"Darkness becomes light, light falls into darkness."

Kingdom Hearts 3D Dream Drop Distance a.k.a 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue Dream Drop Distance 0.2 A Fragmented Passage X Black Cover now these titles are just getting ridiculous. During the making of “Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep” Square-Enix realized that the team who normally made the game was STILL working on “Final Fantasy XV” and that they wouldn’t have the game done for another four years. As a result, Square decided to make, yet another, spin off game. This time for the Nintendo 3DS. It wasn’t until four years later (and two Kingdom Hearts Remakes later) that they finally decided to remake this one as well.
    “Kingdom Hearts 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue” comes packaged with “Dream Drop Distance” “Birth by Sleep 0.2 A Fragmentary Passage” and “Unchained Black Cover” the last being a movie of the Unchained mobile game.  I am writing this just for KH DDD though, as it is a much bigger game. With a lot more characters.

 What is not a dream by day to him whose eyes are cast.

 Sora is, once again, voiced by Haley Joel Osment. In this game he is more focused on making friends then he is actually figuring out how to wake up the worlds, though let’s be honest, we learned in the second game that Sora suffers from ADHD. That explains why he always forgets what he’s doing the minute he enters a new world. We also learned in the second game that Sora’s education is a bit lacking, probably because he always falls asleep in class. At any rate, in this game Sora is, well, he’s not bright. He has gotten older since the second game, and I like that his voice reflects that. There are some interesting choices of words in battle that Sora says as if with an accent, almost as if taunting the enemy. I really like it though whether or not it was intentional I’ll never know. So, anyway, Sora in this story is plagued by a Young Xenort who follows him to almost every world. It’s revealed later in the game that he wants to use Sora to for his narcissistic scheme of creating a world of Xenorts.

 Riku, still voiced by David Galligher, is a much more sophisticated master than Sora. Characters seem to understand this and tell him what’s going on, while with Sora, they just talk about him making friends, which seems to be the only thing he knows how to do. It’s with Riku we learn that Sora is in danger and that he has to save him. In fact, without knowing it, Riku becomes Sora’s Guardian “DreamEater” without realizing it. The two of them travel the worlds semi-simultaneously and work together to wake them up. Then, of course Sora falls asleep again and Riku has to wake him up so that they can go back to the islands and wait patiently for “Kingdom Hearts III” to finally come out.

 Goofy, Donald and Mickey: While featured, they take much more of a back seat role this time, mostly appearing in cut scenes through out, and only really near the end do they start showing up again. By now I think we can expect pretty good quality work when it comes to voice acting in this game. I don't really have much else to say about them, sad to say.



Moogle(s): These little guys are all that remains of the Final Fantasy characters that were once so prevalent in this game. In the past, Final Fantasy characters like Cloud or Squall were only really in Kingdom Hearts in order to help it sell more copies. Now that the game can stand on its own two feet, Square seems to want to keep the two separate. Personally liked the cameos of the characters and I hope to see a return in the future, but if that's not the path Square chooses to go, then I'm okay with that too. With the exception of Squall their stories in Kingdom Hearts 2 were steaming piles of horse shite. If Square is going to have more Final Fantasy characters in the next game please give them a cohesive story that isn't trying to prepare people for some stupid Final Fantasy movie (or re-make) for that matter.

 Axel, or Lea, as he now wants to be called, and which everyone in the game seems to forget (to some rather humorous results) is voiced once again by Quintin Flynn, and wakes up early on in the game. He disappears for a while only to show up again midway through the game asking Yen Sid for a favor. The next time we see him he has entered the dream world and is heading through the levels to catch up with Sora and Riku. He does so just in the nick of time, and wakes Sora up right before Xehnort can get his hands on him. It isn’t until everything is done when Axel, Lea, finally gets his keyblade, making him the 8th out of 7 keyblade wielders of light, and no, I don’t see a plot hole there, what are you talking about? Shh. Shh. It’s okay. We’ll get you help. The likely hood of us playing as all 8 keyblade wielders will probably never happen but with as long as it’s taking them to make the third game something better happen. I have a feeling though that it’s just going to be chalk full of cut scenes in which we get to see the other characters doing cool stuff, then return us to Sora. 

In lieu of having pretty much exhausted all the “Final Fantasy VII” characters in “Kingdom Hearts II” this game decided to go with another game entirely. This time around Nomura chose “The World Ends With You” characters. They, as far as I can tall, are all voiced by their original voice actors from the game. It actually works with the concept of their game as the characters are dead and trying to fight their way out of limbo. All Nomura had to do was say that they were asleep instead of dead and it made perfect sense for them to be there. Depending on who you chose to play at first Neku is the first one you meet. Shiki, Rhyme and Beat, from the game also make an appearance.  Joshua acts as a medium between the two worlds and is the only one able to see both Sora and Riku. ). I had never played the game before, so I forced myself to play it before I allowed myself to play this one. I use the term "forced" loosely, as I enjoyed the game, but got a little board with it near the end. Maybe I just wanted to get to playing Kingdom Hearts. I think it's an interesting concept though, and I wouldn't mind seeing other characters from Square Enix games make an appearance (STILL WAITING FOR SAMURAI MUSASHI SQUARE!!) Similarly to the Final Fantasy Characters, TWEWY folks are restricted to one world: Traverse Town.

