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| | Title:
Kingdom Hearts 2
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System:
Playstation 2
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Genre:
Action RPG
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Publisher:
Square-Enix
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Developer:
Square-Enix
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Release:
March 1, 2006
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Online:
No
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ESRB:
Rating Pending (RP)
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Disney characters are mingling with Final Fantasy characters again. Cloud Strife chats with Donald Duck and Goofy in a world independent of the Final Fantasy series, yet characters ranging from FFVII to FFX-2 are present. How is that? I’m not sure either, since the story is sort of patchy since the original from four years ago. What is for sure is that the Heartless are back, and The Nobodies are vying for control of Kingdom Hearts. For a Square Enix fan that still has a Disney kid somewhere inside of him, it doesn’t get much better than a game like Kingdom Hearts 2. Or does it?
Squre Enix assumes that you played Kingdom Hearts (PS2) and Chain of Memories (GBA) to understand what’s going on in Kingdom Hearts 2. But if you didn’t play them, check out Jiminy’s Journal for some background scoop. [see note at bottom – Brendon] However, for the first few hours not even die-hard veterans know what the hell is going on. Who is this Roxas kid, and why am I controlling him? He does look slightly similar to Sora and he has a Keyblade, but Sora is referenced completely separate from him. As a matter of fact, he has dreams about Sora’s experiences. What gives? As the scenes unfold and the days go by, things change. A new enemy to the Kingdom Hearts game surfaces (The Nobodies) and those pesky Heartless show themselves once again. Oddly enough, they don’t seem to like each other.
Thankfully, the familiar Sora returns to your control--along with Donald and Goofy--but not before questionable acts of Roxas’ person have left you asking even more questions.
Soon you’ll find out that Sora and the two Disney warriors must partake in another journey to rid the worlds of Heartless and now, The Nobodies. Nobodies take on the appearance of humans; talking, plotting and acting like them. They are missing one key ingredient, however: hearts. But they sure know what it takes to hurt a heart. The smartest and most aspiring of The Nobodies are the members of Organization XIII. These guys are bad news and know how to fight.
Fighting The Nobodies and the Heartless is done as it was in the original Kingdom Hearts titles, thankfully. I’m probably not the only one who wasn’t a big fan of the card-based battle system of Chain of Memories–regardless of how gorgeous it was for a GBA game. The action-RPG elements are all present, including a combo-based attack scheme and menu-driven magic, Limits, Summons and Items. New to this title, however, is Sora’s ability to change his Form (aka Drives). In Sora’s different states of Form, he turns into Super Sora, so to speak. Along with being able to wield dual Keyblades, he’s faster, stronger and has a more Abilities which are not limited to the available AP slots. His look even changes with each of the 4 Drives available: Valor, Wisdom, Master and Final. There is word of another Form on the street, but you have to find if that’s true yourself.
Another nice touch to the gameplay is the Action commands added to the combat system. Different events and actions dependent on the enemy and situation prompt you to push the Triangle button at the right time and/or in succession. For instance, when you are next to a guest character--such as Jack Sparrow--the action command will appear and you will be able to perform specialized dual attacks with that character (aka Limits). Other options include exploitation of an enemy’s weakness. Get next to a particular enemy that has a beam fire and you can snag it out of the air and use it against the rest of the enemies for a short time.
Even with all these additions to the gameplay, you’d think there would be more strategy involved. Or even more RPG elements, as a matter of fact. However, you can literally mash the attack button the whole game and win. I often forget about the Summons, never use the magic (including Cure spells!) and used an item probably twice. About the only useful additions are the Drives (Sora’s Forms) and Limit commands. But again, even in those Forms, you just need to hack and slash until the enemy is dead and the Limits are the aforementioned joining of forces with the guest (or Donald and Goofy) character.
Some enemies take a specific formula to beat, but it’s really pseudo strategy, because you can’t beat them unless you do so with the predefined routine…which usually consists of an action command to jump on to their head so you can continue the Keyblade barrage.
Also gone is the reliance on items or certain skills you must acquire to proceed in the game (except for a weak instance in Atlantica). Another aspect which moves this game farther from the RPG genre and voids it of any resemblance to difficulty is that there is no open-exploration for items or characters to get you that new special ability (I want to visit Duncan and learn Bum Rush!). Unless you don’t visit all the worlds (twice) like you’re supposed to, you won’t be missing anything. The game is definitely easy. I only got sweaty palms in a total of 3 boss fights.
There’s some good news and some bad news for the worlds in Kingdom Hearts. Do you want the good news or the bad news first? Ok, the good news is that all the returning worlds have been completely redesigned! The bad news is that they are extremely linear with all the platforming taken away. Gone are those hidden areas you could only find by being an explorer with an eye for obtainable heights. This does help to keep things moving fairly fast with the story, however, since there is now almost never a dull moment. The story keeps pushing you along, almost making you forget how fun it was to traverse the roof tops of Hollow Bastion or the misshapen shapes of Halloween Town.
