Log Status
Completed
Playing
Backlog
Wishlist
Rating
Time Played
--
Days in Journal
2 days
Last played
January 8, 2024
First played
November 27, 2023
Platforms Played
hell has frozen over. 2024 is here. and, as is typical of the new year, it's time for a new me. with that, i announce a great paradigm change: i am now a kingdom hearts II liker. again. please, hold your gasps of shock and awe, we have much to cover.
jokes aside, those who've known me for years and have talked about video games at length with me have likely heard my take on the KH series: it should never have gotten sequels. it's a fun quick summation of my feelings to give. i can now upgrade that to a delightful "it should never have gotten sequels after II". 358/2 Days has always been an exception to this either way, so the one-liner loses its potency. but what was it about kingdom hearts II that was so polarizing for me? i've come around on RECOM, so, truly, anything is possible. but what made II such a dislikeable game?
my history with KH II is interesting. i was obsessed with KH I as a child. it was basically my first JRPG, for however much you consider it a true-blue JRPG. it captivated me by presenting me these complex (to an 8 year old) ideas of strategy and stat management in a familiar environment. i've never been much of a disney fan, even as a child, but you can't deny that there's cultural osmosis shared with aladdin and the little mermaid that makes them feel immediately familiar. i was being introduced to a world i'd never explored, and it helps that the execution of the concepts KH I had was nearly pitch-perfect.
KH I was a tragic game defined by its longing and sense of childlike thrill. being a child taken seriously was something to both crave and fear. KH I was able to capitalize perfectly on what it feels like to be someone just coming into their own sense of self and identity, personified by its characters' own struggle with identity and restraints. sora and riku and kairi are more than just preteens wanting to set sail and see the world, they're also your next door neighbors who want to escape suburbia or their small town or wherever and be free. this spoke to me in a profound way that a lot of art and media with child protagonists didn't. the game never admonishes the destiny islands trio for their desires and wants, nor does it treat them as childish or foolish. these characters were played straight in a serious context. without having the words to vocalize what about KH I spoke to me, i just knew there was this feeling the game evoked out of me that very few things had in my life by that point. i wanted more. i needed more.
so, all this leads to me playing the game relentlessly and waiting like a coiled spring for a sequel. i had played COM, and that gave more questions than answers (though it did give us axel, who's just a special little guy to me). even as a kid, i could recognize that its existence was largely just to serve as a soft-recap of the events of KH I for a ninendo-audience, and the scant bits of new information were difficult to process and determine the significance of. what is the deal with the guys in the black coats? what is "the organization"? what's axel's full deal? who the hell is diz? etc. etc. little did i know that writing for the KH series would follow this tendency of presenting the player with more questions than answers in each installment in time.
still. i was excited for kingdom hearts II. its release would be my woodstock. i can scarcely remember how it felt to want a game so badly, to feel so assured in knowing it would be not only a good game, but that it would be a life-changing event that would radically alter my personality down to the cellular level. i didn't have friends who were into kingdom hearts at all, so i was on that same metaphorical island as sora, wanting someone to share my experiences with. i bid my time, hoping patience's reward would visit me soon.
eventually, it came. i got home from middle school. i put the kingdom hearts II disc into my playstation 2. i hit new game. "i wanna line the pieces up - yours and mine." cue "sanctuary" by utada hikaru.
and you know what?
it FUCKED.
i still remember the feeling of watching that opening FMV. what a fucking showstopper of talent. i would go so far as to say it's a pinnacle achievement in the medium. it not only recaps (without a single word!) both the plots to I and COM in a "here's all the big points you need to know" way using the visual storytelling of a cutscene, but it's done so effortlessly, with such grace and precision. it's what we wanted. i remember starting up new games of KH II later that night just to rewatch it. it was just. . . impeccable.
