Yesterday, Square Enix launched a special website celebrating the upcoming 25th anniversary of Final Fantasy IX. According to the site, Final Fantasy IX has sold and shipped 8.9 million copies since its release in 2000. The site also states that nearly 3 million copies were purchased by gamers since 2019. While IX sales figures remain the lowest of the three mainline Final Fantasy games released on the original PlayStation (VII and VIII also released on the PS1), the gap has been steadily decreasing.
Video games don’t typically get their second wind nearly two decades after release. Much of this can be attributed to Final Fantasy XI finally getting ports to modern platforms in 2019. Its PC and Switch release helped the game reach its primary audience—women and younger gamers. According to a 2020 NHK poll of 468 thousand gamers in Japan, Final Fantasy XI is the fourth most popular game in the series with a fanbase that is 60% female and significantly skewed toward the 20–39 years old demographic. It also helps that Final Fantasy VII (which ranks number 2 in that poll), has already gotten the remake treatment. This has allowed long-time series fans to redirect their nostalgia toward another game from that era.
Square Enix can also thank the game’s online community for Final Fantasy XI’s continued relevance. Of the PlayStation-era Final Fantasy titles, Final Fantasy IX has a particularly vocal and dedicated modding community. For example, fan remaster mod, Moguri Mod, has been featured several times in mainstream games media. Then in late 2022, veteran game developers from across the industry came together to create the Memoria Project. In June 2023, they released a visual reimagining of what the game might look like on modern hardware using Unreal Engine 5. The passion and support Final Fantasy XI continues to receive, even compared to the more popular installments in the series, is impressive.
Despite Final Fantasy IX’s lasting popularity, its publisher Square Enix has proven reluctant to do much with the property. Barring the 2019 ports, which have been criticized for being “low-effort” releases, we haven’t seen much new about the game. In 2022, stalwart fans were given something to look forward to when an animated series was officially announced. However, those plans were scuttled in 2024, when the project’s production studio filed for bankruptcy.
Still, an optimist might glean some hope from the uncharacteristic effort Square Enix is putting into the 25th anniversary celebrations. Neither Final Fantasy VIII nor Final Fantasy X got special anniversary celebrations, despite both titles being significantly more popular than IX when they were released. In fact, the last game in the series to raise this much hubbub around an anniversary was Final Fantasy VII. That game’s anniversary event featured a special stream with the announcement of two new titles: FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH and CRISIS CORE -FINAL FANTASY VII- REUNION.
Now, it feels unrealistic to expect announcements for two new games set in the world of Final Fantasy IX (VII is Square Enix’s Gold Child, after all), but it’s not hard to to see why the recent news has given new life to rumors around a possible remake. Even the new visual novel announced with the launch of the anniversary website shows that Square Enix is open to expanding the game’s backstory. For now, let’s keep our hopes tempered with a healthy amount of skepticism.
