Kingdom Hearts

Kingdom Hearts is a collaboration between Square-Enix and Disney. It is an action RPG that includes appearances of characters from the Final Fantasy series and Disney movies, as well as some characters original to the game. It was created in 2002 and became a smash hit. It was followed up by a sequel released in 2005, Kingdom Hearts II. Also in the series is a "bridge" game between the two, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, released in 2004.

Gameplay
Despite the fact that the game features Disney and Final Fantasy characters, the gameplay more closely resembles that of the Seiken Densetsu ("Mana") series.

The worlds in the game are designed in a very platform-styled manner. Sora can interact with people and places, and use Magic and Items as is customary in most Square games. Sora's ability to jump can be upgraded with new abilities, as well as the option to Glide through the air. There are save points, and even Tents.

Battles start at once when enemies appear on screen, and during battle, Sora cannot open the main menu. Sora can use his variety of spells, as well as his Keyblade to defeat enemies. The party members are AI-controlled, and can follow AI behavior customized by the player. The party members, in some worlds, can also be switched out with that world's exclusive party member.

Sora can buy or obtain Equipment from stores and chests, which all party members can equip. They can boost the three statuses: Strength, Defense and Magic, and also Ability Points (AP), as well as reduce damage from the four elements Fire, Ice, Thunder and Shadow.

By leveling up, Sora learns Abilities, such as Combo Plus, Ragnarok or Scan, which all costs a number of Ability Points, which are also gained through leveling up, or using AP Up items. There are also a number of abilities Sora can learn by completing sidequests.

Gummi Ship
To travel from world to world, Sora must fly the Gummi Ship (No relation to the Disney cartoon Gummy Bears). It functions as a small mini-game, similar to arcade games like Asteroids: Avoiding objects, defeating enemy ships and obtaining power-ups. The Gummi Ships can be customized with Gummi Blocks.

Plot
A 14 year old boy, Sora, and his friends, Riku and Kairi, build a raft on their home island of Destiny Islands, because of the desire to see what is beyond their islands, to see other worlds.

However, on the night before setting out, Heartless, beings without hearts, appear on the island, and begin to attack. A mysterious door appears at the entrance to the "Secret Place" of the island. Sora investigates this door, and travels through to the Secret Place and finds Kairi. A second door within the Secret Place itself then opens, and in the ensuing chaos, Sora appears to absorb Kairi before being forcefully thrown out of the secret place.

Back outside, Sora finds Riku, who states that, while watching the destruction of islands, he is not afraid of the darkness, and chooses to use the darkness to save himself and to see other worlds. Sora, however, refuses to join Riku to use the darkness, and is separated from him. Because of Riku's choice to give into the darkness, Riku, who was meant to be the original wielder of the Keyblade (a mysterious weapon with ability to open and seal various locks) lost the right to wield the Keyblade to Sora, and it was at this point that Sora obtained the keyblade. After facing his own shadow, Darkside, Sora escapes the island (although it is not fully clear how he did so), and the Destiny Islands are destroyed and absorbed into the darkness.

Sora wakes up in Traverse Town, where he meets Squall Leonhart (who is known as Leon within the game) and other Final Fantasy characters, and it is explained to him that the Keyblade has the power to "lock" worlds, therefore preventing the darkness from destroying the worlds. It is also explained to him that the Keyblade attracts the Heartless, for the Heartless fear it, and wish to turn the wielder into a Heartless itself.

At the same time, Donald and Goofy, who have been instructed by the King of their world, Mickey Mouse, by letter, to find the Keyblade wielder and to help him lock all remaining worlds and defeat the evil behind it all, are also listening to this explanation, albeit from different people, and in a room next door to one another. However, before they meet each other, Heartless start to appear in the area, and Leon instructs Sora to find the leader of the Heartless in Traverse Town. Sora travels to the Third District. At the same time, Donald and Goofy are in the Third District, on a balcony above, and from an attack be the Heartless, fall off the balcony, and land on Sora. They defeat the leader, the Guard Armor, and then decide to join up and travel to different worlds, which is profitable to all, as Sora could find Riku and Kairi in the different worlds, and Donald and Goofy may find their King in different worlds.

It is then seen that Maleficent and a group of other Disney villains are plotting to "take care" of Sora. It is also seen that Riku has been taken in by Maleficent, in order to manipulate him to get him to carry out her bidding.

Sora travels to various worlds in order to seal them, and encounters Riku in Monstro, only to find he is chasing hearts, and has turned to the darkness. He later encounters Riku again in Neverland, on Captain Hook's ship, only to find Kairi with him, without her heart.

