FFIX Coming to PC and Smartphones!

[Fox]

It's probably been a few years since we all last bought FFIX. Well, time to do so again! They've given it the VII/VIII treatment with achievements, HD textures and so on. So yeah, shiner, non-aliased FFIX. What more could you ask for? Not 100% confirmed for the west yet but I can't imagine they wouldn't. The trailer song is the English version...

[Psychotic]

They finally found the source code?

[Ayen]

You mean that game that brought the PS1 to its limits in terms of graphics is getting a face-lift on a more powerful system?

I was wondering where all that screaming was coming from. I just thought the neighbors were having sex.

[fat_moogle]

That YouTube video doesn't load for me, but this is good news! Final Fantasy IX is a beautiful looking game so I expect the HD treatment will have more of a "pop" than FFVII. I'll no doubt buy this on PS4 if it makes its way over as I did with FFVII (don't have a PC).

[Depression Moon]

Memories of a life and time when things were simpler and 3d gaming was still somewhat new. It was 2000 for me when I first booted up the game, heard "The Place I'll Return to Someday" and fell in love with a game that would change my life. Fans and newcomers will have another opportunity to visit the world of Gaia today as revealed just this morning for New Year's Eve is the announcement of Final Fantasy IX coming to PC, iPhone, and Androids. This port will feature an HD resolution, a high speed mode, and new achievements. With this announcement Final Fantasy IX is no longer the only game of the PS1 trilogy without a PC port. There is currently no specificity on the release date. What do you think of added speed mode and will you purchase the game when it comes out?

[Freya]

Sorry for the double post about the trailer there, DM was waiting on us to approve it before it was articled. carry on!

I'm so excited. I've been trying to get all the FFs for steam and this, of course, is my favorite game so I was waiting to get it there as well! YAY!

[Depression Moon]

What a great way to end the year.

[Galuf]

Finally!!!!!! I dont have a pc

[Ayen]

I'm starting to genuinely believe we'll see all the FF games on Steam at this rate. A win for PC gamers who haven't gotten to play any of them yet.

[Fynn]

This makes me so happy! I do t think I'll get it since I'm pretty content with the PSN version I have for Vota (unless I decide to stream it) but it looks beautiful and I'm glad more people will get to play it this way.

[DMKA]

It only took them 16 years. Who says waiting on PC ports is consequential? Also, I'm wondering how they managed to get the FMVs to look that good in that trailer. They certainly don't look fantastic, but they look amazingly good to be cropped to 16:9 and then blown up to 1080p. They must have still had higher resolution versions of those videos lying around because there's no way those are the 224p versions from the PS1 game.

No seriously though, aside of handheld titles, I believe this will only leave Dirge of Cerberus, X, X-2, and XII to be ported to PC (which if rumors regarding Steam code are to be believed, X and X-2 PC ports are already confirmed to be happening). That's great. (SPOILER)Not that people haven't been able to emulate every FF but the XIII trilogy for several years now.

I am excited to hear that this is coming to Android as well. I've been wanting to replay it for a few years now and being able to do so on my phone while I'm out and about would be wonderful. Hopefully the same thing ends up happening with VII (which is already on iPhone) and VIII.

[Rostum]

Nice! Hopefully they release this and FFVIII on PS4 like they have with FFVII.

[Mirage]

Not very interested, really, unless the backgrounds have been re-rendered. The bump in graphics would probably not be a lot bigger than you can get on an emulator, except the user interface, of course.
If the loading times for battle effects have been greatly improved, I might give it a chance. Perhaps there will also be some mods available that make the combat much more pleasant. That would also give me a reason to buy it, when the price dropped enough

The upscaling algorithm they've used on the FMVs is pretty decent, however, but we don't play final fantasies for those do we?

It only took them 16 years. Who says waiting on PC ports is consequential? Also, I'm wondering how they managed to get the FMVs to look that good in that trailer. They certainly don't look fantastic, but they look amazingly good to be cropped to 16:9 and then blown up to 1080p. They must have still had higher resolution versions of those videos lying around because there's no way those are the 224p versions from the PS1 game.

they were 320x240i, not 224p. These videos could still be based on those videos, with advanced interpolation techniques that use data from the previous frame to add more details to the next frame. The video is much sharper when there is little motion than when there is a lot of motion, which would be consistent with such algorithms. When there is little motion, more information can be recycled from the previous frame than when there is a lot of motion.

In addition, they have most likely also used algorithms designed to clean up compression artifacts, which PS1 FFs had tons of, and which also reduce the image quality considerably. With this, you could probably get close to "DVD quality" in some scenes, which doesn't look half bad upscaled to 1080p.

This would also explain why the background stills are seemingly of a lower quality than some of the FMV scenes. No multi-frame interpolation possible for those, as only one "frame" exists.

ps.
If you look closely, you can see that many single-pixel details are still very blocky, because these details are very hard to interpolate correctly. For example, Zidane's teeth at 0:30-ish.The amount of detail there isn't greater than in the original PS1 FMV, which it would have been if the scene was actually rendered at a greater resolution.

[DMKA]

they were 320x240i, not 224p.

In the PAL version, maybe. NTSC version's FMVs are encoded at a resolution of 320x224. Same goes for the FMVs of the NTSC PS1 versions of IV, V, VI, VII, and VIII. I believe the PS1 versions of FFI and II had FMVs encoded at 320x240 though, iirc.

I know this because I ripped and edited that footage from my copies of the games several times.

[Mirage]

they were 320x240i, not 224p.

In the PAL version, maybe. NTSC version's FMVs are encoded at a resolution of 320x224. Same goes for the FMVs of the NTSC PS1 versions of IV, V, VI, VII, and VIII. I believe the PS1 versions of FFI and II had FMVs encoded at 320x240 though, iirc.

I know this because I ripped and edited that footage from my copies of the games several times.

Ok, fine, but the rest still stands. PAL generally used a slightly greater horizontal resolution (probably not actually mandated by the PAL standard, as pal60 for 60hz interlaced exists, and PS2 outputting at a different resolution all together even if it still used PAL), but i doubt they re-rendered anything for any given release anyway. It's probably all just conversions of the same raw material.