Kingdom Hearts Re:coded Review

The same old toon.

Version tested: DS

Let's be honest: the clamour for improved graphical fidelity plays a big part in driving the progress of new gaming technology. Pretty games sell. Not that all games are reliant on visual frippery, of course, but it's impossible to deny that much of Kingdom Hearts' appeal comes from its lush recreations of famous Disney worlds and the characters that reside therein.

This naturally presents Square Enix with a problem when it comes to the DS. Re:coded is among the better looking games on the system, but there's no doubt the old girl's starting to creak a bit as she prepares to make way for a shiny new model. The PSP's terrific (and technically impressive) Birth By Sleep offered a number of new locations to explore and smash monsters around in, but Re:coded is content to mostly retread old ground, as Sora revisits settings from the first PS2 game. Sadly, these worlds lose much of their impact in the downsizing process.

The plot contrives to find an excuse to return to the likes of Wonderland, Agrabah and the Olympus Coliseum. Jiminy Cricket's computerised journal of the first game's events has been corrupted, and so Mickey, Donald and Goofy decide to send a virtual Sora into the digital world to get rid of the bugs. But soon after you arrive on the Destiny Islands, it's clear these unsightly blocks of code are the least of your problems.

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You'll sometimes be sucked into portals to another digital realm. Complete additional challenges here to earn more experience and item rewards.

I'm afraid that's your lot as far as story info goes, Square Enix's faintly silly review restrictions preventing me from elaborating much further. Suffice to say that while the plot is more straightforward than most Kingdom Hearts titles, there's a degree of assumed knowledge that means some scenes won't make a jot of sense to newcomers. Given that there's a strong sense of déjà vu to proceedings for those familiar with the series, you do begin to wonder just who the game is aimed at.

There's plenty of toing and froing as you're sent on simple fetch quests by a variety of well-known Disney characters, and along the way you'll spend a fair bit of time smashing the stacks of black blocks which represent the glitches in Jiminy's digital journal. Most hold either restorative items or experience orbs, though they can also be used as stepping stones to reach hidden areas or higher platforms.

Completing missions and defeating certain baddies earns you computer chips, which are placed within a matrix to enhance Sora's powers. It's not entirely dissimilar to Dead Space's weapon upgrades, though here you're levelling up your character more than his arsenal. The rather neat concept of 'dual processing' sees the effect of certain chips doubled if you use them to connect two circuits. This can allow for faster levelling, or hugely increased power in battle – useful during the handful of boss encounters.

There are even 'cheats' of a form, which you can use to tweak the combat mechanics, increasing the amount of experience or cash gained from defeating enemies, but at the cost of making them tougher to beat. The difficulty level can be adjusted at any stage, with rarer and more valuable item drops for those up for the challenge.

I'd have been more willing to do so had the fighting been more entertaining. Kingdom Hearts battles have always been reasonably straightforward, mostly reliant on rapid taps of the standard attack buttons, with combos emerging if you make enough consecutive connections without being whacked in return. You can assign special attacks to the Y button, and activate the more powerful deck commands by holding the L button and selecting them from a short menu. Once you've accumulated a few specials, you can choose which ones will appear in the list, though it's also worth assigning a potion or two here to quaff during the tougher scraps.

There are two main issues though. The first is repetition; the gloopy foes known as the Heartless come thick and fast and take a fair few blows before they fall, enough to make the frequency of the battles a chore. Quite a few quests take you through areas you've previously visited, and rather than being able to explore them at your leisure, you'll always have a handful of enemies to worry about. As the game wears on, their near-constant presence elicits more groans and sighs.

The second problem is the camera, which seems to take an active dislike to Sora, pointing at walls, floors, enemies – anything rather than centre on the spiky hero. It can be manoeuvred by squeezing the R button and moving the d-pad, but that leaves Sora open to attack. Use the stylus instead and you can at least guide him out of harm's way as you shift the perspective, but unless you've been blessed with several extra fingers on your right hand, you're not going to be able to attack at the same time.

