You will encounter many boss fights all through Final Fantasy 7 Remake including Scorpion Sentinel, Crab Warden and more. In Chapter 8 (Budding Bodyguard), when you talk to Chadley, he will give you the option to battle a VR boss. And that’s against Shiva, a beautiful but deadly ice-element summon recreated in virtual reality. Defeating Shiva will earn you a Summon Materia which you can equip to summon Shiva to fight for you in boss battles. Fighting her is optional but it will be a good choice to take her on. Want to know how to beat Shiva in Final Fantasy 7 Remake? You will know exactly how to do that in this guide.
Shiva Boss Fight – How to Defeat Shiva in FF7R
You can enter this battle with only Cloud but we recommend having Aerith with you. This will increase your chances of defeating Shiva. Let’s take a look at Shiva’s powers, attacks and weaknesses first.
Shiva is an ice summon so of course, her attacks are all ice based. This also means that she is weak to fire attacks. She floats around the area, constantly moving around unleashing icy attacks on the player.
Tactics to Use to Beat Shiva
- Ifrit: Before you go into the battle, make sure you have the Ifrit Summon Materia. Ifrit, being fire-based, will be of great help while you are trying to take down ice-cold Shiva.
- Fire Materia: Using a lot of Fire magic will help you deal massive damage to Shiva. The more fire you use, the faster she will get staggered and fall to the floor, weakened. It is at this point that Cloud can begin melee attacks on Shiva.
- Elemental Materia: Make sure to link Elemental Materia to Fire Materia in your weapon because this will unleash fire damage with every physical attack.
- Magic Up Materia: To achieve the biggest impact for your Fire magic spells, use the Magic Up Materia to magnify your power.
- HP Up Materia: Using this Materia will be helpful during the tough battle with Shiva.
- Arcane Ward Ability: You can use Aerith’s Arcane Ward ability during the fight which will basically double your damage output. The Arcane Ward ability conjures up a ward which will allow any spell within the ward region to be cast two times for just one ATB bar. This tactic will deal great blows to Shiva in the fight.
- Focused Thrust Ability: When Shiva is staggered, use Cloud’s Focused Thrust ability to maximize damage.
In your fight with Shiva, apart from attacking, you will need to do a lot of defense as well. She constantly moves around, giving her the upper edge, but you can move around and dodge those attacks too.
Strategies to Use for Shiva’s Attacks
These are Shiva’s attacks that you need to watch out for:
- Icicles: Shiva will send dangerous icicles towards you and you need to block them quickly.
- Icicle Impact: In this attack, Shiva will shoot an ice wave on the floor. Make sure to be away from her before she does this. You can block this and after it breaks, go back near her to attack.
- Whiteout: As soon as she sits down you know she is preparing to use Whiteout. She will blow a kiss, shooting ice beams that come towards you on the floor. If you don’t manage to dodge this, it will stun you. Next, she can use the Heavenly Strike attack which will drop a block of ice on you, essentially ending the battle. This is one reason why fighting alone is not recommended in this case.
- Blizzara: Shiva will shoot an ice ball that will explode in a few seconds causing greater damage. Block this as well and run from the ice ball.
- Frost Familiars: Frost Familiars are three orbs that engulf Shiva, protecting her from magic attacks. You need to block them when they fly towards you.
- Diamond Dust: This attack cannot be avoided. This is Shiva’s powerful move and she performs this when she is low on health. She will fly around, circling your party in a trail of ice. Since this is unavoidable, make sure your health is up because it does 1024 damage.
After all of this, you will defeat Shiva and receive the Shiva Summon Materia. To know more tips and tricks for FF7R, check out our ultimate Final Fantasy 7 Remake Wiki Guide.