Yen Sid: Being a retired Master Keyblade wielder, it's Yen Sid's job to give Sora and Riku, and all the other characters who turn up, the mark of mastery exam. He's also the one to send Riku back out there when Sora goes and gets himself captured like a dumb dumb.
Disney Characters: I think they all do a splendid job, though their stories are stripped down to the barest of bones. I'm not saying that's a bad thing but it's awkward when they use specific lines from the movies without the same visual context. This is most noticeable in the Hunchback of Notre Dam world.

How they creep through my fingers to the deep, while I weep- while I weep!

DreamEaters: There are two types of Dream eaters. The ones called "Nightmares" are the ones that you fight through out the game. Spirits or just DreamEaters, are what fight beside Sora and Riku throughout the game, all of which are brightly colored reskins of the enemies that you previously fought, with the exception of bosses that is. While on the subject of bosses I just want to go on record saying FUCK THEM ALL! Fighting them with Riku isn't so bad, but fighting them with Sora sucks ass. Okay so they aren't all bad if you've leveled up enough but most of them just suck. What's more, Sora ends up having to fight some of the more irksome bosses twice, just to piss you off more, and they aren't even the worst bosses. That title goes to the pelican boss that hides on floating rocks just out of reach and destroys you with lightening.
I wish I could say that the common enemies of the game were fun to fight, but alas, they suck as well. Every enemy has an attack that either stuns you, eats you, blocks you, or is just plain unavoidable. Sure there are a select few enemies that don't but they're usually in with the ones that do. Flow motion helps some, but in the end the fighting in this game is just not very fun to me.
Organization 13: They're back, and what's more, they have a plan to try to steal Sora and make him into one of their puppets. Riku and Mickey find out just in the nick of time save him, of course, but it gets pretty trippy toward the end. I also want to say that this is the last game in the series with Leonard Nemoy as Xehenort. His replacement will have some very big shoes to fill indeed.
Disney Villains: As stated above, the Disney villains are many, and all of them do a commendable job. I do have to wonder about Melificent and Pete. If i were her, I'd have burned his ass with green fire. Pete is a blundering idiot and I just don't really see them working together. Also, I'm not sure how Melificent got into Mickey's castle when in the second game Sora restored the Cornerstone of Light, which I thought was supposed to keep evil out of the castle, hence why Melificent could only appear there when it was full of dark thorns. Maybe I'm just looking too much into it.

With characters done, let's move on to worlds.

    So this game takes place after the dreaded Coded game where Sora was data. Yen Sid has gathered the two boys so that they can become keyblade masters. To do so, however, they have to travel to various worlds and “wake them up” whatever that means.

I stand amid the roar of a surf-tormented shore

 The first world Sora and Riku visit is Old Faithful Traverse Town. Well technically it's Destiny Islands, but you're only there for a boss fight against Ursula because, you know, that's never happened in the history of Kingdom Hearts. After that, we appear in, you guessed it Traverse Town. At least this time the game has some new areas to explore mainly sector 4, 5, and 6. Part of me wants to complain about our umpteenth visit to the world, but with the new additions, it's actually rather fun. Until you have to fight that is.

The next world you visit is La Cité des Cloches. Here Sora and Riku are confronted by Judge Claude Frollo, who thinks they're gypses and tries to kill them with Dreameaters. Phebus, Esmeralda and Quasi all help out the heroes. Actually, Riku ends up saving Phebus and has to fight the dream eater atop the clock tower which is really fun. Sora has to find Esmeralda and ends up leading Frollo straight to her, and has to fight that same DreamEater on the ground after Sora has clipped its wings. I prefer it in the air.

The Grid formerly known as Space Paranoid in Kingdom Hearts 2 is next. The whole level, obviously, is inspired by Tron Legacy. I have to say I love the level very much, but the story just didn't mesh well with what had already been established in Kingdom Hearts 2. Briefly: in KH2 Xehanort made a copy of Encom software and installed it into his own computer, thus creating the Space Paranoids world. Great. So in this game Jeff Bridges character shows up and talks about how he made this entire world blah blah blah, but here's the thing. How the fuck did he end up in Xehenorts computer? Unless the copies of the two software somehow join together, then I don't see how exactly they can be there. Nomura would probably explain it that "they were just in a data world it wasn't real" which is sort of a non answer but whatever. I enjoyed the world alot and thought it was really fun. Hoping for a Tron 3 one day.

Pranksters Paradise is Pinocchio's world. Well technically it's only one of many worlds in Pinocchio specifically the world where he turns into a Jack-a-mule (which in the movie they actually say Jack Ass and it still got away with a G rating). So, Sora comes here and helps Jiminy to find Pinocchio. The level is full of carnival rides and a roller coaster that's fun to just let Sora slide on. In fact, the whole level is really fun to just goof off in. At least on Sora's end. Riku gets to play around inside Monstro again (yet it's still called Pranksters Paradise with him, not sure why). It's not quit as gross this time as you don't have to play around in Monstro's bowels, but its still pretty nasty.

