Zidane is on his way back. Not through a remake, and not as a cameo in some mobile gacha title, but inside a brand new Final Fantasy game constructed entirely out of pixels.
Final Fantasy Resonance arrives 22 October, steering the series back toward the aesthetic that put it on the map to begin with. Pixel art. Dynamic camera angles. Pixelized 3D models that chase drama instead of photorealism.
And tucked somewhere in that lineup is the thief from Alexandria.
Why Zidane is the name that carries weight
Released in 2000 as the ninth mainline entry, Final Fantasy 9 threw players into a war between nations with Zidane standing at its center. He abducts the princess as part of a plot devised by a neighboring nation. The pair then team up to bring down her mother, Queen Brahne of Alexandria, only to learn that the dark forces in motion reach far beyond anything they had imagined.
That premise still lands 26 years on, which goes a long way toward explaining why the game keeps finding buyers.
Final Fantasy 9 had sold 8.9 million copies as of March 2025. It turns up regularly on lists of the greatest video games ever made, it succeeded commercially and critically alike, and its re-releases and remasters have expanded the audience rather than letting it plateau.
A remake has still not been confirmed
Worth being exact here, given how loud the rumor mill has grown. There is no confirmed modern-day remake of Final Fantasy 9. What has been confirmed is an animated series adaptation, currently being developed by Square Enix alongside Cyber Group Studios.
So this Zidane announcement is not the remake announcement. It is a separate thing altogether, and arguably the more interesting one.
With sixteen mainline entries, there are sixteen possible answers to the question of someone’s favorite Final Fantasy. Final Fantasy 9 simply happens to be where a very large group of players end up.
What Resonance is selling
The official synopsis spells out the hook without much fuss: “Travel with companions bound by fate and call on Visions to aid you in battle to uncover the truth behind a force that threatens to bring everything to ruin.”
Square Enix pitches the game as a visually striking experience that feels nostalgic and new at once, leaning on those dynamic camera angles and pixelized 3D models to make individual moments hit harder.
Zidane also won’t be showing up by himself. A post on r/JRPG revealed the 17 characters filling out the roster, pixel-art designs included.
The art style is the draw as much as the cast
The usual problem with a returning character in a franchise this large is that the return is fan service, and nobody pretends otherwise. Zidane is a different case because the pixel-art treatment is the entire point. Watching him rendered in the style the series walked away from is the appeal itself, not a garnish on top of it.
That look has been missed. Resonance is wagering it has been missed enough to bring people out on 22 October.
Seventeen characters, one thief from Alexandria, and a war that begins with a kidnapping.