Why can’t Square Enix get its HD re-releases proper?
Last week, Final Fantasy followers of impeccable style have been ecstatic: finally Final Fantasy 9, one of the best one, was launched for Switch and Xbox One. Then got here an all-too-familiar realisation for followers of traditional Square Enix titles: the caveats.
Those bloody caveats. Make no mistake, Final Fantasy 9 on Switch remains to be one of the well-rounded, charming and good RPGs of its variety ever launched. But as what looks like is now the norm, Square Enix’s fashionable re-release of the game options an array of niggling little issues that add up to make sure that what needs to be the definitive model of a traditional is compromised.
We’ve seen this story earlier than, after all, however with the Switch launch of FF9 it feels significantly egregious. FF9 launched on iOS in February 2016. It hit Steam the next April, then PS4 in September 2017. Each and each considered one of these variations of the game has suffered the identical issues, and followers have been constantly vocal about them. We’re now three years on from that cell launch and never solely has Square Enix not seen match to repair the issues on these platforms, it’s actively releasing the identical flawed model of the game on two new items of {hardware}.
Some of the issues are issues issues you’ll be able to not less than argue Square Enix has made an aesthetic selection round. The unique launch of FF9 had a rustic-looking font designed to match its setting, as an illustration. The re-release opts to go for a extra sterile, fundamental typeface. The new font is worse, however you’ll be able to argue that the builders behind the port by some means determined the substitute is superior. Fair sufficient. There’s lots of little modifications like this, comparable to a Vaseline smear filter over the CG backgrounds that usually actively makes them look worse, and necessary textured gray sidebars across the game’s 4:30 presentation. This stuff is unhealthy, however it’s a selection. Fine.
Other issues are simply bugs, nonetheless. The most placing other than the occasional crash is an issue with the presentation of the game’s soundtrack, a key a part of any Final Fantasy expertise. In FF9’s fashionable port the power for the game to select up a music monitor the place it left off was by some means misplaced within the translation over from PS1.
This doesn’t sound like a giant deal on paper, besides many music tracks in FF9 are a number of minutes lengthy and play in areas the place you’ll stumble right into a random encounter each ten to thirty seconds. FF9’s overworld music is a phenomenal, relaxed three minute melody, however on this model you’ll be fortunate to listen to greater than the primary fifteen seconds over and over, the monitor restarting after every random encounter. It’s a multitude, and although a soundtrack downside might sound minor, Final Fantasy is the sequence that sells out concerts at the Royal Albert Hall. More than maybe some other, this can be a sequence the place music issues.
What’s most unusual about this bug sitting and not using a repair for 3 years is that Square Enix even managed to ship one other traditional FF with an an identical bug. Final Fantasy 10 HD Remaster featured an an identical error however this was patched inside just a few months. In fixing FF10’s iteration of the bug Square has primarily admitted it’s not an appropriate error, however FF9 retains it nonetheless. The uneven remedy could be right down to the truth that FF10 is a full, boxed launch – however placing out a recent model of FF9 on a brand new platform that includes the identical bugs followers have been complaining about for 3 years feels moderately rather a lot like Square is taking the piss.
In different areas the port simply feels rushed. It was first ported to cell, however that is as bare-bones as a cell port comes. Menus on console warn you that you could’t use emoji in character title fields, whereas the most-useful quick ahead characteristic requires a menu to be opened first moderately than a easy button press. The latter is a characteristic the fashionable FF7 port contains, so even between these same-generation re-releases there’s a weird, unflattering lack of consistency amongst releases.
That lack of consistency is usually the theme. Final Fantasy eight on Steam nonetheless options god-awful, disastrous MIDI music, whereas FF7 had its music fairly promptly patched. The PC launch of FF7 is an identical to the console variations on a floor stage however is definitely lacking a slate of options added in these variations – regardless of it being the bottom for these later variations. Then there’s Chrono Trigger, which launched on PC as a gross, careless cash grab utilizing considered one of Square Enix’s best ever games – however in that occasion assets have been rapidly allotted to whip it into form, and it now sits as one of Square’s finest port jobs.
Why can’t Square Enix get this proper? Why in some cases does it clearly take heed to followers, offering verbal suggestions, promising after which delivering fixes, whereas in different instances voices go ignored for years? Why is the corporate’s treasured, genre-defining again catalog handled with such carelessness? If Square Enix needs to view its classics as seminal items of gaming historical past, as artwork, it ought to begin with its remedy of them at residence.
More than something, how is it okay to get away with re-releasing flawed ports years after gamers identified all the issues – and cost over $20 for it whereas they’re at it?
The reply, after all, is that it isn’t. Final Fantasy 9 is considered one of my favourite games of all time, however this careless perspective doesn’t deserve your cash. My recommendation? Head to eBay and choose up a PS1 set as an alternative. If digging out the precise {hardware} isn’t interesting, the emulation choices are intensive – and a rattling sight higher than this port.
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