How to beat the Mindflayer in FF7 Rebirth

Once you complete all Combat Assignments in the Junon Region, you unlock the boss fight for the Area: Mindflayer. The fight isn’t difficult, but there’s a powerful attack that can kill the entire party if you aren’t careful. Here’s how to beat Mindflayer in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth.

Before you fight Mindflayer in FF7 Rebirth

Before you fight this annoying Cuthulu-like monster in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, here’s some light prep. Make sure all party members have a Healing Materia. You probably won’t need a lot of healing, but better safe than sorry. I also recommend you equip Cloud with First Strike. This will let you Assess the enemy as soon as the fight starts (you should always Assess every new enemy you encounter, even bosses). 

As for which FF7 Rebirth party members to bring with you, that’s entirely up to you. I brought Tifa because of her Unrelenting Strength, which lets you Stagger and Pressure enemies faster, and Barret because he does ranged damage, but you can also bring Red and Aerith if you want; it doesn’t really matter. All your party members should be level 24 at least (even though it says the recommended level is 26, I managed to beat Mindflayer with everyone at 24).

If you have everything ready, go ahead and summon the boss.

Mindflayer boss fight strategy in FF7 Rebirth

Start the fight by assessing Mindflayer. If you read the description, it says that you can Pressure it using Synergy Abilities, and that’s exactly what you should do. Start by attacking Mindflayer with your regular abilities. I recommend using Focus abilities so you can build up the Stagger meter faster. 

While you are doing this, Mindflayer will attack you using basic attacks, ground shock, and a grapple attack. You can block or dodge basic attacks, but even if you get hit, they don’t hurt too badly. For his ground shock ability, simply avoid standing in the spots where it shocks the ground, and you should be fine. For the grapple ability, Mindflayer will grab a party member and do medium damage to them. Try to do a bunch of damage to the Mindflayer with your other party members if this happens, but don’t sweat over it too much. Whenever someone needs a heal, make sure you top them up, preferably with a Cura.

While all this is going on, you want to use three ATB abilities with two characters. This will unlock Synergy Abilities. I used Relentless Rush and Synchro Cyclone with Tifa and Cloud, and each time I did, I Pressured the Mindflayer. Once you Pressure it, attack it again with Focus attacks to quickly Stagger it. After you Stagger it, go all out with your best damage abilities.

When the Mindflayer has about 20 to 25 percent health, it will use Psychotic Break, and this is where you need to be careful.

How to dodge Mindflayer’s Psychotic Break in FF7 Rebirth

To dodge Mindflayer’s Psychotic Break, hide behind a boulder. When Mindflayer is about to cast this ability, it will, conveniently for you, drop a few large boulders. When it does this, immediately go and hide behind one. Don’t worry; your other two party members will follow your lead. Stand behind the boulder (you can drop a heal if you want while hiding) and wait for Mindflayer to finish casting the ability. The Psychotic Break will break all the boulders but do no damage to your entire party. 

If you don’t hide behind a rock, Psychotic Break will kill both your party members (even if they have full health) and leave you with around 10 percent health, which means you’ll likely die quickly. So, as you can probably tell, it’s much better to hide behind the big boulder.

After you dodge Psychotic Break, simply fight Mindflayer a bit more using the method above, and you should have no problems finishing it off.