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Has anyone else played the Hardcore mod of FFVII? I'm currently at Mideel, and it's been fun getting here, but also hellish. The Hardcore mod adds new bosses, new random encounters, fixed the magic defence bug and makes materia harder to master (although not impossible, once you learn how to kill the virtually-invulnerable Adamantoise creature near Wutai, you'll be mastering green materia in minutes). Summons can now only be used once per battle and cannot be mimed. Knights of the Round can supposedly cast Peerless (invincibility) on the enemy for some reason. Yeah, not all of the decisions by the modder make sense. Countdown timers now work in real time so capturing the train outside Corel is truly heart-stopping, especially with new bosses blocking your way.

Some previously useless materia now has worth - Adde Effect-Mystify is awesome when mastered and silence can save you from enemies casting ???? on you. You can also get Pandora's box much earlier and more enemies now use it.

Unfortunately, some of the bosses are almost impossible without the right strategy. Yes, you now need strategy when playing FFVII, button-mashing or attack spamming will get you killed immediately. You will need to be prepared to grind extensively. Some of the new random encounters are almost inconceivable to beat - enemies can now hit for up to 30,000 damage if you are using a break hp/damage limit mod, and many, many monsters inflict multiple statuses which sometimes can't even be stopped by a Ribbon.

I don't think I'll be able to beat the final dungeon as most monsters there will hit for close to 9999 even with Barrier and Imperial Guard, on the back row, with Sadness status. I'm not using the break hp/damage mods.

I would recommend anyone who wants a real challenge without arbitrary rules such as no materia/no items etc to get this mod asap. It works with steam.