Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII (2006 Video Game) User Reviews

Overall, pretty good

[EricTheAnteater · 7/10 · 7 October 2006]

Final Fantasy VII was one of the best selling RPGs of all time. So it's no big surprise that Square has made a couple of prequels and sequels to it. SE's latest, Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII, is a hybrid third person shooter/RPG. As such, on top of running and gunning, you'll be buying upgrades for your gun and leveling up the game's main character, Vincent.

The game is fun to play, but the levels feel too linear and simple. Furthermore, you won't be pulling off any of the awesome stunts that Vincent did in Advent Children. Your athletics is limited to a double jump and some punching and kicking. The gunning is usually fun, and DoC's weapon customization system makes it even better. Unfortunately, you'll often feel like your in a shooting gallery, because your enemies are so darn stupid. They will sometimes run up to you and just sit there, waiting to be shot. Also, the game is somewhat short; I completed the game in only three days.

Graphics are pretty good; the character models are great, but the environments tend to look a little bland. It's OK, though, because each level looks very different from the last.

DoC's sound is very good, because of great voice acting, crisp sound, and brilliantly composed music.

The storyline is top notch. While I don't want to spoil anything for you, I will say this: This game may make you cry, especially if you cried during "that" one scene in Final Fantasy VII. You'll also see many classic locations, including Shinra Manor and Kalm.

Overall, DoC is a fun game, but if you're looking for the next great Final Fantasy game, this isn't it.

I loved this game, played it twice through without pausing(much)

[spideycrossfire · 8/10 · 27 October 2006]

This game is spectacular. It has a somewhat interesting tutorial, which is the best to hope for in a tutorial usually. It is an innovative, fun game that truly is very challenging if you play on hard mode and set the focus on manual or semi-auto on extra hard. Most gamers choose auto or semi-auto focus and it's practically cheating(the game aims the gun at the enemy for you), but if you want to play it through quickly the first time for the story, then it's perfect and if you want a harder game, then changing the focus setting's a click away in the settings menu. The second time I played through, there is challenge and excellent replayability. In addition,anyone who would call this game easy or unchallenging has not played it on extra hard and has not finished the extra missions, some of them will take you hours(even though the time limit is only three to five minutes on some of them. Three minute extra mission for four hours: do the math. It adds up to challenging. I threw my controller at the floor many, many times during the extra missions, in a good way, like you've really accomplished something. Helpful hint(not spoiler): when upgrading the machine gun, make sure to choose the upgrade that gives you a larger magazine. Just trust me on this one. It helps on the extra mission: Misslebreaker Deathmatch. I have encountered a lot of so-called pros claiming to be "hardcore FF7 players" dissing this game, but I think it's because it's not a true RPG. Seriously, I have many friends that love and still talk about FF7 and they loved this game too. The game is third person action( a la Tomb Raider Legend)/first person shooter( a la Halo) with some RPG elements. The game lets you use 1st person mode with three stylized, upgradeable weapons(what fun is a pistol without a really long barrel, or a machine gun without a sniper scope?)or 3rd person mode for hand-to-hand combat. The only real problems with the game itself is the lack of super-agility in Vincent(Known for superhuman speed and agility in advent children and dirge of Cerberus, but lacking here in gameplay. Honestly, this game would've been a ten, if it had been modeled after the effort made in Spiderman 2 for Xbox, but it still a great game nonetheless) and lack of variety in the enemies you fight(while this isn't unusual for action or FPS games, considering the huge bestiary found in FF7, I would have liked to see a Malboro, or at the very least, the infamous Midgar Zolom, classic enemies found in the 1997 RPG and where all the chocobos. Did they die? Where are they? To make up for this, there are a lot of new enemies to go along with a few classic enemies. The story doesn't really mess with the FF7 or Advent Children story lines and actually is really cool. For years, fans wanted more of the story lines regarding Vincent(mostly) and Yuffie as well as a sequel to FF7(read the internet chat and you'll find this true). The one drawback to the story is the voice acting by some of the characters and the direction of the voice acting. The voices are great but the way they come across can be really stale, but I believe the direction of the voice acting is at fault and not the actors, because the voice actors chosen were perfectly chosen. It is a joy to move seamlessly from 1st to 3rd person and back. Hit the kick button and move into 3rd person, push in the sniper scope toggle and you're in 1st. Yep, that easy. It's great. The story is solid and is told in an interesting and stunningly visual way that makes you want to keep playing to the end. It shows so much about Vincent's past that you truly sympathize with him, maybe for the first time, and understand how he became the man he is today. The music perfectly sets the mood, no matter what is going on in the story, and the graphics are truly beautiful in gameplay and the movie segments. The game is challenging unless you play it at the easiest level possible, and the tutorial actually recommends a difficulty level based on how good you are or how much you suck. Ignore the haters and buy or rent this game and revel in this late, great sequel to the masterpiece RPG FF7, and the movie Advent Children.

