staceums's Full Review: Kingdom Hearts for PlayStation 2
I first noticed the Kingdom Hearts debut nearly six years ago, in 2002. I was a junior in college and I was sitting in a friend’s dorm room, watching him play this game. He was a big gamer – he played anything ranging from old school Mortal Kombat to Nintendo's Harvest Moon to Final Fantasy, but I was surprised to find him playing a game that looked like it was created for toddlers.
I mean, there he was, traveling through worlds with Donald Duck and Goofy.
How stupid is that?
"It looks weird at first," he assured me, "but I swear it isn’t as bad as it looks."
It was hard for me to grasp the fact that this guy (rough and tough and in a fraternity) was spending time with Disney characters. It was even harder for me to come to grips that the creators of Final Fantasy seemed to join forces with Disney. Wow, were they strapped for money, or what? I already put Disney in my little mental trash can when they abandoned all sorts of true animation for computer-graphics-based movies. What sort of nutso marketing scheme did they come up with this time? I didn’t have any interest, so I didn’t give the game much of a chance.
Two years later, when Kingdom Hearts was put on the shelf as a "PlayStation 2 Classic" and running for about $19.99 a pop, I finally decided to give it a try. Hey, why not? I got bored, and I was in between Final Fantasy releases. I was very surprised. No, incredibly surprised. This game, which started out at the bottom of my skeptic-list, rocketed to one of my top favorite PlayStation 2 games to play. I even reluctantly gave it to my little sister halfway across the States, letting her borrow it, because it’s just that good. Otherwise I’d never sell it. It simply comes to prove that you should never judge a book by its cover.
Plot: You’re Sora, a normal eleven-year-old kid who spends most of his time hanging around Destiny Island, his homeland, with his two good friends Kairi and Riku. Lately, however, Sora’s been having disturbing dreams. Dreams of darkness and shadows. Dreams of emptiness, destiny, and a mysterious keyblade. What could they mean? He shrugs them off until a cloaked stranger appears out of nowhere, giving him a mysterious message:
"This world is tied to the darkness. You understand nothing."
After the ominous message, other things start to happen. Destiny Island begins to fall apart, being sucked away into darkness, and Sora’s friends, Riku and Kairi, disappear. Sora himself eventually is overtaken by the black void and wakes up in a completely different town.
Lost and confused, he doesn’t understand what is happening until he runs into Donald and Goofy. They claim to be on a mission – to find the Keyblade wielder, by order of the King, and to stop the spreading darkness by preventing Heartless from entering worlds and claiming more hearts. Throughout their journey, they learn that there is an ominous force driving the Heartless across the universe to do its bidding - stealing the hearts of others in order to find Kingdom Hearts - and that seven princesses are also in danger. The story becomes more intricate and tangled as various Disney villains pop into the story. Riku, Kairi, and even original Final Fantasy characters play an important role, and Sora finds himself struggling to free his friends as well as prevent the murderous creation of Kingdom Hearts – the ultimate door that leads to darkness.
Gameplay: Although it’s relatively linear and there’s only two main buttons you find yourself using throughout the whole thing, the game is actually very entertaining. This, obviously, is not for your average shoot-‘em-up gamer, as the story in Kingdom Hearts is huge. It’s literally one big RPG, since the gameplay revolves around its intricate plot. Therefore, I have to admit, to me the storyline was absolutely phenomenal. It was a new, original idea and did not give off a recycled feel, even though it included very famous characters. Unfortunately, I just wish the game was more violent, but I can see why they tried to attract the kiddies. But oh, it could've been so much more if it was rated M.
I was also pleasantly surprised to find that Donald and Goofy were not that annoying, and you work as a team as the trio runs about and fights the bad guys. Donald is especially skilled in magic, while Goofy is more skilled in defense and attack, and Sora is good at chopping things apart. Although the format almost has a Final Fantasy-type setup, it is not a turn-based game. You do not have control over what Donald and Goofy do; they automatically attack and heal on their own. This has its pros and cons; the duo can heal Sora or help him out in tough spots, but their actions towards enemies usually go unchecked; so if Donald or Goofy runs out of magic, they can’t help much after that (save for physical attacks).
There is a feature you can use that will allow you to control the items used by your characters; for example, Sora can automatically use a potion if his health enters a critical zone. If you don’t want Sora, Donald, or Goofy throwing out potions like there’s no tomorrow, then you can regulate how many they carry and how much of a priority the item will be. I’ll explain that a little more in the items section.
Leveling Up and Abilities: Most characters level up as they gain experience beating the bad guys, just as in Final Fantasy games. Ability points are also gained as the character increases his level, and points can be used to assign a member certain abilities. For example, as Sora levels up, he can eventually learn “high jump” or an extra combo move. Those ability points (say he’s got 7) can be used to turn on abilities. If “high jump” costs 4 points, then he uses up 4/7 if the “high jump” ability has been assigned. Abilities that are learned are automatic – specific abilities are gained with each member, but you cannot control which ones are learned or when they can be learned. Abilities learned are sporadic, and they will pop up every once in awhile when the member increases in level, but ability points must also be earned in order to assign more abilities to the character.
I have not found, as in usual practice within Final Fantasy games, the need to level grind in Kingdom Hearts, or if it is necessary, then it’s not too extensive. Level grinding, if you’re not familiar with the term, is just time spent fighting the bad guys simply to gain more experience so your character can get stronger. There are a few boss levels throughout the game that you cannot pass through unless you’re strong enough, and level grinding might be required to gain more experience to progress forward. However, the practice of level grinding was not done too much on my part, and was usually performed by choice if anything at all.
