Gothic 2: Classic – The best of Eurojank

 

 

The Gothic series has been known as the Elder Scrolls of Europe. It is a series of games that has come out in the early 2000s by the German developer Piranha Bytes. I have been a fan of the first Gothic for a while now, I have not played these games when they came out, I was too busy playing KoTOR, Warcraft III and Age of Empires II, but sometimes, I get the urge to find an older game and try it out. The first Gothic have blown me away in terms of the setting as well as the difficulty curve. The selling point of the first one was – you are a nobody and the world does not care about you. In recent times that is a very refreshing approach in a video game and one I thoroughly enjoyed having been sick to death of Ubisoft games. Now, I have heard that there are sequels to the first game but I have never tried any of them, because apparently there was a wide decline in every subsequent game. Recently I got into Gothic 2. I did not play Night of the Raven, which is an expansion pack to the original game. I managed to get the game running with just the vanilla content with a mod that makes it balanced somewhat to NoTR, but not so difficult (which has a reputation of being brutal), so I will be writing about that. As far as structure goes, I will start with first impressions of the various aspects – going from gameplay, music, dialogue and others. Further I want to give an overview of the various factions you can join in this game, instead of a write up of individual characters and I also want to provide an overview of the story. Naturally, there will be spoilers for this 22-year-old game.

In order to provide context for the second entry in the series, let me briefly describe the first game. If you have never played it, please go ahead, it is fantastic and truly one of the great classics of RPG gaming. Anyway, the previous game took place in the Valley of the Mines, a natural prison with an unnatural magical dome that prevented anyone from leaving. You can enter the dome but not leave. Prisoners were often dumped into the Valley for various crimes. Inside the dome, in the Valley, the prisoners organized themselves into three main factions (or camps), the Old Camp which was inside an old castle and which was the strongest, the New Camp which was situated in the first mine and held most of the magical ore. Oh yes, the prisoners mined magical ore that was only in this Valley and then exchanged it with the outside world for various benefits such as food, tools, weapons, supplies as well as women. In any case, the last faction was a cult of something called the Sleeper, which was supposed to be a powerful entity that slumbered somewhere in the Valley of the Mines. What happened in the first game was the Nameless hero (as he was known), gets thrown into the Valley, learns how to survive, joins of the factions (for me it always was the New Camp) and then shatters the magical dome by presumably killing the Sleeper, however he himself is unable to escape as the temple in which the entity was worshipped collapsed onto him.

This is where the second game starts. The Nameless hero is rescued by his ally from the first game – the dark magician, Xardas, who is a really cool dude in my opinion.

I have to say something here first about the voice acting; if there is one thing that most people know about Gothic 2 is that there is this one line by Xardas at the very beginning of the game which is hilarious and it is unintentional, of course. When it comes to voice acting for an old game like this, you have to be able to disconnect it from the script (although with this line, they really should have just changed it). Morrowind for example had barely any voice acting at all. Some modern RPGs don’t have any either. You take a look at Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, which have very little. The original Divinity: Original Sin also did not have much. Gothic 2 is all voice acted. Most of it is not great. Later in the game, there are intelligent dragons that you have to speak to in order to advance the main quest and these sound alright – the developers made an effort to make them sound a bit different than your average farmer (I am looking at you, Elder Scrolls Online, wtf).

Xardas informs you that after you killed the Sleeper in the first game, his dying cry into the realm of magic and darkness was to summon all manner of evil things, like demons, dragons, more orcs and also other worshippers of the evil god Beliar. He further informs you that you barely survived the fight with the entity, which is the excuse why you start at level 1 once again and don’t have any of your gear from the previous game. Xardas tasks you with going into the nearby town of Khorinis to get a magical amulet from the holy order of paladins who are there – this amulet allows the chosen of Innos (god of light and fire) to make war against the creatures of darkness. He also tells you to hurry, since the army of darkness is on the move and will swallow everything in its path. No big deal. Xardas finally says that you are the chosen of Innos and the only one who can wear the amulet.

This is how the game starts and let me just say, Gothic 2 is hard. Even when playing the game without the expansion, which makes it even harder, the base game is not a piece of cake. You never have enough resources, potions or money. You always do little damage and are always outnumbered by enemies. This sort of ties into what makes the game great and why I spent 50 hours playing it, because the best thing about Gothic 2 is the progression. Every time you level up by killing monsters or completing quests you get 10 learning points. You can spend these on upgrading your character by training in various different areas, these can be: your stats (strength, dexterity and mana), your ability to use weapons or other various skills like skinning animals, forging weapons, brewing potions, etc. It sounds simple and maybe boring or standard, but it is so good. The excitement you get every time you level up is great. What am I going to upgrade now? Do I want to be a better fighter or do I want to learn how to make my own potions? Perhaps I want to forge weapons, so I can sell them and finally be able to afford some decent armor. This is fantastic and this is why I love RPGs myself. Give me a decent progression system and I am able to overlook a bad story, bad voice acting or nonsensical characters (up to a point, of course). There is an insane amount of backtracking though, which is somewhat standard when it comes to games like this. You go back and forth between various points of interest and your movement is so slow. You cannot sprint, you can only drink speed potions that make you run faster for a limited amount of time. These are however very scarce at the beginning of the game. Later, you can get teleportation runes which help the game feel a bit better. Near the final stretch of the game, the speed potions are somewhat common.

The game is split into six chapters. In any case, you arrive at the city of Khorinis and the guard tells you to go away, because you are either a convict from the colony (after the dome shattered and all the inmates left) or a vagrant. You have no decent clothes, no money, nothing. You would think Xardas would at least give you a way to enter the city, but you have to figure everything out yourself. You can do that by working on an outside farm, picking weeds, chasing sheep, killing some wolves. It is great. You truly start the journey at the lowest possible point – a fly can kill you flapping its wings in your face. Eventually you get into the town by working on the farm, but your social climbing has just started. The paladin at the gate laughs at your story (of course) and tells you to keep it to yourself since his colleagues might take offence at you wanting to take their holy amulet and lock you up.

So, this is where the game presents you with various options how to go forward. Have I said I love it when games have branching paths and choices? Well, Gothic (and Piranha Bytes games in general) is known for its faction system. Every group has different quests, different weapons and armor and also various other benefits as well. I will not be going over character in that much depth like I did in my FFIX article, because Gothic 2 has no companions like that, instead I would like to describe these factions in depth as much as possible, because to me they are one of the cornerstones of the game. They are as follows:

·         The Militia of Khorinis, which later enable the player to join the Paladins,

·         The mercernaries of the former New Camp of the prison colony, which later allow the player to join the Dragon hunters,

·         The Monastery of the Fire mages.