Sora then travels to Hollow Bastion, chasing Riku and Kairi, and encounters Riku again in the middle of the Rising Falls. Riku manages to become the wielder of the Keyblade because his heart is stronger at that point. Donald and Goofy, following the orders given to them by their King, leave Sora and follow the "key". Sora carries on into the castle regardless, and encounters Riku again in foyer of the Castle. Sora regains the Keyblade as Riku returns to the use of darkness.

Sora later learns that Maleficent is planning on opening the lock to the Dark Realm, and requires the seven Princesses of Heart to do so. However, he learns that Kairi is in fact, one of the princesses, but without her heart, she cannot help with opening the door. Sora also learns he cannot seal the incomplete door, so in order to seal it, Kairi must regain her heart.

On the way to this door, Sora fights and defeats Maleficent. Upon her defeat, Riku is encountered, and it becomes apparent that Ansem, the original researcher of the heart and the Heartless, has possessed him. Riku also is wielding a different, dark, keyblade, one with the power to unlock and allow darkness into the hearts of others. He uses this keyblade on Maleficent, and makes her more powerful. However, this time, Sora defeats her, and she disappears.

Outside the door to the Dark Realm, Sora again finds Riku/Ansem, and is told that Kairi's heart is, in fact, within Sora. After defeating Ansem, Sora picks up the dark Keyblade, and releases Kairi's heart, as well as releasing his own, and turning him into a Heartless. Kairi is restored, and the door to the Dark Realm is opened.

Kairi, Donald and Goofy return to the foyer of the castle, when Sora, in his heartless form, appears. Kairi realizes who it is, and manages to restore him. They leave Hollow Bastion due to the growing danger, and return to Traverse Town.

However, Sora, Donald and Goofy return to Hollow Bastion in order to seal the Dark Realm. They do so, and then travel onto the "End of the World", where all worlds that have been swallowed by the darkness are connected. It also aspires that the worlds within the game are also connected to this world at the "World Terminus", and limited areas of each worlds are accessible from here. At the end of this world, after passing through the door at the "Final Rest", Sora and co. find themselves at the Destiny Islands, and also find Ansem. After defeating Ansem and his guardian twice, once as a group and once as Sora alone, Sora must defeat his shadow again, (the one he encountered on the Destiny Islands as they were being destroyed, albeit stronger). Afterwards, Sora and co. enter the realm around Kingdom Hearts, and defeat the large heartless that has absorbed Ansem. This is the final boss of the game.

Ending
Ansem then proclaims that Kingdom Hearts is darkness, and calls on Kingdom Hearts to fill him with darkness. But Sora states, "I know, without a doubt, Kingdom Hearts, is light!". The door to Kingdom Hearts opens, and emits light, engulfing and destroying Ansem.

However, Kingdom Hearts is swarming with Heartless. Sora, Donald and Goofy try to close the door, but the door is too heavy to close. King Mickey and Riku appear on the other side of the door (i.e. from within Kingdom Hearts) and help to close the door, however, this means Riku and Mickey trap themselves within. Sora and Mickey seal the door with their respective keyblades.

All worlds swallowed by the darkness return to their original, separate, states. Kairi returns to the Destiny Islands, and Sora remains with Donald and Goofy. Before Kairi disappears out of sight, however, Sora promises her that he will return.

The ending ends with Sora, Donald and Goofy walking through a plain, discussing how to find Mickey and Riku. Pluto is spotted, and he has a letter with the King's seal. The contents of the letter are unknown to the player, as the game comes to a close.

Main
Main characters are, in this case, defined as characters with the largest effect on the storyline, who have a direct relation to Sora.

Sora (Protagonist; playable character) A 14 year old boy who dreams of seeing other worlds. He gets his wish after the heartless destroy his home. He travels to various Disney worlds with Donald and Goofy in search of his two friends, Riku and Kairi. He wields the Keyblade, a weapon capable of harming the heartless and sealing worlds. His name means "sky" in Japanese.

Donald (AI-controlled character) A magician who is a friend of Sora's. He is searching for King Mickey by traveling to various worlds with the gummi ship. A very powerful partner magic wise.

Goofy (AI-controlled character) A good friend of Sora's. He is also searching for King Mickey. A very powerful comrade defense wise, but not very high attack. Has useful support abilities, such as MP gift.

Riku (Original Keyblade-wielder) Riku is the friend of Sora and Kairi and lives with them on Destiny Islands. Initially he is stronger than Sora (story-wise), and because of this, was meant to be the original wielder of the Keyblade. However, he gave in to the darkness in his heart, but managed to transfer a bit of light to Sora, effectively making him the new wielder of the Keyblade. His name means "land" or "shore" in Japanese.

