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GAME: Kingdom Hearts III


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SonicFanA



Joined: 12 Jul 2017
Posts: 159
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 2:25 pm Reply with quote
I was wondering if I need to be online while playing the game on PS4. I know I need to be to get the secret movie but other than that can I beat the whole game without internet?

Last edited by SonicFanA on Thu Feb 07, 2019 12:10 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Calsolum



Joined: 11 May 2010
Posts: 898
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 5:24 pm Reply with quote
As much as I love this game its got way too much issues than it should and only gets away with it cause it's Disney + sentimental value.

If any small company or even an indie developer made the exact same plot they'd be ripped apart for inconsistency, lazy writing, retcons, deus/diablo ex machinas etc.

That said gameplay wise this game was without a doubt a masterpiece, theyre were a few awkward and irritating battles and some minigames were more trouble than they were fun but the pros outweigh the cons.

One major issue is the 'difficulty' its not really 'smart' just a regular playthrough on the hardest setting and the enemies were much easier compared to the critical mode of previous games and in my experience the only battles I ever lost were gimmicky ones that weren't one on one battles like spoiler[the ship battle in Pirates of the carribean]

The end of the Xenohart trilogy was satisfying although it felt really forced butspoiler[then the epilogue and the secret ending came along and immediately ruined that feeling of closure.]

That said this game did manage to make me tear up at least 4 times so it was certainly an emotional rollercoaster
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Xavon



Joined: 09 Jan 2007
Posts: 366
Location: Minnesota
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 7:16 pm Reply with quote
Loving the game so far.

Hating the control setup. And it is 20 freaking 19. Not giving us the ability to set up the controls how we want is just lazy development.
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residentgrigo



Joined: 23 Dec 2007
Posts: 2404
Location: Germany
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 9:01 pm Reply with quote
KH3 is many thing but not a conclusion to a trilogy dear ANN. It´s not even the first KH game with a 3 in the title, nor is it the first direct sequel to KH2. KH3 isn´t even the finale to the series, not that anyone at SE ever said that. Dat ending is just Confused . Yoko Taro conclusions make more sense.
Not that it is possible to care or even follow this Gordian Knot of a story but what was Nomura smoking when he came up with the epilogue? Fun game of course but i could have lived without 12 hours (!) of cut-scenes. This a Disney game for children, or man children as me, not a Kojima venture. Even MGS4 paced itself better.
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ICO44



Joined: 28 Aug 2015
Posts: 103
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 9:17 pm Reply with quote
residentgrigo wrote:
KH3 is many thing but not a conclusion to a trilogy dear ANN. It´s not even the first KH game with a 3 in the title, nor is it the first direct sequel to KH2. KH3 isn´t even the finale to the series, not that anyone at SE ever said that. Dat ending is just Confused .

Same way KH2 was not direct sequel to KH1 but rather direct sequel to Chain of Memories.
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Calsolum



Joined: 11 May 2010
Posts: 898
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 10:00 pm Reply with quote
residentgrigo wrote:
KH3 is many thing but not a conclusion to a trilogy dear ANN. It´s not even the first KH game with a 3 in the title, nor is it the first direct sequel to KH2. KH3 isn´t even the finale to the series, not that anyone at SE ever said that. Dat ending is just Confused . Yoko Taro conclusions make more sense.
Not that it is possible to care or even follow this Gordian Knot of a story but what was Nomura smoking when he came up with the epilogue? Fun game of course but i could have lived without 12 hours (!) of cut-scenes. This a Disney game for children, or man children as me, not a Kojima venture. Even MGS4 paced itself better.


I don't recall the article but i read KHIII was not meant to end the series only end the Xenohart saga(storyline?Trilogy?).
The epilogue certainly raises a number of questions but unless something is retconned(which I'm not ruling out either) every direct plot thread regarding Xenohart has been resolved.
Personally, I am conflicted over how to feel after the ending but I'm leaning toward satisfaction.

I would definitely call this a Disney game for children, there was so much censoring that really took away from the impact of many scenes but not much they can do given their audience. And a decent chunk of the cutscenes was extraneous and could have been shorter and to the point but being a children's game the developers need to make extra sure they drive the point home.
For example in some scenes, the organization members will interact with sora and then pop up explain what they're doing then leave and explain what they're really doing. If your audience was older then you can cut the explanation part have the character do the action and trust that the audience is smart enough to fill in the gaps but younger audiences might not appreciate that complexity.
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TsukasaElkKite



Joined: 22 Nov 2005
Posts: 3945
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 11:10 pm Reply with quote
I really need to get this game.
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Tylec



Joined: 27 Mar 2017
Posts: 13
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 11:18 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
(If you want to know what I'm referring to, look at the first letter of every sentence in the first two paragraphs).