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The busyness of the HUD exacerbates the camera issue, while the constant cascade of orbs can easily obscure enemies.

Mindful of the slightly monotonous rhythm of the early stages, Square Enix does at least attempt to mix things up as the hours tick by. Hollow Bastion hosts a 2D platformer sequence, which is entertaining in a fairly rudimentary, old-school kind of way. A Sin and Punishment-esque rail shooter interlude is good fun, too. And for the entirety of the Coliseum world, the game decides it's going to be a turn-based JRPG for a bit – and not a bad one at that. It's certainly more enjoyable to defeat the Heartless this way rather than mindlessly jabbing at the A button over and over.

But outside these moments and the admittedly interesting Matrix system, there's precious little invention here, and the anaemic story fails to pick up the slack. While the graphics are decent enough, the presentation is otherwise a little flat, with lengthy conversations presented in a very static and half-hearted way. The game's obviously been buffed up a bit from its mobile phone debut, but it's lacking the polish you'd expect from a Square Enix game.

Camera and pacing issues aside, there are few real flaws, but equally there's very little you'll remember once the credits have rolled on the 15-hour campaign. While Birth By Sleep pointed a potential way forward for the series, Re:coded is a disappointing step back. The unshakeable sense of overfamiliarity won't trouble newcomers, but anyone who witnessed that first glorious collision of the worlds of Disney and Square will surely think that Re:hash is a more appropriate title.

5 / 10

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Comments (19) Latest comment 1 year ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Kami #1 1 year ago

    I'm always in two minds about the Kingdom Hearts series. It's a wonderful, wonderful series full of warmth and intrigue, but I so echo the "Who is it aimed at?" market - I think I asked this question back with Kingdom Hearts 2 and I'm afraid it's not going away.

    Still, being an old hand with the series... I should be okay. I just kinda wish it was easier for others to get into now - because I still think its one of the better franchises of the last decade...
  • Whitster #2 1 year ago

    If this began as a mobile game, I wonder why Squarenix didn't just port it to iPhone given their support for the format?
  • Antaios #3 1 year ago

    I love Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 and quite enjoyed Birth By Sleep on the PSP too, but I really don't have a clue as to what the hell it's all about anymore because of the insanely convoluted storytelling.

    The series can be quite brilliant, but it keeps moving away from the Square + Disney selling point that made the first game so special, with Nomura giving me the feeling that he doesn't even get what made it special in the first place himself.
  • Murbal #4 1 year ago

    Only ever played KH2 and Birth by Sleep (happy to look past the suitably barmy story). Enjoyed the former immensely and the little I've played of the latter certainly leads me to believe it's also considerably better than this. Shame.

  • Steroyd #5 1 year ago

    but I so echo the "Who is it aimed at?" market - I think I asked this question back with Kingdom Hearts 2 and I'm afraid it's not going away.

    Nintendo's games are aimed at everyone i.e 'the family', Disney movies are aimed at everyone, KH would be under that target audience to.
  • StolenGlory #6 1 year ago

  • Slipstream #7 1 year ago

    I noticed from the get go that this was a rehash.

    It seems to be common place for this series that once it's had a high point, it needs to throw out a few lows in between in attempt to maintain the interest.

    A fantastic series for sure, but it would be a shame if someone playing for the first time picked up the DS titles for a first impression.
  • RobotRocker #8 1 year ago

    insanely convoluted storytelling

    Kingdom Hearts is the only game I have ever stopped myself from completing simply because the story just got so shit and was intent on ticking off every Squaresoft and Anime cliché possible.

    Seriously, I got to near the last boss, ejected the disc and traded it in with the quickness.
  • Daryoon #9 1 year ago

    The Kingdom Hearts series is matched only by the FF7 expansions for sheer stupidity of plot development.

    Its tendency for convoluted ass-pulls and fangirl-pleasing subtext sometimes makes me wonder if Russel T Davies is involved o_O
  • FenderMaster #10 1 year ago

    I'm going to get stick for this, but I like KH1, HK2 and KH BbS stories, convoluted and at times nonsensical, yes, but also warm and entertaining.

