KHWiki:Trinity Archives/KH3D Review


 *  Neumannz is an administrator on the Kingdom Hearts Wiki. He is an enigmatic individual who doesn't take "no" for a question.
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 * The following reviews reflect the opinions of their respective authors.

Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance is the latest instalment of the popular Kingdom Hearts series. Featuring all new Disney worlds, creative gameplay, and a story that both brings together the previous games in the series and sets the stage for the much-anticipated Kingdom Hearts III. (Knock on wood.) So, let's take a look, shall we?

The many new gameplay features of Kingdom Hearts 3D add a great deal of depth to the game. The Flowmotion system takes some getting used to, but incoporating movement into attacking enemies is a good alternative from the normal button-mashing style of combat. The fast and fluid movements create a feeling of great mobility, allowing me to fling myself across the field map in a way that reminds me of Infamous. Reality Shifts are a very innovative feature, adding a unique spin on fighting in the different worlds. They break up normal combat, keeping it fresh and interesting, and they are effective in finishing battles and managing crowds of enemies.

The normal combat system, derived from that of Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, is well-implemented in Kingdom Hearts 3D, with the only wrinkle being the different control placement of the Nintendo 3DS from the PlayStation Portable. I found myself slightly hampered by the placement of the D-Pad below the analog slider, which forced me to stop moving before I could select Deck Commands during battle. The addition of the Drop system adds a extra sense of urgency to combat that draws the player in. Moments like trying to defeat the Char Clawbster boss in the last ten seconds completely engaged me in the game.

Collecting and raising Dream Eaters is an engrossing and enjoyable experience, with over fifty colorful species available. It was a sad moment when I had to swap out the Dream Eater I'd been raising for a while with a higher-leveled one I had just created. The Flick Rush mini-game is another great diversion, and it makes for a great callback to the card-based battle system from Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories. I did feel that it could have benefited from a deck customization feature, however.

The worlds in KH3D are visually stunning, with graphics that surpass those of Birth by Sleep and much shorter loading times. They seem somewhat empty, however, since, as is usual for the series, the worlds seem devoid of residents, outside of the few characters featured in the storyline. The 3D is used to great effect, and it feels nonintrusive and natural. That it lets you look into the screen instead of having things pop up is certainly to its credit.

The story in KH3D is well presented throughout the game. The flashbacks and cutaways are an effective tool for expounding on the background of both the main plot and the individual world stories, and both these and the side story depicted between worlds are inserted nicely into the main storyline, without seeming intrusive. Finally, Kingdom Hearts 3D ties together the games that have preceded it,

Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance has a creative and awesome premise (which cleverly solves the recurring problem of "Why is Sora starting at Level 1 again?"), and the incorporation of story elements from previous instalments of the series is largely well done. The Chronicle feature helps in putting all the previous games in perspective with respect to KH3D, in a series of straight-forward and digestible chunks that cuts down the learning curve for series newcomers. I especially liked the well-timed manner in which the summaries are made available to the player, which is a great way to introduce returning characters and concepts to the storyline.

The individual world stories are fairly well preserved and incorporated into the main story. The Symphony of Sorcery plotline is very interesting, especially when you consider how much of it is original. The split between Sora and Riku's progression adds an additional element that keeps the player engaged as the story continues, and we can all be glad that it divides the story into parts instead of having both characters treading the same ground (figuratively speaking, anyway). Exposition is made as simple as possible, with the Memoirs effectively filling out background with a only a handful of optional flashback scenes.

The main story of KH3D is chock full of twists and surprises—Just try counting the number of times the game makes you do a double-take—and most of these are cool and enjoyable moments. However, the major plot twist revealed late in the game, along with most of the last chapter of the story, seems overly convoluted and even a little forced. In fact, it feels eerily like a fan fiction, or maybe a daytime soap opera. While it sets up the next chapter—Kingdom Hearts III, hopefully—it seems to rely heavily on the goodwill and open-mindedness of the fans in order to pass scrutiny.

Luckily, the final stretch of the story lets the game end on a high note, combining an creative final battle scenario with a number of well-placed callbacks to previous games, going back to the beginning of the first Kingdom Hearts.

Overall, the story stays interesting and, for the most part, well-balanced, and as long as the player is willing to exercise a bit of suspension of belief, it will keep them engaged in the series as it continues forward.

Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance is a true sequel to Kingdom Hearts II and a huge improvement over its predecessor, Kingdom Hearts Re:coded. However, the game does not deserve the excessive amount of hype it received and does more harm to the series than good.

