At the beginning of 2019 I went to Disneyland with my family. I couldn’t go on many of the rides but I still enjoyed the charm and the level of detail that went into each of the attractions and various little stalls and buildings and the like. On the heels of this visit, I thought it would be the perfect time to purchase Kingdom Hearts, the Disney and Final Fantasy crossover Role playing game series on the PS2, various handheld consoles and PS4. The third game came out in January of 2019 and I wanted to play through the series in order to experience it. Going through it for the first time was a super charming, enriching and fun experience. Like any good playthrough of a series, it exemplified everything I love about video games. At first glance, I thought the plot to be too convoluted and the story too overbearing. I knew, or thought I knew, about all of the spin offs and wanted to avoid them. But I was curious, following my visit to Disney. Was it worth the inevitable confusion about the plot to get invested? Let’s find out!

Kingdom Hearts is perhaps the best example of the ultimate elevator pitch. The story goes that two Square Enix employees were talking about making a game similar to Mario 64, with all of that title’s freedom of movement. They lamented that only Disney characters could approach Mario’s popularity. Tetsuyo Nomura, the series’ director since its inception and previously the art director for the Final Fantasy series, overheard this and asked if he could direct the game. The employees agreed. Later, Nomura bumped into a Disney executive in an elevator (as both Disney and Square Enix worked in the same building in Japan at the time)  and pitched the idea. The Disney exec obviously loved the idea and work began, with the game being released in North America on November 17th, 2002. I was 3 years of age at the time of its release. 

Fast forward 17 years. I was not a big fan of these Japanese role-playing games when I started, particularly because of their complex stories and gameplay, because most are turn-based. And therein lies the formula for success for Kingdom Hearts. It is an action RPG, allowing fast, free-flowing and flashy combat, with enough complexity to offer a stiff challenge. The story concerns Sora (voiced by Haley Joel Osment, of Sixth Sense fame) and his friends Riku and Kairi, voiced by David Gallagher and Hayden Panatierre respectively. The trio yearn for adventure and to explore new worlds. But their home island is invaded by the Heartless, creatures whose sole objective is to steal characters’ hearts (or souls, if you’d like). The island is quickly swallowed up and Sora is transported to a new and strange world, where he meets our other characters.

