Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep

"Behold! These lifeless keys used to be full of power united with the hearts of their masters. On this barren soil, Keyblades of Light and Dark were locked in combat as a great Keyblade War raged."

Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep was announced along with Coded and 358/ 2 days. Of the three games it was the only one I was interested in; mostly because of the secret movie at the end of Kingdom Hearts 2, but also because of the three games, birth by sleep was the only one that I felt showed the most promise. I would even go as far as to say that it’s my second favorite Kingdom Hearts game, (my first is and forever will be Kingdom Hearts). I love it so much in fact, that, looking at my save game data, I have played the game once every year (except in 2013 for some reason) since it came out in 2010. From the previews and trailers for this game I knew it would be good. I was hyped. I just didn’t realize it would be this good. Too Bad Square can’t make a Final Fantasy this good any more, or so it seems (please be wrong about Final Fantasy XV please be wrong about Final Fantasy XV etc.)

Unlike the other Kingdom Hearts games, this game is split into three scenarios with each of its three characters. Further, each scenario has its own ending. The game clearly wants you to play as Terra first; though in my first play through I played as Ven. I think the story makes more sense to play as Ven, then Terra than Aqua. She is the black sheep of the two, but became my favorite character in the end.  

The game starts out giving you control of Ven. After a short cut scene and an even shorter tutorial; you get to choose your player. What’s even better is that you can skip the tutorial all together.

Characters

Terra
voiced by Jason Dohring is best known for his role in Veronica Mars. The majority of the time all you hear are sound effects “Hoo, Haa, Yaa, Take that,” kind of stuff, which is fine, but when he starts talking, that’s when things go awry. Some of his lines are delivered okay, especially near the end when he’s gone through so much. Terra says something like: “I fucked up Aqua, I fucked up real bad.” I may be paraphrasing there; it is an E10 rated game. At the beginning though, his voice was just bad. I mean no disrespect to him, and

when I say bad I don’t mean like Areis in Kingdom Hearts 2, but it wasn’t good. Having to spend so much time with the character you are able to overlook some of it though, and as I said, it does get better near the end. Either that or I just stopped listening after a while.

Terra spends the entire game searching for “the boy in the mask” but never once comes across him. Instead he finds Master Gezernort Xehanort. Xehanort tells Tarra to embrace the darkness, and Tarra is “stupid and helps him do it.” Admittedly while Tarra does “embrace” the darkness, it’s nothing like how Riku embraces the darkness in Kingdom Hearts. Tarra tried to fight it the entire time, where as Riku truly wholly embraces it. But whatever, it is what it is.

Ven or Ventus is voiced by Jessie Macarthy, you know, Roxas, just look at him. So Roxas Ven starts out in the tutorial. He is there when Aqua and Terra battle for the title of master. When the fight is over Ven runs to his room where he meets the boy in the mask who tells him that Terra is leaving. Ven runs out side just in time to catch up to Terra. When Terra leaves, so does Ven. After visiting his first world, Cinderella’s world I believe, he is hooked. Ven continues world hopping in order to make friends. He pretty much forgets all about the others until he reaches Radiant Garden. There, Terra tells him to get lost and Aqua tells him to go home. Instead, he visits more worlds. After a visit to Neverland Ven is forcibly taken to Master Xehanort who tells Ven the truth of his existence. Which isn’t good to say the least. In the end Ven decides that the best way to win is for him to give up. Venitus forces his hand and the two fight. This is the only part of the game that bothers me. This final fight is forced upon you. It’s a QuickTime event. You have three buttons you can press, one of which continues to change so you can never get it, and another one that wants you to rotate the tiny thumb stick in a circle. This wouldn’t be so bad if your hand wasn’t cramping up from moving the character and failing at this stupid QTE five times already. In the end Ven’s scenario pretty much ends how the game begins.

Aqua voiced by Willa Holland, you know Green Arrow’s sister in Arrow, yeah that girl. When I first saw that you could play as a girl I had mixed feelings. I thought her voice actor was going to be the weakest in the game. Turns out I was very wrong. Not only was her voice one of the strongest in the game, but I pretty much fell in love with her. What’s more, after watching Arrow, My love for the character is even stronger. So anyway, she goes to try and get Ven back but instead runs into Terra who she fears is coming too close to the darkness inside him. She goes to the worlds and has to deal with what Terra has left behind. I do so like how the scenarios of these characters criss-cross through the game. When the three finally meet again Aqua confronts Terra and pisses him off. She then has to look for him again. When at last she sees him, Terra is upset that he “accidently” killed the master, oops. That’s when all hell breaks loose. Aqua has to beat Venitus, then she has to find a safe place for Ven, then she has to find Terra, and in the process gets stuck in the realm of darkness for ten years. God I love her story.

