Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories is less-than-memorable

When I heard about Kingdom Hearts, the collaboration of Disney and Squaresoft, I cringed. Mickey Mouse fighting alongside Final Fantasy characters, which would invariably find their way into this game, sounded awful beyond all reason. Throw some Teletubbies in and every kid should love it, right? Well, going against my intuition, I bought Kingdom Hearts, played it, and loved it. Then there was Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, for the Gameboy Advance, followed by Kingdom Hearts II. For those rabid fans who went that extra mile and procured them, there are Final Mix versions of Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II with all sorts of extras.

I promise that there’s a reason for all of this rambling, and I’m getting to that. Kingdom Hearts started off a long line of sequels and side-games, more of which are still on the way at some point in the future, and I have to ask this: really, Square-Enix? Isn’t it about time to move on to something else?

Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories is the Playstation 2 remake of Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, and it originally debuted as one of the features in Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix.

KH Re:Chain of Memories has some strong points, I will concede.  The obvious benefits of having this game on the PS2 are improved graphics, the addition of voice overs, etc…

The voice acting in Re:Chain of Memories is decent enough.  Having a voice to go with the characters that didn’t end up getting them in Kingdom Hearts II (for whatever plot-related reasons there may have been) was a nice addition for characters like Vexen and Marluxia.

Another minor update is the battles against the members of Organization XIII, which now take place in a new, different arena of sorts.  Most of them, anyway.  There were a few additional boss battles added to the game, as well, in its transfer to the PS2.

The cutscenes, both with the Organization XIII members and the heroes, are a nice touch as well.  It’s hard to not improve upon having the characters standing in fixed positions, talking through speech bubbles alone, I suppose.  At least they made the little bit of effort to make them look that much better?

Okay, giving this game praises is proving to be harder than expected.  It’s actually surprisingly difficult, I’m sad to say, since I do generally tend to overlook some potentially glaring flaws in Squeenix games in order to see the high points.  There’s only so much you can really find good about a remade game, especially one that didn’t really merit being remade.

The game mechanics of Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories are the same as they were on the Gameboy Advance.  You battle with cards, you progress through worlds with cards, and you get to the aforementioned worlds with cards.  Anyone who has picked up this game, or its predecessor, can easily sum up this game with one word: cards.  It adds an interested element to gameplay and, more specifically to the Kingdom Hearts series, reduce the temptation of button-mashing.  It can work, but not nearly as well.  The reason for this is simple: enemy cards of a higher value, as well as ones with a value of zero and premium cards, can be used to negate your cards (it’s called a card break).  Trust me, I’ve tried button-mashing through a few boss battles.  This lead to a few unfortunate instances in which I mistook my Gameboy Advance as a frisbee.  The same thing applies to Re:Chain of Memories.  While this is great in terms of forcing the player to strategize a little more, it’s still a bit of a pain in the ass to have to use cards.

Another factor that adds to the frustration of using cards for the battle system is that there are limitations to how you can arrange your deck of cards you’re using, but this is really more of an issue with the leveling system as a whole.  I understand that the limits are set on how many of each card, of each value, players can have in their decks.  It would be ridiculous if you start the game and make your way through it with the ability to have all cards with a value of 9, and limitless cards in your deck.  What I am saying is that it would be nice if there was some middle ground.  Perhaps add a little to each of the stats (HP, Card Points, and Sleights) or, at the very least, add a little to HP and CP.  Yes, the current system forces players to really choose what they think is the best to boost.  Yes, it forces players to level up a good bit to progress.  There are probably ways that make this less of a pain, but that doesn’t change the fact that they make it a pain.

The opening-the-path-through-each-world-with-specific-numbered-and-colored-cards aspect remains the same, so much so that it requires little comment.  There are a few new cards thrown in to mix things up, but nothing really revolutionary.

All of this comes back to the fact that it’s a remake.  Remakes are a creature often looked down upon on principle, and almost always clustered in with the likes of games based off of movies.  They have potential, but it depends on how well the folks working on the game tap into that potential.

One key problem that the Square-Enix has is its love affair with making sequels and prequels.  Squaresoft had the never-ending Final Fantasy series, which seems to be crawling further up its own ass with each new installment, and Enix had titles such as Dragon Quest.  Admittedly, I can’t be as harsh with them, as I never really bothered with Dragon Quest beyond the Monsters games.  Squaresoft and Enix becoming Square-Enix was a great way to gather all of those sequel-and-prequel-loving folks up in one convenient spot so they can show gamers how overrated new ideas really are.  That’s a whole different series of complaints, however, and not worth really delving into at this point.

Simply enough, Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories was a mediocre game. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad, and short of sending Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix over in its entirity, Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories doesn’t stand so well on its own.  Play it over someone else’s house, but don’t bother spending the money for your own copy unless you’re a real die-hard fan.

~ by crazedpenguin on February 13, 2009.