...

spoiler[Yoora?] I'm totally lost here.
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Neohybrid_kai



Joined: 29 Apr 2011
Posts: 143
Location: Indonesia
PostPosted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 11:50 pm Reply with quote
Tylec wrote:
Quote:
(If you want to know what I'm referring to, look at the first letter of every sentence in the first two paragraphs).


...

spoiler[Yoora?] I'm totally lost here.


Check carefully, its spoiler[Yozora]
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Alexis.Anagram



Joined: 26 Jan 2011
Posts: 278
Location: Mishopshno
PostPosted: Thu Feb 07, 2019 4:00 am Reply with quote
Quote:
I don't think it's unfair to say that Kingdom Hearts III is exactly the game that fans expected it to be.

Yeah, not quite.
spoiler[No Final Fantasy characters. Leon and the Restoration Committee aren't even mentioned.
Original worlds completely shafted. Neither Radiant Garden nor Destiny Islands are playable despite having the most immediate significance to the majority of our main cast. Speaking of:
Original ensemble wasted on a plotline that shoves them all into the back 1/3 of the material and reduces them to fumbling props for cheap drama.
Kairi is set up to be a big deal, gets a couple of scenes of being a vapid love interest then gets fridged for male motivation purposes.
Aqua whiffing over,
and over,
and over again.
Namine's only in-game cutscene is optional, and it's both preceded and succeeded by absolutely illegible nonsense events, even by KH standards.
Xion's return comes out of nowhere, and it's essentially a betrayal of her entire arc in Days, but nbd I guess. Can't expect anything more of KH girls at this point.
Most of the scenes which are given actual weight are sequel bait/open advertisement for the trash mobile game Nomura decided to make canon even though he said he wouldn't. KH3 is so preoccupied trying to bridge future continuities that it neglects to put a proper cap on the saga we were expected to be invested in for the past 8 games. Every resolution is convenient, lazy and trite. Speaking of which:
All of this results in a total non-ending which manages to retroactively make the entire Xehanort saga feel like wafer thin filler for the "real plot" that is now suddenly kicking into gear. Fans are left with a wet fart of a climax that deliberately fails to realize its full potential just to rope them into purchasing the next title so they can ~figure out yet another mystery of a disappearing protagonist~. No thanks.]


It is a bit unfair that we're expected to swallow this as the finale, though.

Calsolum wrote:
As much as I love this game its got way too much issues than it should and only gets away with it cause it's Disney + sentimental value.

If any small company or even an indie developer made the exact same plot they'd be ripped apart for inconsistency, lazy writing, retcons, deus/diablo ex machinas etc.

To be fair, people do criticize the series as a whole for its reliance on these mechanisms, but no doubt the extent to which KH3 has gotten away with doing so wrong by its audience is something sort of special. It reminds me a lot of the live action Disney remake of Beauty & The Beast in how thoroughly it manages to disassemble all of the charm, whimsy and focus in form that defines and characterizes the best of its predecessors.
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Scion Drake



Joined: 25 Nov 2017
Posts: 941
PostPosted: Thu Feb 07, 2019 4:45 am Reply with quote
Quote:


Calsolum wrote:
As much as I love this game its got way too much issues than it should and only gets away with it cause it's Disney + sentimental value.

If any small company or even an indie developer made the exact same plot they'd be ripped apart for inconsistency, lazy writing, retcons, deus/diablo ex machinas etc.

To be fair, people do criticize the series as a whole for its reliance on these mechanisms, but no doubt the extent to which KH3 has gotten away with doing so wrong by its audience is something sort of special. It reminds me a lot of the live action Disney remake of Beauty & The Beast in how thoroughly it manages to disassemble all of the charm, whimsy and focus in form that defines and characterizes the best of its predecessors.


Ehhhh I wouldn’t go that far. There’s a certain heart & charm to this series that manages to keep it endearing. If it didn’t this series wouldn’t touch people as hard as it tends to do.

You got your good & your bad. It’s the way it’s always been with this seiries.
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Morry



Joined: 26 Jun 2016
Posts: 756
PostPosted: Thu Feb 07, 2019 12:08 pm Reply with quote
I agree with pretty much all the critiques. The game is easily the most fun and gorgeous the series has ever been, but it's also an unbalanced mess, and I don't just mean the story. I definitely still think KH2 is the series' high point.
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Alexis.Anagram



Joined: 26 Jan 2011
Posts: 278
Location: Mishopshno
PostPosted: Thu Feb 07, 2019 2:35 pm Reply with quote
Scion Drake wrote:
Ehhhh I wouldn’t go that far. There’s a certain heart & charm to this series that manages to keep it endearing. If it didn’t this series wouldn’t touch people as hard as it tends to do.

You got your good & your bad. It’s the way it’s always been with this seiries.

