#ts2 intro movie

[id-element0]

Bypassing TS2 intro movie

I honestly don't know who would need this but since I have it, I can also share. I was fixing/revamping my ReShade preset the other day and I said "Why don't I also try and install it for the sims 2 while I'm at it?" This reminded me that I still had to hit the space bar when the intro video came up. I realise a lot of people still handle it this way or just delete the movie file. Both ways are equally annoying to me so I decided to solve it. What I did was creating a half-second long blank movie in avi format and changing the extension. Why is it better than hitting the space bar or just deleting the file, you ask? Well, it's effortless. You don't have to do anything apart from replacing the original file. It also deals with the issue that comes with deleting the file, that of the game hanging for a moment after the logo because it's searching for a file that doesn't exist.

No screenshot because there's nothing to show. The transition from EA logo to loading screen is quite seamless with a momentary black screen. So for anyone interested, here it is. Also, my first sims 2 upload - yay, I guess.

- INSTALLATION -

You need to be able to see file extensions in your file manager. Search for how to enable it according to your OS if you cannot see file extensions.

For Starter Pack -> “C:\Program Files (x86)\The Sims 2 Starter Pack\Double Deluxe\Base\TSData\Res\Movies\”

For Origin/EA App -> "C:\Program Files (x86)\Origin Games\The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection\Double Deluxe\Base\TSData\Res\Movies\"

For Retail/Disc -> "C:\Program Files (x86)\EA GAMES\The Sims 2\TSData\Res\Movies\"

Find the file that says intro_eng_audio.movie and change the extension part 'movie' into something like 'bak'. This is just for precaution if you want it back again. If you already deleted it then just download mine.

- DOWNLOAD -

:: MEDIAFIRE | SFS ::

And now the technical details for the nerds.

The video codec EA uses is Electronic Arts Madcow Video or in short 'mad'. It is allowed to be decoded but not encoded. Meaning you can watch media created with this codec but cannot create media with it. I know the game can load media encoded with AVI so I decided to create an empty avi file and just change the extension to 'movie'. It turns out that as long as the name is the same, the game doesn't care the codec is different.

So in theory you can use this file to replace ealogo_audio.movie as well. If the file in the Base folder doesn't work try ..\TSData\Res\Movies\ in your latest pack. For UC and Starter Pack it would be SP9; for disc version it would be whatever you installed last.

[baticeer-sims]

A couple of experiments with TS2 loading time

I wanted to test out some things I've commonly heard around the Sims 2 community as ways to affect your load times. Disclaimer: I have a powerful gaming computer so my game loads fast anyways, so there might be small differences that I won't notice that are more obvious on other machines. I don't know how much of this generalizes to everyone's computer! I run the UC with Sims2RPC as my launcher on Windows 11.

My method: I loaded the game and timed how long it took the game to load from the end of the intro movie, to the neighborhood selection screen. I did it 5 times in a row for each different thing I tested and averaged out the times, just to reduce variance as much as I could.

Test #1 - Control

First I just loaded my game with my downloads folder the way it is right now (8.2 GB of pretty disorganized CC) to get a baseline value. Result: 55 seconds average

Test #2 - Do special characters affect loading times?

I used a bulk file renaming program to replace the letter "S" in every filename in my entire downloads folder, with š - if you can't see that character it's an S with an accent mark on it. (I picked S because it's one of the most common letters in English and it's also in some words common in cc filenames like "sims" and "mesh" so I thought it'd be one where I'm hitting almost every file even if I only replace one character.)

Result: 55 seconds average Conclusion: This one surprised me because it's such a piece of repeated common knowledge around the TS2 community, but I think it's unlikely that special characters affect loading times? If nothing changed from turning the vast majority of my CC from files that don't have special characters into files that do.

Test #3 - Do non-CC files in your downloads folder affect loading times?

I remember hearing you shouldn't keep preview pics in your downloads folder, because it'll slow down the game, and I was confused because I always thought it won't even try to read non-.package files at all. So to test this one, I temporarily moved 17.5 GB of photos, videos, and audio files from elsewhere on my hard drive, into my sims downloads folder.

Result: 55 seconds average Conclusion: If tripling the size of my download folder didn't change load time at all when the new files were all non-sims files, I think it's almost certainly fine to keep preview pictures (or zipped-up backups of something you don't want to use all the time, or whatever) in with your CC if it helps you keep track of your downloads.