Land of the Musketeers comes after another romp in Traverse Town where we meet the Goddamsonofafuckingbitch Spellican. Here Riku is told that the dreaming worlds they thought they were in may not be dreaming at all, but real. We don't really get to understand the truth of this until later in the game, but back to the Musketeer world. I wish I could say I liked it. As soon as I see Pete in any form in Kingdom Hearts I just shake my head because I know some ridiculous nonsense is about to take place. I understand that they wanted more villains and such, but why the fuck Pete? The first Kingdom Heart's game was so good with it's choice of villains and then Pete showed up. He just makes the game feel too childish and I don't like him.

Symphony of Sorcery is based on the Fantasia movies and it is one of my favorite worlds. Part of that reason is that Sora and Riku don't speak in these worlds. Let me explain. In battle Sora and Riku say things like "Sorry" "This is it" "Take that" Which is all well and good until you realize that they say it after every finishing move. So by the time you get to this world you've heard them say it a hundred thousand times already. But in the symphony of sorcery world their words are replaced by musical scores. It's brilliant and I love this world so much and hope that it can somehow make another appearance in the series. That said, it's not without its faults. Aside from the extremely irksome enemies there are "musical puzzles" that the level requires you to do. That wouldn't be a bad thing if they weren't so easy to mess up. I had to do some of them six or seven times before I completed them, and I think the game only let me win because it was tired of me fucking them up.

The World that Never Was is the final world in the game. Here it is revealed that the organization have been with Sora since the beginning, and they were to some degree manipulating his journey. Throughout most of this world Sora is just driven by cut scene while Riku arrives to save him. At this point in the game we are also introduced to Time Travel within the Kingdom Hearts. Yeah, that's a thing now.

 Is All that we See or Seem but a Dream Within A Dream?

 I'm going to go ahead and say that the story is what drives me to play this game. It picks up the slack with all the horrible bosses and enemies. That said if you were to ask me what the story in this game was about I honestly couldn't tell you. Sora and Riku are taking a test to become Keyblade masters. All of the stories within the context of the world, even within the games own worlds, make zero sense to me. There just isn't enough information in any world to give you a cohesive story. But what the hell, I'll give it a try:
    Sora and Riku start out in Destiny Island to start their mark of mastery exam. After fighting Ursula they are split apart and yet both end up in a version of Traverse town where TWEWY character Joshua explains to them that the world has been copied, and Sora and Riku are each in a copy of the world. This must be the case with all the other worlds too because trying to make a cohesive narrative from this point on is impossible. Riku meets Quasi and saves Phebus while Sora finds Esmeralda. Frollo takes Esmeralda and sets the city on fire. Quasi saves Esmeralda and Riku rides the flames of the burning city to fight off the DreamEater. Sora fights the DreamEater on the ground after the flames have died down, but Frollo falls off the tower and into the flames, which coincidentally he did with Riku as well. Oh, and Sora has a vision of Xemnas and Venitus who give him some cryptic message about something or other.
    After that it's off to the grid where Sora and Riku both meet Flyn, Sam and Quorra. They both are capture by CLU but escape. Riku helps to free Quorra while Sora helps Tron remember who he is. Sora also sees Xemnas again and is given some more cryptic messages about sleeping and waking and stuff.
    In Pranksters Paradise Both Riku and Sora have to go on a hunt for Pinocchio, only Riku does it inside whale. Sora gets to explore a carnival. I'm gonna be honest with you know. I have no idea what the fuck happens here. Not a clue. I suppose I could go read a synopsis or something but that won't help me understand what the hell is happening in this game.
    After this it's back to Traverse Town where we are told that Time runs differently in each iteration of the world. I suppose that's foreshadowing for time travel. If not, then I've got nothing. Anyway, Sora has to re fight all the bosses he's had until now.
    I want to pause here for a moment. I don't understand why Sora, it seems has to fight the harder bosses. The mole boss in the next level is difficult to be sure, and that's solely a Riku boss, but for the most part, Sora, it seems gets pitted against the most aggravating iterations of any of the bosses, not to mention the damn pelican. Why is that?
    Anyway back to story. The musketeer world is next. Pete does some shit to mess up Mickey's shit but Riku intervenes and messes up Pete's shit so that Sora can give Pete shit. If that doesn't make sense then join the club. Admission is $5.
    In the Symphony of Sorcery world Sora and Riku find and enchanted Mickey. Both are tasked with finding a Sound Idea in order to free him. The Sound Ideas come together to create a beautiful melody (Kingdom Hearts Title theme Dearly Beloved) and there is a beautiful cut scene where Riku shows how much he cares about Sora. After that, Sora has to fight the pelican which kind of undermines any joy the scene might have brought.
    Finally, in the world that never was we see that the organization have been manipulating Sora so that they can use him as a horcrux Xehanort clone. Riku finds out and saves the day, freeing Sora, and thus granting himself the title of Master. Sora fails the test but doesn't seem perturbed by that at all.
    While all this is happening, Mickey, Donald and Goofy are in Yen Sid's Tower when their castle is attacked by Melificent. Yen Sid knows at once something is amiss. Mickey and his friends hurry to stop the mistress of all evil. In the castle they are overwhelmed but Axel, who has awoken because his nobody and his heartless were both destroyed, thus finding each other in the either and bringing him back to life, i guess, saves the day. For his bravery, Yen Sid allows him to take the test, and he too, becomes a keyblade master.
    The story ends with Kiari arriving at the tower to become a master as well. Mind you, that's a secret ending. Speaking of which, one of the things that this game does right compared to Kingdom Hearts 2 is that, in order to get the secret ending all you have to do is find all the treasure chests, which is pretty tough in it's own right. I'm just glad I didn't have Jiminy forcing me to to acquire a billion points on some trivial skateboard quest. 