A new look for Final Fantasy, but should have stayed with RPG

[chrisrobbins-2 · 6/10 · 27 November 2006]

I have played Final Fantasy VII more times than I can count and it is not only the best Final Fantasy in the whole series, it for me is the best game in the world ( yes better than Halo, God of War, Soul Calibur, and Kingdom Hearts ) and when I heard Squaresoft was making a third-person RPG, continuation of Final Fantasy VII I was basically shocked and interested. So finally the day came and I bought my reserved copy of this game, and right when I turned it on, I knew this was going to be EXTREMELY different. Vincent was one of my favorite characters in FF7, besides Cloud and I was really shocked when I found out about the game play. Don't get me wrong, it is a good game, just... different.

Gameplay: Sloppy, messed up, and completely unoriginal. The hand to hand combat was the same every damned time. The guns weren't very interesting and extremely weird looking. Of coarse it had its okay's, the machine gun was a pretty nice firing gun, and The Cerberus was very interesting, but the looks still don't help this in its own pathetic way 3/10

Characters: The characters were well described such as Shelke, Azul and everyone else. We learn a little more about Vincents past, and we get to see some very familiar faces. I only wish we could see more of Cloud and the gang. Squaresoft really has a problem with only sticking to the main characters. Advent Children was all based on Cloud and Kadaj. Dirge of Cerberus only sticks on Vincent and some villains. We got to see a few characters but not much. 7/10

Overall: This is an okay game, and a good weekend rental. The game play really needs some help, and the characters have a few downsides here and there, but by bearing the name Final Fantasy, just give this game a little chance. 6/10

Nice shooter based on Final Fantasy VII, but it makes me want a remake of said game.

[Aaron1375 · 7/10 · 6 April 2010]

This game is like Crisis Core in that it makes me want to see Final Fantasy VII remade on the Playstation 3 or the Xbox 360. That game would simply amazing on said consoles as that game had an amazing story, however the graphics are very blocky especially by today's standards. Heck, Final Fantasy VIII which story wise was inferior to seven had better graphics. I realize for some reason people think that it would only be bought by people familiar with that game, but considering how well it sold that would make it an instant hit, and I am sure many people who have not played it would buy it because it would be intriguing. This game is interesting and has some nifty story elements as this one focuses mainly on Vincent from seven. In fact, the only other character from seven who plays a big part is Yuffie. Ironically, both she and Vincent were characters you did not even have to get in part seven to win the game. The game is an okay shooter, it is kind of linear though and you are not going to get to see all that many locales from seven present in this game. There are some interesting new characters and some bizarre story points involving some strange little girl and these weird people that have apparently lived underground. The ending scenes involving the other FF VII characters is not something I cared for all that much as it kind of makes out that Vincent is the strongest of the bunch, which goes against Advent Children as it made Cloud to be far and away the strongest character. Still, it was fun revisiting Midgar and this world, if only I could revisit in full.

