[FF9 25th Anniversary Interview Reprint 3] Art Director Hideo Minaba: "Actually, it was planned that ●●● would play the role of telling the story in the ending."

 

Square Enix's "Final Fantasy IX" (hereinafter referred to as "FFIX") celebrates its 25th anniversary on July 7, 2025.

Released for the PlayStation on July 7, 2000, the game depicts the characters struggling to live their lives with the theme of "life," and has won the hearts of many fans. To commemorate the 25th anniversary of FFIX, we would like to share with you an interview with a creator that was published in the July 30, 2020 issue of Weekly Famitsu in an article on the 20th anniversary of FFIX.

This time, we will deliver Hideo Minaba, who served as the art director of "FFIX". In addition, there are interviews where you can hear the secret stories of the people involved in "FFIX", so please read them as well.

In addition, at the time of publication of the article, the remastered version of "FFIX" is on sale at various stores for 764 yen (sale and price varies depending on the model). Below "What day is today?" There is a link in the article, so check that out as well!

The following is a reprint from the July 30, 2020 issue of Weekly Famitsu "Final Fantasy IX" 20th Anniversary Article. Photos may be a mix of original and remastered versions.

Art that aims to balance fantasy and impact

The world of "FFIX" envelops deformed and cute characters with a landscape that makes you feel warm. This world was created by an art team led by Hideo Minaba, with a multinational staff. We asked Hideo Minaba, who brought together the world of "FFIX" as an art director, about his memories of development.

Hideo Minaba

He has been in charge of graphics since FFV and has worked as an art director for FFVI, FFIX, and FFXII. He is currently the President and CEO of CyDesignation. He has been involved in "Granblue Fantasy" and other works.

The world of FFIX began in the village of the Black Mage

――How did you feel at the time as your first art director for FFVI?

Minaba:

 When FFVII was being developed, I was working on FF Tactics next to it. Since FFVII is a large-scale project, I thought to myself, "Wow, that's a lot of work," but I never thought I'd be the art director for "FFIX," ....... I was honestly surprised.

We were developing the game in Hawaii with overseas staff, and the PlayStation development technology was still at a simmer, and we needed to surpass FFVII and FFVIII, so we felt that the hurdles were high.

――Please tell us how you decided to overcome that high hurdle.

Minaha

 First of all, Mr. Sakaguchi (Hironobu Sakaguchi) gave me the keyword "return to the roots." FFIX was developed at the same time as FFVIII, so you don't feel like you're evolving in the same way. Therefore, we expanded the worldview around the Black Mage character like in the original FF, that is, Bibi, and the Black Mage Village.

――You said that the black mages were the starting line.

Minaha:

 Yes. The heads and bodies of the black mages in the village were matched with the heads and bodies of the Jitans. This is because from the beginning, we wanted to introduce a variety of races. The black mages are like a race. From the Black Mage Village, we moved on to the creation of Alexandria Castle, where we introduced a variety of characters, including the members of the Tantalus bandits, as well as human and rat-like races. It's a hippopotamus (laughs).

――It's Kabao-kun (laughs). The deformed heads and bodies of the characters are one of the charms of FFIX, but why did you choose such a head?

Minaha

 I thought it would be quite difficult to depict a realistic head and body with PlayStation's 3D technology. If you look at it close-up, it's not a problem, but from a distance, it looks like a thin stick, and it's hard to recognize the person. I thought it would be better to be able to recognize the silhouette clearly even from a distance, so I adopted a deformed head and body.

――I see. Shuko Murase was in charge of the main character design, but it was the first time that Murase and Minaba worked together.

Minaha:

 The base of the character was an idea that the entire art team came up with. I thought about how to incorporate that into a character, but I had never done character design before, so I got stuck, and I needed to set up a designer.

At the studio in Hawaii, the "Final Fantasy" movie team was working on it, and Mr. Murase was there. When I saw the character design for the anime works and the work he had done in film production, I thought, "This person can do anything," so I asked Mr. Murase to do the character design.

The setting of the theater airship Prima Vista. In addition to the description of the setting of the stage, the detailed decorations are also delicately drawn.

The design behind the crystal logo

――Compared to FFVI, the number of developers has increased considerably. It must have been quite a challenge to put together an art team.