So it’s a give-take relationship now; take the platforming fun, but give a much more active story and immersion. Now, on the other side of the spectrum, you’ve got a gripping story with a gripping plot, but you also have gaping holes that haven’t been patched. As I mentioned, there seems to be no rhyme or reason for some of the Final Fantasy character’s involvement. Again Cloud shows up, confused and bewildered, but as fierce as ever. His story has some backdrop this time, however, along with Cid’s, Yuffie’s, Leon’s (AKA Squall), Aerith’s and even Sephiroth’s. But some characters make appearances in this title that just don’t make sense. For example, Tifa pops in out of the blue for no apparent reason. Square Enix just likes the look of their characters in the game or something. Granted, it’s cool to see her, but the story did not invite her in when she appeared. It feels like you just need to accept that she’s there and will affect the story later somehow.
On the bright side, camera issues don’t plague this title…but that’s probably because there’s no platforming to necessitate many camera angles.
New worlds were an order that Square Enix could not put on the back burner. Included in the game are worlds from Pirates of the Carribean, Tron, Mulan, Timeless River (Steamboat Willy) and The Lion King. The new worlds are gorgeous, if fairly small. (The graphical splendor of this game doesn’t disappoint, especially in the FMV cut-scenes, though; those are few and far between. But the opening CG is fricking AMAZING!)
Each world is bright and colorful; just what you’d find from a Disney movie, including symbiotic musical scores and sound effects. In the instance of Timeless River, the world is all in black and white with the sweet, bumpy music Steamboat Willie is known for. Again Sora, Donald and Goofy take on the shapes (or costume) of creatures and characters you’d find in their respective worlds. The gang is dressed up in Halloween costumes when they visit Jack Skellington in Halloweentown (The Nightmare Before Christmas), and wear the lighted suits when visiting Tron. In Atlantica, they all once again take aquatic shapes.
Quick note about Atlantica: it sucks. It should’ve been removed altogether from the game since there are zero action sequences and no places to explore. All you get is singing and button pressing to the tune. I wouldn’t even bother going there, but you’re rewarded for finishing the mini-games. Even Halloweentown is scaled down too far to be nothing more than a place to show off Tim Burton’s work once again.
Port Royal (Pirates of the Caribbean) takes away the cartoony formula of the rest of worlds and makes it look realistic. It does a pretty good job, I’d say. The character models are rendered quite nicely and accurately, even having some pretty good voice casting (sadly, Johnny Depp didn’t voice Jack Sparrow). It’s a little grainy but you can’t complain. But Sora and gang’s appearance—along with Nobodies and Heartless—look so out of place in Port Royal that you almost wonder why they added it. Oh wait, I know why! Because Jack Sparrow rules! [It’s actually to try and get more girl gamers – Brendon]
We all remember the melodramatic journeys between the worlds—Gummi ships. While it was definitely a good idea that broke up the gameplay nicely, the end result was about as much fun as Hypercolor t-shirts from the 80’s. Square Enix decided to keep the Gummi ship side-games in Kingdom Hearts II, but with some changes. Bravo, I say! Bravo! The new system is a 3D rail shooter very similar to Panzer Dragoon Orta. The Gummi ship can attack from the front, both sides, and the rear. They can also paint incoming targets (hold down the X button) to fire homing shots on top of your aimed fire.
Level 1 and 2 difficulties are set to auto-camera, but Level 3 makes you control it. Now, the building of new Gummi ships is still a little too involved for my taste, but the pre-built models have plenty of wallop and will get you through all the levels if your skills are with it. One downside I find is that I have a hard time locating incoming enemy fire from actual enemies (or my own fire) as there can be a lot happening on screen. Overall, though, the new Gummi ship system is almost worth the $50 price tag itself in comparison to the original.
What keeps Kingdom Hearts above mediocrity is presentation and allure. Between the awe-inspiring graphics, deep story, good amount of playtime (30+ hours) and Disney and Final Fantasy characters, the other flagrant elements to the game can almost be forgiven. Almost.
The lack of strategy and difficulty--and the lack of more RPG elements in Kingdom Hearts II--are disheartening. While it’s still a fun title with some worthy additions, a bit is left to be desired. Overall, the combat being too simplistic is the real killer.
Pick it up and give it a shot, because it's still a game with plenty to keep you entertained due to the high production value and obvious amounts of time put into it. It just could've used some refinement, as we were all expecting.
| The Core Score |
Overall
8.5 |
| Fun |
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8 |
| Gameplay |
|
7.5 |
| Graphics |
|
9.5 |
| Audio |
|
9 |
| Replay |
|
7 |
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