Final Fantasy IX Achievement Guide & Road Map

Final Fantasy IX
Final Fantasy IX Achievement Guide

Overview:
- Estimated achievement difficulty: 8/10 [Legit] - 3/10 [Cheesed] [Achievement Difficulty Rating]
- Offline: 51 [1000]
- Approximate amount of time to 1000: 50-70 Hours [Estimated Time to 100%]
- Minimum number of playthroughs needed: 1 [2 Recommended]
- Missable achievements: Yes - 13
- Does difficulty affect achievements: No
- Unobtainable/glitched achievements: No
- Extra equipment needed: None - Windows 10 PC and 3rd Party Apps suggested

Description:
Selling over five million copies since its release in 2000, FINAL FANTASY IX proudly returns on Xbox One and PC!

Boosters:
This version of FF9 comes with a number of "cheats" you can turn on to help you through the game. The following do NOT disable achievements, so feel free to use them if you wish. They are as follows:

High Speed Mode: Speeds up movement speed, battle speed, and text speed. Does not also increase game timer, so this is helpful for the "Excalibur II" achievement (12 hour speed run).
Battle Assistance: HP/MP/Trance/ATB are always full. You can still be killed if hit with something that is above your max health, and can't cast spells that cost greater than your max MP (though you'll be able to cast unlimited spells). Basically the beginning of God Mode, but your level and damage do not increase.
9,999: Every attack and spell will do 9999 damage. Further enhances the God Mode effect.
Safe Travel: No enemy encounters. Not advised to use this because of the 10k kill achievement unless you plan to grind that out all at once. You'll also still want to level up, as even with Battle Assistance on, you can be killed if you take damage greater than your max HP, which won't increase if you skip all fights.

Anything other than the four listed above WILL turn off achievements. The four above are found when pressing while the rest are inside the Config option of the character menus. Remember to only use the four on the pause menu.

Discs:
Obviously with this being a digital title, there are no discs. However, most older walkthroughs and guides for the game reference the four discs originally available on PS1. These are split as follows:

Disc 1 - Start of game until the end of events in Burmecia.
Disc 2 - South Gate until the end of the second visit to the Iifa Tree.
Disc 3 - Alexandria until after the events in Pandemonium.
Disc 4 - Obtaining the Invincible until the end of the game.

I will often reference disc numbers in relation to events, so use the above as a guidepost to know which "disc" you are on during the game.

Step 1a: Play the Game Naturally
If you are a first-time player, I'd suggest doing the game "normal" and don't use the boosters mentioned above. That said, I understand they can be extremely tempting. Maybe just use them for bosses you struggle on or things like that. Throw them on for end-game grinding and super bosses perhaps. It's totally up to you how you experience the game though.

Step 1b: Play With Boosters
If you choose to throw on all the boosters and treat this like a NG+ run, so be it. There is still a ton to do and many things that can be missed, so be careful working through the game and doing all side content along the way, even though the battles will all be cake. It might be possible to do all missable side content and still hit the 12 hour speed run to save yourself a second playthrough, but honestly it's not worth the risk.

Missables:
No matter which way you choose to play the game, you'll want to make sure you don't miss any content along the way. These are the achievements to watch out for over the course of the entire game:

Driving the Hard Bargain: Purchase all items from Stiltzkin each time he appears. This will be in 8 different locations. The Max Gil booster will come in handy here.
Mister Nice Guy: There are 9 friendly monsters in the game, and they require various stones/ores to befriend. If you sell off the required stones, this can be missed.
Movie Critic: You will need to watch a total of 79 Active Time Events (ATE), and there are only 79 total that count for the achievement so you can't miss any. Some of these require very specific actions to trigger. Be sure to initiate them immediately when you see text in the lower left of the screen.
Over the Moon: There are 4 moonstones to find for this, and they are highly missable.
The Ultimate Sword: See Step 3 of the Road Map for this. It will be done during its own playthrough.

