Man, 2002 was another country entirely. And Kingdom Hearts released in *MARCH* 2002.
The youngun’s among you may not remember but 2001 had a major event happen in the tail end of the year and there was a *LOT* of uncertainty in the weeks and months that followed. What’s going to happen? Are we going to go to war? Are we already in a war and just didn’t know it? What do we *DO*? We should be able to figure out what we can *DO*!, we were feeling.
And it felt like there was just uncertainty and even more uncertainty on top of that.
Well, about six months later, Kingdom Hearts came out. It was *EXACTLY* what a whole bunch of people needed. The ability to visit the worlds of some of the favorite Disney characters… and protect these worlds from Terrorists.
You picked up Goofy and Donald Duck to assist you and then you were on your way to visit Peter Pan in Neverland, visit Jack in Halloweentown, visit Alice in Wonderland, visit Tarzan, visit Simba, visit Ariel, visit Winnie the Pooh… it doesn’t *HAVE* to make sense. You’re running around these various worlds that have been overtaken by “The Heartless” and you clean them out and make the world safe for your various cartoon friends (and, along the way, you pick up a whole bunch of summoning powers so you can have The Genie help you fight, or Dumbo, or Tinkerbell, or, believe it or not, Bambi.
And the controls were tight, the game was fun, the storyline revolved around saving the world from bad guys, and it even had a chaste and wholesome romance at the heart of it where you and your best friend/rival competed for the affections of your childhood friend Kairi.
The game had a good plot, it had a theme that hit *EXACTLY* when people most needed it, and the gameplay was tight.
Happy sigh. It was *AWESOME*.
Of course, it spawned millions of sequels that gave you more Disney properties for everybody from Toy Story to Pirates of the Carribean and they even sprinkled in some Final Fantasy stuff so you met Cloud from FFVII and Tidus from FFX and one of the big fights at the end of the game was against Sephiroth (and, seriously, he was nigh-impossible. I don’t think I got him under 50%).
The games were *AMAZING*. And, more than two decades ago, just what we needed. Well, just what *I* needed, anyway.
They’re on sale on Steam right now. 31% off. Pay just under $35 to get the first six Kingdom Hearts games:
KINGDOM HEARTS Final Mix
KINGDOM HEARTS Re:Chain of Memories
KINGDOM HEARTS II Final Mix
KINGDOM HEARTS 358/2 Days (HD cutscene compilation)
KINGDOM HEARTS Birth by Sleep Final Mix
KINGDOM HEARTS Re:coded (HD cutscene compilation)
That’s not even six bucks a game.
You know what? I’m going to get it right now.
So… what are you playing?
(Featured image is Kingdom Hearts promotional art from 2002.)
I’m bored and between games… next season of Path of Exile starts late July (expect it to either be lame or loot bonanza depending on their launch strategy for PoE2) … Last Epoch’s first season after launch starts in mid July (looks like they are going to lean into making more skills funnerer) … [Seriously though, these idiots should stagger their releases by 2 months so they both maximize hype and players] … and BG3 just announced that they will officially support Mods — in September. I can’t play BG3 unmodded, and, well, the current Modding framework really sucks.
So… I bought Wartales from steam (30% off). It has a decent idea — gritty Might of Magic (no base building) with some Party RPG and a turn based combat system. As mercenaries the primary driver is, well, having enough money and food to make payroll. Which, to be fair, is a reasonable game and thematic constraint… but in my first play through I find it more like cheating death and doom than becoming a Warlord Princeling. Quite possibly I’m not doing it right or far enough along. I could see some of you nerds liking it though.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1527950/Wartales/Report
I’m playing the Persona games on PlayStation 4. I just finished Persona 3 Reload and now I’m on Persona 4 Golden.Report
I got the KH collection on Epic a few years back. I played a good way through 2, but I never finished. It’s on my to-do list now, but I will have to make the effort to get the cloud saves to work on Steam Deck, which isn’t straightforward.
At the moment, I am still making my way through Shin Megami Tensai V. It’s slow going, because I haven’t been playing video games as much. On work nights, I typically play for an hour or so before going to bed, but my weekends have kept me occupied with other stuff, so I haven’t gotten in any long sessions. It makes it easy to feel like I am not really making much progress in a session if all I do is get a few “treasure chests” and collectibles and get to the next save point.Report