Quina Quen

Quina Quen is a playable character in Final Fantasy IX. S/he is apparently a genderless Qu who specializes in blue magic, and loves eating frogs. Quina serves as comic relief, often failing in their eternal quest to consume new cuisine. They speak in broken English, as all Qu do, and will often eat anything they see. Quina's eating habits are one of their greatest skills, as Quina learns Blu Mag by consuming an enemy.
Recruiting Quina on the first chance (when the party leaves Lindblum on foot) is optional. They will join the party the first time the player visits a Qu's Marsh.
== Profile ==
===Gender===
Characters in Final Fantasy IX use the subject pronoun "s/he" to refer to Quina, and masculine demonstrative pronouns "him" and "his". In the game's Spanish version, Quina and Quale are referred to as "she", while Quan is "he". In the German version Quina is referred to as "he". In the French version Quina is "she" whereas both Quale and Quan are "he". In the Italian version, Quina is said to be female, like Quale, and has rearranged with Roman dialect.
In the mobile and Steam versions, forming a party with Quina and the three female party members (possible in Desert Palace and the final dungeon) earns the achievement Femme Fatales?.
The game mechanics treat Quina as male: the Lamia's Entice spell will affect Quina, Zidane's Protect Girls ability will not work on Quina, and Quina cannot equip female-exclusive equipment.
=== Appearance ===
Quina is a genderless Qu, a tribe known for their strange eating habits, long tongues, and poor language skills. Quina wears a chef's hat, and their tongue hangs out to the middle of their chest. They wear a salmon-pink overcoat with a baby-pink apron over it, has a napkin tied around their neck, and wears white gloves and blue shoes with white ribbons. In Trance, Quina's facial area resembles Vivi's (long black tongue notwithstanding) having disappeared into a void with only bright white eyes to hint they have a face. Clothes are replaced by an obese armor set complete with an elaborate neck armor and their chef's hat may possibly be metal as well. The armor includes a decorative design on the chest.
=== Personality ===
Quina has a childlike curiosity for the world and is always ready to explore new locations to find new tastes; when arriving at a new location, Quina is quick to smell and taste-test the local wildlife and cuisine to discover delicacies. The childlike curiosity is Quina's dominant personality trait, as they are delighted by the small things in life, and takes the journey as a learning experience. Quina can be reckless, such as when they jump head-first into the canal in Treno after thinking they spotted food down there.
Setbacks don't bother them much, and they are soon back on their feet ready for new experiences. Quina has great respect for Qus elder to them, and at first wants to journey with Zidane because their Master tells them to. In an optional event in Quan's Dwelling it is revealed that Quina is on their way to become an excellent gourmand because of their vivid imagination, and it is hinted Quina has already surpassed their Master in the ways of the gourmand.
Although it may seem that Quina is the least involved in the quest the heroes undertake, being more interested in food than world events and going off on their own numerous times to pursue their own interests, they do develop a bond to the party. Quina attempts to cheer Freya up en route to Burmecia, and assures Vivi—who worries not being human—that he is as human as anyone else in the world. Quina helps Eiko cook in Madain Sari, teaching her that cooking for friends is at the core of love for food. When Quina is paired with Zidane to go explore the Earth Shrine, they are happy to go with him even if knowing Zidane only took them because they were the one left over when everyone else already left, saying that leftovers are a good thing. In Pandemonium, Quina eagerly helps Steiner fight off a monster. Quina is once again hired as the head cook in Alexandria at the end of the game, showing that they and Garnet are friends.
===Mannerisms===
In the Japanese version, Quina ends their sentences with written in katakana, an alphabet usually reserved for emphasis or for foreign words. This is supposed to be mimicking Chinese speech, specifically how words sometimes end with the "er/ar" (尔) sound in Mandarin Chinese and Beijing dialect (see 尔化 or er-hua). China is often associated with the world of cooking and restaurants in Japan, befitting the Qus' gourmandism. In the Chinese version, Quina just speaks normal Chinese, but like the Japanese version, also ends sentences with the alu sound.
In the English version, Quina speaks in broken English. In the French version, Quina ends many of their sentences with miam, meaning "yum".
== Story ==
Quina was hired as the head cook in Alexandria Castle the month before Princess Garnet's 16th birthday. On the day of the festivities they oversees the chefs' every move and tastes most of their dishes in preparation for the birthday party. Two days later, Quina travels toward Qu's Marsh and, a couple of days later, participates in the Festival of the Hunt in Lindblum under the name "Strange Gourmand". However, it is not until the party visits Qu's Marsh that they have a chance to make their acquaintance properly.
