Final Fantasy VII/Gaea's Cliff

Toward the north
The second CD continues from the Forgotten Capital. Head forward, and you see Cloud's weird mind projection (or whatever) of Sephiroth heading to right path.

The next screen should be fairly straightforward, head up the conch-like thing. The chest, if you're able to reach it through the ground, contains a Viper Halberd. The screen after that should likewise be fairly simple; you can climb up and down the vertical shafts. The chests contain Bolt Armlet, HypnoCrown and a Megalixir. On the bottom of the very long ladder, you'll find a Magic Plus materia. Head up that ladder, and out through the next cave (that also has a chest containing a Power Source).

Now you're back on the world map. The idea is to head as far west as you can, and toward north - you're practically going a little bit northwest. Press on until you find a city.

Icicle Inn
This place seems to be the northernmost point of the civilization. To get further north, you need two items. Talk to the folks in the big house, and you'll find out how to get the Glacier Map - it's actually hanging on the wall, and you can just grab them, though the owner thinks you're a bit bold for taking it before getting his permission. Then, as you find out, there's no way to get further anyway - but as you investigate things, you'll find out that the kid in one of the houses has broken his leg and will let you take his snowboard. Stock up on items if you want and check the north west house for a few videos talking about Ilfana, Aeris's mother.

Then Elena and some Shin-Ra soldiers show up. This is a little bit of a comedic cutscene: Use the controller as indicated, move left out of the way to dodge. Either Elena manages to punch you in the nose, or she misses by a mile and goes down the hill.

Great Glacier
The next point is to snowboard down the hill, in one of the most blatant cases of "guess if this minigame gets unlocked for normal play at some point?"... yes, it will be unlocked in Gold Saucer after this.

Talk to the man to find out how to snowboard; hopefully, this guide will one day contain some tips in the Snowboarding section. Then just head down the hill; there's a curious amount of tricks to do around here. It doesn't really matter what route you go, you just end up at a different part of the glacier.

Now, it's time to navigate around the glacier. Press Square (Switch in the PC version) to check the map. Your objective is to identify where you are (it should be easy - look for landmarks in your current location that looks a bit like the ones in the map) and head toward the red checkmark. You can refer to (someday available) Great Glacier section.

Anyway, either you reach the foot of the mountains eventually, or you slump down and freeze to near death. Either way, you find yourself at the base camp on the foot of the mountain; if you freeze, the climber guy has found you and nursed you to health.

From the climber guy's house, if you head south you'll reach a large snow field where you have to place markers to keep following a straight path through the snow. If you head south directly there will be a cave with an All Materia inside it. Head all the way south by following your markers in a straight line, until you reach a new area, you'll reach some hot springs. Go to the bottom left to touch it, then head back to the field and go directly east to reach a cave where a snow lady lives. If you touched the hot springs, you'll be able to fight her and win the Alexander summon materia. Head back north or get lost again if you like.

Climbing the cliff
The climber will explain how to climb the cliffs and how to keep your body temperature up. (Ultima VII this game is not&mdash;one might guess a place like Icicle Inn would sell warm clothing, but no, our brave heroes want to go to the mountain in a T-shirt...)

You can take various paths that lead up up and away. One of the hidden caves on the cliff face has a Ribbon, and since this is the only time you'll be on the cliff, I suggest you grab it since these are very useful and very rare.

Caves
The two caves aren't much to write home about - they do have some annoying monsters in them, like the Stilvas (who do teach you interesting enemy skills, like Trine and especially Magic Breath, which is a really cool enemy skill). On the cliff proper, you'll run into Malboros, which teach Bad Breath enemy skill - though I sure hope you have either a White Cape or did pick the Ribbon from earlier, or the temple, because this enemy skill has some annoying properties (like sleep+toad+annoyance). In the first cave, the idea is to find your way to a big rock, then push it down, and follow it; In the second cave, the idea is to find your way out, then to the "balcony" above the room, and knock down the huge icicles (this can be done in a single turn by casting Fire3 at them).

Third cave
The third cave has first a save point. And, a cave where a black-robed guy seems to be dying. And a big monster shows up. Uh...

After this humongous boss fight, which turns out to be the hardest one in this section, it's time to head out and to the top of the cliff. A nice view over the Northern Crater.

Black robes torn by the whirlwind
Go down the cliff. If – for some extremely unlikely reason – Tifa isn't in your party, she shows up and insist on going with you. In the first room, there's a nice shiny red orb – Neo Bahamut materia. You'll see the Shin-Ra approaching from the skies, too. Eek. Better hurry.

There's two screens where you need to cross the chasm – as the instructions say, time to cross the chasms when the wind is quiet. Otherwise, you get knocked back and you need to fight some weak enemies.

A lot of black robes after, you meet up with Sephiroth again... who's killing the black-robed guys. What the heck? Well, no time to reflect on bizarre things now, time to fight our old enemy again!

Now, things start to make a little bit more sense. Have Cloud give the Black Materia to either Barret or Red XIII (others will refuse to take it, and you can't give it to a party member either). There's a save point here.

Head up after you've saved. There's a loooooooong cutscene that follows, and even if things started to make sense a bit earlier, I guarantee the whole game gets really confusing now. Pay attention, and remember that it all will make sense later.