Squeenix Kingdom Hearts 3 - Announced for Xbox One and PS4

[aweigh]

Wellp, KH 2 down.

Onwards...

 

[mogwaimon]

did you do the post-game Data battles and stuff? that's like half the game right there

 

[aweigh]

did you do the post-game Data battles and stuff? that's like half the game right there

After experiencing the huge difficulty spike of the Roxas fight and the boss battles in the last area I realized that I didn't find them enjoyable at all. Zero interest in fighting the data battles or the shadowy abyss battles. I was actually gonna write about this, about how the so-called "high skill boss battles" in KH2 were actually DOWNGRADES from the much better boss battles in KH1, but then mid-way through writing it just got tired of the subject. It is what it is.

I think the Roxas fight, while enjoyable in a vaccum, was badly integrated into the game and requires the player to play in a way that the game has never taught to the player before this point. I think it is a disaster in terms of overall design and I didn't find it enjoyable to try to figure out at all.

The so-called "high skill boss battle gameplay" in post-KH1 games is simply not to my enjoyment. The mechanics don't lend themselves well to it, IMO. That said I did enjoy the boss fights in BBS: A Fragmentary Passage, things felt more refined there, and also the Dark Aqua fights were better designed (i.e. easier to read and more natural) than the late-game bosses in KH2.

I didn't manage to beat the secret bosses in AFP but I wanted to keep trying, not so in KH2. In KH2 I just leveled up a bunch then did the bare minimum of spamming reflect and gliding along and then cheesing Roxas/final 3 Org guys with Limit Form's Ars Arcanum which stunlocks them and doesn't raise Revenge Value.

Basically Dark Aqua made me want to git gud, KH2 guys just made me want to find a way to cheese them and get it over with and move on. KH1 remains the best in everything so far, including bosses.

 

[mogwaimon]

I agree that KH1 is overall the better package, though I've got a huge nostalgia for it because it was my first PS2 game and the entire reason I wanted a PS2 in the first place (at launch, anyways, later on of course the library for the system got insanely good)

Did you fight the Unknown battle and the other secret fights in KH1 when you went through that game? The Unknown fight is the only one that was added for the Final Mix version of the game, prior to that the toughest boss battle in KH1 was against a certain boss in the colosseum. I would say that the difficulty of that fight when you're not used to it is somewhere between the fights in KH2 that you disliked and the data battles, but it's been a long time since I last fought it to be fair. Still, I went from being completely unable to get past phase 1 in that fight to farming it for EXP to get to level 100.

still, if you didn't enjoy those or the Roxas fight/final three Org members, maybe the data battles aren't for you. they were added in the Final Mix version of the game and are far tougher than anything else up to this point in the series...then again if you're just playing through on normal it shouldn't be 'too' bad for you if you put in the time to learn the fights. Despite the difficulty they're some of the more interesting fights to do, and again on normal they shouldn't be overly difficult, I play on critical mode myself and with some grinding and defense boosts I can get it so where they don't two-shot me anymore...

oh! right, if you do change your mind look into how the abilities Second Wind and...Last Chance, I think they were called, work. Basically once you get two abilities that's key to surviving some of these fights because you can survive on a sliver of health through a combo so long as you don't recover because one of the abilities allows you to survive with 1HP through a combo and the other one allows you to survive with 1HP from burst damage IIRC, so long as you wait for the right time to recover and escape to heal it gives you another chance to get back in the fight

 

[Amurada]

After experiencing the huge difficulty spike of the Roxas fight and the boss battles in the last area I realized that I didn't find them enjoyable at all. Zero interest in fighting the data battles or the shadowy abyss battles. I was actually gonna write about this, about how the so-called "high skill boss battles" in KH2 were actually DOWNGRADES from the much better boss battles in KH1, but then mid-way through writing it just got tired of the subject. It is what it is.

I think the Roxas fight, while enjoyable in a vaccum, was badly integrated into the game and requires the player to play in a way that the game has never taught to the player before this point. I think it is a disaster in terms of overall design and I didn't find it enjoyable to try to figure out at all.

The so-called "high skill boss battle gameplay" in post-KH1 games is simply not to my enjoyment. The mechanics don't lend themselves well to it, IMO. That said I did enjoy the boss fights in BBS: A Fragmentary Passage, things felt more refined there, and also the Dark Aqua fights were better designed (i.e. easier to read and more natural) than the late-game bosses in KH2.

I didn't manage to beat the secret bosses in AFP but I wanted to keep trying, not so in KH2. In KH2 I just leveled up a bunch then did the bare minimum of spamming reflect and gliding along and then cheesing Roxas/final 3 Org guys with Limit Form's Ars Arcanum which stunlocks them and doesn't raise Revenge Value.

Basically Dark Aqua made me want to git gud, KH2 guys just made me want to find a way to cheese them and get it over with and move on. KH1 remains the best in everything so far, including bosses.

