5/5 ★ – AerialViking's review of Kingdom Hearts Final Mix.

Kingdom Hearts Final Mix is a refinement on what I thought was already an amazing game. This version (originally only released in Japan) makes some great tweaks to the game such as adding several combo modifiers, making the combat in this game feel a bit less basic. Another great tweak is the ability to skip cutscenes (although the original version of this release, you had to have watched the scene 1st in order to skip it). This is an absolute god send for anyone who grew up playing this on the original release and had to suffer through "there's no way you're taking Kairi's heart" ad infinitum. The major addition, imo, is the additional story scenes. Most are just added context to what Riku was doing, but they are great nonetheless for avid fans like me who never got to see them ~20 years ago. There is also a new secret boss that is a teaser for the next game. My favorite part of the KH series is when they do this, so it's cool to be able to see the first time. He's not super hard (I still think Sephiroth is the hardest since you're alone and don't have the ability to summon Tinker Bell), but he is fairly challenging and really gets your head going thinking about what's next. My only real complaint, and it's a minor one, is the Heartless colors. In this version of the game, they decided to give all of the Heartless new color palletes, and I think most of them are absolute downgrades in every way. I wish they offered a way to switch between the new ones and the originals, but ah well. Overall though, I love Kingdom Hearts. It may be my favorite in the series and this version improves upon it in many great ways, making this the best version to revisit.