The plot of Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance, while a step up from that of Re:coded, is quite weak in comparison to the plots of past games like Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep or Kingdom Hearts II. Because the antagonists technically win this time around, it is disappointing to see that they had very little time on-screen. The plot sometimes loses its focus because of the Dive System, and the constant jumping around between Sora and Riku's stories can easily leave the player confused if he or she lacks the insight required to understand how the events of one character's journey influences the other. While Flashbacks are a great way to expand the plot itself, the notices that pop up inquiring if the player would like to watch them seriously interrupt the story's flow. The events depicted in the individual Disney worlds don't do the films on which they are based justice and lack story relevance. On top of this, the delivery of the major plot twist that occurs in the game's final chapters relies too heavily on the open-mindedness of the player and is a perfect example of Tetsuya Nomura disregarding everything the story of the series as a whole has established so far just to incorporate his newer ideas. One might even go as far as to compare the ending of Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance to a well-written fanfiction. In the end, the story is rushed and leaves many of the concepts it introduces poorly explained. Worst of all, it does not leave the player anticipating Kingdom Hearts III and desperately tries to do so through a crude teaser in the end credits.

While they are some of the series' best and can almost be viewed as an apology from Square Enix for its poorly-developed plot, the new gameplay elements introduced in Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance are not entirely flawless. First off, Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance serves as yet another appearance for the fun and easy-to-use (verging on overused) Deck Command system that debuted in Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep. Battles become very dry and repetitive early-on in the game because of this. The new and highly-interactive Flowmotion gameplay element adds even more cool attacks to Sora and Riku's arsenal, but this can get in the way of dodging and leave them vulnerable to enemy attacks if the player isn't careful. Reality Shift, an alternative way of interacting with the environment and finishing off enemies to the classic Reaction Commands of past titles, is rather useless and is easily neglected. Battles that make succeeding at Reality Shift mandatory to obtain victory can turn into hours of frustration if the player has yet to master the tactic. Also, rather than making the player fight alone as he or she had to do in Birth by Sleep and Re:coded, Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance shakes things up a bit by giving the player Dream Eaters, the enemies faced in normal combat, as allies rather than "human" characters like Donald or Goofy. While the Dream Eaters serve their purpose, the entire concept of being able to tame them in the first place is much too similar to the monster recruitment system from Final Fantasy XIII-2, which, coincidentally, was developed alongside Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance. While raising Dream Eaters is a nice way for the player to blow off steam amidst the chaos of regular gameplay, the fact that so much of Sora and Riku's own growth is dependent on and limited to them is a great hindrance. The Drop system that debuts in this game not only serves as a clever way to progress through the story, but it also makes everything from battles to regular travel fast-paced and exciting. The fact that dropping in the middle of a boss battle forces the player to start it over from square one can be a tremendous annoyance, but at least he or she is given the ability to drop manually at any time and can receive special rewards and upgrades through drops to compensate for this. The Dive system introduced in this game is an interesting new way to approach travelling from world to world and makes sense when one considers the nature of the story, and it's fun to see the many differences between Sora and Riku's dives for each world. Along with a card-based battling mini-game called Flick Rush, dives are the only mini-games in Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance, a nice change of pace considering past titles were usually crammed with them. Lastly, as in all Kingdom Hearts games, there is a noticeable lack of things to do during post-story play aside from refight bosses through Secret Portals, improve dive scores, or collect any treasures the player might have missed during the main story. Once the player defeats Julius, the game's sole secret boss, the world of Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance becomes considerably smaller.

To discuss the Dream Eaters in greater detail, there are over 50 different species the player can battle and create to fight alongside him or her. While the idea of having two different versions of the enemies (benevolent Spirits and malicious Nightmares) is interesting, their overly exaggerated designs and color schemes make them look they belong in anything other than Kingdom Hearts. Compared to the Heartless, Nobodies, and Unversed designed by Tetsuya Nomura and featured in past titles, these creatures, while interesting to look at, take a while to get used to. Lastly, Square Enix was quite lazy when it came to naming the Dream Eaters during the localization of Dream Drop Distance. For instance, what was once known as "Tatsu Horse" in Japan is now known as "Tatsu Steed" in the English release. While some names are quite creative, usually containing a pun like "Meowjesty", others make no sense whatsoever, particularly with creatures such as the "Zolephant". If Square Enix was not going to put in the effort renaming the creatures players would be forced to cope with for the entire game, it may as well have retained the Japanese names altogether.

In terms of worlds the player can visit, it's a huge disappointment to see that these "brand new worlds" Nomura promised fans of the series are really just reimagined versions of past areas and are connected to past locations through either characters met or locations visited. A perfect example of this is Riku's version of Prankster's Paradise, in which he merely encounters Gepetto, Pinocchio, and Jiminy Cricket inside Monstro, the whale whose interior Riku is forced to explore for the entirety of the level. Worlds that hold true to Nomura's promise, such as La Cité des Cloches, are taken for granted by Square Enix's staff and often feel small and plain. Square Enix made a huge mistake when they made two of the seven playable worlds in Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance based off of Mickey Mouse cartoons (Country of the Musketeers and Symphony of Sorcery). Ending the game with visits to two places that feature the same relative plot (Mickey, prior to his ascension to the thrown during his days in training, is in desperate need of Sora's help for whatever reason) right after the other in rapid succession is almost painfully boring. Had Square Enix spaced the visits to these worlds out, they just may have been bearable.

