Kingdom Hearts III Secret Game Report Part II - Ambivalent Worlds

Part 1

Yoraiko's Secret Game Report 3

Welcome back. By now, the frozen world has fallen. I also thought about the Toy Story-boss again, and he really isn't my beer. For me, he represents this polished and cleaned, yet soulless and shallow new design that the world bosses in Kingdom Heart III have. None of them is a BeautyAndTheBeast or TheLionKing-boss like the second game had them. The only exception so far with restrictions that I would draw for myself was the last frozen boss. It wasn't particularly memorable either, but visually so overwhelmingly staged that I can overlook it’s weaknesses.

Of course I still appreciated some of the Toy Story’s unique features. The fake-game trailer or the FF15 copy at the beginning of the world irritated me completely and I immediately checked whether it actually existed. A toy store in a video game always requires references, and this one delivered. The doll was an interesting boss. And I liked how vast the areas were.

But let’s talk about the Frozen world. While Tangled surprised me very positively and made me feel good with the game, Frozen was the, so far, biggest disappointment and left me confused, frustrated and also somewhat disgusted. Everything that goes wrong in Kingdom Hearts (3) comes together here. I don't lean too far out of the window when I say that Frozen was one of the worst worlds in the whole franchise for me. And I KNOW the movie. May the Lord show mercy to the poor souls which don't.

I don't know where to start, so I’ll choose the positive stuff, because there is not much to say. The graphics were insanely good in places and almost at the level of the movie. The fact that you got Michelangelo, that’s what I called the ice-titan, into the party was a fun fan service for fans. And Larxene was by far the best element for every fan of the organization, it is nice to see her again and she is still entertaining. In many moments she represents the player, almost breaking the third wall, and I really like listening to her. Outrageous and WhoGivesAFuck. I really hope that in the end she won't just be shredded away with a short fight like in part 2. If she doesn't show that Nobody’s can have personality, who possibly can?

The rest is not so positive. The world lacked any coherence. While Tangled had been minimized meaningfully, this world does not work either for movie connoisseurs nor for newbies.

- A Nordic ice world offers great graphic possibilities. But what do we get instead? Gray-blue, dark and similar, boring snowy landscapes. And a mushy, dark, dull snow castle. Which is only there because of Larxene. Thank you, Square Enix. But the important point is that we are in a Frozen world without Arendelle. That’s just an outrage. If you’re able to afford that much laziness you’ve done it. The only place that looked a little better was the frozen Forest.

- We don't get Elsa into the party, which would have offered so much potential with her ice powers. Instead, as in Tangled, her entire behavior is connected  to Sora & Co which explain her story for everyone. I had been looking forward to fighting with her, there goes that. Instead there is the ice block. Weak comfort. Elsa isn’t even allowed to be the last boss, but ... 'some guy'.

- If you don't know the film, you have absolutely no idea what's going on at any time. While the exclusion of the trolls is a matter of course and understandable, most of the scenes are cut confusedly together, Sora & Co. should actually have question marks over their heads all the time and the plot makes no sense. Sora has known Elsa for an hour and shouts something like "Elsa would never indulge in the dark!!", a random guy (Hans) carries Elsa and is immediately identified as evil. How? And what was that about 

Do you want to build a Snowman? Anna talks over it PERMANENTLY and then they just cut off the song after 1/3? WHAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!

Whaaaat? Am I playing a techdemo here? We don't know who Hans is, that Christopher has feelings for Anna, there is no chemistry between the protagonists and the Disney heroes. We don't understand why Anna ends up living or why she had gray streaks at all. I could go on, but you know what I mean. And I haven't returned to the world yet, but actually all areas should be new now, without snow and ice, right? I'm really excited ...

- The mini-games in classic Kingdom Hearts style were annoying and intrusive. While a friend of mine liked the hidden object game for Olaf, I couldn't get anything out of it. The scenes were funny, but I've seen this kind of thing too often in this franchise. The avalanche-avoid-laser-beams-of-death-game, on the other hand, was unfair and frustrating for both of us, because there is little you can do against the lasers and you have to play the game!

- Let it go. What was that about? Of course, I was initially happy because the graphics are so incredibly good, but here they had the chance to show new camera shots and perspectives, instead they adopt the original 1:1 frame per frame. So it's just a let it go in not quite as nice as the original. They probably wanted to show off their graphic- muscles, which had little effect for me. A flat copy and a missed opportunity.

- The world was boring and tough. And why is there such a fuss about Elsa’s icega?

One more thing: Seeing martial arts aqua calmed me down quite a bit. If I'm not going to be able to play her I'm seriously considering burning my retail version of the game and recording it.

Apparently the Disney Worlds in Kingdom Hearts 3 are Hit or Miss, so I won't burn down the whole game for this debacle, but it certainly didn't make me more euphoric. By the way, I simply flew around the ice castle in space. I really like the world map itself, but somehow it doesn’t kick me to really play it through.

I hope it gets better soon. It became clear to me when seeing Larxene  what a big fan of Organization XIII I am and how much I want to see more scenes with them. That's my main expectation for the game's story.