These are achievements to watch out for at very specific times:

A Round of Applause: Make sure to get a perfect score of 100 on the sword duel mini-game at the beginning of the game to unlock this achievement (at a score of 80) and get one of the moonstones (at a score of 100).
A-Hunting We Will Go: Make sure Vivi wins the Festival of the Hunt in Lindblum on Disc 1.
Out of Harm's Way: Make sure you save all the residents of Cleyra on Disc 2.
The One Ring: Make sure you excavate the Maiden's Ring in Fossil Roo on Disc 2.
Peek-A-Boo: Also excavate the moogle in Fossil Roo at the same time as doing The One Ring.
Track Star: Be sure to get this in Alexandria on Disc 3 when controlling Vivi, prior to watching the play.
Found in the Shuffle: Be sure to get this in Alexandria on Disc 3 when controlling Zidane.
My Little Airship: One of the coffee items required for this achievement can only be obtained during the card tournament in Treno on Disc 3.

For a chronological list of everything above, follow this guide. I would couple that with this walkthrough to easily get everything needed for achievements and not lose your way in the story.

Also, while it is not missable, I would suggest working on the "It's All in the Cards" achievements from the beginning of the game and challenge anyone you can to the card game. You need to defeat 100 opponents. Additionally, get every treasure chest you can find to work on "Another Man's Treasure" along the way.

Note: The game does not have a "clear" save file or anything like that. When you finish the story, load your last save and backtrack out of Memoria to begin the next step.

Step 2: End-Game Grind
Now that you have completed the main story and got all the missable achievements along the way (hopefully), you can focus on all the optional side-content. By the end of this step you should only have one achievement left ("The Ultimate Sword") so work through the guide below and knock out everything else. There is no special order to do it all in or anything like that. If you hadn't been using boosts, some of this content will greatly benefit from them (such as the Ozma battle), but again, it's up to you how you tackle everything.

Step 3: Speed Run
Now that you are familiar with the game's story elements, start a new game, throw on all the boosters you'd like, and plow through the game in under 12 hours to unlock the Excalibur II weapon for your final achievement!

I'd like to thank Darth_Krid over at PST for his work on the trophy guide (I defer to it often in the guide below rather than parroting his info) and JNSpradlin at PSNProfiles for the Missable walkthrough I linked above. They were immensely helpful in planning my playthrough and guide.

[XBA would like to thank The Pants Party for this Roadmap]

Bloodlust

15
Defeat 10000 enemies.
(1)
During a normal play through of the game it is estimated you would only kill one to two thousand enemies, leaving quite a bit of grinding to complete this achievement. You can grind out the rest of this in a few ways.

1. Pay attention to the story and directly after the events in Cleyra and escaping the prison cage with Steiner and Marcus, leave the game running overnight/while at work with the 9999 Damage and High Speed boosters turned on, as well as activating auto-battle by hitting when inside a battle (it will persist to every battle after until you turn it off). You should also have the Blood Sword equipped on Steiner (a reward for turning in the zodiac coins in Treno - this is mentioned in the story walkthrough I linked in the Road Map). You will never die because of the life drain effect on the weapon (though poor Marcus will), and will get a few hundred kills per hour. If you don't have the weapon, turn on the Battle Assistance booster to keep him alive, though this will slow down the kills per hour due to the Trance animation in every battle.

This specific location is mentioned because the enemies will run at you, so you can leave your character idle and use either a turbo controller to make sure is always active on Xbox to skip the post-battle screens, or use an AutoHotKey script that presses the Enter key once every second on PC (see here for how to do that). The downside to this is that there is no way to save during this section, so if your game crashes you lose all the progress. It will also still take nearly 20-24 hours of time. However, you can let this run on your PC and play something else on your Xbox, so that's a plus. This will also put a dent into getting a character to Level 99.

2. Using a turbo controller or a script for AutoHotKey that will press the movement and action buttons for you, you can run in a circle on the world map and let the game run that way. Same premise though, throw on the boosters so you won't die.

3. Play legit. Obviously this will be the most tedious and take up hours and hours of your life. I'd suggest trying to work out one of the other two methods.
Driving the Hard Bargain

15
Purchase all items available from Stiltzkin.
For this achievement you must find a specific Moogle NPC and purchase items from him eight different times over the course of the game. His location is mentioned in the appropriate spots in the missables thread linked in the Road Map. I'd also suggest checking this solution on PST for screenshots of the exact locations.
Cracking the Code

15
Uncover the secret of the Eidolon Wall.
This can be done any time after the events of Shimmering Island on Disc 3. You will need to perform a number of specific steps to find Dagger's true name. Follow the steps here (from the missables thread) to unlock the achievement.
One Nag Too Many

15
Cause Moguo to have a tantrum.
Once you obtain the Moogle Flute during the story, you can use it on the world map to save your game. Use it 17 times in a row to upset the moogle and unlock the achievement.
Follow Your Nose

15
Raise your chocobo's beak level to 99.
Your chocobo's beak will level up based on how many items it has dug up. I would suggest doing the "Diggin' It" achievement first which will likely get you this achievement along the way, then you can grind the rest out with the method below if needed.

