I like Birth By Sleep a lot. It is among my favorite of the Kingdom Hearts games. The story is a bit more coherent than normal and the combat is fun and expressive.
Being set in the past with a limited amount of characters really helps this game's story. This is a good introduction to Aqua, Ventus, and Terra, but it also lets us see some other characters earlier in their lives, so that is cool. The story is straightforward and predictable, and some of the character decisions are pretty asinine, but it mostly makes sense and lacks most of the trash that causes KH 1, 2, and 3 to be incomprehensible. Aqua is everyone's favorite character for a reason, and I like seeing the version of her here that isn't all traumatized by spending 100 years in the darkness dimension or whatever.
The game does suffer a bit for having all three characters go through the same worlds, even though they play different, some of the bosses mix things up, and it is interesting to see the story from three different perspectives.
Gameplay in Birth By Sleep takes a bit to wrap your head around, but once I got the hang of how commands work, I found the system to be super fun to exploit. The basic gameplay of setting up your command deck to put you into the form you want is very satisfying and it feels great once you get things working the way you want. I really enjoyed that each character pushes you in a different direction, favoring different forms and commands.
Melding is great. I love being able to improve my abilities directly like this and the addition of commands granting you abilities you can discover and permanently unlock (Final Fantasy IX!?) is really rewarding.
By the end of each character's story, when you have the most powerful commands unlocked, it can get a bit repetitive, however. It is never worse than combat often is in this game though, and the form changes let you opt into different gameplay pretty easily, if you want to.
Birth By Sleep is a really great game. Possibly my favorite in the series. If you want a solid action game with some cool systems, check it out!
(played in Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 Remix)
Being set in the past with a limited amount of characters really helps this game's story. This is a good introduction to Aqua, Ventus, and Terra, but it also lets us see some other characters earlier in their lives, so that is cool. The story is straightforward and predictable, and some of the character decisions are pretty asinine, but it mostly makes sense and lacks most of the trash that causes KH 1, 2, and 3 to be incomprehensible. Aqua is everyone's favorite character for a reason, and I like seeing the version of her here that isn't all traumatized by spending 100 years in the darkness dimension or whatever.
The game does suffer a bit for having all three characters go through the same worlds, even though they play different, some of the bosses mix things up, and it is interesting to see the story from three different perspectives.
Gameplay in Birth By Sleep takes a bit to wrap your head around, but once I got the hang of how commands work, I found the system to be super fun to exploit. The basic gameplay of setting up your command deck to put you into the form you want is very satisfying and it feels great once you get things working the way you want. I really enjoyed that each character pushes you in a different direction, favoring different forms and commands.
Melding is great. I love being able to improve my abilities directly like this and the addition of commands granting you abilities you can discover and permanently unlock (Final Fantasy IX!?) is really rewarding.
By the end of each character's story, when you have the most powerful commands unlocked, it can get a bit repetitive, however. It is never worse than combat often is in this game though, and the form changes let you opt into different gameplay pretty easily, if you want to.
Birth By Sleep is a really great game. Possibly my favorite in the series. If you want a solid action game with some cool systems, check it out!
(played in Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 Remix)
This review contains spoilers
I never finished the game on PSP, so I was thrilled when the remaster was announced for PS3, though I never got to it. Then it was ported to PS4 and I finally played this game. The battle system was refined and the extra analog stick not available on the PSP was also very helpful. Some of the most fun and flashy boss fights and a fun way to tell the story, with three character points of view.
Any cutscene with Xehanort is a delight due to the late Leonard Nimoy voicing him perfectly. I appreciated how each character played differently and had their distinct style - my favorite was Aqua.
I may consider replaying this on PS3 someday to get the other set of story trophies, or Xbox for the achievements.
Any cutscene with Xehanort is a delight due to the late Leonard Nimoy voicing him perfectly. I appreciated how each character played differently and had their distinct style - my favorite was Aqua.
I may consider replaying this on PS3 someday to get the other set of story trophies, or Xbox for the achievements.
the good:
- i really like the story, even though terra's is literally just revenge of the sith
- ventus and vanitas are really interesting characters
- the music, generally, is pretty good
- shotlocks
the bad:
- the difficulty curve is very steep, like you'll fight through enemies in radiant garden easily but then you'll do chip damage to even common floods in the next worlds
- disney. f*cking. town.
- the worlds feel a little too small, which is understandable for a psp game, but then half of them are like mazes
- ventus's story feels like it adds nothing to the overall plot until the finale
the verdict:
casting the star wars guy and the star trek guy as the two opposing forces was the funniest thing disney has ever done
- i really like the story, even though terra's is literally just revenge of the sith
- ventus and vanitas are really interesting characters
- the music, generally, is pretty good
- shotlocks
the bad:
- the difficulty curve is very steep, like you'll fight through enemies in radiant garden easily but then you'll do chip damage to even common floods in the next worlds
- disney. f*cking. town.
- the worlds feel a little too small, which is understandable for a psp game, but then half of them are like mazes
- ventus's story feels like it adds nothing to the overall plot until the finale
the verdict:
casting the star wars guy and the star trek guy as the two opposing forces was the funniest thing disney has ever done
I'll be damned, what a fantastic game with a very interactive gameplay mechanic that adds a new spice to the game and keeps each playthrough interesting. Speaking of playthroughs, all three of the characters were each really fun to play through, especially Aqua since she was hella mobile and magic powerful. Terra & Ventus were also really fun to play, having their own challenges to boot as well.
Overall, another amazing entry through the series, yippee!!
Overall, another amazing entry through the series, yippee!!