Dirge of Cerberus locks, loads, but forgets to remove the safety.

A little less than ten years ago, there was a little game released on the PSone that you may have heard of called Final Fantasy VII. The game quickly gained an immense following because of its unique and engaging story, its now legendary cast of characters, and excellent gameplay. Not blind to the enormous popularity of FF7, Square-Enix decided to develop several spin-offs that would continue the story of FF7 as well as develop characters that never really got their chance to shine in the original game.

Which brings us to Dirge of Cerberus. As one of the aforementioned spin-offs of FF7, Dirge of Cerberus is a third person shooter that puts us into the shoes of the enigmatic Vincent Valentine who was actually a secret and completely optional character in FF7.

The story of Dirge of Cerberus picks up three years after the events of FF7. We catch up with Vincent as he is reminiscing in the town of Kalm during a festival. All of a sudden the town is attacked by several airships that drop containers full of soldiers and monsters that massacre the towns folk. Never one to sit idly by while innocent people get slaughtered, Vincent dons his Cerberus pistol and leaps into action.



What follows is a fairly interesting tale that weaves together Vincent’s past, his relationship with Lucrecia, and a plot to revive Omega, the ultimate weapon (That’s right, even bigger and badder than Emerald and Ruby.) While this is for the most part a standalone game, if you haven’t played FF7 you are not going to get the full experience of some of the plot twists, character cameos, and nostalgia moments while playing Dirge of Cerberus.

Fortunately, the story is also aided by well directed cutscenes that utilize the game’s in game engine and show off DoC’s excellent character models. While these cutscenes never really reach Devil May Cry 3 levels of coolness, there are some very entertaining action sequences, especially towards the end of the game that are sure to keep you interested when you are not actually playing the game. Of course, this is Square-Enix we’re talking about, so along with the in game cutscenes, there are the usual jaw dropping pre-rendered cutscenes that mirror the visuals seen in the movie Final Fantasy 7: Advent Children. It’s just a shame that these pre-rendered cutscenes only pop up a few times throughout the entire game.



Another thing that people come to expect from a game with Final Fantasy in the title is great sound and music. For the most part, Dirge of Cerberus doesn’t disappoint in this aspect. The music is all orchestral and at some points even feels epic, but there isn’t anything memorable like there usually is in a Final Fantasy game. Voice acting is excellent throughout the entire cast with all of the cast from Advent Children returning to reprise their roles.