I would definitely disagree on whether the mechanics 'lend themselves' to high level play or not. I'm definitely nowhere close to being considered a skilled action game player, but I completed lv.1 critical of KH2&3, and had a fun time doing so; wherein KH1/BBS/DDD definitely showed the strain on what the mechanics/balancing were offering -- although Dream Drop Distance almost worked. It seems more than anything, that you failed to grasp certain mechanics within the game. Granted, many of them the games keeps obscurant, and I would not fault anyone for being incapable of parsing them; I had fun doing the runs without nary a guide to aid me, but I know that we all take games of certain genres to particular levels of engagement. Hell, KH1 in certain respects, is almost a literal translation of the SNES Mana games, with all the negative implications that come of it (granted, they got rid of the 'stamina' system). KH1 lends itself to nothing but having combat similar to most 3D action/adventures have such as the Zelda series. It was only with the sequels that the combat became fleshed out, and had some reactivity to it -- granted, the invisible enemy rage meter could be better implemented, in a similar manner that the Broodals combat design is handled in the otherwise awful Mario Odyssey.

 

[aweigh]

Tried out 358/2 on Desmume and MelonDS and did the first two missions but decided I'd rather just watch it than play it; lack of camera control was a real deal breaker + emulation wasn't perfect.

If anyone wants to play it I found it ran best on MelonDS but the sound still isn't perfect, some scratching/hissing/crackling every now and then, and I found that some of the cutscenes would sometimes have some weird line-doubling near the bottom. Of course, could just be an issue on my system and for others it emulates perfectly. Anyway, even if it emulated perfectly I still don't think I would have played it, hard for me to enjoy a 3d game with only "chase cam" and no real camera control. I really hate chase-cams.

Anyway, watched 358 on YouTube and I liked it. It's a bit too drawn out, could've been 1.5 hours long instead of the bloated 3 hour length, and around the halfway point I found myself using the right arrow key to skip ahead a few seconds during some conversations. Definitely not as riveting as the RE:COM "movie" which I found very engrossing all throughout and watched all in one sitting without complaint.

Still, it was a very cute story. Got a bit weird near the end once all the explanations are in play, and by 'weird' meaning that I don't think Nomura knew how to conclude it, but the core of the story remained intact and effective, and I definitely cared about the characters and what happened to them. I liked it. I was really engaged during the first hour or so, when it's building up the trio's friendship. All that stuff was great.

On to Birth By Sleep HD now.

Question for the people here:

Spoiler

So I assume the explanation for how and why Axel is alive in KH3 is given in either BBS or DDD? You don't need to say the how or why, just tell me which game has that stuff. Thanks.

 

[Duraframe300]

I agree that KH1 is overall the better package, though I've got a huge nostalgia for it because it was my first PS2 game and the entire reason I wanted a PS2 in the first place (at launch, anyways, later on of course the library for the system got insanely good)

Did you fight the Unknown battle and the other secret fights in KH1 when you went through that game? The Unknown fight is the only one that was added for the Final Mix version of the game, prior to that the toughest boss battle in KH1 was against a certain boss in the colosseum. I would say that the difficulty of that fight when you're not used to it is somewhere between the fights in KH2 that you disliked and the data battles, but it's been a long time since I last fought it to be fair. Still, I went from being completely unable to get past phase 1 in that fight to farming it for EXP to get to level 100.

Sephiroth is overrated tbh.

It's really just a fight you have to *learn*. Prepare for it, then play it until you've beaten it. Plays out exactly the same every time. Just needs tight execution.
Easily beatable on a lvl 1 run.

 

[mogwaimon]

Question for the people here:

Spoiler

So I assume the explanation for how and why Axel is alive in KH3 is given in either BBS or DDD? You don't need to say the how or why, just tell me which game has that stuff. Thanks.

DDD, if I remember correctly. it's like CoM in that it's a major bridge between games and if you don't play it you won't get what's going on in 3. BBS is similar to an extent, but I feel like DDD is far more necessary to understanding KH3 than BBS is.

I agree that KH1 is overall the better package, though I've got a huge nostalgia for it because it was my first PS2 game and the entire reason I wanted a PS2 in the first place (at launch, anyways, later on of course the library for the system got insanely good)

Did you fight the Unknown battle and the other secret fights in KH1 when you went through that game? The Unknown fight is the only one that was added for the Final Mix version of the game, prior to that the toughest boss battle in KH1 was against a certain boss in the colosseum. I would say that the difficulty of that fight when you're not used to it is somewhere between the fights in KH2 that you disliked and the data battles, but it's been a long time since I last fought it to be fair. Still, I went from being completely unable to get past phase 1 in that fight to farming it for EXP to get to level 100.

Sephiroth is overrated tbh.

