Surprisingly Good
User Rating: 9.6 | Kingdom Hearts PS2
All right. Most people when they look at the cover of this game thinks it's a kiddy game because of Disney characters being involved. Well I too thought that. At first I thought this game was stupid because I was just entering my love for Final Fantasy and it blocked Final Fantasy VIII page on Square-Enix's webpage to be viewed. Then I saw commercials, look at the webpage. Read some reviews and thought this might be worth trying. So I played it at my friend's house. I instantly fell in love with it. Look to find out why Graphics 9/10: All right graphics are important. The graphics are good in this game. The characters are bright and colorful. The main character Sora looks a little bit younger than his actual age though. Another complaint I have is that the characters' hair aren't detailed like those of Final Fantasy X's characters. Otherwise the graphics are great. The Disney characters have been brought to life perfectly. The environments from the movies are greatly done. Gameplay 10/10: Now the gameplay isn't what you would expect from Square-Enix. It's a real time fighting system. That means enemies appear you beat them up with a key. You have a health and MP meter in the bottom right corner. In the opposite corner is the command menu. There's attack, magic, item, and the last one is for special abilities when in the right situation. The attack button can be changed into open, or examine, or talk when not in battle. So the basic rule in combat is hack and slash. Also the circle button is jump. The special abilities I mentioned can be gained from characters or from reaching certain levels or meeting certain goals. The magic in the game is not that neccessary not including the healing and the defensive spells. But you can set them to shortcuts in the menu. To activate the shortcut. Hold L1 and press the button the spell is assigned too. Another good gameplay mechanic they put in is the Gummi Ship. This is how you get from place to place. There's a series of shooting to get to the destination. But if you visited that world already you can warp to it once you get the warp gummi. The only complaint in the gameplay that I have is that the camera doesn't really cooperate with you while in combat. Sound 10/10: All right the pop Japanese song in the beginning didn't reall impress me. But hell it' just one song I can bear it. The actors for Kingdom Hearts are real proffesionals. Such ad Haley Joel Osment who was in the Sixth Sense plays Sora. Or how David Gallagher from 7th Heaven plays Riku. All the voices from the movies are in here also. It's all the quality we can expect from Square-Enix. Story 10/10: The story of a game is very important in my eyes. This one was thought to be simple but it's not. Sora, Kairi, and Riku wanted to leave their island to search for other worlds. When they do however they get seperated. Sora ends up with the Keyblade(your only weapon). So he must now travel with Donald and Goofy who were told to find the Key Bearer and help him. Donald and Goofy want to find the King Mickey who went missing. Sora wants to find Kairi and Riku who are missing. The story will get more complicated in the future. Replay Value 10/10: this game surprisingly has a lot of replay value. You can play again starting with different stats to find out which stats are hardest to complete the game with. Or compete in the tournaments again. Or find every abilitie or trinity mark or synthesize every item there could be. So there are many things that will make you play through the game again, Rent or Buy?: Well if you enjoy Square-Enix and Disney and trust them enough so that this is a good game then buy. But if you're not sure like I was then rent. Depends.