Mickey Mouse is basically the most powerful being in this universe, and king of his own domain. One day, the king goes missing (actually he’s off fighting Heartless), and Donald Duck, the court wizard, goes to his rooms to find no trace of the king, save for a letter instructing him to find whoever has the “key” and to take Goofy (captain of King Mickey’s royal guard) with him and team up to destroy the Heartless. The “key” turns out to be the Keyblade, a weapon of immense power that Sora wields to destroy the Heartless from the time that they invaded his homeworld. Sora is found by Donald and Goofy in Traverse Town, which serves as the hub world and one that you revisit frequently in the first game. Together, they must travel to the other Disney themed worlds and stop the Heartless and their masters (various Disney villains whom you fight in each world as bosses) for good, all the while working to rescue Riku and Kairi.  It’s a pretty simple premise, and one that leaves room for the other Disney worlds to take center stage. And they do that splendidly!  From the very first world to the very last, this game just oozes charm and personality. I think the voice acting does a lot to add to that charm, with most of the original Disney voice actors reprising their roles. I say “most” because there are some (like Dan Castellanetta filling in for Robin Williams as the Genie from Aladdin, as Williams and Disney had long standing disagreements, and Sean Astin providing the voice of Hercules) that deviate from the originals, but that doesn’t take away from the charm at all. The original characters though, hoo boy. I get that it was 2002 and Sora has plenty of moments of good voice acting, but Riku sounds so flat and bland that it’s hard to believe that he’s a menacing villain. He, and most of the others,  would vastly improve in later games like Re:Chain of Memories and KH 2 but we’ll get to those in a bit. The gameplay is difficult at first but after the first world you start to ease into the flow of things, as there are a lot of things to take into account and keep track of. Throughout the game, Donald and Goofy serve as members of your party, and you can buy equipment to bolster their strengths and improve their weaknesses. Donald is a wizard, so he starts out with more magic (called MP in the game) that he uses to cast spells like Thunder, Fire, Blizzard and Cure. Goofy focuses more on actual attacks, and starts out with more health. Until about a third of the way in, Donald is basically useless and he doesn’t really help things, but once you get Cure, the healing spell, he becomes way more dependable. I usually healed the group starting with Donald first, then he would heal Goofy when I’d be busy in combat. The other two party members are all well and good, but sometimes they can be swapped out for a world specific character (Aladdin when you go to Agrabah, Jack Skellington when you go to Halloween Town, etc.). Each have their own strengths and weaknesses, but they’re usually a couple levels higher than your highest leveled party member. Nowhere is that more evident when you head to Hollow Bastion, the game’s penultimate world, and meet up with the Beast, who has so much health that you basically have to have him do everything, as your Keyblade gets swiped from you at the very beginning of the world. Before I get to the end of this review let’s pause and take a look at my favorite and least favorite worlds from this game. I’d say my favorite world is either Deep Jungle, where you meet Tarzan, Olympus Coliseum, where you hang out with Hercules, or the Hundred Acre Wood, because of the creativity behind it. To progress in this world, you have to find pages out of Winnie the Pooh’s book that are missing, to reunite him with his friends. This leads to a rather depressing initial cutscene in which Pooh is sitting on a log, wondering how to say goodbye to himself because all of his friends have said goodbye to him. But eventually, because it’s Disney, you get all of his friends back. But I didn’t because I just wanted to get through the game, but on my next play through I did end up completing it. My least favorite world would have to be Atlantica. I haven’t seen The Little Mermaid but I know enough about it, like the fact that it’s a musical, and that’s pretty much it. It’s charming how Sora and company get turned into sea creatures, but the swimming mechanics and underwater combat are so awkward and hard to control. That wouldn’t be too bad if the boss you had to fight wasn’t the biggest difficulty spike in the entire game. Giant Ursula (so named after she took King Triton’s trident and used its power for herself, turning her into a giant) has attacks that are extremely difficult to avoid, do a ton of damage and, did I mention, YOU’RE SWIMMING? It took me at least 20 tries to defeat her, initially. You have to get behind her head so that you may not get hit by those attacks. On subsequent run throughs, an aggressive offensive strategy is key if you wanted to keep deaths low. Just keep hacking away and it’s pretty easy. After that happens, you get a break from difficult bosses for a while until you’re faced with Hollow Bastion and The End of the World! There are plenty of fun bosses, like possessed Riku, who is possessed by our main antagonist Ansem, who is the final boss. You fight Riku like a true duel, where you wait for an opening and attack and try not to leave yourself open for him to do the same. It’s quite fun and every piece of damage you take is manageable. Those are usually my favorite fights in the series but you don’t get them very often, at least in the first game, it gets better with those fights later on, especially in the third game. The second hardest fight is Maleficent, who takes two forms. Her first form isn’t that difficult to deal with, just dodge her projectiles, close the distance and just tee off with the keyblade, then rinse and repeat. The second form is a little bit more difficult because she’s a dragon. Her attacks do a ton of damage to the whole party and taking her head on isn’t advised. So I did what any sane person would do: I hung back on a branch in the arena where you fight her, with Tinker Bell at my side. Tinker Bell appears in this game as a Summon, a side character, not part of the main party, who you can call upon to aid you in battle. Tink just happens to give you continuous healing benefits. So I hung out, and hit Maleficent with fire and other magic on the branch and then came off of my perch to hit her with my keyblade. This strategy worked pretty well and after a while she was felled. The hardest boss though, at least on my initial run, was Chernabog! Let’s talk about Chernabog for a minute.

Chernabog is from Fantasia, and the sequence in which he appears is the final one in the film. Also it’s a little terrifying. But, like with Ursula, you’re not moving on your feet whilst fighting him, you’re flying, something you learn from Peter Pan after beating Captain Hook in Neverland. Same with Ursula, you’re supposed to smack him in the back of the head when he calms down with the fire attacks he uses. I didn’t have Curaga, the final upgrade of your cure spell, so it was NOT fun. The fight was accentuated by Mussorgsky’s Night on Bald Mountain, basically lifted from the film itself. It really gives kind of a scary vibe to the fight and it’s awesome for atmosphere! I finally did it somehow, even after failing when there was a single square of ground, summoning Tink and healing. I died even with her assistance. But I did it and then moved on to Ansem. Ansem has about 4 forms. There’s his first form, sort of like Riku, a fencing match. Then there’s a form of Darkside, the boss you fight at the very beginning, which is easy enough by this point if you leveled up enough. Then there’s a second Ansem fight, a little bit tougher but if you have Curaga you’ll be fine. The third Ansem fight is...something. His body turns into this mass of darkness replete with cannons (in reference to the final fight against Sephiroth from Final Fantasy 7) but you have Donald and Goofy by your side so you should be fine. After that, you’re done! It was pretty hard but a very rewarding experience. I realized about halfway through that yup, this is a journey I’d want to continue. The level of detail and love and care put into this so that the worlds are depicted as faithfully as possible. Also I care about these characters and I want to see their journey pay off and their adventures be fraught with success. I immediately continued with Kingdom Hearts 2 after a brief break. This was where the story gets really complicated! But before we get to that, a little reflection.

