#And Sora and Rikus relationship is amazing and I miss them already

[kingdomhearts-and-soriku-trash]

GOD I love Soriku and I’m just here gonna post my feelings on it again and just spill my soul out about:

I’ve never really seen a gay (I see Sora as bi) ship before. I mean as in I’ve never shipped it like that before. It’s not like I was homophobic I just never really saw it in games that I’ve played. Hell, I never really saw how it has to be canon until I was like “Soriku exists. I wonder what posts are there?” And I stumbled upon theories and artists (who are so good) and I was like “CRAP ITS CANON”. Like I always saw Kairi and Sora but I never really saw it. Like I was just “yeah I can see it happening” and that’s it. Just left it at that but when I looked closer I was like “oh GOD. Sora loves Riku and Riku loves sORA AND THATS THAT” dkwndnd. And I couldn’t see Sora and Kairi anymore. It wasn’t necessarily weird just surprising about how I never noticed it or thought about it before.

And it’s my first blog dedicated to just 2 sunshine boys who deserve to kiss and hug and breakdown and JUST BE TOGETHER. And I can see sokai I really can, but I can’t at the same time. I feel like the ending in KH will be like an ending where it’s left to our imagination. It won’t be Soriku or Sokai. It’d just be up to us to imagine it. But there’s a part inside of me that believes Soriku is canon not just bc I love Soriku bht also because, well...the game is about Sora and Riku. They’re the main characters. It’s about their relationship the WHOLE TIME and we see them develop a lot.

Kairi and everyone else are kind side characters (but are important don’t get me wrong. But that’s how I see it. They’re side characters). And we just see Sora and Riku being together in the beginning (Sora and Riku looking at the stars as children, them sitting on the dock laughing together as kids, them racing, and them just being best friends) but then they go through conflict (like many teens can with friendships. It’s just a natural thing) and then we see them grow and develop. And its so good. But theres still development that has to go. Sora has to start believing in himself and not just his friends and Riku has got to learn how to rely on others. I can’t remember much always about the story (bc I’m forgetful) but Ik he still kinda depends on himself most of all.

It’s just AAAAAH. The game is about Sora and Rikus relationship and there isn’t an argument on that bc it was stated by the game creator himself so I’m not saying that just because I love Soriku. But it’s juST GOOD. IT HAS SO MUCH DEVELOPMENT AND SORIKU IS CANON IN MY HEART. There are other times when we see a Riku and Sora just literally being connected bitches:

I remember at one point in the game, apparently Sora is dying. The Young Xehanort (forgive me if I’m saying this wrong) Is saying “goodnight Sora” or something. His voice (Soras voice) was high bC he was still very young in the game (maybe around kh2??? Idk) and I just remember darkness surrounding him and basically submerging him. And the last word he said in the whole thing was “Riku.” So this motherfucker is basicallt DYING and hES like “BUT WHAT ABOUT RIKU??” If that’s not love and them just being connected then idk what it.

Also, when Riku is in need in KH 3 and was fighting the demon tower, he is needing help bht Mickey isn’t there. He’s sorta trapped I guess? But he calls out “Sora” aND GUESS WHAT? THE MOTHER FUCKER JUST APPEARS LIKE “You called?” AND I STILL CANT GET OVER THAT OKAY FKWNND. AND THEY USE THE Gayblade™️ TO KILL THE DEMON TIDE AND IM JUST IN LOVE ALRIGHT.

In the remind apparently there is a scene where Riku is touched by Soras light, but Riku hasn’t opened his eyes. He just knows it’s Sora because he knows what Soras light and love feels like.

When Sora basically died in KH 3 because of the demon tide, the first name he called out was “Riku!” I feel like if Kairi was his most important person, then he would’ve called out her name, but he didn’t. Plus, if Kairi was his light that saved him, why was she in the tunnel of light? You can’t be the light at the end of the tunnel and be in the tunnel itself. It’s as if she had a copy of herself (not Namine) at the end but it wouldn’t make sense?? So it couldn’t have been Kairi. Yes Kairi brought him back, but she wasn’t the most important one at the same time. It was Riku uGHHHH.

I can’t think of any others right now but yes I’m still here and love Soriku with my SOUL and beg of Nomura to give us more Soriku and just admit it’s canon plEASE. I may have said things wrong and if I did I’m sorry!

[forestwhisper3]

Welcome back to the SI/OC series, where I introduce my various brainchildren. This time around, though, we’re gonna do something a little different. Apart from giving you a couple of pics, I’ll also give you snippets that I’ve written out. This is mostly because I have nothing near resembling an actual fic and have literally just written segments.

It’s kinda long, so click the expand to read on.

So...this SI/OC is one that I’ve had in my head for a while. I mentioned her in one of Klonoadreams’s streams and figured I should probably mention her in this SI/OC series too. She is one of two for the Kingdom Hearts fandom, and when the mood strikes, I try to flesh out her story a little more. Maybe one day I’ll have something publishable. For now, here’s Ignis, a fellow student of Master Eraqus, along with Terra, Aqua, and Ventus:

This is her before everything goes to pot, however. The thing with this SI is that, despite her knowledge of the games, and despite all of her efforts to prevent the events of Birth by Sleep, she still fails. Master Xehanort is not a man easily defeated, after all. So, it is a weary, heartbroken Ignis that finds herself on Destiny Islands after she loses everything yet again...

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'This is...'

I smiled, knowing it was a bit wry in nature. After all, whenever I'd given the thought to being here, I'd never quite pictured it...like this.

"Whoa, you were right! There is another weird person here today!"

I found myself laughing at the comment without meaning to, the reaction startling me and filling me with sorrow all at once. It had felt like ages since I'd laughed so freely...

"Hey...are you okay?"

I looked at the two boys before me, ready to assure them that everything was fine but...the words just didn't want to come out.

"You're crying..."

Fingers touched my cheeks, only to come away wet. How did I not realize...?

I gave a start when I suddenly felt small arms wrap around me, the warmth of the action seeping into the chill that had seemed to settle in me these past days.

"Don't cry," Sora pleaded, his own eyes staring earnestly into my own. "Is there anything I can do to make you feel better?"

If my next laugh was mixed with a sob, I didn't think any of us would tell.

"You already have," I told him once I'd calmed down, making sure my smile was gentle.

"Really?"

"Yes. I think a hug was just what I needed. Thank you."

"Oh! I'm glad! I don't like seeing people sad."

I smiled, the warmth continuing to spread as I studied him. I'd thought...it would be strange to see them as children while not being the same age, but...this felt right.

Suddenly, I knew what I had to do.

"My name is Ignis," I began softly, "and I come from somewhere far from these shores."

"I knew it," Riku piped up. "You're from the outside world! Just like-...uhh..."

I chuckled a bit at his attempts to back up, clearly not wanting to break his promise.

"Going by your comment earlier, I'll have to assume you've met Terra or Aqua?"

"Yeah! Miss Aqua was nice!"

"Terra was too," Riku added.

"And he left you with something special," I finished.

"Err...yeah."

"What?! He gave you a present!? No fair!"

"Hey now, don't get upset. What's your name?"

"Sora!"

"Sora..." I put my hand out, smiling at his gasp when my Keyblade appeared. "Terra entrusted your friend with something very special because he must have seen something in him...just like I see it in you."

It wasn't just because I knew what was to come. Riku's light was...amazing- there was no doubt about that. But Sora-...Sora gave off his own light too. A light so warm, and loving, and kind that it chased away the darkness and made me feel safe. I know the games had always made Sora's light out to be something special, but...Being able to feel it, and knowing that both Aqua and Terra had passed him up for one reason or another made me want to cry all over again at the injustice of it all.

Sora would not be the backup plan. Not if I had anything to say about it.

"In your hand, take this key..."

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"Master!/Master Ignis!"

I groaned, turning over in my cot and doing my best to block out their yells and subsequent pounding at my door.

"Master!"

I yelped when a large weight practically threw itself upon me, sighing at the sound of Sora's giggles and Riku's snickers. Still, it wasn't quite enough to stop the smile that tugged on the edge of my lips.

"Alright, alright, I'm up. What are you two doing here so early anyway?"

Sora propped his chin up on his hands from his position on top of me and grinned. "It's not early. You just slept in!"

"Yeah...I thought adults were supposed to be responsible and stuff."

Riku laughed when I threw a pillow in his direction.

"You're lucky I like you," I said without any real heat.

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"This form was a particular favorite of Master Eraqus," I began, smiling slightly when I saw how much Sora and Riku were struggling to remain in position. "Not so much one of ours."

"I-...I can't feel my legs!"

"Don't tell me you-...you can't handle it, Sora!"

"Your legs are shaking too!"

I felt a laugh bubble up. God, those two really were like-

A sharp pang shot through me, and despite my best efforts, it left me feeling desolate all over again.

'I'll see them again. I know I will...but...twelve years is a long time.'

And I would be the only one to actually age.

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"Kairi, I understand that you don't like fighting like Sora and Riku do. Really. But...Keyblades don't just go to anyone- you have to be chosen. The fact that you have one...will you at least learn the basics? You don't have to use them, but you'll know them. Just in case."

She mulled it over for a while, before nodding.

"Thank you," I sighed out with a relieved smile.

"It...means a lot to you...doesn't it."

Despite my efforts to the contrary, the question made me freeze. By this point, the boys had given up any pretenses of being busy and were watching in unabashed curiosity. With a welling sadness that hadn't really dulled these past years and an ache in my heart, I nodded.

"It does," I confirmed quietly. "But more than that, I just want you three to be safe. To know how to take care of yourselves if-...Anyway, this is the best I can do."

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"Master Ignis, when-...when is Master Terra coming back?"

The question, sudden and unexpected as it was (though I really should have seen it coming), hit hard. All of a sudden, it felt like there was a vice-like grip around my heart, and I flinched so violently that there was no way I could have hidden the reaction.

And Riku- who was so clever and so observant that I was constantly reminded of Aqua -didn't fail to catch on.

"...He's not coming back. And...Master Aqua isn't either."

There was a deep hurt in his eyes, and hints of betrayal. All three of them were aware of how the relationship between Masters and students worked by now, which meant that they knew that despite the fact I was teaching all of them, only Sora was my true apprentice. The rightful heir of my teachings, so to speak.

"Oh, Riku," I breathed out, feeling that all too familiar twist of my heart, though this time, it was accompanied by the sharp sting of tears. "They-...They can't."

Riku blinked, the hurt look being replaced by a questioning one. A few feet back, Sora and Kairi watched on, too hesitant to get closer, but not enough to leave their friend completely.

I sighed, and if there was a breath of a sob mixed in, well, no one would know but me.

"Come on...I think it's time I told you."

They were young yet, but if I didn't tell them now, I didn't think I'd ever work up the strength to do it.

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"...When I finally managed to get back to Radiant Garden, there was no sign of Terra or Aqua- the only hint of their fate being the lingering chill in that courtyard. I-...I can only assume they were dragged into the Realm of Darkness. I spent the next few months searching for a way to get to them, as well as keeping an eye out for Ventus, but..."

"...You didn't find either," Riku finished sadly.

"No. Eventually, I found myself here, on these islands. When I saw you, I-...I knew that I couldn't leave. It would have been the height of negligence and cruelty to move on- to leave you ignorant of the legacy you bear. I knew Terra well enough to say that he had every intention of coming back for you, but since he can't, I will do my best to train you in his stead."

He was silent for a while, mulling it over. Finally, he nodded.

"Thank you for telling me, Master Ignis."

"What about Kairi?" Sora asked, his head tilted. "If Mister Terra chose Riku, and you chose me, who chose Kairi?"

"That would be Aqua," I told them. "Just like I could feel Terra's claim on Riku, I can feel Aqua's on Kairi."

"...I don't remember," Kairi said.

"Perhaps it's one of the things you've forgotten," I told her gently, even though I knew that even if she had remembered her meeting with Aqua, she still wouldn't have known when she was given the power. "But even if the mind forgets, the heart remembers."

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The stars were disappearing.

I looked up at the night sky, unease settling in my stomach as I watched another one blink out of existence. It was the third one this week, and while I now knew that some stars actually were just stars in this universe, I also knew that those weren't what was going out.

Xehanort was on the move again.

I'd been wondering about it for a while- mostly since the finer details of the games had slipped from my memory as the years passed -whether or not his plan had some sort of deadline he needed to meet. It seemed I'd gotten my answer. The question now, however, was how were things going to play out.

I was under no delusions that I hadn't derailed things. I had not only trained Sora, Riku, and Kairi, but I had actively done my best to keep them hidden. My unease mostly stemmed from worry over whether it had been enough. If it hadn't, then odds were that Xehanort was going to be paying a visit to the islands soon.

Just the thought of it made my blood run cold.

Ten years, and it still didn't feel like I'd had enough time. I had known what was going to happen, and I hadn't been able to stop it. It had taken everything Terra, Aqua, Ventus and I had had to fight him, and we'd still lost. This time, I was alone. If he came-...

If he came, I probably wasn't going to make it out alive.

I swallowed, feeling my eyes burn as I continued to stare up at the sky. Years ago, that was all I could have hoped for. Anything to escape the agony brought about by losing everything yet again. Now, however...

"Miss Ignis!"

"Master Ignis!"

"Master!"

I found that...I didn't want to go.

"Master...?"

I sighed, a small, wry smile making its way onto my face at the voice. He would be the one to run into me tonight, wouldn't he?

"You should be asleep, Sora," I scolded, though anyone could tell it was halfhearted at best.

"I can't," he said, settling down next to me.

"You should at least try," I told him. "You've got a big day tomorrow."

His grin was just as bright now as it was when I'd first met him.

"That's exactly why!" he exclaimed, turning his gaze up to the night sky. "We've always heard the stories, but to know that we'll actually get to go out there! To see other worlds! It's amazing!"

I couldn't help the fond smile that slipped onto my face at that. He was so much like them, and yet, the warmth he always seemed to instill was unique to him alone.

I hoped that by nurturing it in him, I'd thrown Xehanort's, and even the mysterious Master of Master's, plans awry.

"But," Sora continued, his much more subdued and hesitant tone instantly drawing my attention, "there's...something I've been meaning to ask."

"What is it?"

"If-...If Riku hadn't been chosen when you first got here...or if Kairi had already been with us and not chosen by Master Aqua...would you have still chosen me?"

I blinked, honestly taken aback at the question. "What?"

