My Re-Evaluation of Dirge of Cerberus

[Forsaken Lover]

So earlier this month I bought a game.

The name of that game is Dirge of Cerberus.

Now I had watched all the cutscenes on YT a couple years ago and I even made a thread on here bitching about it. I was very disappointed after all. However now I actually played the game I wanted to share my new thoughts.

It was actually pretty fun. Not great mind you but I liked the gun combat. Melee was crap but luckily you rarely used that. Invisible Walls are annoying until you realize double jump is just there for style and you never use it.

The environments were also pretty neat. They just had some nice atmosphere I guess. That was helped a lot by the music of course. Hamauzu or whatever did not dazzle me with FFXIII but he provided some excellent pieces for this game. (more on that later)

The story was...passable. At least until you get to the end bits with Hojo. That was just retarded and everything after it was pretty dumb too.

I know the Online mode in Japan gave more character to Deepground but just going off the game I actually played, Weiss never really had a character. That is one of the single greatest failings of the game's story in my opinion. Weiss is hyped to all hell. Every member of Deepground is going "Hail, Weiss!" and the Tsviets wank him off anymore. You're really interested to see the guy that these hundreds of mooks were willing to die for.

Only you don't. It's Hojo in a Weiss suit. You never get to know the Weiss that everyone went on and on about. It's very disappointing.

On the other hand, if I may give this game more credit than it deserves, that's also kinda interesting. It makes all those Deepground soldiers and the Tsviets rather sympathetic. They did all this for someone they revered but they were all just pawns in the end. They died for nothing.

Now the other characters in the game didn't exactly wow me. Vincent was alright but the only really good character was Shelke. She had some nice development.

Sadly Lucrecia was so terrible that she alone almost sunk the game for me. Even if this game was absolutely perfect - which it most definitely is not - her presence would drag it down to barely above average territory. I just don't know how you fail so cosmically in making a character sympathetic. Lucrecia is right up there with all teh villains in terms of despicableness. Maybe that's not a word but she deserves her own word because that's that goddam awful.

Now, for some of the pretty sweet music in the game:
Dirge of Cerberus - Counteroffensive [HQ] - YouTube
Dirge of Cerberus - Silent Edge [HQ] - YouTube
Dirge of Cerberus - WRO March [HQ] - YouTube
Dirge of Cerberus - The Immaculate [HQ] - YouTube

The English dubbing was decent enough. Loved Kari Wahlgren as Shelke and Blum was nice as Vinny-Mac. Mary-Elizabeth McGlynn gave a horrible accent to Rosso but hey, it was still sexy.

Overall I think DOC had a lot of potential that it squandered. Even still..I enjoyed it. It's probably not a good game though.

So those are my thoughts. What are yours?

[Quindiana Jones]

I liked playing with the guns.

[ReloadPsi]

I think there's a reason why they made it easy to call the game "Derp of Herperus" and still be understood.

[Mercen-X]

Hojo's control over Weiss disappeared before your first fight against Uber Weiss. He may not have been actively in charge for much of the game, but his intentions were still f'd and he was still a Seph-class a-hole. That's basically the one problem. He's just another Sephy clone.

[Spawn of Sephiroth]

I didn't think it was a great game by any means, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

[Jiro]

It was a fun little romp.

[krissy]

i remember nothing about dirge that was above average

the gun set-up was like
you had 9 final choices or something
how interactive!

the environments were crap tunnels, and i think this was the first time se realized they could get away with this and people would still buy stuff. if you're gonna make a shooter on rails, do it like killer 7 did it.

i did like when yuffie faceplanted herself though

[ShinGundam]

i remember nothing about dirge that was above average

the gun set-up was like
you had 9 final choices or something
how interactive!

the environments were crap tunnels, and i think this was the first time se realized they could get away with this and people would still buy stuff. if you're gonna make a shooter on rails, do it like killer 7 did it.

i did like when yuffie faceplanted herself though

That is far more interactive than most of TPSs that i played on PS3.

[Mercen-X]

What is? You quoted a lot there.

[krissy]

i think it was the 9 choice gun set-up thing
and i mean fair enough
but those games probably have better level design to keep things interesting
and just because there's worse games out there doesn't mean dirge gets a pass

[Sephex]

My favorite part is when the bullet came out of the gun and hit the bad guy.

[Mercen-X]

You just named my favorite part of every action film.



.

just because there's worse games out there doesn't mean dirge gets a pass

it does

[ShinGundam]

i think it was the 9 choice gun set-up thing
and i mean fair enough
but those games probably have better level design to keep things interesting
and just because there's worse games out there doesn't mean dirge gets a pass

I think what you want is better combat scenarios not level design, i mean what do you expect from a JRPG developer when it comes to levels for a shooter ?
And yes, DoC is interactive compared to where TPSs going now which is collection of context sensitive elements (Melee, cover, finishing kills, etc...).

[krissy]

maybe both better combat scenarios and better level design... there's just no memorable areas that stand out for me. i think i remember a large desert circle map, and the reason for my memory of it was because it was the only really 'open' area of the game in my head... i know ff13 had the same issues, but i felt the pacing/themes in the two games were different enough so that in one it's ok, whereas in the other...i couldn't get into it.

i have a legit question about the game working into ff7:

after the plate came down in ff7, didn't the train graveyard also get crushed? or was it a part of sector 6? i always thought it was part of sector 7, and yet there it was as a stage in dirge.

it does

i actually had a few moments of fun playing it, but they got overshadowed. it has aspirations and it just doesn't meet its promises for me. i looked at a review of it i did back in 2008 and at the very end i finish the review with

but overall i'm having a bit more fun than i thought i would be. "

it's funny because in that one i actually said the gun customization is neat.

[Mercen-X]

I'm pretty sure Train Graveyard had a two-sector stretch.