I think the main reason I like Kingdom Hearts as a series so much is that it’s both fun and charming, and the first game is no different. The soundtrack is fantastic, and Dearly Beloved is probably my favorite piece in the game. It offers a sense of slack-jawed wonderment and awe that happens when you look back at your journey. I know when I beat it I definitely did some of that reflecting on the menu for a minute. Because it was an adventure. Not since Wind Waker have I played a game that fully exemplifies that spirit of going on an epic quest to far off destinations. Sure the plot isn’t too deep, at least not yet, the voice acting is so melodramatic that it’s kind of funny, at least on the non Disney side of things. But in spite of all that, I think it works and it’s awesome. I am in no position to criticize the plot of this game anyway because I like Metal Gear and those plots are a mess and that voice acting is melodramatic as well. It was a nice change of pace after the emotionally draining slog that was Red Dead Redemption 2. It was exactly the game I needed, after my experience at Disney to recapture the magic and glee and fun that Disney has brought me throughout my life. But little did I know that we were just getting started!

Kingdom Hearts 2 starts a little slow. Instead of playing as Sora and picking up where you left off from the first game, you play as Roxas, a young teenager with a week left on his summer vacation. Like any teenager, he spends his summer days hanging out with his friends. Also like most students, they wait until a week before their summer project is due to start it! The game starts out with Roxas exploring Twilight Town, as strange things are happening around him. A strange man claiming to be an old friend shows up but Roxas doesn’t recognize him. This turns out to be Axel and he is a Nobody, and a member of the shadowy and mysterious Organization 13. But in order to fully understand why you play as Roxas, we need to talk about Rechain of Memories.

Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories released for the Game Boy Advance in 2004. It serves as a bridge between Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2, and the plot is integral to understanding the plot of Kingdom Hearts 2. In 2008, the remade version was released for the PS2, featuring fully 3D graphics similar to the first game, as well as newly recorded voice acting by the original voice actors. However, it was only released in Japan as part of the Final Mix of Kingdom Hearts 2. It was finally brought over to America as part of Kingdom Hearts 1.5 HD remix, released in 2012. The story picks up literally where the first game left off, with Sora, Donald and Goofy running off to find Riku and King Mickey. They come upon Castle Oblivion, and upon entering, they find that they’ve lost all of their powers, and abilities. And as they go deeper into the castle, they find they’re losing their memories as well. They have to contend with some new foes, Organization 13, a group of people known as Nobodies, or the husks of people after they’ve lost their hearts, in addition to the Heartless also created. But then how can they have any sort of personality if they’re basically human but not technically? This plot is really heavy and confusing and yet I really like it. But anyway Sora and the group must figure out how to get their memories back and defeat the members of Organization 13 before it’s too late.

I didn’t like this game. I know, shocking! I love Kingdom Hearts, and I love the second game. But I don’t like this one. Why? The gameplay. Instead of the Hack and Slash, nicely flowing combat of the first two games, we have a card system. Different cards have different numbers, and they represent attacks, magic, or summons. If you play a card, that card must be a higher number than the card your opponent plays, in order for your card to deal damage. But you and your opponent can break those with 0 cards because 0 cards are basically wild. I didn’t like it because it’s way too much for me to manage, you have to individually shuffle between cards using the controller’s shoulder triggers, all the while moving and dodge rolling out of harm’s way. And then you have to hold down the attack button to reload your deck when you run out. The more you reload, the longer you have to hold the attack button. It’s too much to manage for me, and so I played on beginner mode and quit after I beat the first boss, and watched all the important cutscenes on YouTube. The story was pretty good, the gameplay just hinders it. If it was remade in the turn based style of Final Fantasy on the PS1, or if it kept the 2D perspective and updated the graphics, it would be fine but for me personally it’s not very good. At least compared to our next title. Maybe later on I’ll pick up a Game Boy Advance and a copy of the game and give it a shot? But a quick summary of the plot. Sora defeats the Organization’s members, which include a replica of the possessed version of Riku, for now and is sealed in a pod in Twilight Town, the game’s ending world, while the trio’s memories are recovered by DiZ, a heavily bandaged man with a mysterious identity, and Naminè, the Nobody of Kairi who’s the master behind this whole plot. Now, let’s pick up where we left off.