He seemed a bit more embarrassed now, but the question still seemed to be weighing him down. "It's just- since you've started teaching us how to sense light and darkness in others, me an' Kairi noticed that Riku's...bright. Like, really bright. Then I noticed later that I couldn't sense any darkness in Kairi, and I just-...I couldn't help but think that-...that I-..."

"That you were chosen only because they were first."

He winced and I felt my heart twist painfully at his small nod.

"Sora, no," I told him, perhaps a bit too vehemently, but maybe that would make him listen more. "No, that's not it at all."

I placed a gentle hand on his shoulder and waited until he was looking back at me to continue. "Sora, even if I'd had the option, I still would have chosen you. Precisely because you are you."

"Because...I'm me?"

I smiled. "Maybe Riku's a bit brighter, and maybe Kairi's a bit purer, but you...You want to know what I see when I look at you?"

He hesitated for a moment, probably afraid of what I might say, but nodded in the end.

"I see a warm light. Soft and gentle, like a sunset on the beach. It was that very light that reached out to me ten years ago, and pulled me back from the abyss I could feel myself starting to slip into. Sora, I wasn't kidding when I said your hug was just what I needed. That warmth- your warmth -kept me from ending up just like the others."

He blinked rapidly, his eyes becoming glassy with tears, and I sighed softly before throwing an arm around his shoulders and pulling him close. Even after all I'd done, Sora had still ended up doubting himself and his place as a Keyblade wielder. Still, at least this had happened now, when I could set him straight, as opposed to later, when I...might not be around.

"...Do you really mean that?" he asked quietly.

"I do," I reassured him. "Never doubt yourself, Sora. If you ever find yourself feeling low just remember this:

I chose, and would always choose, you. Not Riku. Not Kairi. You. Because you are kind, and cheerful, and strong- even if you may not believe it at times. You also have something special that they don't: a warm light that welcomes all. A light that shelters and heals. I know, without a doubt, that you will do great things. Amazing things." I smiled down at him, my heart lightening at the small smile on his face as he looked back. "And you trust your master, don't you? So trust in me now."

"...Okay."

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Sora watched with growing concern as his master paled. His gaze fell onto the figure behind her, his eyes widening when he realized it was the man in the cloak he'd spoken with just yesterday.

"I must admit to some surprise," the man continued, seemingly unaffected by the storm that raged around them. "I thought I'd gotten rid of all of Eraqus's pupils, yet here you are- with students of your own, no less..."

She stiffened, finally whirling around to face him with a glare. "You will get nowhere near them, Xehanort!"

Suddenly the gravity of the danger was clear, and going by how Riku and Kairi seemed to freeze right next to him, they realized it too.

Xehanort. The man who was responsible for all of the bad things that had happened to Master Ignis and her friends. Because of him, Mister Terra couldn't be here to teach Riku, and Miss Aqua and Ventus were lost somewhere.

It was because of him that his master was so sad and lonely.

Even his laugh was sending chills down his spine. "Is that so? You may have ten more years under your belt, girl, but you're still nowhere close to my level."

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...To be continued?

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this! Maybe I’ll post snippets of my other, as of yet, unpublished SI/OC fics if you all like this well enough. I leave you with a picture of how Ignis looks at the end of these snippets, or rather, at the beginning of the events of KH1:

[peppermintbee]

15 easy changes that would have made Kairi a more compelling character

Ever since finishing KH3 I’ve been completely preoccupied with what a disservice the writing does for Kairi. This isn’t an unpopular opinion; the KH3 tag is full of complaints regarding Kairi’s treatment. I think what’s really disappointing is that fixing her portrayal wouldn’t require that much work. So, if I was Nomura’s co-writer for KH3, here are the changes I would have suggested.

1. Don’t put her in the time chamber to train

Not only does the pocket dimension cause plot holes (Why can’t Sora train there? Why didn’t Kairi and Lea become high level in there?) it’s only narrative purpose was to keep Kairi and Lea out of the story while Sora was visiting Disney worlds. Having her literally anywhere else, where Sora can see and talk with her, would have been better than that.

2. Let her train and travel with Sora

Conveniently, the game is set up perfectly for having Kairi as a team member. Sora starts the game at LV. 1 and Kairi is a beginner keyblade wielder. They could visit the Disney worlds and git gud together. We know team mechanics were programmed for Kairi, since she briefly fights alongside Sora at the end. In the Disney worlds you can have up to 4 team members, so it doesn’t seem like a stretch that at least one of them could be Kairi (and/or Lea). With that, the opportunities for character building are endless: team banter, selfies, special team attacks, commenting on the Disney stories, etc. 

3. Or, give Kairi her own missions

Riku and Mickey are off screen because they are trying to find Aqua. Even though we don’t see much of them, this makes them active participants to the plot. Therefore, if she can’t be a team member, have Kairi be on her own  important story mission. A really easy one would be involving her in the Twilight Town investigation to find Roxas’ data and/or rescue Ansem the Wise. Maybe one of the turncoat Org 13 members works with Kairi. At some point, Sora and Kairi’s paths would cross, and they’d work together just like Sora and Riku did.

4. Have Sora mention Kairi every once in a while

Honestly, this is such a low bar it’s sad the game didn’t clear it. Sora frequently mentions Riku in the Disney worlds when something reminds him of him, he tries to call him, and he even talks about Riku in the social media loading screens. Kairi doesn’t get the same amount of attention. (Riku also doesn’t talk about Kairi.) It makes it feel like Kairi is not a priority to the characters, which makes it hard to be invested in her while playing.

5. Have Sora and Kairi greet each other when they finally meet

The first time Sora and Kairi are in a room together is after Ventus gets saved and everyone is talking in Yen Sid’s room. During this scene, most of the time Kairi is OFF SCREEN and has almost no lines. When she finally talks, she apologizes to Aqua and says something about saving Namine. Sora and Kairi stand about 5 feet away from each other and he only looks at her when she’s talking. This is dumb, especially considering Kairi and Sora haven’t seen each other in person since KH2 (!!!), a game that she also had very little presence in, and now that she’s finally here, she may as well be a part of the wallpaper. While Sora and Riku are reunited in the most badass way possible (a dimension crossing rescue and summoning of the great rainbow keyblade), Sora and Kairi aren’t even given so much as a chance to say “hi.” Simply include few lines of them being excited to see one another. A hug, a compliment, an “I missed you,” ANYTHING.

6. Just rewrite the entire paopu scene

This scene has such wasted potential. It’s the first time Kairi and Sora really talk to each other, which already starves the scene of emotional impact because their relationship feels underdeveloped and unearned. If this scene had even a little bit of foundation setting (see the above list) it wouldn’t have felt so forced. I’d argue the only foundation their relationship has is from KH1, which not only is over a decade old for players, but the characters themselves have changed a lot since then. 

Secondly, it is almost funny that a scene that’s supposed to be about Kairi and Sora starts with Sora talking about Riku. Would it have been so hard to put a scene change between the Riku/Repliku talk and this one and not awkwardly segue from Sora worrying about Riku to Kairi proposing to Sora.

Third, Sora shows almost no excitement about sharing a paopu fruit with Kairi until the very end, which only makes it feel more forced. He expresses shock, confusion, and even insinuates they don’t need to share a fruit since they are together in spirit. He says he’ll protect Kairi, which is kind of a lame promise since Sora protects all of his friends. Instead, Sora should have looked genuinely touched and excited about the paopu thing, and they should have made a promise that went beyond protecting each other, since that’s a given. (I do really like that Kairi vows to protect Sora, but considering what happens later it feels pretty hollow.)

8. Sora should protect Kairi with his keyblade, not a hug

Honestly, this was so dumb I don’t even know where to start. If there’s gonna be a Kairi hug, it should have been when they were reunited, or the paopu scene, or like... any other time. I get that it’s supposed to be a parallel to KH1, but that defense-hug made sense because Kairi was unarmed and untrained. (Plus, Kairi could actually shield heartless-Sora with her body. In this scene, Kairi and Sora are about the same size so it just looks like a normal hug, not protection). Just hours ago, Sora protected Riku from Aqua with his keyblade and it was badass. At the end of this scene, Riku protects Sora with his keyblade, and it’s badass. The hug isn’t badass, it’s stupid and it makes both Sora AND Kairi look incompetent, which it frustrating to witness.

9. Let Kairi literally protect Sora

As much as I like the scene where Riku protects Sora from the heartless cyclone, that would have been a perfect opportunity for Kairi to make good on her promise and protect Sora. We already know Riku will defend Sora, he did that in all the other KH games. Kairi shedding her damsel persona to defend Sora would have been amazing.

10. Play as Kairi in The Final World

If Kairi’s “light” is the reason Sora can persist in the final world, just abandon the whole deus-ex-kairi and let us play as Kairi. Kairi should collect the Sora fragments (or her own fragments), and save at least Sora and Riku’s heart. I think we should have been able to play as Kairi at some point anyway, but this seemed like an especially good time for it. That would elevate her role in saving Sora into something really believable, instead of Chirithy and Kairi just telling us she saved him when it feels like Sora just saved himself and everyone else (as usual).

11. Give Kairi a cool team attack

We only get to fight alongside Kairi for like, 10 minutes. At least give her a cool team attack. I’m not asking for a lot here.

12. Kairi doesn’t get kidnapped (and if she does, she goes down fighting)

Literally anyone else. I don’t care who. In fact, I think Riku would be a good candidate for kidnapping: not only does it subvert the damsel thing, but it would make the bad guys look pretty formidable if they were able to pull it off, and, Riku is important enough to Sora to “motivate” him to rescue him.

I’d rather she not get damseled at all, but if she really has to get kidnapped, it should at least be because she compromised her safety to save Sora or Lea. Then, when she’s grabbed, she should go down kicking and screaming, maybe taking out an Org member on the way out. Instead, the way it’s framed makes it looks like she got kidnapped because she sucks at fighting.

13. Give Kairi’s death/disappearance some real weight

I still stand by the fact that Riku is the one who should have been kidnapped but I digress. When Kairi explodes, Sora gets upset briefly before talking about closing Kingdom Hearts and receiving encouragement from his other friends. Xion reassures Sora that Kairi is fine, likely to justify why Sora gets over losing Kairi so fast. With a smile, Sora goes into the next battle and doesn’t mention Kairi until long after Xehanort is defeated. This makes her death feel like a cheap way to add superficial stakes and write Kairi out of the story (again). This can be fixed by having Sora react like a normal person, such as falling into complete despair or wracked with grief and vengeance, and having the other characters react appropriately too. 

At the end of the story, Sora and the gang are weirdly understanding of Xehanort when he gives his sob story, even though he exploded Kairi just a little while ago, and they don’t even demand to know how to save her. It really makes it feel like they forgot about her.

14. Don’t gloss over Sora’s end-game rescue of Kairi

We’re shown that Sora saved her somehow and now he’s gone. That’s all the script thinks we need to know because the next game is about Sora and Riku just like most of the KH games. Not that I really want another game about Sora rescuing Kairi, but the fact that this is barely graced with explanation really makes it clear that Kairi is little more than a plot device to set up the next game. I don’t really know how to fix this other than not fridging Kairi, or bringing Kairi back right after Xehanort is defeated, or making the next game about Kairi saving Sora. Which brings us to my last fix...

15. Send Kairi after Sora, not Riku

Kairi explicitly said she was going to protect Sora. Therefore, she should be the one implied to search for Sora at the end of the game. Having her cry on the beach while Riku went after him was lazy and cheap and everyone knows it. But, I suppose it’s fitting end for a character that Nomura clearly didn’t care enough about to write decent character development for.

And there we have it, 15 ways to make Kairi more compelling. If the game included even a few of these, Kairi would have felt like a more meaningful person and not a watered down version of KH1 Kairi. I can only hope that the next game has some strong female characters that we can all root for, but honestly, I’m not getting my hopes up.

Let me know if you have any other suggestions, I want to hear them!

[thechocobros]

My little (not so little) Kingdom Hearts III’s review :)

(possible spoilers under the cut)

Somebody asked for my personal opinion about the game, so, here I am! I’ll try to be as objective as possible, even if you probably know already my deep affection for this saga and for its creators XD

Let’s start with the positive things, the things that really impressed me the most about KH3, which are: the graphic (even the in-game one), the gameplay, the huge amount of enjoyable exploration. And then I’ll start voting the rest, by giving my opinion. 

 - Graphic: 10/10. I was able to see the pores on Sora’s face and on Terra’s hands. I was able to zoom on the smallest details with my Gummiphone and still find some amazing details in the landscape. Literally EVERYTHING was so well done i had to stop more than once to admire what i was playing. It was stunning. Let’s not even talk about the Disney cutscenes, because those were a masterpiece and i have no words to describe them. 

- Gameplay: 10/10. Listen, i never played a game where there were so MANY options for the gameplay. I beated the 13 darknesses by using attractions, limits, different forms, combined moves, special abilities, combos, different keyblades ... There were so many minigames, ideas, i fought on Baymax, i fought as a captain of a ship, i cooked, I did treasure hunts, took pictures, the gummiship style too ... every fricking world offered so many different gameplays options i even freaked out because i wasn’t able to learn them all. It was so FUN!

- Exploration; 10/10. Let’s be real, every world (except Twilight Town lol) was as huge as all the Disney worlds of the previous KH games together. Really, i was lost. It was even too much. It will take me a lifetime to explore all the worlds in all its beautiful details xD for ex in the POTC’s world we are able to access to at least 6 different islands + Port Royal + underwater + the battles setting + we command an entire sailing ship. Also, have you try to collect all the lucky emblems? Because I think they all are in some areas i still don’t know they exist. It was AMAZING. 

- Music: 8/10. I love “Face my fears” so much, i like “Don’t think twice” a lot, Utada is always a queen. As for Yoko, she never dissapoints me either, even though this time she didn’t came out with “new” brilliant melodies like she did in the other games. She mostly arranged differently songs and themes we already were familiar with, which is nostalgic and happily welcomed anyway. + Bonus Points to Somnus song mixed together with Hikari. Wow. 

- Plot twists/Surprise/content/plot elements: 8.5/10. Every Kingdom Hearts game needs a huge amount of “WHAt-THE-moments” and KH3 makes no exception. The final battles and the endings were a concentrated of twists and turns, starting from Yen Sid, to Ephemer, from Sora dying (like twice, during this game? the last one almost got me tho), to Kairi dying, from Xigbar’s real identity to Yozora officially inserted in KH’s main plot etc etc. It was a rollercoaster. And I loved it. Funny enough, the only “secret” that didn’t feel like a “secret” was the “secret” that Nomura defined the “biggest secret” XD ... aka Roxas xD I mean, they talked about making a replica for Roxas all the game long, so when Roxas actually appeared and claimed that Vexen made a replica for him, i was like ... yeah, thanks, that’s not a brand new information xD Talking about Vexen, him and the rest of the Organization had some really nice surprising elements, their story was worthy. 