The option to join the militia presents itself as the first one, it is also the easiest to join as well as the one that comes most naturally. First, you have to become a citizen of the town by becoming an apprentice to one of the master crafters in Khorinis, who will also teach you their trade. You can become a hunter who is proficient in skinning animals, a blacksmith that can forge their own weapons or an alchemist that brews their own potions. You have to complete various quests for all these masters and then become an apprentice of one of them. It is very neat, the city of Khorinis is really immersive, it has an amazing soundtrack and really draws you in. I went with becoming the apprentice of the blacksmith and you do not have to join the militia if you want to become a citizen. In fact, the core experience of every Piranha Bytes game is the same – you should complete as many quests as you can, before deciding on a faction. This way you get a lot of experience as well rewards. It is also an excellent way to get an idea of what the factions are like. The goal when trying to become a member of the militia is to eventually join the Holy Order of paladins. They have amazing heavy plate armor with various ornaments as well as magical swords, and can cast light magic themselves. It really is the traditional fantasy DnD paladin experience. I was very tempted to join them and on a subsequent playthrough, I am definitely doing so. The militia and the paladins are all about protecting the citizens of Khorinis, helping them out as well as trying to defeat anything that might threaten them.

The second main faction are the mercenaries. You first hear about them when you start working on a farm outside of town in order to be able to get in. Farmer Lobard tells you about what is happening. There is another rich landowner named Onar who also managed to persuade other farmers in the area (except for Lobard, he is too close to the city) to join him in his revolt against Khorinis and the king. Basically, what is happening is that the kingdom is at war with orcs and the war is not going in his favor, as such the king has increased taxes. The city of Khorinis started taxing the outlying farmers who have had enough. The convicts who were in the first game at the New Camp joined together with other survivors and have become the mercenaries – they camped in and around Onar’s farm and are protecting it against the town’s guard and militia. The paladins do not really go there, as a lot of them were sent into the Valley of the Mines on another mission. The mercenaries are led by Lee, a returning character from the first game whose backstory is that he was exiled by the king because he was a young charismatic general that was disliked by the rest of the aristocracy who framed him for murder. Not very original backstory, but I liked Lee in the first game. He organized the convicts that wanted to leave the Valley and forced them to live by rules and a code of conduct. There were also other characters from the first game, that were now with the mercenaries; Gorn a brawny warrior that likes to drink and sharpen his axes, Bennet a genius inventor and blacksmith, Lares who is a sneaky, acrobatic thief and others. Most of the friends that Nameless made in game one were in the mercenaries, so it was not really a difficult choice for me. I joined them asap. What do the mercenaries offer? They have good armor that has a combination of plates, chains and fur (and the color blue) that looks great. Bennet can also teach you how to forge exceptional weapons from the magical ore that has been found in the Valley. The mercenaries have terrible reputation however and most of them are thieves, murderers and liars. Lee still maintains order, however more and more of them are slipping away from the rule he established and are resorting back to their criminal origins. Apart from a quest or two you cannot really change this, because as soon as you join a faction, the story moves forward with you needing to somehow obtain the Eye of Innos, the magical amulet that Xardas sent you to get.

However, there is the final faction, the Fire mages of the Monastery. These guys wear red and black, they live and work in a monastery that is very similar to Catholic/Christian monasteries of medieval Europe. Basically, they are all rules, no fun. They have one redeeming value which is magic. In Gothic 2 you can cast magic either by using a scroll which is one use only, or by using a rune, which has infinite uses – both drain your mana as well. The paladins also have their own magic that is separate from all this. The fire mages can create their own runes and spells, however. I thought this was kind of interesting. Would I join them if I were to play the game again? Probably not.

Like I said before, what really is encouraged by the game is to meet all three factions and complete as many quests for them as you can without actually joining them. Do not worry, you cannot join a faction by accident as the game makes sure to ask you several times before you commit. In a sense, I really like this approach. Unlike some other factions in different RPGs, for example Bethesda developed games, sometimes you can never even meet other factions. In Gothic you can really get to know all of them. This is good.

            Before I go any further, there is one more thing I have to say in regards to the gameplay of Gothic 2. The game is a little janky, what I mean by that is that attack speed animation does not always sync up with what you are trying to do, neither do your button presses. For example, you want to attack one of the three enemies that are attacking you and you press the corresponding attack buttons, but the combat in Gothic 2 is not just a simple spam X or A button, you are pressing one button to attack from the right and another button to attack from the left. You also cannot repeat these, you have to go in a rhythm, left, right, left, right, etc. You can also do a flourish of sorts where your character spins around and potentially does more damage, however this usually breaks up your rhythm, so 99% of the time I stuck to left, right. However, this can get easily interrupted, if you move, if you get attacked, and so on. Also, in Gothic 2 there are critical hits and sometimes, especially at the beginning this may seem like a bullshit mechanic – especially since this works for enemies too. A small wolf or a fly can one shot you if they get a critical hit. Therefore, it is necessary in my opinion to use (and to a certain degree abuse) the save/load system. You can save anytime at any moment – I defeated story critical bosses simply by doing this. I swing, I get a hit in, I quick save the game, I swing again, I miss and I load the game and try again. This can get frustrating at times. I did not think this was a super big deal however, I enjoyed the gameplay nonetheless. I played as a strict two-handed warrior and from what I read online; this was a mistake since that is the hardest playstyle in the game, because two handed weapons are very slow and do not do enough damage to mitigate this. Easiest is magic, then ranged attacks (bow or crossbow), then one handed and then two handed. It is universally agreed that two handed weapons are the hardest. My philosophy in any game is to find the biggest sword there is and just bonk all day.

            Right, the story. Like I said, I joined the Mercenaries and helped them around Onar’s farm with various tasks. I learned how to make magical ore weapons and forged my own Zweihanders and felt proud carrying them around (although the save/load system was my strongest weapon). I saved Bennet from town jail because he got framed for murder. Then I was walking around Khorinis, minding my own business and suddenly this really annoying guy got in my face and started talking shit about how he is important and how the group he belongs to really runs the city. So, I killed him with my quicksaving technique and found a note with a key on his body that led me to the den of the Thieves Guild. Their leader once again insulted me and told me how I am a nobody, but if I want, I can join them and through rigorous training they can make a man out of me yet. I killed them all instead, because nobody says things like that to me, right? Then I collected a nice sum of money from the town militia for their heads and bought fancy new armor. Turns out you can actually join them earlier – I was not sure what happened, if I can join the Thieves Guild after I joined a major faction as well. I am not the thieving, dexterous type in games anyway.

            Lee sent me to the head of the paladins for the Eye of Innos which is the magical artifact that Xardas says can empower the chosen one of Innos. Xardas stressed that the paladins will give me the artifact because he made sure that I would be the chosen of Innos. The head of the paladins says that he would not give me the amulet even if that were the case and even if he had it, but he does not, because apparently it was stolen from the monastery of the fire mages. Sounds like plot development.

