Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep, Gamestop Japan
What do you get when you combine Disney with Final Fantasy… Kingdom Hearts. Its been 8 years since the first one graced our consoles with its presence. Those who played any of the series, have mostly enjoyed the experience. Its a great story with a nice blending of characters, worlds, and music. There’s been a sequel, a number of handheld versions, and some “remixes.” The Latest of the series is Birth By Sleep, and I happened to get my hands on the recently released Japanese version. I’ve spent a total of 5 hours playing it over the past couple of days, and this one does not disappoint. In my opinion, this one puts all the others in the series to shame. The graphics are great, especially for the PSP, looks just like the PS2. Even the CG cut scenes are amazing, but hey its Square Enix where talking about here so I wouldn’t expect anything less. The music was great, its got the soundtracks to some of you’re favorite Disney films, as do the other games in the series. Unfortunately, story wise, I don’t speak Japanese so I didn’t know what was going. Even in game, very few things were in English, so it was trial by error when I played it. Nonetheless Birth By Sleep brings a lot to the table when it comes to game-play.
So, Let’s take a look at the mechanics of the game. There are 3 different characters you get to play as: Terra, Aqua, and Ventus. After a brief tutorial, you can select from either to begin the game; I chose Terra. In this game not only do the characters level up, but just about every other aspect as well like attacks and magic. One of the new battle features is a “combo meter” that when filled up, under certain conditions, can lead to a variety of attacks. When in a heated battle, you do have your standard keyblade combo attacks of course. If you were to fill up the meter with your standard attack, you will have the chance to use a finish move. More so a powerful keyblade attack than a finish. You start with one finish but as you complete certain requirements you’re finisher will level up and branch out to other finish moves, and those will continue to branch as well. Besides the standard attacks, you have secondary keyblade attacks. Anything from a dashing slash to a hurl of the keyblade. Fill up the combo meter with certain secondary attacks and you unleash a sort of “Super” mode. There are various super modes obtained by filling the combo meter in different ways. In these Super modes your attacks are more devastating as well as your “super specific” finishers. Then there’s your magic attacks, fire, blizzard, thunder, etc. Fill the combo meter with certain magic attacks and you’ll get the corresponding elemental super mode. Fire attacks give you a fire-like super, your keyblade attacks are endowed with fire, and so on with the resulting element. There are numerous ways of approaching a fight, it all depends on how you play. By the way, there’s no magic meter so all secondary and magic attacks are time based, they can be re-used after a few seconds. All your secondary and magic attacks level up as you fight, max out these attacks and you can use them for synthesis.
Synthesis, if you don’t know, its combining different elements together to make another. In which case you can create all sorts of new attacks. Sometimes the new attacks come with ability attributes. like combo increase. These abilities can only be used when the attack is equipped, but once the attack hits max level the ability is free to use. You can combine different keyblade attacks to create a more powerful one. For instance, I created a one hit kill move, kills most enemies and does massive damage to bosses, if i can land it in time. Synthesis is also how you create the higher forms of the magic attacks. 2 fires equal fira, 2 firas equal firaga, and so on for the other elements. You can also combine keyblade attacks with magic to create elemental keyblade attacks, the combinations are almost endless. Enemies occasionally drop attacks and magic so you’ll be spending time leveling up attacks just to synthesize them.
Other than keyblade attacks, you have what are called “Focus” moves and “D-Links.” The Focus moves are lock-on attacks where you can lock-on to a number of enemies and attack them all at once. Focus moves are great for tight situations. Each of these moves can also level up. The D-Links allow you to link up with other story characters you’ve encountered to use their moves, kinda like the Super modes, only character specific rather than elemental. The D-Links level up, not through experience, but rather by acquiring certain items enemies drop while in that mode. This is why I say the game-play of Birth By Sleep puts the others to shame. Look at what all the original keyblade masters could do, what happened to the new generation of keyblade wielders, man they suck.
Besides the story, there’s more to do that’ll keep you interested. There’s an Arena mode which you can play online or offline with various things to do. There’s some trials you can endure solo or with friends, fighting through a few rounds of enemies or a boss. The trials are kind of like the Coliseum in previous games. There’s a board game mode you can play, a bit like a dumbed down version of Mario Party. You can take on your friends in vs. mode or challenge them to a race to see who the fastest keyblade rider is. There’s different ways to fight and a lot of modes to keep you entertained. I’ve only played 5 hours of this game and I already love it, a definite buy for me. The American version of Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep is set to be released September 7, 2010.
