I found FF8 to be hard if you didn't whore it through with "Squall in constant yellow + Renzokuken madness" FFX-2 throws some pretty nasty monsters at you early on. Regarding FF8, I think as long as you don't level up hardcore, the game will be relatively easy throughout. FFX-2 featured a different structure in terms of allowing the player to now chose different paths/missions and such, so yeah, there'd be a couple of missions from early on which would be too difficult to complete unless you're at a certain level or mastered a few job classes and whatnot -- that's why you avoid them unless certain conditions are met. Like the underground Bevelle mission (something 1000 maze of Incognito or whatever it was called), I think I've only made it to the second boss (that black elemental), and I didn't want to put in the extra time and work needed to complete the rest. Dude, I completely freaked out when I met Angra Maniyu at the desert on my digging run. I've played the game roughly 32% now, I'm at the beginning of Chapter 3.