Automatic "I Win!"

[Super Sepiroth]

Is it me, or especially further on in the game, there are many spells etc that mean you can win without even trying, making the game really easy?

First example I can think of is getting Beta from Midgar Zolem. Any fight from that point to probably Gongaga can be won pretty easily by one blast, and the boss fights made a piece of p*ss.

What else did you think were an automatic "I Win"?

SS

[Carl the Llama]

Your forgetting that the game is made with newbies in mind, sure you know about Beta now, but did you get it first time playthrough? I seriously doubt it.

KotR immediately springs to mind also, obtainable as soon as Meteor is summoned.

[Jessweeee♪]

I think if you got Beta the first time through, you earned it.

[Wolf Kanno]

Most of the Level 3 and 4 Limit Breaks. Meteor Rain and Doom of the Living are boss killers by themselves, there is really no point in describing Omnislash and Catastrophe. Not to mention if you get Great Gospel for Aerith, the rest of Disc 1 is made incredibly easy. Its nice that the developers made it really difficult to obtain without a guide or hindsight.

Most of the Ultimate Weapons, Cloud may already be a damage dealing wonder, but when a simple weapon can make physically weak Yuffie start doing consistent damage on par with Cloud, you know its a game breaker.

Several of the Enemy Skill materia. Beta has already been mentioned, though I feel Trine, Waterlung and Magic Breath are up there as well. Yet, I feel Big Guard and White Wind are the biggest "I win" abilities. Big Guard casts Wall and Haste on your whole party for a fraction of the cost and resources needed to set it up with Magic Materia and All Materia. White Wind restores health in the amount of the casters health. Considering you have HP up Materia, its not difficult to get 6000+ hp restoration early, not to mention its has a secondary Esuna affect restoring your status. Its basically a weakened Pulse of Life Limit Break that can be used by anyone and everyone. The really scary thing here, is that both spells are easy to obtain in Disc 1 because they belong to common enemies on the map and both are available before reaching Barret's hometown. You get Manipulate materia a little later and then its just a ten minute backtrack to get the two spells that will free up quite a few Materia slots and help with all defense for the rest of the game.

[Super Sepiroth]

Yeah I thought that some were a given so not much need to mention them. Another Enemy Skill that makes it p*ss easy is Bad Breath. If you got the 2 Ribbons (or even just 1) up to that point you're sorted.

Comet 2: Annihilation of all enemies in 1 turn
Big Guard: Saves you 2 turns so speeds up killing

Hmm I didn't know it was designed with newbies, just cos as Amazing as it is, once you understand the game, its not that difficult, thats why I enjoy some of the PC mods with hard mode or re-balancing as theres some challenge involved

[Saber]

The biggest "I win" scenario is on minor enemies you can cast any summon and it will most likely kill all enemies. It you take this route you will lose MP fast but again there is always basic attack. In the end once you have Slash-All and Clouds ultimate weapon, his attack will kill everything (except boses) in one or two moves. There is only two basic monsters I know that take a long time to kill, Tonberry, and Thats red dragon creature that you can get carob nuts from. With Sneak attack, you can cast KOTR before entering a command which will kill all the bosses up until Safer Sephiroth. Sure there are the weapons, but they are optional. The game is made to be easy and the simple things about it are what make it a gem. The music, the story and they exploring all fit in where simple battles lose interest.

[Big D]

The e-skills Big Guard and Magic Breath were, for me, pretty easy to get and hugely advantageous early on.

[10-Breaker]

Meteor Shower against those minotaurs found at the icy mountain. That's awesome.

[Del Murder]

Trine was a spell that really did it for me. It was low MP cost for pretty good damage, and it attacked all enemies without any restrictions. Also Yuffie's ultimate weapon is pretty broken.

[qwertysaur]

Blue Magic is very useful in many final fantasy games, probably because getting some of the spells can be a challenge. :p

[Kyros]

4xcut is all you need to kill 99.999999999999999% of everything

[DeadReD]

beta is a pain in the ass to aquire early in the game because your characters are weak. and its a pain in the ass later in the game because they are too strong. You literally have to have them attack naked. if you get beta at the first possible chance then you do deserve to rampage on disc 1 cause its hard as shit

[Carl the Llama]

beta is a pain in the ass to aquire early in the game because your characters are weak. and its a pain in the ass later in the game because they are too strong. You literally have to have them attack naked. if you get beta at the first possible chance then you do deserve to rampage on disc 1 cause its hard as shit

I get Beta first time on every playthrough nowadays, its cake.

[Super Sepiroth]

Its a shame that it didn't have extra difficulty settings really. Even defeating the weapons now isn't too difficult and they are the hardest thing in the game. Its a shame really, I think thats the only drawback of the game from a gameplay point of view.....

[Wolf Kanno]

I think that is just a limitation of the genre itself. Its usually more difficult the first time around in a game cause you don't know what you are doing but once its all figured out, by the end, a second playthrough has you steamroll through it. I remember getting my ass kicked my first playthrough of the DS FFIII, and my second playthrough was incredibly easy.

[Super Sepiroth]

I Suppose so, but as much as I have said in the past that IX wasn't as good as VII or VIII, I have to give IX some credit as its still pretty difficult on other playthroughs....... or is that just me?

[DeadReD]

if you are not using a guide I think these games are hard

[Wolf Kanno]

I Suppose so, but as much as I have said in the past that IX wasn't as good as VII or VIII, I have to give IX some credit as its still pretty difficult on other playthroughs....... or is that just me?

I find the first two discs of IX can be pretty jarring, especially if you just got finished with VII or VIII but I attribute this to the incredibly high encounter rate.

[Darkswordofchaos]

a big i winn for me is to get odin at the first niebleheim visit. for me he usally insta-murders all the random encounter groups.

[Super Sepiroth]

Yeah I'm pretty sure that besides bosses, the only other thing he doesn't slice through are the adamantoise by the beach in Wutai

[Darkswordofchaos]

He is especially useful in the battle arena he'll go straight though any much with more than one enemy

[Karifean]

I found Odin to be most useful when catching chocobos. :D