Quina loves frogs, and is distressed that they cannot catch one. Zidane catches one for Quina, leading the head Qu, Quale, to scold Quina for being too lazy to feed themselves. Quale asks the party to take Quina around the world so that they may visit the other marshes of the world to taste different types of frogs, as frogs are the Qus' delicacy, and attain a higher rank of gourmand.
Quina joins the party for their trek through Gizamaluke's Grotto, Burmecia, and Cleyra while being obsessed with hunting for new kinds of food, which they refer to as "yummy-yummies". At the party's stay in Cleyra, Quina is upset that the locale has no exotic food to be had, settling on a pair of pink mushrooms whose edibility is questionable.
When the other three group members teleport to the Alexandrian airship Red Rose via black mage teleportation devices, Quina declines to go with them and flees Cleyra on foot, saying that they "no like heights". When Cleyra is destroyed by Odin summoned by Queen Brahne of Alexandria, Zidane, Vivi, and Freya are left believing they perished during the destruction, with Vivi particularly devastated by their possible demise.
Quina returns to Qu's Marsh, where, much to Zidane's relief, the party finds them, with Quina explaining that while they survived, they had "much trouble coming back from Cleyra alone". Zidane, Vivi, and Garnet, who has joined in place of Freya, want to find the path to the Outer Continent, and Quina inadvertently leads the party to the Fossil Roo entrance in search of more frogs.
After helping Zidane, Vivi, and Garnet fight and defeat bounty hunter Lani in Fossil Roo, Quina navigates the tunnels with the party and arrives on the Outer Continent and its dwarven village of Conde Petie. Quina rushes in, certain that good food is to be had. They make a beeline for the consumable shop, where the shopkeeper offers to sell Quina a Pumpkin Bomb for 1,000 gil. Quina cannot understand the need for currency, so the dwarf labels them as a thief, and Quina flees the shop in a panic.
In the Black Mage Village Quina finds another source of food: a chocobo egg being hatched by two black mages. Though Quina longs to taste the egg, the mages shoo them out, but they stay and keeps referring to the egg as "delicious". Returning to Conde Petie, it is possible for Quina to undergo the "marriage" ritual with Vivi to access the Sanctuary beyond the village. Quina is pleased with this arrangement, saying, "I...so happy". If Quina and Vivi choose not to marry, the pair will sneak by the dwarven guards when they are called to deal with a theft committed by a little girl from outside of the village.
After being allowed to travel through the mountain path, the party encounters Eiko, the young thief, stuck on a tree limb. Quina is deterred from eating her when Eiko says she tastes horrible. This backfires on her, as Quina runs off to attempt to eat Mog, Eiko's pet moogle, instead. Eiko later mistakes Quina for Kuja, having been reeled in from the river by a fishing pole. Quina stays and helps Eiko cook dinner for the rest of Zidane's party in Madain Sari.
While Zidane, Vivi, Garnet, and Eiko are investigating the Iifa Tree, leaving Quina behind in Madain Sari, they swim away back to the Mist Continent, wrongly believing the others had purposely abandoned them. Quina ends up in Treno, and later, when Gilgamesh attempts to corner Eiko there, using the guise of attending a banquet to kidnap her and hold her for ransom against Amarant, Quina pops up, demands food, and scares Gilgamesh away.
Despite this noble act, Quina is again left behind and, thinking a reflection of the moon in the water resembles food, jumps in to try and eat it. They wash up on the shores of Lindblum, frightening several town guards. They fail to haggle for a Gysahl pickle, a local delicacy, and finally permanently joins the party either after Zidane pays off their debt for the pickle, or Zidane simply boards the Blue Narciss, where Quina will already be waiting aboard, ready to help their friends on their quest to find Kuja and the kidnapped Lady Hilda.
After obtaining the Hilda Garde III airship, the party can visit Quan's Dwelling with Vivi and Quina, where Quina hallucinates a feast on the table of the abandoned dwelling. Upon realizing there is no food as the others are puzzled what they are doing, Quina runs outside onto the fishing post where they meet the ghost of Quan, a master gourmand and Vivi's caretaker, whom he calls "grandpa". Quina's Master Quale shows up, and it turns out Quale is Quan's protege the same way Quina is to Quale, but Quan's ghost deems Quale an inferior gourmand for their lack of imagination, revering Quina for their skills instead. Zidane, who follows the exchange from afar, is bemused, as he cannot see or hear the ghost.
thumb|Quina "drowning" in Memoria.
Quina is paired with Zidane when the party decides to tackle the elemental shrines simultaneously, and is unbothered by Zidane's admission that he only took Quina because they were the one left over when everyone else had already left, stating that leftovers are a good thing. When the heroes reach Terra, Quina candidly interacts with the unresponsive Genomes at Bran Bal. They attempt to taste a large luminous stone seemingly worshiped by the Genomes, to no avail. When the airship Invincible is used to escape Terra, Quina warps in at the last minute from underneath the ship. The rest of the party also uses the warp when they descend into Memoria. While in Memoria, Quina is the only party member not to see a memory of the destruction of Alexandria, largely because they were not with the others when it was destroyed. Quina later experiences Gaia's early era as a globe covered in ocean and tries to swim through it.
