Kingdom Hearts is the hit new game by Disney Interactive and Squaresoft, featuring a highly touted voiceover cast, with Haley Joel Osment voicing the starring role of Sora, a boy whose world is invaded by sinister creatures collectively called “The Heartless”. The main gist of the storyline is that worlds seem to be disappearing one by one because of the Heartless, who have been able to enter all the different worlds (who generally don’t know the others exist), and Sora is chosen by a mysterious weapon called the “Keyblade”, which is the weapon that can defeat the Heartless, and he sets out to find his friends who went missing after the attack. The different worlds you encounter in this game represent the different worlds of Disney, from classics such as Alice in Wonderlandor Winnie the Pooh, to more modern releases such as Aladdin and Hercules. Sora needs to “lock” the worlds with the Keyblade so that the Heartless cannot enter anymore. However, the evil characters from Disney stories have conspired to capture seven “princesses” from the various Disney stories, for some sinister reason that I haven’t found out yet. I have not finished the game, so it’s hard to piece the story together which seems weak initially because a lot of things don’t make any sense. This is the big reason I’m not as compelled to play KH as much as I was compelled to play FFX (like, I couldn’t go a day without continuing FFX to find out what happens next!) But, I am still delighted by hearing Donald Duck’s quacky voice during the voiced parts of the game.
First of all, I want to make it clear for FFX fans that they should not place KH on the same level as FFX. I feel that FFX was an incredibly beautifully produced game. Every time a main character spoke in FFX, it was voiced. And the full-motion video (FMV) in FFX is amazingly intricate. This is not the case in KH. There is an FMV at the beginning of the game (with a catchy tune, I might add), but it’s not at the same level of realistic detail. I most notice this in the eyes of the human characters (such as Sora, Kairi, Riku), which look more cartoonish. Also, voiceovers aren’t as prevalent in KH as one would hope (lots of dialogue “bubbles”). The detail of animation is also much more prominent at the beginning of the game, in the opening dialogue between Sora, Kairi, and Riku – but seems to degrade later on. The mouth movements are dead-on for the English dialogue in the opening scenes, but later scenes don’t seem to have this much detail (they seem to just open and close, without any shaping to the lips). However, you figure out that if they wanted to create this level of animation throughout, it would probably take many more years to perfect and cram into one disc (or probably multiple discs). Besides, how “real” can you make those Disney characters? Though, I was kind of surprised at the, er, largeness of Minnie Mouse (is it just me, or is she just proportionally HUGE compared to everyone else?) The music is also a step down from the haunting and intricate melodies from Final Fantasy games. While the tunes are catchy and pleasant, it just gets repetitive after a while.
Enough about the aesthetics – let’s talk about the actual game play. After playing Final Fantasy X for countless hours, learning every intricate detail of the game play and all the secrets I could possibly gather, I was faced with the daunting task of taking on Kingdom Hearts, thinking it would be much more difficult. The main reason I was a little intimidated at first was because while it was co-produced by Square and should obviously have some similar game play to the Final Fantasy series, KH was going back to the “active time battle” mode that I was so happy to be rid of for FFX. However, when I started playing it, it was clear that it wasn’t just the real-time battle mode that was intimidating – it was the real time AND SPACE battle mode. It greatly reminds me of the Zelda games for N64, where as you are walking along, your location triggers enemies to appear, the music changes, you are now in battle mode. And then as I played it more, it wasn’t as hard as I thought, but it did take some getting used to. The biggest crutch that I was missing was a map of the area — you are definitely on your own here. You can’t really see the whole area in a map, nor can you see where you are in the area. As you are exiting into a new portion of an area, it will prompt you with the name of that portion, which helps a little. If you’re the type of player who is dependent that little navigation map in the upper right corner, then you might have a tough time finding your way around. Just remember that you can really go anywhere in this game and not get hurt falling from cliffs or the tops of trees to the ground.
There are also some silly games at the beginning of the game during Sora’s dream sequence where you actually customize your level of game play. In one scene, you are presented with a sword, mage’s staff, and a shield. You are to pick one, and discard another. Basically, this determines your starting statistics, which is important at the beginning of the game, but then not so much as you gain more levels. For beginners, I would suggest picking the sword and keeping the shield, as at the beginning of the game, magic is not as much of a factor. Also, magic is somewhat difficult and awkward to use. In the real time battle, casting spells is not immediate. Sora pauses a little bit while casting, which may allow an enemy to strike you while you are vulnerable. Also, you need to get used to using the left directional pad to select magic spells, which can get very annoying if you are used to using the pad to move around (rather than using the analog stick). Fortunately there is a shortcut where you can assign spells to a key combination of L1 and one of three right-hand buttons, but this is also somewhat awkward, especially if you assign a spell to the “x” button as you are attacking something (also with the “x” button). Another silly beginning game will also determine how fast you level. I’m not sure why someone would not want to level as fast as possible, but I guess there are some secrets to the game we don’t know about yet…. This dream sequence is generally a way to familiarize with the controls of the game, game battle, and also provides a little insight into the storyline (which, at this point, is not very much).
In battle mode, basically you just have to defeat the Heartless with your Keyblade. Sometimes you will use magic, but most of the time you will jump around and hack them with the Keyblade. If you hit the “x” button repeatedly, you’ll find that Sora will often do combo attacks, which are sometimes good and sometimes a burden (combos take more recovery time). Defeated Heartless drop HP balls to recover your health, “munny” to buy stuff (your Disney-esque unit of currency), and will sometimes drop low-level items such as potions (which is good, because it saves you munny from buying them).