Master Eraqus is voiced by the spectacular Mark Hamill. He does a great job voicing his characters always. The only downside to his character is that we only see him for a short time, at the beginning, and then near the end. His role in the game is minimal at best. He acts as a father figure to Tarra, Aqua and Ven. In the beginning. He helps Aqua learn the ropes after she becomes a master. In the end he tries to stop Ven, and ends up being struck down. Poor Mark Hamill, even as a good guy, his character always ends up dead. He just can’t get a break.

Master Xehanort voiced by Leonard Nimoy. Okay hold on a minute. Mark Hamill, the voice of the Joker, evil in carnet is the good guy and Leonard Nimoy, Mister Spok, mister “live long in prosper,” is the villain. WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD!? Leonard Nimoy does a great job with voice acting though. His villain voice is quite menacing. Fun fact, this was supposed to be Leonard Nimoy’s final job before retiring, but he loved the series so much that he said he wants to continue voice acting. Yay! Another reason to love Kingdom Hearts, now if only they could get Christopher Lee and Leonard Nemoy in the same game. I would probably die of a heartattack. Xehanort baits Tarra into believing he is a better voice actor then Leonard Nimoy is, making Jason Dorhing talk more. When Tarra talks he messes things up and in the end Xehanort takes advantage of him. He takes control of Tarra’s body to become the new Xehanort. Quit a unique way to gain immortality if you ask me.

Venitus at the risk of spoilers I will tell you that this character is voiced by Haley Joel Osment. This is one of the reasons why I believe the player should play as Ven first. Maybe I just wasn’t thinking about it but I had no idea that this was Haley until the end credits when it told me as much. If you play as Terra, who never sees the boy in the mask, save for the first time at the beginning, then you lose that what the fuck moment. That and it makes perfect sense when you finally see his face at the end, which I won’t spoil but probably just did. This kid tries to kill Aqua on several occasions. In the end he finally reveals that the unversed we have been killing are all a part of him. This makes Ven mad and the two share a QTE together.

Zack Fair is voiced by Rick Gomez best known for his role in Justified. His role in the game is the only Final Fantasy character featured. He is featured briefly in every scenario. Apparently Tetsuya Nomura wanted a character from Final Fantasy that was “older” and that people hadn’t seen yet, so naturally he went to Final Fantasy VII. Someone like the warriors of light or Firion from Final Fantasy I or II (respectively) were just too old. Zack is much better. Unless President Rufus or Hojo or Red XIII, or Vincent Valentine, or Barrett Wallace (as a real character, not a shop owner like in KH2. Of course his gun arm might be too dangerous, better turn it into a less dangerous cross bow.) Or maybe even Jenova. Those characters have yet to be used. Otherwise I think Nomura has pretty much exhausted his Final Fantasy VII Characters. He’ll find a way to suck more milk out of FFVII though I grantee it. He always does.

 Disney characters are the one thing that you can always count on in a Kingdom Hearts game. This game is no different. I will not sit here and name them all off. I will say that all the worlds are new in the game, with the acceptation of the coliseum and Radiant Garden, but they are all ten years younger in this game. So that’s something nice. As before I don’t think there is a bad Disney voice in the whole game. All the characters are voiced by their original Disney voices, as far as I know. Pleakley from Lilo & Stich was supposed to appear in the game as well but was cut out for unknown reasons, tough break mate.

 Disney Villians

Surprisingly there are very few. Pete returns, as well as Maleficent, and her lackeys, which is nice. She also voices the Queen, and Lady Tremaine of Cinderella. The only other villain is Dr Jumba Jookiba of Lilo & Stich and he’s not very villainous. Still, he does a wonderful job. Oh yeah, and Captain Hook. Nearly forgot about him. It’s easy to do when all he really does is talk smack and run away like a little chickenshit to fire cannon balls at you.

