Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix

The best saga from the 2000's

I got the original game on PS2 twelve years ago (with a voucher from my late great grandad) and never got the hang of the game. All I knew was Disney, and that was pretty much it. The battles never made sense to me and I didn't know what an RPG meant or what you did in one. Eventually, I traded all my PS2 games and my PS2 in for an Xbox 360 in 2006 (something which I've regretted to an extent), however in recent years I've been rebuilding my PS2 collection by getting a pre-owned PS2 and the games I missed playing. I was considering shelling out $30 for a second-hand copy of the original game on PS2. Thankfully, I saw this existed and decided to shell out the lesser money to be able to play it on my PS3. Arrived today and I've spent almost two hours playing it, and it's felt much shorter. The music, the graphics, the battles, everything took me back those twelve years; even the menu! I pressed the Start button and sat there for about thirty seconds soaking the menu up and "ooh"ing and "ahh"ing, memories flooding back to me. I believe I've seen one aspect of the "Final Mix" aspect of the game, as there was a cutscene I didn't remember, but my memory is also not that great, so it might just be my faulty memory. I got this mainly to play the original for nostalgia's sake, which is what's going on, but now as an adult I'm also looking at it through different eyes as a pure game and experience, other than "Disney and pretty colours". As I mentioned, I really only got it for the first game, but a sequel and cutscenes of another game are included, which I look forward to playing, especially with Kingdom Hearts II.5 HD Remix coming this December. Great game, great franchise, great memories.

I had a wonderful feeling of nostalgia when I first heard rumors of this remix and leapt for joy when it became official. Years ago when the idea of mixing Final Fantasy with elements from Disney and then tossing them into the various animations I grew up watching, I must admit that it seemed like a bad idea. Somehow it worked and I'm glad it did. Like so many other fans, I had a lot of unanswered questions surrounding this remix. Having played this game for a couple of days now, those questions have been answered. I feel that the best way for me to approach this review is to create two separate sections: one those completely new to Kingdom Hearts and another for those looking to relive an epic adventure. For Those New to Kingdom Hearts: Let's start by addressing some of the more common questions that new players would have. Is Kingdom Hearts a Good Game? While Kingdom Hearts utilizes characters from Final Fantasy, the gameplay does not match that of Final Fantasy. It's more of an action based RPG in that you fight battles in real time. With that said, it's not the typical button-mashing action game either (assuming you play it on PROUD mode - i.e. highest difficulty). Kingdom Hearts requires a different strategy for each mob. So if you like RPG and action games, then Kingdom Hearts is a perfect match. Is Kingdom Hearts 1.5 Remix worth the cost? You are getting a total of 2 playable games and 1 game worth of scenes. In essence, three games worth of story in all. So yes, you will get your money's worth. What Order Should I play these Games In? The play order of Kingdom Hearts can be very confusing for beginners to the franchise. The reason for the order is due to handheld releases. With that said, the order is actually listed correctly within the game. It is as follows: 1. Kingdom Hearts Remix 2. Kingdom Hearts Re: Chain of Memories (sounds like spam email) 3. Kingdom Hearts 358/2 You will need to play all three of these games in order to understand the events of Kingdom Hearts 2. For Fans of the Franchise: Now let's move onto some questions that I, as a long-time fan of this series, needed answered. What exactly is included in Kingdom Hearts 1.5? The Japan based version of Kingdom Hearts 1 has not only been fully remastered, but some of the content has been tweaked also. For example, some of the treasure contents have been swapped, scenes changed just a little bit, and so forth. The camera has been changed to the right analog stick (fans will remember the horrible L1/R1 camera movement). The Japan version has more content so NA fans can expect to experience both nostalgia and fresh content. Kingdom Hearts Re: Chain of Memories is about the same as the PS2 version - with the exception of the remastered scenes. Kingdom Hearts 358/2 is not playable. The remastered content is available via a theatre option. For trophy lovers, you will be pleased to know that you get trophies simply for watching these scenes. Furthermore, this is all included on 1 disc and before you ask, no - there is no huge download required like with the Assassin's Creed trilogy release a year ago. Everything has been fit onto a single disc. Where is Kingdom Hearts 2? I would venture a guess and say that if KH 1.5 is successful, then we can expect a 2.5 release in the near future (before KH3). Trust me, you will not be disappointed with KH 1.5 is you are a fan of the franchise.