- The narrative/structure/pace: 6.5/10. Ok, here’s the thing. Even if the actual story content was interesting and pretty good, there were problems in the pace and we all hardcore fans noticed it. Why was that? Because they changed some things they shouldn’t have changed in order to give more space to Disney worlds. 

For ex, I’m talking about the fact that we started our adventure in ... the Olympus world. I have nothing against that world of course. But in KH1 we started in Destiny Islands/Traverse Town. In KH2 we started in Twilight Town. In KHBBS we started in the Land of the Departure. In KH3 we should have respected traditions and start from an original world. Why? Because original worlds are strictly connected to the original characters’ development + main plot. By making Sora starting in a Disney world, they cut out an extremely important part in the KH3 story’s development, aka the very own basis. And  no, Twilight Town arrived 3 hours later, and was half as big as the other Disney worlds, so it doesn’t really stand the competion. 

  So, by putting so many Disney worlds and cutting out the original worlds, they confused the storyline’s pace. The actual story’s progression was reduced to some cutscenes between a world and another which is ... not a really good idea. We needed at least one or two more playable original worlds somewhere there in between, like KH2 had Radiant Garden and KH1 had Traverse Town, so that the story could have been developed  and the characters would have been able to meet and interact properly.

  In fact, the biggest problem is that the entire main plot is rushed in the last hours of the game. 35 hours of funny happy Disney gameplay. 5 hours of actual plot. It’s not balanced. The player didn’t feel the rising pressure for the final battle of light against darkness. No matter how epic the Keyblade War actually was, of course it felt a bit rushed, because it popped out all of a sudden and wasn’t smoothly inserted from the beginning of the game. 

  I can actually justify this choice though: KH3′s purpose was to give a conclusion to Xehanort’s saga. Which means they didn’t plan to develop the story or the characters more than what they already had in the previous games. They just wanted to show a proper “conclusion”. Not “development”. 

  It’s not the choice i would have taken in terms of storytelling, but it’s an option so i’m not really angry about it. It worked anyway because almost all the characters really had a solid background plot. .... almost. Which sadly leads to the sore point of the game. Here we go.

- Characters development: 7/10. Kingdom Hearts has a large quantity of very developed characters. Kingdom Hearts’ original characters are the ones who entered in out hearts years ago and we love them for a reason. They’re all well characterized, with specific strengths and weaknesses. Which means that no matter how weird the pace of KH3 could have been, the characters have been so well written in the previous games that they were able to tollerate everything in terms or story telling. Sora, Riku, Aqua, Roxas, Axel, Ventus, Xion, Terra, Naminè .... they all had a major role in KH’s plot on their shoulders and unique facets. But one character was strongly penalized by this the rhythm of KH3: Kairi. 

  Unlike most of the other characters that belong to the famous trios, Kairi could never count on a strong background, nor a good characterization. 

  Even though i liked her in KH1 (where she at least interacted with both Sora and Riku multiple times and had a part in the main plot, even if she was comatose for 80% of the time), it’s not a secret that she got benched immediately after that. KH2 didn’t make her justice with all that being kidnapped, and in the next games she completely dissapeared even. She was never involved in the story ever again. What am i referring to?

  In Birth By Sleep, only Sora and Riku met all the members of the wayfinder trio and played an actual part in their lives. Kairi barely meet Aqua once, and never played an active part in her life anyway. I mean, Aqua never needed Kairi for anything, never. On the contrary, both Sora and Riku were vital for all the members of the wayfinder trio, back then and later on.

  In Chain of Memories, Coded, 358/2 days ... Kairi was replaced with two other girls that quickly became more interesting than Kairi herself, aka Naminé and Xion. In those stories Kairi is barely mentioned and almost never appears. But Sora and Riku ... oh, Sora and Riku! They’re the PROTAGONISTS. They always interact, they always appear, they always do stuff. 

  Let’s not even talk about Dream Drop Distance, where it’s JUST Sora and RIku. 

  What’s my point? The Destiny trio isn’t a trio, it’s a duo. Kairi is ALWAYS put in a corner, she never has a part in the story. 

  I’m not talking about ships, i don’t care about ships, I don’t ship Soriku nor Sokai, it’s not about this. The problem is Kairi’s character development, which did not exist. Not only a development, but even a purpose was missing. 

  So, since i kinda liked her in KH1 and the potential was there, i thought that KH3 would have set things right for her. I had high hopes especially because of Axel, I was like, “WOW here it is a great potential for a good, healthy, platonic relationship, finally Kairi found someone to be paired with and do stuff. We will finally see her being weak, finding her power again, maybe she will be a playable character, maybe she will interact with BOTH Sora and RIku too, making jokes, express her preferences etc etc” yeah and what we got? Kairi is reduced to a mere man pain object again. She almost forgot about Axel once that Sora appeared. She got kidnapped here and there all along. Again. She kinda forced Sora to eat that fruit and never asked for his opinion, while Riku was having an existential drama going on just some steps away. But i don’t think she cares for Riku anyway since she never had any kind of bond time with him and isn’t interested in his problems. She fought once (badly), revealing that her training was somehow useless (she had to be saved by Sora and the others). She gets killed (pretty stupidly too) and Sora had to sacrifice to bring her back. And what made me angry the most: Sora’s heart gets lost in the process of saving her but it’s NOT Kairi the one going after him in the secret ending. IT’S RIKU. LIKE WHAAAT?? Riku?? She can’t even take her girly keyblade and go after the boy she is supposed to love and that died for her?? Riku has to do it? Really? It’s ridiculous. ... 

  Furthermore, she wasn’t a playable character. The only characters that we were able to play were Sora, Riku and .... Aqua! Pretty funny. (I think they are Nomura’s favorites, i don’t know.)

  Kairi’s only part in KH3 was changing outfit and “being Sora’s light” somehow but ... that was so much out of the blue and most likely an isolated moment. It could have been a nice coronation for a developed love story but the problem is that no development was there before.

  So, going back to my point.

  Even if i would have chosen another way to tell the story, the rushed pace of KH3 worked for everyone anyway, except for Kairi. Kairi needed a different treatment.

  But at this point i don’t think she will ever get it, probably Nomura doesn’t like her too much since he decided to make another DreamDropDistance game settled in Insommia next time xD so i give up on her. I’ll focus on the other beautiful female characters of this game.

  Anyway, even if i talked a lot about why Kairi was another flop, i want to point out how interesting some characters got instead. I’m talking about Xigbar (great plot twist), Saix, Demyx, Vexen (Vexen had so much importance, i mean, i didn’t expect him to be the one moving kh3’s plot), Luxord, Marluxia, Larxene and Repliriku! They used to be marginal characters and now they turned out to be protagonists, it’s amazing.

- FF characters: 7/10. I really loved Verum Rex’s surprise, it’s a clever idea to recycle the Versus characters and concepts Nomura couldn’t bring to life. Now that Nomura turned them into original characters, he has the copyright over them again thanks to Disney and he can use them as much as he wants, bringing the “ff characters cameos in kh” on a brand new level. Starting from the next game, we will have semi-FFcharacters included in the main plot, not just having a cameo here and there, which is amazing!

  But. This doesn’t mean i didn’t miss actual FF characters in Kh3. Cloud, Leon&Co left a hole in kh’s tradition.

Let’s sum it up my notes: 

Graphic: 10/10 +

Gameplay: 10/10 +

Exploration: 10/10 +

Music: 8/10 +

Plot twists/Surprise/Content/Plot elements: 8.5/10. +

The narrative/structure/pace: 6.5/10. +

Characters development: 7/10. +

FF characters: 7/10. +

Total = 8,3

AND ... THAT’S IT FOR NOW I GUESS? xD

[oveliagirlhaditright]

Shrinking Violet

Summary: The first SoKai story I wrote after beating Kingdom Hearts III, where Sora doesn't fade away and everything is happy. And Sora and Kairi are officially together... but still super innocent and not thinking about anything sexual at all and are fine just holding hands and stuff, and figuring out how to balance this new relationship with everything else in their lives now.

Kairi's PoV

Sora squeezed Kairi's hand tighter—as the two of them sat on the paopu tree, and breathed a long sigh of relief after the awful adventure they'd just been on.

Kairi hated that she'd once again been used to hurt Sora... That that man from her nightmares—because of the experiments he'd performed on her when she was a child, before throwing her into space—had killed her twice, and then Sora had nearly died trying to save her.

It made Kairi sick to her stomach, that she'd told Sora he was safe with her—and he had been once (him, and the others through their connection), as she'd kept his existence from fading away completely—and yet it had all still ended up this way.

She knew Sora didn't care in the slightest, or her friends… that they were just happy to have her back, to have them both back, and that's what Kairi tried to focus on now.

Right now, Kairi saw Roxas and Xion debating with Lea and Isa on whether or not sea salt ice cream that fell into the sand was still good... She noticed Pence inspecting Donald's perfect mud castle, that the duck had just erected, as he tried to decide if the mud on Destiny Islands with a Wonder in and of itself. And she caught Riku watching Naminé drawing a hat into her sketchbook, and trying to magically get it appear to protect her hair from the wind.

Kairi smiled at all these displays—and even more that were still going on—and was about to ask Sora if he wanted to go down there where they were at, and swim in the water.

Usually, Kairi avoided the water. But she thought there was enough reason to celebrate today, that she wouldn't really mind getting salt water in her eyes.

But before she could even dream of uttering the words, Sora completely caught the redhead off-guard: "I love you, Kairi."

And she was so much in shock by this confession, that she almost fell backwards onto the island behind her.

And the part of the princess' brain that wasn't reeling, wondered if this was how Sora had felt when she'd sprung the paopu thing on him so suddenly.

"…Sora, I love you, too. Of course I do." But Kairi's words were a lot more calculated than Sora's had been, and she was ashamed for it.

For Kairi knew that she and Sora were in love... but he had a tone to his words, that almost seemed to hint of marriage. And Kairi wasn't quite sure they were ready for even a promise ring yet. They were still only fifteen.

But Sora had changed… and become a bit more desperate with his feelings for her after she'd died that second time—and even a bit before that—Kairi could tell.

And if Kairi was being honest with herself... So had her own feelings become much more desperate, when she hadn't been able to sense him after the Demon Tide and had hoped against hope that her greatest of loves was alright.

Just imagining again, what it had been like without Sora in that moment—and without Riku, Lea, Donald, Goofy, Aqua, and everyone else... but Sora in particular—was nearly enough to make Kairi blackout.

So overcome with her own need now, Kairi reached her hand out and held Sora's face in between her palms.

And then—much more slowly and gently than she'd moved to get here—Kairi placed her lips to Sora's, and let her mouth dance with his as if it was their last night on Earth.

It wasn't a perfect kiss—it wouldn't be, as no one's first one was—as Kairi bumped Sora's nose a few times; and Sora moved away from her whenever he though Kairi's face against the stubble on his chin: clearly thinking it was hurting her—but it was theirs, and that's what made it superb.

And the two lovebirds broke apart only, when they heard everyone giving them a round of applause and whistling.

Kairi and Sora blushed beet red, as they remembered everyone around them and finally started acting proper again.

…Though Kairi was a bit irritated about the interruption, and she could tell Sora felt the same way.

"Shall we go read our friends the Riot Act?" Kairi questioned, grabbing onto Sora's hand as she began leading him down the bridge.

"Please do," Sora agreed, with a slight smirk on his face. But much like her own words, Kairi could tell what her boyfriend said held no real weight.

And instead, Sora began watching in amazement—just when Kairi did—Aqua toasting chestnuts over an open fire.

"You guys want any?" the mage asked, when she noticed the items had caught the couple's eyes. "Terra and Ven have missed my cooking, as it turns out. I'd much rather do some baking, to be honest... but Terra really only likes nuts. So what's a girl to do?"

Truth be told, Kairi was a bit hungry... but she knew if she said yes, Sora—who clearly also wanted some—would let her have the only silverware here to eat, as he went home to get more utensils for himself and everyone else. And not wanting to be away from Sora for even a second, Kairi declined.

"Thank you so much, Aqua... But I'm actually really tired. And I think I'm going to go home and go to bed."

For at least that way, if she had to be separated from Sora… she'd still be with him in her dreams.

But surprisingly, Sora had an even better idea:

"And I'm gonna go with her, Aqua. Riku and I always had sleepovers with Kairi when we were little, so I doubt Kairi's mom Mihoshi will mind if we do the same thing now. But you guys have fun camping out! And I'll see you tomorrow... Oh, Riku. Do you wanna come?"

Sora asked the last, when Kairi and he caught up to him and Mickey trying to figure out if he could do Starkeeper type flips via a water ski.

Riku smiled—clearly glad that they wanted him around more than they wanted alone time, Kairi could see, but she also immediately knew he was going to refuse.

And he did.

"Nah. Xion wants to talk to me about something: Probably about me bequeathing her her own Keyblade, since even now she wants to make sure her identity is her own."

And as those words washed over her, Kairi pondered if Xion had gotten that from her:

Because so often she wanted to stand on her own two feet... but she always came back to thinking she was the shadow of Sora and Riku. And that was why she'd been afraid to even try and escape the Castle That Never Was, until Naminé had told her to believe in herself.

And maybe, in some ways, Riku still needed to believe in himself, too. Which was why Kairi sought to reach to the heart of the issue, as she let her heart do the talking. "If you change your mind, Riku, please do come. You know where to find us." And she made sure to take Riku's hand in hers—the way that she had when she'd helped Sora to see through his disguise-so he understood that no matter what, it was the three of them against the world.

Soon after that—when Sora and Kairi had gotten more than enough hugs from Riku, Donald, Goofy, Roxas, Xion, and Naminé—they were piling into Sora's boat, and rowing back to the Main Island together.

As as they did, Kairi eventually found herself thinking about the upcoming situation. "I'm sure Dad will let you borrow some pajamas, Sora. It's the least he can do after you saved the multiverse again, I mean."

Sora looked like he was about to say something to this… but maybe in not having the right words, he didn't speak what he'd clearly meant to.

