Kingdom Hearts II (PS2)

...music together. Then along came Kingdom Hearts. Packed with beautiful graphics that looked so good you'd often swear it was hand drawn, and with a musical score to leave fans dribbling, it was one of the most raved about games ever. Square fans and RPG fans loved the... well, RPG side of it, and appearances from characters like Squall, Cloud, and Sephiroth, whilst Disney fans loved the huge catalogue of characters, including Donald and Goofy as two ...
...
Which is where Kingdom Hearts ends. Naturally, the baddies are destroyed and the heroes win, but it ended in a way that screamed for a sequel. A good sequel. Here it is.

Kingdom Hearts 2 effectively promises more of the same, hence the lengthy introduction covering the old game. It has more characters, more attacks, and more to the story to discover. Taking place some years after the original, we see a refreshed and somewhat ... more

Disney and Squaresoft. Two very different companies, aren't they? One is a company that produces some of the finest role playing games ever, such as the legendary Final Fantasy series, and the other producing some of the finest animated movies ever. Both of them are the bad boys of what they do. Indeed, Disney has a vast amount of movies that appear in the "Top 200 ---- Ever", and with help from top companies like Pixar it isn't surprising. On the adult side of things, Squaresoft's Final Fantasy series has a large number of games nominated by various websites as "Best Game Ever", such as the huge FFVIII, the involving and touching FFX, and the legendary epic known as FFVII.

But as mentioned before, they are very different. Nobody would guess that the two, aimed at different age groups, different types of people, and indeed different stages of work completely could make music together. Then along came Kingdom Hearts. Packed with beautiful graphics that looked so good you'd often swear it was hand drawn, and with a musical score to leave fans dribbling, it was one of the most raved about games ever. Square fans and RPG fans loved the... well, RPG side of it, and appearances from characters like Squall, Cloud, and Sephiroth, whilst Disney fans loved the huge catalogue of characters, including Donald and Goofy as two of the three main characters, and featuring appearances from classical characters such as Aladdin and the Genie, Beast, Tarzan, Jack Skellington, and many more. It also featured one of the most terrifying bad guys I have ever seen in the form of Malificent, the witch from Sleeping Beauty. Even people who weren't so keen on Disney and Squaresoft loved it. On top of the RPG aspect, there was a real sense of adventure with secrets hidden around every corner. Real time battles added to the intensity making it feel like an action game, and a handful of mini games were thrown in for good measure. On top of all of this, the incredibly likeable star of the game, Sora, was a big hit with children everywhere while adults spent their time reminiscing over their favorite Disney stars, and being overwhelmed by the powerful and engrossing storyline.

This isn't to say it had it's faults. It did, it had them by the fistful. For one, it was a strange game to play. Indeed, I did feel a strange urge to never tell anyone how attached I was feeling to a game starring the Little Mermaid. Secondly, the mini games I touched on before were hard to play, and added very little excitement. It was also a very tough game for young children to fully appreciate; the real time battles were maybe a bit too fast paced, and the boss fights were occasionally stupidly hard. Finally, the storyline was full of so many twists it was hard to keep up, which is what I will touch on in the next paragraph.

The sequel carries on nicely from the first. Well, that's a lie, it actually carries on from the little known - and take it from me, terrible - Game Boy Advance sequel named Chain Of Memories (if you want more information, look at the bottom). In the first game, our young hero Sora lives with his friends on a small cluster of islands known as the Destiny Islands. Desperate to escape and find new worlds to explore, they all dream of leaving. But Sora keeps having strange nightmares, and scary daydreams. After building a raft to flee the island, his visions become reality, and his island is apparently consumed by peculiar creatures, scattering his friends. Whilst this happens, Donald and Goofy set off to find their king, who has also left leaving little more than a note babbling about a key.

The creatures are known as the Heartless, and the key in question is the weapon of the game wielded by Sora; the Keyblade. The Heartless are attempting to consume all light in the universe, taking out the worlds as they increase in numbers. They multiply by infecting the hearts of the good, leaving little more than a hollow shell as the soul becomes a creature of darkness. Led by the powerful Ansem, whose apprentices created them, they can only be stopped by "Locking" each world against them, thus preventing them from annihilating it completely.

Which is where Kingdom Hearts ends. Naturally, the baddies are destroyed and the heroes win, but it ended in a way that screamed for a sequel. A good sequel. Here it is.