**Before I start my review, I'd like to note that I have not played Re:Chain of Memories yet. This review is primarily about the Final Mix and the few videos I've seen of 358/2 Days.** It's been a few years since I played the original Kingdom Hearts on my now broken PS2, so I was over the moon when I heard the original Kingdom Hearts was going to be re-released for PS3. I'll admit, though, I was afraid the game was going to be a flop. I had heard a lot of people saying the remastering was superficial at best and that Square Enix was simply throwing this together to keep its base of fans from totally losing hope in one of Square Enix's best-selling franchises. However, I am happy to say that I have not been disappointed yet. The graphics are really good. The characters and game design are sharp and crisp, yet do not stray far from the look and feel of the original version. The addition of the Final Mix cut-scenes also work seamlessly with the game and show crucial scenes foreshadowing KH2. The switch from L2/R2 camera control to right analog control makes exploring the map much more intuitive, and the special command feature (triangle button) really helps predicting the right moment to use moves like ars arcanum and strike. The gummi ship has also been updated into a more prominent feature. The gummi menu and ship designing are more or less the same, but traveling between worlds on normal drive now involves missions. It's essentially KH meets KH2. You get points for shooting heartless gummi ships and for collecting items like blueprints and gummi blocks. There are three missions for each world. To complete all of them, you have to earn a certain amount of points or attach certain blocks to your ship and run the gauntlet without taking damage. New gummi blocks are also available for greater customization. The diversity of heartless is also really impressive. You'll run into all of the original foes like "shadow", "soldier" and "large body", but you'll also encounter some new ones that originally appeared in the Japanese KH Final Mix. (SPOILER ALERT) One of the new ones is simply an enlarged version of "shadow", but it's a lot creepier having one of them bearing down on you. (ANOTHER SPOILER ALERT) There is another heartless that is a spin-off of the "bouncywild" called the sniperwild. It's name is pretty self-explanatory, but it's one of the more interesting new heartless that I've seen so far. There are new bosses as well. Each of them appear after you've accomplished sealing a keyhole at a specific world. The list of items you can find is longer now. Stones are now available to us in item synthesizing. They can only be collected by defeating the new enemy types. The only other new synthesis item is dark matter, which is only found by opening chests, winning mini-games and, ironically, item synthesizing. There are two new keyblades you can obtain in KHFM. You must defeat certain Coliseum enemies to unlock them. (I have not unlocked them yet.) I'm not really sure what to think about the 358/2 Days cinematic. I never actually played the real game since I was more interested in a true followup to KH2. It's nice to see the cutscenes for it, though. It saved me the time of actually playing the game. I enjoyed the story to it, but it mostly foreshadows the events in KH2. If you already own the game, it won't do much for you, but if you don't already have the game, you might want to go for KH 1.5, watch 358/2 Days, and find out if you like the story enough to buy it. Of course, you could be more frugal and watch the walk-through on Youtube. The number of cool new features is pretty long, and I have not listed all of them, but I feel like Kingdom Hearts Final Mix has lived up to the original game's standards. The graphics are clean, the controls and in-game menu are easy to follow, and the amount of new features and items is enough to satisfy the desires of people who grew up on the original game. If you have not played any of the Kingdom Hearts games before or if you wish to relive the experience, I recommend you buy this game. Kingdom Hearts 2.5 will also be hitting the store shelves sometime in future, so keep an eye out for it. Check up on my review from time to time. I will continue to make updates as I make my way through the game.

Kingdom Hearts is a good series - good action, plenty of comedy and excellent story. Kingdom Hearts 1 is the HD remake of the original game released in 2002 (US) and is as great as ever - looks great in HD and it's as great as I remember the PS2 version being. This also includes the Chain of Memories sequel that was originally on the Gameboy Advance and eventually remade for the PS2, which has a great story and big changes as far as gameplay goes - relying on cards for abilities, spells and how powerful your attacks are. Fun game, but a bit of a black sheep when it comes to Kingdom Hearts games - Similar to Zelda 2 was for the Nintendo back in the days. Square-Enix toyed with a new concept and fewer people liked it, though the game is still decent in my opinion. The reason for the 4 stars instead of 5 is because it was disappointing that they basically advertise 3 games, but you really only get 2, with the "third" being HD cinematic remakes of 358/2 Days. I happened to have read that before purchasing this, but someone not paying decent attention will likely miss that fact, and expect 3 full games. I highly recommend this to anyone who likes Square-Enix RPG's and Disney movies - the quality of the first game alone warrants this purchase, let alone Chain of Memories, which, while different, is still enjoyable (just keep your mind open!).

Bought it the first time around, and the game still holds up well today with a graphic refresh. It includes some older elements, such as not holding your hand, and telling you where to go. It's worth the money not to go digging out the old PS2 (or borrow your buddy's for the days/weeks you can sink into this game), find the memory cards, play with a wired controller, with really poor 480i resolution on a large screen. Minor annoyance seems to be the need for the trophy data to load every time you start the game. That plus going through two start up screens (one to get to game selection, then startup for the game itself), means from the time you turn the PS3 on til you start playing is about 3 minutes. But that's not enough to take away a star. And now, these 10 years later, I have kids who love to watch the game be played, with all the Disney characters. There's no excessive violence, gore, or language.

This game was released in order to get a new generation of gamers familiar with the "Kingdom Hearts" franchise which originally released in 2002. During development, the creators realized they had lost the assets to the original game (Source: IGN - http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/06/27/original-kingdom-hearts-assets-lost). The game had to be largely re-created from scratch after pulling from a retail copy of the game instead. This collection features 2 playable games from the PlayStation 2, "Kingdom Hearts: Final Mix" and "Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories". A third game, "Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days", from the Nintendo DS is also included however it consists only of the games cut scenes edited into a 2 hour 50 minute movie. All three games have been remastered in high definition widescreen and include PlayStation trophy support. Also, instead of using the PS2's built in tone generator, 66 tracks across all three games were re-recorded for this collection. While all of the games do show their age to some extent, the story and core gameplay stand out as some of the best games released in the 2000's and is a collection well worth the price of admission.

As someone who played the first game when it originally debuted back in 2002, I felt it only right to pick up the REMIX(s) (both out of nostalgia's sake and to prepare for the end of the "Dark Seeker Saga" aka Kingdom Hearts III). I do not right reviews often, in fact, it is very rare when I take the time to do so. So bear with me. Getting to replay the original whilst also getting to explore the features that Final Mix offered was both amazing and added new layers to my experience. For me it's like finding out after I finished my favorite book that there was a chapter I didn't know about. As I type this out, I'm in the midst of " Re: Chain of Memories ". I never liked the card system (hence my hesitation in giving this a five star rating) because the series was already a great rpg, but overall the Chain of Memories game is good, just takes time to adjust to the whole combat via cards thing. As for 358/2 Days? I'm aware it's nothing but cutscenes, but since I never got the chance to play the game in the first place, I figure it's a fair trade. I've trusted Tetsuya Nomura and his development team at Square Enix this long with the series, I'm not about to stop now. I recommend this to anyone who is a fan of the series, just starting out, or simply looking to explore an rpg game. It's great to be playing these games again!