• This reminds me of why I never beat ff8 and why I now cycle saves in all my games.

      FF8 has a part at the end that you can permanently softlock if you meet a complicated set of criteria. All of your abilities are stripped away and you have to beat a number of bosses to retrieve them. If you are at a certain level, which scales the bosses to their hardest tier but leaves you at the lowest point of the tier side of the bosses will one shot you.

      When that happened and I realized I only had the one save file I just about lost it. No way to go back and level more or otherwise prepare beforehand. Only option would be to start over from the beginning.

      • As an aside, I hate when games have limited save files and don’t miss how the PS1 memory cards could only store what felt like a dozen saves. I like to make a new save every few hours, just in case of any bullshit.

        On the topic of such bullshit, the original Final Fantasy Tactics is the worst for that. Multiple places that can soft lock you due to unexpectedly difficulty battles. Difficulty level of that game was whack. It had some ludicrously overpowered characters that were basically not fun to use because they felt like cheating, but then it would also do stuff like throw you solo into difficult battles that required careful strategizing and a suitably strong build.

        • I got stuck fighting in that fight against Gaffgarion at Golgollada Gallows. I had like only 3 saves at the time and every save was apparently at that fight. Got softlocked out. I’ve since learned to use more saves than that. And to be sure to have like an “emergency” save.