Kupo Chronicle #26 - Crunch of Cerberus

Chaos!

Welcome to the Kupo Chronicle, the premium edition of the Wark Digest newsletter, where we explore the Final Fantasy universe in long-form and drill down into unique moments of the series’ history. I’m Chris, aka Hoogathy, and in this installment we delve into the unique development of Dirge of Cerberus, an unexpected and ambitious sequel turned black sheep.

This week’s newsletter is 2698 words, a 13-minute read.

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Back in the mid-aughts, the only thing FFVII fans wanted more than a PS2 remake or a mod to save a certain character’s life was a proper sequel. Advent Children scratched an itch for some, but left others wanting a playable sequel. Many fans also wanted more of the secret-character-turned-fan-favourite, Vincent Valentine. Thus, Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII should have been a gift from the gaming gods, then, as a playable sequel starring the moody gunslinger.

Yet, the PS2 follow-up, which just turned 19 last week, has gone down in history as one of the more maligned entries in the series, or forgotten/overlooked by vast swaths of the fandom. Where exactly did Vincent’s solo mission go astray?

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Training A New Guard

The pedigree behind Dirge of Cerberus’ development team is interesting in itself, and on paper it had a fresh new energy.

At its helm as director was Takayoshi Nakazato, whose name admittedly isn’t dropped too often in FF discourse. His first games were a pair of Street Fighter II-esque Dragon Ball Z arcade games published by Banpresto in 1993-94—where he was credited with game design, directing, and some graphical work (literally “Background Digitize” in the first game’s credit roll)—and one of the first adaptations of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventures, as a game designer. He then joined Squaresoft to work on Final Fantasy VII as a planner.