Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has officially launched, and while everyone is excited to dive right into the next chapter of the trilogy, there are a few things you may want to know before starting that journey. These are things we wish we knew before starting and to help save you a bit of time later on in the game. Here are some of the biggest Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth tips we feel every play should know.

Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth Tips – Things to Know Before Playing:

Assess Every Fight

Assess is a Materia you get fairly early in the game and has a ton of use. It’ll start out as level one, allowing you to use it only on one enemy at a time, but using it more and more will quickly upgrade it to level two, where you’ll be able to scan all enemies at once during a battle.

Assess will give you very important information on enemies, from weaknesses to how to pressure and stagger them. That will be crucial in hard mode and any other difficulty higher than easy, as you’ll want to exploit all that.

But the biggest reason is because Chadley’s research requires a certain amount of enemies assessed in each region of the game. Assessing while you are playing will allow you to get enemies that are easily missable, especially those only seen during the story part of the game and not in the open world of each region. So assess every enemy you come across so it gets registered, and you’ll have access to those Chadley missions.

Master Every Weapon Ability

Every weapon you unlock has an exclusive weapon ability. If you master them, they get added to your normal list of weapon abilities, even when you aren’t using that weapon. This will be extremely important in later fights, as some provide good staggering, high damage, and great combos. So user every weapon’s exclusive ability as often as possible. It won’t take long to master them; it will only take a few fights.

Don’t Think Having Better Physical Damage Means It’s a Better Weapon. Pay Attention to Their Skills. 

A common thing I usually find myself getting trapped into is thinking higher physical damage means that’s the best weapon. So I stuck out with a high-damage weapon mostly through my first playthrough, without knowing that there were other weapons with lower physical damage but provided better skills.

There was one weapon that provided MP whenever I took high enough damage, which worked well for magic-based build and ultimately provided infinite healing and greater magic damage than the having greater physical damage. Pay close attention to weapons and their skills as they’ll work greatly into the kind of build you want.

Play Around With Materia Combinations, and Be Sure to Swap and Level Up as Many as Possible

Another thing you may easily forget is that every Materia also can be leveled up. What’s more, though, you’ll likely play through the game and stick to the same Materia. Don’t do this, once a Materia has been maxed out, swap it out with another, be that a different one, or the same type. If you plan on taking on Hard Mode, you’ll need as many Materia that are maxed out as possible, so doing it while you play the first time around would be wise.

Also, play around with material combinations. Some Materia can be paired with one another, like Elemental, with an element to give your weapon elemental damage. Magnify increases a spell range, so instead of only healing one party member with Cura, you can now heal the entire party.

Play around with combinations, as well as the gear you unlock.

Constantly Swap Characters to Draw Fire

Enemies mainly focus their attention on the character that is currently being controlled. This means they will always try to prioritize their attacks on you and to counter this; you’ll always want to be swapping between party members during combat.

This will allow you to draw their attention away from other members, in which you could potentially follow up with an ATB attack/spell of sorts from that character. Don’t just stick to one character. Otherwise, you’ll find yourself dying very often.

Use Ability Shortcuts

Even though the game tells players about these, it was something I did end up forgetting. There are ability shortcuts that you can assign for each character. Use these, and assign the best abilities so they are all easily accessible without going into the ATB menu. This will make combat move faster and make it feel more like a hack-and-slash.

Smash Every Box, and Search the Ground With Your Chocobo When the Prompt Shows Up

As outlined in our how-to get More Moogle Medals guide, you will want to smash every box you see in the game. These are free resources, plus they can give Moogle Medals, which can be used at the Moogle Shop for some good gear and Materia.

Elsewhere, your Chocobo has a scent ability and will notify you whenever it picks up a scent. Follow it, these usually lead to crafting material, as well as some collectible Play-Arts collectibles. There’s one Play-Art collectible for each region, and you’ll need those if you plan on getting the platinum trophy.

Immediately Get the Chocobo in New Regions

I ignored this, which resulted in me missing out on a lot of content my first passthrough in each region. Every region has a specific Chocobo that you need to unlock, and you’ll need to head to the Chocobo farm in each one to locate these. You’ll likely run into the farm passing through for the story, but be sure you get them and find the Chocobo. They will make traveling faster and give you access to some locked locations.

Don’t Be Afraid of Missing Out on Content, Everything is Accessible Post-Game

My biggest scare in any game is missing out on content once I’ve blown past an area. Nothing worse than learning that you’ll be locked out of something because you accidentally went too far into the game, and there’s no way back. Like Remake, Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has a chapter selection, so you can go back to any moment in the game while keeping progress. So, if you missed something or want to see how something else would result differently, you can use that feature. Otherwise, play the game at your own pace without worrying about missing out on something.

Plenty of other tips out there’ll come naturally to you, but for now, I think these are some of the biggest ones you should know. They’ll help make the game easier, especially when starting your hard mode run. Otherwise, get out there and enjoy the game! Oh, and in case you haven’t already, be sure to read our best settings for Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth guide!