Before I could even begin looking for the amulet, the head of the paladins sent me back into the Valley of the Mines, because a large contingent of his men went there on a secret mission and he heard nothing back. This is how I got back into the Valley from the first game. I really liked this part, mainly because I liked the first game so much. I soon found out what happened to the paladins that were sent to the Valley – they took up residence in the abandoned fortress of what was the Old Camp and started collecting all the remaining magical ore in the area for the king back on the mainland for the war against the orcs. However, after the magical dome collapsed, the orcs invaded and have now the fortress surrounded. The paladins have no food, no supplies, almost no weapons. You have to fight your way inside the castle every time you want to enter and leave, which is kind of annoying but Milten – a returning character from the first game and one of the friends of the Nameless hero – gives you a teleportation rune. The issue is that there are now two main “worlds” in game maps – two separate areas. The city of Khorinis and its area and the Valley of the Mines. The teleportation runes are exclusive, meaning you cannot teleport from the Valley to Khorinis. You have to walk each time in between and load into each area and only then can you use each area’s corresponding runes. This is super annoying and increased the length of the game by at least 10 hours, especially since speed potions were scarce as hell at this time. Anyway, the paladins send you around the Valley searching for their missing patrols and various areas where they were collecting the ore for the king. Once you finish this quest and die a lot during it, the paladins at the castle conclude that this is very little ore in fact and they need reinforcements. Amidst the some of the side quests, you can also meet and help your other friends from the first game – Gorn and Diego. In the recap regarding the Mercenaries I said that Gorn is a part of them, however ever since the dome collapsed he was in the Valley where he was detained by the paladin expedition who you can persuade to let him go, which I did. Diego was the first character you met in Gothic 1 who took up a mentor’s role and helped you throughout the entire first game. I really liked Diego – what was awesome about him was that he was voiced by the same voice actor who did Vesemir in the Witcher series, Bill Roberts. They changed him in Gothic 2 and that was a shame.

You go back to Khorinis and report this to the head of the paladins in the city that finally agrees to tell you about the Eye of Innos, the artefact you were sent for by Xardas. Like was already mentioned, it was stolen.

So, thus began the quest for the Eye. I went to the monastery, got beat up some more, decided to train a bit by killing all the small goblins and after a while I talked to the head of the fire mages, Master Pyrokar. He turned out to be an annoying old man that hates Xardas a lot because he used to be a fire mage as well, before he turned to necromancy and black magic. Xardas was also the popular kid who drank a lot, never studied and got all the girls. Pyrokar was jealous. After some persuading, he told me how the amulet was stolen – a novice named Pedro took it. So, I followed his trail around the entire map and eventually found it, however the Eye was drained of its power and also shattered. Xardas insisted that I have to get it working, otherwise everything is lost. I go to Bennet, the blacksmith in the Mercenary faction and since I saved him in Khorinis, he repairs the eye without any issues. What I love about Gothic 2 is that I literally could have gone to any other blacksmiths in the game and it could have worked. Now what remained was to imbue the amulet with its divine power, in order to do that, I would have to bring together magicians of the three main circles of power – a fire mage, a water mage and a dark arts mage. Xardas suggests he can be the dark magician without issues and also has an idea who should be the other two. The water mage is another returning character from the first game, Vatras, who is also a priest of Adanos, the god of balance. Vatras being a chill dude agrees and goes to a ritual site where the power of the Eye can be restored. Finally, the fire mage has to be Master Pyrokar who of course refuses to help and only after persuading him that everyone’s life is at stake, he reluctantly agrees, but not before Xardas returns a precious book he has taken with himself when he left the fire mages. Xardas is happy to oblige, since the book is locked by a spell that nobody who does not know the spell can open. Pyrokar is furious, but goes to help with the amulet anyway.

For the ritual to work Vatras tells you he needs a number of ingredients. This is perhaps one of the best moments in the game, because amongst all the other magical doodads, he tells you he also needs three proper joints of weed, because working with Pyrokar is stressing him out since he is such an annoying asshole. Xardas agrees and tells you, he could use a smoke too. Pyrokar just grinds his teeth and calls them unprofessional and lazy. What a prick.

            Joints gone by and the amulet is magically restored as well. Xardas tells me to get ready and then seek out four dragons that have nestled inside the Valley of the Mines that are leading the orcs. With the power of the Eye of Innos, I can interrogate them and seek who is leading them. Each time I do so, the amulet loses power and I have to recharge it using a ritual that utilizes a dragon’s heart. You can see the pattern.

            I have to gush a little bit about the gameplay once again. I am going to the Valley of the Mines the second time now and it is filled with orcs. Now, they are very dangerous on their own and in a group they are lethal. At this point in the game, I could take on one orc easily. But two orcs were difficult and three were impossible. There are also variants of orcs – the basic savage orc, the orc warrior, the difficult to kill and armored elite orc as well as orc shamans (they throw fireballs at you). In the previous chapter a new enemy was also introduced, they are called the Seekers. These are human (presumably) cultists who worship Beliar, the god of darkness and are in league with the dragons, the orcs and whoever is the ultimate master of this unholy army. The seekers look badass, they look like warlocks and rogues from World of Warcraft, they use exclusively dark magic and can curse you if they spot you before you can smack them to death. This curse makes HP recovery difficult. I remarked that they are presumably humans, because they have a vague humanoid shape that is covered by black and red robes, with hoods and creepy (but awesome!) masks. So, kinda like Darth Revan too? I wish I could have gotten their fit for my character, but alas that is impossible. Back to my second trip into the Valley of the Mines – I was geared better; I had a better sword and of course more levels and skills under my belt. This time I would not be running away from orcs for my dear life. Unless there is more than two of them at the same time which was almost always. But I did not give up, I started clearing the Valley of any hostile NPCs and racking up those XPs and levels. It felt great. I also completed some side quests, beat up some more characters who thought they could insult my character’s stupid face and get away with it. Eventually, I got to the point where I could wield the best two-handed sword in the game and it was awesome. Two handing was still the weakest form of combat in the game, but that did not stop me. I started hunting the dragons, I killed them all. The women dragons and the children dragons too. Just kidding, there were only four dragons and each had something to say to me before I did it, because they were compelled by the Eye of Innos which I had to recharge every time I killed one too. I learned how to gather dragon blood as well as their scales. Bennet turned those into the best armor that is in the game – his words, I did not in fact check. It looked kind of stupid, but I really needed the extra protection from slashing, burning and magic.