Sora’s homeworld is seemingly destroyed by the Heartless, and is somehow transported to a place called Traverse Town, which ends up being the “homeworld” of the game. In Traverse Town you meet up with Donald Duck and Goofy, who in a parallel storyline, have discovered King Mickey Mouse has left his castle, leaving a note regarding the disappearance of stars from the sky and his quest to find out about it. He also instructs Donald and Goofy to find the “one that holds the key”. So, Donald and Goofy set out to search for the king, and this key. Eventually they bump into Sora (literally) and join up with him. As you fight now, Donald and Goofy fight along side you, though you do not directly control them. You can customize their actions in the game menu, depending on how you would like them to fight. Donald is your primary magic user, and Goofy is your all around defender and uses a shield to attack.
As you gain experience and level, not only do you gain stats, HP and MP, but every now and then you gain new abilities. As you level, you have a certain number of ability points (AP) that you may use to assign to these abilities. Don’t forget that Donald and Goofy also have abilities and AP. Sometimes you will want to switch out abilities as you fight certain bosses.
Donald and Goofy have the Gummi ship, which is their mode of transportation between the different worlds. So as you travel between worlds, you are in the Gummi ship, where you have to shoot obstacles and ships controlled by the Heartless as you automatically move forward (you just move around the screen in the vertical plane, you don’t have much control moving forward except to brake a little). Many people are not so pleased with this aspect of the game, as it is reminiscent of an old Atari shooting game with its mediocre graphics and play, and doesn’t seem to really enhance the game. But wait, there’s more – you can actually customize your Gummi ship with pieces you pick up from shot-down Heartless ships, and you might even pick up new ship templates on your travels. When I first explored the “Gummi Garage,” I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do. Then I discovered the fact that it didn’t really MATTER how the ship looked, as long as it had a cockpit and an engine, and some guns of course. It’s just very silly and non-essential, because eventually you gain the ability to just warp to a new world immediately. I’m just waiting for Disney to come out with a line of Gummi Ship candies so that I can chew on cherry-flavored Gummi parts. I think they’d be tasty!
Okay, back to the game. Part of the game play that has received a lot of criticism is the wayward camera angle, in general movement and in battle. The camera angle seems to move around quite a bit more than one would like. You can often reset the angle by either pressing L2 or R2, or pressing “select” twice to go back and forth from first-person view. First-person view is useful if you want to look around to see what’s in the room at the time, but I don’t recommend keeping it on first-person view while moving. During battle, it can be annoying when an enemy is behind you and you can’t seem to get the camera to swing around. One way to get around this is by using the “lock on” feature with the R1 button, which will target the nearest enemy and lock on it, so that you are only focusing your attacks on that enemy.
Normally you would auto-target the nearest enemy to you from wherever you are, which can change as you move. Locking on is useful when you are trying to target a bigger enemy, while letting Donald and Goofy take care of the others. Eventually as you visit other worlds you are able to fight along other characters such as Aladdin and Beast (from “Beauty and the Beast”), but generally only while you are in that world. Donald and Goofy are the only ones who accompany you throughout the game. Many of Square’s Final Fantasy characters also make cameos, voiced by some well-known celebrities (David Boreanaz, Mandy Moore, and even Lance Bass of ‘NSync makes an appearance). Yes, even Cid is here! Because, as we all know, there always has to be Cid in any Final Fantasy game (or, in this case, a game with other Final Fantasy characters in it).
There are also many secrets and mini-games to KH, such as hunting for 99 Dalmatian puppies to receive items, finding “Trinity marks” on the ground that activate to receive items, and of course, a battle arena to test your skill and strength to receive even more items (and much cooler items as you defeat more difficult opponents). You can also eventually create new items from those useless shards you keep picking up from defeated Heartless. And of course, there are the ultimate weapons. I will probably provide information about all of this in a future strategy guide.
The game is very linear, in that you are pretty sure what world you are supposed to visit next. Each world has a Battle Level rating, and generally you want to visit the lower rated ones first. You can go back to different worlds whenever you want though, and pick up secret items that you were not able to pick up earlier, especially as you learn how to activate new Trinity marks. The point of the game (at least in the beginning) is to visit all the worlds and lock them with your Keyblade when you find the World’s keyhole, which will prevent the Heartless from getting into that world again. If that doesn’t make any sense… well it probably shouldn’t until you’ve played the game a bit and paid attention to the storyline.
KH is definitely fun to play, and generally easier than I thought it would be. Battles are a bit less strategy-oriented than in Final Fantasy games, though there are plenty of strategies to use to make the battles a lot easier. However, it’s entirely possible to just hack and slash your way through. Strategy becomes important in figuring out the many puzzles in order to progress in the game. It also seems to be helpful to know the Disney stories to figure out what to do next (such as using the “Drink Me” bottle in Wonderland). Overall, the game is a delightful showcase of Disney characters and stories, as well as some of Square’s thrown into the mix. While I was a little disappointed in the quality of the graphics and music and initial weak storyline, I realize that this game is geared towards a much younger and possibly much less “hard-core gamer,” though I believe everyone will enjoy playing this game.