"…I can just stop at the moogle shop and get something to sleep in there, Kai."

But Kairi was already cutting Sora off—as she stopped paddling, for they'd reached their destination—when she began climbing onto the dock just above her. "Sora, that's silly. And a colossal waste of money. If you don't want to wear my dad's, who's closer to your size, than wear my brother Ryke's…"

Sora must have thought that was a better idea—because when they were in Kairi's home and she was clothed in her own nightgown, Sora came into her kitchen dressed from head to toe and yelled "Tada!"

"Sora, you sound like Ven," Kairi giggled, grabbing the belt around his waist and pulling him to where she'd got cereal out for them. "And via the sleep mask, you have your eyes covered up like Riku did a year ago. Really?!"

And seeming somewhat abashed by that—Sora took the eye covers off without much wait, whilst he stammered: "B-b-by the way, Kairi. You saved the world, too, and you should know that."

So this was what he'd wanted to mention earlier. And it sort of figured, that Kairi's lazy bum would get up the courage to say it only when he was lacking it elsewhere: in wearing the sleep mask, like he truly wanted to. But Kairi wouldn't have had it any other way.

"Th-thank you," Kairi replied—feeling gooseflesh begin to develop on her skin, since she was humiliated in thinking she hadn't done too well in the Keyblade War at all… but appreciating Sora's heart all the same.

She ended up looking at the purple walls of the room they were in—with its orange polka-a-dots for some kind of comfort—but it only served to make Kairi even more embarrassed, since her family clearly sucked at interior design.

"Umm, but about the cereal, Sora. Forgive it for being popcorn-esque—which is weird in milk, I know—but I'm figuring my mom doesn't have any real popcorn, and is planning to soon use this to string on the Christmas tre-"

"Kairi... We- we kissed… Are we going to talk about it, and what it means for us?"

And to say that Kairi wanted to drown herself in the milk in her bowl here would have been an understatement.

Sheesh. Since when had Sora become so confident about this stuff, and she so shy?

But Kairi answered, anyway—even though she found herself becoming the Shrinking Violet she'd been when Sora said she made him strong in the light—because above all else… she wanted to talk to him about this.

"What do you think, Sora? We're going to manage to still spend time with Riku... and figure out who our new friends are, like we both want. But moreover... we'll see what it means to be soulmates at such a young age. I mean… after everything we've gone through to be together now, how could we not?"

And at first, Kairi didn't think Sora was going to react at all.

But then he went into Kairi's kitchen cabinet—pulled out two wine glasses, and then some sparkling grape juice from the fridge—and assured her: "I wouldn't have it any other way."

"...Me neither, Sora. I love you."

And Kairi clinked her glass against Sora's, and leaned her head against his until the moment they both slumped down on the floor and fell asleep.

The cereal, much like their desire for Aqua's chestnuts, completely forgotten.

And yet even without either amazing food, life was good.

[asiryn]

How can you complain about KH3 Sokai when it was even more shallow in KH2? In fact many things in KH2 were worse than in KH3.

……You know, I possess this truly amazing ability: I can be annoyed at multiple things at the same time! However, given the fact that I am physically disabled and suffer from chronic pain, I lack the physical capability of reporting every emotion I feel at all times to the internet. So, with this context in mind: I talk about things when they’re relevant. KH3, seeing as its now been out for only a little over a month, is relevant at this particular moment in time, especially as the majority of asks that I’ve gotten concern the events in that game. KH2, by contrast, came out in the West in 2006, so it’s not as immediately relevant. 

Also: just because KH2 was arguably worse, that doesn’t make the problems in KH3 any better. And while I will agree that, on the whole, KH3 had better writing than KH2—where Kairi is concerned? I think I’m gonna disagree. KH2 didn’t superfluously kill Kairi off twice for Sora’s manpain. KH2 didn’t make it so that Kairi put up literally zero resistance to being kidnapped (or while she was being fucking killed by Master Xehanort). Like, I know that KH2 set an impossibly low bar in terms of resisting kidnapping, but at least she struggled! She tried to pull her arm out of Axel’s grasp! She didn’t even fucking do that in KH3! And again: KH2 didn’t fucking fridge Kairi, an act which was completely redundant, because Sora didn’t fucking need any more “motivation”, he was literally already on his way to fight Xehanort anyway—so not only is this horrifically objectifying, but it’s also utterly fucking pointless.  

And you wanna know how KH3 did SoKai worse? The paopu fruit scene is the first scene that Sora and Kairi spoke to each other in the entire fucking game. Not once before that point did Sora ever even mention Kairi. Even though he talked about Riku several times, and not even always about the immediate plot, but about how he just wanted to show him things in the new worlds that he was visiting. By contrast, in KH2, Sora reminisced about Kairi many times, and generally seemed to remember that she, you know, existed. 

And you know what’s especially galling about this lack of communication in KH3? In KH2, there was literally no way that Sora could have possibly contacted Kairi without showing up in person. In KH3? SORA LITERALLY HAS A GODDAMN FUCKING CELLPHONE NOW, AND A POINT WAS MADE THAT EVERYONE FUCKING HAS THEM, SO HE COULD HAVE BEEN CALLING KAIRI AT ANY FUCKING TIME THAT HE WANTED TO, OR TAG HER OR TALK ABOUT HER IN ANY OF HIS GODDAMN INSTAGRAM POSTS, AND HE. FUCKING. DID. NOT. 

Here’s the thing: Kairi and SoKai have always been written with the shallowest writing possible, in every single Kingdom Hearts game they’ve ever been in. And especially where Kairi is concerned, that has always been, and at this point, seems like it always will be, my least favorite thing about this entire series, because everyone involved deserves fucking better. Kairi deserves better, Sora deserves better, their relationship deserves better, and the fans deserve better. And I have, and will continue, to criticize that writing—and believe me, I’m not saying that KH2 did justice to SoKai. But again: that doesn’t make the writing fails in KH3 any better. If anything, I’m more resentful towards the terrible writing for this relationship in KH3, because they’ve had over a fucking decade since KH2 to improve the way they write for the main love interest and main romantic couple, and they fucking didn’t. Instead, they’ve squandered every opportunity.

So, in conclusion: I’m mad and annoyed at the way SoKai was written in KH3. That does not, and will not ever, lessen my anger and annoyance at the way it was written in KH2, or in KH1, Re:CoM, Days, Re:coded, or KH3D. So miss me with this patronizing, accusatory bullshit. 

[kenzichi]

Here’s my KH3 review:

I would like to start off by saying I enjoyed this game very much. I have a lot of good to say about this game, but also a lot of bad. I tried to keep it spoiler free, but once I reached the cons it was inevitable. Heads up on that. And I also tried not to dive too deep into critiquing the story itself too much. I did sorta do that at the end though, but I felt it was okay to include the points I mentioned because they’re about Org. 13 and X and this game concludes their story arc.

Pros: The game is visually stunning. The worlds are GIGANTIC. It was a little intimidating actually. I always had the thought that I was going to miss something in the back of my mind. But it was still a joy to explore. The scenery really felt alive. The grass moved with you, the water rippled, you can see Sora’s hair move when it was windy! My favorite world in 3 is Kingdom of Corona. It’s just so beautiful and so fun! In this world especially, you interact with Rapunzel as she explores her environment because she’s never experienced it before. It’s really cute and really gets you involved in the world besides just being the guy that takes out heartless.

 Another pro is: Yoko Shimomura did it again! Her music compositions for 3 are AMAZING! I got into the music right away and eventually found myself humming to every background song in no time flat. I also enjoyed how every world had more than 2 themes this time. Usually we had a ‘calm’ world theme and a ‘battle’ world theme. Yoko went beyond that and gave us a different theme per situation… for EACH world! One example is in Frozen: we had a theme for the mountain, a battle theme, and a theme for after they met Larxene (and she did the thing if you’ve played the game lol). My favorite theme is the one for Hiro’s Garage in Sanfransokyo. It’s so soothing; I could listen to it for hours. The theme for Aqua’s battle is totally creepy and it fits so well. I enjoyed all of the music.

 Game play is fun and really nostalgic. They brought back equipping abilities (with AP), the old command box from 2, and accessories. Magic is better than ever in this game. One problem I had with 2 is that I could only use a few spells and my MP level would quickly run out so I felt it was a waste of time. In 3, even just starting, I didn’t have to worry about running out as fast. It was a relief not having to worry about watching my MP levels and I used magic a lot more in this game.

 A new combat feature for 3 is the keyblade transformations. When you finish a world and gain a keyblade, you can unlock special abilities with that keyblade. For example: if you equip the Toybox keyblade, and you bash enough heartless with it, you can transform your keyblade into a giant hammer. I wasn’t too excited about it when they first revealed these new abilities during development, but they’re actually super fun and totally optional if you really don’t dig it. You can also switch between 3 different keyblades during combat easily if you feel one keyblade isn’t working out against an enemy. I love this new feature. My favorite keyblade transformations are the Toybox hammer and the Monstropolis Yo-yos. Sora is channeling his inner Killua with the Yo-yos and I am all for that lol.  

 Another pro is Sora, Donald, and Goofy’s interactions. Like, omg, they are so cute. They are so genuine. It really felt like I was watching Sora and his two Disney dads. It gave me life and I felt so many emotions watching them. This trio was the best developed trio in 3.

 Cons: Pacing y’all. My biggest problem with this game as a whole. It started off good, but once you finish the Disney worlds and get into the real plot with Xehanort it’s like a rollercoaster and not in a good way. All the things we were hoping to happen, that we’ve been waiting for for years, happen so quickly and then it’s over like… did it even happen? I felt I didn’t get to be as emotional about those scenes as I could have been because they immediately thrust us into another scene. I didn’t have time to appreciate those moments like I wanted to.  

 Kairi…. Poor Kairi. Nomura screwed her over again. He let us get hyped about her finally training to become a keyblade wielder, gave her a new outfit, and showed her willing and ready to fight in the Keyblade Graveyard and yet? Screwed all of us. I wasn’t expecting her to be a badass, but I was expecting her to be SOMETHING. I was really hoping she’d develop a personality and presence in this game, but she fell flat yet again because Nomura doesn’t know what to do with her. She literally only exists as a plot device and love interest for Sora (I’m not going to get into that here lol).

 Also disappointed they hyped playable Riku, but it was only 2 times, for 2 battles and frankly switching between Sora’s magic command menu to Riku’s with no time to look through it and get accustomed to it other than during actual combat was a pain. Also sad Sora, Riku, or Kairi didn’t travel to ONE world together. Not one. I was hoping to have them in my party as least once, but nope. I’m generally disappointed in the lack of Destiny Island trio interactions. There were no moments between the 3 of them and there was no interaction between Riku and Kairi and barely any between Sora and Riku despite growing so close in DDD. It goes to show Nomura didn’t develop this ‘trio’ as well as the others.  

Another problem I had were almost all the Organization members ended up… being ‘good after all’ or something. For over 10 years they gave no indication Luxord, Larxene, and Marluxia were nothing, but just evil just because and they had no feelings towards Sora other than a boy that was in their way, but once they start fading away for good it’s suddenly, ‘you’re a great person, Sora. Let’s meet again’ or in the case of Larxene, just giving Sora the time of day and actually talking to him civilly just felt so random to me. Including Xemnas. He suddenly revealed how he felt sorta bad for betraying the old organization members, but there was literally no hint of that before?? Idk, it just felt out of place. I was kinda cringing the whole time, haha. I’m actually surprised YX was the one that disappeared the most unremorseful for his (future) actions.

 And then there was Xehanort, omg. He literally destroyed the lives of dozens of people, almost sent the world into the apocalypse, and had this grand scheme for the last 15+ years that he literally invested multiple lives to see fulfilled, but once his old bff Eraqus tells him ‘you’re done’, he went, ‘okay’. Lol wat? That’s it? I’m sure he knew he lost, but I expected more of a grumbling, complaining old man on the brink of death than just a nonchalant, ‘you done good kids’ while giving the x-blade to Sora with a damn smile on his face. I cringed. It all felt unfulfilling to me at that moment because X gave up too easily and was so OOC. I think Nomura just wanted to wrap up this story real quick and move on with his life.

 And another thing! 3 didn’t go into Xehanort’s past. They gave us some cutscenes of X and Eraqus playing chess and flirting, but that’s it. When did their relationship change? What made Xehanort so obsessed with dark and light balancing? When did he meet Braig? What happened to Scala ad Caelum? Does it still exist? Like…. They didn’t go into X’s background AT ALL. I was really hoping to see more about his character.

 Neutral feelings: I remember reading somewhere that 3 was supposed to be the longest game in the series, but I finished the game in about the same time as the others. So maybe they meant longest game gameplay wise and not story wise. On the plus side, there is a TON of stuff to do in this game like a bunch of mini games, cooking with Remy, finding lucky emblems, and exploring worlds after they’re completed. On the downside though, even just 10 more minutes of cutscenes could have helped the pacing in the later part of the game. The gameplay and story are imbalanced and they should have focused on solidifying the story rather than adding so many different gameplay elements. I honestly find them all overwhelming. I stopped trying to remember them all.

 The Disney attraction rides. I don’t really have a like or dislike for these reaction commands. Good thing is that some are fun to see visually like the train and the tea cups (Sora is so dang cute in those teacups). Downside is some attractions don’t seem to fit with the heartless that activate them. For example: that shooting attraction ride is terrible with flying type heartless and yet I get that command a lot with them so it’s pointless. I never hit them.

 This is a con for me, but maybe not for others. They closed a big chapter in the game, but kept a lot of plot points open too. I think my main problem with 3 was that I was hoping it would be more conclusive. Nomura made it seem like it was more conclusive. I already knew 3 wasn’t the end of the series as a whole, but you can still end a storyline with a definite conclusion while still being open to new adventures. 3 didn’t do that. They closed a bunch of chapters, but also left us with a lot of new questions.

 Most of the voice acting is great in this game! Haley really delivered as Sora and I honestly think this was his best performance as him to date! It was genuine, totally cute, and fit Sora perfectly. You can tell he had a great time voicing this game. I also really enjoyed Larxene which is something for me because I felt her VA was trying too hard in CoM. She really improved in 3 and it was fun to watch her. On the other hand, the voices for Xehanort and Marluxia fell flat. Xehanort’s is just unfortunate and I don’t think anyone could have captured him as well as Nimoy did no matter how much they tried. Marluxia sounded like he belonged in an infomercial. Totally hated his voice.  

