Final Fantasy VII

Disc 1: Midgar

Intro - Reactor

We’ll start at the very beginning (a very good… yeah, you know…). Create a new game and watch the intro. When the train stops, follow Barret and fight the soldiers. The two red guards knocked down on the platform each have a , so examine them before moving on.

Name Cloud and Barret, then continue through the reactor. Talk to Jessie to unlock the first two doors, and grab the in the side room after the second door. Take the elevator, follow the stairs and ladders down, and pick up the on the beam. (Don’t bother talking to Jessie any more. She is just FASCINATED with ladders.) Near the reactor core, use the save point and pick up the Restore Materia before setting the bomb.

Boss: Guard Scorpion

Use Bolt, but stop attacking when its tail goes up. Heal and wait until the tail comes down, then resume attacking. After the fight, equip Barret’s , save if you want (I heal before save points out of habit), help Jessie, and leave the same way you came in.

After the explosion, talk to the flower girl. Choose “Hey Listen…” and “Don’t see too many flowers…” if you want the default date-mechanics route (See below). Grab the at the bottom-left of the next screen, fight soldiers if you want the XP, and then jump to the train.

Date Mechanics

Throughout the game, some dialog choices affect who wants to go on the Gold Saucer date with Cloud. It can be Aeris, Tifa, Yuffie, or even Barret. It does not really affect the main game, but it is a fun thing to play with on later runs.

On the train, talk to Jessie. If you talk to her a second time, choosing “Looking forward to it” makes it less likely that you will date Tifa.

Sector 7 Slums

After Barret’s speech, you can talk to people near the station. If you head right toward the Train Graveyard, you can solo level Cloud. I would recommend waiting though, as there’s a better time to grind that location coming up. When you are ready, follow the team left from the station. Use the save point, talk to the guy there if you want a preview of a later route, then continue to the slums.

Talk to people, visit the three-level store if you want the tutorial dump, then head into the bar and talk to Tifa.

Date choices here:

If you bought a flower from Aeris, giving it to Tifa helps Tifa. Giving it to Marlene helps Barret.
When Barret leaves, tell Tifa “Give me something hard” if you want to help Tifa.
When Tifa asks if you are ignoring your childhood friend, answer “How can you say that” to help Tifa.
The next morning, “Next to you” helps Tifa, while “Barret’s snoring” helps Barret.

Flashback time! As you can proablly tell from the stars, they’re not in the slums right. AH! A shooting star! It must come true, right? heh heh. Anyway, you’ll get the “sleep track” and it’ll be the next day.

Once Barret unlocks the materia menu, visit the weapon shop. Talk to folks around here and you’ll get access to a tutorial. Talk to the guy below the tutorial man to get an All Materia, then grab the from the chest. Buy all three of your characters an , then visit the materia shop. I like to pick up a Fire Materia and another Restore Materia if I can afford it.

If you need money, the train graveyard enemies are useful. Sweepers give 27 XP and 30 Gil, Mono Drive A gives 18 XP and 8 Gil, and Guard Hound A gives 20 XP and 12 Gil. Some enemies drop a and other drop an . If you need money, sell an or 10.

When you are ready, board the train. Talk to Tifa and run from car to car until Barret starts talking about jumping out, then talk to Tifa twice.

Reactor Revisited

Technically once you get off the train, if you want to get into lots of battles, you can go down six screens for a nearly endless run of fights. It’s not really a good play to level grind, though.

When you’re ready to continue, go up until you see lasers blocking the path, the choose the dialog to “look inside”, and then go down the hole.

Pick up the , climb down, and work through the ladders until you reach Jessie. Grab the in that room. The room with Jessie and the isn’t a terrible early-game leveling spot. Link Lightning Materia with All Materia on Cloud or Barret, burn through MP, swap the pairing to the other character, and use Tifa to heal as needed. You can then use the nearby /save point and repeat as desired.

Continue back through the reactor path, plant the bomb, and save on the way out. The long bridge near the save point and the 90-degree stairway before the elevator are both decent leveling spots. You can earn , , and items depending on where you fight.