 What could there be more purely bright?
This part is hard for me. On the one hand the battle system is liken to Birth by Sleep, which was fun. There are even some link attacks that Riku can do that are copies of attacks from Birth by Sleep like Ghost, Light Sword, etc. I enjoy them. Building your own deck and being able to use whatever attacks you want is great. If you want, you could have a whole deck of heal spells, whatever works. Along with attacks there are new skills that you can learn as well, such as Glide for Sora, which allows you to move around the environments even faster, and that's along with flow motion abilities. All of that said, I find the game to be very trite.
    Let me explain. As mentioned above, many, if not all of the enemies have some kind of stun weather it's Stop, Slow, Gravity, or even an attack that makes you unable to use your deck commands until the enemy who cast it on you is defeated. If it were just a few enemies through out the game, that would be fine, but it's not. It's Every. Fucking. World. It makes the game feel tedious and, honestly, makes it unfun to play. The bosses are a different story though.
    They're fast and many of their attacks come out of no where and seem to deal massive amounts of damage. I remember having tons of trouble on my first play through, and on my second one, less, but I still find them to be annoying. I'll use the pelican as an example. He flies around the area making hitting him nearly impossible, and when he does finally land on a floating rock trying to get up to him is a joke. Even using flow-motion Sora will sometimes pass him without landing a hit, and land on the ground. By the time he finally does land on the rock the pelican is moving again. What's more, at the start of the battle, and once more in the middle and end, you have to flow motion to catch him. This means you are in a sort of on-rails shooter, only you can't shoot, only dodge. Sora's health is significantly decreased, and if you get hit by all the flying debris, he dies, making you start, not just that section over, but the whole damn battle. And that's not even the end boss.

 Riku's end boss has a cool attack where he can drain your health to 1 and then, if he so desires, while Riku is still stunned from the former attack, he can do another attack right under you and kill you, and there's not a damn thing you can do about it.
    Diving is another story. The goals are easy at first, but get progressively harder, especially when you are required to defeat bosses. The only way to do it while Diving is to wait for the bosses "core" to be exposed, but the game doesn't always like to tell you how to do it. It just says "defeat the boss" and leaves you to it. It isn't until you die, or have been fighting him for two minutes or so when the game finally gives you a hint, but sometimes, it flies by so quick that if you blink you'll miss it. Fortunately, there aren't too many boss fights when diving. I wish I could say diving without boss fights is fun, but that isn't great either. There is usually always a strict time limit and if you run out of time, you have to start over.
    Rather than Donald or Goofy or any other Disney Character in your party, this time you get to use Dream Eaters. I heard someone describe them as dimwitted Pokemon, and I think that's a good description. The dream eaters can be helpful but they can be just as much of a hindrance. In the later levels you can flow-motion your way all the way to the top of a building or cliff side to get a treasure, but as soon as you reach the top, your DreamEater appears there and knocks you all the way back down again. In battle I've seen them just standing there. Sometimes, they'll even get stuck in areas and not show up until you've defeated all the enemies without them.
    Each one has link abilities which grant Sora and Riku abilities as well such as Defense Boost or HP Boost. The problem is that some of the dream eaters charge you points to open pathways between those abilities. In other words in order to get new abilities for Sora and Riku you have to spend ability points on nothing to open a pathway that leads to something. Mind, not all of the DreamEaters make you do this. Some of them require your DreamEater to get to a certain level before you can gain access to all of their abilities, even once you've opened all their abilities on the board. This means you have to stick with the same DreamEaters throughout almost the entire game. That's not a problem if you don't give a crap about the other DreamEaters, but if you want to level all 100 or so of them up, it makes for a lot of level grinding, that in my opinion, isn't really worth it.

Hath cheered me as a lovely beam a lonely spirit guiding.

