For defeating Airbuster you’ll earn the Sharpshooter’s Companion Vol. You’ll fight some more Monodrives, and if you bother with the synchronous button press minigame you’ll find that the Magic Up Materia has now been replaced by Healing Materia.Īirbuster is the boss of this chapter, naturally, and as with the other bosses its Hard difficulty strategies will be relegated to their own page. The rest of the chapter up to the boss is fairly inconsequential. Use Thunder to take it down, or just rely on Cloud’s counterattacks. Next up is a Cutter, a melee-modified Sweeper. You can dispense with Magnify here (or rather, move it to Healing + Magnify) if you wish.
Dispatch them with Fira + Magnify, then swap back to Lightning Materia. These are scripted attack combos, so don’t feel compelled to bother with the keycards and consoles any more than the story forces you to.Īfter you’re past the point of no return regarding the ineffective keycards, you’ll fight several Elite Riot Troopers. Airbuster will spam “Finger-Lasers” and “Big Bomber” attacks regardless - in fact, the former triggers the latter. We highly suspect that in Hard difficulty your attempts at sabotage don’t matter at all. With the exception of the latter group of bots, every foes mentioned is weak to fire, and Fira + Magnify should outright end these fights or significantly hasten your victory.Īs before, you can pick up keycards to “disable” various aspects of Airbuster’s offense. In between rooms you’ll break this cycle to fight some more Monodrives and Laser Cannons.
Your enemies will be fairly varied, including Security Officers, Elite Security Officers, Elite Grenadiers and at the end, two Elite Shock Troopers.
Now you’ll be heading through the various keycard and console-cluttered rooms (B8, B7, B6, B5, etc.) Instead of giving you a complete (and unnecessary) rundown, let’s paint with broad strokes. Fira + Magnify will also help speed things up. The latter can be easily dispatch with counterattacks, but the former has more ranged attacks up its sleeve, requiring a more versatile approach - even if it’s just waiting for the Elite Shock Trooper to commit to a physical attack before switching to Punisher mode. (1 of 4) Fira + Magnify will get you through the trooper-occupied rooms.Īfter the fight with the two Sweepers, switch your Lightning Materia out for Fire Materia.Īfter setting the bomb and trying to escape you’ll have to fight an Elite Shock Trooper and two normal Shock Troopers.