Mickey Mouse

is now voice by Bret Iwan. He does such a good job that I can hardly tell the difference. King Mickey first appears in Ven’s scenario I believe. He helps you fight in Radiant Garden before he vanishes with his star shard. If memory serves he then fights alongside Aqua, in the end battle. After that he takes her to see Yensid and they discuss Kingdom Hearts 3

Sadly, not in such detail as I would like, but at least it’s something. In the end Mickey goes back home with Donald and Goofy. Before that, however, he returns the star shard to Yensid and is deemed Master. That or Yensid just really hates Mickey’s keyblade, whichever. 

Unversed this creature is actually a heartless, but I’ll explain that in a moment. Unversed are, like heartless. The lesser enemies of the game aren’t too bad. They can come in really irksome forms though, like the one who can only be attacked from the back but traps himself in a corner all the time forcing you to attack his front so that he can go kamikaze on you. Another really irksome unversed are those damn birds that just won’t come down, or those cabbages that just throw shit and confuse you. Most of the other unversed are all really fun to fight. There are even some that drop flavors that you will have no idea what to do with until half way through the game when you go to Disney Town, but won’t have enough variety to do anything with so will just give up on it. I think I have only ever made one flavor and it gave me something to replenish my D-Link, which you can do in battle anyway, so there’s no need really. Now, the heartless above is not featured in the original game. It is called Red Eye, and it only appears in Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep Final Mix++. Fortunately we are getting Final Mix in America now, so I will get to fight him. I have to say he/she reminds me of Atma Weapon from Final Fantasy VI.  I wonder if that was intentional.

Places

There were some levels that were, unfortunately nixed from this game. A level based on the Jungle book was one of them. Personally, I would love a level based on that movie. I have wanted one since Deep Jungle. That was one of my favorite levels in the first game, despite some of its faults. I hope they find a way to fit it into the game in the future. Please Square, for me. Anyway, I digress. In this game each character begins the game at a different location. I don’t remember the order so I’ll just do it in whatever order I please. To start, is the place where everyone begins apply named:

Land of Departure

This places acts as the tutorial level. Should you choose to play it (you can skip it if you desire) you will be shown a basic tutorial on how to lock on and attack things. The tutorial is basic and to the point. It’s a nice change of pace from the tedium that is Kingdom Hearts II and Kingdom Hearts 358/ 2 days tutorial. To be frank though, there really isn’t a lot to do here. And once your characters depart (also why it’s called that) they almost never return. When they do it’s only briefly. Each character leaves for different reasons, of course. Terra leaves to find out what’s happening to the other world upon Master Eraqus’s request. The master tells Terra that should he succeed then he to can become a master. Ventus leaves because he gets a visit from Venitus and wants to talk to Terra about it, and Aqua leaves to try and find Ven. And that’s the level. That is until Mark Hamill’s character dies . . . again.

Dwarf Woodlands

While the woodlands do appear in the other characters escapades here, Terra never actually sets foot in the woodlands. His adventures take him into the castle, where he meets the queen. He plays the role of the huntsman in this story (once again conjoining story of movie and game like the first Kingdom Hearts) but fails to do so when he meets Snow White. Terra saves her from the monsters that appear and goes back to the queen to break her mirror and gain 10 years bad luck. Ven comes later to find the dwarves, who he has to catch, and then he saves Snow White from the evil forest. Before the end of the game he stupidly gives an old woman an apple. Aqua comes after Snow White has bitten into it. She has to go to the queen and break the newly refurbished mirror, gaining 10 years bad luck. Somewhere along the line she finds Prince Charming and takes him to Snow White so he can break the spell.   

Enchanted Dominion

Terra’s time here is pretty minimal actually. He comes in right at the forest outside of the castle. Terra enters the castle and finds Sleeping Beauty. He steals her heart, via Maleficent’s influence, fights an unversed, and leaves. The player is invited to come back whenever he or she wants, but unless you have to 100% the game then there is really no point. It’s sad though because the music is wonderful, but more on that later. Ven comes later and the three fairies show him the way to Maleficent where we actually get to fight her again WOOOOO! It’s pretty hard actually. Once she is defeated Ven is able to set  Aurora’s heart free, but all is not well. Aqua comes. She meets Ven here and tells him to get his ass home. Ven ignores her of course and leaves to go to other worlds. Meanwhile Aqua has a chat with Maleficent and ends up in the dungeons with Philip. The two of them bust out and put an end to Dragon Maleficent and free princess Aurora.  