Kairi (Girl of mysterious origins) Not much is known about Kairi, like where she's from or how she even got to Destiny Islands (this answer is only hinted in a report by Ansem in KH: Final Mix). It is revealed that she comes from Hollow Bastion. Riku and Sora do not seem to care though, as they both enjoy her company and friendship. Her name is based on the Japanese word for "ocean" ("kai").

Temporary
Temporary characters are world specified, and as such, will only be present in the world they come from. They are characters that Sora meets and befriends during his search for Riku and Kairi. Each character can become a party member, by switching him/her with Goofy or Donald.

Tarzan (from "Tarzan") Tarzan is only available in the Deep Jungle world. He fights using brute "jungle-strength" and his stone-tipped spear. His passive abilities boost his attack power and chance of landing a critical hit.

Aladdin (from "Aladdin") Aladdin is only available in the Agrabah world. He fights using "street-smart acrobatics" and a saber. His passive abilities boost drops by enemies (HP/MP balls as well as rare items) and also boosts the summon gauge.

Ariel (from "The Little Mermaid") Ariel is only available in the Atlantica world. She fights using potions with certain effects and swimming skills. Her passive abilities boost her MP recovery as well as raise rare item drops.

Jack Skellington (from "The Nightmare Before Christmas") Jack is only available in the Halloween Town world. He fights using magic and scare tactics. His passive abilities are the same as Aladdin's.

Peter Pan (from "Peter Pan") Peter is only available in the Neverland world. He fights using flight and a wooden dagger. His passive abilities are a scattered version of the above four's. He has the critical hit boost of Tarzan, the drop increases of Jack and Aladdin and one of Ariel's MP recovery abilities.

Beast (from "Beauty and the Beast") Beast is only available in the Hollow Bastion world. He fights using animal senses, claws and brute strength. His passive abilities are the same as Tarzan's, yet he has one of Ariel's MP recovery abilities, but it's boosted even higher than hers, because he has two of the same MP recovery ability.

Final Fantasy Cameo Appearances

 * Tidus
 * Wakka
 * Selphie
 * Squall (he calls himself "Leon" in the game, taken from his last name, which he chose because he was angry with himself for not being able to save his world)
 * Yuffie
 * Aeris (known as Aerith)
 * Cloud
 * Cid
 * Sephiroth
 * Moogle

Summons
Throughout his travels, Sora finds summon gems, which he can bring to the Fairy Godmother, and be granted a summon from the gem. In reality, the gem is the heart of the summon, created when the heart of a world is devoured by the Heartless, but with the heart of one of the residents being to strong to die. Summons take the place of the to AI members of the player's party, and as such, both AI must be conscious before the player can use a summon.

Simba (from "The Lion King") Simba's gem is the first one acquired in the game, and once shown to the Fairy Godmother, she will explain about summons. Simba's attack is a charged attack. Once the charge-button is released, Simba will roar and nearby enemies will take damage. The longer the roar is charged, the higher the damage.

Tinkerbell (from "Peter Pan") Tinkerbell is acquired after completing the Neverland world. Peter [ Pan] tells her to help out the party, after defeating Captain Hook. Tinkerbell will heal Sora at timed intervals and if Sora is defeated while her summon is active, she will revive him once and then disappear. To draw parallels to the FF games, she functions like Regen and Auto-Life.

Genie (from "Aladdin") Genie is acquired by defeating Jafar and completing the Agrabah world. Like in the movie, Aladdin uses his final wish to wish for Genie's freedom, making Genie free to help Sora. Genie uses random magic attacks on locked on targets as his attack. The spell attack power is usually higher than Sora's and Donald's.

Bambi (from "Bambi") Bambi is a good summon to use, when facing enemies strong against physical attacks, but weak against magic, or if simply fighting Heartless attacking in large groups. Bambi will jump around the stage (while still staying near Sora), sprouting large amounts of MP balls each time he lands, making him an ideal helper for when excessively using magic attacks. From a strategic point of view, this is better than using Genie, as you have no control of what spells Genie will use, which at times can backfire.

Dumbo (from "Dumbo") Dumbo is yet another summon ideal for dispatching several Heartless at once. When Dumbo is summoned, Sora shrinks in size and latches on to Dumbo's hat. Dumbo attacks by dousing the enemies with water from his trunk and the hit has a wide-area effect. While riding Dumbo, Sora is invulnerable.

<font size=+1>Mushu (from "Mulan") Mushu is a fire-breathing dragon that is ideal for dispatching single enemies quickly or significantly lowering a boss' HP. This is because of his ability to rapidly shoot small fireballs at targeted enemies. However, this ability takes the place of regular attacks, and is a just a little weaker, but it can be used at long distances, meaning less risk of taking damage.