Test #4 - Merging your CC

I knew this one was going to actually make a difference because I've directly experienced it before (on an older, worse computer where my load times were longer) but I thought I'd give it a go anyways just to see how much difference it made for me. So I merged some of my CC subfolders I knew would be the biggest (clothes, buy mode objects, & hairs) with CC Merger. According to the logs, it went from 4,308 individual files to 148 merged files.

Result: 46.5 seconds average Conclusion: This definitely makes a difference but it will make a lot more of one for people who already have long load times. For someone like me it might not be worth the amount of time it would take to be bundling every little thing I download lol.

A few other things I've heard that I couldn't think of an easy way to test

1- "Default replacements don't affect your load times as much as if you had a custom version of the same thing" - It feels to me like this doesn't make sense because surely the game still just has to read the files but I have no clue how to test this, I'm not about to spend hours gathering up the custom versions of all my defaults just to try it.

2- "The game will load faster if you have shorter file paths / fewer subfolders within the download folder" - I heard of and started doing this long enough ago that all my downloads are already only one or two subfolders deep already. I couldn't think of a quick way to make my folder structure a lot more complicated lol, and I think even if I found out this wasn't true I wouldn't change how I organize my downloads, so I didn't spend time on it.

Everyone draw whatever conclusions you want from this post, I'm not telling you to change how you organize your CC or anything, just wanted to share what I found is true for me specifically, I would be interested to hear other people who have longer load times repeating my tests and see if you get the same results, or to hear people who know more about the programming side of this weigh in, maybe something like the special characters is dependent on your computer or operating system!

[bearpillowmonster]

D23 Haul

Eh. No Kingdom Hearts. No Big Hero 6, that would've made everything worth it but I feel like lately companies have been showing too much too early. Here's Incredibles 3...it's happening, dunno what it's going to be, when or anything else but it's coming! Frozen 3, concept art, 3 years from now...which is so far away that I wouldn't even plan on getting people's hopes up, look at Beyond the Spiderverse, where is that? I don't mind waiting for it but they set that original date too soon, it wasn't just the strike, it was that they weren't even ready for it to begin with, it was a pipe dream and only makes people more wary when something gets delayed. I thought we learned this from CP2077 but apparently nobody learns anything.

On a positive note, I'll allow the Lilo and Stitch one even though Detective Pikachu set the standard for those designs but it had a cool intro. Tron at least had a cool laser and Nine Inch Nails (though no actual music reveal) Zootopia and Moana did great. Snow White actually got a trailer. Toy Story told us what it was about (even though it sounds tacky and seems in part with the og TS2 concept)

The parks. Yeah, we're gonna have a Lion King Land and an Encanto Land and a Frozen Land and a Villain Land- "Well, when is that?" Uh, yeah, left on read, so we have pictures! "That's concept art. That's not going to be how it'll look." Come back to me when you have models or animatronics and did you really just tell us that LK Land was based on the 1994 movie and show us concept art for the 2019 one? AND it's just Splash Mountain but with Pride Rock? You've had since 1994 to think something up and that's it?

Look at all the hotel concept arts to what they ended up being. So you're telling me that you won't (not 'can't', 'won't') spring for a new dragon for Fantasmic (which is literally on the poster for it) but you'll make a whole side-park for villains and add a dragon. And the walking mat...yeah, that's cool technology but that's all you're showing. You didn't incorporate it into anything. "Yeah, we're going to use this in the future...for something!" It's all tentative.

Well, what about the games? They had a big presentation set out after announcing that they wanted to get back into games. The stream actually taking place within Fortnite. They had an Epic Mickey panel celebrating its remaster and original release. They have all these Marvel games in the works, Kingdom Hearts (of course) and rumors that the Disney Afternoon cast will join in Fortnite, a vague Epic Games collaboration announced earlier in the year. So what did we get? I'll start a bingo card...Oh...it started a half hour later than scheduled. Ok? Oh, it has the leaders with Dave Filoni, Pete Docter, Kevin Feige and Jennifer Lee and they each have something to announce. Ok, Disney Villains in Fortnite. More concept art. Ok? The Incredibles in Fortnite. Ok, a picture. IG-11 with Baby Yoda backpack and Moff Gideon coming next week. Ok, this is all Fortnite, maybe they'll get that out of the way first. A bunch of Marvel cast which was inevitable as they have most in there already, ok. Black. Huh? Black? Oh, it's over, they didn't say bye, they didn't say anything else, just DONE, mic drop. You needed a whole event and panel that was delayed...for some skins?