    The series big problem is forcing important plot developments into portable games... CoM for GBA was crazy important story wise, but forced you to revisit KH1 worlds (and gave a sneak peak at a HK2 world). 358/2 Days... well i don't know what the hell that Xion crap was about, not so important it seems except for Roxas character development. Also forced you to revisity KH2 worlds in scaled back for...

    Birth by Sleep was wonderful, all new worlds, stand alone plot that feeds into and explains some weird HK1 and 2 shit, it's more a prequel than spinoff.

    RE:Coded looks like the worst spinoff yet though, Wikipedia tells me theres an important KH3 tidbit at the ending if you stick it out, but to have to play through the KH1 worlds again? No thank you...
    Edited by FenderMaster at 10/01/11 @ 17:35
  • Pikol #11 1 year ago

    It's a little spin off, but super enjoyable for me. Plot wise its bad and we know all the places, but it's very fun and one of the best looking NDS games. looks far better than 365 days.
    imo 8/10
  • Antaios #12 1 year ago

    Daryoon: Nomura's involved. He's worse than Russel T. Davies. At least Davies is still capable of telling a coherent story with a beginning, a middle and an end (at least, I like to think so even if Moffat's infinitely more talented). Nomura just starts writing without an idea of where the story might be headed and just wing it from there by the looks of it.

    The guy should never be allowed near another Kingdom Hearts or Final Fantasy game if you ask me. Look at the pretentious drivel that has become (and frankly already was) Final Fantasy VII and all related games/films/books/whatever. Same goes for Kingdom Hearts.
  • RobotRocker #13 1 year ago

    Its tendency for convoluted ass-pulls and fangirl-pleasing subtext sometimes makes me wonder if Russel T Davies is involved o_O

    And worse is that there is no John Barrowman to admire while the plot flies over your head.

    Hold on a second, I need to swoon.
  • alcides #14 1 year ago

    Finally that franchise gets a score it truly deserves.
  • Cloud-Strife #15 1 year ago

    I'm sorry but I've gotta say this I'm so sick of all the Squenix bashing that goes on here.

    If you don't like KH or FFVII or whatever the hell you're giving off about, why are you here? Accept that there are people out there that appreciate the warmth that KH offers. It's a game about friendship. If you were truly serious about it you'd understand how different it is.
    There are more opinions out there than yours. I'm 21 and I still love KH and all the FF's yes including 13. I know for a fact that without Squenix RPG's would be alot worse off.
  • Silent-Hal #16 1 year ago

    This is what, the third side-story in a row? It's no wonder this got a less than glowing review. Law of diminishing returns, anyone?
  • Andrefpvs #17 1 year ago

    I can see why this is a sub-par game, but I'll whore myself out for Nomura once again because at this point I can't afford to not follow on every "tidbit" of the story.

    But seriously, HD Kingdom Hearts 3 already.
  • Antaios #18 1 year ago

    "Finally that franchise gets a score it truly deserves."

    The franchise basically has a brilliant premise: blending popular Disney characters and worlds with the Final Fantasy franchise. Wonderfully simple. What they should do is just keep the story simple and do different Disney worlds per game instead of rehashing 75% of them and they'd really have one of the most popular and succesful game franchises out there.

    It's the writing and the stuff like Organisation XIII which no-one including Nomura understands anything about anymore by now that really makes the franchise sub-par. There's nothing wrong with the basic gameplay however.
  • Daryoon #19 1 year ago

    Organisation XIII was a stroke of genius, so far as marketing is concerned: a whole cast of prettyboys for the fanfic writers to slash together, all of them with DEEP AND MYSTERIOUS PASTS that can be spoon-fed across a plethora of side-games regurgitating old levels. Want to make money? Produce a sub-par game and shoehorn in a late-game revelation that'll make sure all the fans HAVE to buy it!