Kingdom Hearts III is the end of the "Xehanort saga". The roman numeral "III" may lead people to believe this is the third game, but it is honestly the ninth. In order to understand the plot of KH3, you have to play eight other games. Luckily, most of this can be achieved through the
The Story so Far collection, which has five of these games in game form, and the other three in cutscene form.
For thirteen years, I have wanted Kingdom Hearts III. In that time, five other KH games came out, and none satisfied me. The "command deck" games,
Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep [キングダム ハーツ バース バイ スリープ] and
Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance were just "good", if that, and served only to muddle the plot, which was already muddled enough by that point. In a story about people separating themselves into two separate entities, then merging those two entities back together, did we honestly, truly need a time travel plot on top of it all?
This isn't even touching upon
Kingdom Hearts Re: Chain of Memories and
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days [スリー ファイブ エイト デイズ オーバー ツー], which I found awful.
On their face, the only KH games before this one that I replay are
Kingdom Hearts [キングダムハーツ] and
Kingdom Hearts II [キングダムハーツII]. I wanted more of that style of gameplay. KH2 perfected it, and expectations were high for KH3.
Gameplay-wise, KH3 pretty much delivers. The new keyblade transformation system is neat, but I honestly wish they'd just made them different weapon types full-stop, so I could switch from the Pirates of the Caribbean staff to the Monsters Inc. yo-yo
Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening [デビル メイ クライ 3]-style.
The main thing the transformation system and the accompanying keyblade upgrade menu accomplishes is making it so every keyblade in the game can be considered useful for the entire game. In every other KH game, I ditch the default Kingdom Key as soon as I can, but the endgame stats screen said it was my most-used weapon this time around.
Magic is something I largely ignored in previous games (aside from cure and some defense spells), but KH3 makes it so obviously good that I used it all the time. It's probably too good, however, since Firaga basically just destroyed most of the later bosses. One problem I had, though, was that Blizzard spells seemed like just a worse version of Fire. I also would have liked Reflect and Magnet to return from KH2, but I appreciated the addition of Water spells.
I wish that they'd let me turn off attraction flow, though. It sucks, and I only ever activate it by mistake. All the summons are terrible, too, but that was the case in KH2 as well, so.
The Disney/Pixar worlds in this game are a mixed bag. The biggest problem with KH2 was that every single Disney world was just "the movie, but everyone says 'Sora, Donald, and Goofy' a lot". Half of KH3's worlds are like this, but half feature entirely new plots, written with the help of Disney/Pixar.
The Hercules world seemed to just be there to wrap up the plot of the movie, since KH2 didn't really finish it. Hercules's voice acting seemed really stilted for most of the world, and James Woods's voice isn't what it used to be.
The Toy Story world features a new plot, and is one of the cooler worlds in the game in that regard. Fans of Woody in particular will not be disappointed with his role. However, the constant presence of the giant robot enemies got really annoying really quickly.
The Tangled world just goes through the plot of the movie, but I honestly loved this world. I've never seen the movie, though, so the fact that a lot of the plot happens off-screen left a lot of plot holes as I was playing.
Why is Rapunzel calling Flynn "Eugene"? How does she have the tiara if it was last seen in the tower? However, the visual design and the fun character moments with Rapunzel made this world second-best in the game, I'd say.
Now, I've never liked Monsters Inc. I didn't like the movie as a kid, and I don't like the world. The ending was cool, but I hated Sora's monster design. The original plot they created for the game was fine, but I simply wasn't a fan.
The Frozen world is ridiculous. It features the clearest example of Disney meddling in the series. At the beginning, a labyrinth is created out of nowhere for no particular reason, but that's the best part of the level. The heroes climb the mountain, watch Elsa sing "Let it Go" (because Disney), then get booted down the mountain in a horrible sled chase. After this, they meet Anna and listen to her talk over her past self singing "Do You Want to Build a Snowman", with horrible audio mixing. Then they go back up the mountain again, and get booted down again. It's an annoying world where Sora, Donald, and Goofy do basically nothing and only interact with the movie characters once each.
Luckily, that's followed by the best world in not just the game, but the series. The Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End level is absolutely brilliant. Not the story part, though, since it's just another "the plot happens off-screen" world in that regard. Jack Sparrow gets a really cool moment with a member of Organisation XIII, though, so that's nice. The real part thing about this world is that you get a pirate ship, and can sail from island to island and find treasure, and face other ships in sea battles. The underwater swimming sections are absolutely brilliant, because they just let you have fun and aren't trying to jump-scare you with horrifying undersea life, which is something I dread in games with water levels. I honestly wish this had been its own game. If they do DLC for this game, I 100% want more islands.
