Final Fantasy VII? This one should be called Dirge of Cerberus: Kingdom Hearts
User Rating: 4.1 | Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII PS2
Final Fantasy VII was great game. It is a game worthy of talking about even to this date. Also Final Fantasy VII had grand story that can makes fans want to revist it, but Dirge of Cerberus doesn't take us to Final Fantasy VII world, but a world that is similar towards Kingdom Hearts. As a fan of Final Fantasy VII, I have to say this game offends me. The characteristics of memorable Final Fantasy VII characters doesn't match from original game, and newly introduced characters doesn't look and sound like characters you would expect from Final Fantasy VII world. The things they talk about, the way they talk about these things are closer to Kingdom Heart style than Final Fantasy VII. It's like this. Final Fantasy VII would be heavy metal, and Kingdom Hearts is emo. Dirge of Cerberus is definitely emo. Yuffie and Vincent is two characters that did make smooth transition from Final Fantasy VII to Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus, but what happened to the rest of the characters? Cloud went from cocky mofo to emo dude, Cid went from ^&(%$@#^$@&#$@#&$ to southern accent, Barret lost his tough gangster talk, and Red XIII is nowhere to be seen. Cait Sith somewhat come close to what you would expect, but where is his big moogle? These characters might look similar to the characters Final Fantasy VII fans love, but they aren't the same characters. Even if SquareEnix is trying to give fans some fan service, it has no meaning because I'M NOT SEEING THE SAME CHARACTERS. This is incredibly huge flaw as a game with the name Final Fantasy VII. If a game carries the name Final Fantasy VII, that name is like a promise to take the players back into the world of Final Fantasy VII. Final Fantasy X-2 did exactly that. Yuna although her personality changed slightly was still Yuna and Rikku was still Rikku. Now who the *&^% is this dude calling himself Cloud in Dirge of Cerberus. I know that is not THE Cloud, because Cloud has some attitude. So already this game fails what it promises to deliver. DoC ruins the Final Fantasy VII name even further with the story. Listening to many corny lines these characters speak would give most of the players goosebumps. The main story uses Vincents memories that was part of Final Fantasy VII. Which would be about the time when he was with Turks. Hojo personality does seem like what we expected, but as for the Lucrecia, her personality was quite different from what I expected. I remember her as more obedient type since in FFVII, and she didn't express any powerful emotions. She is more of very practical character that seems rather detached from strong emotions. I know Final fantasy VII didn't have the graphics to show many emotions, but with words and character actions, it was clear that she didn't have an outburst in Vincents memories. However in DoC, she has many outbursts of emotion in same scenes you saw in Final Fantasy VII that showed no such thing. Also the expansion of this story is rather uninteresting. The intertwining events and his memories that uncovers more about his past and Lucrecia's past does bring some interests to players, but the secret organization Vincent is fighting against is more frustrating than interesting. They talk in typical Kingdom Hearts/ Final Fantasy VIII fashion where everyone talks like a freakin poet. DoC is by far the worst because it is incredibly corny. You would NOT expect Vincent to say something like "It's time to save the world" Ugh Well, even without relating to original Final Fantasy VII, there is plenty of problems in Dirge of Cerberus to make it a bad game. Graphically, The game has similar look as Kingdom Hearts. Great character models, and rather bland background. Character design might be flawless but backgrounds are just awful. Many of the same location you revisit from original Final Fantasy VII looks nothing like the locations you explored before. There might be some specific landmark that will be noticeable, but the places you visit will mostly feel foreign. Also the backgrounds lack quite a bit of detail and seems repetitive. Voice acting is done fairly well. I'm guessing it's same cast from Advent Children. I really wish they added Japanese voice acting option for this one. I watched Advent Children in Japanese, and now playing this game, I was heart broken to hear Cid talking in southern accent. The voice actors and actresses has done great job, but the director for the voice acting? He has done a TERRIBLE job. He should be ashamed. Well I can't fault for him too much because Advent Children was the same and Japanese version was not very different either. In other words, I blame Nomura. He should just stick with character design and leave directing of ANYTHING including games to someone else. The music has been done fairly well. At the end a popular Japanese Rock group plays some nice rock songs to give nice grand finale, but other than that nothing else really caught my attention. Gameplay of Dirge of Cerberus is where it hurts the most. It has incredibly linear path and it is incredibly straight forward shooter. There isn't even much or if any platform action. Also it is quite disappointing to know that other than Cait Sith, the players don't get to play as other characters. As as shooter, it is bland and straightforward. Enemy soldiers barely makes a move other than to just stand and shoot. The boss fights aren't much better, which usually ends up being just move around and shoot. The gameplay feels it is a shooter stripped down to the basic. Actually, I've found Vincent's melee attack is more effective on enemies that is within walking distance. Still it is satisfying to see Vincent kick some butts so it can get mildly entertaining. Overall, Dirge of Cerberus ends up being bland shooter with straightforward levels. If level design was more imaginative, then this game could've been so much better. The game does have very responsive controls and good basic mechanics to become a solid game, but poor level design and dumb A.I makes it not very interesting shooter. Other than great cut scenes that is ruined by terrible dialogue, there isn't much to this game other than it carries the name Final Fantasy VII.It does have interesting secret levels which is obviously made for online mode this game was supposed to have. In the end, DoC ends up being major disappointment. For a game that carries Final Fantasy, you expect to see great storyline and characters, but in the end, DoC ends up following typical trend of Square and many animes. You get your typical somewhat slow (mentally) and muscular character, young girl that talks way beyond her age but doesn't understand mature emotions, gloomy main character trapped by his past memories of his lover, etc etc etc. Same ol, same ol, and it gets boring quickly.
Then DoC disappoints again because it is a shooter. Shooters are usually very similar to one and other, and most of them does have good controls and game mechanics, so DoC having similar quality in those is not something to be wildly praised for. What makes a shooter stand out is often decided on level design and A.I, which DoC unfortunately fails in both. If you want PS2 shooter, there is a good one called Resident Evil 4. Resident Evil 4 offers poor storyline, but the level design and gameplay is top notch unlike DoC. It's best to get that one if you are looking for a shooter. If you are Final Fantasy VII fans, do avoid this one. Most likely you will be furious how they butchered the original game. If you are SquareEnix fanboy, you are brainwashed already and will accept anything they give you, so you would be the only ones I would recommend this to. 
