3.5/5 ★ – bokonon764's review of Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance HD.

Another game down in my journey to platinum all the Kingdom Hearts games, the ones available on PS5, at least. This is only my second playthrough of this entry, and I enjoyed much more this time around. The direct sequel to Kingdom Hearts II, a spiritual successor to Birth By Sleep, and a spin-off in its own right, this version is an HD port of the original, which was released on 3DS in 2013. I think this game is a little underrated. My first playthrough, I thought it sucked. I don’t know what changed, maybe playing it right alongside the other games makes it feel better by comparison. It’s has great music, some of the best level design of the series, and new systems that make a relatively small and short game feel more full. I did play a new game plus off my old clear data, so maybe it was just getting strong abilities early in the game that bettered the experience. Like Birth By Sleep, you play as multiple characters, but unlike Birth By Sleeps messy and cumbersome one-save-file-per-character thing, switching back and forth between the two characters (which are series protagonist Sora and his rival-like friend, Riku) is done seemlesly through the new Drop system. There’s a timer that forces you to switch between characters, but it can be easily circumvented, making it so once you reach a certain point in the game, you can switch freely between either character. You visit the same worlds, also like BBS, but the worlds feel more unique to each character, and in some cases, completely different. And the level design!! KH3D has you revisit expanded worlds from the original Kingdom Hearts, and I love it. One of my favorite worlds in the series, Traverse Town, shows up. It features characters from another great Square Enix franchise, The World Ends With You, which was cool to see. And man, the reworking of the original Traverse Town theme music is brilliant. In fact, I’d say KH3Ds music in general is some of the best in the series. Other notable worlds include a Hunchback of Notre Dame world, and a great return to The World That Never Was, the final world of Kingdom Hearts II. Combat is somewhat similar to BBS. The command deck is back, and more or less the same, a lot of commands return, but that’s where the similarities end. There’s this thing called Flowmotion, which essentially just lets you fly around using wall kicks, laying down AOE attacks, grinding on rails, etc. As I mentioned, this was a new game plus run, so that may play a factor in the difficult; but this is one of the easiest KH games. There’s no danger of losing and dying in most encounters, at least for anyone sufficiently experienced in these games, but I will say, attacks are interrupted so often. That definitely gets old. A huge part of KH3D is it’s Pokémon-style Spirits system, in which you recruit enemies (referred to as Nightmares when they’re enemies, and Dreameaters when they’re allies) through synthesis. You name them, fight alongside them, level them up, play games with them…it’s a fun, time consuming system that I had a pretty good time with. The design of the spirits themselves is essentially neon color schemed animals. There’s a chubby cat-dog thing, seals, eagles, even a T-Rex. They really can’t hold a candle to the Heartless’ design level, but their okay. Naming them is fun. One of the main things that make this game divisive is its story. And it’s bad. The concepts and ideas are there, and it’s okay I guess, they just made it so fuckin confusing. There’s time travel, and it is without a doubt the worst time travel system anyones ever come up with. I’m not even gonna go into detail, cus it’s just that fuckin stupid. The most frustrating part is that it was wholly unnecessary. It’s a fictional anime-style universe where Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck show up. Why make it so needlessly complicated? The main series villain reveals his plan, as it’s the big setup for Kingdom Hearts III, the grand finale. And like I said, the ideas are there, it’s one of those “gather the alternate versions of myself to do evil shit” kinda things, and I’m here for that trope, I actually kind of love that idea; they just fumbled the bag on the execution. This is the game in the series that completely derailed the train that started wobble a bit in Kingdom Hearts II. There’s some design choices that I hate in this game. The keyblade designs mostly suck, and you just get one for every world. I miss when there were keyblades hidden for those willing to explore. There are some unlockable keyblades, but they’re late game/post game, I didn’t get much use out of them. But it’s not all bad. The shitty timing of the voice acting that was in KH II is gone, thank god. There’s a couple legendary actors in this game, Leonard Nimoy has a small role, and kills it, enough said. Riku’s somewhat absent personality has returned, he really shines in this game. I love how many things from previous Kingdom Hearts games show up in KH3D. As I finish more of these games, this being the fourth one I’ve platinumed, it’s bittersweet. I’m not sure I’ll ever play these games again. But who knows, I could be firing up the series again in a couple years, when a new one comes out. Knowing this series though, could be closer to another decade. Birth By Sleep is next. I’ve heard it’s a beast to complete.