I thought they were holding back throughout the year to save stuff for the game event but no, they were actually just trying to scrape the barrel to make stuff for it, maybe that's why they delayed it, they realized that they didn't have anything and had to try to get everybody that got applause on stage. They didn't seem to know what they were doing, like these people were thrown in, quickly briefed to add a quick word before grab the wheel and show it. It reminded me of trying to stretch out my powerpoint in college to meet the 5 minute runtime.

Show me stuff, sure, there was no shortage overall but I feel like concept -> production -> marketing -> release should be how it goes but lately it's all been combined with production taking a backseat and release still on the GPS. Show me earlier stuff at an event like D23 but make it past the concept stage first, show me production!

They design it to generate hype so much before the fact that by the time it actually releases, you feel like you've seen everything and nothing is no longer a surprise. "Oh yeah, Incredibles 3 is coming out. I could've expected that but now it's real and I heard about it 20 years ago." It's not just Disney, it's every corporation, I see it with game shows. Oh...a title card...oh...CONCEPT ART. I love concept art but it's more something I like to see AFTER THE FACT as bonus of seeing 'we went from here to where we are now!' but I see the whole journey now, I don't need the after the fact, you're not investing in your future, you're investing in your now so that investors will see this, it's no secret, it's not about the mainstream fans anymore that actually do most of the promoting for you and give it the returns. It's a bunch of rich people buying into other rich people and the audience just happens to be outside fueling it.

[murfeelee]

Weekend Replies

I have not simmed in like a good three or so weeks. My UNI schedule is really strange this time around, and I still need to find my rhythm. But midterms are almost around the corner, and usually after that things seem to slow the eff down. I know Spring Break’s coming up next month I think - thank god.

So let me just reply to all these lovely comments while I still have the chance. :P

It’s effing long, since I'm backed up, so I put them under the cut.

cavernsofdarkness replied to your post“TS2 to TS3 - Egyptomania!”

Wcif the sheer shoulder pieces on the female female sim in the first  picture?              

All of Naevertiti’s CC is listed in this post here.

witchzenka replied to your photo “witchzenka reblogged your post and added:  Is that book a computer?!...”

You are the BEST!                

I’m really not, but thank you! :D

willky12 replied to your photo “witchzenka reblogged your post and added:  Is that book a computer?!...”

Couldn't agree more, the book laptop is one of the best pieces of cc I have ;)                

Oh, Luna, why did you have to go!?

my-simension replied to your photoset “Pietut and the Philosopher’s Stone  CAPTIONS AS TEXT  - One day while...”

lol@ your thoughts. xD                

I’m a frikkin idiot and therapy did nothing but make me realize just how crazy I really am.

willky12 replied to your photoset “Pietut and the Philosopher’s Stone  CAPTIONS AS TEXT  - One day while...”                               

fist bump Pietut ;D                

The animations they do on the Philosopher’s Stone are really cute. I was terrified cuz I couldn't remember if I had installed any No Death by Philosophers Stone mods, so he couldn't get killed if the Stone turned HIM into gold rather than the mummitomium. Thank god it didn’t, or I’d’ve been PISSED. 

willky12 replied to your photoset “Pietut and the Philosopher’s Stone  CAPTIONS AS TEXT  - One day while...”                                

I didn't see that radio either :P                

DANGIT, @willky12​! AVERT YOUR FREAKING EYES! I forgot to look for medieval radio CC and that was the most inconspicuous one I had. :P

simblu replied to your photoset “Pietut and the Philosopher’s Stone  CAPTIONS AS TEXT  - One day while...”                                

Not "Pfft"..Ptah.                

O_O TOUCHE~~~! :D

kittythesnowcat replied to your photoset “Pietut and the Philosopher’s Stone  CAPTIONS AS TEXT  - One day while...”                                

walk like an egyptian *sing*                

God I remember back when everyone (read: me) was doing that walk-dance-jig.

declarations-of-drama replied to your photoset“Pietut and the Philosopher’s Stone  CAPTIONS AS TEXT  - One day while...”                               

But. . . . How. . . . ??? Is The Pantheon so easily impressed with a little flattery like that? I love this story!!! (Skips back cos I just noticed I missed some!)                

The Pantheon was drunk on sacred beer at the time -- they were raining down blessings all over Al Simhara that day.                                                                 

declarations-of-drama replied to your photoset “Goddess Most High Thou art the Mistress of Jubilation, the Queen of...”                                

Beautiful pictures! And I love the headpiece you've made :) Awesome stuff!!!!!                

