Some Background Info
I'm sure you have seen many reviews on this game already, but most of them are either pure love or pure hate. I hesitate to give a fair review because I have been a huge fan of the series myself. Actually, I would say more than a fan. I struggle to think of more things that matter to me more than this game franchise. To some of you that may seem absolutely ridiculous, but for others I'm sure you understand exactly where I'm coming from. So loving the series as much as I do, I feel the need to address some of the things that broke me out of the immersion and stopped just short of being the game I waited 13 years for. Fair warning, Spoilers ahead.
Issue 1: Pacing
The first major issue with this game is the horrible pacing. Don't get me wrong, it's not the first Kingdom Hearts game to suffer from this issue. However it was never in a main console title. This issue can be slightly overlooked in the handhelds due to it being just that. You don't come in expecting the polish of a triple A game. Unfortunately though, Kingdom Hearts 3 does just the same thing as it's handheld brothers. It's very frustrating to see considering the fact that we KNOW they could have easily done it better.
Allow me to explain myself. The game for some reason does this fantastic thing of dumping all the Disney worlds on you back after back. Half of the time, they offer literally no importance to the main plot of the series, and they reluctantly just feel like game filler. Just something there to give the game more playable time. It's honestly almost like they just said "Screw it, can't have too much important information in the beginning cause then we will have to show meaningful character interaction." Time restraints or not, I would have gladly waited a few more months for a story that didn't feel so oddly placed. This here brings me to my next section.
Issue 2: Character Interaction
For such a big cast, this game for some reason forgets about 70% of it's characters. It's so bad, that most characters never get meaningful interactions, or are just bootlegged into the ending for god knows what reason. It's seriously like, "Here's some important information that may hint on how to save Xion. WHOOPS JUST KIDDING, you don't need to save her, she's already here!" There are no hints to this happening, no meaningful way of it happening, and no forseeable reason for it TO happen. It's just there. Honestly, it hurt me a bit. Sure I was happy to see the gang all reunited, but I wanted a reason. I didn't want to just be fed some fanfiction writing that just made everything perfect because that's how they appease the fans.
I think that explains about 80% of everyone's biggest complaints about this game. We were waiting for so long to see how some of our favorite characters would come back, and how we would save them. When it did happen though, it felt... easy. It's hard to explain, but the worst part was that it felt easy and cramped up together. As I mentioned in pacing, since the game was basically throwing everything into the end that meant they had to save everyone back to back. This left little to no time for tender moments and characters reuniting that we've waited a literal decade for. We were kind of rushed through all these different emotions that could have been fleshed out just to get to the games ending. Speaking of ending, that reminds me of my final part of this reflection.
Difficulty
For some reason as I'm sure you have heard many times before, this game is ridiculously easy. The most frustrating part is that we know that originally there was plans for a critical mode to be implemented. This is proven true by data miners who found the selection option in the games files. For some reason they thought it would be a good idea to take that core function of difficulty out of the game. I really can't tell you what they were thinking about when they made that choice. As of right now the community is just hoping for a patch that will enable the critical mode and give us a fair shot at something difficult. Kingdom hearts 2 has a famously difficult critical mode, so we know that it could have been amazing.
It's really just a big disappointment that playing on proud mode feels like normal difficulty. Not to mention combat already gives you huge life saving abilities in the form of attraction flow making the game even less challenging. You'd think that after seeing all their fans play and enjoy their games, Square Enix would know what should be integral to their core experience. All this said though, I have a confession to make in my conclusion.
Conclusion
As many issues that this game has and as much as I could rag on it forever for having the dumbest small mistakes in game play and story decisions, I truly loved this game. Maybe this is just the inner child talking in me, but this game is amazing. I mean that with all my heart and soul. It wasn't perfect by far, but it did manage to recreate the magical feeling of when you first get the keyblade, all the way until dream drop distance and seeing Riku pass the mark of mastery exam. No matter what anyone says, this is a Kingdom Hearts game at it's core. If you liked the franchise before hand, you'll like this game. It did some questionable things in between and left some things ambiguous, but the ending was wrapped up in a neat bow and is something I wouldn't change.
My adventures with Sora are something I'll never forget. He's my childhood Hero and role model. He'll always be my Hero, and the ending proved to me just how right i am in that statement. If there is one thing this game got right, it's Sora and his personality. The very thing that got me to love the franchise in the first place was him, and it ended with him doing exactly what i thought he would do. Saving his friends no matter the cost. So thank you to all those at Square Enix, and thank you Nomura. You've allowed me to complete a chapter of my childhood, and I'm extremely grateful.
-Primelink