            The dragons spoke about a master who commands them, someone that is dead, yet lives. They mentioned that the master is close, but far. This master is also supposed to be the chosen of Beliar the same way my character was supposed to be the chosen of Innos. Except I had no army to command, I think. Unless the faction(s) count. Eventually, the final ice dragon that was nestled in the frozen former New Camp from the first game told me the exact location before I slaughtered him. Alright, time was to go back to Xardas – only to find a note that he disappeared and he left me something in the book that I gave to Master Pyrokar. He also left me a magical passcode how to open the book, which held the exact sea chart to the location of the evil temple of Beliar, where the master of the unholy army was located.

            Right, Xardas also mentioned in his letter that he is gone to do more important things and I should get a ship, gather a crew and sail to the temple to kill the master of the unholy army. No big deal. The only ship that was in Khorinis was one that belonged to the paladins. Have I mentioned that the whole game is taking place on an island? As well as the first one? The Valley of the Mines as well Khorinis is on isolated island far off the mainland. My character remarked that had I been a member of the paladins or the fire mages, the ship would be no issue – despite the fact that I completed a quest for Lee earlier, the leader of the mercenaries, regarding a judge from Khorinis who was corrupt and now owed Lee. He simply wrote a letter to the judge to relinquish the command of the ship to me. Easy, peasy. Now I needed to gather a crew – I could invite any of the characters I have helped or simply met during the game. I loved this concept! You are getting ready for the final mission to go kill the big bad guy and have to get a mobile base as well recruit your own kill squad. It was really awesome, it reminded me of my favorite movie trope of getting together a band of specialist. I went with Lee, Gorn, Bennet and Lares from the Mercenaries – everyone had a quality and would be helpful in their own way. Then I could not go without Diego of course (even though I was still pissed their replaced his original Voice Actor). I also got Vatras, the stoner water mage and Lester, a survivor from the Sleeper cult from the first game who was also a stoner. And finally, I got Milten, the fire mage. The game also insisted on getting a captain who can steer the ship and there was this one guy at the monastery of the fire mages that I got, because he was sick of that life and having been a sailor his whole life wanted to get back out there. I finished a side quest, and off we sailed.

            The final chapter of the game was over rather quick and here are my thoughts. There is a trend with older games where if you are near the end, the difficulty suddenly spikes very high just because this is the end. This can be definitely said about Gothic 2. Where I could finally take on four orcs at the same time before I finished up with the Valley of the Mines in the previous chapters, here there were groups of six or eight orcs. Plus, a troll, seekers that throw fire at you, lizard men with insane health pools and also one more dragon. Later, there were skeletons, skeleton mages, skeleton knights, skeleton paladins, zombies and demons. Everything you could fit into an evil temple, was there. The hallways and areas were also incredibly small, so pulling fewer enemies was impossible. Basically, what I did was pull groups, have them follow me and then lead them onto the ship where my crew would help me kill them. This got annoying quickly. During one of these trips when I got back, I found Lee dead. He was not killed by one of the enemies chasing me, I just got back onto the boat and he was lying there dead. Alright, I guess? I really liked the design of the temple however, it reminded me of an alien tomb with weirdly etched symbols, impossibly deep crevasses and never-ending ceilings. Decent, evil vibes. Once again, I have to stress out, that my two handing gamestyle really made me suffer here – once again I said to myself if I were to ever play this game again, I am going with paladins. There was also a sort of puzzle before the main chamber of the temple, which was kind of more annoying to get through rather than to figure out, because it was just pulling levers, but you had no way of knowing which lever was correct and everytime I made a mistake, two strong enemies spawned.

Hello save/load system my old friend.

In the end it turned out that the master of the evil army was an undead dragon that greeted me with the good old “It is I!” and my character gasped: “Not you!” and I just sat in my chair thinking what the hell was going on. During the credits I found out thanks to google that this was supposed to be the Sleeper entity from the first game. But this was in no way communicated to me in the game. Maybe I just missed it, but I am a pretty attentive player. In any case, I killed the undead dragon and a cutscene played. Someone, based upon his clothes I would guess a fire mage or someone similar (the clothes were dark with a hint of red) appeared and it looked as if he absorbed the undead dragon’s soul. The cavern collapsed (this time not on my character though) and I ran towards the ship. I talked to my friends on the way, they each said what their plans were for the future and we sort of said farewell (even though we all left on the same boat, so?).

Lee (who was now miraculously alive) told me to go to rest in the cabin as we are sailing away. He did not say where. There was another cutscene where the Nameless hero heavily sighed and put all his gear into a chest next to a giant bed. Before he could finally lie down and rest after saving the world (or just Khorinis?), someone suddenly magically appeared in his bedroom. It is Xardas! He says that it was him who absorbed the soul of the undead dragon and now he has become the chosen of Beliar, the god of darkness. He exclaims how this is something he always wanted and that we will also meet again before magically vanishing.

            Gothic 2 ends. Damn, so that was an experience. A storytelling and worldbuilding epic, truly the best of Eurojank. I enjoyed it a lot, however I can see how this would not be an experience for everyone. I can easily imagine someone getting turned off by the jankiness, the difficulty, some of the voice acting that is unintentionally funny. As far as I am concerned, I really enjoyed the progression, the gameplay, the levelling up as well as the world. The brutality of the world and the gameplay was fantastic. When I finally accomplished something in the game, it was all my work (and save/load system), it was not because I was the chosen one (although that is what the game says to you many times, however in terms of gameplay, you get nothing). I loved that aspect of it. If I were to rate it, I would give Gothic 2 a 6/10. Slightly above average experience, that I would recommend to anyone, as long as you are aware of its shortcomings.

 

Final Fantasy IX - It is like a Stephen King novel

 

I have been playing a lot of Final Fantasy IX with my wife lately. You could say that we are fans of the franchise - I have been vigorously playing through FFXIV: Shadowbringers annually as well 100% Final Fantasy VII (the original one) every summer. I have never played IX; call me superficial, but I looked at the characters and was turned off. I looked up what the story is about and based upon one single glance I immediately said: no. However, my wife being an admirer of everything Final Fantasy, wanted to give it a try (and I was curious), so we did. Let me briefly outline what are my thoughts on this game – I really enjoyed the 2/3 of the story while disliked the last 1/3. I want to start with simple first impressions of everything going from the aforementioned art style, the gameplay, the characters, before going deeper into the story. There will be spoilers for this 24-year-old game. I will also be criticizing a lot, because that is what I do and who I am. I will also be drawing some comparisons to earlier and later entries in the series.