Use Chocobo's Air Garden to get the rest of your levels. Play the game here with the High Speed Mode boost turned on. Your movement will again speed up, but not the clock of the mini-game. This should allow you to always get the maximum items and bonuses from left over time. You can grind the remaining levels fairly quickly. Again, see "Diggin' It" for more info on the digging mini-games.
Beach Bum

15
Visit every beach in Gaia.
To unlock this achievement, you must complete a side-quest given by Fat Chocobo in Chocobo's Paradise. However, there is a bit of pre-work for the quest to be available.

First, you need to get an Ocean and Mountain Chocobo (see "Diggin' It" for how to unlock these) and find five secret areas with each. To unlock the secret areas, you need Dead Pepper items which come from digging after upgrading to the Mountain Chocobo. Once you have ten Dead Peppers, see this solution on PST for the secret area locations.

After you have found all the secret areas, the beach hunt can actually begin. Return to Fat Chocbo for a scene, then challenge him to a card game. Instead, he will challenge you to visit all the beaches. Return to the solution on PST I linked above for a list of all 21 beaches. Inspect each beach when you see the exclamation point (!) above your head to hear a chime sound. Once you hear the chime on the final beach you will get the message "Watched the waves around the world and relaxed!" and the achievement will unlock.
Diggin' It

15
Locate all hidden treasures on the world map.
This achievement is tied to a side-quest called Chocobo Hot and Cold. The goal is to dig up 24 "Chocograph" items and use them to find 24 hidden treasures. For 60Gil you can dig around to try and find treasures inside the chocobo areas, which will sometimes include a Chocograph (it's completely random). When digging, your chocobo will say a few things to alert how close you are to a treasure. These are: "Kweh" = cold. "Kweh?!" = warm. "Kwehhh?!" = hot. "K-KWEHHH!!!" = item found. Again, this doesn't guarantee a Chocograph each time. The best way to do this mini-game is turning on the High Speed Mode booster and just run around mashing the button.

You will first begin this quest in Chocobo's Forest outside Lindblum on Disc 1. You can find 13 Chocographs here, 4 of which require a mountain chocobo so you'll need to return later on. Next you'll be able to access Chocobo's Lagoon with the reef chocobo upgrade where you'll find 7 more Chocographs, 3 of which require a sea chocobo. You need to have at least completed the Healing Shore Chocograph from the forest area to unlock the reef chocobo to enter the Lagoon.

In addition to the full Chocographs you can find inside the above two locations, you will have to find six pieces of another called Mist Ocean. You will find 2 pieces inside the Forest, 3 inside the Lagoon, and the final piece can be in either location. Once you have all six pieces, solve Mist Ocean to get the sky chocobo.

Using the sky chocobo, you can now enter the final location called Chocobo's Air Garden. This spot changes locations, and can be in any of the five spots found here. Once you get inside, you'll be able to find the final 3 Chocographs with the digging mini-game.

As you find Chocographs, use this thread to solve each of them and dig up the corresponding treasures. Once the 24th treasure is dug up, the achievement will unlock.
Back Online

15
Repair the machine at Mognet Central.
To repair the machine at Mognet, we first need to find Mognet. You need to deliver six letters to and from different moogles you meet on your travels. These are all listed in the missable walkthrough from the Road Map, so be sure to follow that closely. Once all the letters are delivered, speak to Ruby in Alexandria to obtain the Superslick item. Finally, return to Mognet and repair the machine with the Superslick to unlock the achievement. Mognet is also one of the five secret areas for the "Beach Bum" achievement.
Well Lubricated

15
Obtain a bottle of Superslick.
See "Back Online" for how to obtain this item.
Frog Wrangler

15
Successfully catch 99 frogs.
Frogs will spawn in the game's "Qu's Marsh" locations, and you must have Quina in your party to participate in the frog catching mini-game. Theoretically, that's all there is to it. However, frogs are in limited supply and need to repopulate each location after you've caught them. When catching frogs, be sure to always leave one male (yellow feet) and one female (red feet) in the marsh. This will ensure they have babies and more frogs grow for you. If you see a golden frog, leave that alone as well. This speeds up the repopulation. Catching the gold frog is needed for another achievement, but you can grab it as your 100th frog, or save and reload after grabbing it to keep it alive (though it does eventually respawn somewhere else each time it is caught).

