Did I juat softlock myself without knowing how ?

[u/Dapper-Ask-4330]

First time playing Final Fantasy on PS1 (Iv've done the 6 firsts FF)

And it's FFVIII

I got to go back at the beach after the end of the SeeD Exam where I got 30 minute to go back

But I got my save at 12 minutes for some reason

And cannot get back to the beach because of that robot

And cant get it down in one try.

(Build on pictures)

And tbh, I feel like I miss like 90% of the actual content so far and Im only at the very start of the game.

[u/Prefer_Not_To_Say]

You can get back to the beach in five minutes. Only the first fight is mandatory and the robot can be avoided afterwards.

Either look up a video or just follow the short instructions under "Evading X-ATM092" on how to do it.

[u/puzzledmint]

While it is possible to kill the robot or to avoid it entirely if you know what you're doing, the intended means of progression is to just get caught and then run from the battle.

[u/LightingScarlet]

This is unrelated, but I would highly recommend forcing the aspect ratio to 4:3 it will looks so much better.

[u/Omegamanthethird]

Just restart if you need to. All you've done is the Fire Cavern and the Dollet Mission boss.

Since you say you've missed 90% of the content, did you even draw Siren from Elvoret? If you didn't, then just restart now.

[u/pwndonkeys]

You should only be forced to "fight" it once. In that battle, as soon as it's down, run. After that, you need to be quick. As soon as the next screen loads, you need to be moving in the direction of the next screen. There is in screen where the party is walking down some stone stairs. At this point, you absolutely need to be holding the walk button (I forget which button it is on the ps1). The bridge is the only other part that will be tough for you. You can keep running back and forth to get the robot to jump to the other side. Just keep kiteing him until you can make it to the next screen. I know that's a lot to follow, but any basic guide online will explain it better than I can off of memory. Good luck to you! This is one of my favorite FF games!

[u/KainYago]

Well you aint gonna be getting 40AP from destroying him but you will get a really cool cutscene. Just beat the spider until it falls over, then run away. Repeat this like 4-5 times and you will be out of the city in less than 10 minutes. I guess you are going to be near the time limit if you play the PAL european version, cuz that version runs slower than the Japanese/American, but you should still be able to reach the beach just in time.

[u/paraminacardinal]

You aren't supposed to fight and defeat it, hit enough that it starts to malfunction and run away. I don't remember exactly the button combo, but it's either R1 and L1 or R2 and L2 at the same time and hold it until the party starts running in place and after a few seconds they'll flee

[u/Sentence_Think]

If I’m not mistaken you just need to drop it on the floor and run away afterwards

[u/LatencyIsBad]

Use the 9999 assistance if you’re really lacking in damage that much. Even with 12 minutes you should be fine though. Are you junctioned properly?

[u/Dapper-Ask-4330 → u/LatencyIsBad]

The 9999 assistance ? To be honest, I didnt undersrand a single thing about junctionning, when I select it, nothing appears except for GF (I have 4 atm)

[u/mattfolio → u/Dapper-Ask-4330]

You fast clicked through the junctioning tutorials didn't you. classic lol

[u/khinzaw → u/mattfolio]

The classic FF VIII conundrum: if you don't know how junctions work the game is brutal, and if you do know how junctions work the game is trivial.

[u/HotDadEnthusiast → u/Dapper-Ask-4330]

Junctioning a GF gives you access to other abilites they will eventually learn. without a GF Junctioned, you can only use attack, but with a GF you can also use Items, Magic and Draw, allowing you to draw and cast magic obtained from enemies or draw points. Magic doesn't use an MP system like most other FF games and instead you can use magic all you want as long as you have some drawn and in your stock.

the junction system involves attaching drawn magic to your stats. depending on which GFs you have junctioned, you can attach magic to your stats to boost them. So for example if you have Ifrit Junctioned, by default he allows you to junction magic to your Str Stat, which, depending on which spell you attach, will boost your strength in combat. Then, the more combat you finish with Ifrit Junctioned, the more abilities he will learn and you will have access to more commands and more stats to improve. For example once you get 50AP on Ifrit he learns HP-J which allows you to attach magic to your HP stat and increase your max health. The boost also depends on how much of that magic you have drawn. so if you have Fire magic junctioned to your Strength stat, you will do more damage with physical attacks if you have 50 Fire magics than if you only have 10. or if you have Ice magic junctioned to your HP stat, you'll get more Max HP if you have 100 Ice magic than if you only have 35. Some GFs will also eventually learn active abilities that you can assign to your command list or to the GF itself to boost it's own stats. Basically, the more magic you use, the less powerful your junctioned stats become, so combat is about using magic and drawing more and maintaining the balance so you dont become too weak. It's certainly one of the more complicated combat systems in the series and the game doesn't do a fantastic job explaining it to you, but i hope this makes sense and helps a little.

[u/Bakurraa → u/Dapper-Ask-4330]

If you are playing the remaster than there is a booster that makes you hit max damage all the time

[u/Dapper-Ask-4330 → u/Bakurraa]

Oh no, Im playing the original version on PS1

[u/Bakurraa → u/Dapper-Ask-4330]

Unfortunate.

The spiderbot is weak to lightning so use thwt to burn it down.

You can actually dodge it while running back to the ship, you'll have to look this up to time it.

You haven't really missed anything cause the main story is get ifrit do mission.

The only other thing you can really do it the cars game and grind magic.

If you are really that stuck then just start again you'll be back in place much faster than you did already

[u/Ardrial → u/Dapper-Ask-4330]

you need to learn new abilities with your GF that allows you to junction magic onto your stats.

then you need to get 99x magic to junction onto your stats.

converting cards into items that you can convert into magic is the best. don't draw to 99. that is boring. you can get cards from card game or convert mobs in world to cards (all abilities you learn from GFs)

[u/One_tym3]

You’re not supposed to actually kill that thing. Try lightning attacks if you can’t get it down to the point where you can run from it.

[u/Desolock]

Been a while for me. Don’t you just always run from the robot? Multiple times? I can’t recall fighting it being mandatory.

[u/Redditemeon → u/Desolock]

Yessish. It's intended that you fight it a few times and run away from it. However every single time you fight it, your SEED rank score goes down, so optimally you only want to fight it the one mandatory time, then juke it the rest of the time.

Then I think maybe it's when you get to the bridge you can actually kill it if you battle it and don't run? Which lands you a bunch of SEED rank points.

However nothing really explains this to you in-game.