 As far as music and voice work goes it's great. "Simple and Clean/ Passion" Remix is back for those people who like it. I do, but I'm just tired of it at this point. Fortunately we get a new son in Kingdom Hearts 3 so there's that. The world music is great. Once again I love that, in the Disney worlds they use music from that world. Tron's world comes to mind. Even the battle theme they used in the game fits perfectly.
    I have only a few gripes, and they are personal gripes. I don't take points off for any of these next few things. First and foremost, is the Spirit Menu Music. Any time you go to train your DreamEaters, you are forced to listen to something liken to the Meow Mix commercials. It's sickeningly cute, and not in a good way. The song makes me literally want to throw up. I suppose they want these games to stay "E10+" which is why Nomura throws in cute songs or moments like this, but honestly, having grown up with this game, Some part of me was hoping it would grow up a little bit too. I'm not asking for an "M" Rating for Kingdom Hearts or anything, but maybe just some more grown up themes.
    Second is some of the voice work. As mentioned above, Judge Claude Frollo's voice actor does an okay job, but there are lines from the movie incorporated in the game that without the visual impact of the movie just don't make sense. Example: In the movie Frollo talks about stomping out the Gypsies by crushing some ants with his fingers. Then picks up a brick and shows thousand more, crushing all of them as well, to which Phebus replies "you make your point quite vividly." In this version, it's just them talking. It just doesn't work for me. I don't want to say that the line was delivered poorly, but yeah, I didn't like it. 

 What though that light, thro' storm and night, so trembled from afar—

 I really want to like this game, I really do. It has some great elements in it that, if done properly, could have made for a stellar experience, but sadly, with enemies that constantly stun you, spirits that knock you off platforms, and bosses who can attack even while you're stunned, the game play of the game is just subpar. I love the story, the visuals, voice work and music (for the most part) but I just can't get into the game play, and that's a shame. Fortunately, 0.2 has restored my faith in the series.

Difficulty in Games

Call me old fashioned but I don't like this new trend of difficulty in games. It seem like now everything wants to be like Darksouls, which is known for its punishing difficulty. That's all well and good, but it makes the games feel unfair to me. Having to memorize what one enemy does when you're surrounded by hoards of enemies just doesn't seem fair to me. I can hardly remember what I had for breakfast let alone which enemy attacks which why, when, and how.

Dark Souls Stephen Totilo Kotaku

  Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I don't like difficult games, on the contrary, I love a good challenge, but there is a fine line between being cheap and being hard. This, of course, isn't anything new in games. It's been around since the days of text adventure games. Also, I know some people may like games that are frustrating, and if that's you, more power to you, but that doesn't mean that the game isn't cheap and unfair. Before we go too far, however, let's define difficulty:
When you have enemies that can kill you in one to two hits regardless of your health, while you, as the player, have to hit that same enemy 20+ times to kill it, that's what you call unfair. There are exceptions of course, like during boss fights, which are supposed to be a test of all the things you've learned. Even they, can be frustrating sometimes, especially when the instant death moves comes out of no where.  I can understand dying five six, even ten times to figure out how to beat a boss, but after 20, 30 or even 100 deaths the game just stops being fun. I'd like to say that this solely applies to bosses, but in many games (like the aforementioned Dark Souls) it applies to every enemy. Some games allow enemies to attack you from off screen. How am I supposed to defend myself if I can't see that I'm being attacked. There are some games that fill the screen with so many things that you can't even see where you are and die as a result. Then of course, you have stun locks which is when you are hit by an enemy, stunned for a brief second, and then hit again by another enemy, wash and repeat, until you're health is gone. 
We can't talk about difficulty, though, without also addressing the opposite side of the spectrum, easy hand-holding, difficulty. This is when a game does things for you automatically, like blocking or dodging, or some other move to help you. The problem I have with that is that you don't learn anything from that, because, if the game is doing it for you, there's on reason to figure out how to do it. It can be helpful sometimes, especially if you are new to a series or franchise, but, at least for me, If I want to play a game, I want to learn it. I want to get good. I play on easy my first play through to get the ropes of the game, and learn the ins and outs, and then I switch to normal, and if I enjoyed it, to hard difficulty. But games that hold your hand, make it harder to learn, and in some games, even normal difficulty is ramped up way more than it should be, even after playing the game on easy.
So what makes a fair challenge?
People love Form Software Dark Souls, saying that once you take the time to learn it, it's very fun. Personally, I've never played it, so I can't really conform or deny those allegations. But what I have played are games with that Dark Souls formula, NioH for example, which I did not enjoy at all. My biggest gripe with those games is that they are punishing from the start. There isn't an option to play on easy to get better, you just have to die and try again, and that's not fun for me.
What is fun, in my opinion are games like Devil May Cry (the original) and Ninja Gaiden Black/Sigma. To me, those are the epitome of fair difficulty. I admit I was frustrated when I first played them, and I'm not even ashamed to say that I had to switch to Easy Automatic/ Ninja Dog Mode. Now before we jump to conclusions, these are not hand holding difficulties. In Devil May cry Easy mode means that more moves are unlocked at the beginning, and that you don't have to hold down the "charge shot" button. Also you are stronger and take less damage. In Ninja Gaiden, you are given more healing items, and more accessories as well as more defense and higher attacks.
In those modes, you're still playing the game though, things aren't being done for you and you still have to learn to be a better player, especially as you begin playing higher difficulties. In those games what makes them hard, for one thing, is enemy placement. As you play through the game the enemies you fight, even on easy, become progressively harder. On higher difficulties, those enemies can show up sooner, often when you are ill equipped to fight them. Even though they are harder enemies that doesn't mean that they do insane amounts of damage, or that they kill you in two hits. As a player you still feel like you have a fighting chance, and that's whats important.

