Difficulty level

A game's difficulty level refers to a game's challenge level allowing players to choose a level best suited to their level of skill or play-style. Giving the player option to change the game's difficulty level is a rare occurrence in the Final Fantasy series, and has mainly appeared as an extra in re-released versions of games.

Other things similar to a difficulty level is the introduction of an Expert level Sphere Grid in Final Fantasy X PAL and International versions, and the different New Game Plus modes in Final Fantasy XII International Zodiac Job System. Notably, the original North American release of Final Fantasy IV was made easier than the Japanese version, and is often referred to as the Easy Type version.

Crisis Core -Final Fantasy VII-
Hard play mode was added to the game's international releases, and this mode is absent in the original Japanese version of the game. In Hard mode, the enemies have greatly increased stats, but otherwise the game plays the same as in Normal mode.

Final Fantasy XIII
New Easy Mode was added to the release of Final Fantasy XIII on Xbox 360 in Japan. This mode was later made available for PlayStation 3 players as well in form of a patch released for the Japanese gamers, which adds the tweaks made to the North American and PAL versions, as well as the Easy Mode.

Players can set the game difficulty level from the config any time when they are playing, but the default difficulty is Normal. In Easy Mode players deal more damage to staggered enemies, enemies have reduced HP, making battles end faster. Enemies are still as strong as in Normal Mode. One drawback of using Easy Mode is that during it, enemies do not drop rare items. This may be to prevent gamers from making grinding faster, thus earning game achievements more easily.