Before the boss, heal up. Cloud should have Cure-All and Lightning, Tifa should have Cure and Lightning, and Barret can go without materia. If you want to build limit breaks, walk the lower catwalk and let enemies hit you, then heal before the cutscene.

Meet Aeris

Equip the you just got and any materia you want. Talk to Aeris until the escape begins. On the next screen, open the menu and junction materia to Aeris. Cloud using Ice-All works well on the Hedgehog Pie enemies.

When Aeris falls, tell her to hold on and push the barrels in this order:

Aeris position	Barrel
Bottom of the stairs	Left barrel on the upper beam
Stairway to the right	Right barrel on the upper beam
Next set of stairs	Right barrel on the lower beam

After you escape, cross the beam. When Aeris points out her house, you can head right into the church first if you want to let the kids tend the flowers. Then return left, save, and continue into the Sector 5 slums.

In town:

In the tube on the left you can find the guy that triggers the famous bad translation: “This guy are sick.”
The next house to the right is a materia shop.
The next house sells items. The is a very useful item.
The house on the far right has Turtle’s Paradise No. 1 upstairs. The dresser has 5 Gil, but if you leave it alone, you can get something better later.
The northern shop sells weapons and armor, but another is not a great buy if you are about to reach Wall Market.

Aeris’s house is one screen right. Save, then collect the and Cover Materia from the garden. After the cutscenes, grab the and in the guest room before sneaking out. Stay close to the rail to avoid the squeaky board.

You can level up here, but if you want for just a few minutes, you’ll get to Wall Market where you can buy better gear that will allow you to level more materia at once.

Wall Market Prep

Work through the playground scenes until you reach Wall Market. If you want to level Aeris’s limits, buy one or more and a better weapon from the shop labeled “Machine Gun.” Give Aeris Cover Materia and Fire Materia. Link Ice Materia with All Materia, give Cloud Restore Materia and Fire Materia, put Aeris in the front row, and put Cloud in the back.

For Hell House enemies, have Cloud cast Fire first, then Aeris. For Whole Eater groups, have Cloud defend while Aeris attacks and uses limit breaks. Aeris starts with Healing Wind. Use it eight times to unlock Seal Evil. After enough kills, she can unlock Breath of the Earth, Fury Brand, Planet Protector, and Pulse of Life.

Slum Town “Girl”

Talk to everyone in Wall Market (don’t forget to buy a for everyone), and upgrade weapons if you want. The shop labeled “Item” just shoots at you for now. If you need money or want to grind, head back toward Aeris’s house and rest at her house or the inn.

To advance the plot, ask around about Tifa. She is at Don Corneo’s mansion. Talk to the guard, then go to the dress shop. The dress shop sends you to the bar. Talk to the lonely guy there and ask for something “soft” and “that shimmers.” Return to the dress shop.

Next, go to the gym. Talk to the guy in the middle and do the squat mini-game. If you beat him, you get the ; otherwise you get the normal .

Optional Cloud makeover items:

Item	How to get it
	Sleep at the inn, buy the 200 Gil vending-machine item, and trade it to the curious guy near the stew pot.
	Order Today’s Special at the diner, say “it was all right,” trade the Coupon at the pharmacy for a , then give it to the person in the bar bathroom.
and	This part is both optional and PG-13. Get the membership card from the man near the south sign, enter the Honey Bee Inn, choose the upper-left room, then request afterward.

Technically you can try to leave the town now, but Aeris doesn’t seem to want to fight in heels.

When ready, save, change at the dress shop, and go to Don Corneo’s mansion. In the left room upstairs, grab the . After the dialog, equip your party and enter Don’s room.

If Cloud is not picked, you will be sent to the lackeys. Grab the and talk to the guy at the top of the screen a few times. If Aeris or Tifa is picked, regroup and return to Don’s room. Search behind his bed for a . Your dialog choices with Don do not matter much, though I like defying him.

Boss: Aps

Equip everyone before talking to the other characters in the sewer. Fire works well against Aps, with Bolt as a decent backup. Afterward, grab the , work through the ladders, and pick up the Steal Materia. Junction it to Aeris right away. If Aps inflicted Sadness and you do not have Hypers, you can steal some in the sewers.