 

Anyway, I could not have been more wrong about the art style - yes, when you put the characters side by side and you have nothing but a white background behind them, they look weird. They look abnormal. Their heads are somewhat larger than their bodies, their arms plop around them as they walk as if they had no bones - they are absolutely disproportionate, comical even. Up to the point where there is a character whose hair covers their face so much it looks as if they have no face at all. I was shocked how beautiful the scenery and the design of the cities, castles, forests and villages were. The world of Gaia is a fantastic display of high fantasy that somehow reminds me of the Never-ending story and to some degree of Tolkien - especially of the pale drawings of Alan Lee. Forget the cyberpunk of VII and whatever it is that was VIII, the world of IX is traditional fantasy. As such, these over-the-top characters that are far from realistic actually fit quite well into the game. The world map itself isn’t anything to gush about, it remains very similar to VII and VIII, with its bland green for grass, dark green for trees and blue for water, however the interiors of the cities are a shining gem that I have not seen done like this before. Nothing compliments a beautiful scenery better than immersive music. Nobuo once again saw a Final Fantasy game and decided to make an epic soundtrack; the music is so good at invoking medieval fantasy that I want to use it at my next DnD session that I will have with my friends. I simply have to mention these: Court Jesters, Quina’s Theme, Ukulele de Chocobo (Oh my god!!), Linblum, Gargan Roo, Black Mage Village and many others! I mean the music is just amazing. One last thing I want to mention about the soundtrack is that it gave me serious Twin Peaks vibes (and overall, Angelo Badalamenti feelings). Some tracks further near the end of the game have also reminded me of the Disco Elysium of recent fame. Both were expressions of dreamy, hazy and uncertain emotions.

The gameplay system is truly coming in strong when considering what is and is not the traditional "old school" Final Fantasy. It is not entirely turn based, but still retains the classic ATB system that VII and VIII had. I enjoyed it. I had issues with how the animations not always sync up with what is going on and sometimes, especially during boss battles it can get somewhat daunting to figure out who is going to attack when. However, I could get used to it. There are no limit brakes in FFIX, instead the developers opted for a “trance system”, which works in a similar way, even though there are differences. In IX, what happens is that when a character has sustained enough damage, they “trance” and transform into a strengthened version of themselves. Their visuals also change which is really the only exciting part about the whole thing. Mages can go twice in a row, melee characters attack with stronger blows but that is it. What is annoying is that there is no control over when a character goes into “trance”. So, 90% of all trancing is wasted on trash mobs. There is also an equip and an ability system that is somewhat intertwined – every character has five slots for gear and each piece of gear has one or more abilities that a character can use if they have this piece equipped. They can also, over the course of battling gain ability points (AP) which can contribute to that character learning that ability regardless of the item equipped. So, for example you have Zidane (the protagonist) equip a Power Vest which has the ability Counter – Zidane needs to gain a specific amount of AP in battle in order to learn the Counter ability so that he can use it with other gear equipped.

This all sounds very interesting and I was excited when it was first introduced, however further into the game you realize that essential abilities are tied to this system and each character can only equip a limited number of abilities. Therefore, you cannot really make insane combinations like you could do in Final Fantasy Tactics (which is the best Final Fantasy game of all time, obviously). Typical FF summons like Bahamut, Alexander, Odin (and others – although no Diabolos in IX!) are present and they also feature somewhat in the story, but not to an extent they do in the latest FFXVI – however this time there are only two characters in the game, who can do the summoning (unlike in VII or VIII).

 

Alright, I am getting near to the characters themselves, but before I break them down, let me get you into what the story is about, at least partially. In the world of Gaia, there is the city kingdom of Alexandria where the Queen Brahne rules and whose daughter Garnet does not really want to be a princess and wants to escape her everyday life. Well… in comes the main protagonist of the game called Zidane (no football jokes) who is a part of a travelling circus called the Tantalus Theater Troupe, a gathering of actors, performers, jugglers, you name it. He is a young monkey man (that is what he is referred to in game, however he has a yellow tail and that is it) who is full of bravado, does not fear anything, wants to enjoy life to the fullest and is very easy going. You can imagine the type - Indiana Solo but without the trademarked Ford grumpiness and with beautiful Meg Ryan blonde hair that is parted down the middle. The Tantalus roams the world aboard the Prima Vista, a flying airship. Have I mentioned that FFIX is traditional high medieval fantasy? There are flying ships too. Zidane and his friends are getting ready for a performance of a play in Alexandria where they also plan to kidnap Garnet the princess. It is never quite clearly stated why they want to do that, but one would assume for money. Thankfully, Garnet wants to be kidnapped, however the whole operation goes down literally in flames as the Queen, Garnet’s adoptive mother decides to blast the ship with cannons and they crash in a cursed forest full of monsters. They are also joined by Steiner, a captain of the Knights of Pluto who are one half of the Queen’s guard. He joins the fleeing Prima Vista and reluctantly joins Zidane and Co. in their escape from the cursed forest. They are also joined by Vivi, a shy little boy who looks almost exactly like the Black Mage sprite from older Final Fantasy games. He turns out to be exactly that – a black mage. Together they flee the forest and Garnet decides that she does not want to return home and persuades everyone to go the nearest city kingdom of Lindblum, where she has an uncle (this game’s Cid). Steiner protests, of course. The party is attacked by Black Mages who turn out to be puppets that serve the Queen of Alexandria who turns out wants to conquer the whole world with their magic, because we need our first villain. Garnet is also a summoner and her adoptive mother needs to extract the summoning magic from her in order to get a steady access to other Black Mage puppets. These are being supplied by a mysterious individual about whom I have a lot to say later.

 

Now, let us take a break and let me start describing the characters and what I think about them. This is very important to me, because if it is not a From Software game (or exceptions), my main interest in a game is the story and the characters.

I will start with the party members I like.

My most favorite character has to be Freya. She is a Burmecian dragon knight – meaning she is this game’s iteration of the dragoon job from Final Fantasy. Dragoons either hunt dragons by jumping really high and/or have the power of dragons themselves. Freya seems to be more of the latter. She is no non sense, strong and yet empathetic. She is a dreamer and a romantic. She is not afraid to get shit done either, however. What I love about her design is the fact that she is apparently not a human – she is a Burmecian. It is my subjective opinion that the more fantastical characters in a fantasy, the better. Who plays humans in World of Warcraft? I am a boring human in real life, after all. Freya is from another city kingdom called Burmecia whose inhabitants look like humanoid rodents with distinct facial features (similar to that of the Skaven from WHFB, yes-yes). They also have claws and tails. They stand tall and proud, and Freya is no exception. In terms of gameplay, she is a solid frontliner with the already mentioned jump abilities – dragoons also invoke the power of dragons and her weapon of choice is the spear. She also has a semi romantic – platonic relationship with a fellow Burmecian dragoon named Sir Fratley, whom she has been looking for ever since he has disappeared. And their reunion is a tragedy as well. When it comes down to it, I like Freya because she is the type of a female character I love in any media. She is not an omnipotent Rey, but is very confident and capable still. She also is not afraid to show love and emotion. Freya is amazing and I could gush about her for days.

