Printable View
I haven't played FFVII:DoC yet, but I haven't heard much that makes me want to play it. Of this general loathing for the game, the only specific complaint I've heard is that it's too short. Mostly I hear generalizations like "This game sucks".
Why is this game hated on so much? What makes it such a bad game and is there anyway to get around those things that people can't stand when playing?
People hate this game because they dont think of it as a game, they think of it as a sequel. Think of it as a game and not a sequel and you should like it fairly well...
The biggest drawback to DoC is the gameplay. It's ok, but there also some glaringly huge flaws or omissions that make it much harder to get into and enjoy. Here are a few:
AI: the enemy artificial intelligence is horrid. Deepground seem to have two strategies: (1) stand still and shoot, or (2) chaaarge while shooting. Yet despite their brainlessness, they're still incredibly good shots. You'd think that Vincent's uber jumping prowess would let him dodge a bullet or two... nope. If you leap onto the scene, every enemy in the vicinity can immediately fix you with a perfect aim. There's simply no reasonable way to play this game without getting hit an awful lot. Even the old strategy of "duck behind cover and pop up to take a shot" is useless. As soon as you're visible, you're hit.
Vincent's acrobatics: Advent Children confirmed what the original game suggested: Vincent's strong, light, and limber, able to leap great distances and swoosh around at great speed. Not in DoC, though. In the cutscenes he does all kind of crazy :skull::skull::skull::skull:, like leaping to the top of the Kalm church's spire then somersaulting over a helicopter to shoot out its engine. If he could actually do that in normal gameplay it'd be great, but he can't. He's limited to a vertical leap of about 12 feet, or maybe 20 if you use double-jump. He can't grab onto ledges or railings, or wall-jump, or perch on small structures - except in cutscenes. He climbs ladders as though he's suffering mild arthritis in his legs and arms. Basically, the controls should have felt fluid, athletic, and supernatural - but instead, it feels like a copy/paste of generic third-person action controls with a few tweaks that are meant to suggest you're playing as Vincent instead of Generic McActionstar.
Character involvement: Vincent's always fighting by himself, except for a few times when he's assisted by generic WRO soldiers. There are two levels where Cait Sith's playable, but that's little more than a mini-game. Considering that all the FFVII cast join the fight in DoC, it should be possible to fight alongside them. It'd be highly cool to charge into Deepground's stronghold with Cloud and the others at your side... especially if it was possible to divide the team into parties of two or three to do each of the essential tasks at the game's end. Having to team up with the original heroes, and make use of their unique talents, would've been a great extra feature. Red XIII's on the back cover of the PAL edition of the game, (SPOILER) but he only appears once in the game - in the final FMV, where he yawns. That's it for him.
Now, I've said quite a bit here - don't get me wrong, I like DoC well enough. But it wasn't given nearly enough time. If it'd had another year or so in development, they could've done it properly, a well-polished masterpiece with all the detail, fluidity, and heroism you might expect from a Final Fantasy title. As it is, though, it given too little development, and rushed out with clunky controls, unrefined gameplay, and a butt-ton of wasted potential.
It lacks solid control, a variety of enemies, a variety of gameplay, destructable backgrounds, decent challenge, or anything that makes a shooter good. The story is okay, I guess, if that's all you want to play it for. Personally, I found it didn't add anything interesting enough to warrant it's existence. As for length, it's a shooter, and as a shooter it's long enough. Although the lack of variety makes it almost feel too long.
It's a bit too "standard". There's nothing about it that's particular great. Not the story, the gameplay, nothing. The only thing you could say that is good are the graphics, but compared to the latest consoles of this generation they lose out somewhat.