Previously, I would have been inclined to agree with you, because right up until about DDD I was susceptible to that sentimental draw: no matter how outlandish the story would get, KH always had a way of playing off the strength of its characters as a way of framing the material to make it feel believable and even rewarding. DDD and KH3, however, are just soulless and so devoid of narrative grace that none of the usual tricks can make up for what's lacking. The characters and themes are constantly reduced to cheap talk, jargon and lore dumps are used as substitute for genuinely emotional interfacing, and the presentation of what little narrative there is to speak of feels short-thrift and secondhand. Bargain bin Dive to the Heart, bargain bin, flavorless Disney tutorial world, bargain bin contrivances used to place characters in an artificial state of peril, and then bargain bin cop outs for all of those conflicts. Right away as I started to play KH3, I found myself thinking of how KH1 opened with Sora being told by a mysterious voice how he would come to discover his own power and destiny, or how KH2 opened with, essentially, the death of a character via the loss of his autonomous identity, and how both set the stage for what was to come. KH3 opens with Yen Sid writing Sora a grocery list and that's pretty much the quality of its drama all the way through.

Morry wrote:
I agree with pretty much all the critiques. The game is easily the most fun and gorgeous the series has ever been, but it's also an unbalanced mess, and I don't just mean the story. I definitely still think KH2 is the series' high point.

It peaked with Days for me, but even then I thought that 0.2 was a strong indicator of what KH3 could be if it just stuck to that level of character writing and rooted its conflict in the two basic, universal questions: what do these characters want, and what do they need. KH3 doesn't even begin to define that for most of its cast, and actively undermines those like Aqua who actually had arcs which addressed that dichotomy.
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Scion Drake



Joined: 25 Nov 2017
Posts: 941
PostPosted: Thu Feb 07, 2019 2:56 pm Reply with quote
Alexis.Anagram wrote:
Scion Drake wrote:
Ehhhh I wouldn’t go that far. There’s a certain heart & charm to this series that manages to keep it endearing. If it didn’t this series wouldn’t touch people as hard as it tends to do.

You got your good & your bad. It’s the way it’s always been with this seiries.

Previously, I would have been inclined to agree with you, because right up until about DDD I was susceptible to that sentimental draw: no matter how outlandish the story would get, KH always had a way of playing off the strength of its characters as a way of framing the material to make it feel believable and even rewarding. DDD and KH3, however, are just soulless and so devoid of narrative grace that none of the usual tricks can make up for what's lacking. The characters and themes are constantly reduced to cheap talk, jargon and lore dumps are used as substitute for genuinely emotional interfacing, and the presentation of what little narrative there is to speak of feels short-thrift and secondhand. Bargain bin Dive to the Heart, bargain bin, flavorless Disney tutorial world, bargain bin contrivances used to place characters in an artificial state of peril, and then bargain bin cop outs for all of those conflicts. Right away as I started to play KH3, I found myself thinking of how KH1 opened with Sora being told by a mysterious voice how he would come to discover his own power and destiny, or how KH2 opened with, essentially, the death of a character via the loss of his autonomous identity, and how both set the stage for what was to come. KH3 opens with Yen Sid writing Sora a grocery list and that's pretty much the quality of its drama all the way through.

Morry wrote:
I agree with pretty much all the critiques. The game is easily the most fun and gorgeous the series has ever been, but it's also an unbalanced mess, and I don't just mean the story. I definitely still think KH2 is the series' high point.

It peaked with Days for me, but even then I thought that 0.2 was a strong indicator of what KH3 could be if it just stuck to that level of character writing and rooted its conflict in the two basic, universal questions: what do these characters want, and what do they need. KH3 doesn't even begin to define that for most of its cast, and actively undermines those like Aqua who actually had arcs which addressed that dichotomy.


Eh it doesn't sound that bad.
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Calsolum



Joined: 11 May 2010
Posts: 898
PostPosted: Thu Feb 07, 2019 11:17 pm Reply with quote
@Alexis.Anagram

To be honest I can't argue with most of your criticisms because quite frankly they're true BUT I do believe that what KH does well outweigh's its flaws.

As i mentioned I teared up several times but Kairi's 'role' really pissed me off.
I really can't see her as anything more than a plot device and KH CAN write strong female characters(from a literary standpoint) that was practically what spoiler[Aqua was in BBS and 2.8 but in this one she just had a few flashy fights and was sidelined cause she was too weak from being in the dark realm... ok so that is a legitimate reason but like there are other ways to keep her role relevant]

If I had to hazard a guess why these things happened its because there were too many powerful characters in one narrative work and we focused too much on sora.

Also on a side note can I get a show of hands for who thinks Sora is one of the worst protagonists ever? He's a walking plot device. I'm not saying that he's a bad person or anything he's just... the man spends the whole game with everyone telling himspoiler[he can't go to the realm of darkness yet cause he needs the power of waking but he suddenly gets it goes to the realm of darkness anyway cause like it was the only option left. Thats either bad writing or he simply wasn't motivated enough In sora's defence I think its the former.]
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