10 Hardcore Challenges Gamers Set THEMSELVES

4. Level 99 Cloud And Barrett Before The First Boss - Final Fantasy VII

Back in 2015 - before all the stuff happened - someone going by the name of CirclMastr managed to level up Cloud and Barrett to level ninety-nine in Final Fantasy VII.

Now I hear you: "Ha! What? That's not an impressive feat at all." To which I reply: why do you think it's included on this list if they did it in a normal way whatsoever? Also...look at the title of this entry.

So, CirclMastr spent five-hundred plus hours over the course of two actual years of their real life going through what must have felt like endless random encounters - which we can all agree are the gaming equivalent of eczema flare ups - until they'd levelled up both characters to ninety-nine before even facing the first boss.

This is made all the more impressive because they chose to do it on an OG PlayStation rather than an emulator. That means no frame-skipping or save states.

The best of it, and the reason I don't consider this particular entry totally pointless, is it was done out of spite. Another player was trying to do the same but eventually stopped posting updates, so CirclMastr went ahead and just did it themselves. Humanity is awesome.

Contributor

Johnny sat by the fire, idly swirling his brandy, flicking through the pages of War and Peace, wondering whether it was pretentious to write his bio in the third person.