what followed was me consuming the SHIT out of KH II. i will say, my initial playthrough of this game feels very much like a blur. i barely remember how i played, what i thought of things, and i didn't even properly digest some of the plot elements of it. in that way, i treated KH II like a rollercoaster ride: something to experience, not to contemplate. it couldn't necessarily be helped; at 12 years old, the nuance of the roxas cold open was entirely lost on me nor did i even really comprehend it. i didn't even connect the dots on roxas being a former organization member despite it being explicitly spelled out several times. again, experienced, not contemplated. it's worth stressing that i missed all these story beats and didn't even largely understand a lot of the text of the game because, and this is the important part, i still loved kingdom hearts ii. i was apeshit for it. i thought it was an incredible achievement. my DNA had been altered from playing it. i was a different person. society was post-"sanctuary". i lived in a different world than the one i did on march 27th, 2006.
and then, when i became a more thoughtful, analytical, and critical teenager, i revisited kingdom hearts ii. and you know what?
it was fucking terrible.
"sanctuary" still hit those everest highs. but the gameplay had largely been solved once i realized there's next to no punishment for mashing attack, reaction command, and healing as necessary. was there any fight in the game that challenged this standby? even sephiroth could be bruteforced by a level 80+ player using this mentality. i didn't even use magic beyond cure. reflega? firaga? why would i use something that isn't my explosion finisher? all these boss fights i had thought on my first playthrough to be these accomplishments of skill suddenly became revealed as artifice. so many boss fights felt disposable and unmemorable to me in this playthrough. i had lost the ability to see the magic that had enchanted me. and, truthfully, i still understand this mentality i had. i don't even necessarily disagree with it; i find vanilla II to be a pretty easy game to bulldoze with mindless tactics. gameplay isn't everything to these games, but it's the lion's share of what you're doing. if i'm not having fun, what good is the game to me? if it's not challenging me, what is the value of combat? if it's not engaging, what is the value in engaging?
this was a viewpoint that i had predominantly held onto for several years, dating to even recently. it's worth stating that even playing final mix did not amend this for me. if anything, it arguably made it worse. i got the platinum in PS3's KH II FM and that is not an easy task to accomplish for the uninitiated. much of my "success" with the superbosses was a result of me bruteforcing my way through fights that required more planning, strategy, and creativity than the entirety of II vanilla had required. it was incredibly frustrating fighting someone like data vexen and getting my ass tapdanced on because i didn't know dominant strats or how to utilize the options i had. sure, i had learned that reflega exists, but limits were still a mystery to me, and it was beyond my expectations that there would be combo modifiers i'd want to unequip (i.e. dodge slash and aerial sweep).
none of the things i needed to do felt explained, none of my tools felt like options i could even use. truthfully, it wasn't just that it didn't click. it was that it was infuriating. it felt like i was missing something. it was a game i had endured seeing heaps of praise for from speedrunners and high level action game players alike. i wanted to understand, and i was dealing with a client that refused to let me in. my opinion managed to sink lower. what's worse than casually being disappointed by a game you thought you loved? exclusion from the cool kid's club and being incapable of finding the way in.
that was 2018. i played II FM as a refresher for III as well as to see how different FM would play. now that we live in a post-kingdom hearts III world, it's easier to see how nothing matters and everything is decaying. but it's worth sharing this poorly arranged medium-article of a review because KH II is a personal game for me. one of great success and failure. i think art, especially video games, can be an intimate experience for people in profound ways, and it feels as though i can segment periods of my life with my experiences with kingdom hearts ii. it's relevant to this review because i am who i am now because of kingdom hearts as a series. not in a major way, but also in an observable way. these anecdotes are relevant to my review because they are me and my feelings on the game are defined by these experiences.
so, with that preamble said, we reach 2023. by this point, i've made my peace with not being in the cool kid's club. if anything, i've been bolstered in my opinion by finding the KH II hater now and then. i know who i am, i am a matured adult. i know what i'm about. still, in spite of my harsh misgivings with KH II, i'm also a person makes mistakes and does not always agree with my past opinions. i even have a list dedicated to games that i used to hate but now love (and one for games i used to love but now don't). i am a person with a perspective, and perspectives change with time, age, and experience. i am struck by a sudden urge to replay kingdom hearts II final mix. i own the story so far collection for PS4 (which has wondrously short load times). i decide to replay it. worst-case scenario, i know the bad things i'm in for, so i can't be surprised. i pop in the disc. i hit new game. "i wanna line the pieces up - yours and mine." cue "sanctuary" by utada hikaru.