Castle of Dreams

 Ven is the first to visit the place. He takes the place of the fat mouse from the movie (Gus Gus). With Jaq’s help the two of them make Cinderella a wonderful dress so she can go to the ball, though not before a fight with Lucifer the cat. Terra arrives just as Cinderella has been stripped of her clothes. She is crying and naked . Terra helps her up and makes her believe, and in doing so Cinderella’s fairy godmother appears and gives her a new dress. From then on Terra acts as Cinderella’s escort into the ball. There he finds out that the conductor of the band has turned into an unversed and puts an end to him , thus ending the dance. As Terra is leaving Aqua is just arriving. She takes the place of escort for Cinderella. When she arrives at the house she helps Jaq, via Fairygod mother magic, to free Cinderella. While she makes herself presentable, Aqua stalls, nearly getting hitched to the prince by accident when the glass slipper fits her instead, oops.

Radiant Garden

Here Terra comes in and finds an unversed almost at once. He goes after it and is stopped by Merlin who forces him to go into his house where some yellow bear wants to play. Terra tells the bear to fuck off and continues after the unversed. He finds it and, with his friends help, destroys it. Aqua and Ven both confront Terra and make him angry. He runs a way where he meets Xigbar now called Briag or something, whatever, Terra goes Incredible Hulk on his ass and puts him in his place. When Ven tries to confront him again Terra spits in his face and leaves. When Ven arrives in town he is stopped by Scrooge Macduck who gives him passes to Disneyland because, well, hell I don’t know who wouldn’t want a free pass to Disneyland? So anyway Ven continues down the street and is stopped by Merlin who forces Ven to go into his house and talk to a yellow bear who wants to play. Ven tells the bear to fuck off and goes all the way up to the castle gates where he meets Xaldin aka Dilan and Lexious aka Lousie or something. They tell him he

can’t enter. Ven then sees the unversed and goes after it. He confronts Terra, ignores Aqua, then meets Axel aka Lea and Siax aka Isa. While Isa is on the fence about any new friends Lea becomes friends with Roxas Ven right away, as if you didn’t see that coming.

Aqua starts out at the castle gates where she meets King Mickey. She helps him fight some unversed. Then Kiari comes out and touches the keyblade, thereby in inadvertently becoming a keyblade wielder. Aqua then sees the unversed and chases after it. Merlin stops her and forces her into his home where a yellow bear wants to play. Aqua tells the bear to fuck off and continues after the unversed. Once she gets there all three parts join into one and she Terra and Ven dismantle it. Aqua tells Ven to leave and for some reason thinks that he listens to her.

Olympus Coliseum

Finally the “audience” thing makes sense. The coliseum is on Mt. Olympus. The town below is Thebes, though we don’t see much of it. The coliseum story is pretty much the same. The only difference is that Terra represents West Side and Aqua represents East Side. The two of them partake in the tournament in which they must defeat the enemies within the time limit. That’s where Zack comes in under Hades influence, and tires to kill them. Poor Zack is too easily influenced by Hades because the same thing happens when he sees Terra. Ven comes in to help young Herc train. Phil sees this and says “screw you guys I’m going home.” Ven and Herc go after him and both save him from some unversed. Zack comes in like a blister and cracks some jokes. When you leave Zack is your new friend even though Ven saw him maybe twice, for 60 seconds, for about 15 minutes of the level.

Disney Town

This place is paying homage to Toon Town in Disneyland for the less fortunate people who never got to go as a child. There are some similarities here and there, but it’s mostly different to cater to the game. Here Aqua is forced to play fruit ball, which can actually be fun, Terra is forced to race, which can actually be fun, and Ven is forced to make ice cream which can actually be THE MOST INFURIATING SHIT IN THE HISTORY OF INFURIATING SHIT. If you do not get a perfect score in this game you cannot progress. The game does a shit job of explaining it to you as well. Anyway I digress. After all the “forced” work is done Terra, Aqua, and Ven all end up in alternate dimensions where they are at the “million dreams award ceremony”. Each one has to accept the award on the others’ behalf. Pete shows up and Queen Minnie sends him to Hell (plot hole: in KH2 it is stated the Mickey sends Pete here) where Maleficent resides. They join forces and capture the Princesses of heart. See KH1. After that’s all done we get

to finally explore. There is a whole lot to explore here. Especially in Pete’s rec room. There are also some strategically placed items that are a pain in the ass to get. Why?