After Trance Kuja and Necron have been felled and peace returns to the world, Quina is back in the Alexandrian kitchen, cooking up more munchies to satisfy their never-ending palate, ensuring the other chefs prepare a good meal for their friends, who will soon be visiting Alexandria for what is presumed to be Garnet's seventeenth birthday, as well as to witness another performance of I Want to Be Your Canary by the Tantalus Theater Troupe.
== Gameplay ==
Quina wields forks in battle, which deal random damage, but can be very powerful. Their primary function is casting Blu Mag (blue magic) spells, which are learned by consuming enemies with Eat when they are at 25% HP. In Trance, Eat transforms into Cook, which kills enemies at 50% HP. They have great utility through their Blu Mag spells, but each need to be learned from fighting specific enemies.
Quina's dodge animation looks similar to poses seen in Kabuki dances and performances.
Quina can also participate in frog catching at the Qu's Marshes to obtain their ultimate weapon and boost their Frog Drop power.
Cinna is an early temporary character whose levels (not statistics) are transferred to Quina, should Cinna's level be higher than the party average upon Quina's joining the party.
Though some localizations treat Quina as a female, the game mechanics treat them as a male: Quina is affected by the Lamia's "Entice" ability, Zidane will not take damage in place of them with his "Protect Girls" ability, and the Rubber Suit that can only be equipped by female characters, cannot be equipped by Quina.
== Musical themes ==
"Quina's Theme" is named for themselves, and plays during the frog catching minigame, when they wash up in Lindblum, when they first meet Grandma Pickle, and in Quan's Dwelling if both Quina and Vivi are brought there. It has parts of the the Qu's Marsh theme inter-spliced with a new techno melody.
== Other appearances ==
Quina has made appearances in the following games in the Final Fantasy series:
* Dissidia Final Fantasy Opera Omnia as a playable character.
* Pictlogica Final Fantasy as a playable character.
* Final Fantasy Airborne Brigade as a summonable Legend.
* Final Fantasy Artniks as a series of cards.
* Final Fantasy Record Keeper as a playable character.
* Final Fantasy Trading Card Game as a series of cards.
* Tetra Master as an opponent and a card.
* Triple Triad as a card.
===Other media===
An NPC in the Miner quests in the 1.0 version of Final Fantasy XIV would mistakenly call players by the wrong name and call a miqo'te "Quina".
==Behind the scenes==
thumb|right|Quina's only FMV appearance.
The only FMV where Quina appears in is at the game's finale. Quina is the oldest playable character in Final Fantasy IX.
== Gallery ==
FFIX-QuinaQ-concept.jpg|Quina Quen face and body concept art.
Quina Trance FFIX Art.jpg|Trance form concept art.
Quina FFIX Rough Sketch.jpg|Quick sketch.
Quina Rough Sketch.jpg
FFIX_Indulgence.jpg|Quina Quen Indulgence.
quina.jpg|Quina Quen render.
trancequina2.jpg|Quina in Trance.
FFIX Quina PC Model.png|PC battle model.
Quinas vision.JPG|Quina's vision of food in Quan's Dwelling.
QuinaIndulgence.png|Indulgence art.
Fork-ffix-fork.png|Quina's weapon, Fork.
FFIX Quina Blu Mag.png|Quina casting Blue Magic.
Eat fail.png|Fail message for Quina's Eat command.
Quina Victory Pose.gif|Victory pose.
FFIX Quina Ready Pose.png|Quina's ready pose.
Eiko and Quina Bring Arts from FFIX.png|Bring Arts
== Etymology ==
The name "Quina Quen" is a Japanese play on words.
Throughout the game, Quina is on a personal quest to find new, exotic foodstuffs, but most of the time fails at this task.
All of the Qus' names in Final Fantasy IX begin with "Qu".
In the Final Fantasy Ultimania Archive, Volume 2, the names of Quale and Quan are given as Quina Quan and Quina Quale, which would indicate that "Quina" is a clan name. If this is the case, this would make Quina's personal name "Quen" and would also indicate that similar to Adelbert Steiner, the name that the player is allowed to change in-game is not the character's personal name.
==Notes==
===Annotations===
===Citations===
de:Quina Quen
es:Quina Quen
fr:Kweena Quen
it:Quina Quen
ru:Куина Куен
Category:Characters in Final Fantasy IX
Category:Blue Mages