Train Graveyard

Save your game and make sure Aeris has Steal Materia. If you want to level up a bit, this is a decent place do so while you steal.

Screen one:

Go through the nearest train opening and get the from the trash can.
Climb the nearest ladder for another .
Jump onto the crossbeam and head left.
Grab the from the trash can.
Get the from the next car.
Exit that car on the right and climb the nearby ladder.
Go down the ladder just past the rubble.
Pass through the car on the right.
Exit on the left and get the at the top of the screen.
Go up to screen two.

Screen two:

Go up and left around the car to get a .
Get the from the trash can around the train to your left.
Climb the ladder near the engine for a .
Enter the lower engine to move it forward.
Re-enter it to back it up, then enter the upper engine to move that one.
Climb the ladder, cross to the moved train, and descend on the left.
Leave the graveyard to the left when you are ready.

I really recommend stealing at least one before leaving.

Fight at the Pillar

After the Train Graveyard, remove Aeris’s materia and good armor before heading to the pillar. Save just past the fence, rearrange materia, and make sure someone has Steal Materia. The shopkeeper here can sell supplies, and if you stole an extra or an or two, you can sell them for good money.

Head up the pillar and talk to people along the way. Bolt-All is very useful. If Cloud has Blade Beam, it can help in the upcoming fight.

Boss: Reno

Talk to Barret and equip him while the message box is up. Reno has nothing to steal. If he uses Pyramid, attack the trapped character to break it. Cloud’s Blade Beam can hit Reno and diffuse outward to break Pyramid from allies. Ice works well enough here. When Reno says “It’s time,” the fight ends.

Talk to Tifa, then go “talk” to Barret to jump across the wire. During the cut scene when you see them in the playground, look for something interesting on the ground (Also, nothing says Barret cares about collateral damage like watching him fire a machine gun into the air so that random bullets will fall down on folks all throughout the city. Aheam.) ANYWAY…

After the scenes, head toward Aeris’s house until the party regroups. Then go back toward the playground and pick up the Sense Materia. Continue to Aeris’s house, talk to her mother, and leave when the party is ready to return to Wall Market.

Invading Shinra HQ - Prep

Back in Wall Market, buy materia and gear if needed. The guy who wanted the inn vending-machine item now sells Fire Materia, Ice Materia, Lightning Materia, and Cover Materia. When ready, talk to the man in the back of the weapon shop and buy batteries.

Head toward Don Corneo’s mansion, then one screen right to the wire. Talk to the kid and climb.

Climb until you jump left.
Curve down and around under the path.
Put a battery in the yellow box.
Hop onto the propeller and continue up.
Put another battery in the yellow box by the tracks and climb the gate.
Put the third battery in the box for an .
Return to the swinging bar and jump when it is closest to you.
Continue up the pipes until the Shinra HQ cutscene.

You can storm the front door or sneak in. The front door lets you read Turtle’s Paradise No. 2 on the board at the back-right of the ground floor. If you sneak, you have a very long stair climb, with an on the fifth stair screen. (It gets old quick, but think of it as an unofficial mini-game. You have to try and beat them to the top on every floor! That makes the time go a little bit faster.)

Either way, you end up on floor 59. Fight the guards to get .

Invading Shinra HQ - Floors 60-67

Floor 60 and 61

On floor 60, sneak across the room from pillar to pillar. If you are spotted four times, you just get into battles. On floor 61, talk to everyone and choose ”…” instead of “where’s Aeris” to get .

Floor 62

Talk to the mayor and guess his password. If you get it right on the first try, you get Elemental Materia.

The way this puzzle works is that you have to find the one file in each library room that does not belong, then count letters based on the number at the start of the title. Let’s look at an example:

2 M[a]ko energy and the rise in life forms
10 New plans f[o]r urban planing
16 Modern history of [M]idgar space program vol. 1
4 Ran[k]s and extended use of Make weaponry

Those letters are A, O, M, and K, which rearrange to MAKO.

