It’s great to read your experiences playing the game! I suppose for me, hearing recounts of other people’s experience of the game extends my enjoyment of the game in a similar way to what you mentioned about discussing superbosses with school friends. So thank you for sharing!
Yep, Kingdom Hearts is bonkers so a LOT of choices are incredibly bizarre, like certain narrative beats, the ending and the music video. My favourite is the introduction of Sora’s mum in the start of the game. Spoiler alert - she’s never mentioned ever again! Poor mum must be worried sick, definitely the most tragic character in the series. Also, the bizarre lore-dump cutscenes are exclusive to the Final Mix versions of the games and there’s to come in Kingdom Hearts 2. They make a lot more sense after playing the later games in the series, so it worked out very well for me that I played the games in the order of vanilla KH1/KH2 -> later games -> Final Mix versions. Having just looked it up though, the original Final Mix versions on PS2 were launched way before the later games were released so these scenes were always puzzling to their audiences. Another strange choice!
Kingdom Hearts is a rare series where its ludicrous nonsense actually makes it even more endearing, perhaps because it’s delivered with just enough heart to hook us in (or perhaps nostalgia, who knows!). Honestly though, even if I wasn’t invested, I’d play it just to be able to appreciate the memes because boy can they be entertaining. Points of contention that you’ve mentioned, like Kairi’s character and Dr “DARKNESS” are common memes. Once you catch up so you’re safe from spoilers, I’d definitely recommend checking out the memes on YouTube/Reddit.
The worlds in the first game are definitely the most confusing to navigate. Supposedly, there are always subtle clues that are meant to direct you though. One example that I can remember is in Monstro (probably the most labyrinthian map), Gepetto gives a hint to follow the Green Requiems and sure enough, one spawns in each room at the door towards which you should go to progress. Here’s a video ([LINK] if you’re interested. I’m not saying that makes some of the awkward level design okay, but it does make it a little more forgivable.
Gummi ships are actually improved and expanded on in subsequent titles, though they never really captured my own interest. Also, the problem of limited party size is no longer present in KH3, so perhaps it’s a hardware issue that prevented them from allowing four party members. I’d be interested to know how you found the Phantom boss and the Final Mix-exclusive Heartless that appear in each world as almost mini-games that you need to beat to get synthesis materials. Overall, I appreciated their inclusion to add variety, but some overly eccentric ones did get very fiddly.
With regards to the game development, here are some tidbits that you might find interesting. Firstly, Square Enix actually wanted Mickey to be the main protagonist of the game but Disney, being overprotective of their mascot, refused so we ended up with Sora. Disney did however allow Square to include Mickey for one single scene, which Nomura wanted to make the most of, and that’s what led to the final anime moment that we got in the end. Secondly, Nomura explained in an interview that the name change from Squall to Leon was to make the reveal of the character more surprising, since Leon’s name was first mentioned in Mickey’s letter to Donald and Goofy near the start of the game. The in-universe reason is what was mentioned in his lore entry. Still a strange choice, if you ask me. Having not played FF8, I wasn’t actually aware that there was a personality change also, but in the same interview Nomura does emphasise that the KH incarnations of FF characters are meant to be new interpretations and not 1:1 analogues. It does make you wonder what changes Nomura would make to the Disney properties if he was allowed the opportunity.
I hope you enjoy Re:Chain of Memories whenever you decide to play it! I remember the narrative of that game having me quite hooked, but its gameplay is definitely the most polarising in the series so I wonder what your take will be.
Yep, Kingdom Hearts is bonkers so a LOT of choices are incredibly bizarre, like certain narrative beats, the ending and the music video. My favourite is the introduction of Sora’s mum in the start of the game. Spoiler alert - she’s never mentioned ever again! Poor mum must be worried sick, definitely the most tragic character in the series. Also, the bizarre lore-dump cutscenes are exclusive to the Final Mix versions of the games and there’s to come in Kingdom Hearts 2. They make a lot more sense after playing the later games in the series, so it worked out very well for me that I played the games in the order of vanilla KH1/KH2 -> later games -> Final Mix versions. Having just looked it up though, the original Final Mix versions on PS2 were launched way before the later games were released so these scenes were always puzzling to their audiences. Another strange choice!
Kingdom Hearts is a rare series where its ludicrous nonsense actually makes it even more endearing, perhaps because it’s delivered with just enough heart to hook us in (or perhaps nostalgia, who knows!). Honestly though, even if I wasn’t invested, I’d play it just to be able to appreciate the memes because boy can they be entertaining. Points of contention that you’ve mentioned, like Kairi’s character and Dr “DARKNESS” are common memes. Once you catch up so you’re safe from spoilers, I’d definitely recommend checking out the memes on YouTube/Reddit.
The worlds in the first game are definitely the most confusing to navigate. Supposedly, there are always subtle clues that are meant to direct you though. One example that I can remember is in Monstro (probably the most labyrinthian map), Gepetto gives a hint to follow the Green Requiems and sure enough, one spawns in each room at the door towards which you should go to progress. Here’s a video ([LINK] if you’re interested. I’m not saying that makes some of the awkward level design okay, but it does make it a little more forgivable.
Gummi ships are actually improved and expanded on in subsequent titles, though they never really captured my own interest. Also, the problem of limited party size is no longer present in KH3, so perhaps it’s a hardware issue that prevented them from allowing four party members. I’d be interested to know how you found the Phantom boss and the Final Mix-exclusive Heartless that appear in each world as almost mini-games that you need to beat to get synthesis materials. Overall, I appreciated their inclusion to add variety, but some overly eccentric ones did get very fiddly.
With regards to the game development, here are some tidbits that you might find interesting. Firstly, Square Enix actually wanted Mickey to be the main protagonist of the game but Disney, being overprotective of their mascot, refused so we ended up with Sora. Disney did however allow Square to include Mickey for one single scene, which Nomura wanted to make the most of, and that’s what led to the final anime moment that we got in the end. Secondly, Nomura explained in an interview that the name change from Squall to Leon was to make the reveal of the character more surprising, since Leon’s name was first mentioned in Mickey’s letter to Donald and Goofy near the start of the game. The in-universe reason is what was mentioned in his lore entry. Still a strange choice, if you ask me. Having not played FF8, I wasn’t actually aware that there was a personality change also, but in the same interview Nomura does emphasise that the KH incarnations of FF characters are meant to be new interpretations and not 1:1 analogues. It does make you wonder what changes Nomura would make to the Disney properties if he was allowed the opportunity.
I hope you enjoy Re:Chain of Memories whenever you decide to play it! I remember the narrative of that game having me quite hooked, but its gameplay is definitely the most polarising in the series so I wonder what your take will be.