Kingdom Hearts 2 definatle provides a fun experience and improves over its predecessor.
Luckily Kingdom Hearts offered a fun role-play oriented experience. And Kingdom Hearts 2 certainly improves.
The Review
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Kingdom Hearts 2 takes place one year after both Kingdo Hearts and Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories. First, you play as Roxas. A boy who soon starts to get troubled by a past he never knew. So much suspicion comes flying around. Organization XIII are stirring up trouble with Roxas, and soon he's put in the role of finding out his past. Don't worry, you can play as Sora soon.
Now, the game starts out with a 4 hour tutorial. Which gets very frusturating to say the least. Most Kingdom Hearts fans already know enough about the gameplay, but its nice for newbies to the series. Combat is still a blend of Zelda of and Action RPG, with a little bit of strategy involved.
New to the game is the Reaction commands. Most Reaction commands are set up by abilities that are set up in the main menu. Pushing the Triangle button at the right time either leaves you to pull off a fast attack, or an even devastating one. You can even combine limit moves with other characters.
Now when Square said they were going to combine their characters with Disney's characters. They aren't kidding. This game is chalk full of more Disney characters and Final Fantasy cameos. Each character in the game handles themselves really well although they do a few stupid things every now and then.
What's most phenomenal about the game is how much detail Square Enix and Buena Vista Games put into this. Each Disney character looks remarkebly like their original counterpart. I should also mention the Port Royal level. You know, the Pirates of the Caribbean. Yep, they're in this game and fully rendered in a 3-d model. The Pirates of the Caribbean characters and the Port Royal world itself looks so lavishly detailed, you'll almost feel that you've walked into a next-generation game.
It's nice that in some worlds like The Pride Lands and Space Paranoids (Tron fans, your place is here) make Sora, Donald, and Goofy actually look they came from there with new clothing or either being turned into a different creature. Although, I would've liked to see more of that. Like Sora looking exactly realistic like the characters in Port Royal for instance.
But with those complaints aside, you've got to really appreciate the music. They put some cool techno music hybrid in Space Paranoids, Old pirate type music in Port Royal, or some of that Hakuna Matuta singing in the Pride Lands. (No not the ones from Timon and Pumbaa)
Much of the flaws have definately been fixed, the camera is now less crazy and gives you more control over it. Proud Mode is especially difficult, so if you want to get the real experience, then play it on Proud Mode. Because Standard and Beginners Mode is too easy. Another nice addition is the voice acting. It's good to hear that Haley Joel Osmont (Sora's voice actor) has definately matured enough for the sequel so his voice doesn't make Sora sound like a 10 year old. And yes, all the voice actors for the Disney characters, are here.
Yes there are flaws in this title. For instance, there's too much button mashing of the X button. Not to mention with the use of the Triangle button. It often too crazy and a little tiresome. The camera did a few funny things and the game often gets a little too confusing. But still, Kingdom Hearts 2 definately delivers a solid experience and any RPG fan or Disney fan should surely pick this game up.