I BEAT KINGDOM HEARTS!!

You heard right. Last night, I went through and finally finished Kindgom Hearts. It was really really fun, and I'm prolly gonna, over the summer, try and do it again, on hard. Also, I still have a few odds and ends to clear up in the game. You know, the non-story side-quests. I gotta get some more Dalmations, kill a few bosses... (CURSE YOU SEPHIROTH!!!), synthesize a couple of items, you know how it goes. It's really a great game. Towards the end, I started feeling, I don't know, more in tune with Sora. Not in the story line, I'll get to that in a second, but in terms of control. I really felt, I dunno, like I was there, actively controlling him. I'm sure you all either know what I'm talking about, or think I'm crazy. But yeah, there was a little bit of a feeling towards the end of "this is easy." Not "this villian is dumb and simple to defeat," but "I am better than the game." I guess that's sorta how it's supposed to feel, though. In any case, I really enjoyed the feeling.

Storywise, I was a little disappointed. I realize that as the story goes, once you beat the final boss, that's it, but still, I wanted to continue exploring the worlds with my newfound levels I'd gained from the battle. Anyway, the story still was almost a let down. It made perfect sense, and it was what SHOULD have happened, but to me, the story doesn't really feel.... complete.

Okay, SPOILERS. If that doesn't scare you off, you deserve to have it spoiled. Anyway, when it starts, you get Sora stuck on an island with his friends. Life is, for them, perfect. They live in a tropical paradise, Sora's pretty sure he has a girl who loves him in Kairi, or at least a very close friend, as well as his pal Riku, who he has sort of a friendly rivalry with. That is, they compete a lot, but no more than brothers normally do, and you can tell the friendship there is strong. Then, all of a sudden, shitstorm. He is ripped away from his friends and home, and finds himself in a strange place with no one he knows. I like this way of telling a story, where the main character doesn't know anything the audience (gamer, in this case) doesn't. So he's lost, disoriented, and he finds Donald Duck and Goofy... Does Goofy have a last name? Anyway, Goofy and Donald. They tell him that big ass key he's been carrying around (and really, it's a very clever way to make the weapon, this 'Keyblade') is an item of magical power, and because he bears it, he is destined to save the universe from the heartless. And really, Sora doesn't want it. He couldn't care less about the rest of the world. He just wants his island back, and his friends. But Donald and Goofy promise that they'll help him if he helps them, so off they go. It doesn't hurt that Sora has a good sense of right and wrong.

So they go off, traveling from world to world, sealing keyholes and whatnot, and eventually Sora learns that somehow Riku and Kairi are involved in this too. So yay, they have convergent goals. When they save the worlds, Sora's friends will be saved too. He presses on, ends up dueling a corrupted Riku, eventually freeing his friend from the darkness, he fights the evil overlord and wins, and... Kairi disappears. He and her are seperated. Kairi's back on her island, safe and sound, but neither Sora nor Riku are with her. It's really sad. The game's last image is one of Sora, Donald, and Goofy, walking together, trying to figure out what to do next.

That's it? Game over? I knew going into it that there was a sequel yet to be made, but when you get such a good game, that's almost taken for granted. But at the end of the game, the world is always set to perfection again, only to be ruined just before the next game. Mario's princess was right there at the end of world 8-4. I dunno, at the end of Kingdom Hearts, I almost expected one of those mushrooms from Fantasia to pop up and say "I'm sorry Sora, but your princess is in another castle." u_u

Okay, enough of the review of Kingdom Hearts. I'm gonna go see about getting those last Dalmations, and unlocking that kickass KH2 Video. Later all, and thanks for listening to my ramblings about the game. Seriously, I love it, and if you have a PS2, you should get it. I promise you won't regret it.