This really could have been a bit shorter. Drop the dull parts in between the insane Eikon fights, and it would improve so much.
There are so many Eikon builds to think of and try, but they don't matter too much on your first run. It is a bit unfortunate that the first run had to be easy, but I guess after FF7R, it's just a series staple to make the other difficulties balanced around your full kit.
The side content otherwise is pretty good; arcade mode(also has the hardest difficulty post game) is great for people who are big into scoring; the Eikon trials are a nice change of pace; and most of the hunts are good if you do them right away.
I've finished NG+ now, and it was a decent bump in difficulty. Everything has a lot more health, letting you do some combos rather than just one ignition to clear them all. Enemies are also way more aggressive and do more damage to you. Lots of them will be much higher level as well. Despite doing all the sidequests, the A/S hunts would be anywhere between 10-20 levels higher than me. Each group of enemies in the stages now has an additional endgame enemy with them, making it just a little bit tougher. The blacksmith will have more recipes for weapons and equipment, while accessories are now able to be upgraded. Once you have two copies of an accessory, you can combine them into one to get double or more of the effect in one slot. There is also an ultimate weapon only obtainable in NG+, but it's a bit disappointing that it's not locked behind a secret boss or area.
The real meat is the arcade mode. If you started NG+ in Final Fantasy mode, you will now have two additional difficulty options: Final Fantasy and Ultimaniac. Both have their own leaderboards, with the latter being very hard. Going for S ranks in Ultimaniac is very tough, let alone just clearing the stages at all. Right now, some of the stages only have a handful of clears, despite having hundreds and hundreds of clears in FF mode. In Ultimaniac, every little enemy can 2 or 3 shot you, and if you do get hit, you have just one potion and one high potion to help. For each Eikon fight, there is no healing, and each one does a decent amount of damage compared to the story variant. You also don't get any continues, and with some stages being ten legs, messing up anywhere could ruin a run for you. Even with all this, I still enjoyed my time there, but I didn't go for S ranks on each stage. There are also final Chronolith Trials, which are harder versions of the base game with new enemies thrown in. It also has a leaderboard and ranking system if you're competitive.
If you really wanted to, you could probably spend hundreds of hours on both of these challenges.
There are so many Eikon builds to think of and try, but they don't matter too much on your first run. It is a bit unfortunate that the first run had to be easy, but I guess after FF7R, it's just a series staple to make the other difficulties balanced around your full kit.
The side content otherwise is pretty good; arcade mode(also has the hardest difficulty post game) is great for people who are big into scoring; the Eikon trials are a nice change of pace; and most of the hunts are good if you do them right away.
I've finished NG+ now, and it was a decent bump in difficulty. Everything has a lot more health, letting you do some combos rather than just one ignition to clear them all. Enemies are also way more aggressive and do more damage to you. Lots of them will be much higher level as well. Despite doing all the sidequests, the A/S hunts would be anywhere between 10-20 levels higher than me. Each group of enemies in the stages now has an additional endgame enemy with them, making it just a little bit tougher. The blacksmith will have more recipes for weapons and equipment, while accessories are now able to be upgraded. Once you have two copies of an accessory, you can combine them into one to get double or more of the effect in one slot. There is also an ultimate weapon only obtainable in NG+, but it's a bit disappointing that it's not locked behind a secret boss or area.
The real meat is the arcade mode. If you started NG+ in Final Fantasy mode, you will now have two additional difficulty options: Final Fantasy and Ultimaniac. Both have their own leaderboards, with the latter being very hard. Going for S ranks in Ultimaniac is very tough, let alone just clearing the stages at all. Right now, some of the stages only have a handful of clears, despite having hundreds and hundreds of clears in FF mode. In Ultimaniac, every little enemy can 2 or 3 shot you, and if you do get hit, you have just one potion and one high potion to help. For each Eikon fight, there is no healing, and each one does a decent amount of damage compared to the story variant. You also don't get any continues, and with some stages being ten legs, messing up anywhere could ruin a run for you. Even with all this, I still enjoyed my time there, but I didn't go for S ranks on each stage. There are also final Chronolith Trials, which are harder versions of the base game with new enemies thrown in. It also has a leaderboard and ranking system if you're competitive.
If you really wanted to, you could probably spend hundreds of hours on both of these challenges.