Lurker > Ultimaphazon

I like the colosseum battles, especially the 6-man fights, but the enemy variety was just ass. There's only so many times you can fight King Zu, Malboro, Mindflayer and co. before you get sick and tired of it.

I still have most of the Brutal and Legendary challenges left. Those are ridiculous. I saw some broken setups, but those kinda feel like cheating (Brumal Form spam, mostly), and I'd rather not resort to that.

I'm curious to read your Palmer write-up, because he's like 20 spots too high imo.

Mai > Chadley

The best thing about Chadley are his interactions with Mai. Everything else he says is worth less than Mai's monster intel, which I actually kinda liked.

Fortunately, I didn't start UPA until after I had beaten the game, because I'm sure I would have done the same if I had started it in chapter 12.

The battle square kicked my ass so hard, I'm sure I would have quit and tried to gain some XP after repeatedly dying to the Cactuars.

Here's what I can think of for now:

Rufus
Scarlet
Palmer
Hojo
Rude
Tseng
Elena
Roche
Middle Manager
Midgar Infantry and the Commander (1 or 2 slots)
Dio
Biggs
Cissnei
Chadley
Mai
Dyne
Johnny

Not sure who else is missing

Edit: Palmer, Chadley and Mai seem too high, but I feel they have to appear somewhere.

3d Brawler is frustrating, but Sephiroth certainly doesn't require the pause trick.
I will admit it probably took me close to an hour to finally get good enough to recognize his moves and learn his combos, but so did "2 Legs" and the crunches.

Sounds like Chocobo glide is next.

My unpopular opinion is that Chocob Glide is a top 5 minigame. Yes, I'd prefer inverted controls, but I love the feeling of diving at full speed through those rings, and then rising right back.

Cosmo Canyon also happens to be my favorite area in the game.

Linkin

Heidegger is pretty disappointing, honestly. In the OG, he and Scarlet always felt pretty equal to me, but Rebirth and the Remake DLC have made Scarlet so much more prominent in the new games, while Heidegger just gets nothing interesting.

Gears & Gambits and Cactuar Rush are the bottom two of minigames to me. Those were the two quests I couldn't bother to finish before NG+

Honestly, this might be my favorite game ever. Maybe not quite, but I'd have to go back more than 20 years to remember a game that captivated me this much.

I'm not done yet (currently in the Cave of the Gi), but at a few points, I just realize that I'm sitting there, with my mouth wide open, incapable of realizing that this is all real... but it is. It's so unreal.