Dissidia Final Fantasy OO (Free) is the kind of game you can easily be sucked into for hours at a time if you like what it’s giving you. Though loosely connected to the similarly named console fighting game, OO is as classic a Final Fantasy experience as we’ve seen on mobile, albeit one that has the usual free-to-play trappings and a selection of characters that spans decades of titles.

It’s also somewhat unique in the sense that you can play for long stretches of time without investing a penny since there’s no energy system. And there’s no need to worry about grinding and hoping to get your favorite characters since you have the opportunity to recruit every one in the game to date just by completing quests.

That doesn’t necessarily mean that you can stroll right through the whole thing, get all the best gear and max out your characters with no problem. Or at least, not without some guidance along the way, the kind we’re happy to give.

The Basics — Or, What is Bravery Anyway?

The combat system in Dissidia Final Fantasy OO is classic, turn-based RPG goodness. Both your characters and enemies act according to their speeds, and the order in which they attack is displayed in a bar at the bottom of the screen. When it’s time for one of your characters to act, you can choose a target simply by tapping on it, then pick a BRV Attack, HP Attack or skill to use from the buttons on the right-hand side of the screen.

That BRV Attack is especially important. OO uses a system called Bravery, and each character has his or her own amount of it shown next to their health bar. At its most basic level, the amount of Bravery you have at the time you perform an HP Attack is how much damage you will do, and reducing an enemy’s HP to zero is still the name of the game.

But to build up your Bravery, you need to first use a BRV Attack to “steal" some from an enemy. If you reduce a monster’s Bravery all the way to zero, it will enter a break state, and subsequent attacks will always be critical hits — obviously making them much easier to destroy with HP Attacks.

It takes some getting used to, but once you’ve got the hang of it, the combat system will make a lot more sense. Two additional things to keep in mind: One is that special abilities will sometimes deal HP damage regardless of an opponent’s Bravery, and the other is that a character’s HP Attack button will flash purple when using it would destroy your current target.

How to Get Higher Scores in Battle

It’s not enough simply to defeat your foes. You want to run up the score and embarrass them by the largest possible margin. At least you do in this game, because it will give you extra premium currency to play with.

There are three keys to a high score in battle:

• The number of turns it takes to win. The quicker the win, the better.
• How many HP you lost, minus any you recovered with healing abilities, so keeping those HP meters high is key.
• How many BRV breaks were performed against you. The less breaks you take, the more points you’ll earn.

Those factors should always stay in the back of your mind in a fight. Style points matter here.

How to Get More Characters

This might be the easiest section of this or any other mobile game guide. You unlock all the characters in Dissidia Final Fantasy OO simply be playing through the game. There are no random draws to worry about, simply look for quest hexes that have a character’s face on them. Most characters will require you to complete a string of several quests interspersed with cutscenes before you can recruit them.

Could this change down the road and see the game incorporate limited time event characters or something of the like? Of course. But at least at launch, there’s nothing tricky to do or RNG gods to pray to for you to earn more than two dozen Final Fantasy characters.

How to Get 5-Star Weapons

Now here’s the part where they might get you and your wallet. Weapons and armor are earned in OO by way of random draws paid for in the game’s premium currency, gems. Gear ranges in rarity (and corresponding power) on a scale of one to five stars. Armor only goes to four stars, but 5-star weapons are the most powerful in the game and match up 1-to-1 with a specific character for maximum effect.

You can buy a single draw for 500 gems and take your chances on the result, which will give you a five percent chance of obtaining a 5-star weapon. A much better way to spend your gems is to save up for the 10+1 draw, which guarantees you at least one 5-star weapon. On top of that, some draws give you a discounted rate for the first time you decide to try the 10+1.

If you take only one thing away from this guide, this should be it. Please save up for the multi-draw. Pretty please. Your weapon collection will thank you for it.

How to Get Free Gems

Final Fantasy Dissidia OO is on the generous side when it comes to free gems. In fact, simply clearing all the quests in chapter 1 gets you a one-time bonus of 10,000 gems, which would cost you more than $50 to purchase from the in-game store.

You won’t be able to obtain them that fast ever again, but there are a number of ways to slowly acquire gems for your 10+1 draw pleasure. Let’s run them down.

• Log in daily. At launch, there is a special release campaign where players receive gems just for signing in. That won’t last for more than a few weeks, but you can expect more offers like that down the road.
• Play through the cutscenes. Even if you don’t dig the game’s story, it’s worth it to check out every dialogue-only quest hex (the ones with the “…" symbol) because you get 50 gems just for finishing them. You can even skip the talking and you’ll still receive the gems.
• Complete some missions. If you tap the ‘Missions’ tab in the game’s main, right-hand nav bar, you’ll see three types: Dailies, Player and Events. Gems are awarded only for finishing the fifth and final daily, but you’ll see a number of cumulative goals to work toward for Gems in the ‘Player’ tab.
• Rank up. Every time you level up a character, it earns you credit toward your next player rank. A triple-digit gem reward comes with each new rank.
• Clear all three quest missions. While they don’t always award gems, every quest has three missions that set conditions for which you’ll be rewarded. These include clearing without any KOs, clearing within a set number of turns, causing a specified number of BRV breaks and using a specific character to beat that quest.
• Beat the target score on a quest. Hopefully, you were paying attention when we discussed how to get higher scores in battle above …

How to Enhance Weapons and Armor

Powerful weapons and armor are great, but they’re only ultimately as great as you make them. To buff their stats, you’ll need to enhance them. Tap the ‘Enhancements’ icon in the main nav bar, then the ‘Enhance’ button next to Weapons/Armor to get started.

After picking a piece of gear to enhance, you’ll see your options to level it up. You can use unwanted weapons and armor as enhancement material, but you’ll also end up with numerous items specifically for this process as you progress through the game.

Note that if you use the exact same weapon or armor piece for enhancement, you’ll limit break your item. Not only does that raise the max level for the item, limit breaking it three times can bump it up to the next rarity tier or allow it to bestow passive bonuses to the character using it. Needless to say, you should enhance the weapons and armor you use the most whenever you have enough gil (the fancy Final Fantasy term for gold) and materials to do it.

All the Things You Can Do to Make Characters More Powerful

Given what we’ve talked about concerning quests that require specific heroes to earn full rewards, it behooves you to keep as many characters as powerful as possible, even if you have favorites you gravitate toward more often than others.

Here are all the ways you can do exactly that.

• Level them up. The simplest and most time-honored way to increase characters’ stats is simply to use them in combat, earning them XP and allowing them to eventually level up. At some levels, characters will acquire new abilities as well.
• Increase their crystal strength. Under the enhancement menu, you’ll see a button that says ‘Crystal Strength.’ Each character has a certain color of crystal to which they are attuned, and there are six colors in all (we’re not good with colors, so we’re not listing them by name). Using the correct crystals, you can unlock higher levels of crystal strength all the way up to level 50, with each rung on the level granting a new stat boost and every fifth level giving you a new passive or active ability.
• Get them better gear. We’ve covered this in some detail, but it’s worth repeating that every character has a 5-star weapon attuned specifically to them. Save up those gems and hunt them down, and may the god of random draws smile upon you.