The Mi’ihen Highroad is a fairly lengthy section of the game and it involves traveling through a number of different areas (South, Central, Newroad, Oldroad, etc.).
The Mi’ihen Highroad section is broken up in to two different pages to make it easier to navigate.
Walk forward and touch the Save Sphere to save your game. As soon as you touch the Sphere you will be given a quick overview of how to scout for Blitzball players to join your team.
There are a number of talented Blitzball players that you should scout as you work your way through Spira. Blitzball is normally played towards the end of the game though so these team members will not be pointed out other than in the Blitzball section of the strategy guide.
Check out the Blitzball Section for more information.
Yuna has a difficult solo battle coming up very shortly. You can tilt the odds of this battle in Yuna’s favor if you include Yuna in your party and if you allow her Overdrive gauge to charge up as you travel through the first sections of the Mi’ihen Highroad.
Hold onto her Overdrive until the upcoming battle against Belgemine.
At this stage of the game you will now have Auron in your party. Auron has attacks which are capable of piercing armor so its a very good idea to switch him in to your primary party.
Many of the enemies you will encounter along the Mi’ihen Highroad have high armor. The first battle that you encounter along the Mi’ihen Highroad will provide you with an explanation of high vs. low armor enemies.
Auron is a fairly strong character to have in your party throughout the game. Check out the Characters section for more information about characters and how to form strong parties.
The Dual Horn enemies (shown below) can be fairly difficult. Their standard attacks hit for quite a bit of HP. A good tactic for defeating them is to use Wakka’s Dark Attack Skill as they are susceptible to the Darkness status effect (Blind).
Talk to everyone that you encounter along the way. Many of the people along the roadway will provide you with useful items including two Antidotes and a Hunter’s Spear.
You can learn the “Fire Breath” Ronso Rage ability by having him use Lancet on a Dual Horn enemy in this area. Check out the Overdrive section for more information on Kimahri’s Ronso Rage.
Continue along the pathway. There are a number of cutscenes that you will have to watch as you progress and you will be given a number of historical explanations starting with one about the ruins from Maechen. Behind the ruins is a treasure chest that contains an Ice Brand (shown in the two screenshots below).
Towards the end of the first part of the trail you will see a woman off to the right side. Her name is Belgemine. You will run into her several times throughout the game and she will challenge Yuna to a duel, Aeon against Aeon.
She will essentially use an Aeon that is one step higher than Yuna’s current strongest Aeon and you will have to use some strategies in order to win each battle against her.
HP: 3,500
There really is no strategy that you can employ though for this first fight against Belgemine. Belgemine will summon Ifrit and Yuna will only have the option to summon Valefor.
Ifrit’s attack pattern is fairly straight forward. It will alternate between ‘Attack’ and ‘Meteor Strike’ and then use ‘Hell Fire’ once its Overdrive gauge is maxed.
As noted earlier on, you can make the fight really easy if you charge Yuna’s Overdrive gauge prior to the battle. This will cause Valefor to start the battle with a charged Overdrive gauge as well.
Because of the alternating nature of Ifrit’s attacks, the best strategy to use is to Shield for every Meteor Strike and then to use Blizzard for every attack (capitalizing on Ifrit’s weakness to Ice based attacks).
If you win the fight you will receive an Echo Ring and if you lose the fight you will receive a Seeker’s Ring. The fight is very difficult if you have not leveled Yuna up prior to this battle.
Continue down the Mi’ihen Highroad once the battle has concluded.
There is a treasure chest on the north end of the next screen (behind the Crusader/girl riding the Chocobo) that contains a Remedy. A man will also run past and give you a Red Ring.
Continue along the pathway and run right past the Blitzball. By choosing not to kick it off into the distance you will receive three Softs when you speak to the young child nearby.
Talk to the man who walks past to receive a Lv. 1 Key Sphere - a very useful item.
Continue along the pathway and grab the treasure chest off to the right which contains 2,000 gil. There is another person you can speak to in this area that will give you four Antidotes.
Finally, there is a man walking back and forth on the trail also has 600 gil to give you if you speak to him.
Continue down the pathway and approach the wagon. The wagon will move out of the way as you get closer. Talk to the person on the left side of the road to receive an Ether. Further down there is a person who will give you a Hi-Potion.
Move over to the right side to talk to Gatta and Luzzu to learn more about the Crusaders.
Down the pathway you will run into another non-playable character who will give you four Antidotes. You will also run into Shelinda who will provide the team with some background information on Machina, the Crusaders and the teachings of Yevon.
There is one more treasure chest at the end of the trail that contains three Eye Drops.
As you are traveling through these different zones and are battling different enemies, you may see an information window pop up during the battle that indicates that one of your characters has learned a new Overdrive Mode.
Overdrive modes are learned by completing certain actions. The most likely one that you will see, fairly early on in the game in fact, is the “Warrior” Overdrive mode.
The “Warrior” Overdrive mode allows characters to charge their Overdrives whenever they attack opponents. This makes it an extremely effective way to gain Overdrives for your damage-dealing party members (Tidus, Wakka, Auron, Kimahri and Lulu but not Yuna). In fact, because many of the enemies you encounter will be defeated in one hit, they quite often won’t hit your party members, causing their Overdrive modes to charge very slowly!
Check out the Overdrive Modes section for more information.
The walkthrough for the Mi’ihen Highroad continues on the next page.