Dirge of Cerberus

[tigerlove1992 · 9/10 · 23 January 2007]

I really enjoyed this game. I just recently got into to Final Fantasy through Advent Children, so I really didn't know what to expect. I was young when FFVII came out so I had no background information. I just knew the story (so far) was very good.

The game was fun, but too short. I really would had like to had seen more with Dr. Lucrecia Crescent and Vincent past. And showing Vincent turning into the person he is now. Maybe I'm missing a link or something.

The game effect were very impressive, the hair, eyes, clothes. So, that mainly kept me entertained

This game is about the connexion between Vincent's past and the discovery of Deepground soldiers.

[silver_wings111 · 9/10 · 17 January 2007]

I'm one of the biggest fan of FFVII so, naturally, when i heard they were making a sequel, i ran to the store and bought it. DoC is a great game. I enjoyed seeing all those cut scenes about mysterious and gloomy Vincent Valentine, my favorite FFVII character.

I was happy to see a lot of Yuffie Kisaragi too. Since this story takes place three years after the original 1997 game, she has become more reliable and mature. Some people complained about not seeing enough of Cloud and the others. Well, this game is NOT about Cloud or Tifa or Barret. It is Vincent's story. I think Vincent is an excellent choice of main character because of his connexion with Shinra and Hojo.

The music was beautiful and so were the graphics. The in-game movies were amazing, and I loved Steve Blum as Vincent Valentine. His voice is perfect to play this character.

I thought the game was a bit short though. When set on easy, you can finish it within 10 hours or less.

I think this game is worth buying. It is an excellent sequel to Final fantasy VII so ignore the bad comments and get right on it!!

Waste of time.

[leonx42-1 · 1/10 · 5 October 2006]

I haven't played the English version but back in February I imported the Japanese version and dame it was bad! I have no knowledge of the Japanese language but it didn't matter because the game-play was awful. It was like playing a basic retro 2D shooter in 3D. You run through each level, blasting down the same old enemy and collect key card's to unlock barrier's, which is pretty lame if you ask me.

I can't actually review the story but it looked bad anyway. And as a fan of Final Fantasy: VII this was a complete let down and receives no good complements from me.

If your a true fan of the series you will agree that they're time would have been better sent on developing a remake of the original or even an FFVII-2.

Avoid this game if your new to the series but if you really have to play it don't fork out a lot of cash for it! Trust me its not worth your time.

Very impressive.

[Galenator15 · 10/10 · 29 December 2006]

Being the first shooter game form Square Enix, I was expecting it to be a bit harsh or rough, but the gameplay, I was surprised to find, was quite easy and enjoyable.

The story was pretty good, adding to the epic FFVII storyline. I find that a lot of the voice actors performed very well(I also enjoyed how, for the first time in FF voice overs, they had British and Russian voice-overs), but some characters were a bit flat and had no character depth.

I only own a small amount of shooter games, and don't really favor them much, but DoC is truly a wonder. The gameplay truly is addicting and quite fun (The only drawback is that it doesn't have a lean function), I mean, everyone talks about how miraculous the Halo franchise is, but I'd choose this game over Halo any day.

This game was there to delve further into Vincent's story (his past and the present) one year after the events in Advent Children, and how the world is coping after Meteorfall.

Before I received the game, I heard a substantial amount of negative criticism, but now that I play it for the first time, I look at those critics in awe. The graphics are top notch. Fantastic during FMVs, and the normal graphics were considerably well done.

The sound was great. The gunshot sounds sounded like the real thing, along with the rest of the sound department. The music was performed by the Tokyo Philharmonic, and they made you feel, in every scene and area, exactly how you were supposed to, and Gackt's songs at the end really set the mood. I quite enjoyed them, and I've never listened to Gackt.

FPS and FF fans alike, I would whole-heartedly recommend this game.

What happened?

[pippin_evil_genius · 3/10 · 28 December 2006]

Over the years Final Fantasy has come out with a series of instant classics. The biggest one is known as Final Fantasy VII. Which was released nine years ago in 1997.

