MY HEART’S A BATTLEGROUND

Prologue: Before Kingdom Hearts II
So, our third game and we’ve already lost count. Good work! Anyways, Kingdom Hearts II is what I’ve always heard to be the best of the series, the cream of crop, the fan favorite, the very peak of Castle Oblivion (and without those stupid cards). So I was pretty excited to get to this game, though I did keep my expectations within reason. Were those expectations met? Well, I don’t like to spoil, but uh… no, they were surpassed. This game is really damn good. This is a log detailing my journey through Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix, all of it, including the spoiler parts. This will be a long read, but I hope it’s a good one.

Chapter I: Summer and Sea Salt Ice Cream
Our game begins with a kid with spiky hair and big ass shoes. This boy is… Roxas? Who the hell is Roxas? Well, it seems like we’re stuck with him for the time being. Roxas lives in Twilight Town, and it’s where we’ll be spending the first 10 hours of the game (yes 10 hours). Twilight Town is just your everyday town, permanently stuck at sunset, prone to graphical and auditory glitches. Y’know, the usual. And Roxas is just your everyday pre-teen, well, except he keeps having dreams of another kid with spiky hair, keeps having encounters with slithery folks in white jackets, and keeps getting his hands on a giant key. During these encounters with white coated weirdos, we’re introduced to the combat and omg it’s so good!! One of my favorite changes to the first game is Reaction Commands! Depending on who you’re fighting, there will be points where you can press the Y button to gain an upper hand on the enemy. It can be pretty fun honestly! With all of that out of the way, I quite like the story of this part. The day to day life of Roxas and his best buds, encountering weird shit that hints at Roxas’ secret past (so secret even he doesn’t know), and all of it adding up to the death(?) of my poor boy. Yeah, Roxas doesn’t make it out of this chapter alive, having to be absorbed by Sora for… reasons. It all really hit me in my soft, squishy, heart.

Chapter II: The Boys are Back in Town!
Roxas may be gone, but it’s not all bad. Our boys Sora, Donald, and Goofy are back after a long ass nap! Walking out of the memory pod thing from the last game, they end up in Twilight Town. They uh, don’t spend much time there before King Mickey suddenly shows up! He tells the gang to go visit the wizard, a wonderful wizard by the name of Yen Sid (who is actually from Fantasia, bet you didn’t know that). After an encounter with Etep, er I mean, Pete, Sora learns that those white guys are called Nobodies (bodies with no hearts as opposed to Heartless being hearts with no body), gets a new outfit and a new Gummi Ship. That new outfit is how we get one of my favorite mechanics in Kingdom Hearts II: Drive Forms. Drive Forms are so goddamn fun, they’re just a collection of super forms that you activate using the Drive Meter. Our first Drive Form is Valor Form, a physical based form which has Sora using two, count ‘em, TWO Keyblades for some fun as hell combos. With new drip acquired, we’re off to Hollow Bastion. That’s right, the penultimate level of the first game is now the second level of the second game, kinda cool in my opinion! I don’t have much to say on it, it's kinda nice to see Leon and the gang again. You fight a few Nobodies, see some foreshadowing, and you’re off!

Chapter III: On the Road Again
With Hollow Bastion saved (?), we head out to our first Disney World. I chose Beast’s Castle. This leads us to our first Gummi Ship segment and they feel both better and worse than the first game. They’re more dramatic and feel almost like a theme park ride (like at Disneyland haha). However, this is also its downfall, as it’s really fucking hard to see what is even happening. Anyway, Beast’s Castle is the first world where we encounter a member of our villainous group for this story, Organization XIII. A mysterious member of O. XIII has been fucking with Beast, ending with him summoning a big fuck off Heartless. The Heartless is actually a pretty damn fun fight, even if I died to it, ONLY FOR ME TO BE SAVED BY MICHAEL MOUSE! That’s right, in a moment that caught me really off guard, the game introduces Mickey Rescue. It’s a pretty fun mechanic, even if Mickey controls a bit strangely. After saving Beast from the Organization, I went off to Olympus Coliseum. Unlike the first game, there was no coliseum-ing to be had, and instead we have a story of Hades fucking with Hercules. Also Auron from Final Fantasy X shows up. Next up is the real life country of China, as seen in the hit movie Mulan (1998) This world was kinda mid in my opinion. Watching Mulan right before playing this world did influence my thoughts a bit but like, it just doesn’t do the movie justice. I did like a few parts, especially the fight with a fuckton of Heartless on the mountain, but all and all it was kind of a boring world to me.

