The limit break is a powerful attack that is individual to each character. Its not activateable unless in extreme circumstances. There seems to be only two ways of gaining a limit break - either by building something up, or being near death. FF7, FF9, and FF10 use the building something up method. In FF7 and FF9 its only by getting hurt (in FF7, you can hit your own party members to build up their meter. In FF9, you can’t). In FF7, you are only allowed a single attack, and then the meter returns to zero. In FF9, you stay in a “trance” for either the remainder of the battle or the meter being depleted, which allows a new skill building on that characters existing skill and improved stats. In FF10, you can switch the ways you build your meter to better suit your characters - taking turns, getting hit, causing damage, using items, etc.
In FF8 (and FF6, I think), the characters HP must be below 32%, and only comes up proportional chance (although this can be circumvented by repeatedly switching characters).
So my question is, which one of the games has the best/most useful limit break system?
I found that FF10 is the better. Partly you can hold it off to when you need it. Like Bosses and Malboro’s in Omega, and also if your moves are good enough, you can get 2 Overdrives in a single battle.
Yes, FF6 has a move set called Desperation Move for attacks, it is only used instead of a normal attack when you HP is Low, I had it triggered of a Blackbelt Counter. It is Like FF8’s Limit Break.
Out of them all, I would have to say that 10’s is the best. Because it is nice to be able to custumise your fighters depending on how you use them.
The other style are too boring, or too easy to manipulate. Oh well.
I’d vote for FFXI’s “limit break” system if it was an option. If you’re a melee class, the best way to maximize your damage is to combine your limit break, or weapon skill, with a partner to form a skill chain. A skill chain results in an elemental burst of damage which weakens the target’s resistance, and allows your magic casters or summoners to maximize their damage with a “magic burst”.
Weapon Skill 1 + Weapon Skill 2 = Skillchain damage + Magic = Magic Burst. It’s a beautiful thing.
Here’s a video of a Light skillchain: Bard plays Light Threnody song to weaken the mob against light attacks, Ranger uses Heavy Shot weapon skill, Thief follows with Shark Bite weapon skill which creates a Light skillchain, White Mage casts Holy for the magic burst. And the Paladin finishes the mob off with Savage Blade, the coolest looking weapon skill in the game:
http://www.infieldpress.com/parser/Light.wmv (it’s 12MB and in slow motion)
You can use a weapon skill based on your TP meter. TP is obtained when you strike a target, or get hit yourself. The amount you gain each strike is based on your weapon’s delay. The amount of TP you have when you use the weapon skill can effect your attack in many different ways (+accuracy, +damage, +poison, etc.)
It’s an incredibly detailed system, and if you’re really bored you can read all about it here: http://klin304.homestead.com/files/FFXI/WSDanalysisdata.htm
If I had to pick from the existing choices, I’d probably go with VII. VI’s system was too unpredictable, and I didn’t even know near fatals existed until I read about them.
Err, the FFXI limit breaks are the 2-hours, not the TP system.
2 Hour is a job ability, based on a timer and nothing else. Weapon Skill is available when you build your TP meter through actions or taking hits; sounds like a limit break to me. I don’t know SE’s official stance on the matter, so I guess I’ll just agree to disagree.
It is SE’s official stance on the matter, though. Said sometime early in an interview somewhere. Yay for vague statements that can’t be backed up.
And the TP things are based on weapons (and magic, shut up), not on the actual character (class) itself, as limit breaks have traditionally been. The 2-hours are. They’re also mostly (screw Dragoons) reserved for “Oh Shit” moments, not in every fight as, argueably Limit Breaks have always been intended, barring how easy it is to exploit them in most games. And they don’t involve other people. It’s a very interesting system, I’ll give you that, but it really isn’t the limit break of FFXI.
Definitely FFX. It builds it up in a variety of different ways and doesn’t force you to either a) forego your Fight command, or b) immediately use it up.
FFX is the best, simply because you can use it when you want, and can choose how you store it. I heartily dislike FF9’s.
I wuld normally say FFX’s, but in a weird way, I kinda like Trance form FFIX, too. Sure, it’s unpredictable and you have no control over when it occurs, but come on, people, have you seen the kinda stuff Trance does for your characters? Hell, if you could have all four people trance at once, There really would be no challenge whatsoever. So I see the chaotic nature of Trances an even tradeoff for the new powers and abilities you get for a short period of time.
If you could Trance all four people at once, the battle would end when the first one attacked and the other three would go to waste.
I thought the reason why Cover was added to that Characters could trance Every Boss Battle not every Other.
X, no contest for me. A completely reliable system, and everything Sohee said… I love getting to use it whenever I like. I also liked that each character’s Overdrive move was unique and that options were available within each.
However, the random Limit Break in FF8 was kinda fun, too. 
Push that turn button enough, and sometimes it pops up!
correct me if i am wrong, but in ff8 wouldn’t the spell ‘aura’ raise the frequency of the limit break? similar to the items ‘hero drink’ or ‘holy war’? i liked that system alot, but i voted for X cause it had way more options, like everyone said, on how to use and how to store.
I like the FF7 system. cause you are given a set way to build it up and you don’t need to waste it if the bar is full but you don’t use it during that battle…
I tend to be drawn toward FF7’s for that reason myself, it doesn’t make you use it, but it has its own limitations so that you can’t just put it in your pocket and use it when you need it. The trade off is that the limits are more powerful (and they look cooler than FFX’s)