Well, one day Square Enix decided to release a sequel. NINE YEARS LATER! That's worse than the Star Wars sequels.

Dirge of Cerberus is a poorly done version of Devil May Cry. A version of Devil May Cry with crappy controls and a camera that will make you very, very mad. You'll spend more time fighting the camera instead of actually playing the game. But what playing? Gameplay is often interuppted to show you a pointless cut-scene of a character shooting a guy. Or a bridge breaking. But why? No one cares about these characters. Especially since Cloud is barely even in the story. Vincet doesn't make half as cool as a character as he did in the original Final Fantasy VII.

But not all is bad about this game. The game allows you customize your own gun adding it scopes, and accessories and such. That's pretty fun to play around with... and that's about it.

The graphics look great, I have to give Square credit for such great graphics, the opening cut scene is motion picture quality, and the characters make real facial expressions. But then again Square-Enix always has the best quality.

The story to the game is rather blah. It's about a underground army that has mutants and can make people disappear and put them in acid. The army is SO secret that only three people in the entire world knew about it, and didn't say a thing. It's gets pretty boring. However, the ending to the game is rather satisfying, and I can say many fans will be happy to see the conclusion in the Final Fantasy VII Trilogy... OR you could get very unsatisfied and want to shoot some one.

A rent would do before a buy, and people looking for a REAL Final Fantasy should play Final Fantasy XII, or X, or VII.

I'll give a solid six out of ten.

6/10

You're kidding, surely?

[Isakawa · 3/10 · 12 June 2007]

I absolutely and sincerely hope this is not the shape of things to come. I saw this played from beginning to end - twice - and dared not pick it up for myself. When I did, I can assure you I put it down again, sharply. Absolutely the worst kind of spin-off is one that does not draw on the original material to any level other than a superficial one, and this is about as superficial as they come. Set in Midgar and thereabouts - fine. Includes characters in a cameo form - okay. ... what? Is that it? Format is dreadful, voice-acting atrociously bad; I mean, does anyone actually finish a bloody sentence!!? Cringe-worthy from start to finish, with some pretty, mo-cap CGI FMV sequences thrown around.

Diabolical, SquareEnix. Fo'shame!

Wow. Just wow.

[harajuku_drugstore · 2/10 · 26 April 2006]

This game was ridiculous. I'm a huge fan of Final Fantasy VII, and I can't even tell you how disappointed I was in this game. Apparently, Square-Enix thinks that all they need in order to be successful anymore are good graphics. I suppose they're right, though, considering the amount of money they made on this game and Advent Children (which, admittedly, was halfway decent, but still nothing spectacular). I think that the graphics (both in-game and cinematic) were good overall (although I'm still wondering what in the hell was up with half of the characters' hair). The plot was lackluster at best. Prior to playing this game, I had been really excited to get more insight on Vincent's past, but most of the game ended up being a bunch of crap that felt like nothing more than filler material.

I was completely unable to get any sort of feel for the new characters, except for *maybe* to be slightly disturbed by Vice, and that was primarily due to his particular predicament and the person with whom he was...most closely associated. I don't know if she's any better a character in her minor role in Before Crisis, but Shalua Rui was, quite possibly, one of the flattest characters I've ever come across.

Character depth (or lack thereof) aside, the game was ridiculously easy. Even if you put the difficulty level on Hard, once you have a feel for the controls, you come across almost no challenges. If you want to mix things up, you can opt to not use the Auto-Scope (if you choose the Hard difficulty level, you start without Auto-Scope, but you can either pick it up or buy it shortly thereafter). Enemies typically do something like 50 HP worth of damage. You start off with at least five hundred HP. Every time you level up (which you do at the end of most - if not all - missions), your stats go up by a ridiculous amount. I think Rosso and Vice were the only remotely challenging enemies. A couple of the enemies - Nero, for example - are annoying, but present no real challenge. Even the last boss is ridiculously easy. Mind you, this is coming from someone who absolutely sucks at shooter games.