It's really just a fight you have to *learn*. Prepare for it, then play it until you've beaten it. Plays out exactly the same every time. Just needs tight execution.
Easily beatable on a lvl 1 run.

i was trying not to spoil it for aweigh in case he hadn't seen it but cool, thx. but yes, you pretty much said what I said but more succinctly, once you learn the fight it's easy. derp.

 

[aweigh]

holy shit

Birth By Sleep HD is unbelievably addictive!

I'm already level 20 on the 2nd world because I just can't stop leveling up my Command Deck abilities. I love leveling them up and creating new commands via Command Deck melding.

 

[Robber Baron]

Birth By Sleep HD is unbelievably addictive!

Yep it was KH3 before KH3 in everything but name
*in a sence of it being a numbered sequel to the franchise, I don't think that highly of KH3 itself

 

[aweigh]

improved camera mod for BBS HD (mainly wider FOV, but that alone is good) on PC:

https://www.nexusmods.com/kingdomheartsbirthbysleepfinalmix/mods/1?tab=description

 

[aweigh]

FUCK FRUITBALL

 

[aweigh]

man, Birth By Sleep HD is like fucking crack. I can't put this game down. Just love everything about leveling up commands and then melding them together, it's addictive as fuck. Also the only KH game where I actually seek out money so I can spend it on extra or backup commands.

i love being able to do stuff like lay down Mine Squares and then cast Magnet to suck enemies in, or be able to use Stop/Confuse/Bind on even some of the bosses (had a laugh using Stopra on Zack in the colisseum and then blinding him), or using abilities that inflict poison debuffs or fire debuffs while physically attacking. Just made a spell that makes enemies float while syphoning life from them, and finally melded an Ars Arcanum command for use, and early game it was cool doing strike raids that inflict elemental magics on contact. Having defensive commands inflict debuffs or do other stuff is cool too.

Only real problem is that if you use even a modicum of common sense when melding commands you're going to end up much more powerful than your current world's enemies, it gives you every tool possible and allows you to make yourself as powerful as you're willing to grow, balance be damned. I enjoy the system for the system's sake but once I finish my current BBS run I'm going to do the remaining 2 characters on a harder difficulty.

 

[aweigh]

did ventus and aqua, youtubed the final episode and the super-secret ending. on to DDD.

 

[aweigh]

Want to avoid sperging before finishing the game but just wanted to say:

Dream Drop Distance HD is great. Really enjoying it, incredibly solid Kingdom Hearts game, and easily better than Birth By Sleep.

 

[aweigh]

about halfway thru DDD HD and i think it could be the most lengthy KH game yet, at least in terms of main story content that's not skippable. Already at 19 hours and i'm only halfway thru (4 worlds done with both chars, 3 worlds left).

Game's fucking awesome. Feels like a proper mainline sequel to KH2 and KH2, and the base gameplay of the game is WAAAAAAY better than Birth By Sleep. Really enjoying the Spirits too, though by now I'm just using the Water Barrel trick to accumulate easy Link Points, fuck it.

 

[Omasterkurosawa]

What's sad about KH game design is that only 2 nailed critical mode right. In other games, it has the tired "enemies has more defense and deal more damage". In KH2, you have half HP (meaning that enemies are relatively twice as strong) but you deal more too ! Which made the battles more tense and interesting.

I remember playing BBS in critical and was baffled in how spongey enemies and boss were.. And given the fact that you have cooldown on everything be it healing, or super moves, there's no attrition resource war to justify this. This is bad design.

 

[Amurada]

What's sad about KH game design is that only 2 nailed critical mode right. In other games, it has the tired "enemies has more defense and deal more damage". In KH2, you have half HP (meaning that enemies are relatively twice as strong) but you deal more too ! Which made the battles more tense and interesting.

I remember playing BBS in critical and was baffled in how spongey enemies and boss were.. And given the fact that you have cooldown on everything be it healing, or super moves, there's no attrition resource war to justify this. This is bad design.

true for every KH other than 2 and 3. KH3 is a little clumsy, but not any more or less than KH2 is; granted, they are janky in different areas. overall though, would say that the abundance and frequency of Keyblade Forms in KH3 definitely makes lv.1 critical mode much more fun to go back to. when I first saw that Drives were gone, I was kinda disappointed, but it is more than made up for when the significance and variety of each form adds so much to the combats overall entertainment value and depth.

 

[aweigh]

BBS impressed me with the command melding system but around halfway through i realized the game was fucked, there is NOTHING to the game, it is completely shallow. There's just nothing there.

Almost done with DDD now and I gotta say, really enjoyed it, HUGE improvement over BBS. Enemies are actually a threat if you fall asleep at the wheel in the last two worlds, in some ways reminds me of the final worlds in KH1.

Also finally made a Tyranto Rex hehe

 

[Thac0]

prior to that the toughest boss battle in KH1 was against a certain boss in the colosseum.

Doing my boys in Agrabah and Neverland dirty. They gave me much much more trouble than Sephiroth.

 

[aweigh]

kh1 final boss gauntlet tho... left quite an impression