Kingdom Hearts. Upon its appearance in 2002, this RPG series caused an incredible sensation and won thousands of fans around the world. Its fast-paced gameplay, story and characters, coupled with an unlikely crossover between SquareEnix and Disney, has captured everyone's heart, making many sequels possible on many different platforms. And so we reach, on Playstation Portable, the sixth chapter of the saga, set ten years earlier than the first game, which promises to reveal many mysteries. Turned on the PSP, therefore, we are in the Land of Departure.
Three Heroes, One Destiny.
In this very special world, Land of Departure, we get to know the three heroes of this story. Terra, Ventus and Aqua are three guys who are training hard in order to become true warriors of light and obtain the prestigious title of Keyblade Master. Their master, Master Eraqus, closely monitors their progress, all in an atmosphere that closely resembles Jedi apprenticeships.
Terra is a very contradictory boy, in fact both the powers of light and those of darkness coexist within him. Master Eraqus is quite concerned about his situation, and trains him with severity and consistency to make sure that he can bury his dark powers forever.
Ventus is a young boy (physically identical to Roxas, the one who in the chronologically following events will be Sora's Nobody) with a mysterious past. He was placed in the care of Eraqus by another teacher, the old Master Xehanort, and since then, unaware of his past, he has been training hard with his two friends.
Finally, Aqua is a very determined girl, very attached to Terra and Ventus. Her light powers are perfect, and her magical abilities are exceptional. All 3 wear special devices on one shoulder which, when stimulated, dress them in majestic armor that symbolizes their status as Keyblade users.
The real story of the game begins on the day of the Terra and Aqua exam, the day when it will be decided if they have what it takes to become Keyblade Masters. In this exam he was also invited to observe Master Xehanort, who is particularly interested in Terra's abilities. Regardless of the result that we won't reveal here, our 3 heroes will learn that after the exam, Master Xehanort seems to have disappeared into thin air. And not only that, in the various worlds monsters are running around, called Unversed. All of them will then leave with their Keyblades, each with their own motivations, for an important mission. Some to save the Master, some to obey different orders and discover the origin of the Unversed, some simply for personal purposes.
Which one will we choose, among the 3 heroes, to play and follow in his adventure?
Aqua, Terra, and Ventus, ready for action in the Keyblade Graveyard.
Hearts united from afar
The basic style of play of Kingdom Hearts has remained almost unchanged, in fact we have full control of our character in the third person, and the fights are always frenetic and captivating to play. We will therefore only talk about the real, important differences that distinguish the gameplay of this game from that of the chapters of the main saga.
One difference we will immediately notice is the lack of Magic Points. In fact, in this game it will not be necessary to spend anything to perform special moves or spells, which in this case are called Commands. We will have a certain number of slots available, destined to increase with the continuation of the game, in which we will be able to insert the commands we want, obviously on condition of being in possession of them. For example, if we have 4 slots, we can decide to fill them with an attack ability, such as Strike Raid, and 3 spells, such as Energy, Fire and Stop. During the fight, the equipped controls will appear in the lower left corner of the screen, and we will be able to navigate between them with the up and down buttons of the directional pad. It will also be possible to select a favorite Command, which will be selected automatically if we press left on the cross. In any case, in a battle where the buttons to be used will be X to attack, Square to parry or dodge, Circle to jump, and L + R to aim (individually they only serve to change the camera angle), it will also be available to us. the Triangle button, which will make us use the selected Command. The only problem, although we will not have to spend MP, is that each skill, when used, has a recharge time of a few seconds, an obvious problem, however, by equipping more units of a Command that we know we have to use very often.
Commands can be leveled up and made more powerful by keeping them equipped during combat, and more: they can also be merged together. In the Command Fusion menu, in fact, we will be able to select two Commands that we will decide to get rid of (if at a fairly advanced level and if compatible with each other) and, optionally, a Crystal to be used as an intermediary in the merger. The fusion will naturally give rise to a new, more powerful Command, depending on the nature of those used as materials. For example, by merging an attack skill with Fire, we will most likely find ourselves creating a new attack skill similar to the previous one but with fire as an additional attribute. Or by merging two equal spells together we will obtain the higher degree, with two Energy we would in fact obtain Energira. But the results are many, have fun experimenting.
We speak rather of these Crystals used as a medium. There are several types, and each of them, inserted in a Fusion of Commands, will give the resulting Command an Extra ability. These abilities will automatically be equipped to our character, as long as he keeps the Commands associated with them equipped, and they are completely passive. Scan, for example, is one of them, but there are many others, such as Ability to increase your maximum HP, to decrease command reload times, and much more. The interesting thing is that by reaching the maximum level of a Command associated with a skill, we will obtain its ability forever, even by getting rid of the relative Command.