Variety is also important. In Ninja Gaiden there are so many enemies that it's hard to count them all, and each one fights just a bit differently, keeping you on your toes at all times. Devil May Cry, while it has fewer enemies, the ones you do fight can be very tough. Devil May Cry has variety too. Some bosses, for example have a limited move-set on lower difficulties, meaning that when you play on higher difficulties they can do things that they couldn't do moves that they couldn't do on lower ones.
Also, I should note, that both games do punish you. In Devil Ma Cry there are certain enemies that you especially have to watch out for because they have Fatalities. This means that they can grab you and do massive amounts of damage. I should not here that while these moves may kill you outright at the beginning of the game (hence the name Fatalities) as you play through the game, and increase the size of your health bar, getting caught by these attacks will do tones of damage, but WILL NOT outright kill you.
In Ninja Gaiden, if you hold down the block button for too long some enemies will vault over you and skewer you with a sword. Others will knee you to the face. They don't do that much damage, but it is a lesson learned. There are some foes around mid game that can skewer you with the bayonet at the end of their gun, or throw you down to the ground. What's more, the attacks come out pretty quickly. If you aren't paying attention you can be seriously hurt several times in a row. It's absolutely infuriating, but it's also fair.
Fighting these various enemies, it forces you to change your play style. It forces you to actually learn the GAME not just learn what time to dodge a specific enemy attack. And once you've mastered it, you feel like you can take on the world. You feel powerful. That, to me is what difficulty should be.
To conclude. Easy mode should be just that, easy. I should be able to plow through enemies with out blinking, but once I get to a boss, I do want to be tested. That doesn't mean I want to die 100 times though, there needs to be a balance. Challenge me, but make it clear what I need to do, and give me the tools to do it. If I have to use all my potions, so be it. When I play a game on higher difficulties, I want to test my skills. That doesn't mean EVERY enemy should have instant death attacks, on or might, but they need to be well marked, like being a different color than all the rest so that you can tell them apart. They can be more aggressive, sure. They may be more nimble, that's cool. They may even have different moves sets on higher difficulties, and I'm okay with that. Maybe even surprise me by making me fight an enemy from a later part of the game sooner. Make me think on my toes.
What a game shouldn't do is hold my hand or punish my for playing.

The Future of Final Fantasy

I Just finished playing Final Fantasy XV after over 100 hours of game play. I am a completionist. and didn't want to finish until I had done absolutely everything. That means all the dungeons, all the sidequests (monster hunts) all the upgrades, weapons, clothes, everything.


That is the beauty of a Final Fantasy game. I love to avert my attention from the main quest and take on all the side quests, which usually happen near the end of the game. Take Final Fantasy VII for example. Near the end of the game there are three optional boss fights, one against Ultima Weapon, Emerald Weapon and Ruby Weapon. These fights are insanely hard and at least one of them is timed. In order to remove the time limit you have to go on a whole separate side quest. There are other quests that happen through out, like getting a gold chocobo and acquiring everyone's final limit break, some of which are found in game and others that, most likely, you've started at some point or another.


The point here is that, while Final Fantasy XV had side quests, most of them were fetch quests. Not to say I'm complaining, I did them all because I wanted to do EVERYTHING before I moved on to the next chapter in the game and I had a ton of fun doing them. The quests really aren't the issue here. In fact, I enjoyed the game a lot, much more than Final Fantasy XIII which I admit I only played some of XIII-2 and just couldn't really get into it. I think the Kingdom Hearts combat sorta ruined turn base battles for me, but anyway....


My problem with Final Fantasy XV actually had nothing to do with the game play. I will agree that the game is super easy and that they made dying next to impossible, but whatever, less load times. My gripe with Final Fantasy XV actually comes in the form of the story. To put it simply: I didn't get it.
SPOILERS AHEAD READ AT YOUR OWN RISK


I understand that Noctis and Luna were childhood friends/ lovers, and that when she died Noctis was upset, and I get that Arydin or whatever his name is, is playing the long game, finally revealing his plan to Noctis and locking him away for ten years.


Here's the thing though. Noctis and Luna's relationship is glossed over, at best. What's more, Noctis's attitude makes it seem like he's not really into her at all. So when she dies, while sad, I wasn't grief stricken in the least. Compare that with Areis's death in Final Fantasy VII, and I was a mess. I'd spent time with her, leveled her up, been on a date with her in Gold Saucer, even found her final limit break. Then the game stabs you in the heart as she falls dead. I'll admit, I cried, I'm not ashamed of that.


But with Luna, I didn't really care. Even after watching King's Glaive, which I made sure to watch right around the time I got to that point in the game, I still didn't really care that she was dead. Then, after her death, I'm supposed to believe that Noctis is grief-stricken despite the fact that he barely talked about her, and no, sending messages via dogs did not help me care in the least.