Kingdom Hearts 2 effectively promises more of the same, hence the lengthy introduction covering the old game. It has more characters, more attacks, and more to the story to discover. Taking place some years after the original, we see a refreshed and somewhat older Sora once more traveling from world to world trying to prevent the Darkness from spreading yet again. There are even more cameos from Disney and Final Fantasy stars, including Jack Sparrow (who was a very predictable addition to the game), Mulan, and (another predictable one) Yuna, Rikku and Paine of FFX-2 fame. On top of this, the battle controls have been completely revised. So, after picking the game up, you're ready to go around blasting enemies with the giant Key, right?

No. In a very brave and, if I may say this, stupid move Square has decided to begin this game NOT as the loveable Sora, but as a strange and - for some reason, unappealing - Roxas. It begins so slowly it took more than a week to actually get into the game. You basically take control of Roxas who is suffering dreams and visions similar to Sora in the beginning of the game. You are also introduced to some of the new controls, such as pressing Triangle to do pretty much EVERYTHING, and the newest enemies known as the Nobodies. These are what's left of the people and creatures that the Heartless take, and are a refreshing change. That would all be well and good, but since it is literally a case of pressing a few buttons then leaving the CG to do its thing it gets old fast. We do learn, however, that Roxas is a Nobody and is what's left of Sora. That's it. Since it was an introduction to the controls and the story, I really don't see why a whopping four hours of game time is wasted.

Whilst these strange happenings are going on, Sora and his friends are in a deep sleep whilst being "restored". Once you complete the Roxas introduction, they awaken (with possibly the corniest reasons for having zilch experience in a sequel ever - in the deep sleep, they forgot all of their magic and strength!) and are plunged straight into the action. They too, are in Twilight Town - Roxas' home town - and meet his friends. Sora becomes tearful at leaving (showing the smoothest crying in any game I've ever seen) showing the bond he still shares with Roxas. And thus, the game begins.

Graphically, KH1 set the bar so high you can hardly see it. With bright blocks of colour and the smoothest animation in computer gaming history you could be forgiven for thinking the CG movies were hand drawn. The towns themselves were packed with details, and the lead characters and stars were smoothly crafted with flawless animations. Even in battle it was amazing. The problems? Well, as with any game where you fight large amounts of enemies in real time, there was slowdown. That's where everything moves almost in Bullet Time, if you didn't know. This has certainly been examined and repaired in KH2, considering there are come boss fights where you face literally thousands of enemies at once. The graphics themselves have certainly been toned down a little; there have been few moments to make me drop my jaw, but it is still an incredible spectacle. The animation is smoother than before, with combos fluently melting together. So far, the highlight with regards to graphics are the boss fights. There is one memorable fight early on which sees a demon-style heartless taking control of Beasts castle, and it is animated in a terrifying manner. The windows are surrounded by a purple fog, and mysterious chains are wrapping around the stained glass windows, and the pillars are raking inwards. It may be a child's game, but aspects like this are scary enough to be included in games like Resident Evil of Silent Hill, I think.

As mentioned before Sora is somewhat older, which means he is given a whole new wardrobe. Sporting a snazzy black and red get up, the new threads change in certain environments; under the sea he has the bottom half of a dolphin, in the electrical land of Tron he is covered in a neon glowing robotic suit, and he even transforms into a lion cub!

The audio qualities of the game are just that: quality. The voice acting has been cranked up a notch, but with an older star you would expect that. The Disney characters steal the show here, often featuring the original voice actors - or at least, some incredibly good impersonators. This applies to the majority of the case anyway; Jack Sparrow just isn't right without Johnny Depp (which is a statement every other man will batter me for) and even the Final Fantasy characters sound a little bit daft; there is one part that made me laugh where Selphie (FFVIII) refers to Tidus, pronouncing his time Tye-Duss. Every Final Fantasy fanboy and indeed most gamers know that isn't how Squaresoft intended it to be said, so it was funny to see them slip up themselves. It looks like I'm nit-picking here, and indeed I am. The standard of the voice acting is so good, I have to. The treat for the ears is continued with regards to the musical score. Containing many tracks from the films they are referring to, it is atmospheric to say the least. It has also been toned down a bit; listening to Under The Sea repeating a thousand times at a level somewhat higher than necessary got boring fast in the original, but here it's quieter without silencing the voice-overs or battle sounds.

As I touched on before, this is pretty much more of the old. In fact, in the first few hours of decent gameplay you revisit Hollow Bastion and Olympus, and are reunited with Beast and Hercules. This is a nice touch, I felt; as you learn early on, although the efforts in the first game helped with the Heartless situation, they were never completely wiped out. Naturally they had to include that, since it would be a pretty dull game without any bad guys.