and you know what?
it FUCKED.
okay, maybe fucked is a bit much. i still have misgivings with the game (most notably in the plot). and i cannot deny that one of my larger complaints that still resonates with me is with the game's design is level structure that feels open and empty. i still have things to critique about this game. but i do find much more joy in it now as someone with tempered expectations. it's funny, my first playthrough was too much hype that colored me into a state of blind adoration without the adequate understanding to verbalize why i liked the game. then, after that, it was sophomore slump-esque cynicism that failed to see any value or joy in the game at all. thesis, antithesis. it's logical that synthesis would follow.
one of the largest hurdles i had to deal with was coming at this game with the right set of expectations. it's not necessarily a misnomer to call KH II a JRPG, but it is a lie by omission. whereas you could potentially get away with calling KH I a JRPG and not an action game, KH II is a prominent and unapologetic action game. KH II lives and dies by the moments where the player is managing space between an enemy(s) and weighing what options they should use to solve the encounter. this is more than just "use fire on the enemies weak to fire" logic of I. fire is more of a magic function than an element, with emphasis being on using it as a character-orbiting hitbox more than for its elemental status. blizzard gives the player ranged damage in the way ebony and ivory would in DMC. magnet gives crowd control options to help the player deal with larger numbers. reflect is downright busted when you learn how to utilize it. all of this sounds redundant, but starting to view magic as functions rather than JRPG elements is a microcosm of the perspective shift i needed to appreciate what the game is doing. i have to meet the game as it is, not what i demand it be.
the thing about all of this is that the game does not ever expect any competency with these systems, and, as mentioned, it's easy to just bruteforce. in fact, KH II's greatest shame is that it seems embarrassed to tell you about the things you can do and when you should do them. it doesn't even seem to want to provide you with the obstacles that would necessitate them. everything can be largely solved by attacking it, and while there's more efficient ways than just attacking, they're almost always unnecessary. the greatest flaw KH II has is that it lacks the confidence to provide better explanations of these tools and simultaneously demand players use them. what good is a jewel that is too precious?
i now get it though. i understand why people say that this game shines at higher levels of play with critical mode and data organization. to be frank, critical mode feels like the only way i could ever recommend someone experience this game, as it gives that level of burden i had earlier alluded to. it's not a perfect system, and complementary explanations are woefully absent, but it does alleviate so much of what made KH II dull to me. i now understand the value of limits and what tactical advantage they can provide. i now use limit form fairly regularly as a panic button (and because it's busted as fuck for certain fights like roxas lol). i needed third-party suggestions and information to get to this point, but i met the game halfway and got more out of it as a result.
the bittersweet nature of kingdom hearts as a series continues on, however. this was the entry that tied up all loose threads, yet, here we are, characters with stories still being told. the plot was essentially self-contained and could easily be the final entry for the destiny island trio. literally all you would need to do is delete that "chamber of repose" FM cutscene, the letter from the king teaser, and remove references to xehanort from the BBS teaser. from everything i've seen, xehanort might as well be an entirely new character in BBS (a game i have not played yet), so there's no reason to tie the destiny islands trio back into it. KH II was a closure for their story, a finality. sora, riku, and kairi had their adventure, they saw the world, and they returned home to each other. they matured and got to satisfy their yearning for freedom to greater appreciate their surroundings. it was the end of the book. the final scene. the last moment. i know i'm tardy to the party on this one, but KH II did not and should not have gotten sequels that involved these characters anymore. i do plan on playing BBS in the near-ish future, and it's going to be a monumental task for it to overcome this finality in my mind.
