Forum - View topicGAME: Kingdom Hearts III
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Alexis.Anagram
 Posts: 278 Location: Mishopshno |
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All of these characters have unique abilities and insights that should have obviously been drawn upon when formulating the idea for this final conflict: managing the ensemble so that every individual feels essential to bringing the whole story full circle was the foremost mandate this game had and it blows it. The Kairi stuff is awful in a way words fail to convey, but I'm also not down with the excuses the narrative makes surrounding Aqua, because they rely on a blanket dismissal all of her established qualities in terms of training, abilities, and character in order to justify a portrayal that reads as weak and ineffectual using logic that never gets applied to anybody else. Sora is outright stated to spoiler[have lost all his power after falling into MX's trap in DDD, which is why he's on a journey to recover his strength, yet he's still depicted achieving heroic feats like saving Disney characters and the worlds they inhabit right from the get-go. Riku has his body literally possessed by Ansem SoD in KH1 then gets trapped in the Realm of Darkness until the events of CoM where he begins his personal journey of recollection and redemption which extends through the next three games chronologically, and he never even pauses to catch his breath. Meanwhile Aqua, who is unfortunately female, is told she "needs to rest" and is shown standing around stuttering like she has no idea how to even summon a Keyblade while her friends and allies get knocked off one by one in front of her. And we're meant to believe this is the same Master Aqua from BBS and 0.2, yeah, OK.]
I liked Sora a lot prior to KH3, even though I wasn't a fan of how he was rewritten to have less of an overtly human interpretation and becomes more of a one-note shonen protag post-KH2, I still thought there was a balance between his natural willingness to aid others and answer the call to duty, and his personal drive to regain his home and his friends. KH3's lack of center and narrative gravity just makes him seem tiresome and oafish, like when spoiler[he and Donald and Goofy arrive in Kingdom of Corona and Donald's asking why they stopped there, and Sora's response is, "Can't we just go with the flow?" Like, aside from the fact that it just makes him seem like a huge dick when characters like Aqua are languishing in KH Hell and absolutely do not have time for him to "go with the flow," the bigger problem is what kind of protagonist is the game making him out to be, and how does that convey any urgency or a sense of real stakes to the audience? If Sora's response to the imminent destruction of the world as we know it, as a reference point for the audience, is to shrug and go play with his Disney friends, there is absolutely no reason we would believe in or care about the edgy turnaround inflicted upon him during the events of the final battle. This wasn't a problem in KH1, when Sora was mainly lost and fumbling through world after world with no clear directive, or KH2 when he was likewise looking anywhere and everywhere for his lost companion and a path back to his home world. The set up for KH3 doesn't really allow for that, and it speaks to how poorly they integrated the Disney worlds that they would need to rely on such flimsy reasoning for Sora to venture through them when there are so many obvious Disney stories that would reflect and enhance the drama at the heart of this installment. But that's a whole other conversation.] |
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SuperRed
Posts: 37 |
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People in this thread: bla bla bla bad writing, weak female characters, retcons, rushed ending, Not enough FF characters, Sora bad protagonist, etc.
Me: Great graphics, great action, man it was so fun watching "Let it Go" play in a game, traveling the seas and shooting pirate ships, gliding through the city, etc. I'm glad Im one of those that likes KH mainly for the Disney stuff and didn't expect novel level writing for most of the characters. Gameplay alone it was 9/10 for me, story was ok. |
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Revolutionary
 Posts: 601 Location: Too Far South |
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I mean, I understand where you're coming from. I've never been one to get too invested in stories either, and overall the fun things you mentioned had more of an influence on me. BUT spoiler[It is simply too hard for me to not get frustrated with what happened with Kairi. The content released leading up to KHIII clearly pointed toward her becoming a fighter, and the Hyperbolic Time Chamber training going on with her and Lea during the game's story should have cemented this even further, but then she gets kidnapped again. It's just offensively bad writing. It's both very bad writing in the sense of a female character, and in general. I can't get over it.] |
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Animeking1108
Posts: 1244 |
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Come on. We had whole games where females got to be badass in this franchise, but the one time a character gets Nanako Dojima'd, the Anita Sarkessians of the world lose their minds. |
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SuperRed
Posts: 37 |
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Idk, the game is clearly made to be fun and even people who I know are pretty hard to impress liked it, then all of a sudden a 20+ minute titled "Kingdom Hearts 3 - Why it Sucks" pops on my youtube feed out of nowhere. It just feels really forced negativity to me. spoiler[didn't she help Sora get out of the darkness and into a previous point in time during the final battle? Doesn't that at least count for something?] |
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