Not great when compared to other shooters, but the story can still deliver a good shot.
What I can say about the gameplay is that it's a good start for Square to learn what needs to be done to make their next shooter/action games a success, as it seems to lack some things which they could have made this game a big hit if they were added to it. Don't get me wrong, the game was fun at some parts and I liked visiting these areas again after beating the game, but when you gather all the gameplay features together, they were not enough to deliver a fun and interesting experience.
The good:
- Many ways to customize your gun slinging action. You can customize your gun to be either long range, powerful, or a fast shooting gun. Also being able to upgrade your gun with improved performance of your choice, and some areas you need a different kind of gun style to prevent the fight of getting ugly, which is another good thing of offering verity to your freedom of customization.
- An actively nice battle system. You can either use your guns to keep shooting at your enemy from the distance (Which most of the game is about it), or you can attack an enemy with your arm if they enter your melee range, or you can transform into a beast when you get angry to deliver a heavy blow to your enemies, as well as use magics to boost your power and items such as potions to help you throughout the course of the missions. There is much different stuffs you can do than just shoot at your enemies.
- Impressive storyline, continuing from the story of FF7 and Advent Children. The story is mainly focused on Vincent Valentine's dark history, but some other story elements are revealed as you progress throughout the missions. The wonderful cutscenes, characters, along with smooth conversations make FF7 fans feel that they are still in the FF7 universe while playing DoC. I strongly encourage people who are interested to try DoC to play FF7 first or at least read the story analyzes as there will be a LOT of stuffs in DoC that you may not understand about them if you haven't played or read FF7's plot.
- The magic of FF7 still swirls in DoC. You will get to see many FF7 characters in this one but this time with better models and voice acted. Plus you will get to see some FF7 enemies, too. As you move on through the missions, you will step into familiar places which you have visited in FF7 (In case you played it).
- Incredible boss fights. While some boss fights are mainly about dodging its attacks and counter attack with your gun until you defeat it, there are some boss fights which require you to fight in a specific strategy to beat them, which it can prevent the boss fights from looking repeative. In other words, rapid gun shots won't work in some boss fights, but rapid quick thinking does. Finally, some bosses have their own background story, which can make you feel that there is a relation between the boss fight and the story.
- Nicely rewarding gameplay. As you gain experience throughout the battle and depending on how good you played during the mission, you get more exp, and as a reward, the more exp you have, the more upgrades and improvements you can make for yourself. Plus there are loads and loads of bonus missions that you can try after beating the game, as you progress through the game with a hawk's eye, you will be able to unlock some nice and rewarding contents should you be able to find the secrets....
The bad:
- As I have mentioned that DoC is mainly focused on Vincent Valentine but you still get to see other FF7 characters, many of these characters don't play a large or at least a fair role in the story. You may be disappointed that some your favorite FF7 characters aren't so popular in DoC (If it wasn't Vincent that is).
- The battle system could have been better. Most of it is focused on your guns. While you can still punch your enemy, the melee attack is weak when compared to your gun and it's a limited combo. You may only be impressed with your melee attack the first three times you use it. Even when using the gun, you don't have a large variety of guns, the only thing that makes your gun look and feel different than the other is when you customize it. Other than that, they are basically all the same.
- The limit break, while it's cool to transform yourself to a beast to deliver heavy damage, it's a very limited break. It's not like devil may cry where your rage increases through time and you can convert the rage into a super form, in DoC, you just need to use an item to transform, and once you're done, you won't be able to use it again until you find another "Limit Break" item. It would have been better if it were similar to FF7 where your meter increases as you attack and take damage. Finally, you can just transform yourself into one form that has everything maximized. I think it would have been better if there were multiple forms and each form had its own strength and weakness.
- There are many things which you won't make use of throughout the game. I may have said that there are some parts in the game where you need to change your gun to kill your enemies faster, but it's still possible to go from the start of the game until the end with the same gun. Melee weapons, as I've mentioned, are useless in most parts of the game. While Vincent is able to double jump, you won't make much use of it, also some people prefer to just walk to the side instead of dashing around.
- The targeting system is naturally like normal FPS on consoles, but I believe it would have been better if there was a better/easier targeting system or at least if it had an option to change the targeting system from manual to a lock-on button.
- Vincent doesn't ride chocobos, does he? Regardless, it would have been cool if there were different sub-gameplay options available to offer variety to the game, instead of just walking around and shooting. There are parts where you set on a turret and rapidly shoot on incoming enemies, but more of these different gameplay styles would have been nice.
So as you can see, or have seen from many reviews, this game has lots of issues that could have been made in a better way, but as I mentioned at the beginning of the review, it's a good start for Square to learn from mistakes and make their upcoming action games a success.
If you're really into the FF7 story, then you should get this one since you will be impressed with how DoC fills up many unanswered questions, but if you're looking for a fun-to-play shooter action game, then it's suggested to try out something else.