Let me be honest with you to start with. I've not played any FF games except for the first ones on the NES. Also I've not played many RPG's, but the ones I have were excellent. But Kingdom Hearts I found was unnecessarily hard, boring and pointless! Now obviously alot (A WHOLE LOT) of people love this game, so take what I say however you like. But I believe that if you are a casual gamer, then Kingdom Hearts is not for you! The game just kind of throws itself at you - or better yet, you get thrown into the game and are expected to swim on your own. I've never seen a game with such a hard to manuver control system. And the leveling up aspect is just rediculous considering you have to fight hoards of "heartless" creatures. This wouldn't be so bad if they were easier to fight, but instead they each take several hits, use sheilds, can hide from your attacks and pull all sorts of tricks to where you are just pounding on the attack button hoping against hope that they will just go away. This especially becomes a problem because they never attack by themselves, there are usually 3, 4, 5 or MORE - each attacking you relentlessly. If you end up dying in one of these many battles (there is a new batch of heartless popping up every 5 feet) you loose all of your experience you've gained since your last save. Leveling up just becomes a chore - you have to fight the heartless, but all the battles are unfairly balanced and monotonous. You'll start off the game with such a low life count that you end up dying countless numbers of times before you really get started. Don't even get me started on how insanely difficult boss battles are. The first major story line boss you fight in the third district of Traverse town (starting off point of the game) has nearly 700 HP devided between it's limbs and torso. You on the other hand (unless you've spent countless hours trying to level up) will have about 14 HP(at lvl 6) in which to survive. I want to point out that I spent way more than 3 hours just to get to level 6 counting all the times I died and lost all my accrued experience. So unless you find a quick way to level up, expect to have a slim chance of beating this first boss. You will however have magic potions to "help" you out, but when the first boss can take nearly half your life with one swipe - it's not going to to much good. Especially since you can only use a maximum of 4 in battle - plus the few that Donald and Goofy dole out to you. If however you can overcome all of this turmoil with the gameplay, expect to see some wonderful graphics representing some of Disney's finest movies. It's a shame that you have to go through so much just to experience them, but for what they are, they are spectacular, which is why the visuals are the best part of this game. Second to visuals is the voice acting which I think really draws you into the storyline. It is of course a cast of some of Hollywood's best. I do however want to mention the annoyance of the sound as well - in some levels which you find yourself stuck at a dead end, the music looping over and over will drive you mad. Also, if you've just barely escaped from a battle (with the BILLIONS of heartless) expect your life meter to give off an alarm that constantly sounds till you've replenished your health. A little warning in these situations is alright, but the game takes it too far. You'll especially see this when you're stuck somewhere, without potions or any way to replenish your health. You'll wish for death to come - except you'll loose all your experience since your last save. Sometimes it is just better to mute the sound and play a CD in your room. Lastly I'd like to mention my "tilt" score. It's difficult to say, but I just plain didn't have fun playing this game. It was interesting to say the least, and beautiful worlds and locations. But the constant frustration during battles -even minor ones - drew all the fun out of the game for me. I can't even recommend this as a rental, since when I purchased my copy, I only paid $5 for it, and I still feel ripped off somehow. It seems like a great game, and even more so by how many people love it, but I just found it a boring, relentless chore. I couldn't imagine playing through again! Avoid Casual Gamers - You've been warned!
This game has been one of the best action RPGs I've ever played in my life. At first I didn't want to like it cause I had the normal, "Don't mess with the childhood Disney legacies." But after I finally tried it I abso... Read Full Review
This game right here is the start of a great series! The first Kingdom Hearts started off a great collaboration between Square and Disney which now spans three games and two systems. This game really caught me by surpr... Read Full Review
