With the Final Fantasy 7 Remake came the return of Materia in combat. These little orbs help you out by giving you advantages on the battlefield. Some let you cast magic, some give you a boost to your ATB gauge, and some, when combined, can unleash devastating attacks that leave your foes wondering why they even bothered attacking you in the first place.
Throughout the game, you come across a bunch of these helpful orbs, but it isn't exactly clear which ones you should be using. With a limited amount of Materia slots on each character, it can be hard to choose which Materia you think will be best. Here are a handful of them to help you get started down the right path.
10 Assess
Early on in the game in chapter 3, you gain access to the Assess Materia from Chadley. He tasks you with using it on various enemies so that he can use the information to create new Materia for you to use. Besides giving you access to even more Materia down the road, this little gem can prove to be very useful in combat throughout the game. When using the Assess skill, it shows you all the information about the enemies you scan. This gives you access to their weaknesses, strengths, and health pool.
9 Auto-Cure
Auto-Cure is another Materia that you can get early on in chapter 3. After getting the mission from Chadley and you assess a few creatures, he will create the auto-cure Materia. This Materia allows whoever is using it to cast cure automatically a few times in a battle. This can potentially save your life if you have a tendency to ignore your health bar. Equipping it to Barrett makes him a healing fortress, allowing you to dish out more damage and worry less about making your allies heal you.
8 Elemental Materia
This Materia isn't available until chapter 6 but it is by far one of the most useful. When placed in a linked Materia slot with a magic Materia, (fire, wind, lightning, or ice) it causes you to deal extra damage with that element with each attack. It also absorbs the element allowing you to take less damage. This is extremely useful when dealing with enemies that have elemental weaknesses and can tear down their health bar. As you rank up the Materia, the damage bonus increases up to an additional 23%.
7 Magnify
Magnify is another Materia that you will want to have in a linked Materia slot. This is because it amplifies whatever magic Materia (fire, wind, lightning, ice) you have linked with it. Since you get this around the middle of the game, your fire Materia is probably leveled up and if you like this Materia to it you can rip away at those Shinra soldiers like they are made of paper.
You could also take the cure route which makes your healing bounce off each member of your party. Mix that with auto-cure and you have a recipe for immortality.
6 Magic-Up
This Materia isn't unlocked until chapter 7, but it is well worth the wait for anyone focused on using magic. With the ability to stack multiple on a single character, you can potentially increase your magic attack power by a whopping 100%. The magic boost you get from this Materia will help you destroy anyone in your path. Try equipping this to Aerith and she can turn into the world's greatest magic-user. With the boost from these Materia and the magic boosting weapons in the game, any character can quickly turn into a dangerous sorcerer.
5 First Strike
The first strike Materia is something that is an absolute treasure in the Final Fantasy 7 Remake. This Materia makes whoever is equipped with it start with a partially filled ATB gauge in each battle. This allows you to quickly get to access to your spells and skills early on in a fight. The advantage that this gives you is huge. You could quickly cast assess and know everything about who you are fighting. Or if you already know the enemy's weakness, you can blast them with some magic or any of the great skills in the game.
4 Prayer
Prayer is a great way to recover HP for your party without needing to sacrifice MP. The downside of this ability is that it requires two ATB gauges to use. When combined with the first strike Materia or any Materia that gives a boost to the ATB gauge, you can quickly get the required ATB for this ability.
Think of this Materia as having both the healing Materia and magnify Materia in one ability. It is a shame that it isn't unlocked until chapter 8.
3 Chakra
Chakra doesn't get enough love when it should. It is another quick way to heal without using MP. This Materia only works on the team member it is equipped to so it is not as strong as Prayer. But when you are the only member of your team still fighting and require healing, it can be an absolute lifesaver. This Materia isn't unlocked until chapter 8 but is great when equipped to Cloud or Tifa.
2 ATB Assist
ATB assist is another Materia that is acquired in chapter 8. When equipped on a character, it refills their ATB gauge whenever they use an ATB command. This can prove useful on Cloud and Tifa. Whenever this Materia is ranked up it can give a bonus of one and a half ATB gauges when using two ATB commands back to back.
1 Refocus
Did you ever think that two ATB gauges just isn't enough? With the refocus Materia, you can use the refocus limit break in battle which will give you a third ATB gauge. It also only uses half the limit gauge so you can still quickly get to another limit break soon after using it. When this Materia is mixed with the Gotterdammerung accessory, refocus can be used immediately in battle giving you that extra edge.