Common answers include MAKO and KING. In an event, when you successfully guess the password, you should receive .

Floor 64

Floor 64 has the save point, so make a beeline for it. You can get an and a from the lockers. There is also a megaphone Cloud will not take yet.

Floor 63

Use the computer in the lower-right room and solve the door/coupon puzzle. The goal is to open only three doors and collect all the coupons. Turn them in, equip the rewards, save on floor 64, then continue. .

Floor 65

Open the bottom chest in the upper-left room to get . Place them in the model, then repeat as more chests unlock.

Piece	Chest
1	Top room on left, bottom chest
2	Upper room on right, only chest
3	Upper-left room, upper chest
4	Lower-left room, upper chest
5	Bottom room on left, bottom chest

When all five pieces are placed, the hallway chest unlocks with the next keycard.

Floor 66

Talk to everyone, climb into the restroom vent, watch the meeting, then follow Hojo.

Floor 67

Watch the cutscene by the tube, open the chest for Poison Materia, then save. I like linking Elemental Materia and Poison Materia on Cloud’s armor so it can grow toward poison immunity. Give someone a for the next boss. When asked who should escort Aeris, I usually pick Tifa so Barret can fight from the back row.

Invading Shinra HQ - Meet Red XIII

Boss: Sample: H0512

Do not use Poison; it heals these enemies. Attack Sample: H0512 in the back. It can reanimate the smaller H0512-opt enemies, and when the main enemy dies, they all disappear. The main target has 1,000 HP and 120 MP. None of them have anything to steal.

After the fight, remove materia and good equipment from Red XIII and Tifa if you are swapping them out. I like Cloud, Barret, and Aeris here. Grab the Enemy Skill Materia from the experiment chamber, save, then collect the 2x on the catwalk. Talk to the man for , follow him, and pick up two more Potions on the way out.

Invading Shinra HQ - Battles

In jail, talk to Tifa. If you want to help her date score, say “Leave it to me.” When Cloud thinks about party members, the first person gets the largest affection change, the second gets a smaller one, and the third gets none.

After the escape, talk to Red XIII near Jenova, save, and follow the blood trail. Before heading to the president’s office, remove all materia, armor, and accessories from characters who will not be in the next fight.

Bosses: Hundred Gunner and Heli Gunner

For Hundred Gunner, physical attacks cannot reach, so use magic and Barret’s ranged attacks. It has 1,600 HP and is weak to Lightning.

Heli Gunner has 1,000 HP and is also weak to Lightning. It can put characters to sleep. If Aeris is awake, have her lightly smack sleeping allies to wake them up.

Boss: Rufus and Dark Nation

Use Square to take materia from the other party, then set up Cloud. Use the to prevent poison and give him Restore Materia. Do not bother with Steal Materia, Enemy Skill Materia, Sense Materia, or Cover Materia for practical reasons (unless you want the Dex +2 bonus that the Steal Materia provides.)

Dark Nation has 140 HP and 80 MP. Rufus has 500 HP and unlimited MP. Kill Dark Nation first so you get the , then heal and cast Bio on Rufus until he leaves.

Afterward, return to the lobby. If you have not read Turtle’s Paradise No. 2, go up the stairs to the floor with the green door, talk to people near the car, then look at the wall by the two posters. Then leave the building.

Biking Out of Town

Before the bike sequence, you must junction your party. Form your party with the X button. I used Cloud, Tifa, and Red XIII. The next boss is a back attack, so set your rows backward, with Cloud in the back row. Do not bother stealing, and do not link Poison Elemental to your weapon because the boss is immune.

Boss: Motor Ball

Motor Ball has 2,600 HP and 120 MP. Like most machines, it is weak to Lightning. Use Bolt magic. You can also link Elemental Materia with Fire Materia on armor for defense, or link Elemental Materia with Lightning Materia on a weapon for extra damage.

For the bike ride itself, read the directions and protect the truck. You should get another after the boss. When you regain control outside Midgar, talk to everyone, try to leave, fix your party rows so you are no longer set for back attacks, junction up, and head to the bottom of the screen.