I really like Vivi. He is uncertain, very shy, introverted and ultimately afraid (and terrified) when he slowly comes to the realization that he might also be artificially created just like the other Black Mages. What makes Vivi different however is that he has the stature and mind of a 10ish year old boy. The Queen’s Black Mages are tall, adult like and have a very computer like disposition. They follow simple commands, do not appear to express any feelings or thoughts. They do not have opinions. They are killing machines and that is it. Vivi however does all that and behaves like a real person. His journey of finding out who he is and how he came to be is harrowing, sad and overall, very well done. His responses to what is happening around him as well as to him are believable and he is very sympathetic. I just want to hug him and tell him that everything is going to be fine. What needs to be said is that Vivi reacts better to all the horrific truths he finds about himself better than any adult in the game to less dramatic circumstances. Really goes to show that even in video games, age itself is rarely representative of maturity, just like in real life.

There is also Quinna. A character of ambiguous gender and role. They are a giant that is solely obsessed by eating good food. They join Zidane and Co. with the promise that if they travel the world together, Quinna gets to eat all the delicious food there is. I like Quinna. They are entertaining and it seems to me that they might be the first straight up comic relief character in a Final Fantasy game that is actually funny. Which is rarer than a unicorn. The jokes are somewhat basic and range from catching frogs and eating them to abrupt suicide by frog, but they work 90% of the time. I have little to say about Quinna, but I love them a lot.

Finally, amongst the party members that I like is Eiko. She is a small girl, an orphan that lives in a ruined village the main storyline takes you to, eventually. Her only company are moogles. And oh my god! I just have to sidestep away from Eiko for a bit and talk about the moogles! How could I have skipped them so far? If you don’t know what a moogle is, they are essentially grumpy, sometimes lazy, sometimes annoying, type of fairies from the Final Fantasy series. Their design varies from game to game as well as the fact whether they even appear in it or not. In any case, moogles in FFIX appear as cute cuddly furry little bears (or cats?) with tiny bat wings and each moogle has a tiny ball on their head which is colored either red or pink (that is called a pom pom, kupo). They are 90% identical to the moogles you can find in FFXIV. Not only do the moogles function as characters with their own sizable side quest in the game, they also work as the save point, tent point and teleport hub in the game’s world. The males and females of the moogles are differentiated by the colors red and pink, respectively. The feminine moogles also sport a pink bowtie and clothing, which is cute. Enough about the moogles. Eiko is a small kid and she has her own trials with being left all alone. She protects a summoner relic in her village which was left to her by her grandfather who has passed. Obviously, she does not know exactly how to behave properly around other people and displays her awkward nature around others (she never misses an opportunity to profess her love to Zidane). Overall, I liked her. Just like Vivi, she takes challenges head on, she knows that you can be afraid and courage is overcoming that fear.

Usually, with Square’s track record for children characters I was dreading Eiko and Vivi, but I stand in amazement at how great they are. The other child characters in later games are abysmal in comparison. I feel like this needs to be said. I feel like Vivi and Eiko might just be the best kid characters in any Final Fantasy game (perhaps excluding FFXIV).

 

Sigh. Alright, now here we go for the characters I did not like. I will start with those I like the least and eventually I will get down to the one I dislike the most. I do not want to use the word hate. Not yet, anyway.

             

The protagonist of the game is called Zidane, like I mentioned before. I do not like Zidane very much. This is really my personal preference, but he reminds me too much of another Final Fantasy character I despise from a later game. I know this is not fair, but nothing is, so there is that. Why I don’t like Zidane, besides his obvious similarities to a certain snot nosed blonde haired idiot? Well, his nonstop abuse of anything with a skirt or a pair of boobs – and I mean NONSTOP, Zidane never misses a chance to hit on anyone. Pretty early on he sets his sights on Garnet and just bombards her with bad pick-up lines at the most inappropriate of times – like when her entire home is destroyed. Instead of consoling her or trying to give her space, Zidane is immediately in her tits about how he wants to take her out and bang her. Even Zevran would tell him to cool his jets. What else? The one aspect of Zidane’s character I like is how cheerful he is throughout the game and how optimistic he is. Final Fantasy as a series is so full of dark and edgy protagonists, and while those can work – it is my personal belief that life itself is too short to spend it moping around. Bad things happen to good people and that is horrible, but what exacerbates things I feel are unnecessarily depressive protagonists in media. So, Zidane has that going for him in my eyes. However, this is completely forgotten about at a certain point in the story when suddenly he decides he does not want to be a burden, he needs to do everything on his own, blah, blah, you know the trope. He does have parts in the story when he is not constantly hitting on Garnet that I liked – especially his relationship with Vivi and Eiko. His encouragement of Freya. Zidane seems as if he really cares about the people around him and wants them to succeed as well as be happy. Which further clashes with that one point in the story when he is suddenly a dick to everyone. And it is not like he is mind controlled. Eh, it could have been worse, could have been more like Tidus.

Right, so there is Steiner. A classic German sounding name for a very old school “knight”. Zidane calls him Rusty throughout the game and other characters also comment on his armor being less than pristine. Despite the fact that the game is situated in a medieval pseudo-European setting, the armor Steiner wears is very similar to an Iberian conquistador, which somewhat clashes with the visual theme that is presented in the game, at least for me. Furthermore, Steiner is incredibly annoying throughout the first half of the game. He is either unintentionally goofing around, always saying things that are out of touch or just cringeworthy. He makes attempts at comedy, but I never laughed. He is like Quinna, but not funny. What is worse, Steiner is supposed to be a serious character (sometimes). He is also one of the first adults in the party that you get and dare I say that he behaves more like a child than the actual two children you get in the game (wtf?). This is a recurrent theme, by the way. The game insists on him being the point of view character for many chapters and sequences, and I just cannot take him seriously. He is either fussing about Garnet being the all-important princess or insulting Zidane for being “shady”. Eventually, after several hours of this, Steiner slightly develops when one of the antagonists “joins” the group – Queen Brahne’s general and Steiner’s former colleague, Beatrix. I really like her, because she is the exact opposite of Steiner (which I think was the point) – quite literally, she is capable, no nonsense – she is a badass female warrior and a general. She has her own commando of female warriors which mirrors Steiner as well. He has his Knights of Pluto (who are shown to be incompetent and goofy, just like Steiner). It is a shame that Beatrix does not become an actual party member (this is fixed with mods, of course). For me, there was too much Steiner in the game. He either needed to become a more capable character or more serious. The humor did not work for me. I have read somewhere on a wiki that Steiner is supposed to represent the Dark Knight job from previous Final Fantasy games, but I did not see that anywhere. What a shame.