The final Disney world is based on Big Hero Six. It has an original plot as well, but the world is small and feels kind of rushed. It's a little section of the city, but aside from a cool plot set-up, there's really nothing to say about it.
Then we get into the original plot. I'm not going to talk much about it, aside from complaints. All I am going to do is complain from here on out. I'm better at complaining than talking about why I like things anyway.
Riku's voice actor sounded like he didn't try. A lot of his lines sounded like he got one take, without being able to read the script before hand. He kept emphasising the wrong word in his sentences, making his dialogue sound really unnatural.
I wasn't a fan of the replacement voices for Master Xehanort, Scrooge McDuck, Ansem SoD, and Mickey Mouse. I get that Bret Iwan has been voicing Mickey since Wayne Allwine's death in 2009, but I just don't like him. Chris Diamantopoulos voices Mickey in the Disney channel shorts, and I like him a lot better in the role.
As far as Ansem SoD goes, I will never get over the loss of Billy Zane. He was absolutely perfect in KH1.
Seriously, why did Sora just forgive Xehanort at the very end? Why didn't he demand to know what happened to Kairi? Why, after all the shit he caused, is Xehanort allowed to just stroll back to heaven with Eraqus?
Why did Sora go back in time after The Final World, just to do things the exact same way again?
Why was "The Power of Waking" so important if all Sora does is use it wrong? What did Yen Sid even want Sora to do with it?
After a big subplot of KH2 was Roxas learning to accept that he wasn't a real person, and learning to accept that his place was as a part of Sora, why does he get to come back? His ending was bittersweet, but that was the point.
Why did they think it was a good idea to end on a downer cliffhanger? After thirteen years of waiting for another good game after KH2, why were we slapped in the face with that ending?
Also, really disappointed that Scala ad Caelum was just a boss arena rather than an actual level.Kingdom Hearts III slapped me in the face at the end, but the journey was mostly great. I don't know. I'm glad Donald and Goofy got to be relevant again, at least.
Makes me appreciate the other entries in the series much more.
there are no doubt silly moments, 80% of the game involves running around in disney worlds (it should be expected at this point), but there's a lot of really subtle, beautiful moments. i love how aqua is portrayed at the start of keyblade graveyard for instance; i think the writers did a good job of showing her trauma from years of being trapped in the realm of darkness. ironically, i remember a lot of people saying it was stupid and "unrealistic" for her to freeze up as she sees her friends get swept up by the darkness, which is why i don't think many of the people criticizing this are doing it in good-faith. the biggest criticism that i wholeheartedly agree with, with regards to the story, is that the pacing is off. there are story beats that happen between worlds, but since the player doesn't actually have any involvement in them (à la hollow bastion in kh2), it feels entirely disconnected from what you're doing. however, this is pretty common in kingdom hearts games. i struggle to see how kh1 or bbs have better pacing than kh3. kh2 is just the golden child that did a lot of things right.
the combat leaves a lot to be desired only if you are intent on not trying to make the most out of it, which is a fair criticism, but there is a lot of depth and nuance that comes out if you play the game with restrictions and on higher difficulties. the skill ceiling is insanely high with a lot of hidden tech, but the only bosses that require you to genuinely engage with this are the DLC bosses. however, using those tools in the base game makes it a hell of a lot more fun, in my experience. most people that may have heard of revenge value probably don't even know about stagger endurance or how it works (since the game doesn't tell you and all the bosses that have it are really easy on any difficulty other than critical lvl1). most people probably don't realize that if two enemies stunned by thunder run into each other they take a lot of damage! there's a lot of really interesting stuff that's only really useful if you decide to ignore most of the advertised game mechanics (attraction flow, keyblade transformations) and substitute it with base sora's kit. i don't think the player should have to "make the game fun" for themselves but it happens in plenty of other games, anyways. i've heard some people say that certain dark souls games become more fun on level 1 because the restrictions force you to really understand and get good at the game. i feel like kh3 is in a similar position where it becomes more fun the more you take away it's flashy mechanics.
i could go on forever but i really do think this is game is misunderstood in a lot of ways. it's by no means perfect but it is one of the best games released in recent years imo, particularly the dlc which has the best content in any kh game bar none. osaka team has improved tremendously, not just from bbs to kh3, but from kh3 to re:mind. i think a lot of the adamant detractors probably have never played re:mind because they found the base game boring but it really is worth it if you've ever enjoyed kingdom hearts in the past or like really fun bosses. it might change ur mind!