Turned out to be much better than expected.
User Rating: 9.3 | Kingdom Hearts PS2
To tell you the truth, I thought a collaboration between Square and Disney was going to turn out a disaster. However, with the release of Kingdom Hearts, I learned that I couldn't be further from the truth. The entire game is filled with an imaginative plot, great graphics, intuitive gameplay, and a well-done soundtrack. You play the game as Sora, a young boy who is sucked into another dimension. There he meets up with Donald and Goofy, who are searching for their missing King, Mickey Mouse. The plot is very dependent on the Disney characters (i.e. Tarzan, Aladdin, etc.), and has you moving from one familiar world to another to advance the storyline. The graphics are very resemblent to Final Fantasy X's, but the in-game graphics are slightly enhanced (however, the CG cutscenes don't look as good). The various animations were superb and the effects look great. The soundtrack for the game is exceptional, but just barely. I found some tunes to be annoying and/or underwhelming. The voice-work is great, however, as Square went out of its way to enlist some actors such as Haley Jole Osment. However, there are a lot of moments when there are no voices to be heard, and very few moments when the voice-work is actually put to use. The gameplay is definitely one of the game's high points. The combat is in real-time, unlike the FF series. And even with the lack of a time-based combat system, the menus and overall design of battle turn out to be very smooth. The only annoying things I found were Donald and Goofy's AI (at times), and the GummiShip travels. Also, there are two difficulty modes, and tons of secrets and sidequests, so you won't be done with this one in a hurry. Overall, this is a superb game that doesn't quite use its full potential, but will definitely not leave you disappointed.
