The Opening of ‘Last Fantasy IX’ Is a Love Letter to Fantasy Itself

Final Fantasy games are recognized for his or her large, bombastic openings. Last Fantasy VII‘s legendary bombing mission, the brainwashed Terra being despatched by the snowy paths into Narshe in Last Fantasy VI, the destruction of Zanarkand in Last Fantasy X—these are grand set pieces with excessive stakes, introducing threats and conflicts central to their epic narratives. They’re large and loud, meant to right away hook you right into a journey that may final dozens upon dozens (upon dozens) of hours.

They’re all iconic in their very own rights, however there’s just one Last Fantasy opening that I’ve performed again and again rising up with the franchise and hold revisiting even when I don’t really keep on enjoying past it that a lot: Last Fantasy IX‘s theatrical, whimsical introduction to Alexandria.

Last Fantasy IX, which turns 25 as we speak, opens in stark distinction to its PS1 predecessors. Already a serious divergence in returning to the traditional fantasy aesthetic that had outlined a lot of Last Fantasy‘s earliest days—and had been, to a lot success, diverged from itself at that time in succession with VI, VII, and significantly VIII‘s leaning into extra steampunk and trendy sci-fi trappings—Last Fantasy IX opens in a much more subdued method. We’re steadily launched to the assorted preliminary gamers in IX‘s occasion throughout three interwoven storylines, all threading round a particular efficiency of a play referred to as “I Need to Be Your Canary,” held to have a good time the Alexandrian princess Garnet’s birthday.

There’s Vivi, a younger boy new to the town however wanting to see the sights and attend the play, solely to seek out that the ticket he was bought is a pretend. There’s Captain of the Guard Steiner, tasked with guaranteeing the night goes off with no hitch. There’s Zidane and the crew of the Tantalus, masquerading because the theater troupe placing on the efficiency however secretly tasked with kidnapping Princess Garnet on the behest of a rival nation-state—and Garnet herself, who really desires to be kidnapped so she will be able to escape the management of her more and more erratic mom, Queen Brahne, and see the world past Alexandria’s partitions.

Except for its intelligent interwoven tales, what makes Last Fantasy IX‘s opening act stand out subsequent to its contemporaries is how playful it’s with the style the collection has returned to. This isn’t Last Fantasy VII‘s daring act of eco-terrorism or Final Fantasy VIII‘s deliberate shattering of its preliminary faculty setting with the truth of battle. That’s to not say there aren’t stakes which are actual to the remainder of the story’s opening, after all—Garnet’s issues about her mom’s habits are for her potential to plunge the world into chaos, and the Tantalus troupe’s mission has comparable stakes the place failure might result in struggle between Alexandria and the neighboring city-state of Lindblum. However the opening is wrapped in a layer of metanarrative that’s actually concerning the thought of fantasy itself and what it means for Last Fantasy to have returned to this classical, medieval-inspired custom.

Every of the characters we’re launched to all through the opening act are eager for one thing larger and past their present tons in life: Vivi desires neighborhood and friendship as he takes on this planet, even when it means he will get hoodwinked a couple of occasions. Garnet, extra than simply out of fear for Queen Brahne’s decline, desires to be freed from the expectations positioned upon her as a princess. Though he could not initially understand it till Garnet asks him to whisk her away, Zidane finds himself instantly enchanted by the princess he’s been tasked with rescuing and the prospect of a life past his thievery. Even “I Need to Be Your Canary” itself, a riff on Shakespearean classics, is about this type of longing: a Romeo and Juliet-esque story of star-crossed lovers, Cornelia and Marcus, whose love transcends their views on both aspect of a battle between warring kingdoms.

“I Need to Be Your Canary” itself even turns into mechanically necessary to this romantic view of fantasy. A lot of the early battles you combat in Last Fantasy IX‘s opening aren’t, as they’re within the different video games, precise fights: they’re introduced, even past tutorialization, with a layer of artifice. The duels within the play, from Zidane and his Tantalus comrade Clean’s well-known minigame, to the portrayal of the play’s combat scenes as in any other case traditional Last Fantasy turn-based fight (together with “SFX” instructions to solid magical spells that don’t really hurt however dazzle the viewing viewers), there’s a layer of fantasy beneath the fantasy IX is already participating with, a love letter to the romantic archetypes of the style.

There’s a way of craving all through IX‘s opening—for the participant returning to Last Fantasy‘s conventional aesthetics, for its characters and their wishes to see past their present lives, and for the sport itself to play with the wanderlust of all of it. It stays as infectious now because it did 25 years in the past, a name to journey that doesn’t open with the promise of world-ending calamities or large evils to combat, however a easy need to embrace that fantasy. And see, as IX‘s overworld theme asks us to contemplate, what’s over that hill, and what’s past the following horizon.

Need extra io9 information? Take a look at when to count on the most recent Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s subsequent for the DC Universe on film and TV, and every little thing you must learn about the way forward for Doctor Who.