I've started playing Final Fantasy IX, which was actually the very first Final Fantasy game I ever played, way back when it first came out. I think I might have been... 9 at the time? Anyways, I have fond memories of the portion of this game that I played. It is notable in my mind as for the next years into high school i had one goal. To learn Japanese and game design to work for Squaresoft (now of course, SquareEnix).
 
So basically I never got that far into the game. Close to the end of the first cd and that's about it. So far I'm about to reach the third cd, so I've covered significantly more content than that which I encountered my first time playing the game. I do of course intend to finish it this time!
 
I don't want to write a long review of the game so far or anything, just my general thoughts on the game and basically how I think its aged overtime in comparison to my thoughts of it when I was younger. The first thing that springs to mind is the dialogue, which I feel has aged terribly. It reminds me of a narrative I wrote for English in grade 6, which I loosely based on the feel of characters and worlds JRPGs. I mean, it sounds pretty cool in theory right? Though obviously if I read it now it would read rather childish. That's how I feel about this game. It's a real shame too, as I believe the story may have come across a lot stronger if the dialogue held up. It's hard to give a standout example as really it's the vibe of the entire game's dialogue that has made me feel this way so far. The only character really excusable would be Steiner, who is obviously meant to come across as awkward and is the game's comic relief. Anyways, the graphics in my opinion hold up extremely well. You can see a clear art style reflected in the characters despite the limits of the PlayStation's 3d technology, which I was actually surprised by and didn't remember it looking quite as good as it does. The FMVs too of course look very good, like VIII before it (VII's were a bit primitive, but from VIII on it seemed like Square got the hang of it). I don't want to comment too much on the story. It seems like there is a lot more to come across before everything will start to add up. The only games in the series I can think of that really differ and give you most of what you need to know up front are VII and X, so this isn't too surprising. One thing which I still agree with from my memories was how extremely text heavy the PS1 era final fantasy games were. It's a bit of a drag when none of it is spoken like in the entries directly after this game, though bearable. Overall I'm enjoying the game. I'm keen to complete it as it's something I've always wanted to do and am finally getting around to.
 
I'll probably post up my final thoughts on the game in a week or two, whenever I get around to finishing it. That's it for now.