In all RPG's, whether stand alone or turn/time based, it is the combat that takes up 50% of the game. Kingdom Hearts was unique in that it had no random encounters. Instead, in order to level up you had to walk around the land fighting the same bad guys over and over. Unfortunately, this is still the case. The bad guys always occur in the same places in the same order. The experience they offer is notably higher than the last game meaning you acquire new skills faster, and for each major battle or "boss" fight you learn new unique abilities. Combos are now more than X X X X X, and you can now link together attacks in typical fighting game style. The magic leave something to be desired, but with the huge amount of customization with Sora and his physical attacks you'll hardly notice.

While on the subject of the desired, the summons have also taken a heavy beating over the course of the last couple of years. Even though the only one worth using in KH was Mushu, and even then only out of desperation, Kingdom Hearts 2 makes it so obvious they are there for the novelty that it almost hurts. Square are usually brilliant - Final Fantasy games are almost always blessed by Shiva, Ifrit, or Leviathan - but the lack of decent summoning spells is actually surprisingly insulting. There is a silver lining though; instead of relying on other creatures, you can become them. Ah yes, the new magical clothes he has been blessed with (by the three fairies from Sleeping Beauty, no less) allow him to fuse with Donald, and/or Goofy to become a totally new character complete with new and powerful abilities. Sadly, the first form remains the best since it is already considerably leveled by the time you learn any new forms. Never the less, it is a fantastic feature, and the sight of Sora wielding two different keys is breath taking.

Having mentioned the good and bad, let's talk about the "marmite" feature. By this I don't mean blobs of brown stinky poo in a jar intended for toast, but the "love or hate" feature. The triangle button, so often overlooked in modern day gaming is relied on very heavily. Overly heavily. In fact, occasionally you get fed up with it. It is used to talk, to save, to perform actions, to open chests, and in battle. Which is where the love it or hate it comes into play. See, having the ability to reverse attacks, swing behind an enemy, or pull off a long winded and special attack is great. Having the ability to do all of these things almost all the time and in almost every battle is not so great. It really decreases the challenge and not in a good way, since the game effectively forces you into it. For example, early in the game you fight Hydra. The Hydra is an enormous serpent in Greek Mythology and is responsible for my favorite piece of cinema ever in Disney's Hercules. The twist to any fight with Hydra is that for every time you remove one of its heads, three grow back. Now, the fight in KH2 sees you destroy one head, then three before it revives itself with a huge nine heads. "Oh ho", I said to myself as I often do, "This should be an epic battle proportionate to the invasion of Britain by the Romans!" Was it an epic battle proportionate to the invasion of Britain by the Romans? No. Why? Because every single time it goes to attack, you need to hit triangle, resulting in an admittedly cool movie and a huge chunk of damage done to the boss. Lather, rinse, and repeat, and hey presto, the boss is gone before any real challenge. Can you see the problem there? The only advantage with this feature is that some of the movies are absolutely incredible, particularly against some of the bigger and badder bosses.

Mini games are always a big chunk of Squaresoft games, and this is no exception. Here you are spoiled for choice, whether you'd like the immense challenge of the Light Cycle races a la Tron, some gentle arcade style games in the Book of Pooh, or the frantic button mashing of the Gummi Ship courses.

Ah yes, you didn't think they'd remake this without those bloody Gummi ships did you? Fear not, mighty reader, for unlike the last game where the journeys were boring, repetitive and tedious along with terrible options for customization, this time it's actually fun! You don't even need to tackle the building of the ship, although it is certainly worth it for the variety of weapons and engines! Indeed, even though here they have a host of awesome and well made ships, you have so many options at your fingertips you're bound to be able to rustle something up. Instead of just guns and cannons, you can now have spears, saws, and knives. Instead of jets, you can choose to make a propeller-driven motor car complete with neon's. It is certainly a lot of fun to see what you can dream of! As well as that, the missions play more like the old arcade shooter Starblade, which is an "on the rails" space game where you fly through a series of levels, changing direction automatically but dodging lasers by yourself.

The gameplay is generally fast and frantic, but it can get slightly mundane. However, if you like a game where you can go wherever you want pretty much immediately, this is the game for you. I like it, even with the few flaws I mentioned. A graphical and musical masterpiece, with a huge host of characters... well, what's not to like eh? In short, I recommend you buy it, and any fan of the first should buy it. It is proof that Disney is not just for kids.

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Incidentally, if anyone wants to know the story to the Chain of Memories game, check out this link

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_Hearts:_Chain_of_Memories

Apparently it is going to be remade on the PS2. If it is, I hope they decide on a new combat system! Anyways, that's it from me. Bye!
 

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