Compared to those featured in past games, the soundtrack of Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance is incredibly flat and one-dimensional. This is a major blow struck against the series as a whole, considering one of its best features has always been music. Recycled tracks are often misplaced or misused, and a majority of the soundtrack is comprised of the standard remixes of remixes, though some, such as "L'Impeto Oscur", are quite catchy. World field and battle themes all sound relatively the same, and some pieces, such as "Untamable", hardly convey the mood of the situation at hand. The one thing Yoko Shimomura does right in terms of the soundtrack is she took the themes played in Symphony of Sorcery straight from the movie Fantasia rather than destroying these masterpieces with her own reorchestrations. If only she would do this more often. There is, however, a substantial difference in the quality of music played in Symphony of Sorcery compared to the rest of the game, so sadly, it sticks out like a sore thumb.

Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance serves as the debut of The World Ends With You in the Kingdom Hearts series. This is quite possibly the worst possible idea that could have been made during development, simply because it's just too late in the series to add yet another cross-over. While this comes as a good thing to those familiar with The World Ends With You, those who are not should still approach these characters with an open mind. Unfortunately, it is very unlikely the player will have an emotional connection to them due to lack of experience with their original series.

It seems that ever since Kingdom Hearts II, voice acting in the Kingdom Hearts games has continued to go downhill. Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance quite possibly contains the worst voice acting yet. One can hear the strain in Haley Joel Osment's voice as he tries to fit his more mature vocals into the body of 14-year-old Sora. David Gallagher does a great job as Riku (as usual), but some of his battle cries sound absolutely pathetic. Jesse McCartney still uses his new, annoyingly high-pitched voice when playing Roxas and Ventus, and some voice actors, such as Richard Epcar, weren't up to par as the have been in past titles. Actors such as Paul St. Peter and Quinton Flynn do an amazing job maintaining the sound and feel of their voices from Kingdom Hearts II, and after it was disputed for so long, fans will be overjoyed to hear Leonard Nimoy reprise his role as Master Xehanort. Likewise, fans will be disappointed to hear Corey Burton replace Christopher Lee yet again as Ansem the Wise, and his impression of Lee is much too similar to his "Yen Sid voice". Save for the essential characters, such as Donald and Goofy, almost every other Disney character appearing in the game is voiced through a sub-convincing impression and nothing more. Fans of the Disney franchise will miss hearing Tom Hulce as Quasimodo or Demi Moore as Esmeralda, just to give an example. Quite possibly the worst decision made in terms of voice acting, however, was replacing David Gallagher with Ben Diskin as Young Xehanort. Not only would retaining Gallagher have presented a nice case of irony story-wise between this character and Riku, but it also would have saved the arguably main antagonist of the game from a monotone voice that sounds like it has a cold.

In terms of graphics, Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance needs to be experienced with the Nintendo 3DS's 3D capabilities on at maximum. This will not only make everything from cutscenes to normal gameplay breathtaking with the added sense of depth and feigned realism, but it will also save the player from having to sit through another flat, bland world of flat, bland characters and locations.

One must appreciate Square Enix's attention to detail in Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance. Character voices are muted and replaced with musical instruments to preserve the nature of Fantasia in Symphony of Sorcery. Cutscenes were reanimated to improve lip-synching, a welcome sight considering many of the past games in the series merely featured English dialogue and text inserted over Japanese animation. Square Enix also makes a subtle attempt to maintain the feel of the various Disney worlds' movies of origin through the script. A true Disney fan instantly feels nostalgic when Kevin Flynn's line on the true nature of perfection is repeated word-for-word and the lyrics to Frollo's portion of the song "Out There" from The Hunchback of Notre Dame are spoken to Quasimodo with minor alterations along with several of his other iconic lines. Several scenes from the Disney movies are replicated perfectly in Dream Drop Distance, such as Frollo's death in Sora's story and CLU's attempt to obtain Kevin Flynn's identity disc in Riku's.

Overall, Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance is intended for veterans of the Kingdom Hearts series instead of newcomers. While the game's Chronicle system helps bring the player up to speed by summarizing the stories of every game in the series, it is still possible for those who haven't actually seen the events described with their own eyes to feel lost when playing. While it actually contains accurate information for the most part (there is a huge difference in saying "the Sweet Dreams Keyblade is obtained by clearing Flick Rush" and "the Sweet Dreams Keyblade is obtained by obtaining the gold trophy in every Flick Rush tournament") and is a huge improvement over the one released for Birth by Sleep, the accompanying BradyGames guide is rather useless, as it lacks essential information, such as where to obtain all the commands listed in the index and which Dream Eaters drop which Dream Pieces or grant which abilities. Post-story content is completely omitted from the book, so the player is often left to develop his or her own strategies and play through the game blind. In the end, the guidebook is all about looking pretty rather than helping the player.