Then we have Ardyn. You could tell from the word GO that he was a bad guy. I have no problem with his character. He's the one who captures you on the train. Can't remember how he got there though, or if it's ever even explained. He steels Prompto who by the way turns out to be a demon or something, oh and by the way Ignis is blind after Luna dies. Yeah, that's never explained.


So, anyway, Noctis saves his friend and meets up with Ardyn who turns out to be the original King Lucias Ciam something something, I don't know. I'd lost the story some way back. I had to look it up. the jist is that he was supposed to be king, but after taking on the demons via sucking their souls into his own body, he became corrupt, and the gods told he couldn't be king so doomed him to live forever, or at least until the True King showed up to kill him. That, of course, being Noctis.


Before that, however, Noctis is shoved into the crystal and spat back out ten years later. There were are treated to a scene of him in a world of night/ ruin. We start out at Cape Ciam and are picked up by another NPC. As he drives us to Hammerhead (the starting point of the game) we see a world in darkness. In Hammerhead we meet up with our old friends and then head straight for Insomnia and the end game. No more exploring, no more talking with Cindy, no more side quests nothing.

That is, not until the end credits roll. Let me back track a little. The only other game in which there was a world of ruin was Final Fantasy VI. That whole scene starts out with one of the main characters thinking all of her friends are dead. She climbs to the top of a cliff and jumps off. The current carries

her back to shore where she finds the scarf of one of her team mates, prompting her to search the world for her friends. The scene is touching and dramatic, and there was no voice acting in the series at the time. What's more, you get to travel the entire world after it's been destroyed. I feel like Final Fantasy XV should have let you explore. Also, It talks about how Cindy had done all this stuff to help people, but when you get to Hammer head, she's not even there.


After you return to Insomnia Noctis finds Ardyn and they fight, but Noctis chooses to leave his friends behind, I guess so they can be king when he's gone? Again, never really explained. Anyway, Noctis and Ardyn fight and Noctis sacrifices himself. Then, at the end credits a cut scene Noctis and his friends comes up. I have no idea when this happened because In ever camped out, as far as I know, on the way to Insomnia. If that's when I happened then that scene was totally out of place and didn't make any sense since Noctis was already dead at the time.


At the end, he is reunited with Luna and the logo changes, and so does the music at the title screen. Personally, I like the sad vocals better but whatever.


In the advertising for this game it showed us the flying car telling us you could fly around the world like in the days of the old Final Fantasy. Throughout the game, in the several dungeons of the game, there were closed doors that the characters would talk about needing a key for. It's only now, after the credits that you get any of this stuff.


This bothers me on two levels. The first, is that I can remember a time, even up through Final Fantasy XII that there were hidden areas, treasures, bosses, all within game. Fighting/ getting/ finding these areas would get you ultimate weapons, summons, or in some games just the satisfaction in knowing you'd beaten the hardest boss in the game. What's more, it hall happened in game. You didn't have to wait until after the credits or to get a new game plus or DLC or any of that bull crap. All of that stuff was included. It made the game feel complete.


The second thing is really just false advertising. Sure you DID get the flying car, and you COULD fly around the world, but only after you'd beaten the game. And you could only get into the secret dungeons when you'd beaten the game too. The problem with that is this. Once I beat a game, I'm done. I usually don't pick it up again because, chances are, I've completed everything there is to complete. I don't care about.


I actually really like how Batman Arkham Knight approached this. The game "ended" after Batman beat Scarecrow, but he said something like "When I give the signal, begin Knight Fall Protocol" or something to that affect. This was your chance to complete any side quests that you hadn't finished. I had finished them all in game though (With the exception of the DLC) so by the time "Knight Fall Protocol" happened, I was done. It was only then, that I was treated to the TRUE ending of the game.


I guess what I'm trying to say here is that, while I enjoyed Final Fantasy XV it just left something to be desired. I'm still playing, doing the secret dungeons now, and I'm still having fun with it, but, I don't know, it just feels like something is missing, or that the game was rushed, which is weird, considering they were working on it for ten years. I realize they had to scrap a bunch of stuff. I mean hell, the game was originally part of the Fabula Nova Crystalis and it was called Versus XIII. The story had to be completely revamped. It's still part of it, I think, though the comparisons are Easter Eggs at best.


I hope the next Final Fantasy is not plagued by DLC or by waiting until end credits to go back to secret areas. That was part of the charm of the game. For me, I would get to the end of the game, get everything, and start over because I'd have read about something that I missed previously. That, to me, is the best way to play Final Fantasy. To me, that is replay value. Don't pack stuff in at the end of the game, pack it in WITH the game. Make it so that when people read about some secret weapon or boss or item that can only be acquired by doing X instead of Y they go and start the game over. That is what you want from a game. That's replay value. Sure, you can still have DLC, down the line, but do something unique with it. Don't hide content away on the disk or make people pay for the dungeons. Have all that stuff in there to start, then use the DLC for extra stuff, like a VS mode, or timed trial or something. That's my two cents anyway.


