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Kingdom Hearts 2 Review
Fans have been waiting for the release of Kingdom Hearts 2 for quite awhile and it’s no surprise considering the success of the original and its Game Boy Advance side story. The combination of Square-Enix and Disney can at first seem cheesy and ridiculous, but as the original game proved, the combination is oddly fitting. Putting players in a universe where both the characters of Square-Enix and Disney co-exist, the adventures of Sora, Donald Duck and Goofy are more engaging than your typical game. The game's world map is split up into different themed worlds that span numerous Disney movies and within them, characters like Aladdin, Mulan and Hercules grace your screen. Kingdom Hearts and now its sequel is definitely aim at pleasing a wide range of ages, and while its gameplay isn't anywhere near being the most sophisticated, its engaging and intuitive enough to enhance an experience that is often more about the sights, sounds and story than gameplay depth.
The events of Kingdom Hearts 2 end after the storyline of the Game Boy Advance game Chain of Memories. The storyline is far more ambitious than in the original game as we follow Sora (and in the beginning another boy named Roxas) on an adventure to find his friends and once again battle the heartless and a new enemy called the nobodies. It’s quite possible to play Kingdom Hearts 2 without having played the two games before it but it’s definitely more of a treat tailored to those who are versed in the previous events. What’s important to note is that the game follows Sora, but there are many different side storylines within the Disney worlds you visit. Some of the events in the Disney worlds mimic their corresponding movies, while others pick right off where Sora left them if he had visited them in the original game. Some of the worlds you will visit with Sora include Beast's Castle (Beauty and the Beast), Space Paranoids (TRON) and even Port Royale which is of course from the surprise hit Pirates of the Caribbean from 2003. Most interactions with the Square-Enix characters takes place in a world called Hollow Bastion which is an area you will visit quite a few times throughout the course of the game. Characters like Cloud, Tifa, Merlin, Stitch, Jack Skellington, Hades and Ariel make appearances as well as many many more. One of the most impressive aspects of the game is just how many voice actors Disney was able to dig up. Many of the original Disney talents reprise their roles for the game and actors like Rachel Leigh Cook, Mena Suvari and David Gallagher were brought in to voice the Square-Enix created characters. Haley Joel Osment returns (although of course sounding older) to voice Sora and overall, the quality of the dialogue and voice acting is superb throughout, with only a few of the Square-Enix characters getting a few bum lines. By combining the storytelling abilities of both Square-Enix and Disney, it’s no wonder that the story of Kingdom Hearts 2 is every bit as enchanting as their past projects (although by no means the best).
At its core Kingdom Hearts 2 is an action RPG. Those who played the original would know that you control Sora from the third person and attack the heartless with a special weapon called the Keyblade. By pressing the R1 button, Sora will lock on to a nearby enemy and be able to land some basic attacks and combos. Sora is also equipped with several magical spells such as the ability to utilize fire, water and lighting to wound his enemies. Combat is fairly simple and quite a few new options and features have been implemented. Sora now has a drive gauge which when charged (as you attack enemies) allows Sora to transform and gain extra strength, speed and abilities, not to mention some snazzy new clothing and dual keyblade wielding (which can be mixed and matched with the various keyblades you are awarded throughout the game). There are a few different forms and some are more useful than others, but charging up the drive gauge can take quite awhile if you don't have any replenishing potions, so it’s definitely wise to save it for the more dire situations. Sora once again has access to a few summon abilities which are basically Disney characters who show up to help him. They aren't as effective as they were in the original but it’s still nice to have them around. Sora can also swap out either Goofy or Donald when another Disney character offers to help you out. When playing with other Disney characters (and even with Donald and Goofy) Sora can initiate a special limit attack that often has Sora teaming up with another party member to do some serious damage while depleting his magic power. Overall Donald and Goofy are helpful but can sometimes make situations worse if the begin wasting the items and abilities you equip them with. You can tweak their behavior a bit and when it all comes down to it; they are more useful than they may initially seem (keeping in mind the whole time that you have no physical control over either of them).
Another new feature is the addition of the reaction commands. In certain situations when fighting an enemy (mostly bosses) a reaction command will pop up allowing you to perform a special attack or move by pressing the triangle button. The reaction commands are different for every enemy and their usefulness varies. One thing to keep in mind when playing the game though is that it’s often best to use the reaction commands too much, rather than not at all. Sometimes the reaction commands are vital to the defeat of a boss because they may trigger certain conditions. The feature itself is a bit flawed logically. It’s quite odd and annoying at times for Sora to gain some brand new powerful abilities that are only available when fighting certain monsters. With one enemy you can actually grab hold of its sword and use it against it, but other enemies with swords or weapons are missing that weakness completely. There is one particularly annoying boss battle that has you mashing on a reaction command called "Learn". What Sora is actually "learning" is never really stated and the visual effect of the ability is spastic, yet there really isn't any way to beat the boss without it. While it isn't that large of an issue, the reaction commands can sometimes make battles too simple and can also make you wonder why you even bother to actually use the keyblade when the menu will come to the rescue out of nowhere with some command that Sora can use and lose in seconds. Speaking of battles in general, the non-boss enemies that Sora and his pals face throughout the game are often well balanced. Sometimes an enemy may seem particularly difficult but it’s usually only because you haven't yet discovered the ability or combo that works best against it. Each of the worlds you enter places you on a linear path towards an inevitable boss battle. To reach each of the worlds you must pilot a Gummi ship along a path and open up a doorway to them. At this point the game loads into a space shooter mode that has you shooting through droves of mindless ships. The Gummi ship levels are much more fun than in the original game and the ability to create and customize your own ship has returned. Still, the Gummi ship battles often feel like a disconnect, pulling you away from the story, as none of those levels seem to have any impact on the plot.
