It's hard, for me random battles were ok, but boss fight were bitch hard and the counter, how many times was i killed by it. Well at least you have to think not just grind. I'm on Asura right now and her attack counter is so bullshit.

^ yeah the boss's in this game are just plain evil, they will do loads of horribly things to you, one particular boss is just sinister, i don't wanna name any boss since that would spoil it for you.

1 - No, it's really an hard game to begin with.

2 - It's not one of the best. Like stof said FFVI advance would be a better choice. It's one of the best game of all time and it's pretty balanced.

3 - How long is the game? 30 hours

4 - How hard is the game? It's a real bitch and it's why I don't play it nearly as much as I would otherwise.

^
I would not suggest FF6 advance just because It's a good bet that a remake will come out soon- which is exactly what happened to me with FF4.

Yes FF6 is better it's the best FF the SNES version has way better music get the rom FF4 is the best after 6 and 7.

=I

I will get this game once I lv all my main party on diamond to lv 100.

Those that having problem with counters.
Try not to go offensive. Stack up your defense and use the hardest hit you could only.

*spoiler*
For me. I used Kain's Jump against Asura.

Grinding level doesn't really help much. You gotta use different offense/defense against different monsters.

And don't go stinchy on items when you really need to. The casting delay could very much make or break your party.

Use those augments wisely, too. Putting on the wrong char could make it become useless.

I didn't know that it was based on the JP version, now maybe I'll get it, as it will be a challenge to beat then.

The random battles were actually stupid easy until the moon (where they are now kicking my ass).  I was able to auto battle or mindlessly fight most things and was generally at full HP and MP the whole time.

Trick to making every before where I'm at pretty stupid easy:

1. Have Rosa always use Pray
2. Have Cecil heal or use Esuna if you absolutely need it, otherwise just attack.
   
3. Have Rydia cast break if it's a single enemy, otherwise just summon a 30MP monster
4. Have Kain attack, don't waste time with jump unless you have to
5. If the enemy has an elemental weakness, let Edge use Ninjistu, otherwise just attack.
6. After battles in the menu screen have Rosa heal your party if they need it.

Doing that will let you auto battle for most of the game and just about always keep you at full HP/MP.  Most of the time Pray will keep you healthy and will constantly keep your MP full.  Pray will almost always give Rydia more than 30MP so she'll always be full.

For some reason Break works well on just about everything other than bosses (it even works on mini bosses).  If there are one or two enemies just have Rydia Break one while everyone else focuses on the other.  If there are three or more, just have her summon.  Even on the moon I haven't had to waste time on Doom (takes forever to cast and cast 40MP), break still works on everything.

And there are of course exceptions to that above method, but for the most part you'll be able to walk through most places with little effort and you just do your grinding while getting 100% on all the maps.

Why?  Just use reflect on her and the battle is simple  Also, slow works on every boss I've encountered so far and it's a lifesaver.

I di like how each boss is ridiculously hard at first glance but each one has a specific trick that makes it beatable.

Basically it's challenging, like a good RPG should be. You will need to be conscientous of your party's stats, abilities, the abilities of the enemy, turns. All that stuff that, outside of the ShinMegaTen series, modern rpgs have forgotten.