In , Fort Condor’s Hard Mode is optional — but that doesn't mean completing it will go unrewarded. Fort Condor is a recurring (if greatly expanded) mini-game from the original . It's a real-time strategy tower defense game in which a variety of units are placed on a two-laned battlefield. The end goal is to destroy the enemy's headquarters, or to run out the clock with more towers remaining. Finer points of strategy come from calculated unit placement, and a rock-paper-scissors system of strengths and weaknesses.
Fort Condor is intensely satisfying to win, and is one of the most addicting mini-games in . It's not as ubiquitous in as it was in, though — Queen's Blood has taken over as the most popular pastime in Gaia. Still, there are a handful of Fort Condor challenges in. The first four are played in Normal Mode, and are central to the Protorelic quest line in ’s Junon. The last four are played in Hard Mode, and the reward structure is a little less straightforward.
Completing 's Hard Fort Condor challenges rewards players with a point towards Johnny's Treasure Trove, a completion list of 88 tasks. The Treasure Trove is perhaps the most comprehensive and accurate reflection of how much a player has completed. It grants players points for everything from story events to mini-game challenges like this one. However, that's all there is.
Fort Condor is unlockable beginning in Chapter Four, after completing the first few main quest steps in Under Junon. Players must then travel to the Phenomenon Intel quest marker in the Junon region, which will start a chain of four Fort Condor matches on Normal Mode. After completing those, the Hard Mode stages will be available.
Fort Condor is slightly different in . There's no more choosing units — instead, the player can choose a loadout from a menu of predetermined packs. Spells have also been replaced by Heroes, little models of Cloud, Barret, and Tifa, with special abilities that make them more powerful than the rank-and-file units. Players are allowed to select two Heroes per battle, but each of them can only be summoned once.
Unlike other units, Heroes can't be summoned with ATB points alone. Each has its own meter that must be filled prior to summoning. The meter ticks up each time a unit of the same type is summoned: tanks for Cloud, melee for Tifa, and ranged for Barret.
There's no material reward for finishing all eight Fort Condor levels, nor is there a Trophy — but there's one of each for finishing the entirety of the Treasure Trove. Once players have filled in all 88 entries, they'll receive a piece of Sheet Music — One-Winged Angel, which allows them to play Sephiroth's theme on the in-game piano. They'll also get the “” gold Trophy.
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offers a choice of swimsuits for Cloud, Tifa, and Aerith at Costa del Sol, and there's a reason to pay attention to the options at hand. Acquiring one vacation get-up for each character is a mandatory part of progression, as the beach doesn't allow anyone to step out onto the sands if they're not dressed for the part. Barret has this covered with his iconic sailor suit that he first dons in Junon, but for the others, this can be a somewhat more involved task.
Yuffie pops up several times throughout the earlier parts of , but she can't actually join the party until Costa del Sol, where the party is presented with a choice regarding the Materia-obsessed ninja. Here, she challenges Cloud to a fight to prove who should be the leader of the party, to which the mercenary can respond with either "" or " Unlike most decisions, this one can be a bit intimidating, as the implied possibility of failing to gain Yuffie as a party member could be disappointing.
Protorelic quests might not seem like critical content to play in , but there's one in particular that's well worth completing. As unique objectives that make up a part of the World Intel checklists found throughout the game, Protorelic quests task Cloud and company with tracking down pieces of ancient armor. Although this can lead to unlocking a powerful summon and gear late in the game, anyone uninterested in committing to the long haul could easily decide to ignore all the quests in favor of focusing on the main story.
is filled to the brim with World Intel to discover, but it can often be unclear just how much of a reward is in place for taking on this exhaustive task. As a somewhat open-world game that divides the giant map of Gaia into distinct but major zones, isn't shy about unfurling long checklists of activities to do. While some can be fulfilling in their own right, it doesn't take long to start questioning whether there are any rewards in place that could make some of the more tedious activities worthwhile.
has an open world that's perfect for the inclusion of many side quests and extra activities. While some of these activities are just for fun, others reveal lore about the game's world. The rewards for these extra activities also vary, but one specific chain of quests has a pretty powerful final reward once the entire quest chain is completed.
has its fair share of unusual challenges, but one side quest that has caused a particularly notable amount of frustration doesn't necessarily have to be all that hard. Like many RPGs, focuses on delivering a consistently manageable main story experience while packing more difficult tasks into the optional content. The big difference, however, is that a lot of the hardest trials aren't based around combat at all, instead following in the original 's tradition of relying on unique mechanics that shake up the general course of gameplay through minigames or random challenges.
As you continue to find paths through the Temple of the Ancients in , you'll run into the Ironclad boss, who can only be beaten when staggered by your party. This massive knight has nearly no weaknesses, making them difficult to pressure. You'll need to use specific attacks from characters on your team to stun this creature quickly enough to defeat it.
Although isn't a particularly choice-oriented RPG on the whole, the game has its fair share of moments that present Cloud with a decision. One that seems like it could be big lies in deciding which party members to help in Costa del Sol, a junction point that comes up without much warning. The beach location starts out as a relaxing getaway, but par for the course, it doesn't take too long for things to go south.
The final boss of is Sephiroth, who you have to beat across multiple phases in many different forms. The one-winged angel appears once you defeat the Jenova Lifeclinger boss, challenging not just Cloud but many other characters from the story. With his own Summon and plenty of resistances, it can be hard to anticipate what you need to do during each stage of this battle.
Of 's four game modes, Hard is the most difficult, and provides a distinct experience from the base game. After completing a single game on one of the base modes (Easy, Normal, or 's new Dynamic Difficulty), Hard Mode becomes available on the difficulty select screen. It provides a far greater challenge than any of the other modes, and comes with some significant rule changes to keep the experience interesting.
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Johnny's Treasure Trove is one of the most expansive side activities in — considering the laundry list of tasks it involves, a good reward seems almost inevitable. Unlike most side quests and mini-games in , Johnny's Treasure Trove isn't focused on a single activity. Instead, it's more of a dressed-up completion list akin to 's Curiosities. In order to complete Johnny's Treasure Trove, players will have to complete chocobo races, win Queen's Blood Tournaments, and find all the buried PLAY ARTS figures in .