Yoraiko's Secret Game Report 4

Some time ago I continued playing KHIII. Unsurprisingly, the experience remains mixed. I have now arrived in Big Hero Six. I respond chronologically and in positive as well as negative parts divided to my impressions if someone wants to read it.

- What's going on with Ratatouille? What is going on with Sora. What the fuck. I had to briefly verbalize this to a friend when I arrived in this collection of minigames: This is Kingdom Hearts 3, the dramatic finale of the Xehanort saga, Aqua has been rotting in darkness for decades, the others still need to be saved, organization XIII is running wilde, we need to stop the Keyblade wars from breaking  out and but instead WE PREPARE EGGS AND MEAT !!!!!! 

Jesus Failking Christ.

That Sora lacks any seriousness so far is one thing, but that right here is beyond absurd. In one cut scene he still swears to save Aqua, Ventus and Roxas and then the future key swordsman and hero helps a rat in the kitchen while Aqua fights for her life. Great, great, that 's the content I bought Kingdom Hearts 3 for. That makes perfect sense. The mini-games are very funny, don't get me wrong. But what am I playing here right now?

- The Winnie Pooh world joins in immediately. I have to say that I never liked them in the previous parts, especially in part 2 with the annoying mini-games, it was a burden. This Winnie Pooh world here was a bad joke ... just a map, and all you do is this pearl mobile game-fake in different variations. Could it be any lazier and insolent? Of course we are happy to help with gardening, the others should take care of Aqua and Xehanort.

These two impressions have thus confirmed and set in stone that despite the serious history and climax status of KHIII, Square Enix does not want the game to be completely serious and purposeful, you still want the light atmosphere, the distractions and the light-heartedness, to pick up as many kinds of people as possible. For me, unfortunately, this only works to a very limited extent based on internal logic ...

+ The Mickey Mouse Easter Eggs are really creatively hidden. It's just a fetch quest, but it's fun to track them down.

- Of course, the Frozen world is still frozen. But it is even more inconceivable how all the NPCs were simply parked in front of the ice castle, which, like Arendelle, cannot be entered. That is incredible. Like a bad Indiegame. The longer I think about this world the angrier it makes me, but I find it satisfying that everyone, really everyone who has played KHIII hates this world.

The Pirates of the Caribbean World was something I really didn’t look forward to. I didn't like Pirates of the Caribbean in part 2 at all, which is mainly due to the significant style gap between realistic people and SoraDonaldGoofy. That was again the case here, and the empty desert area made me even less euphoric. Now that I am done with the world, I have to withdraw most of that. For me it is the second best world after Tangled.

Since Luxord I couldn't do much in Kingdom Hearts II, for me he was the weakest of all Nobody-characters. Now in part 3, something bad has happened to his face, but he gets a lot more depth and is even critical of the organization, which I find exciting. He also seemed very 'sensible' about the course of the world and I hope that something will be made of all of this.

- In the end, I found the flight mini-game more annoying than fun. I don't really know why anymore, since it was a bit ago, but basically it is the case that several possible levels (water, ship, air, ...) are pretended to be  part of the fight, but in the end it all comes down to fighting on the ship and this is very monotonous.

+ The port city is all I wanted from the KHIII worlds. You can walk on all roofs, it's huge, it looks terrific, you can swim underwater and out to the sea, lots of lively NPCs, there's a lot to discover, it's so open and all in all a little bit more successful than Tangled City, even if there isn't a great mini-game here.

+ The ship or the sinking ships-battlegame is effective and spectacular, can be really fun and developed into a grandiose experience, the huge open sea with islands and everything is just as successful, although the ship battles tend to be too easy, that wasn’t the case anymore in the important scenes and with red ships. All of that was an effect-firework for shining eyes. The only thing I missed for perfection was one last, huge ship battle in which that Pirates of the Caribbean theme plays for the grand finale. But still, a great feature. Great mini game. 

Of course there were other weaknesses and shortcomings in the world and the mini-game, the story was absurd again and I didn't care at all, but overall I was pleasantly surprised even though I don't like the franchise. I can’t get it in my head that such a world exists next to one like Frozen. How great Frozen could have been if the same team had worked on it ... hopefully I'll be lucky again at BH6. I really liked the film.

+ The scene with Lea and Kairi was very nice again. What bothers me about the whole thing is that you haven't seen any of this ominous training, let alone that you could have played parts of it yourself. That would have been an awesome thing: Before each of their scenes, you play a short training session with Axel or kairi between Sora's adventures. What a welcome change that would have been! But no, instead you get stuck again on Sora (And Riku), while there are so many potential characters to play with ...

+ The scene in front of the mansion in Twilight Town, in which the Nobody’s attack Xehanort, was surely staged with Evan. But nevertheless, certain scenes, dialogues and hints make me wonder whether there is yet another internal uprising against Organization XIII in the making. I am thinking primarily of Marluxia, Larxene and Luxord. It is not likely, but one can hope.

All of the games remains difficult to rate. The core story will decide everything in the end. I’ll stay thrilled for now.

If you have any feedback, please let me know.

Until the next report.

- Yoraiko