So faithful was the Final Fantasy 7 Remake to the original that it even retained the challenging boss fights. The Final Fantasy 7 Remake brought back many of the iconic enemies from the original 1997 title. It even turned the Hell House into an actual boss fight and brought back the first boss you’ll even encounter, the Guard Scorpion, and renamed it as the Scorpion Sentinel. As the first big battle that players will encounter in the Final Fantasy 7 Remake, the Scorpion Sentinel acts as a crash course on how differently the fights play out in the remake compared to the original. Unfortunately, this means that some players tend to struggle against it. With that said, we’d like to encourage you to scroll down below and join us as we teach you how to beat the Scorpion Sentinel boss in Final Fantasy 7 Remake.
Tips for Beating the Scorpion Sentinel Boss
One of the things that you’ll learn fast in Final Fantasy 7 Remake is the most boss fights are split into multiple phases. The phases are usually dictated by how much HP a boss has left. If you lower it down enough, the boss will switch to another phase, which is usually accompanied by a change in attack pattern, behavior, and sometimes, even weaknesses and strengths. The Scorpion Sentinel boss does a great job at teaching players this and isn’t above hand-holding newbies.
Phase 1
Because the game is well aware that the Scorpion Sentinel is the first boss battle in Final Fantasy 7 Remake, it doesn’t put up much of a challenge at first. The game even tells you outright what the boss’ weakness is and encourages you to take advantage of Barret’s Thunder spell to deal a lot of damage and put it in a “Pressured” state. In terms of attack patterns, the Scorpion Sentinel is fairly easy to figure out. Even his high-damaging attacks are well-telegraphed and easy to avoid. Just don’t forget to use Lighting, especially if the Scorpion Sentinel manages to catch Cloud in its claws.
Phase 2
Once you whittle down the health of the Scorpion Sentinel to 75%, a short cutscene will begin that signals the start of the second phase of the battle. During this time, the Scorpion Sentinel will switch up its attack pattern. It will start to use powerful long-range missiles, so we recommend trying to stay as close as possible to minimize the damage. Also, during this time, you’ll learn how some bosses (and even normal enemies) in Final Fantasy 7 Remake will have different parts that you can attack to make them more vulnerable. In the case of the Scorpion Sentinel, you can take down the barrier that it puts up that blocks most physical damage, and damage from the Lightning spell by destroying the Field Generator located at the tail.
Phase 3
After your constant barrage of physical attacks and Lightning drops the Scorpion Sentinel to 50% health, phase 3 of the battle begins. During this time, the Scorpion’s attack patterns will change once again. Instead of mostly long-range attacks, the boss will mix it up with two new tail attacks, a powerful laser, and a bunch of blasts. The laser is the one that does the most damage. Luckily, it’s pretty easy to avoid. It takes a while for the boss to charge it, so Cloud will have enough time to keep his distance and get behind the debris that drops down at the start of the phase and use it as cover.
Phase 4
Yet another cutscene will signal the start of phase 4, which begins when the Scorpion Sentinel only has roughly around 25% health. In this phase, the Scorpion Sentinel starts to go all out. However, most important of all is that it will start using the Auto-Repair skill. This will allow it to regain health passively, so playing aggressive is important so that you don’t end up wasting your progress so far. Do be careful though. Another skill that the Scorpion Sentinel will start using in this phase is Overkill, which is essentially throwing all of its attacks so far into one blow. Your best bet to survive Overkill is to avoid it entirely. Or, at the very least, most of it. This is relatively easy to do, so it shouldn’t pose that much of a problem. Your main concern here is to outpace the healing done by the Auto-Repair skill and the only way that you can do it is to play aggressively. Cloud’s Punisher stance is particularly effective in this phase with Barret providing support from afar.
How To Beat the Scorpion Sentinel in Hard Mode
Hard Mode is accessible only once you’ve beaten Final Fantasy 7 Remake, which means that you probably know what you’re going up against at this point. Still, we’d like to remind you that, while the Scorpion Sentinel remains mostly the same, it will start to hit a lot harder. Case in point, the laser attack can hit from range this time around and will hit twice. This means that, unlike before, both characters will have to hide behind a piece of debris to avoid the enormous amounts of damage that it can do now. Luckily, even though the Scorpion Sentinel hits harder, you’ll have access to far more Materia and skills this time around. We recommend using Lifesaver on Barret to help spread out the damage better. Also, Focused Shot and Focused Strike are crucial abilities here. These abilities can help you keep the Scorpion Sentinel in a “Staggered” state most of the time. Another tip we’d like to add is to save your MP until the last phase. This way, you’ll have enough MP to rain down Thundara on the legs of the Scorpion Sentinel. This should make the fight a lot easier. Another way to make the fight easier is to use Lighting Materia and pair it with the Elemental Materia on Cloud’s weapon. You can also try equipping HP Absorption Materia on Barret. This makes it easier for him to survive as he’ll heal himself while dealing damage.
