So with the Final Fantasy VII Remake now out and everybody forming their opinions on it (which are overwhelmingly good), I thought it’d be fun to look back at a Final Fantasy title that was very much a part of the world of VII, but got a mixed reaction from fans. Critics didn’t really like it either, but then what a gaming journo has to say along with $3 will get you a cup of coffee, so I don’t really pay too much attention to them.

The magical year was 2006. Facebook had become open to 13 year olds, which we all know makes EVERYTHING better. Some of the biggest movies were Casino Royale, Da Vinci Code, that dumpster fire that was X-Men: The Last Stand, and some of the big songs were the awful Bad Day song, the even more awful You’re Beautiful song, and Rihanna’s still catchy “SOS”. My football knowledge is embarassingly minimal but the interwebs says that the Steelers won the super bowl that year. And even back then I was still bald, because life hates me.

Now Final Fantasy VII’s original release was back in 1997. When the game finishes and the credits are done rolling, there’s a lot of questions still unanswered. Who made it out of Meteorfall alive other than Red XIII? Were there any other adventures for the gang to go on? Did Barrett’s gun-arm double as a salad shooter or food processor after they all went back home? Things that fans wanted to know. Ambiguous endings can be fun, but as you may already know, Final Fantasy VII was a huge deal back when it released. Most Final Fantasy titles were self-contained and didn’t get sequels. VII was popular enough that fans wanted more, especially after that long of a journey.

So fast forward to 2005, when we finally got some closure in the form of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, a CGI sequel that takes place 3 years after the events of VII and gave us another adventure featuring Cloud and the gang. It was still mostly Cloud’s story, but it helped us get caught up with everybody since then and also treated us to much-needed closure. Personally, I really liked it and it remains in my dvd collection with such gems as Ninja Scroll, the Beastie Boys Video Anthology, and Golden Boy. 1 year later, Dirge of Cerberus released, a shooter and RPG combo that starred Vincent Valentine, one of the optional characters in VII. It was a type of game that was a bit of a surprise since we all knew Squaresoft, Square Enix, whatever era you’re referring to, as mostly just doing RPGs. I bought my copy at launch, and almost 15 years later decided to play through it again and see how it’s aged and personally, I think it’s got some wrinkles but can still be a fun time and deserves another look by those who might’ve written it off way back when.

A quick synopsis of the story is that 1 year after the events of Advent Children, a military group called Deepground emerges with the goal of summoning the final weapon, Omega, that’ll basically wipeout humanity. Vincent joins forces with a group called the World Regensis Organization, or WRO, to help stop them. Among the major WRO members is former Turk Reeve, who’s also the pilot of Cait Sith, and Yuffie, quirky ninja girl who battles in shorts that don’t leave much to the imagination. But really the whole group is here, even if they don’t play a huge role. You also get to learn more about Vincent’s past, which has its interesting points. He’s a little bit of a Debbie Downer but he’s still a character you can root for, which makes up for it. The cutscenes are typical Square awesomeness and it’ll bring a smile to your face to see everybody fighting together again, because at this point it wasn’t gonna happen again for like 15 years.

The villains are honestly kinda meh, and they look like the same interchangeable bad guys you’d see in Kingdom Hearts titles or other Final Fantasy games, especially during that era of Square. And they all have that weird pointy-swoop hair thing going on like Seymour from Final Fantasy X. Their motive is obviously world-ending which means you’re headed for some pretty huge boss battles toward the end of the game. Leading up to that though, I kinda thought they were dull and you’re mostly just killing tons of soldiers and tanks and stuff.

It’s mostly a simple action game. You’ll hit R1 to draw your gun Cerberus, point, shoot, dodge, and jump. You also have some limited materia at your disposal, that when equipped fires off magic. Think of it as the difference between normal shots and missiles in Metroid.

It’s mostly a simple action game. You’ll hit R1 to draw your gun Cerberus, point, shoot, dodge, and jump. You also have some limited materia at your disposal, that when equipped fires off magic. Think of it as the difference between normal shots and missiles in Metroid. You gain experience throughout each level but a fun twist is that if you die or complete the level, you have the option of applying that xp to your level gains, or you can convert it to money and upgrade your gear. If you feel confident enough in your stats that you’d rather upgrade your gun barrel or handle or whatever, then you can do that. Or if you find you’re just running low on money to buy supplies, you can do that too. You can customize your gun to cover 3 different loadouts as well that you can switch to on the fly. It’s really cool to be able to switch between different types of guns, but they’re all just modified versions of Cerberus, because they feel totally different from one another.

You’ve also got a melee attack that hits hard but doesn’t look like anything special, and you can also change into Vincent’s beast form for extra firepower. Oddly enough this happens by popping an item and not just building up some sort of rage meter or limit gauge like in most modern games. But still, he’s got a decent arsenal to work with.

In the graphics department, it’s a PS2 game that was released towards the last half of the console’s life. So while the graphics aren’t bad, they didn’t age as well as some titles did, either. As I said earlier the cutscenes look great, even if the colors appear a little washed out. The character models look pretty good and anything is better than the popeye limbs everybody had in the original game, but I think my biggest issue is with just how bland the environments are. I don’t even think it’s the textures nearly as much as there just isn’t a ton of variety in what you’re running through. The fact that the PS2’s processing power didn’t allow for a lot of enemies or characters on screen didn’t help things either, which wasn’t surprising but still kind of a bummer because the levels can feel kinda lifeless. Then there’s things like draw distance not being great, stuff like that.

The music was fine but nothing noteworthy other than the music in the cutscenes.

So the game had it’s blemishes, but I enjoyed playing it again and thought it was worth talking about because I do think it belongs in any Final Fantasy VII fan’s collection. The customization and simple but fun gunplay mechanics are easy to pick up and mess around with, and it’s a game you can probably knock out in a weekend. Also at the time of this video, I found out that there’s a new Trademark for Dirge of Cerberus that likely means it’s getting remastered, and because I can talk myself into buying the same game multiple times, I’m excited to see what they touch up and improve in an HD remaster. I suggest that if you don’t feel like getting a PS2 copy, give what I’m assuming to be a remaster a shot and I think you’ll have some fun with it.

That’s another one from my vault of games. If you enjoy my walks down memory lane or my reviews of newer titles, be sure to subscribe to the channel on Youtube after checking out the video –  I’ve got a lot more to feature.