overall though? i'm glad i replayed this game. i gained a greater understanding of it with age, and i feel as though i've finally reached a closure with with game that i've denied myself for years. an open wound has finally scabbed over and begun to heal. i can appreciate the heart and soul of this gargantuan entry in not only the series but the PS2 library as well without losing focus of its shortcomings.
new year, new me.
jokes aside, those who've known me for years and have talked about video games at length with me have likely heard my take on the KH series: it should never have gotten sequels. it's a fun quick summation of my feelings to give. i can now upgrade that to a delightful "it should never have gotten sequels after II". 358/2 Days has always been an exception to this either way, so the one-liner loses its potency. but what was it about kingdom hearts II that was so polarizing for me? i've come around on RECOM, so, truly, anything is possible. but what made II such a dislikeable game?
my history with KH II is interesting. i was obsessed with KH I as a child. it was basically my first JRPG, for however much you consider it a true-blue JRPG. it captivated me by presenting me these complex (to an 8 year old) ideas of strategy and stat management in a familiar environment. i've never been much of a disney fan, even as a child, but you can't deny that there's cultural osmosis shared with aladdin and the little mermaid that makes them feel immediately familiar. i was being introduced to a world i'd never explored, and it helps that the execution of the concepts KH I had was nearly pitch-perfect.
KH I was a tragic game defined by its longing and sense of childlike thrill. being a child taken seriously was something to both crave and fear. KH I was able to capitalize perfectly on what it feels like to be someone just coming into their own sense of self and identity, personified by its characters' own struggle with identity and restraints. sora and riku and kairi are more than just preteens wanting to set sail and see the world, they're also your next door neighbors who want to escape suburbia or their small town or wherever and be free. this spoke to me in a profound way that a lot of art and media with child protagonists didn't. the game never admonishes the destiny islands trio for their desires and wants, nor does it treat them as childish or foolish. these characters were played straight in a serious context. without having the words to vocalize what about KH I spoke to me, i just knew there was this feeling the game evoked out of me that very few things had in my life by that point. i wanted more. i needed more.
so, all this leads to me playing the game relentlessly and waiting like a coiled spring for a sequel. i had played COM, and that gave more questions than answers (though it did give us axel, who's just a special little guy to me). even as a kid, i could recognize that its existence was largely just to serve as a soft-recap of the events of KH I for a ninendo-audience, and the scant bits of new information were difficult to process and determine the significance of. what is the deal with the guys in the black coats? what is "the organization"? what's axel's full deal? who the hell is diz? etc. etc. little did i know that writing for the KH series would follow this tendency of presenting the player with more questions than answers in each installment in time.
still. i was excited for kingdom hearts II. its release would be my woodstock. i can scarcely remember how it felt to want a game so badly, to feel so assured in knowing it would be not only a good game, but that it would be a life-changing event that would radically alter my personality down to the cellular level. i didn't have friends who were into kingdom hearts at all, so i was on that same metaphorical island as sora, wanting someone to share my experiences with. i bid my time, hoping patience's reward would visit me soon.
eventually, it came. i got home from middle school. i put the kingdom hearts II disc into my playstation 2. i hit new game. "i wanna line the pieces up - yours and mine." cue "sanctuary" by utada hikaru.
and you know what?
it FUCKED.
i still remember the feeling of watching that opening FMV. what a fucking showstopper of talent. i would go so far as to say it's a pinnacle achievement in the medium. it not only recaps (without a single word!) both the plots to I and COM in a "here's all the big points you need to know" way using the visual storytelling of a cutscene, but it's done so effortlessly, with such grace and precision. it's what we wanted. i remember starting up new games of KH II later that night just to rewatch it. it was just. . . impeccable.
what followed was me consuming the SHIT out of KH II. i will say, my initial playthrough of this game feels very much like a blur. i barely remember how i played, what i thought of things, and i didn't even properly digest some of the plot elements of it. in that way, i treated KH II like a rollercoaster ride: something to experience, not to contemplate. it couldn't necessarily be helped; at 12 years old, the nuance of the roxas cold open was entirely lost on me nor did i even really comprehend it. i didn't even connect the dots on roxas being a former organization member despite it being explicitly spelled out several times. again, experienced, not contemplated. it's worth stressing that i missed all these story beats and didn't even largely understand a lot of the text of the game because, and this is the important part, i still loved kingdom hearts ii. i was apeshit for it. i thought it was an incredible achievement. my DNA had been altered from playing it. i was a different person. society was post-"sanctuary". i lived in a different world than the one i did on march 27th, 2006.
and then, when i became a more thoughtful, analytical, and critical teenager, i revisited kingdom hearts ii. and you know what?
it was fucking terrible.
