@VainamoinenJanuary 30, 2025
"Maybe it's good despite that cutesy character design", I thought back in 2000 when I bought the game day one. Most of us did, I guess. Little did we know that Final Fantasy IX was a story about horrific loss, total war, genocide, soul crushing guilt, and existential dread. The deepest and most profound of the series in my opinion, and reportedly, the favorite of creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. FF9 stuck with me like no other. I played it alone first, then with a friend, then with a group of friends, then alone again. On PS2, the game only properly started from Disc 2, but I still didn't get tired of it. I'm still drawing and painting the characters, I'm still discussing the instalment with my best friend a quarter century later. And I've started playing the music on piano – this varied, expansive, this utterly devine soundtrack by Nobuo Uematsu with its never ending parade of catchy tunes or 'earworms' as we Germans would say. As much as I keep on hoping, no artificial intelligence will ever repaint the original backgrounds satisfactorily, and no remake will ever improve the experience in any meaningful way. Nine was perfect as it was released; and it has aged quite well. Please preserve it for us and for future generations, SQE, and bring it to GOG.