[applegelstore]

My sis and I are through with the actual main plot of KH3, so I can officially go back to scheduled ToZ fangirling now. …Well, I promised Cray a bit of fix-it-fanart, so after that, I guess.

Hit the cut for a resume. It got super long and has endgame story spoilers, so you might not want to stumble upon it by accident.

Another extra big shoutout (again!) to @crazayrock for bearing my liveblogging on Discord, screaming without context and occasional spoilers. And linking me fluffy Soriku doujinshi. Here, have my favourite, spoiler-heavy excerpt of our conversation:

Okay anyway, let’s get started: GAMEPLAY

Kingdom Hearts 3 is BEAUTIFUL. The gameplay is so smooth and intuitive that you can immediately get to playing like you’d never done anything else; in fact so smooth that I doubt I will ever be able to pick up the first game ever again. It’s always been fun, but the looooooong years’ gap actually did wonders to the gameplay.

The keyblade form changes are fun and keep things fresh, you can do flashy triangle button shit every other minute, and shotlock is still insanely useful without being a game-breaker.

It seems easier than the first two main games, though?

The gummi ship is still a pain in the ass to steer, but I do enjoy the open world-like travel options (even if there’s not… much to discover except heartless lasering the shit out of you). I’m also eternally grateful that they kept the gummi ship thing from KH2 where you can just use a new gummi ship once you got the blueprint and don’t buy actual fucking legos as in the first game.

Thank you, Square. Not thanking you for the dumb cherry flan game, though.

The Caribbean being basically an open world stage was delightful! Apparently what our resident island kid needs is a big ship and tropical islands to plunder.

VISUALS AND STUFF

PRETTY LIGHTS EVERYWHERE

The long gap between the games also did wonders to the visuals.

There’s finally, FINALLY a few towns with actual NPCs you can talk to. Why it took the team so many years and the Gods know how many games is beyond me. The magic effects are beautiful, the animations smooth (honestly you can hardly tell apart cutscenes and fully rendered CGI scenes in this day and age of the PS4. I’m probably the only person still amazed by this because the only games I played on PS4 before were a few hours of Child of Light and of course Tales of Zestiria and Berseria. No, I still haven’t played FFXV but that’s a topic for another day). How far videogames have come.Even space finally looks like space, lol. Not really high-end what the PS4 can do I assume but god, it’s such an amazing and much needed upgrade from the terrible textureless colourful tubes you flew through before.

No excuse for the terrible battleship thingy before the Keyblade Graveyard, though. I got lost and beaten up so many times and crashed against more walls than I can count.

Nothing beats the World that Never Was, but the Keyblade Graveyard also has creepy cool potential, as does the beautiful but ghosted City in the Sky.

Still not getting what’s with JRPGs and very Definitely Final Dungeons (TM) that are basically space. …………or heaven. Or nothing. I’m getting the bad kind of original NGE TV series ending vibes. But. Okay.

The soundtrack is splendid

.……I miss Traverse Town and Radiant Garden, however.

Which brings us to:

THE WORLDS

I guess I can live with no more Final Fantasy characters being there (although I always loved that), and the meta jokes in Toy Story world really got me. Seeing Disney characters calling the KH villains call out on their shit was delightful. …the KH characters lampshading their own games’ sloppy dialogue writing was delightful.Still, those Disney worlds are always so much more in my head than what I actually get to play. This has been bugging me ever since the first game and it still does. I do not expect or want to replay the entire movies, but would it hurt to give the cutscenes some goddamn background music? Whenever there’s cutscenes, either the world’s usual BGM keeps playing or the music stops altogether. Together with the shortened dialogues and generally drastically shortened plots with odd cuts, that leads to scenes that are awkward at best. They never even remotely have the impact the movies had. You just sit there and think “oh wow that is so silly and awkward”.

Dancing scene in Corona? My favorite scene in Tangled. Zero impact on me without the lovely BGM (at least they made it a minigame so the moment isn’t over after 3 secs). Just for example. You can ask me like, world by world, but I can think of only exception off the top of my head and it’s not helping:

Let it Go of course. Listen guys, I actually love the song. But it’s so overused (and Frozen is an overrated movie at best that doesn’t deserve its hype in the slightest) that I can’t even really enjoy it being there. Like.


IF THAT’S OKAY WITH YOU,WHY DIDN’T YOU INCLUDE LITERALLY ANY OTHER ORIGINAL SONG FROM THE ORIGINAL MOVIES. Instead of BGM just not being there entirely, or in odd, cringey re-renderings that nobody wants to listen to (*cough* Atlantica *cough*).

Why torture me and not give me the one good scene from At World’s End (the up is down scene) when you had the chance?Kingdom Hearts is also prone to super lazy level design and wasting chances at wonderful scenery for no apparent reason other than I suppose empty cliffsides are quick to render. All games before did that, and KH3 is, sadly, no exception. We get to see a bit of Corona and Athens and they finally have NPCs, too, but you cannot even get near Arendelle. You cannot enter Elsa’s palace. You spend the entire time there climbing around in the snowy mountains of Norway, and unfortunately it looks less interesting than one would expect from the lovely concept art that the film unfortunately never used.You cannot enter Rapunzel’s tower although Sora can apparently parkour his way up even without her help.

………In short, the places you can go are, again, very limited, and a lot of interesting places and scenes you never get to see.

And to follow the plot you still only need the stuff that does NOT happen in those Disney worlds because they’re all beach filler episodes. It’s always been like that, but I keep wondering whether I’m the only one bothered by that. I’m also still salty they didn’t introduce a single new world from a 2D animated movie.

Also, as I said, I miss Traverse Town, it felt so warm and welcoming and beautiful.

And I get behind The World that Never Was missing although I loved it there, but why not give us back Radiant Garden? Destiny Islands since they’ve been restored? Disney Castle?

As much as I love the series, it never fucking lives up to its own potential. Idk whether it’s made more difficult by copyright issues or whatever, I just know that it bugs me.The first two games also had like twice as many worlds.

PLOT

I mean it’s never been deep; however, it’s complicated. No analysis or whatever from me because plot analysis and meta writing bore me like seven hells, just my emotional reaction: AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH 
Okay, bad news. I got into it expecting nothing, and still got disappointed. I don’t actually enjoy the prospect of writing essays about it, but here’s my tea with it; in not particular order:

1) the pacing is terrible. Nothing happens for like 30 hours and then suddenly like 20 characters’ arcs are (naturally poorly) resolved within the last few hours of cutscenes. Build up anyone? At least they actually did pick up Maleficent and the box thing again. …In the epilogue.

2) Speaking of build ups, Sora’s breakdown could have been developed nicely and steadily over the game to feel natural, and instead it’s hinted at in the beginning by everyone picking on him, but then it’s never further developed and comes out of fucking nowhere. Like. For real? It felt terribly OOC.

3) Why on earth have they shown 90% of the plot in the trailers already, and why are those scenes so massively disappointing in context

4) Kairi. Oh god, Kairi. What are we gonna do with you. I want to love her, I really do, but she’s a prime example of shittily written female leads. Mostly because she’s not leading. It’s not her fault. She’s just a fictional character. But honest to God, Nomura, why. Her screen time is almost nonexistent, and she’s entirely use- and helpless whenever she’s on screen (which isn’t often). Her ONLY point in the plot is being rescued because she is fucking useless. Why. Just why. Why waste her character like that. All we know is that she’s shoehorned into being the token love interest, but she has zero plot relevance and there is even less build up of her relationship with Sora. It’s all tell and NEVER show; and not even much telling, either. She has literally zero direct interaction with in the entire game before they share their paopu. The question remains: why are straights like this

5) On a related note: look, I don’t even ask for (or expect, or even hope) my ship to be canon. Squeenix doesn’t exactly have a rich history in queer representation. I’m totally fine with Sora and Riku being best friends. BUT. Building up Sora as the most important person in Riku’s life (and arguably, vice versa) over the course of several games, just to then hardly have them interact in the finale and then SUDDENLY bring back Kairi into the equation, who hasn’t interacted with him since the ending of KH2 (except for one unsent(?) letter) is just piss poor writing, period.I actually love Cray’s suggestion she gave me over Discord: let Sora, Kairi and Riku all share a paopu together (and let them group hug, too, you cowards). It would have been the perfect message to send (Sora as truly all-loving hero, and loving all your friends equally; romantic love isn’t more important than platonic love and doesn’t need to be singled out). Really sad that this isn’t what happens. Apparently that wouldn’t have been no homo enough.

LET THE DESTINY TRIO GROUP HUG YOU COWARDS


Do Riku and Kairi even interact once in the whole game?


HOW IS THIS A TRIO, IT’S JUST A SHITTILY WRITTEN LOVE TRIANGLE

6) Time travelling is a bitch, Christ. It doesn’t solve plotholes or can be played for drama, it just adds MORE plotholes. It just got WORSE. The cloning blues and people not aging doesn’t help, either.

7) Just so you know, I care absolutely zero for wild fan theories. You’re not Nomura. I want a statement from the man who wrote this shit himself why on bloody earth Sora dies when he apparently successfully found and brought back Kairi (and since nobody aged a day, apparently it didn’t even take that long lol). DUDES, THIS IS KINDA PART OF THE PLOT, AND YOU DON’T BOTHER TO EXPLAIN IT INGAME???? And how was Ienzo/Zexion able to revive Naminé while Kairi was still missing/dead/whatever…?

Okay so in short the writing is worse than ever and that’s saying something.

However, let’s try to find something good in this trainwreck; it wasn’t all bad. There’s some really nice scenes which sadly are better enjoyed without any context at all.

So, guess my favourite scenes.You had time enough, here’s the solution:

1) Purifying uhm er rescuing Aqua. Poor girl. She deserves the rest. Poor, poor Aqua. The only properly wirrten female in the whole damn franchise. Also the only person other than Riku who fucking gets shit done.

2) The Gayblade (TM)

3) Happy Axel in the reunion with his kids. Oh god, the poor chap deserves it so much. Thank you, Nomura. I don’t care that it makes pretty much no sense. Make him happy. Give him his friends back. Just give Axel all his friends and let him happily set things on fire. Hi I love Axel

4) The party at the beach cutscene before the credits roll. Axel and Xion get clothes. Half the organization is on our side now. I almost teared up at the Wayfinder trio saying goodbye to Eraqus’ forceghost. Hey come on he’s the voice of Luke Skywalker

5) Sully yeeting Vanitas

6) Woody calling out Xehanort that nobody loves him

7) Jack Sparrow bad breathing Luxord

I wish we had gotten:

1) justice for Kairi

2) a happy Zexion, the poor emo kid. Well maybe now he will be, with all the orga members who changed sides now, lol.

3) I will never trust mobile games ever again so I don’t want to play KHUX but I would have loved to learn about the Keyblade Wars :;))))


WHAT WAS THE KEYBLADE WAR ABOUT CAN WE SPEND MORE TIME IN THAT COOL CITY IN THE SKY WHAT’S THE DEAL WITH MIKLEO
I MEAN THAT EPHEMER KIDDO


WHAT’S WITH THE MASKED DUDES AND DUDETTES FROM THE MOVIE


WTF WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM AFTER THE MOVIE???? WHERE THOSE KEYBLADE USER NAMES ACTUAL MOBILE GAME PLAYER NAMES??? Next game? PLEASE?

I really, REALLY hope the epilogue means we will get Xiggy/Luxu as our new big bad and we learn more about the five dudes and dudettes from the movie. Please. PLEASE. I’m so up for it. Them finally pickung up the bit with Maleficent and the mysterious box again? Hell yeah.

The secret movie was really unexciting in comparison, although I laughed very hard at the “Verum Rex” scene in Toy Story world. Maybe that’s why it was much cheaper to unlock than in KH1 and KH2.

4) give Ven a drink

DLC ideas I would actually pay for because I’m a sad human being: 1) more Disney worlds 2) Japanese audio 3) at least one of the following as permanently playable characters: Riku, Kairi, Axel, Ven, Aqua. At least as a guest member as in KH2. THIS SUCH A BIG STEP BACKWARDS I’M FUMING

FINAL THOUGHTS

Kingdom Hearts 3 is a hella lot of fun, beautiful, and also moving when it sets its mind to it. Unfortunately it doesn’t always do so. I don’t feel like it wasn’t worth the wait; it was. However, I’m very salty how rotten the writing is. I do not mind logical fallacies, I do not mind the cheesiness and cringeyness; however, I do mind how so many interesting characters do not get the screentime they deserve, and Kairi is a very bad joke.

I’ll probably find more to nitpick about (Gods. Just. Don’t come up with dub excuses why Sora is lv 1 in each game. JUST LEAVE IT BE. You don’t explain why Donald and Goofy are lv 1 again, either. JUST. LEAVE. IT. BE. The sacrifice was dumb and not even moving, I’m just still furious that Kairi’s ONLY point in the plot is being so useless that it’s literally getting herself KILLED and she needs constant rescuing to the point that Sora has to sacrifice himself for her, effectively. Kairi deserves better, Sora deserves better, I deserve better than to think about this absurdity.…I’m just… gonna cherry-pick the good bits from the lore and try to pretend the finale didn’t exist, I guess. GODS.

[zdbztumble]

Penultima Raving (KH III Spoilers)

No, I haven’t finished the game yet.

I must be near the end, as I’ve ended up in the crazy windmill world from the opening sequence, but as there was quite a bit that happened in the short span of story progress I made today, I decided against waiting ‘til the finale to do another write-up.

Where I left off last time was Sora piecing himself together - literally - and then proceeding to rescue everyone but Kairi in the various Disney worlds. That Kairi didn’t need rescuing, but was in fact keeping Sora from fading away, and was there to guide him back to the realm of light, was a great idea. The line “you’re safe with me” was wonderful, and a good start to a pay-off on her promise to be the one to keep Sora safe this time. But a great sequence in isolation can’t achieve its full potential impact when the character arc that it’s a part of is so neglected prior to that point. And as for the follow-up to that moment...well, let’s come back to that.

I feel torn here, because there’s quite a bit in this section of the game that’s brilliant in concept and beautiful to look at. If the execution weren’t so spotty, then this post would be much shorter, and much more of a SQUEE! in text form.