There are four locations to play this game: outside Lindblum, on the Outer Continent near the Black Mage Village, on the Forgotten Continent by Oeilvert, and on an island south of the Forgotten Continent. I'd suggest hitting each location as soon as you can to get working on this, since you need the frogs to repopulate a few times to reach 99 total. Grab everything except one male and one female (and the golden if he's there) and leave. Continue with the story and after 2-3 hours check back and grab any new frogs. They do not have to be adults to count for the achievement, so grab the babies if you want.
Going for the Gold

15
Successfully catch a golden frog.
As mentioned above, the golden frog will spawn randomly in one of the four Qu's Marsh locations. Catching it slows down the frog regeneration, so either leave it alone and only catch it after earning "Frog Wrangler" or save before catching it and reload.
Auctioneer

15
Win 10 items at the Treno Auction House.
You can win any 10 items from the Treno auctions starting in Disc 2 to unlock this achievement. Be aware that you need to win five specific items for "Sword of Kings" so I'd suggest waiting to get those first, then winning five other random cheap things after that to get the achievement.
Sword of Kings

15
Obtain the sacred blade Excalibur.
To obtain Excalibur, you must win five different items from the auction house in Treno. I would suggest waiting to do this until your return for the second time in Disc 3 since only three of the items are available during the first visit, and you need to blow all your money for an ATE in Lindblum which is the next story destination anyway. When you return, win the Griffin's Heart, Doga's Artifact, Une's Mirror, and Rat Tail items and then you must sell these items to people around Treno. They are the Scholar in the Synthesis Shop, the Nobleman in the Cafe, and the two Adventurers in the Cafe (you can usually only find one of those three in the Cafe at any time, just move screens and come back to get a new person).

Once you have the above step done, speak with the old man at the Daguerreo Inn after the events at Shimmering Island. He will request the Magical Fingertip from the auction house. Go back and win that, then return to trade it for Excalibur.
Beating the Ragtime Blues

15
Correctly answer all the questions in Ragtime Mouse's pop quiz.
Ragtime Mouse is a random friendly encounter that can happen in the game's forest terrain on the world map. Each time you come across him, he will ask you a True/False question. You MUST get all of these right or you will fail the achievement, so be very careful when you encounter him. As soon as he asks the question, pause your game and be sure you have the correct answer, then use an attack command to hit the X for a false answer and O for a true answer.

Ragtime can only be encountered a specific amount of times depending on where you are in the game. You can find him up to 4 times on Disc 1, 6 more on Disc 2, and the final 6 on Disc 3. These are cumulative, so if you never see him and you're on Disc 4, you can get all 16 encounters. While these encounters are random, it has been discovered that if you tap your movement button very slowly in any direction and move without seeing a rustle of leaves show up on-screen, you can sort of force the encounter to happen. It's not foolproof, but it's better than running full speed and hoping for the best.

Now, once you have had all 16 encounters and successfully answered every question correctly, you'll need a final 17th encounter to actually unlock the achievement. The full list of questions and answers is found in the missable thread I linked in the Road Map, which you should know by now to have up at all times as you play through the game.
Mister Nice Guy

15
Gain the favor of all friendly enemies.
There are nine total friendly enemies to encounter in the game, and each of them will be random encounters in specific locations. When found, they will ask for an item (some type of precious metal) and you must use the item on them from your inventory to complete their request and end the battle. If you don't have it, attack them (they will run away) or flee. You can encounter them more than once, so be sure to avoid giving the same friendly enemy an item twice or you risk voiding the achievement as there are only a specific number of Emerald, Diamond, and Moonstone items in the game.

