Quote Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno View Post
Well the in-game designs were done in order to allude to a 2d in 3d design. I don't personally find them "cartoony" nor did I find the enviroments to be the same.
Perhaps the graphics weren't massively more cartoony than those in FF1-6, but trying to mimic the visuals of those games with pre-rendered backgrounds and low polygon count models somehow looks "wrong" . But have a look at
http://www.warmech.net/special/bosses/bosses.html
and compare the boss art from each game. What I have in mind is stuff like the Shell Dragon, Catoblepas and the Tantarian in FF9,
or http://www.rpgamer.com/games/ff/ff9/...enemies_04.jpg.
As for the environment, two examples are:
http://www.rpgamer.com/games/ff/ff9/screens/ff9_112.jpg
and
http://www.rpgamer.com/games/ff/ff9/screens/ffix_34.jpg
If those don't look cartoony to you, then we must just have different conceptions of "cartoony".

As for Brahne, I don't feel that comparing her to Golbez is right. She may start off the whole war nonsense but her role is pretty minor compared to the likes of Garland and Kuja within the storyline. As for designs, must I remind you of Borgen from FFII? He does not exactly come off as sinister or serious villain material when one looks at his designs.
But she's presented as the main villain at the beginning of the game, and later we learn that she isn't. Golbez is the same, but he's got a bigger role in FF4's story than Brahne has in FF9. Garland is ... both the main villain and not the main villain at the same time (and there really isn't much of a story in FF1).
Borgen looks a bit silly, but he's certainly not very important in FF2's story from what I remember (less important than Brahne in FF9).
I know that all of the games have some designs that aren't serious (PuPu in FF8 for example, Ultros/Orthros in FF6, the Magus Sisters in FF4), they just didn't give me the same impression that FF9 did. Actually FF2's art style might be the least serious out of FF1-6.

The story is pretty dark actually, I think the lighthearted elements were placed in there to counter it. The plot and the way it explores it's theme of "The Meaning of Life" makes it one of the darkest games within the main series. I don't feel the characters are anymore cliche than previous installments and I feel they only help to tell the more serious parts of the story better.
I certainly don't think that game is the darkest in the series by far (I'd go with FF6 and 7), but keep in mind that atmosphere is produced by many different things, including visual style, music, and characters. I didn't say all of the characters are more cliche than previous installments (but I think they are more stereotypical and uninteresting than those in FF7 and 8), just that no other characters were so totally stereotypical and overdone as Steiner.

The previous games always had light hearted moments thrown in to counter their rather dark stories. Only FFI and FFII are mostly serious but that is probably due to them being early installments in a genre that was just starting to grow within the video game media. FFVIII was also pretty damn serious as well with only a few humorous moments spread thinly through the game.
I'd say only FF5 even comes close to not being "mostly serious", unless you just mean that only FF1 and FF2 don't have any lighthearted moments, which might be true.

Overall, FFIX brought back good characters, better world design and a more interesting villain than what we got from FFVII and FFVIII. But that's just my opinion.
I disagree sharply with this last sentence that's basically the opposite of how I feel. FF9 has the worst world design in the series (except for the mist continent, which is just decent), a disappointing villain who is not in the league of Sephiroth (himself arguably overrated, but villains haven't generally been a strong point of the FF series), and uninteresting characters except for Vivi. This isn't the place for another debate about this though .