"sanctuary" still hit those everest highs. but the gameplay had largely been solved once i realized there's next to no punishment for mashing attack, reaction command, and healing as necessary. was there any fight in the game that challenged this standby? even sephiroth could be bruteforced by a level 80+ player using this mentality. i didn't even use magic beyond cure. reflega? firaga? why would i use something that isn't my explosion finisher? all these boss fights i had thought on my first playthrough to be these accomplishments of skill suddenly became revealed as artifice. so many boss fights felt disposable and unmemorable to me in this playthrough. i had lost the ability to see the magic that had enchanted me. and, truthfully, i still understand this mentality i had. i don't even necessarily disagree with it; i find vanilla II to be a pretty easy game to bulldoze with mindless tactics. gameplay isn't everything to these games, but it's the lion's share of what you're doing. if i'm not having fun, what good is the game to me? if it's not challenging me, what is the value of combat? if it's not engaging, what is the value in engaging?
this was a viewpoint that i had predominantly held onto for several years, dating to even recently. it's worth stating that even playing final mix did not amend this for me. if anything, it arguably made it worse. i got the platinum in PS3's KH II FM and that is not an easy task to accomplish for the uninitiated. much of my "success" with the superbosses was a result of me bruteforcing my way through fights that required more planning, strategy, and creativity than the entirety of II vanilla had required. it was incredibly frustrating fighting someone like data vexen and getting my ass tapdanced on because i didn't know dominant strats or how to utilize the options i had. sure, i had learned that reflega exists, but limits were still a mystery to me, and it was beyond my expectations that there would be combo modifiers i'd want to unequip (i.e. dodge slash and aerial sweep).
none of the things i needed to do felt explained, none of my tools felt like options i could even use. truthfully, it wasn't just that it didn't click. it was that it was infuriating. it felt like i was missing something. it was a game i had endured seeing heaps of praise for from speedrunners and high level action game players alike. i wanted to understand, and i was dealing with a client that refused to let me in. my opinion managed to sink lower. what's worse than casually being disappointed by a game you thought you loved? exclusion from the cool kid's club and being incapable of finding the way in.
that was 2018. i played II FM as a refresher for III as well as to see how different FM would play. now that we live in a post-kingdom hearts III world, it's easier to see how nothing matters and everything is decaying. but it's worth sharing this poorly arranged medium-article of a review because KH II is a personal game for me. one of great success and failure. i think art, especially video games, can be an intimate experience for people in profound ways, and it feels as though i can segment periods of my life with my experiences with kingdom hearts ii. it's relevant to this review because i am who i am now because of kingdom hearts as a series. not in a major way, but also in an observable way. these anecdotes are relevant to my review because they are me and my feelings on the game are defined by these experiences.
so, with that preamble said, we reach 2023. by this point, i've made my peace with not being in the cool kid's club. if anything, i've been bolstered in my opinion by finding the KH II hater now and then. i know who i am, i am a matured adult. i know what i'm about. still, in spite of my harsh misgivings with KH II, i'm also a person makes mistakes and does not always agree with my past opinions. i even have a list dedicated to games that i used to hate but now love (and one for games i used to love but now don't). i am a person with a perspective, and perspectives change with time, age, and experience. i am struck by a sudden urge to replay kingdom hearts II final mix. i own the story so far collection for PS4 (which has wondrously short load times). i decide to replay it. worst-case scenario, i know the bad things i'm in for, so i can't be surprised. i pop in the disc. i hit new game. "i wanna line the pieces up - yours and mine." cue "sanctuary" by utada hikaru.