Items and Accessories: Also a Final Fantasy trait, accessories may be equipped to increase magic, defense, health, or strength to the character. Accessories can be purchased or obtained through random treasures. As the character increases his level, the accessory slots may increase as well, allowing the player to equip the member with more accessories. Even though Donald and Goofy cannot be controlled, the player may still equip a weapon or accessory of their choice.
Items may be "equipped" to each member, as there are item slots as well. This enables the character to use that specific item in a time of need – such as a potion, an ether, an elixir, whatever – without the player having to scroll down the menu and fumbling around for a potion themselves. That can get aggravating. Equipping a member with an item can be incredibly helpful, but it can also get annoying. Donald or Goofy can spend ethers like crazy since they use up magic, so you have to keep an eye on your items and how much you want to assign to each character.
Summons: Yep, there’s Summons in this game too, but this is where Disney gets a piece. Sora can learn to summon different characters to help aid in the cause, but the Summons are much different from our traditional Final Fantasy beasts. For example, Sora can summon Simba, Tinkerbell, or Genie, to name a few. Summons are gained throughout the game once you’ve beaten a certain world, and you may find them helpful or you may just find them stupid. I, for one, used Summons once in awhile, but I didn’t become addicted. There’s only so much a Summon can really do. Each summon has a different trait and some of them aren’t geared towards attacking, so it really depends on the battle whether or not you’ll need it.
Magic: Magic spells are an option, but again, they are only obtained as the character moves up in level. The traditional Final Fantasy magic spells are utilized, such as Fire, Ice, Gravity, Cure, etc. Because each character’s ability really focuses on his stronger feature, Donald usually ends up as the magic guru while Sora is primarily the strongest of the three. As such, I found that I hardly ever used magic on foes, and button-mashing was more practical as Sora swung the keyblade around. The only spell I found to be helpful was, of course, Cure, but this can vary if you prefer the main character to be strong in one suit and not the other.
For instance, at the very beginning of the game, you are allowed to "choose your path" – you can take the path of the warrior, the mystic, or the defender. Before Sora floats three objects – a sword, a magical staff, or a shield - each representing strength, magic, and defense, respectively. You may pick one that you wish to gain, and you must pick one you wish to give up. So, picking a sword allows you to gain strength, but giving up the magical staff forces you to lose a bit of magic ability. I usually pick these two choices simply because strength and defense is pretty important, in my book. Your choices are reflected in Sora’s stats and the traits you choose to give up or do not pick are therefore shown in Goofy and Donald, giving the game a fair balance. I haven’t had much time to really play around with the choices, so I don’t exactly know where the other pathways lead, but I do know that the abilities that are gained are different depending on your choice.
Jiminy’s Journal: A helpful little guide in case you get confused about what you’re supposed to do or if you want to take a look at the bestiary. Jiminy’s Journal contains everything pertaining to character backgrounds, information on the Heartless, information about the worlds, treasures to collect, missions/sidequests to complete, even statistics about how many hits Sora got on his last combo. Even though most of Jiminy’s Journal can be skipped, there are important aspects in there worth browsing. Ansem’s Reports, for example, are collected and kept in Jiminy’s Journal – each Ansem Report gleans new information on just where on earth the Heartless came from in the first place.
Worlds and the Gummi Ship: You must travel to other worlds and help out those in need while also fending off the Heartless, but you cannot travel unless you’ve got a Gummi Ship. The Gummi Ship is provided by, of course, King Mickey, but you’re allowed to modify it if you so wish. This is where it gets a little Disney-ish. The Gummi Ship essentially looks like it was constructed with building blocks, so it has a little cartooney effect, and as you travel in outer space between worlds, you can collect different abilities the Gummi Ship can use and Gummi blocks needed to build newer, faster, stronger ships.
Have I used this option? No. I’m not interested in building a spaceship. But it’s there if you want to play with it.
Each world is different, and each world is being harassed by the Heartless. You may recognize some of these worlds based on Disney movies - Tarzan, Alice in Wonderland, Aladdin, the list goes on. It’s neat to enter worlds and find extra Disney characters in them that contribute to the story while also brutally bashing Heartless aside, and sometimes you get the option to include an extra character into your entourage. If you don’t want Donald’s magic spells, you can always ask Ariel to help you out instead. Tired of Goofy’s presence? Have Peter Pan fly around with you. The character depends on the world, obviously – you can’t keep each character with you every step of the way. Each character acts on their own, and they also have their own set of abilities – something the player cannot change. One thing that you can set to your liking is equipping the extra character with accessories or changing the assigned abilities, but that’s it. Once you’re finished with the world, you have to leave the character behind. Each world, also, may or may not be to your liking. There are some worlds that can appear absolutely pointless (the one with Winnie the Pooh made my eye twitch on occasion), which is the reason for this entire game being four stars instead of five. However, the annoying worlds may also be beneficial towards the end, as experience points and extra rare items can be won.
Music: I can’t complain, seeing as how I own the soundtrack. Half of it is pretty good, and half of it can annoy the crap out of you, but that’s what you’d expect from a hybrid Final Fantasy - Disney game. Most of the time, the music is relatively pleasant, and it’s very good score to accompany the story, which is a plus. If I have one thing to say about the music, it is definitely fitting. It can be goofy to accompany the comic relief within the story, or it can be serious and dramatic to accompany the sadness and angst. For more detail, just visit my review of the entire 2-disc collection.
Overall: A great game, in and out. It’s got adventure, mystery, a touch of evil and deception, a touch of warmth and love, and a touch of comic relief and genuine Disney stupidity. However, that being said, it’s something that you’d need to experience yourself, because I can’t exactly explain how a mishmash of Disney and Final Fantasy really worked out to be what is now Kingdom Hearts. It’s no longer at its 2002 selling price, $49.99, but now set low at a whopping $19.99 or so. Why not? Go out and give it a try.
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