Chapter IV: Sora Goes to Florida
However our next world is very interesting because we finally get to visit Disney Castle! That’s right, Micheal Mouse’s abode! And he really needs to clean up, cause there’s Heartless EVERYWHERE! So many that we have to escort Minnie Mouse to Micheal’s throne because she has something to show us. It’s honestly not that bad of an escort mission, it’s short and Minnie can show fucking lasers. What does she have to show us, well, Maleficent (who is now alive after getting killed by Sora in the last game, don't worry about it) has redecorated Disney Castle with some spooky thorn bushes. How do we deal with it? Well, apparently our answer is behind a mysterious door. Now when I stepped through that door, I was not expecting a level based on classic Mickey Mouse cartoons. Already an amazing idea, but then I saw they made models of classic Donald and Goof. And gave Sora his own rubberhose makeover! AND THEY ADDED A FUZZ OVER THE MUSIC AND SFX!? Oh my god, the attention to detail is on point! Why are we here though, what’s going down? Well, the story of this world is very… Kingdom Hearts. See, this world is actually just Disney Castle in the past. Clever eh? The past looks like an old cartoon? But anyway, Pete is trying to fuck with Disney Castle from the past, so we gotta team up with Pete to beat Pete. Yes, I’m serious. Some shenanigans later and Disney Castle is saved and Pete is sent packing into the future. And my reward? Getting to beat people to death with a metal pipe!

Chapter V: Beyond Underdrome
I suppose now is a good time to talk about the Coliseum. Not the Olympus Coliseum, that got destroyed. No no, Hades has set up his own coliseum, The Underdrome, and it works a bit differently than the one in Olympus. See, each cup has different rules. One locks your Drive Meter, one you’ll have to fight alone, one you have to rely on Summons, and they’re some others. All of ‘em are pretty damn fun. Of course, I was a bit overleveled for all of them, but uh, um, uh…

Chapter VI: In the Groove
By now, most of the gameplay has been revealed and the story is slowing down a bit. Not a bad thing, though! Well, most of the time, as we’ll see. First, I went to the Caribbean, as seen in Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) and also seen in Real Life. I quite liked seeing PS2 Captain Jack and Barbosa, and sailing from island to island was a fun touch. After that was Atlantica. Atlantica, as is tradition, sucks! However, instead of removing your legs, it instead makes you play a bad rhythm game with bad music! Yippee! …Okay, but seriously how did they screw this up? Disney and music go together like cart and horse, and Kingdom Hearts has some kick ass music, it feels like it should have been easy! Ah well, I was cut off until I got magnet magic, so off to Agrabah (which is not where you get magnet magic but I didn’t know that at the time). Agrabah is Agrabah, I don’t have a lot to say about it. Next is… wait, why is Twilight Town back? I get the feeling we should check that out…

Chapter VII: Return Trip to Twilight Town
So it seems Twilight Town is back, and upon arrival, shit is already going down. Nobodies are fucking shit up in Twilight Town, and we got just the tool for the job. After that, another one of those fucks from Organization XIII show up and they say they got Riku!? What the hell!? I’ve been waiting for that guy to show up, he’s like my favorite character! And now Hollow Bastion has an aura of darkness around it! What is going on!? I’d go save them, but I noticed I was rather underleveled, so uh, hopefully Hollow Bastion can hold em off for a bit????????? I then went to the best place to get some levels, Halloween Town. I most certainly did not just say that because I like The Nightmare Before Christmas. Unlike the first game, it follows the plot of the movie a bit. Although this time, Jack decides to be a bit more polite and simply ask Santa if he can take over Christmas, instead of kidnapping him and hijacking it by force. Uhhh and then Oogie Boogie shows up and you fight him. He has a pretty fun boss fight, you gotta break his platform by overloading it with presents. Lotta fun. Anyway, next was Pride Lands… and this one might take a bit…

Chapter VIII: Animorphs
Ironic, I don’t have much to say about Lion King as a movie, yet I have a shit load to say about it as a Kingdom Hearts world. See, this world has you on four legs instead of just two, and that leads to some changes in the gameplay. It’s full of charges and pounce attacks, fitting since Sora is a cat in this level. It takes some getting used to, but once I did it felt like I was a wild animal ripping into its prey (which to be fair, I was). So, with an extra set of legs, we go through the story of The Lion King. Hakuna Matata and all that. It all ends with one of my favorite boss fights in the game. Scar’s hatred, rage, and jealousy turn into dark power, and we fight him with Simba by our side. It’s such a fun boss fight!

