance but I wasn't sure. FF7 and FF8 characters weren't realistic but they were grounded. So FF9 is Disney characters; maybe I should wait until its on sale.

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It's -20% right now...

Silver said:

So FF9 is Disney characters; maybe I should wait until its on sale.

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Yes, I'd wait. FF9 is strange game because rather than a developer having a creative spark or idea, FF9 was commissioned by Square to simply be a romanticized version of Final Fantasy, a sort of tribute to all prior Final Fantasy games.

As such, it's really cutesy and cuddly, but to me it always felt like a cheap cartoon imitation of the series. For instance, there's Vivi, an adorable Black Mage...why's he in the game? Because adorable Black Mages are...adorable! And Steiner, he's a stoic knight in shining armor because...fantasy games have knights!

Also, I find it quite funny that Square purposefully tried to create an "understandable" story for FF9 because the story goes completely loony tunes toward the end.

Basically, if you like cute games with cute characters with cute locations, you may really enjoy FF9. But there is no story depth here. And there's almost no character development beyond "I'm down...but my friends will help me...happy, we won!"

I simply cannot recommend it if you want substance, story, and strong characters. But the actual gameplay is adequate for a year 2000 PSX JRPG. If forced, I'd replay FF9 and moderately enjoy it...but there's so many better games to play.

PS: at least the soundtrack is fairly epic.

Well I rather play Final Fantasy 9 then Final Fantasy 13 at least. I wonder if Final Fantasy 12 will be released on Steam next? As I remember reading a rumor early this year.

Silver said:

Someone sell me on this game (I have played and completed ff7 and ff8)

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When master Uematsu was asked which was his best work, he said FF9. Sold yet?

I think it's made for very young gamers.

Not quite.
The characters are cute, yes, but the game touches some very somber topics, like Vivi's … SPOILER …

Mind you, it's a very Japanese thing lamenting about Big Issues coated in sugar and kitsch.

Couchpotato said:

I wonder if Final Fantasy 12 will be released on Steam next? As I remember reading a rumor early this year.

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That would be one of the few FF ports I'd actually be interested in.

GothicGothicness said:

When master Uematsu was asked which was his best work, he said FF9. Sold yet?

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Reports are that the PC soundtrack uses more severe compression than PSX (because PC is a mobile port I guess). So actually…you'd do better to buy the PSX version and play it on the ePSXe emulator, which also allows for better graphics than the Steam version.

Brumbek said:

Reports are that the PC soundtrack uses more severe compression than PSX (because PC is a mobile port I guess). So actually…you'd do better to buy the PSX version and play it on the ePSXe emulator, which also allows for better graphics than the Steam version.

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Gah... how sad.. if they screwed up that! Hopefully a patch will fix it!

Brumbek said:

Reports are that the PC soundtrack uses more severe compression than PSX (because PC is a mobile port I guess). So actually…you'd do better to buy the PSX version and play it on the ePSXe emulator, which also allows for better graphics than the Steam version.

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Not surprised really as all recent Final Fantasy PC ports on Steam are based on the android versions. I'll take a quick guess and say it's probably because it's cheaper.

Maybe someone creative like Durante could find a way to replace the compressed songs with the uncompressed ones. Otherwise its sounding like this is best experienced via emulator.