Scraping It All and Starting Over

There comes a time in many RPG's where you hit a wall. There's that one boss you can't beat. Epic 30 minute battles are fought with the boss, only to have your entire party destroyed in one powerful AOE attack.

You have to take stock of where you are in the game and figure out if you need to grind it out further or just scrap what you've done, start over, and follow a guide.

I'm at that point in two games.

I've discussed how Final Fantasy VII is a huge black mark on my gaming history. I'm currently on disk 3, right at the point of no return.

Before I ventured on, I decided to make sure I was properly equipped to handle the final fight.

I've read that Knights of the Round is almost necessary to defeat the final boss. But the requirements for Knights of the Round are pretty steep.

Even if you don't have Knights of the Round, Yuffie and Vincent are almost necessary, both of which I missed.

Since I hate wrangling Chocobo in the game, let alone some rare one, I'm considering starting over and specking my characters different ways and get the two characters I did not.

I could potentially spend another 10 hours grinding and leveling up to where it doesn't matter as much. I've had friends tell me they've beat the game around level 75-80. I'm currently sitting in the mid-50's.

Starting over means losing about 50 hours of game play. I fear if I start over, I'll never finish the game. I'll hit the wall I hit back in the late 90's and never progress.

The other game I'm currently stuck on is Vagrant Story. It's my all time favorite RPG. I've beaten it before, so I'm not agonizing over this decision as much. (Plus the game is only about 10-20 hours long) I'm stuck on a dragon and don't have any of the gear to make this a fair fight. He's killing me in two hits.

I know if I started Vagrant Story over, I would finish it. It's just a matter of how long will it take me. I'm about 3/4 of the way through the game and was really looking forward to finally taking on some of the New Game + dungeons.

I think I need to step away for a week or two, reassess, philosophize over our role in the universe, maybe get a life coach. Only then do I feel I can make this decision.