This game seriously got to the point that the only reason I was motivated to finish it at all was a) Reeve getting screen time, b) to see how many in-jokes my friends and I could get out of it, and c) to see Gackt (who is, indeed, in the game, albeit a secret character of sorts).

I guess if you're a hardcore fan of Final Fantasy VII or Vincent, feel free to pick it up, but don't waste the money on importing a copy of it; just wait until it comes out in the U.S. and is cheaper. In fact, just find it used somewhere.

A clunky and very mediocre "Devil May Cry" knock-off, "Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII" is a disappointing sequel/spin-offs with a few good aspects...

[TedStixonAKAMaximumMadness · 5/10 · 15 February 2012]

I will start this review by admitting that I have never finished "Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII", a long-awaited sequel/spin-off of what is arguably one of the greatest RPG's of all time. I bought it the day it was released in 2006, and I tried playing it, but it left a very sour, underwhelmed taste in my mouth... For such a legacy as "Final Fantasy VII" (a 1997 release for the Playstation) has, this game feels very rushed and full of incomplete ideas. I never felt motivated to finish it.

Let's break the game down to the basic categories...

Graphics/Visuals... 8 out of 10- The in-game, pre-rendered FMV video sequences are incredible. The videos are the same high quality as the CGI-animated feature "Advent Children", and are all gorgeous and remarkable to behold. And I will say, the in-game graphics aren't half bad. Character models, though stylized with "anime" inspiration, are cool-looking, and animation is tight and smooth. But the game looses a few points for repetitive visuals. Some of the levels feature areas that look identical to one-another (such as the opening level in Kalm town, where I kept getting lost due to very repetitive design), and some animations are kind of weak. But overall, a solid game visually.

Sound... 8 out of 10- I'm not going to lie, I missed Nobuo Uematsu's music in this game, which was scored by a different composer. But the music present is very decent, albeit unmemorable. Sounds are also all very good, and in general, the voice acting is all pretty darned good. (Particularly uber-voice-artist Steve Blum as our hero Vincent Valentine) However, some performances are kinda flat, and the pronunciation of certain words is debatable. (Although I suppose it comes down to personal interpretation, but everyone I knows pronounces "Maka" as "May-ko", whereas this game calls it "Mahh-Ko.") It's a very solid audio presentation, which suffers slightly due to a few sore thumbs and a forgettable score.

Controls... 3 out of 10. Here's where the game starts to fall apart. The controls are very mixed. Somehow, the control system feels simultaneously too simple while still being too complicated. They are also very loose, and the camera controls are clunky, clunky, CLUNKY. (You'll almost always going to accidentally move the camera in the OPPOSITE direction of where you want it, and even swapping it in the options doesn't help, as it's response is very sensitive.) The game is obviously taking inspiration from hack-and-slash games like "Devil May Cry" with it's action-oriented gun-play, but the controls aren't precise and are too "wonky" to make gameplay fun.

Story... 4 out of 10. My other huge problem- the story is very convoluted, and without knowing every exact detail of every facet of the "Final Fantasy VII" franchise, you will get lost. In addition, the game does a very poor job as establishing what is going on, and the overall intent of the story. It's very sloppily told, leaving you guessing way too often. And not in the good way of guessing what will happen next due to suspense, but in that bad way where you get totally lost and frustrated. I've played the first part of the game several times (each time giving up due to "meh" gameplay and bad controls), and I honestly can't tell you a single detail about what's going on. All I can gather from the sloppy plot is that Vincent is good, and the bad guys are... uh... bad. (?) Silly, simplistic-yet-convoluted plot.

Overall... 5 out of 10. This game gets a lot of sympathy points for the great visual and audio presentation and the built-in love for "Final Fantasy VII." But the gameplay sucks, and robs the game of a lot of the fun. I didn't even get into the other huge problem (lack of difficulty settings in the North American release, which makes the game near impossible with the clunky controls), which is also tedious.

I'd recommend this game only to huge fans of "Final Fantasy VII"- for others, it's too mediocre to really care about.