For a full list of the friendly enemies, their locations, and the items they ask for, check this post on PST. The first time you can encounter them will be noted in the missable walkthrough as well. Again, don't use any of the precious metals more than once, or for anything else like synthesis.
To Ozma and Back

40
Defeat Ozma.
(5)
Ozma is a special optional boss that can be fought anytime after discovering Chocobo's Air Garden. See "Diggin' It" for info on that. It is also suggested to complete "Mister Nice Guy" before fighting this boss if you plan to do it legit. This will cause the boss to become weak to shadow and physical damage. You will initiate this battle in the cave at the back of the Air Garden.

As for the battle itself, if you're doing it legit, I'd suggest reading this post. If you're going to use the Battle Assistance and 9,999 damage boosters, just whack away.
My Little Airship

15
Obtain a miniature copy of the Prima Vista.
To get the model airship, you must deliver three coffees to the old man at the Observatory next to Dali. This achievement must be done prior to completing Disc 3, as the location is closed during Disc 4. All of the coffees are mentioned in the missable walkthrough linked in the Road Map. One is very missable as it is only available during the card tournament on Disc 3. Be sure to follow the walkthrough closely and as soon as you get the third coffee, visit the old man to trade them for the model and unlock the achievement.
Earning the Queen's Favor

15
Receive 10 rewards from Queen Stella.
See "What's Your Sign?" for more info.
What's Your Sign?

15
Obtain the Hammer.
The Hammer is a reward you will receive from Queen Stella after collecting 13 unique coins throughout the game and giving them to her in Treno. None of the coins are missable, though thankfully they ARE included in the missable walkthrough I linked in the Road Map. Following that, you will get them all along the way. Their locations can also be found here with a video to help if needed.

After collecting 12 coins, visit Stella and the last one will become available. Go grab it and return once more to receive the Hammer and unlock the achievement.
Another Man's Treasure

15
Receive certification as a Rank S Treasure Hunter.
To become a Rank S treasure hunter, you need to accumulate 340 points in a hidden treasure hunting game. And by hidden I mean you don't actually know it's happening until you find a specific NPC. The Four-Armed Man found at the top of the lift in Daguerreo will tell you your rank and how many points you have. Any regular treasure chest or field icon is worth one point, while Chocobo treasures earned doing "Beach Bum" and "Diggin' It" count for two points each.

You will get 64 points from all the chocobo treasures, so you'll need to find quite a few regular treasure chests and investigation points. Get as many as possible before the end of Disc 3 as multiple locations will be lost to you on Disc 4. A guide with every treasure spot can be found here if you need places to look.
Dragon Lady

15
Defeat Behemoth in the Treno weapon shop using Dagger.
You can challenge this monster after the events in Terra on Disc 4. Doing the fight legit, you'll want to be over Level 50 or more with some of the best equipment. You can cheese the fight by summoning Odin which should kill the enemy immediately. You can also turn on the Battle Assistance and 9,999 damage boosters for an even easier cheese (having Auto-Life available if she's a low level will help too). Just be sure to win the fight with Dagger to unlock the achievement.
Hail to the King

60
Jump rope 1000 times without tripping and obtain King of Jump Rope.
(9)
This mini-game can be found directly in the beginning of the game as you control Vivi in Alexandria, and again late in Disc 3. You have three options in obtaining this achievement.

1. Legit: You will need to simply play the mini-game. It is comprised of simply pressing on Xbox or the Enter key on PC at the correct times. The jumping changes speeds at 20, 50, 100, 202, and 300 on the jump counter. The grouping from 202-300 is the most difficult as it is not a consistent speed the entire time, but rather a jump-jump-pause type of cadence. This will take a lot of practice to perfect, and considering the 1000 jumps takes a good seven minutes to complete, you'll need to have good eye and hand endurance as well. Most people do this method by sound and only open their eyes to see when the speed changes are coming.

2. AutoHotKey Script: Playing on PC, there is a script that you can edit to fit your specific setup that will do the jump rope mini-game for you. Now, it's a bit difficult to setup (I'll be honest, I tried for multiple hours to tinker with it and completely failed) but there are many others who had success. If you want to give this method a try, read this thread for instructions and scripts to try, as well as how to edit it.