Chapter IX: Water and Water and Water Water
So remember how I brought up how Atlantica is not very good? Well, I’m not entirely sure if that’s correct. See, Atlantica is weird, as you play through the other worlds, you’ll unlock new abilities that will allow you to progress through Atlantica. What my point is, the later songs aren’t awful. They’re basically just songs from the movie but with Sora thrown in here and there, along with a pretty decent villain song from during Ursula’s “boss fight”. Sadly, the gameplay doesn’t end up as good (whoever decided to have notes you shouldn’t hit in a rhythm game should get a piece of popcorn stuck in their teeth).

Chapter X: Hollow Bastion Rescue Mission
Alright, time to finally save Hollow Bastion. I’m sure everyone is doing fine… wait, they actually are? Damn. There are a lot of Heartless around, but everyone seems to be keeping fine. Hell, even King Mickey is here…wait KING MICKEY!? WE’VE BEEN LOOKING FOR HIM ALL DAY! On our way to go find him we end up in a room belonging to… Ansem? The fucker from the first game? And Leon is also here? And he wants to show us a secret room? Well, I’m not one to turn down Leon. Inside is a big ass computer with a weird circle thing, and after fucking around on it (I don’t think Sora knows how to use a computer) it starts talking to us in this deep as voice and… wait, did they base a level off of fucking Tron?

Chapter XI: They Based a Level Off of Fucking Tron!
Although it’s sadly a bit disappointing. Not bad, just not what I was hoping for. Seeing Tron (the character) was pretty damn cool, but the story of this level feels a bit like it ends too early. We simply unlock the database (named the Door To Darkness (yes really)), and then the Master Control Program tries to take it over! And he starts to threaten Hollow Bastion! How do we stop him? We.. change the password. And then we have a fight with a random Heartless. Yeah, that’s it. Though there is a fun Lightcycle minigame (even it plays nothing like actual Lightcycles), and you get Master Mode, and it’s AMAZING (even if it does suck Drive Meter down like a hungry tick). All and all, kind of a mid world. Hell, even the keyblade you get from the world is meh, not bad, but just not as good as what I have at the moment. But hey, we got the DTD online and now we look up stuff about Organization XIII! Except not, all we got was a picture of a dude with a beard, and it seems Micheal Mouse knows who that is…

Chapter XII: Ansem and His Shadows
Prepare for a lore dump. Okay so, that dude with the beard is Ansem the Wise. Now, the final boss of Kingdom Hearts 1 was also named Ansem but he wasn’t Ansem, just called himself Ansem. He was actually the Heartless of a dude named Xehanort (who apparently worked for Ansem the Wise). Now of course, Xehanort also has a Nobody, and he calls himself Xemnas, and he is the leader of Organization XIII. Oh and also has a room with a weird set of armor that he calls “friend”. Got all that? No? Okay perfect because I didn’t either. Stuff like this nonsense is why I love the plot of Kingdom Hearts, it’s just fucking weird.

Chapter XIII: The Battle of Hollow Bastion
WIth that out of the way, we get to one of the best parts of the game. Hollow Bastion is under attack! Heartless and Nobodies are everywhere! Sephiroth shows up for some reason! And then, we see it: thousands upon thousands of Heartless, all with their eyes on Hollow Bastion. We get a cutscene of what few citizens that can fight battling with a hundred or so Heartless each, Leon and Cloud acting all cool, it’s all so cool! On our way there, we gotta fight Demyx, and we just… actually kill him, damn. Guess they’re gonna have to call themselves Organization XII now. And then, ooooh and then! We get down to the battlefield, we split up with Donald and Goofy to cover as much ground as possible, and then 1000 Heartless converge on us. That’s right, we gotta kill 1000 Heartless. It’s honestly not even that hard, kinda easy actually, but my god does it feel so GOOD! The lil counter going down with every Heartless slain, the Reaction Commands zipping you around the battlefield, the crowd of Heartless in the background slowly vanishing as you off them by the hundreds, it’s all so COOL!! Oh, and then Goofy fucking dies. He gets better a few minutes later so uh, who cares. But then, with the Battle of Hollow Bastion finished, we learn who the true victors were. See, Organization XIII has been taking the Hearts of all the Heartless we’ve killed and are using them to make their own Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts II if you will. So this entire battle has just fueled their plot even more. And just to rub salt in the wound, they’ve even kidnapped Kairi for some reason, and before we can even process all that, the cutscene ends and we’re booted back to the World Map…