But the news of the fighting certainly did not end here, far from it. Another of the bars present, along with that of Life, is the Focus bar. This is inextricably linked to some particular Commands, the Area Attacks. It is possible to equip only one of them at a time, and they will not appear in the list of normal commands. Their power is used by holding L + R in combat, and a first person view with a scope will appear. The more time passes in this view, the more the Focus bar will drain. At the end of it we must have selected all the enemy targets we want to hit with the viewfinder for as long as possible, and in this way this devastating area attack will be unleashed, which will hit all the opponents we have selected. You will need to reload the Focus bar while fighting other enemies as normal in order to reuse this type of Command.
Aqua is doing her best to protect Cinderella's little friend from the Unverseds.
Let's talk now about the final attacks. Above the list of commands, in battle, there is yet another bar. This will charge as we attack our opponents or use Commands. When this is fully charged, with the X button we will be able to deliver a final attack, a particularly powerful blow, of which there are many versions. In fact, by accumulating experience we will unlock more and more powerful final attacks, with a skill tree. From the first final attack it is in fact possible to unlock 2 final level 2 attacks, from them further level 3 attacks and so on. Of course we will only be able to equip 1, and if we see that the last attack unlocked is not to our liking, we can always return to the previous one to unlock another of the next branch.
Yet not always by loading the bar we will launch a final attack, using some commands in our combos, in fact, we will make it possible to transform the fighting style of our character for a limited period of time. For example, using in our combos while loading the ice move bar, we will turn our style into Diamond Dust. Each style has a much higher power than normal, as well as applying additional skills (in this case ice attacks). During the time we have this fighting style, a new bar will appear. This will drain on its own over time if we have no enemies to attack, ending our higher state. It will also end by charging the bar to the maximum (with the same mode of the normal fighting style, therefore using attacks and commands), but in this case we will be given a devastating final attack, different depending on the fighting style used in that moment.
One final, important mention in regards to the battle system is for the D-Link. There are in fact many characters that we will meet in our story, with whom the heart of our hero will form a particular bond. By pressing right on the directional cross we will have a list of them, instead of the Commands, and by pressing Triangle on the desired character we will perform a D-Link with it (using yet another bar that will download over time). During the D-Link we will have a whole series of new commands available, as well as two auto-abilities to be unlocked during the fights. For example, using Terra and establishing a D-Link with Ventus, we will acquire Commands based on Aero spells, and powerful auto abilities like Haste, which will speed up our movements and our attacks. As if that were not enough, the bar to be filled for the Final attack is still present, and even the latter will be more powerful and particular depending on the character with whom we have made the connection.
It's not just the battles that have some news, there are also many mini-games to play with. In addition to all the games that we will find to do in the Disney City, there are two other major entertainment: The Mirage Arena and the Command Board. The Mirage Arena is a place where we will be able to engage in various fights against Unversed groups in waves and mini-games, but the important thing to know is that here it will be possible to play with our friends with a great multiplayer. The Command Board is instead a sort of Monopoly, whose boards are based on the various worlds we will visit. Here we will be able to "buy" the boxes and level them up, just like in Monopoly, to make sure that the opponents who pass over them are forced to pay us a sum of money. The difference is that here, to get ownership of each box, it will be necessary to place one of our Commands. In this way, by acquiring those of the opponents and the bonus boxes where there is already a Command, we will also take possession of these skills in the real game, as well as greatly enhance the level of those that were already at our disposal. A great way to power up our character when we don't feel like fighting.
There is not much more to say, as regards the collectibles the famous Reports are always present, necessary to know more about the background of the story, and the stickers, scattered around the worlds, to be attached on an album make their appearance. to acquire points and unlock new items.
Anyone who has played the previous Kingdom Hearts will find no other relevant news, well, as if these just mentioned weren't enough already.
Master Xehanort seems particularly interested in Terra… what will his purposes be?
Technical Data
One thing is undoubted, Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep does not lack graphics and sound. As usual, Square-Enix manages to bring out the maximum possible in graphic terms on any console you work, and the music is as always catchy and well done. Nomura's character design is always nice, so nothing to complain about. As for longevity, we are faced with a prologue, a story for each of the 3 characters, and then a final story. Taking all the totality we will have about fifty hours of play, to which we can add the time needed to obtain 100% of the collectibles. The only drawback of all this is that we will be forced to grow a character 3 times from the beginning, which can annoy the player a lot who will see all their efforts in enhancing their character canceled when they have to start a new story.
In conclusion
There is little to say, Birth by Sleep is a new, excellent chapter of the saga, with great potential and innovations. It doesn't lack graphics and the story is well structured, of course it would have been better if it had been developed for a major console rather than a portable one, but at least they added the multiplayer variant to take advantage of this choice. All lovers of Kingdom Hearts certainly cannot miss it, thanks to this game we will discover the origins of many things, in addition to the encounters with Braig, Lea, Isa, and other characters whose Nobody will later become members of Organization XIII. But for those who don't love it, it would be better to play the previous chapters first, to hope to understand something in a story now intertwined in an uncontrollable way.