3. Frame Rate Control: This is the method I used and also requires playing on PC. Download a program such as RivaTuner Statistics Server and set it to cap your computer's Frames Per Second down to a very low number with the Application Detection on High. Have this setup prior to opening the game or it may not detect the game. I personally used 8FPS, but I likely should have gone to 10 or 12. Doing this will slow the game down and give you plenty of time to react to the jumps. Use Vivi's feet as a marker and press the Enter key to jump every time his feet begin to swing forward. I thought of it more as me shoving him back to the ground rather than actually initiating the next jump. You'll need a good 25-30 minutes set aside for this method since the game is slowed down so much, but it's nearly failproof.
Skip to My Lou

40
Jump rope 100 times without tripping.
(3)
See "Hail to the King" for more info.
A Round of Applause

15
Have the nobles demand an encore.
Directly in the beginning of the game, you will act out a play with your troupe. In a sword fight with Blank, you will be tasked with pressing directions on the D-Pad or hitting face buttons at Blank's request. You need to respond to these fairly quickly, and keep the flow of the battle moving. It's fairly simple and I was able to get a full score on my first try.

If you fail, you can simply try again right away. Keep going until you get 100/100. To get an encore and unlock this achievement, you only need a score of 80 out of 100 but to get a Moonstone for "Over the Moon", you must get a full 100/100 so aim for that.
A-Hunting We Will Go

15
Win with Vivi during the Festival of the Hunt.
At the end of your visit to Lindblum on Disc 1, you will participate in a mini-game to hunt monsters that are loose in the town. You will play as Zidane, but must manipulate things to allow Vivi to win for this achievement. The easiest way to do this is to make your way to the business district killing as few monsters as possible, and let the clock run down to 4:30 left. Then, enter the shop area (the NE exit from the square) to find a Zaghnol enemy attacking some kids. Engage the monster and Freya will join you in battle. During this fight, use attack commands on yourself to kill Zidane and Freya, and upon their deaths they will be eliminated from the event, defaulting the win to Vivi and unlocking the achievement.
All's Well That Ends Well

15
Complete FINAL FANTASY IX.
Story related and can not be missed.
End of the Road

15
Attain level 99 with at least one character.
I would suggest first grinding out all the kills toward "Bloodlust" and that will likely get all your characters to Level 99. If not, head to Popos Heights (take the vine up from where the moogle is in Gizamaluke’s Grotto) and kill Grand Dragon enemies. With Battle Assistance and 9,999 damage boosters, you can kill a few per minute. If you kill off three characters, the remaining one will earn 4x the XP since it is always split between living characters at the end of battle. They don't auto-revive after the battle is won, so you can just keep getting experience with one character quickly in each fight.
The One Ring

15
Obtain Madain's Ring via mining.
This achievement will be done in Fossil Roo. You can participate in a mining mini-game (it costs a potion), and there is a very small chance to obtain the Madain's Ring from one of the mining spots here (five up top and three down below). It is completely random, so you'll just need to repeat the mini-game until successful. If you turn on the High Speed Mode booster you'll be able to mine more spots each attempt. After 10 attempts or after getting any item (ore, potion, etc) move to a new spot. Once all spots are hit, leave the screen to reset the game and try again.
Peek-A-Boo

15
Free Kuppo from a wall in Fossil Roo.
At the same area where "The One Ring" takes place, you will see a wall with cracks in it in the NE corner. Use the pickacke on the wall until it breaks open to rescue Kuppo.
Track Star

15
Obtain Athlete Queen.
The title of Athlete Queen can be won by Vivi during a trip to Alexandria in Disc 3. Make sure you complete this before watching Ruby's play.

The mini-game is started by talking with Hippolady, and you will race her son Hippaul. During the race, you will need to alternate pressing and quickly to make Vivi run. Beating Hippaul by a lot will gain Vivi 5 levels and a close win only 1 level. Continue racing until you reach level 80 to obtain the Athlete Queen title (Hippaul will tell you your current level). The races will be fairly simply until you get closer to level 80, then Hippaul speeds up and you'll have much closer races until the end.
Found in the Shuffle

15
Beat the Nero Brothers' shuffling game nine times in a row.
The shuffling mini-game is also in Alexandria on Disc 3, but while you are controlling Zidane. Speak with one of the Nero brothers in the weapon shop to start the game.