Thank you!!! I had a lot of fun, and I hope it inspires other cc-makers to do more Egyptian content for World Adventures -- Wawa made a bunch of TS2 stuff that I didn’t convert (too lazy, out of time, etc), so I hope it sparks more interest.

simsdestroyer replied to your photoset “Goddess Most High Thou art the Mistress of Jubilation, the Queen of...”                               

I LOVE your gameplay, I wish I could have your skills as my own lol... Your game looks so very interesting and entertaining.                

Omg THANKS! :D Trust me: my game is effing slow and laggy and annoying and I need to scale back on how much CC I use but nope I’m an CC-addict and a CC-holic and I’m not effing going back to effing rehab!

nornities replied to your photoset “Goddess Most High Thou art the Mistress of Jubilation, the Queen of...”                               

This is so beautiful!                

Y’all are killing me with the compliments; thank you! Dang. Wow. It’s really all thanks to the CC creators listed, it really is. (Cuz lord knows EA can’t be arsed to do cultural content unless Katy Perry used it. >_>) 

divinekemetic replied to your photoset “Goddess Most High Thou art the Mistress of Jubilation, the Queen of...”                               

regarding your thoughts blabber: a lot of the female godesses were merged but hathor was more the goddess who danced, drank and partied, while isis (or aset in ancient egypt) was a mother and mistress of magic (as indicated by her various names). i thought i'd reply and add haha xD                

Add away! That’s why I linked to the articles on both Hathor and Isis, cuz Hathor’s cult is waaaaay older than Isis’, which really didn’t take off until the Romans got their greasy palms on it, so it gets confusing to determine exactly when Isis started absorbing the roles and functions and iconography of Hathor. Effin Romans.

willky12 replied to your photoset “Goddess Most High Thou art the Mistress of Jubilation, the Queen of...”                               

I love the way you put her outfit together <3                

It’s frikkin hard to find sheer outfits, lemme tell you. U_U Art-sims’ was the best one I had, so I just tweaked the multiplier and overlay so it was white and gold instead of blue, since the original is non-recolorable.                  

echoarborsims answered to your photo “Bang, Marry, or Kill: Disney Princes  I was organizing my downloads...”                       

100% agree about Beast! Not hot at all in human form. Also agree with Eric, 10/10 would bang.                

I am really excited to see the new Beauty & the Beast movie! Emma Watson’s gonna be Belle, and I have high hopes that she’ll do a good job -- a little young, IMO, but hey, Ariel was like 16. #SMDH

And the Beast looks hawt!

willky12 answered to your photo “Bang, Marry, or Kill: Disney Princes  I was organizing my downloads...”                       

None of the above :P                

Them’s be fightin’ words, yo!

Alright, spill the beans -- who’s your cartoon crush? >:)

declarations-of-drama answered to your photo “Bang, Marry, or Kill: Disney Princes  I was organizing my downloads...”                       

Hahaha That made me literally LOL! I agree with most of it, especially the part about John Smith’s ass. Give me Pongo any day over these nit-wits - he's my true prince :D                

O_O Are we thinking of the same Pongo here, or....?

I’m in. 10/10 would Bang, yup! XD (Balto’s hotter, IMO though.)

But if we’re gonna talk about full-on bestiality cuz clearly we need Jesus, then there’s no one more bang-worthy than MUFASA -- UNF! <3 TOTAL DILF!)

tencentsims replied to your post “As it is written, so shall it be Replied to!”        

Oh my God-- while building my Roman tomb I had the SAME THOUGHT about ALL OF THIS. I'm avoiding using CC and it is a NIGHTMARE trying to find fitting wall decor!! Ancient peoples of EVERY civ had beautiful decor on their walls! I know WA came chalk full of items but they could've been a bit less stingy with their clothes and decor, just like you said.                

I commend you for trying to play a culturally specific game with no CC. I really do. WA was great, but they didn’t go the distance at all.

hyperkaos replied to your post “As it is written, so shall it be Replied to!”           

Nods head vigorously in agreement with MJ comment (gods I miss that man) and btw, your historical knowledge is amazing! I think it was Tacitus who stated Cesar believed the Gauls were Barbarians, but of course they were, the Romans won!                