Then there is Amarant. He is a blue and green dude that looks like he fell out from a rejected Gorillaz concept art, a ridiculous design with giant arms, small legs, a goatee that would make evil Abed jealous and also hair that is impossible (which is not a criticism just an observation; impossible hair is a staple of the FF series, after all). Now, I am not one on disliking characters solely based on their appearance. But it does help if they do not look ridiculous. Which Amarant does! Anyway, what is Amarant about? He is a bounty hunter who lives for the hunt! He chases his prey relentlessly and does not care about company, friendship, love… you know the type. He is charged by bringing the party to heel and eventually Zidane beats him one on one and then like a Pokémon, he joins the party, because he has nothing better to do. Throughout the game he keeps pestering Zidane and Garnet, and Vivi. He keeps insulting them for having feelings, he insults everyone whenever they express happiness or joy. While Zidane and Garnet are professing their love for each other - boring and unfulfilling love - Amarant is studying the blade. If I could roll my eyes any harder, my optic nerves would be tangled like Rapunzel’s hair. Amarant has one line at the very end, when he says that he respects Zidane but still thinks he is an idiot for caring about others. What a useless character.

I despise Garnet. She is what I hate in every female character in any media. Weak and pathetic - always needing saving. She is the opposite of a Mary Sue. Absolutely worthless. I just… I don’t know what else is there to say? Sometimes she reacts normally to certain events happening, but most of the time she is truly the original Princess Peach. Sorry, Zidane, the princess is in another castle. There are times in the story when she is given power for power’s sake and she does NOTHING with it. She is also central to the story, so it is not like you can just park her outside the obligatory 4 party members slot (like I do with Aerith every time I play VII). The game insists on having you play as either her or Steiner and it is infuriating. These parts cannot be skipped, they contribute little to anything to the plot and are somehow more worthless than the Laguna flashbacks in VIII. Oh, she is sad because she has to live the life of a princess. Oh, she is sad, because her mother starts a war. Oh, she is sad because Zidane keeps hitting on her. Oh, she is sad because evil clowns kidnap her. Oh. My. God. Meanwhile there are two literal children in the party that have their entire lives turned upside down, have been abandoned and had their families slaughtered, but yes, Garnet, please tell me more about how sad you are. Not even their romance makes any sense. She falls for Zidane…. Because? Because the story requires her to do so in order to move forward. Pathetic. At least Beatrix and Steiner have a funny happenstance of a meeting that I could see being real. They complement each other. Steiner, despite his faults has a sense of deep loyalty and that is something that Beatrix admires about him, while Steiner is smitten with how Beatrix really is amazing at everything she does, but then again, she does not feel steady or grounded in what she feels. Zidane and Garnet? They are a couple, because he is the protagonist and she is the love interest. There is no other reason. I hate this.

Right, so these were the party members. I loved Freya, Vivi, Quinna and Eiko. I did not like Steiner, Zidane and Amarant. I hated Garnet. Last we left the story was when Queen Brahne of Alexandria declared war on the other city kingdoms. She lays waste to Burmecia, annihilating it completely while the party slowly trudges through the ruins, while the Burmecian survivors flee towards a distant refuge. So, the story so far had me really hooked in. There were some characters I did not care for, but the overall plot of pseudo-medieval geopolitics was super interesting. I also liked the personal stories of Vivi and Freya. It is in the ruins of Burmecia where we first meet Kuja. Oh boy. This is the mysterious weapons dealer who supplies Queen Brahne with the endless supply of black mages in exchange for Garnet’s eikons (Final Fantasy name for summons). And let me go on another tangent here. Once again, first let me comment on the design of Kuja. This is probably nothing surprising, but I did not like it. I try not to overuse swearing, I have always felt that swear words have their place in everyday life as well as in any media and there is just no way of saying this otherwise, so here goes nothing. Kuja looks like he woke up one day and decided he wanted to get the prize for the biggest slut in the universe. There is nothing quite like this design. It is ridiculous beyond any belief. He wears a loosely clasped see through veil around his hips, a man thong with the tiniest spot covering his junk, a bra with sleeves and nothing else. This is slut central, the harlot train 5000, the ambassador of the hooker bimbos. It is just… unbelievable. I fail to put into words how fantastically unreal the design is. I thought that I would never feast my eyes on a more absurd character design than Master Seymour from FFX, but here we are.

I tried my best to not judge a book by its cover, I tried to get past the design and I figured, ok, let me see what is this mysterious weapons dealer is all about. But, come on. He arrives on a silver feathery dragon (that is green) and he even has a theme song that sounds like a slowed down “We Will Rock You” by the Queen and starts strutting about, thrusting his hips about in the most erotic fashion possible while trying to be threating and commanding like Darth Vader. And I just cannot, I am sorry, Final Fantasy IX, I tried. The writers also give him this serious script that is nowhere near as wild as his design – Kuja is basically just another typical Final Fantasy villain that essentially wants to first rule the world and then, when this is not possible, he wants to destroy it, because screw it. Actually, he wants to destroy not just this world, but all the worlds, everywhere and all of reality at the same time. There is more to this, but it is hardly nuanced and it is something you have seen done a million times everywhere else. I have read that people like Kuja because he is “complex” and combines the traits of three various other villains from the Final Fantasy series – specifically Kefka’s nihilism (nothing matters, so why bother), Golbez’s dynamic with a good and an evil brother (oh yes, he is Zidane’s “brother“) and Xande’s fear of mortality. I disagree with this assessment, primarily because these are defining traits of three separate characters that make sense when they are separate. They make little sense when combined, at least to me.

 

I am going to try and maintain the illusion that I can follow the narrative in a comprehensive way in a similar fashion as I could not just accept Kuja as a character that exists in the world of FFIX and was constantly taken out of it, whenever he appeared.

But I will try – there is a magical giant tree that is sentient which produces a mysterious substance called the Mist. Which is in reality all the souls of the deceased of the world Gaia, which is where the game takes place. This Mist produces monsters and covers certain parts of the continent, which is why the kingdom of Lindblum where Cid reigns utilizes airships (which was neat and I loved this aspect of worldbuilding). This Mist is also used by Kuja to create more Black Mages for Queen Brahne’s army. The party does some travelling and visits more medieval looking towns, there is a card tournament, there is a fighting tournament and more worldbuilding and I am loving this part. Eventually, they all travel to this magical tree where they figure some things out, they defeat the Avatar of this tree, Kuja appears and mind controls Bahamut with a space ship, kills Brahne, proceeds to destroy Alexandria just moments after Garnet is supposed to become the new Queen – then the party flees to Lindblum, where Kuja appears again and destroys it with a giant mouth (it’s the Atomos summon/enemy) and flies off like team rocket again. Only team rocket wishes they were that sexy and slutty looking when doing all their evil shenanigans. Up to this point I am still kind of on board and while whenever Kuja is on screen I am just torn away from the world and my immersion is ruined – I enjoy the battle system, I enjoy the locales and the various game mechanics. I am loving the music.

