{"id":55550,"date":"2026-01-06T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-05T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=55550"},"modified":"2026-01-05T20:43:37","modified_gmt":"2026-01-05T11:43:37","slug":"final-fantasy-9-is-more-popular-overseas-than-in-japan-says-composer-nobuo-uematsu-but-the-soundtrack-is-still-among-his-personal-favorites-after-all-im-a-medieval-otaku","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/final-fantasy-9-is-more-popular-overseas-than-in-japan-says-composer-nobuo-uematsu-but-the-soundtrack-is-still-among-his-personal-favorites-after-all-im-a-medieval-otaku\/","title":{"rendered":"Final Fantasy 9 is more popular overseas than in Japan, says composer Nobuo Uematsu, but the soundtrack is still among his personal favorites. \u201cAfter all, I&#8217;m a medieval otaku\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Final Fantasy IX<\/strong>, the 9th mainline entry in Square\u2019s legendary JRPG series, was released for the PlayStation in July, 2000, and celebrated its 25th anniversary last year. To commemorate the big milestone, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.famitsu.com\/article\/202512\/61821\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Famitsu<\/a> sat down with series composer Nobuo Uematsu to discuss some of his memories working on the title, and asked him about his personal highlights of the soundtrack. \u00a0In the interview, Uematsu notes that while FF9 is much more popular among overseas fans of the series compared to Japanese fans, many of his personal favorite tracks are precisely from that game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhenever I travel abroad, I get the impression that there are many FF9 fans over there. Compared to Japanese people, I feel like overseas people bring up FF9 as their favorite title more often,\u201d says Uematsu. And while he\u2019s not quite certain whether the game\u2019s return to a classic medieval fantasy setting is what hit the sweet spot of Western fans, Uematsu notes that FF9 in particular has a lot of songs he\u2019s fond of &#8211; which could be one of the reasons for its popularity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Interestingly, the Final Fantasy composer says he usually isn\u2019t satisfied with any of the songs he makes. \u201cFrom the moment a song is complete, I don\u2019t want to listen to it. It\u2019s just too embarrassing. Bud during debugging I do end up having to listen to them until I start hating them,\u201d he jokingly adds. However, he admits that, when it comes to most of his favorite FF9 songs, he likes the melodies or the chord progressions. \u201cI usually end up noticing flaws like <em>The tone quality sounds so dull here <\/em>or <em>Why didn\u2019t I arrange this part with more care <\/em>\u2013 the stuff only I pick up on, but I\u2019m like, <em>Eh, I guess the melody is not that bad<\/em> (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"\u30ed\u30fc\u30ba\uff65\u30aa\u30d6\uff65\u30e1\u30a4\" width=\"1160\" height=\"870\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/djz5LAkV1so?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Uematsu brings up Roses of May, the piano theme of General Beatrix, as his personal favorite among the ones he composed for FF9. He also mentions The Final Battle, the last boss theme in the game, as the other one he particularly likes. \u201cI wanted to have the voices of the dead in that one, so I told our synth programmer Keiji Kawamori to <em>Go to hell and record it for me. <\/em>He was like,<em> Okay,<\/em> and the next day he brought me an amazing track.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Apparently, the \u201cback-to-the-basics\u201d approach of FF9 was quite refreshing for the composer who had been making tracks for the more sci-fi oriented series entries that came before it. \u201cI was really happy to find out that I\u2019ll be able to go back to something more medieval-ish with FF9. After all, I am a medieval otaku (laughs).\u201d According to Uematsu, when thinking about the stylistic direction for the FF9 soundtrack, he decided to take a trip to Europe to look for inspiration. \u201cI thought it would be best for me to get a grasp of what medieval Europe was like. So, my wife and I went on a tour of old European castles. But there were so many university students around us and we were the only old people there \u2013 so it was a bit exhausting,\u201d he jokes. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Related articles:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/game-directors-and-producers-have-too-much-power-in-their-hands-final-fantasy-composer-says-theres-less-creative-freedom-in-game-music-nowadays\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">\u201cGame directors and producers have too much power in their hands.\u201d Final Fantasy composer says there\u2019s less creative freedom in game music nowadays<br><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/final-fantasy-composer-nobuo-uematsu-says-hes-never-used-generative-ai-and-never-will-hardship-is-what-makes-the-creative-process-rewarding\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Final Fantasy composer Nobuo Uematsu says he\u2019s \u201cnever used generative AI, and never will.\u201d Hardship is what makes the creative process rewarding<br><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>To commemorate the 25th anniversary of FF9, composer Nobuo Uematsu talks about some of his favorite compositions from the game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":55564,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[17],"class_list":["post-55550","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-japan-related-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Final Fantasy 9 is more popular overseas than in Japan, says composer Nobuo Uematsu, but the soundtrack is still among his personal favorites. \u201cAfter all, I&#039;m a medieval otaku\u201d - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"To commemorate the 25th anniversary of FF9, composer Nobuo Uematsu talks about some of his favorite compositions from the game.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/final-fantasy-9-is-more-popular-overseas-than-in-japan-says-composer-nobuo-uematsu-but-the-soundtrack-is-still-among-his-personal-favorites-after-all-im-a-medieval-otaku\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Final Fantasy 9 is more popular overseas than in Japan, says composer Nobuo Uematsu, but the soundtrack is still among his personal favorites. \u201cAfter all, I&#039;m a medieval otaku\u201d - AUTOMATON WEST\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"To commemorate the 25th anniversary of FF9, composer Nobuo Uematsu talks about some of his favorite compositions from the game.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/final-fantasy-9-is-more-popular-overseas-than-in-japan-says-composer-nobuo-uematsu-but-the-soundtrack-is-still-among-his-personal-favorites-after-all-im-a-medieval-otaku\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"AUTOMATON WEST\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-01-05T16:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/20260105-55550-header.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"819\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"460\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"\u0110or\u0111e P\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@AUTOMATON_ENG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@AUTOMATON_ENG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"\u0110or\u0111e P\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Final Fantasy 9 is more popular overseas than in Japan, says composer Nobuo Uematsu, but the soundtrack is still among his personal favorites. \u201cAfter all, I'm a medieval otaku\u201d - 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