Roxas doesn’t recognize Axel and proceeds to an old mansion of Twilight Town legend. In that mansion he finds a white room on the top floor, with a mysterious girl named Namine. In the basement of the mansion he finds a room with a bunch of computers. After being guided by the booming epic bass voice of Sir Christopher Lee, he finds himself in the basement, fights and beats Axel while dual wielding keyblades, and accepts his fate as an integral part of Sora as the title finally pops up. 

What you’re all here for is Sora, Donald and Goofy. I have to level with you all, this prologue was incredibly tedious. I mean yeah, it was fun to try out the new and improved combat, but I found that each time the day number popped up on the screen, like Days 1-6, I let out an audible groan. I texted my friend Nathan, I said, “how long do I have to stay with these people?” Forever, he replied. It certainly felt like it. So they continue their journey, as every sequel should. They visit old worlds, visit new ones, and generally have a good time along the way, battling Maleficent and Pete, as well as the sinister new Organization 13, as they attempt to find Riku and King Mickey once again. New to this game are Drive Forms, forms that Sora can go into once his Drive Gauge is powered up, by defeating enemies or collecting orbs from defeated ones. Valor Form emphasizes strength, and gives your combat abilities a boost. Wisdom Form emphasizes magic, and turns your keyblade into a gun-type weapon, shooting beams of energy. Master Form, an amalgamation of both Wisdom and Valor Forms. Limit form emphasizes your abilities from the first game, transforming the magic menu into the limit menu where you can unleash reaction commands from the first game, like Sonic Blade (called Sonic Rave in this game), Strike Raid (where you throw the keyblade towards the enemy) and Last Arcanum (called Ars Arcanum in the last game) where you unleash a combo move with your keyblade. There’s also Infinity, which I didn’t use all too often but it wasn’t very powerful anyway. The final two forms are Final Form and Anti Form. Final Form basically makes you all powerful and your spells are powered up as well. It’s very useful for getting to level 99 quickly (which I was able to do fairly quickly, in under 2 hours. More on that later!). The last form is anti form. This is basically a punishment for using Drive forms too much. You can’t use magic, use reaction commands or dodge. You can only attack and wait for the meter to run out. It sucks, especially against harder bosses! But it’s not too bad. Onto the worlds then! Which was my favorite, and least favorite?