Minaha:

 There were a lot of developers, so I couldn't really see every corner. Thanks to the excellent leaders of each section, the direction was well done.

――Since it was developed at the same time as FFVIII, did you have to adjust the elements so that they wouldn't be overshadowed?

Minaba

: No, Sakaguchi-san and Kitase-san (FFVIII director Yoshinori Kitase) worked together for places and keywords to make sure we didn't wear them. For example, Mr. Sakaguchi gave us an element like an opera house, that is, a place called a theater, so it appeared in FFIX.

――I heard that the story of "FFIX" reflects your way of thinking about life.

Minaba:

 Certainly, I think there is a lot of Sakaguchi-ism. Where does life come from and where is it going? By the way, the setting of "planetary fusion" in which an old planet takes in a healthy planet was planned only for the back setting.

――That's right.

Minaha

 Yes. So, the illustration used for the FFIX logo was originally supposed to be a single crystal drawn by Amano-sensei (Yoshitaka Amano), but the setting of "stars merging" and "two crystals merging" came into the story, so I chose two designs from the crystal designs drawn by Amano-sensei and attached them to myself. It's to keep it in line with the theme of the story. Even in the ending, there is a production where the two planets are combined.

- Yes! The picture of that logo was not a single crystal, but a combination of two crystals. By the way, I was surprised that the final boss was not Kuja at the time of playing, but was it decided from the beginning that the final boss would be eternal darkness?

Minaba

: No, I feel like I was going back and forth. As for the final development, there are many intentions of Mr. Ito (director Hiroyuki Ito). In terms of how to summarize the theme...... In fact, it was Kuja's plan to play the role of telling the story in the ending, not Bibi.

I remember Mr. Ito thinking, "There is not a single bad guy in this story." However, considering the psychology of the player, we decided that the ending narrative should be Bibi, so we settled on the current form.

――By the way, how did you decide on the design of eternal darkness?

Minaba:

 I think it was a staff member named Mr. Takeuchi (Kuniharu Takeuchi) who designed Eternal Darkness. When designing, Mr. Takeuchi used the method of modeling with clay and then creating a character design. The two of us thought about whether there was a design that would leave an impression on us, and in the end, we decided that "simple design has the strongest impact," and I think we came up with that design.

At the time, I was looking for impact. If it's just fantasy, it's going to be very plain. The reason why Kuja's costume became so exciting was because I thought, "I want to have some kind of impact" (laughs).

――(laughs) Is there anything else that left an impression on you regarding design?

Minaha

: The 

transformed form of the Ark, the strongest summoned beast, is based on the game "Cruise Chaser Blasty" released by Square on PC It's based on the motif of the main character robot "Blasty", but it's a little frustrating that it hasn't been noticed much (laughs). At first, I said that the name of the technique should be "Cruise Chase", but it was changed (laughs).

A license plate from the Hawaiian era was displayed on Mr. Minaba's bookshelf. "FF9378" is a pun on "FFIX" Minaba.

Colored paper drawn by Mr. Minaba for the "PlayStation 20th Anniversary Special" in the December 18, 2014 special issue of Weekly Famitsu. The friends of "FFIX" are all there.

"FFIX" developed while thinking about life

――What was your long-term life in Hawaii like?

Minaba:

 Looking back, Oahu was a small island, so wherever you went, you would run into someone, so all the staff were like family. Also, the development period of "FFIX" was long, so it was also a time for the staff to reconsider their lives, and I think that was connected to the theme that Mr. Sakaguchi came up with, and everyone's various thoughts were put into "FFIX".

――It was a title that many of the staff members created with life and life in mind.

Minaba:

 For example, in the original scenario that Mr. Sakaguchi wrote, the Tantalus Gang was not going to appear at all after the PrimaVista crash. Blank becomes a decoy and petrified, and you get a platinum needle to put it back...... This is what the staff discussed and put in.

Even if they are supporting characters, each character is alive and moving because they are filled with the thoughts of each and every staff member. If there's one thing I don't remember about FFIX, it's that the number of units sold didn't increase, but I'm glad that people still like it.

Illustration contributed by Mr. Minaba for the supplement "FF 25th Anniversary Booklet" of the January 17, 2013 special issue of Weekly Famitsu. This time, I was specially reprinted.