One of my professors is always saying: “Tacitus was NOT tacit”, cuz the man talked way too much dang crap about people. :P

The Romans won for a time, yes, and their legacy is indeed what this whole modern Western world order f*ckery is based on, but in the end it was the Gauls that beat them. They messed up when they let the Gauls be their mercs/soldiers, and then their Western emperors after the schism moved the seat of the empire to the East in Constantinople, leaving Rome-proper in the West to the descendants of people they had enslaved once. :P That was NOT a good idea. Same thing happened in China, too. I’m just waiting for Fuhrer Trump to build that wall. Let history repeat itself. The Great Wall, Hadrian’s Wall, the Berlin Wall, Trump’s Wall... Yep. You do that, Donald Duck. >_>

willky12 replied to your post “As it is written, so shall it be Replied to!”                

Blue has a mod over at the Asylum "No mascot Intro" blah blah, you'll find it :P                

I found it, yup -- thanks to everyone who sent me messages about that Mascot!

Happy Simming!

[bearpillowmonster]

Kingdom Hearts 3 Full Review

Here I am 6 years later and I've beaten Kingdom Hearts 3. Was it worth it? What did I think of it? This will be an extensive review. So bare with me because I'm going to cover almost every little detail however I'm going to try and keep it spoiler free in terms of story! (I'll nod to the people who finished it with vague comments as you already know what happens) I spent a lot of time on this review so it will work out to fully explain my thoughts on this game without hesitation, I don't want to hold back from criticism even though it's my favorite franchise and the most long awaited game for me.

I will say this to both people who haven't played the games and casual fans. DON'T COMPLAIN YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT HAPPENS IN THE STORY. The negligence of some of these reviews is appalling because they haven't played the past games. Square Enix has went out of their way to go and rerelease all of the games ebfore the release of this one, put up a summary video, put nods in the intro to the game. As well as put seperate summaries in the menu of the game, so I don't want to hear the whining, if you want to play it so bad, play the other games first, that's all there is to it. Yes it is confusing, but make an effort to understand it.

There are no more pesky text boxes like the other games, this is all cutscenes baby! So it may seem like a lot but think how many text box scenes were in the previous games and translate those into full cutscenes.

Let's talk about the menu. Yes, the menu. It's BRILLIANT. I love the transition from the past games, you look at the first two games, Sora with that fish in his mouth looking to the side, then the second with Sora turning slightly but with a sea salt ice cream, and now we have Sora turned all the way around with a paopu fruit. The way the music is presented is excellent, I couldn't get enough of it. In fact a lot of the music is great, both Utada songs are top notch despite me not originally seeing why she made those songs specifically, they make some sense now. Now the actual battle themes and stuff were instant classics for me in KH2, I would unintentionally hum some of the tunes, in this game I might have to get used to them though and familiarize myself. I'm sure if I heard the theme out in the open, I would recognize it though.

I worked my way to try each of the keyblades a decent amount (about one world each and that don't need unlocked through version exclusives and Ultima weapon yet but I never get ultima weapon anyway) The fun part about that is that each keyblade has a different ability and a different form so no more drives. I especially love using all of them in the Monsters world because it changes the color of Monster Sora.

I'm not going to talk about all of the worlds but just the ones revealed through trailers because I want you to experience them blindly or to their full capacity without the knowledge of what's ahead so I won't mention anything in any particular order either. I'm going to refer to the movie they are from and not the actual world name, to make it easier on you. Let's start with Pooh since that was the shortest. The minigames are just eh, I mean I love Pooh as a character and I like the idea that he's in the games but I've never really found his actual world all that because it's just minigames, I can't really bash it because that's what they did in the past games. Also at the end of Winnie the Pooh, why was that happening? Was something made to throw us off?

Now let's talk Twilight Town. I love Twilight Town, it is my favorite non-Disney world to explore in Kingdom Hearts 2 and when I saw we would return and see the characters we love, I got all excited. This Twilight Town however seems kind of condensed because it's just a section of it. You don't get to explore as much of Twilight Town as I would have liked but they do make references to it through the townspeople such as mentioning Seifer. There's a certain group of characters we saw a lack of but after the secret ending I'm starting to understand story-wise.

Frozen. We all saw it coming and I can say to you that it's not a rhythm based world. YAY. They do sing at times but you don't play those parts. I just think Frozen is ok as a movie so this world wasn't too hyped, I did like seeing Marshmallow though, that part is fun in fact any part you fight an actual Disney character I just adore. As for the actual landscape, it's different than I would have imagined, the heartless are interesting but there's no draw back to make me want to go back to that world. This, technically Pirates, and Tangled are the two world that just follow the movie plot, the others have their own new plot.