Going point by point:

- The cutscene when you enter the Keyblade Graveyard the second time, opening in the same way as the first, was a bit confusing but not a bad idea. But having Terra defend his friends against Terranort was. If I’m just starting to get the hang of how the Xehanort Horcruxes and Sora’s “host to three hearts” business all work, I still can’t figure out how Terra’s heart relates to his possessed body. More importantly - after Sora goes through the hard work of rescuing everyone and turning the clock back, having another character rush in to claim the Hero Moment leaves him feeling like a bystander in his own story. This isn’t a new problem in this level; Sora was a glorified bystander in the two Disney fairy tale worlds. Other characters pointing out how special and important Sora is throughout the game, besides being annoying and actually undermining Sora’s special qualities, make it all the more obvious when he gets left out of important action.

- Surfing the Keyblade stream is fun, but it’d be more fun if the combat didn’t just amount to hitting a single button in rapid succession, and if it wasn’t made confusing as hell with a random shout-out to the mobile game.

- The multiple Demon Towers surrounding all our heroes made for a very dramatic visual and a formidable sense of menace. It’s a shame I never got a chance to see how challenging they actually were, because this entire sequence is left as a cutscene. I imagine there are serious technical challenges to putting together a battle where Mickey, Riku, Aqua, Ven, Kairi, and Axel are all battle partners to you along with Donald and Goofy, but this just makes me think again that a toggling system that let you battle as members of various parties would be a great solution.

On the other hand, this sequence gave us Master Yen Sid casting his Fantasia magic all over the place, and that was a truly unexpected pleasure. I don’t care much for him being a Keyblade Master on top of being a wizard, but seeing him be a wizard was amazing. Now all we need is a Sword in the Stone world where Merlin can cut loose.

- Splitting the party up and leaving Sora to find them in a maze is a great idea, as is pairing enemies that were formidable bosses in their own right together to face him. I didn’t find any of them that much of a challenge, but I think I’m overleveled (spent a bit too much time having fun with the ship battles in the Caribbean, I think.) The bigger problem with these battles was the pacing, with cutscenes interrupting the gameplay entirely too often. Each of the villains is given an almost-identical death sequence, and with pretty much none of them being likable (or even memorable in some cases), the efforts at giving these moments some pathos, and the attempts to create moments between the dying and Sora, all fall flat.

- Did I miss something about there being two Replikus? I have been so confused about this ever since the Big Hero 6 level. The one running around being an evil Organizer was confusing enough, but another one living inside Riku? And being able to spontaneously emerge from his body to neutralize the evil one and leave behind an empty replica for Namine, who is also in this game by the way? The fuck?

- This whole sequence serves as a great illustration of the problems that come with having too big a cast. Terra gets his Hero Moment back in the Graveyard (and virtually the same one in the maze), but he gets written out of the action pretty quick. Aqua and Ven do too, as do Axel, Mickey, Riku, Kairi (still not back to her yet); all the Keyblade Wielders of Light get shoved out of the way rather unceremoniously unless the time for their one brief flash of brilliance (if they even get one), while the bulk of the story is driven by the antagonists. But as I said, the members of Organization XIII are still not very interesting, and there are too many of them for any one to stand out.

- What the fuck is Xion doing back here? She barely made sense as a character in 358/2 Days, but her death was one of the very last to have any sense of permanence, and to give the concept any meaning in this world. That’s now undermined even worse than it already was. On top of that, it seems obvious to me now that all those conversations between Ansem and “Ansem” that I thought might be alluding to Kairi’s part were actually about this blank slate of a character.

- And now we’re back to Kairi.

Xehanort cutting her down didn’t surprise me. I’ve been expecting something like this to happen from early on in the game, though I wasn’t sure whether it would be Sora or Kairi who was killed. In part, this is because I stumbled on some sad fan art that, though lacking any description or anything to tell me that it was a moment from the actual game, was tagged “spoilers” and made me nervous. A bigger tell for me was the fact that most of the Disney movies used have a moment of sacrifice for a loved one. Meg shoves Hercules aside, and Herc in turn offers his life for Meg’s; Eugene gives up his chance to be healed to free Rapunzel from Mother Gothel; Anna rushes forward to take a blow for Elsa; and Tadashi and Baymax both sacrifice themselves in Big Hero 6. At World’s End also sees the lovers Will and Elizabeth cruelly separated by Will’s death, with Jack sacrificing his chance of immortality to give them some measure of happiness.

Between that, and all the taunting by Organization XIII, there was a sense of foreboding early on in my play-through that something was going to happen to Sora and/or Kairi, and for all the missteps in the handling of their relationship over the years, those kids are still cute as hell, so I was emotionally invested. But then, in each of the worlds where a death or sacrifice happens, no connection was made by Sora, or any other character, to him and his bond with Kairi. In previous games, moments of much less importance would set him or someone else off, but not here. In some cases, that makes sense (Sora wouldn’t even be aware of the sacrifices in Big Hero 6) but for those moments that he literally bares witness to, it seemed very strange. While that was something of a relief, as it made any potential death seem less likely, it was also annoying, as I’d given the game credit for selecting worlds with the same thematic idea as a neat bit of foreshadowing that seemed destined to be an unfulfilled coincidence.

Then, when Kairi leads Sora back to the realm of light, Sora has a brief flash of Eugene and Anna’s sacrifices, and the connection was finally made. (Will’s death gets left out of the count for some reason.) It was very little, very late in the game, but it was something, and I started expecting a death again. But this was after the neglect of Kairi’s character and of her relationship with Sora became apparent, and the emotional investment did not return - at least not in full force.

It is rather cliche, killing the heroine (or letting her die) to motivate the hero, but that’s not a reason not to do it if it can serve the story and be executed effectively. Given how important Sora and Kairi are to each other, it’s the ultimate extreme that you can take with their arc. So I can’t object to the idea out of hand. And had Kairi been kept a prominent presence throughout the game and her training as a Keyblade Wielder made apparent and meaningful, her being cut down after demonstrating skill and bravery would have made for an extremely powerful moment.

That’s not what we got.

What we got was everything I objected to in my last post about Kairi, with a vengeance, in this entire section of the game. While I didn’t have the same experience of her being an incompetent battle partner that others have (she even pulled off a quick heal in a pivotal moment), she (and Axel) could have been removed and I wouldn’t have had any more trouble with those bosses. Of all the Seven Lights, Kairi’s consistently the one with the least screen time and the least to do in the cutscenes. The way Xemnas and Xehanort handle her, she’s reduced to a prop, a passive object. And when the moment of slaying comes, it lacks the dramatic flare and emphasis that was given to the deaths of literally every single member of Organization XIII, or to the revivals of Terra and Xion. This - the death of our supposed tritagonist, who is the prime motivating force for our hero and who plays a vital role within this fictional universe as a Princess of Light - is quickly tossed out and moved past.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; this is not about Kairi being a favorite character of mine (until she’s developed more, I can’t call her that.) This is a character who is supposed to be important. Not just important, but central. You can’t maintain the credibility of that idea if you leave this character sidelined for game after game after game, and only ever trot her out for when the plot requires something to happen to her. Again, the moment where Kairi tells Sora “you’re safe with me” is a good moment. Sora’s cry of “why her?” is striking; the implication is, basically, “out of all my friends that you could have killed, she was the one I would choose to save,” and that is a powerful moment. But moments can’t cut it on an arc this important, not after three games disregarded it and this one spent nearly all its time on the convoluted mess of the villains’ scheming.

That no one in the development process of KH III (to say nothing of the games between it and II) ever realized this, or recognized the problems that it would cause at the climax of this, the culmination of the entire series up to this point, is truly baffling, and I can’t imagine that there’s any way that the story can dig itself out of this mess in the short time remaining on the game.

[violethowler]

My thoughts on Kingdom Hearts III

My initial reaction to the ending of Kingdom Hearts III was equal parts confusion, devastation, and just being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of how much time was spent on the final battle. I had a lot of conflicting opinions about how some things were handled, but unlike when that happened with the final season of Voltron, I feel a lot better about everything after a good night's sleep, because I was up late at night finishing the game. I'll get into the spoilers under the cut.

So, for starters, let me put my reactions on a scale of negative to positive:

Major disappointments that should absolutely be done better in the next saga:

After Kairi was hyped up for so long that she'd have a more important part to play in the story, her role in the final battle was a letdown. I can swallow her not being as amazing a fighter as the others because she's never been in combat before and she's been effectively thrown into the deep end on her first day, but I at least expected her to resist when Xemas grabbed her, instead of passively standing there like a helpless damsel in distress. The only in-universe explanation would be if after stress and panic of the previous fights, she froze up when Xemnas made a more for her. But after seven years of being built up as a Keyblade Wielder, and her relationship with Sora, she could have done so much more. I sincerely hope that Testuya Nomura learns from this and lets her shine in the next saga.

With trailers and interviews hyping up how big the worlds were this time around, having Twilight Town and 100 Acre wood be just one small area each was seriously disappointing. I was really looking forward to seeing more of the 100 Acre Wood. They could have fleshed out the whole "Sora disappearing from the cover mystery" for at least a little bit, maybe let us run around the other characters' houses instead of just Rabbit's. And for Twilight Town, I would have liked to have been able to see how the other districts looked.

Going straight to the endgame after San Fransokyo. I know that the creators decided to focus on quality over quantity when it came to the worlds in this game, but I was hoping for just one surprise Disney world that could give fans one last breather after rescuing Aqua and Ven. If not a Disney world, then I would have at least liked to have been able to explore more of Land of Departure or visit Radiant Garden outside of cut-scenes. I love RG's look from BBS and I would have loved to walk around and see the world restored to its former glory.

Vanitas was frustratingly underused in this game. For all the hype surrounding his return, I expected more from him. Especially because the Kingdom Hearts concerts kept including his theme music with the "heroes and heroines" meddley, tantalizing us with the possibility of him getting a redemption arc. And instead, he just dies all over again, only this time, he's calmly accepting his own demise instead of freaking out like after his final fight in BBS. As someone who loves the idea of him getting redeemed, that was a big disappointment. The only thing I'm hoping for is if he somehow comes back in the next saga, because it was kind of unclear whether he's really dead, if there's a way for him to come back, or if he's just faking it like Xigbar was.

Things I wish had been handled differently but I can ultimately live with and hope are handled better in the next saga:

The lack of focus on or explanation of the X era mysteries we've been pondering for years disappointed me on first playthrough, but now that I've had time to think about it, I realized that X/Unchained X/Back Cover/Union X/Whatever-They-Change-The-Name-To-Next isn't truly a part of the Xehanort Saga, but rather, the connective tissue that sets the stage for what comes after Xehanort. It was supposed to set just enough things up that we'd know who the Foretellers were and what Xigbar being Luxu meant. But because it was released before KH3, the fandom built up our expectations that the mysteries of what happened would ultimately be answered in III, so when they alluded to Marluxia and Larxene's past as Dandelions without following up on it, I was kind of disappointed. But now I realize that it was meant to open the door to them playing larger roles in the Lost Masters Saga.

Maleficent and Pete just lurking in the background despite trailers and previous games hyping up her interest in Luxu's box and the Book of Prophecy. This is something else that was clearly being set up for the sequel, but I wish Maleficent had at least had more to do. A boss fight with Pete followed by a conversation to establish that she's waiting for the dust to settle between the Guardians of Light and Seekers of Darkness before she makes her move would have been nice.

The sudden introduction of this mystery girl. At first, I thought when they kept mentioning this girl, they were talking about Kairi, and that we'd be starting to learn more about her past in Radiant Garden. I soon realized that the implications of Kairi's life pre-Destiny Islands were a red herring, but the more they kept bringing this girl up, the more I was expecting there to be some kind of explanation for who she was in the game itself. I can understand in retrospect why Isa and Ansem SoD would suddenly bring her back now, because both knew they were going to die (Isa at least had the promise of recompletion) and wanted closure on burning questions they hadn't thought about in years. Considering that the epilogue and secret reports imply she's amnesiac Ava, I think this is another case of planting seeds for future installments in a way that I wish had been done better.

After years of Aqua being celebrated as a badass Keyblade Master, her not really getting to do anything in this game is upsetting. Sure, things make sense from an in-universe perspective: she sent her Keyblade to Destiny Islands as a beacon for Sora, Riku, and/or Mickey to find her, which weakened her already worn down defenses when Xehanort’s heartless came for DiZ. With how much warping Terranort does, I figured he’d attacked Ven at speeds so close to superhuman that Aqua didn’t have time to react. And in Land of Departure, Nomura wanted to have Ven’s awakening be a dramatic moment where he swoops in to protect someone he cares about. But having Aqua kick Vanitas’ ass only for her to get taken down by a single Firaga spell feels like a poor way to achieve the desired result.

While having some Disney worlds follow the plots to their respective movies was expected, Sora, Donald, and Goofy's presence their felt a little insubstantial. I mean, I'm not saying they should have just copied the movie shot for shot with SDG there in the background, but it felt like they missed out on large chunks of the movies. It was forgivable in Kingdom of Corona because they were there for the important parts and Marluxia basically told them what they missed re: Rapunzel. With Arendelle it felt weird that they were really only involved with Elsa running away, the Marshmallow fight, and the ending. The rest was pretty much spent with Larxene coming up with elaborate ways to keep them away from the plot of the movie. With Pirates it was just ridiculous. They were really only there for the escape from Davy Jones locker and then just ran around with fake!Jack doing their own thing until it was time for the final fight of the movie. It's hard to not know the plots of Tangled and Frozen due to pop culture at this point, but if you're playing this game with no knowledge of the pirates of the Caribbean movies, you're going to be very confused on what's happening in the maelstrom fight.

Minor quibbles:

An explanation for what happened to Demyx would have been nice, but then, that could just be another mystery to be addressed later.

The whole "rewind time and replay everything before Sora's near-death until things change at the last moment" thing didn't really make a whole lot of sense, but it wasn't too big of a deal, and Xigbar's "we don't need you to make a second blunder" implies that he had something to do with it, which can hopefully be explained properly at a later date.

Little moments that weren’t necessarily big for the story, but I enjoyed anyway for personal reasons:

At first, I was crushed by Even’s return to the Organization because I loved the fanfic Why The Sun Sets Red where he becomes a surrogate parent figure to Xion, and wanted that relationship to be a reality in canon. Then when he saved Ansem, Hayner, Pence, and Olette from Fake Ansem, my head was saying “this is probably a trap”, but my heart screamed #ShittyScienceDadConfirmed. And I was so relieved when my heart turned out to be right. I will probably end up writing a post-III fanfic of Even bonding with his Science Daughter at some point.

