What to play? – Final Fantsy IX Moguri Mod

The year is 2000, the sixth generation of consoles has become obsolete, because the first representatives of the new, seventh, in the person of SEGA Dreamcast, Sony PlayStation 2, have already slowly begun to appear, and a year later the Nintendo GameCube and Microsoft Xbox will be released. But there was still an agreement between Sony and Squaresoft to release another game on PS1 based on the Final Fantasy universe. She, as conceived by the game producer Hironobu Sakaguchi, was supposed to combine all the best that came before, while paying tribute to the very first games in the series. Therefore, the ninth part became more fabulous and soulful compared to the seventh and eighth parts, which were more mature and serious. Some people didn’t like this approach, but others were not just satisfied, but truly delighted with the new style, which literally captivated with its visual performance! Coupled with incredible music, the game easily took you away from reality, immersing you in the events of the fictional world of Gaia. I am sure that even if you played FF9 a long time ago, after listening to this tune you will be filled with nostalgia and your soul will become warmer.

As a person who has completed most of the parts of the series and has been a fan of it for many years, I can say that I somehow didn’t get along with Nine from the very beginning. Having first become acquainted with the line of games in the eighth part, admiring its visuals and stunning graphics, I had a hard time accepting the ninth, despite all its advantages. But over the years, having convinced himself to give it a chance and starting from scratch, he very quickly became involved in the events taking place on the screen and for a long time could not tear himself away. And the game itself helped me with this…

The first time my saves were broken was closer to the middle of the playthrough, then I used an emulator. The second failure happened many years later, when I decided to finish what I started and go through the Steam version of the project (at the same time I was broadcasting on Twitch). Then my saves broke literally at the very end, shortly before the denouement…

The game is loved by many not only for its enchanting atmosphere and wonderful sound design, but also for its interesting plot. It tells us about heroes who, having completely different motives, by the will of fate find themselves in a whirlpool of events that begins with the conquest of one of the kingdoms. But these internecine wars are just a prelude to the awakening of a force that is much more terrible and dangerous than anything this world has faced before, a force that has the power to completely destroy it.

In the “nine”, Squaresoft managed to create such an interesting and beautiful world that it is not only pleasant to be in it, but you also want to explore it, discover new locations and study them. The game is thoroughly permeated with some kind of fabulous atmosphere of adventure, which, coupled with a bewitching story, is unlikely to bore you.

In this world you will have to travel a lot with heroes who, by the end of the game, will truly become family and friends to you. They develop and change under the pressure of circumstances, and the difficulties encountered along the way make them stronger, not only spiritually, but also physically. Since this is an old-school JRPG, in your travels you will find yourself in random battles (random encounters), for winning which you will receive not only experience, but also skill points. Each piece of equipment allows your heroes to learn different skills that greatly enhance your combat abilities. And it is precisely on mastering new skills that these skill points are spent, since if you do not achieve perfection, you will be able to use them only while an item with this skill is equipped. Despite the fact that there are a lot of monsters in the game (about two hundred) and they are really diverse, differing not only in appearance, but also in attacking capabilities, most players really do not like the approach to battles, namely, the random encounter that I mentioned above . For those who are already unaccustomed to such mechanics (or even don’t want to start getting used to them), in which you cannot see the enemy and cannot avoid meeting them, the Final Fantasy IX remaster added the ability to completely disable such encounters. A very convenient function that allows you to enjoy the story without random battles and engage in battles only when you want to level up your party. If you don’t want to grind too long and monotonously to get several levels, there is a time acceleration mode that doubles the speed of the game.

Of course, it’s worth taking a closer look at the battles themselves. In the lower right corner there is an ATB (Active Time Battle) bar, which gradually fills up and depends on the characteristics of your ward. After it becomes full, the hero will be able to take any action: attack, use a skill or magic, an item, etc. Many battles have great tactical depth, since you and your opponents are capable, in addition to regular attacks and casting spells, of inflicting various negative statuses such as poisoning, petrification, silence and others. I think fans will immediately remember the name of the classic monster for the series, which with one attack sends a state of confusion, poison, blindness, slowdown and shrinkage to the entire team. And now try to come up with tactics to destroy it.

But why is it that the best version of Final Fantsy IX is available these days? The thing is that the game was perfectly updated for modern systems, releasing an official remaster in 2016, and together with the fan modification Moguri Mod, the project became even more beautiful. But first things first…

The remaster improves the appearance of the project, adding an anti-aliasing filter, updated sprites for the card game “Tetra Master”, a new interface and redesigned game screensavers. And character models along with location backgrounds were enriched with higher resolution textures. In addition, “legal cheats” were implemented, such as those that allow you to double the game speed (both on a location or world map, and in battle), disable random battles, add an always full ATB bar, enabled trance and 9999 damage per hit, and many other things that simplify the game and make it, in my opinion, uninteresting. Other useful additions implemented in this remaster were achievements and an autosave function. And finally, speaking about the remaster, it is worth mentioning that the player can now skip the cutscenes and camera flyover before the start of the battle.

To be honest, I can’t say that this remaster is a truly great work of updating a classic. Rather, it looks like a hastily made craft with the aim of extorting money from loyal fans. That is why, in my opinion, the price of $21 is not particularly justified. The fan community decided in exactly the same way, independently making a modification of Moguri Mod, in which everything that the developers themselves should have done is finalized. According to the modders, their modification is a reworking of the PC version of Final Fantasy IX using deep learning technologies (ESRGAN). The biggest changes affected the background images, which are now cleaner, more detailed, and with a higher resolution. Added: support for 16:9 widescreen format, original font from PS1 (I don’t understand why they changed it in the first place), HD textures for NPCs, world maps and battles, FMV videos at 30 frames per second, reworked soundtrack orchestral arrangement by Pontus Hultén (must be selected separately in the settings) and fixes many bugs of the original game! Not bad, right? And tell me, which of these two game improvements should really cost $21? Below I am posting a video so that you can clearly understand how the game is transformed with the mod.

You can play all this in a wonderful fan translation, in which not only the dialogues are adapted, but even the inscriptions on the objects.

In conclusion, I would like to note that I highly recommend that those who have not tried it before get acquainted with the project. For fans who haven’t immersed themselves in their favorite world for a long time, now is a great time to return! After all, the already wonderful game after the remaster has become even better and more convenient, tightening up the “stuffy” moments and making the gameplay simply perfect! And together with the Moguri Mod, which improves the visual component of the project, it turns into an almost perfect role-playing game from the PS1 era. It’s hard to imagine a more suitable moment to meet her! Therefore, in the telegram channel “Oldfag Gamer” I posted an archive from Final Fantsy IX, so you can plunge into nostalgia! And for those who want to play exactly the version that the world learned 23 years ago, I will add an archive with a PS1 emulator, as well as the game itself for this platform. Choose which option is closer to you!