1. Jump off top of building to reach item, fall to ground.
2. Run all the way back to sewer and climb through again
3. Fall off gears and have to climb back up
4. Make it to Pete’s rec room and try to get yourself up
5. Jump off building while standing on boxes, move in wrong direction and miss, fall to ground
6. Repeat step 2
7. Repeat step 3
8. Repeat step 4
9. Finally make it to item and realize there is more to get.
10. Repeat step 2
11. Repeat step 3
12. Repeat step 4
13. Make it all the way to other side. Fight unversed and fall off ledge
14. Repeat step 2
15. Repeat step 3
16. Repeat step 4
17. Repeat step 5
18. Give up

This is a place that shouldn’t really be touched until your characters have gained all of his or her abilities. Also it should be pointed out that Aqua has the best skills. Terra and Ven MUST start the gears. Aqua can jump onto them without starting them, but ONLY if you wait to get all her abilities first.

Deep Space

Let’s see if I can recall this from memory. In Terra’s scenario he meets Doctor Jumba Jookiba who convinces him that his creation Stitch needs to be fixed. When Stitch steals Tarra’s friendship keychain (like a friendship bracelet but goes on at the end of a keyblade {kind of like Kiari’s charm on the end of the keyblade oathkeeper in Kingdom Hearts 1}) so anyway, Terra gets all up in arms and goes after Stitch. Once he finds Stitch he comes to the realization that the guy isn’t all that bad. In fact, all he wants is a friend. So Terra befriends him after defeating Experiment 221 or Sparky. Stitch remembers Terra’s name, and Terra decides that it’s okay to leave. Enter Aqua. She meets up with Captain Gantu, and is taken to the Grand Councilwoman, who sentenced Stitch to be imprisoned. But not before meeting Stitch who has made himself his own star charm aka friendship bracelet. Aqua goes to find Stitch and ask him about it. She convinces the Grand Councilwoman to let her do it. When the captain finds out he goes mad and tries to stop you. Aqua has to stop him. The Grand Councilwoman gets angry at the captain for disobeying orders and Stitch now remembers Aqua’s name. So when Ven arrives, Stitch is saying the names of his friends. After that he is helping Ven defeat an Unversed. Then Stitch is captured, but escapes and leaves for Kingdom Hearts 3 hopefully.

Neverland

Believe it or not this game has Neverland in it. I don’t mean just some islands close to Neverland, or Captain Hook’s ship, or even London, I mean really, really Neverland. It’s got the Indian camp, and Peter’s hide out, and Mermaid Lagoon, and even Skull Rock, which was in Kingdom Hearts 358/2 days but only as a background prop. It also has Rainbow Falls. I really love this world. Mostly because of Aqua’s awesome new ability, the triple jump. This is another reason why she is the best character in the game. Remember all that crap from Disney Town? Yeah she can bypass that. You don’t even have to start the damn gears up, you just jump on them. I love you Willa . . . I mean Aqua . . . okay I love you both. So story, Terra is once again tricked by Captain Hook to look for the evil Peter Pan, who turns out not to be such a bad kid after all. I’m beginning to see a pattern here with Terra. Aqua is here for some reason, I think she ends up as an escort through the Rainbow Falls, where she finds out that Peter may seem like a douch bag, but he actually does care about his Lost Boys. Note, that there are only two of the lost boys here. The other ones must be, well, lost. After that she fights Venitus.

Ven comes here to make friends. Apparently he is no longer friends with Aqua or Terra. So he helps the pirates seek out the treasure (which Terra helps Hook find in his Scenario). Oh, and naturally, Ven learns to fly. Here I would also like to say that I love Ven’s ability to dodge roll, air dash (which is quick run from KH2 but in the air), double jump, then fly off a cliff or building. I would love it if in KH3 we got a dodge roll, air dash, triple jump, and then fly off a building, that would be crazy.