I generally stay away from shipping in the KH fandom, but after years of having SoKai as my first OTP, I came to start shipping SoRiKai, and as upset as I am about Sora’s fate (I can’t really complain about that too badly since Nomura already promised that Sora would still be the main character in post-KH3 installments so having this kind of ending should have been expected, if not for 3 than for a future title), I at least take comfort in the fact that there’s enough wiggle room for SoRiKai headcanons set after Sora’s inevitable return.   

Everything else that I absolutely loved:

The visuals were absolutely freaking gorgeous. On every single world, they went out of their way to make the graphics as beautiful as possible.  The 2D fire effects on Olympus, the different shaders used each world to make Sora, Donald, and Goofy fit with the aesthetic...

The Skein of Severance. While I wish we'd gotten to explore more of the Keyblade Graveyard during the final battle, or that the maze was a little more elaborate, I loved having to fight multiple members of the new Organization simultaneously, and oh dear god the aftermath of every fight: Xion's return, Terra regaining control of his body, Saix's death.... I was sobbing after every boss fight.

Despite how complicated the lore has become, the story itself was actually pretty straightforward. It was pretty refreshing and reminded me of KH1 and BBS, where the heroes have a clear overarching goal and a reason for why they're traveling to other worlds.

As much as I wish that Unchained X had been held until after KH3, there's a stroke of genius to the epilogue: Because of Xehanort's whole "balance between dark and light" obsession and Riku's whole "dark is not necessarily evil" character arc, I've seen a consistent idea within the fandom that the main villain of the next saga after Xehanort should be one of those who fit into the "Light is not good" trope. And by implicitly setting up the "Lost Masters" for that role in the epilogue, they've both ensured a masterful conflict between the Keyblade Wielders of the past and the ones of the present, and ensured that the next saga will be as heartbreaking as possible by ensure that the fandom is already attached to these characters.

Honestly, despite the issues I've had with the game above, I absolutely enjoyed Kingdom Hearts 3. It was worth the wait in my opinion, and I can't wait to see what the future holds. My only hope, given the epilogue and secret ending, that we get an announcement of Kingdom Hearts IV within a year or so. Doesn't need to release next year, but it definitely needs to be announced for development.

[nerdlostinspace]

SoRiku Fic: The Beginning of a Friendship

The Beginning of a Friendship

Fandom: Kingdom Hearts

Rating: General Audiences

Words: 3,919

Relationship: Sora/Riku

Additional tags: Fluff, Children, Friendship

This is a rewrite from my first fanfiction on ao3!

Riku was a four-year-old boy with silver hair that reached a bit above his shoulder, and blue teal eyes. He was the tallest out of all his classmates and probably the strongest, as he was often seen training and fighting with a wooden sword, instead of spending time with the young children of his age. Indeed, he was more of a lone wolf and did not have many friends, only comrades in kindergarten. Was he feeling lonely? Of course, he was. But for some reasons, the boy did not have the courage to ask his schoolmates to play with him during breaks or outside of school, and he even started to assume that everyone feared him because he was so strong. He was used to being alone and to be looked at by everyone else, until a few days after the start of his second year in preschool. The silverhead was now a year above a few kids that he knew nothing about and he was watching them getting along. The children of his age were getting along together, not with upper or lower classes. He thought that it was normal, they were in separate groups, so why would they go see elsewhere to make friends when they could already have some without doing anything? But apparently, that was not the case for everyone. As soon as the new year started, Riku had noticed a boy from a lower class, he noticed him mainly because he was very noisy compared to everyone else. The boy had brown hair, and he caught the silverhead’s attention because he was always going to people, asking them to play with him, no matter what class they were in. He also always had a huge smile on his face, even when the group he was asking refused his request, he did not seem to give up and kept a bright smile. Riku ended up finding himself looking up to that small boy he would only see during breaks. He wished he could have had such an outgoing personality, sometimes he did not mind being alone, but most of the time it was hard because he was always feeling like everyone else did not want him as a friend, even though they barely knew each other. When the bell announcing the end of the day rang, Riku’s classmates instantly got up and ran towards the exit of the school to meet their parents. The silver-haired slowly packed his pencils and the book his class was studying in his backpack before leaving the room. Once he reached the doors, he tried to weave in and out the crowd of children and parents; he knew that neither his father nor his mother were here to get him, therefore, he started to walk home on his own. He was used to it and did not mind, he was aware that his parents were working hard and pretty late, and they trusted him not to stay outside late and they knew the village was small and rather safe; plus, Riku knew he was strong enough to defeat anyone who would attack him. The silverhead was walking back to his house, lost in his thoughts as he was reciting what he had learned today in class. He kept spacing out until he heard a small stick of wood breaking behind him. He turned around, standing on his guard, scooting his surroundings, before he noticed a backpack coming out from behind a tree. The boy smirked, proud of himself and his skills of analysing what is around him. “I know you’re here, so you’d better reveal yourself,” he said to the person hiding. The latter executed themselves and revealed their identity by leaving the tree. A young and small boy with brown hair and deep blue eyes was standing in front of Riku. The latter noticed that the child he was facing was the one he had been admiring, from a lower class, he wondered what he wanted to do with him. He seemed to be unsure of what he was doing, Riku could see his legs shaking a bit; was he scared of him? “What do you want?” The silver-haired ended up asking, tilting his head a bit. “I, um…” The brunette started, looking to the ground, a sign of shyness. “I wanted to know if you would be alright to teach me how to be as strong as you and how to fight with a sword!” The brown-haired seemed all relieved after he managed to get this out of his chest. He looked as if he was sincere in his request and Riku couldn’t ignore that, even though he was somewhat shocked that someone younger than him would ask for lessons. He thought he was not the best fit to teach anything, but maybe it was his chance to finally make a friend. He knew his parents were worried that he did not have any close friends because they always repeat that friends are important to get through life. But there was one thing that he did not understand: why would someone want to be friends with him? The silverette always assumed everybody hated him, he felt as if everybody was avoiding him, and he could not figure out why. So he was wondering if the brunette was not pulling a prank on him. “Aren’t you scared of me?” “Huh?” The brunette replied, widening his eyes, he did not understand why he should be scared. “But, you’re not scary at all! You don’t look like a monster, just a normal human being. Nothing to be afraid of!” The brown-haired had a huge smile on his face, he placed his arms behind his head and looked at Riku. The latter seemed to be analysing the other boy. He was younger and innocent, he seemed that he could trust anybody even before knowing their true colours. The silverette’s lips formed a small smile, he thought it was cute to be that innocent and so careless about others. He somehow started to feel like he wanted to protect him, even though he barely knew him. “Alright, then.” Riku ended up saying, nodding to his new friend. “I’ll teach you the ways of… the sword. I’m Riku, by the way.” “Awesome! The name’s Sora!” The two boys smiled at each other, they were already bonding without doing very much, and they were both happy about it. The two of them decided of a day to go training, and the silverhead mentioned his dad owned a small wooden boat that they often used to explore the island; they agree that it would be their training grounds, especially since nobody ever goes there. After getting all set about the date and the place, they both parted their own way and went back to their houses, a smile on both faces could be seen. * “Dad, wake up!” A young boy’s voice said to the man laying in his bed. The small silverette was already up and ready to attack the day, that early in the morning, when the sun was currently rising. He was wearing a yellow tank top with blue on the edges, black shorts and two blue wristbands. He was shaking his father, asking him to wake up because he had something important to do on this day. He was meeting with his new friend, Sora, and they were going to go to the island for the whole day, he did not want to miss this. He was already all dressed up, ready to leave, but his father told him to go grab a breakfast before leaving, in the meantime, he would get ready. Riku did as he was told, he went downstairs in a rush and opened the fridge to grab some milk. Some cookies and a glass were already on the table, so he simply sat down and poured the milk into the glass before starting his meal. He was eating really fast, not taking his time to enjoy the food, as he was very excited to spend the day with his very first friend. He wondered about what they would do today: first of all, he knew they would spend a lot of time on fighting with their swords. Then, maybe they would take a swim, he had packed up his bathing suit in his backpack, just in case. He knew his mom had prepared some sandwiches for lunch, for him and Sora; he was looking forward to the picnic on the beach. He then ended up thinking that if they ran out of ideas, they could always do some exploration. Once his breakfast was over, the silverhead quickly tidied up his things and rushed back upstairs to drag his father so they could leave now; he was too excited that he did not want to wait one more second. As they were walking towards Sora’s house, Riku’s father had to remind him several times not to walk too fast; it was the first time that he had seen his son this enthusiastic about doing something, he was surprised, but also happy, he hoped that this friendship would last very long. The silverette could not stop talking about it the evening before, it meant the start of an amazing and long friendship. After a few minutes of walking, they arrived at the brunette’s house. He was, apparently, as excited as his new friend; he had been waiting next to the window, looking through it so he could see when Riku would arrive, and he instantly opened the door, right after the silverhead’s father rang the bell of the house. He was wearing a white shirt with blue on the edges, and red shorts. Sora’s mother came to meet the newcomers, bringing the brunette’s backpack with her. She talked for a bit with Riku’s father, discussing safety stuff, while the boys were trying to make them stop talking so they could go to the island as soon as possible. After a while, the parents finally put an end to their conversation and the children were on their way to the dock. There were a few wooden barks, along with paddles, attached to the platform. Riku’s father took the backpacks and placed them into the wooden boat where the silverette had invited the brunette in. The two children had grabbed the paddles and started rowing as soon as the adult untied the bark of the dock. Fortunately, it did not take them very long to get synchronised and the small boat was peacefully going towards the island. Once they arrived at their destination, Riku’s father took the time to carefully attach the boat, while the two kids were already running wild, swords in hand, ready to start their long training. First of all, the silverhead explained to the brown-haired the position of his body that he should adopt to get a good balance, but the younger boy decided to make his own battle stance: lowering himself and holding his wooden sword with his two ends, while Riku was standing straight, holding his sword with one arm, which was above his head, and his other arm was held out towards his enemy. Without waiting anymore, they both agreed to start fighting because they both knew that it was a good way of learning. Of course, the silver-haired had already some experience in fighting with a sword, so he did not have to do much to beat his friend. “Not fair!” Sora pouted after being thrown to the ground once again. He sat up and crossed his arms. “What do you mean, ‘not fair’?” Riku asked, sitting down next to his partner. He wiped his forehead with his wristband. “I’ve been training longer than you, but with practice, you could easily reach my level.” “One day, I’ll become stronger than you, Riku!” The younger one replied, his look was full of determination. “How about a run?” As soon as he finished his sentence, the brunette was already on his feet, running as fast as he could. “Hey, wait up!” The silverette said, quickly standing up to catch up with his friend. “THAT’s not fair!” He rapidly reached Sora and passed him, a grin on his face. The children ran from an end to the island to another one, they were both panting at the end of their race. “I win,” Riku said between two pants, to which his friend answered with a growl. “Let’s do something else. Why don’t we explore a bit?” The brunette asked, looking around. The island seemed quite big, with several spots to visit. “Sure,” The silverette replied. He let Sora lead the way as he had already seen most of the island. The first thing that caught the younger boy’s attention was the wooden door that they had reached after running from the docks to the other end of the island. The brunette wondered what could be behind it: an abandoned house? Another part of the island? Or maybe just a cupboard where past children would drop their broken toys or toys that they don’t use anymore? He looked at his friend, who looked back at him, and they both nodded to each other, understanding what they would do. They opened the door walked through it to discover a new area. In front of them, they could see an old wooden bridge that was broken, some planks were missing, and it did not seem very stable. After the platform, there was a tall wooden tower with a cable that linked it to the rock wall at the end of the zone. Between the tower and the façade, there was a small part of the beach with many palm trees. Next to the entrance towards the first part of the island, there was a big yellow star. The two children looked at each other in the eyes, as if they understand what they were thinking without talking. “Let’s go for a race!” Sora said, confirming Riku’s thoughts. The both of them had a grin on their face, there was no way they were going to lose this run. They got into position and the silverette started the countdown. As soon as he shouted “Go!”, the two kids started running as fast as they could, jumping onto the old, broken bridge. The silverhead was a bit faster than the brownhead, he was already almost at the wooden tower when his partner screamed. He instantly turned back to see that Sora had stepped on a risky plank and was hanging on the next plank that was making cracking noise; his eyes widened, and he immediately rushed towards the poor boy. “Sora!” Riku shouted, laying down on the platform to reach the brunette. He grabbed his arm and started to pull him with all his strength. Unfortunately for the both of them, the wooden platform did not resist under their weight and the two children fell down into the water below. The silverette was on his knees, slowly getting up to look for Sora who was next to him. “Sora! Are you alright? Did you hurt yourself?” He asked, panicked that he might have a broken bone, but the other boy simply shook his head while rubbing the back of it. “I’m alright! My head hurts a little bit, but I’m fine, don’t worry!” The silver-haired wanted to be sure, he took a look at the back of Sora’s head and felt relieved not to see any trace of blood. “Phew, you really scared me there…” Riku sat down to catch his breath and to get his heartbeat to slow down. “I’m stronger than I look like! Let’s finish this race!” Sora answered, jumping back on his feet. The other boy did as well and they both started running again. The silverhead arrived at the wooden tower first, the brunette decided to follow him, instead of taking the other way that may have been quicker than waiting for his turn on the Tyrolean. Riku slid on the cable, holding onto something not to hurt his hands due to the friction; he had the wind his hair and he could see a beautiful view of the ocean from where he was. He jumped onto the top of the palm tree next to the passage way to the other part of the island, and poked the yellow star with his hand, which lighten up at the contact. He then turned back and waited for his friend to join him. The brown-haired jumped next to Riku and placed his hand on the star, panting a lot. “Looks like I win, again,” The silver-haired said, a smirk on his face. Sora glared at his partner. What if this was not the end? He asked himself. As his lips started to form a grin, he removed his hand from the star and started jumping onto the other palm trees, going back to their starting point. “Hey!” Riku shouted. “That’s not fair!” He followed his friends, trying to be quick, but the other already had a head start. When he arrived at the wooden bridge, Sora made sure to be more careful, and he managed to arrive next to the door without falling again. He turned back to Riku, put his arms behind his head and made a huge smile. “Looks like I win!” He said when the silverette finally arrived, insisting on the ‘I’. “Yeah, but you cheated. I didn’t know we had to go back here,” Riku replied, pouting. “Well, next time you’ll know!” ‘Next time,’ repeated the older boy in his head as he looked at his friend with a genuine smile. It implied that Sora wanted to hang out with him again, and it meant so much to him. Sora was his very first friend and he could not be happier at the moment. After getting their breath back, they decided that it was time to have their lunch break. They went back to the main area of the island and joined Riku’s father, who was laying on the sand, reading a book. They set up the blanket that they would sit on for the picnic and they pulled out of their bags their meal. They both had different stuff to eat, so they decided to share. Riku loved Sora’s mom’s cooking, and Sora loved Riku’s mom’s. * After their lunch, the kids decided to go back to exploring. The brunette had noticed the entrance to an unknown place, next to the waterfall, so they decided to search this area. They were small enough not to have to crouch to go through the passage way; they arrived in an empty cave with some mushrooms and an odd wooden door at the end. They both reached the gate and tried to open it, but it did not work, and it did not even have a handle. “This will be our secret hideout! We won’t let the other kids know this place! But we’ll have to decorate it. Maybe later, what do you think?” Sora said as he was walking towards the exit. “Sure!” Riku answered, following his friend, and looking back at the door, wondering what it meant. Once outside, they decided to go to the huge wooden platform that was near the docks, they had to climb on a ladder to reach it. Nothing much was there, beside a rope and a wooden stick, as well as a stunning view of the ocean. “Hey, this could be our pirate ship!” The brunette shouted, raising his wooden sword in the air. “Our pirate ship?” The silverette repeated, chuckling a bit. He already loved his friend’s imagination and he could not wait to go on many adventures with him. “Yeah!” Sora nodded. “But we also need… the captain’s room!” He looked around, trying to find a special spot on the island that could serve as the captain’s chamber. He noticed another wooden ladder, leading to an area inside a tree. “There!” He shouted, pointing the place with his finger, before rushing towards it, follow by his friend. Once they arrived in this huge whole in the trunk of the tree, they realised that it was also very empty, only a cloth was hanging there. This area did not have much light and the kids suddenly felt sleepy, therefore, they decided to lie down and rest a little before going back to their activities. Riku grabbed the cloth and gently put it over himself and Sora so they would not get cold during their nap. Soon after they lied down, they could not help their eyes from closing themselves and they quickly gave into slumber. * After a few hours, the brunette opened his deep blue eyes and stretched his body, before waking up. His friend was still sleep and he tried not to make any noise, so he would not wake up. He tiptoed his way out of the hole in the trunk and looked around; the sun was already setting down. He rushed back to his friend and shook him, now trying to wake him up. “Riku! Riku, wake up! The sun is going down!” The silverette grunted, he did not like to be woken up, especially not in such a brutal way. He rubbed his eyes and slowly stood up, following Sora outside. He looked at the sunset with a smile on his face, he had an idea that would please his friend. “Hey, do you want to go to a spot where we completely see the sunset?” He asked. The brown-haired instantly nodded, stars could be seen in his eyes; he must love sunsets, Riku thought. They both climbed down the ladder to go back to the ground and headed to the wooden shack next to the waterfall. Inside, there was a staircase that they climbed to reach a wooden bridge that lead them to a tiny isle. In this area, there were several palm trees, as well as another tree with yellow star shape fruits. The kids sat down on the trunk of the tree, facing the horizon, watching the sunset. “This is my favourite spot,” Riku said, breaking the silence after a few minutes. “Oh? You come here often?” Sora asked, looking towards his friend with surprise on his face. “Yeah,” the silverette nodded. “Almost every weekend. I don’t have many friends so… I spend my free time here.” “But now, you have me!” The brunette replied, a hugged, bright smile on his face. Riku looked at his partner and smiled back. They were really friends, he thought. He looked back at the ocean and let his mind wander. He hoped that Sora and he could be friends for ever, and that nothing would separate them. A sound behind them made they turn, the silver-haired’s father had joined them to watch the sunset. Riku and Sora moved a bit, leaving some room on the trunk for the adult. “Do you know what these fruits are?” He asked the children, after a moment of silent. They both shook their head, and he grabbed one from the branches. “They’re called paopu fruits. The legend says that if you share one with someone, your destinies become intertwined, meaning that you will remain part of each other’s life, no matter what happens.” The two kids were now looking at him with an expression of surprise and admiration on their face. “Riku! Let’s try one!” Sora shouted, to which Riku shyly nodded. They were friends since only a few hours, but the silverette felt like they had connected so much, he was happy to meet such an incredible person. His father cut the paopu in half and gave one to each of them. They happily started to nom the fruit, looking at the horizon, watching the sun sets on this beautiful day that marked the start of a beautiful friendship.