and you know what?
it FUCKED.
okay, maybe fucked is a bit much. i still have misgivings with the game (most notably in the plot). and i cannot deny that one of my larger complaints that still resonates with me is with the game's design is level structure that feels open and empty. i still have things to critique about this game. but i do find much more joy in it now as someone with tempered expectations. it's funny, my first playthrough was too much hype that colored me into a state of blind adoration without the adequate understanding to verbalize why i liked the game. then, after that, it was sophomore slump-esque cynicism that failed to see any value or joy in the game at all. thesis, antithesis. it's logical that synthesis would follow.
one of the largest hurdles i had to deal with was coming at this game with the right set of expectations. it's not necessarily a misnomer to call KH II a JRPG, but it is a lie by omission. whereas you could potentially get away with calling KH I a JRPG and not an action game, KH II is a prominent and unapologetic action game. KH II lives and dies by the moments where the player is managing space between an enemy(s) and weighing what options they should use to solve the encounter. this is more than just "use fire on the enemies weak to fire" logic of I. fire is more of a magic function than an element, with emphasis being on using it as a character-orbiting hitbox more than for its elemental status. blizzard gives the player ranged damage in the way ebony and ivory would in DMC. magnet gives crowd control options to help the player deal with larger numbers. reflect is downright busted when you learn how to utilize it. all of this sounds redundant, but starting to view magic as functions rather than JRPG elements is a microcosm of the perspective shift i needed to appreciate what the game is doing. i have to meet the game as it is, not what i demand it be.
the thing about all of this is that the game does not ever expect any competency with these systems, and, as mentioned, it's easy to just bruteforce. in fact, KH II's greatest shame is that it seems embarrassed to tell you about the things you can do and when you should do them. it doesn't even seem to want to provide you with the obstacles that would necessitate them. everything can be largely solved by attacking it, and while there's more efficient ways than just attacking, they're almost always unnecessary. the greatest flaw KH II has is that it lacks the confidence to provide better explanations of these tools and simultaneously demand players use them. what good is a jewel that is too precious?
i now get it though. i understand why people say that this game shines at higher levels of play with critical mode and data organization. to be frank, critical mode feels like the only way i could ever recommend someone experience this game, as it gives that level of burden i had earlier alluded to. it's not a perfect system, and complementary explanations are woefully absent, but it does alleviate so much of what made KH II dull to me. i now understand the value of limits and what tactical advantage they can provide. i now use limit form fairly regularly as a panic button (and because it's busted as fuck for certain fights like roxas lol). i needed third-party suggestions and information to get to this point, but i met the game halfway and got more out of it as a result.
the bittersweet nature of kingdom hearts as a series continues on, however. this was the entry that tied up all loose threads, yet, here we are, characters with stories still being told. the plot was essentially self-contained and could easily be the final entry for the destiny island trio. literally all you would need to do is delete that "chamber of repose" FM cutscene, the letter from the king teaser, and remove references to xehanort from the BBS teaser. from everything i've seen, xehanort might as well be an entirely new character in BBS (a game i have not played yet), so there's no reason to tie the destiny islands trio back into it. KH II was a closure for their story, a finality. sora, riku, and kairi had their adventure, they saw the world, and they returned home to each other. they matured and got to satisfy their yearning for freedom to greater appreciate their surroundings. it was the end of the book. the final scene. the last moment. i know i'm tardy to the party on this one, but KH II did not and should not have gotten sequels that involved these characters anymore. i do plan on playing BBS in the near-ish future, and it's going to be a monumental task for it to overcome this finality in my mind.
overall though? i'm glad i replayed this game. i gained a greater understanding of it with age, and i feel as though i've finally reached a closure with with game that i've denied myself for years. an open wound has finally scabbed over and begun to heal. i can appreciate the heart and soul of this gargantuan entry in not only the series but the PS2 library as well without losing focus of its shortcomings.
new year, new me.