Just finished 2.0 (All bosses/Limit breaks/Weapons except the secret boss) and wanted to give some feedback
I originally couldn't find the 1/35 soldiers but i found them all so modifying my message here for feedback instead.
First of all, W-Item is a bit easy to obtain. I understand why it's where it's at but at the same time, I don't think it's actually even needed. It kind of trivialised almost everything. When you're able to duplicate Megalixirs as well as Stardust or Gospel sparks, it makes the entire game a little trivial including the post game bosses such as the weapons.
In terms of character balance, Tifa is a lot more balanced now which is fantastic, however it feels like Barret might've taken the new position of over powered.
Once I was able to reach the Drill Arm and basically ignore all defense, it pretty much ignored all mechanics that are supposed to be in the game, not much reason to dispel anything or worry about anything, that combined with unlimited Megalixirs and Gospel Sparks.. Well you can see where I am going with this.
Also to touch on the ignore defense mechanic, Jenova's Deaths incremental defense/damage, now, as we know Jenova is susceptible to Petrify, however when the AI is petrified it usually makes it so the incremental mechanic doesn't increase, this is where Barret being a little over powered comes in, with the ignore defense mechanic, it completely ignores the incremental damage even while the AI is petrified.
I'm not exactly sure how you would go about this but maybe a good idea would be to change ignore defense to increase damage depending on how much str Barret has? Which could then increase incrementally through the fight whenever he gets attacked in the front row? I literally have no idea on how you would be able to balance it (If you would like to balance it that is) but I would like to mention that Barret does feel like he ignores any mechanics in the game entirely.
I do think there is only one particular boss that I should mention feels a little much.. Air buster in Mt Nibelheim, while I found a way to get past him a lot easier, it felt a little over kill with the amount of time it takes to do attacks.
Love what you did with Wu-Tai, feel like it flows much better and it's nice that there's some post game in disc 3.
I miss the X-ATM memes. He was fun.