[angel-with-a-pipette]

For the character meme one: Terra! Unless someone already asked it, then Kairi ^^

Why I like her: She’s both sweet and cheeky and knows how to be sassy towards both of her friends. She’s also very courageous and wants to follow her boys into battle :)

Why I don’t: I hate how she barely gets any screen time, but it’s not her fault, it’s SE’s fault

Favorite scene: The KH2 ending. I love her interaction with Sora so much :3

Favorite game: KH2. The other games tend to have her missing or sleeping most of the time, sadly

Favorite line: 

"Thinking of you, wherever you are. We pray for our sorrows to end, and hope that our hearts will blend. Now I will step forward to realize this wish. And who knows: starting a new journey may not be so hard, or maybe it has already begun. There are many worlds, but they share the same sky — one sky, one destiny."

Favorite outfit: I actually very much love her KH2 outfit! I know a lot of people prefer her KH1 appearance, but I love her KH2 appearance more.

OTP: Sokai obviously. I mean it’s only as if the entirety of KH2 ships it, right, RIGHT?

BrOTP: Kairi with both of her boys. I love how she teases both of them in a friendly way and they need more scenes because the interactions they have are amazing.

Headcanon: I hope she’ll be a good Keyblade Wielder, but one that is focused on magic like Aqua, especially since she has Princess of Heart powers. And seeing how Aqua is eventually able to take on Terra in a fight, Kairi will - given enough time - be able to take on Sora, Riku and Lea in fights, too. But don’t make this happen too quickly.

Unpopular opinion: Her character isn’t undeveloped - she only has few scenes to make her character shine. Also, Sora and Riku both love her dearly as a friend. Just because people tend to be blind and ignore Kairi in favor of the Sora/Riku relationship doesn’t mean they don’t care about her. Every single scene with Kairi and one of her boys shows their friendship and how much the three of them care about and need each other, but you can only see it if you actually look and not if you keep your eyes closed ;)

A wish: MAKE HER A PLAYABLE CHARACTER IN KH3

An oh-God-please-don’t-ever-happen: Don’t make her a powerhouse :/ I want her to be a good and strong Keyblade Wielder, but please do not turn her into a female Terra. I know it’s a popular headcanon, but I don’t think it suits her. 

Five words to describe her: cheeky, sassy, sweet, trusting, loyal

My nickname for her: Maaaaybe Kai from time to time. I definitely headcanon though that Sora calls her Kai :)

[spoofenshmirtz]

so because I like rambling about various things, lemme talk about Kingdom Hearts 3. spoilers and whatnot under the cut! it also got extremely long and rambly so I apologize for that in advance for anyone who wants to give following my thoughts a shot

so, like most other fans of Kingdom Hearts, I’ve been waiting for KH3 a long time. not the 13 years lots of people like to spout, like dumbasses, but definitely for a long while.

and, honestly? I have some mixed feelings about this. one of my friends already talked about how KH3 doesn’t feel like the “finale” he was looking forward to, and how it raised more questions than he had answered - which, valid, but seeing as I’ve gone deep into KHUX I don’t think I’m as confused as some people might be - and I understand and empathize with that notion. KH3 isn’t a grand finale, it’s a new fork in the road on our path throughout this crazy world.

would it have been better as a grand finale? I don’t know. I do feel like Nomura’s been biting off more than he can chew, especially regarding the specific ways he’s been tying some stuff together - through time travel?? - but on one hand, many characters’ stories did seem to reach an at least somewhat satisfying end. Axel, Roxas and Xion were finally reunited and can live on together; Isa joined them, showing Lea and Isa’s reconciliation; Terra, Aqua and Ventus are finally back together after a decade apart; and Eraqus and Xehanort were finally reunited. Sea Salt and Wayfinder Trios’ endings were the most satisfying, in my opinion, and it was kind of obvious that Nomura wanted to wrap these up for sure.

the rest? kind of set aside, to be honest. even our original trio, the Destiny Trio, kinda took a backseat at times - although Sora’s breakdown over being worthless without his friends was pretty great. like many others, I’m also displeased with the game’s handling of Kairi, which is too bad, because I’ve honestly grown fond of her over my years of growing out of my dumb “I hate fictional girls for breaking up my OTPs” phase. especially her interactions with Lea were particularly fun, and I kind of wish there had been... you know, more.

that’s my main complaint, really. that there wasn’t more. the story we’re told almost feels like a summary, like we’re supposed to assume things about the relationships between characters that we’re not... you know, shown. that’s been a problem when it comes to Sora and Kairi for ages; that their relationship isn’t really shown, ever, and Sora and Riku’s is explored much more. I feel more for Xion now than I did before, because with her you’re actually shown a lot of her internal conflicts and her hurt; while with Sora and Kairi, you’re just kind of supposed to assume that they care for each other a lot. probably based on the knowledge that he’s a boy and she’s a girl alone. “he was a boy, she was a girl... can I make it anymore obvious?”

the same can actually be said about the main antagonist, too. Xehanort. I get what was going on, but... I kind of wish there’d been more with him and Eraqus from their early days, before they had all their conflicts? you don’t really get to feel their conflicts so hard when the times before aren’t shown, like, at all. it would’ve been incredibly cool with a... you know, a prologue in a similar vein as KH2, where you get to play as Eraqus and explore your relationship with Xehanort before everything goes to shit. or adding an episode in the middle where you start following them for a while. it could’ve been done as a really cool parallel story thing, even more than their game of chess - which, don’t get me wrong, was really neat! I’ve always been a fan of chess symbolism, for whatever reason, and that was really cool! but there’s not a whole lot of substance to it, other than their fun, competitive spirit.

let’s just agree that KH3 has a lot of “tell, don’t show” problems. or, even worse, “assume, don’t show”. there’s not a whole lot of substance to the stories told in the game, because there’s still a lot of it missing, it feels like. I mean, the fact that Nomura rewrote the ending so many times (as he admits to in the preface to the artbook that was released with the Deluxe Edition) should probably hint to problems with coherent storytelling...

it is unfortunate, I must say. because I LOVE this game. gameplay alone was incredibly satisfying in ways I’ll get into later, but the way the story feels so.... you know, not finished, really does put down my joy a bit.

let’s not even talk about the epilogue. not yet. I’m so goddamned confused by Xigbar’s role in... well, everything. although I guess it makes a bit more sense for Xigbar to having been number II in the Organization now... knowing that he’s been around for centuries and is just here to wreak havoc, pretty much...

I’m all for the secret movie, though!!!! Sora’s finally going to Shibuya!!!!!! HELL YEA

anyway, got a bit off track. KH3 has a lot of storytelling issues, even with the disney worlds, which is real unfortunate because they’ve usually been pretty narratively solid. the developers’ obsession with exactly recreating some scenes really did pull down the quality of the storytelling, because the way they chose scenes to recreate didn’t consider the effects of the storytelling in the original movies... although recreating Let It Go with Sora, Donald and Goofy in it was an absolute power move and I’m still knocked on my ass from it.

anyway, the worlds with new stories - Big Hero 6, post-movie; Toy Story, in between 1 and 2; and Monsters Inc, post-movie - really were more narratively coherent, while the worlds following the original storylines - Tangled, Frozen and Pirates of the Caribbean - suffered from losing a lot of crucial scenes and (would you look at that!) relationship-building.

okay, but ENOUGH ON STORY CRITICISM! I think we can all agree that Nomura built himself too much to work with and may have gone a bit overboard with it, but honestly, overall? it was still pretty damn good! not entirely solid, but satisfying enough and emotionally engaging that I definitely enjoyed it as an experience! and the reunions of the Sea Salt and Wayfinder Trios brought me to tears for solid minutes at a time!! I’ve been very emotionally engaged in these kids’ specific storylines and their conclusions were more than I could have hoped for!

and like I already said, playing the game itself was THE most satisfying experience I’ve had in AGES! the game itself is so smooth, and just the fact that transitions from cutscene to gameplay were done SEAMLESSLY is enough to make me cry out of joy!

fight systems? great!! I love the way situation commands and such were handled, I love the drive forms connected to the keyblades themselves, I loved the boss fight patterns!

graphics? AMAZING!!! I had to stop and stare at stuff all the time, cry at the beauty of the different worlds, marvel over textures and lighting in different places, and WATER PHYSICS!!!! the game is so goddamned beautiful I can’t stop thinking about how amazing it all was, how many different kinds of scenery they handled and how well they did that! snow physics in Arendelle had me crying, lighting in Kingdom of Corona made me shout with glee, textures in the Caribbean made my jaw drop! underwater levels didn’t even suck!

minigames? honestly? I loved them. cooking is amazing fun (although I kinda suck majorly at cracking eggs), the 100 Acre Woods minigames may have been the same minigame rehashed twice but they were different enough to be fun - plus they’re only really necessary for farming for ingredients, which is pretty cool, sailing in the Caribbean was honestly fun, and the goddamned Verum Rex in Toy Box... *chef kiss* I LOVE it. I know lots of people dislike the multitude of minigames in KH games, and I do get it when it comes to sledding - the one I consistently had the most trouble with - but honestly? I don’t hate a single one of them!

lucky emblems? well. I haven’t really tried to discover all of them yet, but I have had the problem of a character going “look! a lucky emblem!” and me just not being able to find it anywhere a couple times. the concept of taking photographs is itself great, though!

and music? Yoko Shimomura is goddamned DELIVERING, again. the music is so beautiful in KH3, and the opening (with Skrillex) and ending themes by Utada Hikaru were great, as usual. I’ve cried to these songs more than I can count.

so, SUMMARY? the story has kinda gone out of Nomura’s hands, and storywise I still find KH2 to be the best at both telling a story and engaging you in it; but gameplaywise, the series has grown so much since the first game that I barely can’t believe I’ve lived to see the growth of the series as a whole? it’s kind of an amazing feeling knowing you’ve grown with a series like this, and I’m thankful for having been born the time I did so that I got to experience it! KH will always have a special place in my heart, and I will surely keep following this series to see where Nomura is taking it!