Since playing Final Fantasy X, I understood all the hype about the Final Fantasy series of games, before that I had no clue. I saw that Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus came out and since everyone I talked to loved the original Final Fantasy VII, I obviously had to try it. Since I was use to the RPG aspect of Final Fantasy, it was a bit of a surprise to see that this one was a shooter, but I was still willing to give it a try and so was my teenage son.

Story

This all takes place three years after Final Fantasy VII and you'll play Vincent Valentine, from what I understand, he was a mysterious character in the original Final Fantasy VII. The story will take you through the attack by the Deepground soldiers in Kalm to their nasty plan to wake up the Omega Weapon. As Vincent, you'll battle the Deepground soldiers and many other enemies and you'll also learn about Chaos, which is some kind of wild beast that Vincent can change into, and Vincents past.

If you're like me, never played the original, you'll be lost on a lot of the references to the original happenings, while this can be aggravating, the story can still be followed although there are times you'll just go "huh?"

Gameplay

This being a shooter, it was new to me, I haven't played many before, although I had watched my son play some. You'll go through a series of missions, get the "boss" at the end of the missions and then move on to the next one. Fairly simple, although there are times when you'll have to do some extra things, make certain kills or talk to certain people, to get a key card to get into an inaccessible area.

You'll have a variety of weapons to use from hand guns to machine guns, which you can customize with mods, which can affect the power of the weapon, range, firing power, etc. You can also use melee attacks, punching and kicking, although you don't want to do that around a big group of enemies. And finally, you have the limit break which you can change Vincent into a beast who has some very powerful attacks and he can also take more damage/shots before being killed when he is in this stage. Unfortunately, the limit break doesn't happen as often as I would like, but boy can he do a lot of damage when in this mode.

You'll have potions and other items, such as Phoenix Downs, you can find throughout the different missions to help you stay alive also. I've heard some say that this was an easy game for a shooter and you don't really have to worry too much about getting killed, but I have a different take on it since I was and still am, fairly new to shooters. Thank goodness for those Phoenix Downs, others may not have to use those too much, but I found myself using them a lot when I got further into the game.

The controls were pretty straight forward for using the weapons too, R2 to bring out your weapon or switch it and R1 to fire. If you have "materia" attached to the weapon, you use L1 to fire that, materia is a stronger attack that the regular weapon, but requires to find "Mako" to use it, which you can find throughout the game or use Either to fill the gauge. As with any Final Fantasy game, Vincent can gain experience and level up, so to speak, at the end of each mission, how well you do on the mission will decided your experience you actually get.

Graphics and Sound

The graphics were rather good in the game, I didn't notice any lags or slowdowns and they are on par with any of the Final Fantasy games for PS2. Everything seemed to flow smoothly during gameplay. Most of the areas you go through are dark, to give the intense and dark mood I guess and they do it quite nicely, although there were a few times, because of my TV, that I couldn't really see where I was suppose to go because it was so dark in the area.

The graphics in the cut scenes were fantastic, it looked like you were watching a movie, not a game. I do have to say that some of the cut scenes were long and there are quite a lot of them throughout the game, which from what I heard, is unusual for a shooter. I enjoyed watching the cut scenes and learning more about the story, but my son had a different take, he says they were too long, but this is typical of him, if he can, he will skip cut scenes in any game and miss out on part of the story.

Sound was fairly good in the game, I didn't notice anything that didn't fit, I usually don't really notice the background music unless it doesn't seem to fit. The voice acting in the cut scenes were done well also and they did a good job with fitting the voice and graphics where it didn't look off like I have noticed in other games.

Conclusion

I say if you're a fan of Final Fantasy and liked the original, you need to give this one a try. It's a fairly straight forward game and although I have heard some say that it was too easy of a shooter, I would still recommend it. For people looking for a two player mode, you'll be disappointed though, this is strictly a one player game, although there are different difficulty levels to choose from. My son has done the harder levels after beating it once, but I have to admit that I haven't tried the harder difficulty levels yet. The game doesn't have a lot of replay value unless you want to play at the more difficult levels or unlock all the extras (scene viewer, trailers, pictures, etc.).

For fans of shooters, this game is probably only worth a rent if that, I keep hearing from others that it's too generic and easy from hard-core shooter fans, but if you're a fan of Final Fantasy VII or any Final Fantasy, I say it's worth it to pick it up to add to your collection.