Why a lot of fans don't like this game *SPOILERS*

[empower]

LOL.

Congrats. You've managed to make a LOT say so little. Nice side-stepping though.

It's silly of you to call pre 32-bit characters cartoonish also. Back then that was about as good as the game-makers could make them look. That was also a time where we could look at graphics like that and see real people rather than say 16 bit figures made of very few pixels. Nowadays artists and developers have the ability to shape characters into anything from Smurf's to real people. FFIX was more on the Smurf side.

I'm having a hard time taking you seriously when you rip on FFVII's characters compared to IX. VII has by fact the best and most memorable characters in I would say any RPG ever. Sephiroth, Cloud, Tifa, Vincent even are phenomenally more popular and once again more human / interesting than the blank tablet characters of IX. Steiner brought some great personality but more as an ongoing comic relief if you ask me.

By the by - the material I presented was not simply my opinion but it was such as well as a large portion of reiteration of mass opinion about the game. Trust me I do my reading about how games are received as well.

I'm just going to pop in and say vivisteiner you are out of your mind for calling FFIX the best of the series.

The characters were completely overly cartoonish and often juvenile. The humanity and emotion of great games like FFVII and VIII were completely absent. Hell it was even humorless!

You have no sense of humour.

FFIX's characters are some of the most human and relatable in the series, whereas FFVII and VIII featured some of the most rediculous and poorly handled character development I've ever seen. At least, when there was character development at all.

Compared to FFXII (and most other FF titles), IX:

1. Is shorter, by a LOT.
2. Is more cartoonish / abstract
3. Lacks characters with ANY depth
4. Lacks innovation or new concepts
5. Is too lighthearted for the most part. Good guys and bad guys alike seem completely un-frightening or powerful.

1.It can be shorter if you know what you're doing. My first playthrough (and most peoples I'm sure) clocked in at about 40 hours. The only game in the series it's shorter than is FFXII, and only because it's incredibly long.
2.You claim FFVI and VII among your favourites and complain about this? It's no more cartoonish than any FF pre-FFVIII. Particularly the ones in the pre-32-bit era.
3.Play it again. These characters had more depth and development than any character in FFVII or VIII and it was better handled than almost any game in the series. From Zidane's relationship with Bikke and Tantalus, to Garnet having to deal with having to fight her mother while still caring deeply for her, to Vivi's struggle's with the revelation of his creation and what it means for him as a person. This is just about the definitive character story in the series.
4.I'll give you this one, but only because it wasn't trying to be overly innovative. I will say though that the return to a strict class system was a plus and made it a much more strategic game, and refined and balanced this system to play almost as well as FFV.
5.I actually feel that the villians are some of the best in the series. Kuja and Braane destroy entire cities, and kill who knows how many people. And the whole time the player is left feeling almost helpless. I think this struggle against seemingly insurmountable odds only added to the feeling that everything was on the line.

IX lacks a strong hero figure and a dark enough or cool enough villain.

I think Zidane was a stronger hero figure than the previous two games, if only because he was a good person who was fairly selfless in his desire to help people. Cloud and Squall were your steretypical apathetic soldier types who start to give a crap out of nowhere. And Kuja is also a very effective villian. So he's not overly dark in his look or in most of his dialogue even? He still managed to demonstrate a cold hatred for Garland and everyone else, and a willingness to destroy and kill to reach his goals that made Sephiroth look like he was a halfhearted pansy.

There's a reason it was outsold by both VII and VIII.

Because a lot of the fanboys who didn't play the series before VII were only interested in more of the same and blew it off before it even came out. Those who didn't were treated to one of the most mature and well done games in the series.

The game is also utterly without reward in side quests which is HUGE in Square RPG's all the way back from Chrono Trigger and early FF's. The ultimate weapon side quests are over complicated in execution and redundant to some. Otherwise there are a couple optional bosses with mediocre difficulty and little reward.

Of all the things you said, I think this is the one I take the most issue with. I could see you just not liking the characters, or missing some of the finer points in the story and it's development; everyone's tastes are different afterall. But to say that it has no rewarding side quests, or that they're overly complex is just plain ignorant. For starters, many of them, especially Chocobo Hot & Cold are downright simple, and more importantly, they are some of the most rewarding side quests in the series. Sure they don't give you things that are as game breaking as Knights of the Round, but that was almost refreshing in a way. And the idea that they were a major part of the series in early FF's is border line rediculous. FFVI was the first one to have a lot of them since the whole second half of the game was prety much optional. FFV had some, but not really that many, and FFIV before it had almost none. FF's I-III weren't any better for them either. FFIX is one of the most sidequest heavy games in the series. There's plenty there to keep anyone occupied well past the end of the game if they want.