Each of the characters that populate the Disney worlds has a set of problems that Sora and his friends offer to help with. The game worlds vary in size, but most of them are fairly small consisting of only a few "rooms" disguised as expansive environments. The worlds are fairly static and most are littered with chests that either give you synthesis items or maps of the surroundings. Enemies will spawn along as you move from area to area and in many situations you will be forced to defeat all the enemies around you before you can continue on. The boss battles of Kingdom Hearts 2 are the most exciting and sometimes most frustrating sections of the game. While most bosses seem intimidating at first, there is often an obvious weakness or reaction command that pops up as you go along. Towards the end of the game though, there are a few bosses that are very difficult to the point of ridiculousness. In some battles it feels like you were supposed to know exactly what to do before facing your enemy. Since of course you don't, some of these endgame battles you fight become repetitive tests of patience and trial and error. These battles prove to be annoying because the spikes in difficulty are drastic. You could be breezing through several hours of the game only to come up against a seemingly impossible boss. Once you finally defeat it, you find that the next few hours of the game return to being fairly simple. That may perhaps be one of the bigger complaints that Kingdom Hearts 2 will garner. The game is actually very simple and almost excessively so in parts. While there are a few tedious battles, the game itself isn’t all that difficult to get through. In fact, throughout the course of playing the game, I may have used Sora's spells less than twenty times. They aren't particularly vital and I actually only felt the need to upgrade Donald and Goofy's weapons once. Fairly simple or not, Kingdom Hearts 2 can last most people anywhere from 25 to 50 hours depending on how often you play and if you want to complete everything to unlock an extra special ending. Kingdom Hearts 2 isn't exactly the deepest action game available but it’s definitely fun throughout the adventure. Its RPG elements are much more subtle as battles often turn into bouts of hacking and slashing. By far the biggest improvement that Kingdom Hearts 2 shows off is a much improved camera that makes the game far less tedious and unforgiving than the first. It does still catch up on things in situations when you deal with fast moving enemies, but overall its far better than what we had to deal with before.
The original Kingdom Hearts was a great looking game. Its environments were often repetitive and sometimes bland, but they always managed to represent the Disney worlds almost perfectly. The character models are nothing short of amazing, especially during cut-scenes, although at times some characters look like they were tended to more than others. The amount of enemies Sora will face on screen at once has increased quite a bit and one battle in particular features a thousand enemies. The framerate was blazing fast for most of the adventure, slowing down only in some of the more visually crowded battles towards the end of the game. The environments are far more detailed and colorful this time although fairly empty aside from the main characters and enemies. Along with the bigger battles, droves of enemies and colors comes an increased display of sharp and impressive special effects, explosions and particles. It is also important to mention that the game starts off with an excellently animated cg opening. The Playstation 2 is pretty much knocking on the door of its limits, but Kingdom Hearts 2 manages to look better than its predecessor in several ways, namely in detail. The environments while polished graphically still feel a bit empty and lack much interactivity. Overall though, Kingdom Hearts 2 is a wonderfully colorful and detailed achievement by Square-Enix, ranking among the best looking games on the console.
Japanese pop starlet Utada Hikaru provides the title song (played during the opening scene) again with an awkward but catchy single called Sanctuary. The Japanese version titled "Passion" was a much better version of the song, although many will probably hold the song from the first game as their favorite. Aside from the game's main theme, the soundtrack is of excellent quality with some familiar Disney tunes mixed in with many original compositions. The game's soundtrack is slightly disappointing in that quite a few tracks sound exact or at least very similar to the soundtrack in the original Kingdom Hearts. It’s not much of a problem considering the original's soundtrack was excellent as well, but it would have been nice to get a little more variety.
If one things for sure, it’s that another sequel is inevitable. Bringing together the worlds and ideas of both Disney and Square-Enix was a risky undertaking, but along with this fusion of ideas came the mass fan followings from both companies that in turn made Kingdom Hearts as successful and popular as it is today. There is no doubt that Kingdom Hearts 2 will sell millions of copies and that regardless of its critical reception, fans will flock to it. So for anyone who actually does care what a reviewer thinks about Kingdom Hearts 2, I can honestly say it’s a really fun game that pulls you into its universe and takes you on a ride and enchants you not unlike the ever popular Disney World itself. It’s a memorable adventure that doesn't break any new or innovative ground, but succeeds in trying its best to make sure you are entertained. A little too easy in spots, a little less like an RPG and maybe not as original as before, but Kingdom Hearts 2 is definitely a colorful theme park trip worth taking.
Written by Joseph Bennett. Posted year 2006.
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Released on
March 28, 2006
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