The brother who speaks before the game starts is the one you need to locate at the end. This is just like a traditional cup shuffling game where you need to find a ball under a cup. As you successfully guess their location, the game will get faster and much harder. Pausing it off and on will help you keep track, and if you're really struggling I would suggest using the Frame Rate Control trick from "Hail to the King" to cheese this, or people have suggested filming it and then slowing the video down frame by frame. I was able to do it on my first try with no tricks, so it's not really that bad to be honest.
It's All in the Cards I

15
Win a Tetra Master match.
See "It's All in the Cards III" for more info.
It's All in the Cards II

15
Win 10 Tetra Master matches (some NPCs can be re-challenged after further game progression).
See "It's All in the Cards III" for more info.
It's All in the Cards III

40
Win 100 Tetra Master matches (some NPCs can be re-challenged after further game progression).
Tetra Master is a card game that can be played with nearly every NPC in the game. Despite the achievement description, you need to defeat 100 unique NPCs to obtain this achievement. Beating the same opponent multiple times will not increase your total for this. You need a minimum of five cards to play, which you should get very early in Alexandria. However, you can lose cards when losing a match, so try to reload an earlier save if this happens. If you walk up to someone and see two bubbles, pressing will initiate a match. Choose your five cards and the match begins.

I will once again defer to the PST guide here for the specifics on how to play these matches. The rules are fairly complicated and he lays it out very well.

There are more than 100 battles when on Disc 4, so you could travel from town to town and defeat every person at that time if you wish. Or you can work on this slowly as you play through the game. Whichever method you do, try to keep track of who you've beaten in each location so you don't waste too much time battling people more than once.
A Clean Bill of Health

15
Have a single character affected by all status ailments (both beneficial and detrimental).
There are 26 total status ailments to be afflicted with. This does not have to be all at the same time (and would be impossible to do so). So long as someone in your party is afflicted, it will count toward the total (despite the description specifying "single character"). Most of the ailments you can cause to yourself. Use spells and target your own character rather than the enemies. Obviously with boosters on you can stay alive and get many ailments done at the same time so long as you don't miss. Some ailments will require fighting specific enemies though.

For a full list of the ailments and the easiest way to have them inflicted upon you, see here. Be sure not to have anything equipped that will protect against the ailment you're working on, and be aware that "auto" abilities that cast the ailments at the beginning of battle do not count. They must be inflicted after a battle has already begun.
Overly Emotional

15
Enter trance 50 times.
A character's trance bar (the red one under their normal green ATB bar) will fill as they are attacked. Once filled, they will enter trance automatically. This will come through normal gameplay. You could also turn on the Battle Assistance booster which will cause every character to enter trance in every battle, which will pop this achievement very early in Disc 1.
Movie Critic

40
View 79 Active Time Events.
(1)
There are exactly 79 Active Time Events (ATEs) that count toward this achievement. There are 83 total in the game, but three are related to learning tutorials and don't count at all (these are called "Teach Me Mogster") and one can not be earned as it is the opposite choice of another. All of these are listed in the missable walkthrough, so again follow that closely to earn them all. You will see "Active Time Event" in the lower left of the screen and a chime sound will play when one is available to view. These are only available for a short time, so press immediately to initiate them.

Most locations are fairly simple and you will earn all the ATEs simply over time spent in the location (so long as you trigger each in turn). However, a few locations must be traversed in specific routes to see all the proper ATEs. Take extra care when arriving in Treno for the first time at the beginning of Disc 2, Conde Petie and Black Mage Village on Disc 2, the second visit to Treno on Disc 3, and finally your third visit to Lindblum on Disc 3. These all have very specific instructions to obtain them all.

For a full list of these chronologically, see here. Again, following the missable thread will get you all of these but just be careful when entering a new location and follow its directions or you will easily miss one.
Over the Moon

60
Obtain 4 moonstones.
There are only four moonstones in the game, so this can be missed. You don't need to own all four at once, but you must collect the four listed here. These are all mentioned in the missable walkthrough as well, so again, follow that for success.
Kain's Legacy