Mysterious Tower

This is the dwelling place of Master Yensid. He is Mickey’s instructor and probably the oldest Sorcerer/ Keyblade Master in the game. Though he doesn’t quite look as old as Geezehnort. Tarra, Aqua and Ven all come here for various reasons, all story related, which means there really isn’t much done here. Terra comes here early in the game to Talk with Master Yensid about Venitus. Yensid doesn’t have a clue. Ven comes here by accident via Mickey’s star shard thing. Aqua comes here with an injured Mickey to learn that the master has been struck down, poor Mark Hamill. Aqua comes here one more time at the end of the game but leaves soon after with a now totally krunk Ven.

Keyblad Grave Yard aka The Badlands

This place starts off being called the Badlands. Ven and Terra come here when it is called such, though I believe that Terra comes here upon Xehnort’s request. Xehanort wants him to embrace the darkness. Ven comes here by accident, but finds Xehanort waiting for him. It is here you learn of Ven and Vanitus’s origins. As the Keyblade Grave Yard Terra, Aqua, and Ven all meet here. It is in the Keyblade Cross roads where Aqua confronts Terra about the death of Mark Hamill saying something like “he already died in Batman Arkham City and in Darksiders and in why did you have to kill him in this game too?” That’s when Ven shows up. Aqua and Terra both want to protect him but he tells them “Just put an end to me.” Remember the cut scene at the end of Kingdom Hearts 2 and Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix+? Of course you do. Well that happens here. The result is: Terra loses his body to Xehanort, Ven loses his heart to Sora (somehow) and Aqua ends up having to save the day. End game . . . But wait there’s more! If you play the game on normal, or hard, then you get a special ending. To get it you must go through the game and collect everything (hence why Disney Town can be so tedious) and why it’s important to do it. Yes you can play the game on hard and get it anyway, but getting all the stuff around the levels is pretty rewarding so it’s worth it in the end. So do all that and you are treated to a “Final Episode” in which Aqua takes Ven back home. There, it is revealed that The Land of Departure is Castle Oblivion. The scene explains that Master Eraqus told Aqua, after she became master, that if anything should happen to him, she needs to take his keyblade and lock the world up. Anyone who enters the castle from that point on will “find to lose and lose to find”. He actually says they will catch amnesia, but Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories says otherwise. So Aqua puts Ven here and locks the place up. Then she sets out in search of Terra. There is only one little problem. Terra isn’t Terra anymore. Xehanort took over his body so that he could live forever. Now Aqua has to fight him. She hits him so hard in fact that Terrahnort loses his memory. When Terra begins to fall into darkness, Aqua saves him, locking herself into the world of darkness, ending the game, or does it? So after you beat the game on Final Episode, you get another scene. It is located in the archives, where all the in game videos are stored. It is called “blank pages” and it ties everything together. We see Xehanort as Ansem’s apprentice. We see all the other scientists, and guards who will become Nobodies in the future, and we see a young Sora and Riku. Sora listens to the ocean and hears Ven calling out to him, somehow.  Ven asks Sora to hold his heart. Sora says “yeah okay” and does it. In the mean time, time passes, Sora defeats Ansem and Xemnas and Aqua ends up, finally on the dark shores of Kingdom Heart 2. There she finds Ansem the Wise voiced, sadly, by Corey Burton. He does a fine job to be sure, but is no Christopher Lee.

Mirage Arena

I nearly forgot about this place. To be fair though this place isn’t a real level. It is here only for the purpose of entertainment. When you first arrive you are prompted with a load of questions. After that’s done, you get to enter. Depending on how soon you decide to come there’s really not much to do. As you progress in the game, however, more events become attainable. Disney Town racing, for example, can be completed here once you unlock it in the game. Another thing to do is come here for the epic battles. Much like in the first Kingdom Hearts game, you can come to this arena and just fight enemies. What’s more, you not only level up for it, but you are rewarded very handsomely. The arena is what makes this game so fun, and it’s what keeps me coming back. You can even fight extra bosses, much the way Kingdom Hearts had. The bosses are insanely hard, as they are meant for group fighting, but Nomura has said he will tone down the difficulty when final mix is brought to America. Speaking of final mix coming to America, it looks like we get a Monstro fight, which was not in the original game either. Neat. The only other thing to do in the Mirage Arena is the command board game. Though I try my best not to do that. The game board is like a board game, only stranger. You get a new game board for each level you visit, aside from the Badlands or the Keyblade Graveyard. To use the game board you must sacrifice your commands for moves. Once you get a certain number of points you can finish the game. It sounds easy enough, but I gave up when I lost to Pete in the Disney Town game three times. I’m pretty sure he cheats somehow. If you win though, you can get some cool attacks. I think if you beat Pete you can also get a Dlink with him, though I’ve never won so I can’t be sure.