Villains
Most of the villains in Kingdom Hearts are take from the various Disney films that are featured in the game. The most notable Disney villain in the game, however, is Maleficent (from Sleeping Beauty), and appears at first, to be the main villain of the game. However, it aspires that an original character, Ansem, is the main antagonist of the game. Both of these characters are major bosses within the game. Ansem is in fact the final boss.

Other Disney characters that appear as villains in the game include Hades (from Hercules), Clayton (from Tarzan) and Jafar (from Aladdin).

For a complete list of villains in Kingdom Hearts, see Villains in Kingdom Hearts. For Strategies on how to defeat them, see Villains in Kingdom Hearts/Strategies

Heartless
The Heartless are living beings, whose hearts were corrupted by darkness, and they play the roles of the "common enemies" Sora and party must defeat. They exist for no other purpose than to consume hearts, be it the hearts of other living beings or even that of entire worlds. If someone loses their heart to a heartless, they themselves become one.

In general, there are two types of heartless, commonly referred to as Pureblood Heartless, who are created "naturally", and Emblem Heartless, who are artificially created. The Emblem Heartless received their name because upon creation, they were all branded with an emblem, in order to distinguish them from the Purebloods.

Worlds
Sora, Donald and Goofy are able to travel to several worlds through the use of a Gummiship. Each world has a different theme, many which are based on Disney animations, but also a couple of original worlds. The purpose of traveling to these worlds is to lock their hearts, so they cannot be consumed by the Heartless, thus destroying them. However, even though this is the goal of the travels, it is not that which actually drives Sora, Donald and Goofy. Sora only agreed because he wanted to find his friends, Riku and Kairi, while Donald and Goofy are in search of King Mickey.

Final Mix
Kingdom Hearts: Final Mix is a Japanese re-release, which was made in response to the US/EU versions of Kingdom Hearts, which had several extra features that the original Kingdom Hearts from Japan didn't have. The Kingdom Hearts development Team then decided to make the same features in Final Mix, as well as several other things to tie up any lose ends of the story nicely, hence the title "Final Mix".

New Features
New Bosses Ice Titan, Kurt Zisa and Sephiroth, all of whom were in the US/EU versions, were added to Final Mix along with the Enigmatic Man, one of the hooded members of Organization XIII, (the antagonists in Chain of Memories and Kingdom Hearts II), who can be fought at Hollow Bastion. The closest the US/EU versions got to this, was seeing the hooded members in the secret ending movie "Another Side, Another Story".

Enemy Changes The stats of all the enemies have been changed, making the harder to beat, as well as giving them a new colour scheme.

New Heartless Six completely new heartless had been made, including the heartless seen in the secret ending movie "Another Side, Another Story" called NEO-Shadow, who are the only Heartless in the game that seem like to be having actual teamwork while fighting.

Additional Secret Ending To the original secret ending, new scenes had been added as well as an addition to the title, now called "''Another Side, Another Story [ Deep Dive]".

New Cutscenes Slightly more focus was put on Riku, as he was "left out" for the greater first half of the game, so there has been made 3 new cutscenes focused on him. A new cutscene was also added of Cloud and Sephiroth fighting, which can be seen if the player defeats Sephiroth.

More Dialogue More dialogue has been added to explain some of the things that might have left the player in the dark by the original story. For example, Aeris explains that Cloud has returned to look for, not Aeris, but Sephiroth (which he continues to do in KHII).

New Weapons Two new keyblades were introduced, both given Final Fantasy inspired names. The first is acquired by defeating Sephiroth and is fittingly called One-Winged Angel, which is the name of Sephiroth's theme. The second is obtained by defeating the Ice Titan and is named Diamond Dust after Shiva's attack when summoned.

Two new staves for Donald were introduced - the Meteo Strike (possibly referring to Meteor Strike) which was found in a treasure chest, and the Fantasia, which is obtainable by synthesizing. Goofy gets two new shields as well, called the Massive Bumper (found in a chest), and the Seven Elements (which can be synthesized).

Gummi Ship Missions Actual missions were added to the Gummi Shop mini-game, which must be played whenever the player wishes to travel to a neighboring world, without using Warp. This gave more of a point to the mini-game, as well as making it more enjoyable. A more advanced version of these mission made its appearance in the US and EU in KHII.

Extra Ansem Reports Three additional Ansem Reports where added to the game. One of these reports gives a bit perspective to who Kairi is and how she came to the island, the two others make clear references to the two sequels of Kingdom Hearts, but it's doubtful that anyone would realize this, without actually having played at least KHII.

New Abilities Sora has gained 10 new abilities to add to his already impressive arsenal of abilities. One of them has a FF inspired name, Zantetsuken, which is the summon attack of Odin.