Hello and welcome to my first entry in my replay through all the kingdom hearts games, FYI there will be spoilers.I am playing though the PS4 version of final mix for anyone wondering. I originally wanted to do this first entry when I was about to seal the traverse town keyhole, but umm, I have finished all the Disney worlds and am getting ready to go to hollow bastion...oops. Part of the reason I kept playing and not writing was because I was having a really good time, the other was because of how short the worlds were and just how good it felt to finish a lot of them quickly.

As I stated last time I got lost but as I am playing through the game again I think the main problem is how unintuitive both the maps actually are, and how the game docent really signposts you very well on where you're supposed to go. Take Deep Jungle for example after you meet up with Tarzan’s gorilla parents Clayton the bad guy from Tarzan.....I don't really remember Tarzan very wel,l goes and shoots some gorillas after getting posted by a heartless. What you're supposed to do is go to all the previous areas of the map and save a gorilla from a gang of heartless and then make your way back to the tent after saving the gorilla. Unfortunately the game never really gives you any indication of the going back part so it is totally possible, which I think is on purpose as this is an adventure and you're supposed to be exploring around in the world, messing with stuff to get the right outcome but it can just be frustrating as well to the point of not wanting to finish a world which in reality is maybe only 4~5 rooms.

This leads into the stories for each worlds also feeling a bit short, or at least incomplete. Part of the charm of Kingdom Hearts is the blending of the Disney stories with Tetsuya Nomura bullshit and they are clearly still figuring that balance out. I think the Disney stories aren't really that fleshed out and feel like inadequate summaries of those movies with so far very little Namura stuff. I think Neverland does the blending the best with revelations about there Kairi has been this whole time, turns out she if lifeless with Riku thinking you have abandoned him in favor of Donald and Goofy, and a kinda, well not great version of the end~ish of peter pan.

The other thing I am noticing is just how lame the boss fights are. I think there are some great spectacles with some of the bosses like oogie boogie becoming his whole house and having to platform your way to his darkness orbs. I think Cloud is also a good example of a KH boss, it's more about dodging around and finding the right moments to combo off on him and deal damage, or if you do have the timing right counter attacking his own attack to stun him and deal a lot of damage. Unfortunately, a majority of the bosses are more just about hitting the attack button on the boss a couple of times with no real need to learn the patterns. Then there is giant Ursula, who might just be one of the worst bosses I have ever fought in a game. Her main thing is an attack right at the start that is just lightning everywhere with no real way to dodge or interrupted so you always kinda take damage and have your combos interrupted throughout the fight, and because you don't have your normal range of movement abilities during atlantica, mainly dodge rolling, it is not fun to take damage and have zero way to stop that.

Some last thoughts before I step into hollow bastion. I am really learning how important it is to have a decent level of MP this playthrough, magic spells are surprisingly strong as well as the games limit attacks, also I did not know that different keyblades have different crit chances it's not just pure damage on them. I think Jiminy's journal is a bit useless for tracking completion without an individual world tracker. I am really looking forward to finishing this game again I definitely remember it raping up alot in the second half and I hope I am right. Until next time I am signing off and will probably be back once I have finished the game

I have been thinking about Kingdom Hearts lately, I know a dangerous prospect but I have just been here thinking about it. I first came across Kingdom Hearts in a commercial for Chain of Memories I watched on Disney Channel, or ABC Family while I was watching power rangers or some other place but I knew the moment I saw that commercial I knew I wanted to play it. A game where I got to hang out with my favorite Disney characters from the movies I watched on VHS who wouldn't want that, so for Christmas that year I asked for a copy and a gameboy advance sp and I got both. I spent most of my time at my family Christmas hangout that year just playing it, not the last time I would do that with a Kingdom Hearts game, but I did not get very far I got to Hades in Olympus and I just couldn't fight him, so I reset and did the Alice world and got to the boss there and reset the world card again, at some point I gave up. Really I didn't know how the game worked or how to deck build, I was not a smart 10-year-old, I didn't really come back to that game and just kinda resented it, but there was still something about KH that just worked for me.

The next year I got a PS2 for Christmas and went to GameStop to get some games for the system. One of the games I picked was, of course, the original Kingdom Hearts and I was in love from the moment simple and clean played on that screen. I wanted to know more about that world. I wanted to know more about Kairi,Riku, and Sora. I wanted to know about the world they inhabited, escape the destiny islands, beat Riku in a fight, to know what the heartless are and what they want what was Maleficent doing hanging out with Jifar, what the keyblade was, and more importantly where was Mickey Mouse. Unfortunately, I didn't get very far again I made it to Tarzan and got lost, well I got lost at alice world and traveled to tarzan world and also got lost there, even with the strategy guide and the whole page for cheat planets page for the game printed out and taped to the living room wall, that original game was not great for giving players good clues about where to go combine that with the camera being controlled by the 1 buttons it just made it hard for me to know where to go,I also don't think I beat Cerberus at the time either, but that love and fascination for the series was still there.

Finally, Kingdom Hearts 2 came out and I would finally beat a kingdom hearts game, after dying to Demyx a lot as a kid I just didn't know how quickly you can get through that fight with the right reaction command timings but I just kept failing to “dance water dance” until I didn't. KH2 was one of the few games I rented multiple times in a row from a Hollywood Video, a testament to how much I loved that game before I would get a copy of my own. The way combat in 2 flows with Sora and his aerial movement just made that game feel so special, doing combos that ended in big explosions just made me feel so powerful in addition to the spectacle it brought. As well the story with all its melodrama and mystery, trying to stop organization 13, as well as the true nature of the universe of kingdom hearts but the beautiful reunion of the trio that happens towards the end of the game. I would go on to beat that game at the point about 7 times over the various of that game to say KH2 is one of my favorite games would be an understatement. I was never patient or good enough to do the secret bosses that were required to do them, though I would look up the ending online after hearing about it on a forum somewhere probably screwattack.com, and once again I was in love and wanted to know more about who would become the birth by sleep trio.

Kingdom Hearts also got me to check out Final Fantasy, I rented advent children based on clouds appearance in KH and wanted to know more about him. I could do over the rest but I think the rest of my history like how my copy of 358/2 was I bought from a dying game crazy attached to a Hollywood Video and how both were important stores that helped me form my love of games and media but the death of rentals is probably a story for another day. Kingdom Hearts is a series that just means a lot to me, it brings me comfort to go back into that world even if it is kinda ridiculous, so I think I am going to replay all the kingdom hearts games again and maybe I will make a little diary blog here about my experiences as I make my way through these games that I hope I have proven to mean something important to me.