Put Airship Here! Let's Play Final Fantasy IX

Welcome, one and all, to:


Yes, I was procrastinating writing the introductory post for quite a while when I was hit with a flash of mad inspiration!

During the LP proper, I'll be doing my best not to grind out XP and AP so that each encounter is a total curbstomp, and I'll be sure to point out interesting things. I'm not going to screencap EVERY SINGLE SPOT WHERE SOMETHING IS LYING AROUND, because if I did that, I'd be at this for the better part of a year.

Also, I will not be speedrunning this for the Excalibur II. Fuck that noise running, as I won't feasibly have the time to play the game, screencap everything I need to, and still have time to get all the way to the end of the game. I'll probably write a post about it at some point, which leads me to a few reoccurring things. If you'll notice the dispenser above, click those to dispense out some tunes to listen to while you're playing, much like Brickroad's FF1 LP. The other one will be some of the more technical aspects as they come up, as well as in-depth character info. I call these "Saxton Sez" moments.

Oi! I don't know what right all the hell is goin' on, but rest assured, if there's a shark that needs piledrivin', I'm yer man!

Chapter List
Chapter 1 - cp_alexandria
Chapter 2 - koth_canary
Chapter 3 - tc_evilforest
Intermission - wtf_tetramaster
Chapter 4 - pl_icecavern
Chapter 5 - ctf_dali
Chapter 6 - plr_airship

Augh, FF9... I make it no secret that FF9 is my personal black sheep of the series. To say I dislike it is an understatement; it's the only FF that's generated genuine hate out of me. Though not for the reasons most people would assume (ie. story, characters, etc.). No, what slays me about FF9 is that the randomizer is lord and master over EVERYTHING, turning the entire game into one giant luck-based mission. And as I've noted before, I have the Anti-Luck.

I hate to think of how many un-logged hours I spent on any given FF9 play-through resetting because I'd just gotten absolutely curb-stomped by a weak party since every last one decided to act in perfect synchronization to destroy my party... Or because I'd just failed to steal from a boss for the 256th time in a row while they steadily whittled my HP and MP away to nothing... Not to mention how many play sessions were cut short from a rage-reset at getting into a battle every single step so that it took me upwards half an hour to cross a single screen (yes, that happened to me; more than once, in fact).

Perhaps this will be cathartic, since TirMcDohl will be aiming to get the same experience I usually do, except on purpose. Maybe I should find a way to lend him my Anti-Luck for maximum comedic effect.

I only know the most basic elements of this game, but already the big guy in heavy plate armor with the >:| face is my favorite.

Please also take note of the fact that said knight is wearing armored shorts.

I don't remember having any serious issues with randomness other than that one mandatory card battle. Of course, I've got some serious problems with luck in my games as well, and will steadfastly ignore anything that relies too heavily on it. I don't think I've ever attempted to steal in this game.

Overall I enjoyed playing it, so this LP is going to be fun times.

EDIT: He seems to be wearing metal sneakers as well. At first glance he looks all threatening, but if you cover the top half of him it looks like a grey Sora from Kingdom Hearts.

It is no exaggeration to say that no other Final Fantasy has been so strongly theft-oriented. You have deprived yourself of part of the experience of FFIX by not stealing.

I believe they are plate-armored lederhosen -- platerhosen, if you will.

This is also one of my least favorite FF games. The world is charming, wonderful, and filled with loving details... and the cast is mostly annoying, the plot trite, and final disc's plot twists clumsy and disappointing. It feels so close to be a masterpiece, but it falls short in such frustrating ways.

If the core party consisted of Freya, Vivi, Steiner, and Quina (and if the game properly explored those four's personal narrative arcs instead of going "meh" midway through and forgetting about them all), it would be among my favorites in the series!

I always considered FF IX a mediocre game, so I am looking forward to you performing a 180 on my opinion.

(but no pressure)

- Eddie

I haven't played FF IX and have heard conflicting views on its quality, so I am looking forward to a well-written LP on this game with viewer debates on how its components work or do not work.

(but no pressure!)

