Final Fantasy VII Rebirth’s fast-paced combat has a lot of little nuances beyond simply hacking and slashing. Each character in your party has their own playstyle, strengths, and weaknesses, and you make them your own by customizing each hero’s build with different materia. However, there is one universal trick that can help you close distance in fights that Square Enix’s sequel doesn’t go out of its way to tell you.
Swapping between party members is a key part of Rebirth. It’s tempting to just stick to your favourite character in fights, but switching around during a fight is how you maximize value across your team rather than relying on AI party members to execute certain abilities. This also helps you build your ATB meter to use special skills and execute cooperative synergy moves. While it’s not required to finish a fight, switching things up mid-fight is the intended way to play Rebirth. If you want to get the most out of each of these swaps, however, there’s a trick that will get some added value every time you switch.
If you hold down the block button while locked onto an enemy, then switch to a different party member while you’re defending, the character you swap to will execute an attack on the locked-on target. Another perk of this is if you’re locked on and blocking from a distance, the party member you switch to will teleport across the battlefield to attack the enemy. This is great for switching from a long-ranged character like Aerith or Barret, to a close-quarters fighter like Cloud, Tifa, or Red XIII. Here’s an example I was able to pull off where I was playing as Cait Sith, then swapped to Red XIII. You can see our four-legged friend teleport from across the battlefield to execute the attack upon switching.
While that is just one of the little nuances Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth doesn’t tell you about its combat system, we have plenty of other tips on how to get the most out of Cloud and his crew.
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