Choosing a favorite world in Kingdom Hearts 2 was difficult. It's hard to pick just one but I’m going to say it’s Port Royal, the Pirates of The Caribbean world. Not only do you fight pirates who are neither dead nor alive, not only do you have to fend off Heartless from your ship, your party member in this world is Jack Freaking Sparrow himself (sadly not in this game is Johnny Depp, but the sound alike is good enough I suppose). My least favorite world would have to be Atlantica...again. This is because the world has been completely overhauled. The good thing about that is they fixed  the swimming mechanic, which is now controlled with the left and right sticks. Left controls movement and right allows you to swim up or down, which is nice! What’s not nice, however, is literally EVERYTHING ELSE!!! Because The Little Mermaid is a musical, the developers apparently decided to make this world musical-themed. That’s right, you’re playing rhythm games with Ariel and friends. And I hate it. Because it’s not even rhythm based. If it was a Guitar Hero, Dance Dance Revolution style game, that’d actually be kind of fun! But did they do that? No they did not! The setup was there, improved combat, improved swimming, improved magic implementation...and they squandered it! It barely qualifies as rhythm, you just press one button at the right time. That’s it! That’s a quick-time event! And there’s only slight variations throughout the entire game. Every once in a while, you press triangle instead of X, or you wait for Ariel’s face to pop up instead of Sebastian’s or you rapidly tap X. A lot of people hated this, and it’s clear that Square learned from their misstep, as the rhythm game in Birth By Sleep is at least marginally more fun and actually is sort of a rhythm based game. Other than that though, this game does a pretty good job with its worlds. The most creative is the Timeless River, which transports you back to 1928. That’s right, Steamboat Willie Mickey makes an appearance and the world is entirely in black and white, and the sounds are muffled and grainy like old film, it’s really cool! The characters are given retro style redesigns as well, and it truly adds something to the aesthetic. The most shocking is a world inside of a computer based on 1982’s Tron, with Brian Boxleitner reprising his role as the title character. Sadly, there’s no Jeff Bridges. I would pay an exorbitant amount to see The Dude in a Kingdom Hearts game! Anyway, this is probably my favorite game in the franchise. The story is complex and convoluted, but emotionally engaging. The gameplay is fun, fast and free flowing with enough depth to it that I still don’t know what certain moves do, and I’ve played through it twice. The voice acting is still over the top, but massively improved over the original game. The Gummi Ships got an upgrade to a space-shooter arcade style experience, as opposed to a Star Fox style game from the first one. And the music deserves its own paragraph. Yoko Shimomura has been scoring these games for a long time, and this was where she was at her peak, in terms of scope, ambition and quality, starting from the very beginning theme, going all the way to the final note of the end credits theme. But one piece in particular stands above the rest.

It is probably my favorite theme in the entire game, but first some context. Roxas is probably my favorite member of Organization 13, as he has a tragic backstory. He was the Nobody of Sora, created when Sora turned into the Heartless at the end of the first game, which I explained earlier in the review. That Roxas defeated Riku, was rescued by Ansem the Wise and protected in a virtual simulation of Twilight Town, while Namine restored Sora’s memories. When Sora awoke, Roxas was no longer needed and we don’t see him again until we’re near the end of the game. You’re at the Organization’s stronghold and Roxas is actually the first of many boss fights in this world. Throughout this journey, Roxas is struggling with his own identity in a manner not too dissimilar from the Monster in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. There is a fair amount of parallels here. Both want to know why they exist, and can never get a suitable answer. Both are angry for their existence, but in different ways. And both accept their fates in the end and are left to die. The monster is angry because he cannot accept that humanity is this hideous and not welcoming of him. Roxas is angry because he desperately wants his own identity and attempts to establish it, but can’t. He’s in denial, and sick of being a puppet, and wants to know why Sora is his other half, hence this boss fight. It’s probably my favorite fight in the entire series, because it’s difficult, but not too challenging and it feels like a duel between wielders of the Keyblade. But Roxas has two keyblades, and it makes it more difficult unless you can get his keyblades away from him, when he and Sora clash, your commands (Attack, Magic, Items and Drive) disappear and are replaced with question marks and The End. The End appears randomly and your job as a player is to select it, and then you can deal massive damage with your keyblade AND Roxas’ two keyblades. It’s an awesome fight. It’s enhanced by the theme that plays during the fight.

It is in a word: beautiful. I can’t describe the emotion that clearly went into this piece. It’s a melancholic and tragically beautiful piece, told in three phases. First, the buildup to the flute and the flute itself represents resignation on the part of Roxas, an inner acknowledgement that yes, he is in denial. The orchestra and piano swelling represents the rage and anger building up inside of him and the full orchestra jumping out and playing the motif represents the clash of dark and light that this battle signifies. It reminds me of John Williams’ moments of the Return of the Jedi score, when Luke is overcome with anger, fighting Vader in the Emperor’s throne room. The theme as a whole is so good, I didn’t even mind that I lost for the first handful of attempts. Eventually, Sora wins, and Roxas fades away into nothing, never to be seen again. But then we’re flashed back to a cutscene in 358/2 days, which features Roxas and Axel mulling over Roxas’ fate and whether Nobodies have hearts. It’s very affecting and I get emotional every time I watch it. All the while this is playing over it:

It’s one of the most emotional sequences I’ve ever had to play in a video game. And it’s partially why Kingdom Hearts 2 is one of my favorite games ever. Top 10 for sure! 

When I started this review back in February of 2019, I didn’t think it was going to be this big, I had a lot more to say about Kingdom Hearts than I thought, so it’s going to be split into three different parts! So long for now and I’ll see you next week for the second part!