Guys. Lets not turn this into a "I can break this game using this method!" pissing contest. Every game can be broken given enough effort, time, and technology due to the fallibility of human programming and foresight and the fact that most games only have one shot to 'get it right' whereas millions of players have for as long as they care to to break the game.
As suggested before by Jimmy, is that there are so many more options available to the common player compared to what the system is used to handling. Just like how in FFV you have so many options (i.e. Jobs) that there are far more opportunities for the player to find something that wasn't perfectly balanced or was made too effective for the time it is acquired. Whereas in cases like FFIV, where the game's progression and advancement is so ridged and static that developers can more effectively predict the given power level of a particular player's party at any given time and thus plan their events and challenges accordingly.
Both forms of play styles have their advantages as well as their disadvantages such as rigidness's lack of replayability (since your ultimate experience won't change without cheating) but has a better designed challenge curve (as well as allowing game designers to do things like take pages out of a Shonen anime/manga and create a situation where you cant use your most powerful/main character due to a dungeon's gimmick by weakening or disabling him and letting your side dudes take over for a dungeon power hour until the boss where things go pear-shaped due to lacking your big guns thus a sympathetic side character makes their noble last ditch effort to save the party from almost certain doom). While games that grant you more options naturally possess more replayability (maybe this time I'll take a party of Knights, Monks, a Bard, a Thief, a couple of various Mages, and a Hunter instead of a Samurai, a Chemist, two Summoners, and a Mime) but have the greater potential of unchecked exploits (like chucking purchasable/disposable rods at enemies for 15x the damage output you're supposed to possess, as well as making it difficult for designers to craft believable situations where an early unwinnable boss fight is easily revealed to be unwinnable as you've long since exceeded the highest possible amount of HP anything could have at that point in time as you've been chucking rods at it constantly for far more damage output than what should be currently available).
The problem with Awakening is that it made the classic mistake of throwing everything short of the kitchen sink (and to be fair, the capture/dismount mechanics) into the game. And while the systems don't clash with each other like Sword of Mana's system clusterfuck did (didn't help that the core game was based on an OG Gameboy game), you still have excess options like class changing (although not nearly as bad as the DS games where your designated Knight makes for an awesome Hunter since his base Def is solid for early game and he wont miss the Def growth as a Knight since his personal Def growth sucks too much for anything, but it does open up infinite grinding options and less personalized skill sets/functions), the eugenics (although not as bad as GotHW where you had potential fathers who were practically useless as fathers or even detrimental given combinations as siring a Mage with 20% Mag growth as well as characters who were simply deadweight in terms of parentage), and the random items ("Hel~lo Prologue 2 Ephraim's Lance!").
And then there's the DLC which is a veritable fire hose of content and options that can open up options that far exceed anything available in the main game (including content that far surpasses the difficulty available in the main game or the base game's post game).
Ultimately though, this is what happens when you make a game for fans of the series first and foremost. Despite that fact though, for what it is, it is a spectacular game (again, for what it is).