15
Obtain Kain's Lance.
See "The Ultimate Mace" for more info.
Close But No Cigar

15
Obtain the Tower.
See "The Ultimate Mace" for more info.
The Ultimate Claws

15
Obtain the Rune Claws.
See "The Ultimate Mace" for more info.
The Ultimate Flute

15
Obtain the Angel Flute.
See "The Ultimate Mace" for more info.
The Ultimate Mace

15
Obtain the Mace of Zeus.
Inside the Memoria dungeon, you will find power weapons for Freya, Zidane, Amarant, Eiko, and Vivi. All of these weapons are hidden in the environment and found when the exclamation point (!) shows up over Zidane's head. Their locations are noted in the missable walkthrough and the story walkthrough I linked in the Road Map. If you would like pictures to go along with that, click on the character names above.
The Ultimate Fork

15
Obtain the Gastro Fork.
After completing the "Frog Wrangler" achievement, Quale will challenge you to a battle. Defeat her to obtain this weapon. The fight can be won easily with boosters, or returning after getting to Level 99.
The Ultimate Sword

60
Obtain Excalibur II.
This achievement will most easily be done on a second playthrough, and should be your only achievement left when starting a second new game. You could combine it with a full playthrough getting all missable things along the way, but it would be close (and impossible if you want to play without boosters).

Excalibur II is obtained by completing the Memoria dungeon in less than 12 hours of game time. Normally this would be quite difficult, but with the boosters available in this version of the game, it can easily be done in half the required time. Be sure to always have all four boosters active, only do whatever is required to move the story along, skip all cutscenes and rush through the dialogue.

You will want to take a break at least once to level up to make the end game doable. Even with Battle Assistance on, you can be killed if the damage done is higher than your max HP, so getting that up is important. Make sure Freya wins the Hunt mini-game in Lindblum to get the Coral Ring which negates lightning attacks, and grind the dragons found up the vine at the back of Gizamaluke’s Grotto. You can get to Level 30 here very quickly and could get to 40 in not much extra time if you want. Another important thing to do is winning the card tournament on Disc 3. This will give the Rebirth Ring which casts Auto-Life, a handy ability to keep you alive during harder fights.

Once you finally get the Memoria and defeat the Lich, loot the Excalibur II from the platform. It is at the base of the pillar on the right side. Again, it will only appear if you've got to this point in less than 12 hours, which you can check from the character menu. If you need to take breaks at all, the pause screen () DOES stop the game timer, while entering the character menu does not.
The Ultimate Rod

15
Obtain the Whale Whisker.
This weapon is found as one of the treasures associated with the "Diggin' It" achievement and will come while working on that.
The Ultimate Racket

15
Obtain the Tiger Racket.
To get this weapon, you will need to have a Dead Pepper (see "Diggin' It" for how to obtain these items) and use it at an inspection point on the outside portion of Quan's Dwelling. This will take you to the world map where you can jump into the ocean and fish out a chest with the weapon inside. If you need additional help, this video has all the locations.
The Ultimate Dual Blade

15
Obtain the Ultima Weapon.
This weapon is at the bottom of the ocean in an unmarked spot near where Shimmering Island's location was (south of Lost Continent), and can only be found on Disc 4. You will need to use a Dead Pepper to blindly search and find the correct spot. There is no indication from the bird if you're close or not either. You can watch this video for a little help, but it will still take some attempts. You can get 99 Dead Pepper from the chocobo next to Fat Chocobo in Chocobo's Paradise, and you can save prior to making your attempts and reload if you somehow fail that many times.
Path of the Samurai

15
Obtain the complete set of Genji armor.
There are two full sets of Genji armor in the game. For the first set, all the pieces will come along the way when working on the "Beach Bum" and "Diggin' It" achievements. The other set must be stolen from Kraken, Maliris, and Lich. Obviously the first set is much easier and you don't need to go out of your way if you're working on a full completion of the game.
Your Lucky Day

15
Receive a Very Good Omen from a color fortune.
At the Dali Inn you will find an investigation point to the left of the bedroom. You can pay 10 Gil to get a fortune, and a "Very Good" fortune is a possibility. Just keep buying fortunes until successful (I think it took me about a dozen tries).
Out of Harm's Way

15
Guide all the residents of Cleyra to safety.
This is mentioned in the missable thread, but when you are in Cleyra on Disc 2, you will need to pick a specific set of directions to give the villagers to ensure they all survive. Tell the oracles to go right, Learie to go left at the first screen then right at the next screen, and finally admit that the town is not safe yet when asked.