Man, I kind of hate this game, but I'm interested in reading this almost solely on the fact that McDohl is a cool dude and Saxton Hales

Steiner is basically Inspector Zenigata in armor shorts, and therefor awesome.

Though I also have a bit of a soft spot for Emo Girl Rat Dragoon. And of course Vivi, 'cause everyone loves a Black Mage.

To balance out all the hatred... this is the best Final Fantasy. The. Best.

I shall be watching.

I really liked this game, too, and am looking forward to seeing it again, since i kind of rushed through it the one time I played it.

Don't get me wrong, I am looking forward to this LP! A disappointing Final Fantasy is still a fantastic game. And the active FFIX LP at Something Awful is pretty lousy. The dude running it has a comedic repertoire that consists entirely of (1) racism and (2) marijuana. Hilarious.

I have a similar idiom for Elvis Costello albums.

I want to say that people who hate FFIX are bad people, but that seems awfully negative.

So instead: People who love FFIX are the best people. I so happy.

Here you go, my girlfriend already named your heroes for you:

Unicorn. Where are your pants unicorn?!

Sorry, but this team's names are already locked in. Don't fret! I'll come up with some sort of audience participation! Maybe I'll break down each character's battle skills and what they do and go all "Eddie on FFT" or "Brickroad on FF1".

If you want a hint as to what their names will be, all you have to do is look at Demoweasel's snazzy photoshop job in the OP.

So does that mean Quina get to be the Spoy?

- Eddie

No love for the one main FF protagonist in years who actually has his shit (mostly) together? I found Zidane's worldliness and cheerful desire to help his friends to be such a refreshing change from the usual clueless angsty messes who headline most FF casts. If I had to make a list of Final Fantasy Characters I'd Actually Want to Hang Out With, it'd be down to like him and Balthier.

Agreed. Zidane is one of the main reasons this game is my second favorite after 6. The previous protagonists were too angsty for me to relate to and the ones in 10 and 12 made me want to reach into the screen and punch them. At least 12's cast seemed to agree with me, as it eventually got to the point where at least one of them berated Vann every time he opened his stupid mouth. I got the impression that Lulu was only barely containing herself as well, and she may have actually hit Tidus at some point, but it's been far too long for me to remember.

Zidane in the airship swinging by his tail, taunting Steiner is a good enough reason to love this game.

Zidane is awesome except for that one scene we can forget about because it doesn't exist anyway.

Tidus could even hit on Lulu. You could break the sequel's mold and have his affection rating toward Rikku or Lulu better than Yuna's. The only thing this affects is Tidus's final overdrive, where he kicks a blitzball at the enemy like a freakin meteorite, and the person serving him the ball is the one who has the highest affection rating.

Of course, if I were Lulu, I would have punched him for looking at my boobs in the binoculars and left his sorry ass to drown.

That one scene gets a pass from me on account of having a totally awesome music track. Also, getting resolved fairly quickly.

That scene is so wretched, contrived, and out-of-place that it largely ruins the entire character for me. Well, that and pretty much anything related to his home world and the fact that he's basically just Goku from DragonBall. Like I said, the second half of the game really spoils the whole thing, pushing the interesting characters aside for the crappy "Oh whoops we need to shoehorn in a big epic twist" nonsense.

Here's a fun little tidbit I dug up ages ago (and sadly lost the link to): FF9 was originally not going to be a main-series Final Fantasy at all. In fact, it was intended to be a tribute game to the series with references galore to past titles and a general light-hearted feel to it overall. This all got kicked out the window around the time they realized that FFX was getting way too complex for a PS1 game and would have to be pushed back to the PS2. So they hastily re-engineered the game that they'd been making as a spin-off into a main-series game instead. If you were ever wondering about the strange duality in tone of FF9's story and the oddly simple and randomizer-heavy battle engine, that would be the culprit.

Now I just need to dig up those concept art sketches that all mysteriously vanished off of RPGamer around the time when FFX was announced... Ah well, perhaps TirMcDohl will be posting a link to them at some point.

The music in that one scene is among my favorite tracks from the series, so as much as I hate the writing there I can't help looking forward to it. Besides, every FF loses it's shit by the end, so I have to judge them based on how awesome they were until that point.