Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, the latest RPG from Square Enix, is a tremendous game. And like any massive adventure, there are dozens of subsystems, features, and layers to navigate. If you’ve played the first game in the new trilogy, Remake of Final Fantasy VIIYou already have a good knowledge of the basics of speaking FF7. But whether you’re coming for New birth As a complete beginner or a die-hard fan, these are some helpful tips to keep in mind as you start your journey.
1: The open world stuff doesn’t start until Chadley shows up
When you first leave Kalm and step out into a large open world New birthYou may be tempted to run away and start exploring. By all means, give in to this urge, but know that many activities will not unlock properly until you meet Chadley at Bill’s Chocobo Ranch. Follow the story as written until you argue with your first flying friend, and you’ll encounter a talkative (and very needy) cyborg. You will be asked to activate a tower and your map will start filling up with icons indicating interesting places.
Read more: PSA: A Final Fantasy VII The spin-off in which you didn’t play a significant role New birth
If you explore before talking to Chadley, you won’t be able to activate any towers, clear lifesprings, and more.
2: Synergy skills and abilities are essential
If you are a recent arrival remakeyou may be tempted to use the default option Combat system You already know from the first game. Although the basics of the combat system are essentially the same, the synergistic skills and abilities are worth getting used to sooner rather than later. Skills can be activated by pressing the R1 button and selecting the face button. Synergy abilities are special combo moves you can use once you’ve used enough ATB charges. We detail synergy capabilities further in We increased New birth Combat guide.
3: Press L1 while traveling to view character affinity levels
Do you want to know how much you like a certain character? You’ve probably seen the little smiley faces above their heads during scripted sequences, but it’s not quite as obvious when you’re out exploring. If you hold down L1, you can see what level of affinity any character has with Cloud at the moment.
4: Side quests greatly affect affinity
Do you want to increase your affinity with a specific character? Completing side quests is one of the best ways to do this. When you do a side quest, you’ll notice that a party member will likely play a present role in the story. If you complete this quest, you will increase your affinity with that character.
If you’re not sure which character relationship will be enhanced by a particular quest, tap the touchpad to bring up the map and press L2 to jump to the quest area. Here, you’ll see each area’s quest with one of the characters’ faces on the quest title.
5: Use the menu button to quickly navigate the map
Take it from someone who spent about 100 hours undoing the right analog stick to zoom New birthMultiple Map Layers: All you have to do is press the Menu/Pause button (the button to the right of the DualSense’s touchpad) and you’ll automatically zoom out one layer at a time.
When we talk about the map…
6: The map menu is really important
Tapping the touchpad to bring up the map is something you should get into the habit of doing early and often New birth. While the menu button to the right of the touchpad is essential for inventory management and character growth, the map itself is your command center for understanding quests, information objectives, and more. The map menu is divided into main tabs and sub-tabs. Navigate between main tabs using L2/R2, and sub-tabs using L1/R1.
To start, you should get used to marking with R3, as the mini-map can often get a little crowded. Don’t worry, it disappears when you access the site, so you don’t have to come back to turn off the pinned site.
Story and Quests breaks down the main narrative material in outline form, so you can quickly update yourself on what’s happening. The same applies to many of the game’s side quests. Under Intel and Chadley, you’ll find useful information for keeping track of various side activities in the game. In fact, under Chadley > Region Intel, you can read the unlockable knowledge for each region. For example, did you know that most of the world’s goods are transported by sea and air? Or do the people of Junon have a unique and special relationship with the sea? If you are dying to know more about him FF7In our world, Intel’s territory is where it’s at.
7: You can replay almost all mini-games at any time
New birth It has a huge amount of mini-games that you can play. Most of them will allow you to pause and retry (or at least exit, where you can then try again). Some mini-games may not go your way at first, e.g Queen’s Blood card game. Save yourself the hassle of reaching an unsatisfactory outcome or defeat screen and only repeat a mini-game if it’s giving you a hard time.
8: Feel free to mix up open world activities, with some exceptions
Although I recommend starting with the side quests and letting them guide you through the world (many of which involve other side objectives, so you’re often killing two birds with one stone by picking up the quests), feel free to do the open-ended quests. – Global activities in your free time…with one notable exception: Fiend Intel.
Fiend Intel sees you encounter unique monsters while your other cyborg friend Mai… rants about the whole thing. These missions often ask you to tap and stagger creatures and then defeat them within a set amount of time (the game will mix these objectives up from time to time depending on the enemy). The problem with saving these activities until later is that you risk becoming too powerful to properly send an enemy into a staggered state. You’ll then need to equip lower-level weapons to complete these challenges, but even then, you may have to repeat these battles to meet all conditions. Despite Mai being a bit arrogant, Fiend Intel is good practice for learning the battle system and should be used as such.
9: Keep track of the items you want to craft
In the Item Transmuter list, you can square-tap any item to pin it to your to-do list. Not only will this move the item to the first page of the Transmuter’s menu system, but you’ll see a purple indicator on your HUD letting you know when you’ve collected enough materials for that item.
10: Always be a resident
Using assessment items (which require one ATB charge during battle and are found within abilities) during combat is essential to knowing the enemy’s strengths and weaknesses. You should use this at the beginning of every fight with a new enemy to learn how to pressure, sway, and exploit their weaknesses.
11: The touchpad is your best friend in combat
After evaluating the enemy, you can remember his information at any time using the touchpad. Also, while displaying your synergy skills with R1, you can press the touchpad to call up a menu explaining each move.
12: You can quickly switch party members using X + L1/R1
You can configure up to three party makeups in the main menu. In the main menu, go to Combat Settings and tap the box to edit the group. Here, you can switch between three different party presets. Once you’re out on the field, you can just press X followed by L1 or R1 to switch party without diving into the menu.
13: Rotate characters based on weapon skills
Are you burdened by choice paralysis about who should be in your party? Here’s a question to ask: Who has a weapon skill to learn? In the main menu, select Materials and Equipment and you will see a meter below each character. Some will be partially filled in, while others will be filled in with a yellow check mark. This bar represents weapon skills.
Any time a character obtains a new weapon, they can learn a new weapon skill simply by using it in battle enough times. A great way to determine who should get fighting time in the game is to see who has weapon skills to learn. Everyone who needs to learn their new skill must actively fight.
14: Feel free to experiment with materials
Obviously, some characters benefit from certain roles. Aerith, for example, is the best at magic in the game, so it makes sense to give her plenty of offensive and defensive spells to use. But since you can input any texture for any character, you can create some dynamic designs that offer a great mix of strategy and creativity.
You can view the materials for each character in the Materials and Equipment section. But if you tap the touchpad in this menu, you can enter an overview screen that shows you all the materials everyone has equipped, and easily swap them between characters or clear the entire board to start over.
15: Autosave is very rare
If the only game you plan to play on your PS5 is New birthIt may be convenient to hang up your console and pick up where you left off. but New birthAutoSave does not run as frequently as you would like. While I never lost a significant amount of time, there were more than a few occasions where I lost a few hours of progress because I jumped to another game before making a difficult save. Like any RPG, you have to save regularly New birthespecially if you’re going to play a different game or turn off your console.
16: Read the game guide
Confused about a certain game mechanic? Go to the guide in the main menu to read everything from world traversal to combat systems. Although you won’t find every possible tips and tricks in the game (hey, that’s what we’re here for), there’s a lot of useful information here.
This covers our initial tips for getting started Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. What features of the new game surprised you? Are there any tips you would give to new players?
