Kingdom Hearts 3D – Dream Drop Distance: first playthrough thoughts

The first Kingdom Hearts game on the newest gen of handhelds certainly blows all the games on its predecessor away – and surpassed my expectations – but in my view didn’t match up to the brilliant Birth By Sleep in any aspect, and suffered from some major problems.

These are my thoughts after my first playthrough, in which I unlocked the secret ending but otherwise did not explore very thoroughly, so there may be bits and pieces to add after I play again in critical mode. Since the secret movie was so easy to unlock, though, I doubt there’s anything too significant.

So where does this game leave us, post-BBS? Nomura stated that it was to be considered, much like BBS, as important plot-wise as a numbered title and not a side-game like Coded – and indeed, it’s likely that the plot of KH3 will make no sense without playing this one…though that can be said of Chain of Memories too, leaving only Coded and 358/2 Days as lesser side-games. Either way, I’m pleased that the title was actually meaningful, as seeing the younger character models and bizarre scenes of raining Soras in the sneak peaks I found myself doubting it would be – though my initial hopes upon starting the game that it would be about bringing Ventus, Aqua and Terra back ended up dashed. Perhaps we’ll see that in Birth By Sleep 2.

Nomura apparently looked at his sprawling mess of a plot for this series and thought ‘You know what this incredibly convoluted and confusing scenario needs? Time travel.’ KH3D is not for the uninitiated. Be prepared to concentrate on who Xemnas, old Xehanort, Young Xehanort (also known as ‘Terranort’ because he inhabits Terra’s body), Ansem and Ansem the Wise are, all of them except the last looking pretty damn similar, save the bald old coot. Be prepared to count off all the different aspects of Sora found in his heart: his anomalous nobody Roxas, the replica/false nobody/memory vessel Xion, and the disembodied asylum seeker Ventus. And now try to wrap your head around the trap Master Xehanort devised to get thirteen different aspects of himself from different times together in different (mostly possessed) forms in order to represent thirteen darknesses in opposition to seven lights, including an attempt to use Sora’s body. It’s a very, very tangled mess. And it’ll get worse once there’s an attempt to extricate Terra from the wrong side and when the two surprise-twist keyblade wielders who come to the fore at the very end of the game decide who fills the one remaining space (though the secret ending twist wasn’t…really a twist, but rather a strange omission up to that point).

But that’s only the game’s place in the wider series. It has a plot of its own, which is largely kept simple: Sora and Riku are accomplished keyblade wielders, but not yet masters. Thus Master Yen Sid (who for whatever reason is retired from using a keyblade and won’t be fighting) sends the two boys on a mission to restore previously destroyed worlds that have been left in a state of sleep. For some reason, they have to be sent back in time to do this (because otherwise they cannot learn any new skills, perhaps?), which leads to them inhabiting their younger forms – which I find a shame, because their KH2 designs are much more appealing and are after all included in the game, looking much better. They set about freeing the worlds and seeing the pasts of some familiar faces, fighting ‘Dream Eaters’ along the way, but of course Xehanort is on hand to intervene.

It’s an often bewildering plot, but it just about hangs together, and at least finally leads to the right place and supplies answers to most questions even if they’re far-fetched – though just how Lea and the rest somehow went back to being somebodies again is anyone’s guess. It facilitates a mostly straightforward game, and with the exception of the very dull Tron world, it’s fun to play through the story.

But there are a few big problems, chief of which is the gameplay. BBS really got things right, though shoot lock made things a little too easy. But each character was used alone and had moves that flowed into an increasingly deep play style. DDD’s seems…slapped together. Annoyingly, you have to use dream eater companions, which both confuse you in the thick of action (as they look like the enemies) and end up dying and needing to be revived by the player, which against harder bosses often means you end up having to prioritise getting a stupid snail back to life and die yourself. I wish they could be turned off. Then there’s ‘flowmotion’, which is incredibly useful at the start but soon gets very annoying, as a simple dodge roll too close to the door can end up with you being immobilised for a half-second, enough for tougher bosses to wipe you out on proud mode. It also feels tacked-on, as it means you more or less get the ability to fly from the start, so many carefully-designed stages with springboards and obstacles just seem like they were put together before flowmotion was introduced, because it makes them obsolete. Finally, there’s the cute little special attacks done with the touch screen – I enjoyed these, but there were only a handful of different ones, which soon got repetitive: it would have been much better had they been complex and varied.

What really stood out above all the rest, though, was the homoeroticism of the whole thing. The KH2 ending more or less dropped all pretence that the Sora/Riku relationship was anything but a love story, and here it’s the heart of the whole piece: they’re split apart but their strong bond brings them back together…and that’s before the innuendoes about Riku being inside Sora and the bizarre image of him collecting Sora bodies as he skydives are discussed. What’s remarkable is that the female presence in the game is almost non-existent. None of the characters significant to the overall plot of this game are female. The important female characters – Kairi, Naminé, Aqua – get next to no screentime, and a hint that one will be controllable in KH3 doesn’t cut it. In fact, the female character who gets the most to do is probably Olivia Wilde’s character in the Tron world…and it’s weird seeing Thirteen from House interacting with Sora!

Believe me, I don’t mind that this epic saga is basically a love story between adolescent boys. They’re a cute couple. But let’s see more of Aqua soon, eh? I really want some interaction between Sora and the BBS characters.