The mess of a story detracts from a much improved game
"They'll pay for this."
Think about that statement for a second. What image does it conjure? If you're thinking about an enraged warrior, his anger building towards the breaking point, quietly warning his foes that he is about unleash Hell upon them, you're probably on the right track.
It's also a direct quote from Kingdom Hearts II, the wildly anticipated sequel to the runaway hit from Square Enix. It fits the game pretty well, actually. After all, KHII is an action-RPG that borrows many elements from the Final Fantasy universe, and Final Fantasy games have included this type of dialogue all along. Even with its Disney influence, there are moments where you can expect Sephiroth, Seifer, or even Hades to utter such a dark proclamation.
But can you honestly picture that coming out of Mickey Mouse's cute little mouth? Well it does, right before he goes on a vengeance-filled killing spree against the Heartless on Hollow Bastion. Mickey Mouse, who has delighted children for almost 80 years, is transformed into a bloodthirsty murderer.
Mickey's attitude is indicative of the major problem that permeates Kingdom Hearts II. The first game was pretty good about finding a balance between its Final Fantasy and Disney roots. Sora was an innocent, and approached each new world with wonder. Every time you defeated a Heartless in KH, it was a means to an end. You wanted to find Kairi and Riku, and you also knew that destroying the Heartless would save the worlds from being destroyed. But why must the Heartless die in Kingdom Hearts II? It's never really explained; you just kill them because they are there.
The explanation isn't forthcoming because the story is a convoluted mess. You'll start the game as Roxas, who whiles away the summer with his friends in the peaceful Twilight Town. However, strange enemies that look like the Heartless, but aren't quite the same, start popping up. Roxas surprisingly discovers that he can wield the keyblade, and starts fighting off the new threat. As this enigmatic story slowly unfolds, Sora eventually reappears, and you'll continue your search for Mickey, Riku, and Kairi yet again. Throughout your travels, you'll uncover a new set of enemies and figure out their ultimate plans.
Unfortunately, fans won't notice how off the tone of this game is. Sequels tend to be judged on how well it expands on the elements of the previous game in the series. By that measure, KHII is an unmitigated success. Just about everything that was broken in the first game was improved.
By far, the camera has seen the most improvement. The camera was practically broken in the first game, but it works quite well in KHII. It's been moved further away from Sora, allowing you to see more of what's going on. The controls have been moved from the shoulder buttons to the right analog stick, which allows you to move it in any direction quickly. You'll still have occasional issues where the camera is not looking at what you're attacking, especially if you're changing direction quickly, but for the most part it does a good job of staying on top of the action. It helps that Sora now becomes semi-transparent when right in front of the camera, so you can still see what's going on even if the camera is at an awkward angle.
The action is spruced up quite a bit as well, and battles are far more flashy and dramatic than they were in KH. Limit breaks, a modern Final Fantasy feature, make their appearance. Each party member has a limit attack that teams them up with Sora for a limited amount of time, raining destruction all over the battlefield. Additionally, Sora can use his "Drive" forms, which transform him into a human wrecking ball by merging with Donald and/or Goofy. Each form has its own strengths, like improved attack range, more powerful magic, and the ability to quickly dodge out of the way of enemy attacks. Sora changes his animations completely during each form, to impressive effect. In the Master form, for instance, he wields two keyblades, one of which he controls like he's using the Force. Though there are a lot of points in the game where you can't use the Drive forms, they never get old when you are able to bust them out and start tearing through enemies. Additionally, Sora eventually unlocks a few finishing moves, which cause massive damage and can have other effects, like launching enemies into the air. Effectively using finishers on groups of enemies is a must. In fact, bosses can only be defeated by using finishers.
There's all-new minigames throughout Kingdom Hearts 2 as well. The gummi ship levels return, but are much improved. There's much more variety to them, and you'll need to have good reflexes to stay alive. The levels still run on rails, but the camera angles switch up, as do the enemies that you face. The 100 Acre Wood also returns, with a host of different minigames that find you playing around with Winnie the Pooh and his friends. You'll also ride the magic carpet from Aladdin, attempting to fly yourself out of the Cave of Wonders as it explodes, just like in the movie. All of these games are nice, and add a bit of variety to the 40-hour long game.
The sound department is the only place where KHII drops a notch from its predecessor. This isn't to say that the special effects, music, and voiceovers don't sound wonderful. They are just as good as Kingdom Hearts. The only loss is that some of the original voice actors from the film versions of the Disney movies do not come back to reprise their roles. Like KH, though, whenever the film actor is not used, his TV show counterpart steps in. For instance, Sean Astin didn't lend his voice to Hercules this time, but Tate Donovan did. The live actors were a mixed bag, as well. It was certainly a treat to hear Bruce Boxleitner reprise his role as Tron, but the actors who attempt to approximate the Pirates of the Caribbean cast are not convincing at all. As was the case with KH, the actors voicing the Final Fantasy characters are also not nearly as dynamic and interesting as their Disney counterparts. This stems partially from the emotionally flat delivery of many of the Final Fantasy crew, like Squall Leonhart from FFVIII and Cloud Strife from FFVII. Not helping their case is Mena Suvari as Aerith Gainsborough, also from FFVII. If you've ever heard the phrase "phoning it in" and wondered what it meant, Mena's job as Aerith is a case study in simply collecting a paycheck. Aerith is not only emotionally flat, she literally sounds like her IQ tops out in the teens. It's an absolute shock to hear such a poor performance in a game that is so reliant on voiceovers to tell its story.
Kingdom Hearts II clearly had two priorities. First, the developers wanted to fix what was broken in the first game. They did that quite well. Then, they wanted to give players more. They did that too by giving us more worlds, more combat, more things to do. But by focusing on improving the game, they sacrificed the story and its roots with Disney. They just took Final Fantasy, changed it into an action-RPG, and sprinkled Disney on it. They stripped out the very soul of the series and gave us a fine game that contains absolutely no heart.
