00:00This video is on Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories for the Game Boy Advance
00:04and I believe I made a terrible mistake in starting the Kingdom Hearts franchise with this Game Boy Advance iteration.
00:11Perhaps if I had at least played Kingdom Hearts or Kingdom Hearts 2 on the Playstation 2
00:15then at least I would have been overjoyed by the charm of seeing familiar characters in familiar settings.
00:21I recognized all the Disney characters right away
00:23but this being a Game Boy Advance title
00:25I was instantly disappointed with having to read through text dialogue instead of being greeted by voices in those Disney
00:31films I loved so much as a kid.
00:33The charm wasn't all gone since the art style reminded me of why I loved those Disney movies so much
00:39and it was just cool seeing all these characters again, characters like Peter Pan, Aladdin, Pinocchio and the like.
00:46The scenarios involving these characters are rather trite and boring especially compared to the works they were based off of
00:52but at least the main story tying them together is at least really intriguing.
00:57I was and still am a bit lost though.
01:00Having never played any other Kingdom Hearts games, I really had no idea what was actually going on most of
01:05the time.
01:06All I knew was that these two characters named Sora and Riku were stuck in this gigantic castle with 13
01:11floors.
01:12In every floor they climbed up they lost more and more of their true memories and remembering more and more
01:17of the memories they believed were the most important.
01:19A group of people wearing black hoods called the organization or something like that who can teleport involved
01:25and they can use this old blonde girl with the sketch pen to test Sora's memories and strength.
01:30Most of the dialogues that happen are laughably bad but there are certain lines in there that are pretty damn
01:35cool.
01:36Especially the one referring to the title of the game, Chain of Memories.
01:39Nothing is ever explained about what happened before they entered this castle of a lobelian and the character relationships are
01:45just as mysterious.
01:46The story for the most part just feels like a filler material for fans of the franchise but doesn't really
01:51grab a newcomer like me
01:52and I'm pretty sure it also doesn't reveal any necessary truths or discoveries to those into the series.
01:58In a word, the story of this game is interesting but it doesn't really take off beyond that.
02:04The card based gameplay is where I'm really disappointed.
02:07The whole premise of the game is to explore a maze of rooms and these rooms can be unlocked by
02:11key cards meeting certain conditions.
02:13For example, some doors will not open unless the number of the key card is 6 or higher.
02:18Some doors will only open when the number is exactly 6.
02:21Beyond this mechanic, also important to note is that all key cards have different effects.
02:26There's a card that fills the room with the enemies, a card that makes the room contain a treasure chest,
02:31etc.
02:32The goal then is to go through these rooms to get to those doors that trigger a cutscene and further
02:37the story.
02:38There are 3 of these doors in each scenario and this basic formula makes the whole game.
02:44What's unexpectedly expected are the boss fights that occur between each floor of the castle.
02:48And what I mean by this is that after completing a floor, you expect the boss to be there, but
02:54you really don't know what can the boss expect and how difficult the boss will be.
02:59Now other than the 100 acres scenario, all the other floors of the game follow this exact formula.
03:07The problem however isn't this formula, but the repetition that occurs during combat, which is based on a deck of
03:13cards and attack and magic cards.
03:16Everyone has cards, and all cards have single digit numbers.
03:20Whoever has higher numbers can continue using their cards.
03:23When the enemy uses magic card that's number 6, but then the player uses an attack card that's number 8,
03:28then the player overrides the enemy's move and is able to attack.
03:32The only exception is a card with the number 0, which can override any other card, but at the same
03:37time can be overridden by any other card as well.
03:40This complicated card game is hard to notice however, because you will be too busy tapping the A button to
03:45use whatever card you have currently selected.
03:47The shoulder buttons are used to browse through the cards either to the right or to the left, but with
03:52everything occurring in real time, the most frequent action will be to continually mash the A button,
03:57while double tapping the D pad in the right or in the left direction to dodge enemy attacks.
04:01When all the cards are used up, the cards must be refreshed either by holding the A button or by
04:06using a support card that refreshes.
04:09Magic cards can be used by pressing a select and desact as support, such as being able to override any
04:14of the enemy's attack,
04:15coming back to life after losing all the HP, halving magic damage of enemies, and stuff like that.
04:21But not much strategy is used beyond that.
04:25There is the feature to use slates, where you can stack up 3 cards and use them all at once
04:29to trigger a special move,
04:31but with this move removing a card from the deck during the battle, it's also rarely used except in boss
04:36fights.
04:37The battles in this game can be very, very tiresome and repetitive, which is made worse by the repetitive exploration,
04:43since it strictly follows the formula I have mentioned before.
04:47Some boss fights are extremely hard, and so grinding is a must, which makes the repetition all the more hard
04:53to bear.
04:54Some bosses reappear several times, most frequent of which is Riku, who must be beaten a total of 4 times,
05:01with this fourth appearance definitely being the hardest boss fight in the game.
05:05Adding the fact that card management in the menu screen is cumbersome and restrictive,
05:08and what we have is a tiresome game that rise in the famous brand name of Kingdom Hearts.
05:13Sure, the graphics are awesome.
05:15The truth, the story and the characters are interesting somewhat, especially since many of them are fan-favorite Disney characters.
05:19And sure, there is a good amount of content within the cartridge with two separate campaigns featuring Sora and Riku
05:26as playable characters,
05:28but they're small treats to be earned through tedious and repetitive card-based gameplay.
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