Quite possibly the weirdest game I've ever played. But does it work?
User Rating: 8.1 | Kingdom Hearts PS2
Sora dreams of travelling to new worlds with his freinds, Riku and Kairi. It seem's that they should have been careful for what they wished for. A strange dark portal takes Sora, riku and Kairi to a new land filled with.... (and wait for it!) the dark, broody final fantasy characters (Cloud, aerith, squall etc.) and lighthearted, lovable disney characters. Sora meets up with Donald duck and Goofy, only to find that he is the keyblade master. A supposed mythic hero to bring the world to light by sealing the darkness (bad guys) Away with his keyblade. Will Sora find Kairi and Riku? Will he get back home? Can he save the universe? Gameplay: Basic gameplay consists of hacking and slashing anything that moves. Although it sounds like a departure from the classic turn based system of final fantasy, it actually works pretty well to an extent anyway. During a fight you have an array of magic spells such as fire and thunder. Problem being I've only ever used two spells throughout the entire game. Most spells are pointless and usually miss the target it was intended to hit! The lock on system works fairly well but things do tend to get a bit to hectic with too many things on the screen making it harder than it should be to find your target. Your party members are controlled by a.i. and doesn't seem all that intelligent as they seem to have a thing of knocking themselves out mid-battle. After the battle you usually get a cutscene. The cutscenes are very well animated most of the time. So when you watch the genie from Aladdin or Peter Pan it really does feel like you are watching them. Occasionaly though the character's are static but this only during very heavy dialouge scenes. In fact that's actually something that surprised me. I imagined this to be final fantasy lite, a kiddy version. Although the storyline isn't epic it is by no means bad. It will make you want to play through right to the end. You can also shop final fantasy style at traverse town. Although the options are nowhere near as extensive as a final fantasy game, the options are surprisingly extensive. There is also plenty of hidden items on every world so be sure to go back every now and again. The big surprising news though is this. If you were expecting an easy, quick to get through rpg, you'd be wrong. Do not expect a newbie to rpg to enjoy this. The ingame bosses are hard. And I mean play it again for the tenth time hard. It wouldn't be as hard to swallow if you didn't have to go through, the often lengthy pre-battle cutscenes all over again. There is sadly no way to skip them. Graphics: The disney character's look amazingly similar to their 2d counterparts and it is as if they jumped out of the cinema screen. The environment's probably aren't what I expected. They seem very undetailed probably because they are meant to fit in with the characters but wasn't their more detail in those cartoons? Sound: Let me just say this first. The voice acting in this is superb. Disney characters are played by their official voice actor. So when Donald speaks, it really is Donald. Haley Joel Osmond of sixth sense fame play's Sora and does very well to convey Sora's emotion and comes through as a very likable character. The music isn't particulary memorable but you may just find yourself humming too it. 