Some more things happen, Garnet loses her voice and is extremely sad (oh no! Anyway…), Zidane hits on her some more just after she lost her adoptive mother, her queenship, her city kingdom and everyone she ever knew died (come on Garnet, it is just like happy festival fireworks!). What I neglected to mention is that Cid is cursed by his wife, because he was chasing other women and cheated on her, which is a plot point that just slaps you out of nowhere and I do not know whether to take this seriously or not. It was funny as hell, but I do not think that was what the writers were going for. Eventually, through a lot of backtracking and filler the party figures out that the magical tree they were already at some 10 hours of game time previously is the source of Kuja’s power. At least they think so. So, they commandeer Cid’s airship and fly towards it.

Unlike the previous Final Fantasy games in the series, this one has a lot of CG generated cutscenes. A lot! Sometimes it felt like there were too many of them and too little game, but it never reached the ridiculousness of other FF games (like XIII). Such a scene plays when the party aboard the airship gets towards the tree – other ships appear, an entire flotilla of ships with survivors from Lindblum, Burmecia and Alexandria. It is a super powered friendship moment because the flotilla helps the party reach a portal that has appeared above the magical tree out of which a massive herd of dragons attacks everyone. It is a spectacle during which you as the player do nothing.

 

Right, this is the part where the first two thirds of the story are concluded and where really my enjoyment of the game ends. What follows is the last third that had me disinterested and asking regularly “how much more of this is there?”.

 

The party wakes up in another world, another dimension in a different point of time. They do not know where they are or how they got there. It all looks very H.R. Geiger but for kids – so just like the original Alien movie. No absurd genitals or graphic sexual violence. I kind of like the design, but that is about the only thing I enjoy. What they find out is this – there is a different world called Terra, which was destroyed a long time ago by a cataclysm of natural circumstances. Before the survivors withdrew into stasis in their cryosleep pods they created an everlasting custodian called Garland who was supposed to take care of them, and possibly also figure out how to bring everything back. Talk about high expectations. Garland looks like an evil version of Iron Man – complete with a black mechanical suit and a red arc reactor on his chest. He created artificial monkey people like Kuja and Zidane who were sent to Gaia to help create a process called “rejoining” (FFXIV fans, pat yourselves on the back). This would essentially merge the remains of Terra into Gaia and create a new world which could be repopulated by the sleeping original inhabitants of Terra. For this, Garland created the magical tree which turned the souls of Gaia’s inhabitants into Mist and allowed the souls of Terra’s people to be integrated into Gaia’s system of reincarnation, essentially replacing the souls of Gaia. Garland gives a lot of power to Kuja, who is his lieutenant – including his inter-dimensional space ship that sucks up summons like a hoover as well as allows Kuja to mind control them. Zidane has forgotten all about this, of course. Amnesia, what a plot device. Kuja does not like to be Garland’s lackey and eventually rebels against him. He attacks the party, who defeats him. Then the party defeats Garland who besides his really great design is just spouting non-sense all the time, pseudo intellectual and pseudo philosophical non sense about how what is reality anyway, what defines a soul, etc. The entire theme of the game is further reinforced as existentialism. Why does anything matter? Why should we bother doing anything when eventually we die, because we are mortal? What is the point of any of it?

Well, the game does not bother answering any of these hard questions, it just gives you the usual power of friendship and the party succeeds in stopping the rejoining, stopping Garland and stopping Kuja.

I want to make a somewhat insignificant remark in regards to the story here. The final level is called Memoria and is very reminiscent of Griffith’s dream from Berserk – especially the long staired wind up to the castle. There is also a screen in the castle that looks entirely lifted from Berserk, from the same sequence – when boy Griffith is chasing his dream during the events of his rebirth during the Eclipse.

Ok, so the party defeats Kuja, who wants to destroy everything because he realized that he was also made by Garland to be mortal and will die. And what is the point of anything existing if he is going to perish, right? After he is defeated, the ultimate god of the universe suddenly shows up and the party defeats that too, because friendship is magical and love is awesome.

I am aching at this point. The endings of Final Fantasy are like the endings of a Stephen King novel.

Everybody gets magically transported back onto Gaia, into the magical tree. Everyone starts fleeing, but Zidane who at a last minute decides to go back for Kuja. Everybody pleads with Zidane not to go back as the tree is collapsing and he will surely die. Amarant calls him an idiot and fucks off, proving once again his worthlessness to the narrative. Zidane finds a dying Kuja at the root of the structure and they exchange some words about friendship and being brothers. The scene fades to black. If it were to end here, I would actually not be that mad.

It does not.

The game then shows what happened to everyone. Freya reunites with Sir Fratley and they get their happily ever after, so does Steiner and Beatrix. Quina goes on to become the royal culinarian of the kingdom of Alexandria. Vivi seemingly dies because Black Mages only live for a limited amount of time, but leaves behind identical copies of himself, his sons, which is heart-wrenching. Amarant is mean to a girl and as usual does not contribute anything. Garnet has her crowning ceremony during which the Tantalus theatre company once again performs the same show it did at the beginning of the game, the game shows a lot of the play – 10 minutes straight of actors performing their lines. It is drawing out as much as it can the fake out death of Zidane as possible. It takes way too long. Eventually, the lead of the shows discards his costume and is revealed to be the protagonist and tearful Garnet runs to him, discarding much of the stately jewelry, including the royal jewel for which she was named before jumping on him in a loving embrace.

The end.

 

All I have to ask is this: were the last 6 hours of non-sense sci-fi really necessary? Square had a strong medieval fantasy with various kingdoms vying for power and some shady behind the scenes manipulation. Sure, Kuja is ridiculous and cannot be taken seriously, but if the story remained grounded in what it was, it would have stuck the landing.

It may seem like I was really harsh on Final Fantasy IX, it may even seem like I really dislike the game. This is not true, overall, I liked it, I just found the last third disappointing. If I were to rate it, I would have to explain it too. A 10/10 is a legendary video game, a 5/10 is an average game with nothing exceptional about it and a 1/10 is utter garbage and a waste of time. The first two thirds of the game were strong, really great, perhaps even 8/10, but the last third and the ending just drag it down for me. And just like a terrible ending can ruin an otherwise great movie, so was the case with this game for me.

I would rate Final Fantasy IX a solid 7/10 – a truly good and above average experience.