Wait what? A review? on a Game that hasn’t come out yet to the US? Yep! You read it right. The author of this story wanted to remain anonymous. He wrote this story exclusively for The Mug Show! Agent 00Gamer *tuh tuhn pah!*.
first one graced our consoles with its presence. Those who played any of the series, have mostly enjoyed
the experience. Its a great story with a nice blending of characters, worlds, and music. Theres been a
sequel, a number of handheld versions, and some “remixes.” The Latest of the series is Birth By Sleep, and
I happend to get my hands on the recently released Japanese version. I’ve spent a total of 5 hours playing
it over the past couple of days, and this one does not disappoint. In my opinion, this one puts all the
others in the series to shame. The graphics are great, especially for the PSP, looks just like the PS2. Even
the CG cutscenes are amazing, but hey its Square Enix where talkin about here so I wouldn’t expect anything
less. The music was great, its got the soundtracks to some of you’re favorite Disney films, as do the other
games in the series. Unfortunately, story wise, I don’t speak Japanese so I didn’t know what was going. Even
in game, very few things were in english, so it was trial by error when I played it. Nonetheless Birth By
Sleep brings a lot to the table when it comes to gameplay.
So Lets take a look at the mechanics of the game. There are 3 different characters you get to play as: Terra,
Aqua, and Ventus. After a brief tutorial, you can select from either to begin the game; I chose Terra. In this
game not only do the characters level up, but just about every other aspect as well like attacks and magic.
One of the new battle features is a “combo meter” that when filled up, under certain conditons, can lead to a
variety of attacks. When in a heated battle, you do have your standard keyblade combo attacks ofcourse. If you
were to fill up the meter with your standard attack, you will have the chance to use a finish move. More so a
powerful keyblade attack than a finish. You start with one finish but as you complete certain requirements you’re
finisher will level up and branch out to other finsh moves, and those will continue to branch as well. Besides
the standard attacks, you have secondary keyblade attacks. Anything from a dashing slash to a hurl of the keyblade.
Fill up the combo meter with certain secondary attacks and you unleash a sort of “Super” mode. There are various
super modes obtained by filling the combo meter in different ways. In these Super modes your attacks are more
devastating as well as your “super specific” finishers. Then theres your magic attacks, fire, bizzard, thunder,
etc. Fill the combo meter with certain magic attacks and you’ll get the corresponding elemental super mode.
Fire attacks give you a fire-like super, your keyblade attacks are endowed with fire, and so on with the resulting
element. There are numerous ways of approaching a fight, it all depends on how you play. By the way, theres no
magic meter so all secondary and magic attacks are time based, they can be re-used after a few seconds. All your
seconday and magic attacks level up as you fight, max out these attacks and you can use them for synthesis.
Synthesis, if you don’t know, its combining different elements together to make another. In which case you can
create all sorts of new attacks. Sometimes the new attacks come with ability attributes. like combo increase.
These abilities can only be used when the attack is equipped, but once the attack hits max level the ability
is free to use. You can combine different keyblade attacks to create a more powerful one. For instance, I
created a one hit kill move, kills most enemies and does massive damage to bosses, if i can land it in time.
Synthesis is also how you create the higher forms of the magic attacks. 2 fires equal fira, 2 firas equal
firaga, and so on for the other elements. You can also combine keyblade attacks with magic to create elemental
keyblade attacks, the combinations are almost endless. Enemies ocasionally drop attacks and magic so you’ll be
spending time leveling up attacks just to sythesize them.
Other than keyblade attacks, you have what are called “Focus” moves and “D-Links.” The Focus moves are lock-on
attacks where you can lock-on to a number of enemies and attack them all at once. Focus moves are great for tight
situations. Each of these moves can also level up. The D-Links allow you to link up with other story characters
you’ve encountered to use their moves, kinda like the Super modes, only character specific rather than elemental.
The D-Links level up, not through experience, but rather by aquiring certain items enemies drop while in that mode.
This is why I say the gameplay of Birth By Sleep puts the others to shame. Look at what all the original keyblade
masters could do, what happend to the new generation of keyblade wielders, man they suck.
Besides the story, theres more to do that’ll keep you interested. Theres an Arena mode which you can play online or
offline with various things to do. Theres some trials you can endure solo or with friends, fighting through a few
rounds of enemies or a boss. The trials are kind of like the Colussium in previous games. Theres a board game mode
you can play, a bit like a dumbed down version of Mario Party. You can take on your friends in vs. mode or challenge
them to a race to see who the fastest keyblade rider is. Theres different ways to fight and a lot of modes to keep
you entertained. I’ve only played 5 hours of this game and I already love it, a definite buy for me. The American
version of Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep is set to be released sometime in September.