 

Okay, now that that’s all done onto the Gameplay

When I first heard that the Okanawa team was going to be responsible for this game, I was a bit worried. My horrible memories of the card deck from Chain of Memories came rushing back to me, specifically the ones with Larxene and Riku. I am glad to say that they did not disappoint this time. Unlike in Chain of Memories this game did not require you to have a card to attack. Really you can go through the entire game and never equip a deck. Why you would do that is beyond me but I don’t know, maybe on a dare. So anyway the decks in this game are mostly “special moves”. The ones you start out with are the elements, like Fire, Earth, Air, Water, etc. As you go through the game you acquire more. Even better are your, “charge modes” or whatever they are called. If you say, use fire on an enemy and raise up the combo bar above the command menu, your character will use the FireStorm ability, in which they become surrounded in fire and beat the ever-loving hell out of everyone. Further into the game you can even use different spells within these modes and “charge” even further. It’s a really cool concept and I’m glad they brought it into the game. Another similar mode is the D-Link mode, which teams you up with the friends you have made in each level. So for example, after meeting Snow White you can D-Link with her.

The attacks she uses are based on the seven dwarves. This feels very reminiscent of the Drive Form in Kingdom Hearts 2. It even builds up in a similar fashion. The other thing, strictly new to this game is the Focus attacks.  They use a bar, also similar to the drive form bar, but instead of changing into a new form, it uses a lock on feature. This will attack all surrounding enemies. It’s very useful to end boss fights quickly, or to fight enemies under a strict time limit OLYMPUS. Then of course there are the command decks themselves. in your deck. You don’t have to remember any card combinations. You can even combine moves to create entirely new moves. Really, the system in this game is spot on. It’s so fun to just create new moves and abilities. The amount of things you can do is astronomical. This is one of the many reasons why this game is so good. Just playing with the different combinations of abilities is enough to keep you interested for hours. 

In the game there are, of course, treasures to collect as well. Each level is riddled with them. As you play through the game you will also notice something else. There are small crowns littered all over the place. Now in Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix+ these were pieces to puzzles you had to solve in order to gain special items. In this game, the crown pieces are not puzzles, but stickers. While they are fun, and you get some cool stuff from them, I can’t help but wonder if Square thought that, maybe, the west wouldn’t be able to solve those complicated puzzles, so prompted for sticker collecting instead. It is what it is I suppose, no harm no foul. As I said, you get cool stuff for doing them, so it’s worth it. Sticker collection wasn’t in the original game when it came out in Japan. I like when Square does that, but only if the Final Mix gets put out in America and in Japan.

Sound and stuff

The music and sound in this game is great. All the voice actors do a great job, minus Terra. The music in the game is wonderful as well. My favorite track is the Enchanted Dominion. It’s so wonderful that when I arrive, I don’t want to move, just so I can listen to the piece. The intro is, you guessed it, Simple and Clean. By now the song has been engraved into everyone’s head. I cannot say anything bad about it. This is every side story Kingdom Hearts game go to song. It really sounds like Square might have conjoined the words of this song with the music of Passion from Kingdom Hearts 2. I don’t know maybe I’m wrong. You decide. Also, there is something I would like to point out from the original trailer. At the end of Kingdom Hearts 2, in the secret movie, we see, Terra standing. What the hell is he standing on and why don’t I remember fighting it? That’s not fair Square, that’s not fair!

To Conclude

Much as the first Kingdom Hearts game there is nothing truly bad I can say about Birth by Sleep. The Okanawa team did a great job. They have even worked on Kingdom Hearts 3ds Dream Drop Distance, which is also a great game, so I’ve been told. But since I have no 3ds or 2ds which is the same thing without the 3d effects, and have no intent on getting one as I barely use the Nintendo DS nor the PSP that I have now. Why the hell would I want to shell out $100 for another console only for it to collect dust? Besides, It’s coming out on the ps4 which I intend to get for other games, so I can wait.

sources

all pictures are taken from the internet, I don't remember where. If you see one, and it's yours, let me know and I'll add you to the list.

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