FFVII: Battle square
After some crazy twists and turns in the plot, and after Cloud returned to the party, I decided to kill some time in the Battle Square at the Gold Saucer. My brain needed a break. The story is not getting any easier to follow. I feel like I need a flow chart or something.
And kill time at the Battle Square I did. The Battle Square is a mini-game of sorts where you face a series of battles in a row. Why? Good question. Wait, I mean “to win Battle Points.”
Yes. That’s it.
Said Battle Points are traded in for items, ranging from useless to game-breakingly awesome.
I had a few items in my sights: the Speed Plus materia and Cloud’s Omnislash limit break.
Let’s back up for the non-geeks: limit breaks are special attacks your characters can use after taking enough damage.
I suppose the name implies the character has reached his or her “limit” and unleashes a desperation attack.
Y’know, like Popeye not “stands”-ing no more, Michael Douglas freaking out over a can of over priced Coke in Falling Down, or Kat Cooper finding out she just missed a shoe sale.
The limit break in question, Omnislash, is Cloud’s final limit break, and therefore his strongest attack. This was something I never had when I first beat the game, so I wanted to make the effort to grab it.
Easier said than done.
Omnislash costs a hefty 32,000 (yes, thousand) Battle Points. The effort took a decent chunk of time, summed up brilliantly by my girlfriend as “this game seems to be a lot of you doing nothing.”
Well put.
There are a few snags to spending a lot of time in the Battle Square.
1. It costs 10 GP to enter. GP is the currency only used at the Gold Saucer. You can win GP by playing mini-games, or by waiting for the Gil exchange man to appear randomly in the Ropeway Station.
I don’t have the patience for the mini-games, so I opted for the easier route: the Gil exchange man. This meant a lot of exiting and entering the station until he appeared. And then, he trades you 1 GP per 100 Gil. I maxed out what I could get, 100 GP, it cost me 10,000 Gil.
Good thing I sold a mastered All materia back on Disc 1 for 1.5 million Gil.
2. If you leave the Battle Square area, your Battle Points drop to zero. Yes. You read that correctly. You could have 20,000 BP, accidentally exit and BOOM—you’re back to zilch.
This happened to me after my first go through. I survived my first time all the way to the end and had a bit over 10,000 BP. I left to save, and whoops—back to zero.
Sounds like my 401K a couple years ago. And speaking of saving–
3. You have to leave the Battle Square to save, and it costs 5 GP to save at the Gold Saucer—and if you leave the Saucer, any GP you have goes away. And remember, if you leave to save, you lose all your BP.
4. You’re subjected to a status affecting slot machine after each battle. Yep. After each win, you can stop or continue. If you keep going, a slots reel pops up and your status is messed with.
If you have the Ribbon equipped, like I did, you won’t get hit with Poison, Toad, or Mini if it pops up. But, there is not stopping the 1/2 HP or Broken [fill in the blank] slots. This is where the challenge comes from. You can go from having 8000 max HP, down to 2000 just like that.
One highlight was a final battle where my sword was broken (mainly less attack power), I couldn’t use items and I was out of MP.
I beat the final guy with Goblin Punch. No lie. It was silly.
Was getting Omnislash worth all the hassle? Man, I hope so.
I don’t think I’ll go back to get the w-Summon materia. It costs 64,000 BP.
Where you at?
Disc: 2
Cloud’s Level: 58
Location: Mideel area
Timer: 62:10
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Read Gavin Craig’s week 10 post
I hear you on the w-summon, but you need that if you want the Final Attack materia. My suggestion, do what I did and blow through to disk 3, get everything you can from the crater and then come back. You’ll zip through it quick.
yeah, after reading your post that is what I plan to do.