Chapter XIV: Disney Sequels
With Hollow Bastion saved, the game kicks us back to the world map, and… why did all the level recommendations go up? What happened? Well, we’ve unlocked each world's second episode, continuations of each world's story. And oh my god, they’re all an improvement. Mulan’s second episode has a fun fight with a dragon (and a better ending than the movie in my opinion). Beast’s is rather heartfelt and really got to me. Herc’s has you fighting through another cup in the Underdrome. The Pirate’s return trip is a lot of fun, even if the plot makes no sense. Aladdin’s is bad, hell the magic carpet parts gave me a headache. Nightmare’s return trip has you fighting Lock, Shock, and Barrel again for some reason, but then introduces The Experiment which has some great themes and an awesome boss fight. Lion King’s in just kinda eh? Has a cool boss fight though. Finally, Tron’s second episode, well…

Chapter XV: Debuggin’
Oh man, this was a massive improvement! Starting with Hollow Bastion getting ravaged by the MASTER CONTROL PROGRAM. Then when we go into the Grid, things get even better! We get to ride a Solar Sailer (even if it is kinda annoying). We get to fight Commander Sark and the MCP! We get… a surprising amount of character development for Tron. Kind of adorable honestly. And with the day saved, Hollow Bastion transitions into Radiant Garden, and we’re finally onto the end of the game. Except, I feel like I forgot something…

Chapter XVI: OH SHIT I FORGOT THE 100 ACRE WOOD!
This is gonna sound weird, but The 100 Acre Wood is oddly intense in this game. I know that’s an odd thing to say about the funny Winnie the Pooh level, but a lot of the minigames are way faster than the first game’s minigames. Not much else to say other than that, it’s just more of Sora and Pooh being adorable. Also Hunny Slider is my favorite minigame in any of the KH games so far.

Chapter XVII: Fall and Friends Unforgotten
With Pooh out of the way, we can finally make our way to Twilight Town… again. The Twilight Town gang are investigating the old mansion, believing there’s an alternate Twilight Town. Maybe even, a virtual Twilight Town? That’s right there were TWO! And the virtual Twilight Town somehow leads to a real(?) place(??), the final world: The World That Never Was. Even though it is, if it wasn’t we couldn’t go to it. Whatever. None of that matters because OH MY GOD THIS WORLD IS SO COOL! Before we even get in we gotta fight through security with my boy AXEL, YOU GET FIGHT WITH AXEL!! And then he dies and I’m sad now… But then when you get to The World that Wasn’t, not a few minutes in and you’re already heading for a Star Wars-ass spaceship castle. You have boss fights against the remaining Organization XIII members and also ROXAS! YOU HAVE A BOSS FIGHT AGAINST ROXAS AND IT’S AWESOME AND I NEARLY CRIED FOR MY BOY CAUSE HE DIDN’T DESERVE THIS!! The story of this world makes no goddamn sense, Ansem the Wise is trying to put Kingdom Hearts in a computer(?), Riku looks like Fake Ansem from the first game because darkness(?), it’s all kinda stupid. And I love it. It’s only been 2 and a half but I already have a love for Kingdom Hearts stupid story telling. Oh and the final boss is awesome! You get to team up with my boy Riku! You get a 1 on 2 fight with Xemnas! You get a random shooter segment where Xemnas rides a dragon! You get awesome music!! Oh it’s all so COOL!!! It all ends with one more fight with Xemnas, no robot dragon, no speeder, just Sora and Riku going against this Heartless wizard man. He uses laser attacks, including a ridiculous amount during a QTE part, but with the help of Sora’s edgy best friend, Xemnas dissolves back into nothingness. And with the adventure done, Sora, Riku, and Kairi return to Destiny Islands, all of them together for the first time since the beginning of Kingdom Hearts 1. Oh, it just warms my heart to see them all get the ending they deserve. Or at least, it would be an ending, but a letter in a bottle washes up on the shore, with a Mickey Mouse symbol on the paper.

Epilogue: My Sanctuary
So, that was Kingdom Hearts II. Sorry for going off the rails a bit there, but oh my god I loved this game! Compared to Kingdom Hearts 1 and Chain of Memories, both of which I thought were a bit middling, KH II was amazing! It had a few problems, but it was just one of those games where the flaws become but bumps in the road, a road that is a hell of a lot of fun to walk. And for those of you wondering, no I’m not fighting the superbosses. I’m sure they’re fun, but I don’t feel like grinding for 2 weeks just to fight them.