 Even though I had to wait until the end credits to get to fly, and go to secret dungeons, it's still a fun experience. Maybe next time, make a cohesive story, but otherwise, great job Square Enix. You've put my faith back into the Final Fantasy franchise.

Kingdom Hearts 2.5 Final Mix++ HD

“A far off dream that’s like a scattered memory, a scattered memory that’s like a far off dream, I want to line the pieces up, yours, and mine.”

Dammit Square you consistently make it difficult for me to hate you.  After several years of playing Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix+ and pretending I understand the squiggly lines that make up the Japanese language, you finally cave in and give me one in English. How can I hate you for that? Anyway, This really is the definitive edition of the game. Rather than go through the entire game and pick it apart, as I have done in the past, I’m simply going to go over the new content. If you are reading this and would like to know my thoughts on Kingdom Hearts 2 then you are reading the wrong article.

                This game does, most, everything right. Not only are there fun things to collect, like crown pieces, but there are some great, challenging, puzzles to solve as you collect them. Also, there are more conversations between the organization. That was one of my biggest gripes with Kingdom Hearts 2, that, with all the shit that was happening, the player never saw the organization planning anything, not once. And the scene at the end of the game with Siax and Xemnas doesn’t count. Also in this game we get to fight the other organization members. The game kind of just does a half ass job of explaining it saying something like “Hey remember when— oh right you went to sleep for a year and forgot everything, no worries though teleport through these randomly placed data portals and you will get to fight the people you’ve forgotten.” It makes no sense what so ever but it’s hell-a fun to fight them.  In this game you are also given a new form, which is supposed to be Sora remembering his past or something ridiculous. Really, it’s just an excuse to let you use some of your abilities from the first game. In all honesty though, Quick Run makes Dodge Roll obsolete. In Birth By Sleep Quick Run was changed to Air Dash, but whatever, it’s the same thing. Probably my favorite part about this new game is the Cavern of Remembrance. I love that place. It is so fun and so vast and so hard and just great. The main reason for this is because in order to survive you have to utilize all of your skills. I don’t just mean fighting either. One of the other things Kingdom Heart 2 lacked was in making the player use the cool skills they learned in their drive forms. High Jump, Ariel Dodge, Quick Run and Glide were all great abilities but not at all necessary to learn in the whole of the game. Yeah, sure they helped in the final battle, but still, I never really felt like I needed them. The Cavern of Remembrance amends that entirely. Not only do you need to learn all of these abilities, but they have to be leveled up to the max. If not, then you will find yourself stuck in certain areas. Oh and not mention the music in here beautiful. Then the caves open up to a long white hall reminiscent of Castle Oblivion. I have no problems with this, not really. It can be quite challenging trying to get through this part of the game, but it’s also a phenomenal place to level up your characters, especially when you can get upwards of 25000 experience with both experience boosts equipped.

The only real issue in this game is the enemies. It’s a shame that Square couldn’t do something to make them a bit more fun to fight. Half of them just annoy the crap out of you while the other half make you want to break your controller. Sure there are some fun enemies to fight, but they are so few and far between that I can scarcely remember them. Also I’ll admit, playing on proud mode doesn’t help either. The only reason I did it though is because I knew that, in doing so, I wouldn’t have to deal with the utter bollocks that is Jimminy’s Journal. Seriously, that little bastard just makes me want to step on him over and over again. The mushroom quest is a great example of this. Some of the quests are easy, while others jut suck. Trying to land a hundred and fifty hits on one mushroom is just stupid and time consuming and not fun at all. Knowing the ‘secret’ on how to do it doesn’t make it any less tedious, and that goes for all the other ones as well. Once I learned that the mushroom in Christmas town would give me one of every item I opted only to do that one.

Now, this game also came with a Birth By Sleep hd remake, which happens to be the Final Mix version of that as well. As far as I can tell there wasn’t a whole lot added to this. There are some re-colored enemies. I think there might be an extra keyblade somewhere. There are some new abilities and finishers. Ventus has the coolest one called Skydive or something like that. He rains down like comets from the sky. Aqua’s teleport has her moving around the enemies shooting spheres of light around them. Terra’s meteor is the hardest to pull off, having to position where you want it to land while the enemies are still moving, often resulting in hitting nothing. The other thing this game has is a second secret episode. In it we travel the realm of darkness with Aqua until we meet the Behemoth in the world. After that the game flashes Birth By Sleep 2.0 on the screen.

The last thing I will talk about is the much better, and very long, recoded movie. After watching the movie I almost wanted to play the game again. Then I remembered how awful it is and it makes me glad I opted to watch the movie instead.

The only games I have left to play now are Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance, which I really want to play, and the mobile version Kingdom Hearts X. I suppose I really should get back to Kingdom Hearts Unchained, but I kinda got stuck in the Hercules world and just haven’t bothered with it since. I have played Dream Drop Distance and Birth By Sleep 2.0 but it’s been a while and I want to play them again before I write about them, so it’s going to be a while.