Toy Story. I have to say that I like the Toy Story 2 game and I really like the idea of exploring the Toy Story world, even just exploring Andy's house. I knew we weren't going to see the whole house like TS2 but it was still fun to see everything there as I remember it. Galaxy Toys is a new area though, pretty cool to play through because it's not hard to navigate, there are 3 floors and you go through all the stores, interact with objects, and get this really cool and interesting mini boss. There are these mech robot things that I've come to love and each color has a different ability, making it just that much more fun to play around in. I particulary like the purple one because it's the fastest but even when you're in a keyblade form the mech will change colors with you (usually a bluish green in my experience) but that was a cool little tidbit I noticed. The story just surprised me with how involved it became with it's characters especially Woody.

Pirates. This opens so nice, it begins with Sora being excited to be brought back and then we eventually get a mini-boss (there are quite a few compared to the other worlds) where you can ride the heartless, that's really cool. We get some ship gameplay where you can shoot down other ships and basically sail around all the islands, they aren't all required so exploration is pretty vast. A really cool idea is that with the shotlock command you can shoot on over to wherever it can lock onto, that way instead of making your way all the way back to the ship then trying to find a way to climb back up it, you just use the shotlock and boom you're back!

In the Tangled world, it takes the time to show you some of its great design with Rapunzel pointing things out such as how nice the grass is and how when you use Aero on the dandelions, they fly all over the place, then you can splash in the water, it's her first time experiencing it but it's also a nod from the developers showing you the amount of work they put into it and it's well deserved.

Monsters Inc. I mentioned about how the forms change the color of your monster and I really adore that. You can actually go into Roz's place! There are some places that would be interesting to see but wouldn't do much for story, just be to explore so I can kind of see why they aren't in the game, same with Big Hero 6. This is where the railriding really comes into action and I must say is pretty fun. There is also a dive option when you get up to a certain height then it will have you free fall and you can press X to dive bomb, it's all over the place in this game but it's just another good addition.

Olympus. Not the Colessium, we saw that before. This is brand new ground and is quite a joy to explore, I would be disappointed if Greece didn't actually look like that. I beat it the first night I had the game and I've revisited multiple times for other content, this was essentially my first impression of the game as well as everyone elses and it delivers. This as well as Tangled have a town full of people. I love hearing the little conversations they have and even going around and interacting with them. There's a side mission to collect these Golden Herc dolls (I finished after the game) that reminds me of the odd jobs at the beginning of KH2 that I actually have come to love, however those were mandatory, these are optional.

The Gummi Ship system is awesome, I mean I don't see any multiplayer coming to this but it's fun. I like being able to customize my own gummi ships and unlock new parts to put on it. The only complaint I have with it is small and that's when you're creating a gummi ship, it's not always easy to know which way is up considering you can change all different angles, so you may end up building your gummi ship upside down if you don't pay attention when you start. I've saw this problem quite a bit in the community as well as experienced that mistake myself but it's nothing too major, can probably be fixed in a future patch to just have a little note pop up that says "This is the front". Big Hero 6 is the best world in my opinion. I love all the worlds in their own unique way but this has momentum. A lot of the worlds have their own original story but this one seems to use that to the best effect. This one has an atmosphere that is open and easy to navigate, it's all one big area. You can fly with Baymax during a certain part which I would have loved to do that all the time but then what would be the point in using your fly ability you get at the end of the game?

At a certain part at the end we see some of the heartless move slower, like the framerate is down. It does not affect your gameplay and the thing I'm talking about is only visible stuff, but once you reach that part you will understand why it's like that. Voice acting is pretty good, they didn't get all the same voice actors for some of the characters such as Buzz and Woody, Mike and Sully, etc but they got a pretty decent amount of the characters their original voice actors and I respect that. The ones that are standing in, do a really good job though to the point I had to actually listen to try and find faults that differ from the originals. Old man Xehanort also has a new voice actor, I mean nobody can beat Leonard Nimoy but this guy seems to do a different take on the way the character sounds so it might take some getting used to but it's nothing bad just different I guess. I think they should've given you more space in your camera because there's a whopping 90 hidden mickeys and 100 slots, so you better make those 10 extras count if you want to get that secret ending. (However you can delete pictures so I don't know if the hidden mickey still counts if you delete it but I wasn't risking it) If you try to take a picture of a character (mostly any character) they will pose or smile, I love that.

Kairi doesn't get enough. I'll be honest. We don't get enough Kairi, she was great in this game and we see her grow, in fact I'll argue we probably see her more than the other games but they could have given her more spotlight.

The final battle is interesting, I like how it turned out but I will say you take on a lot at once. I liked the change of pace, but at the very end with the final 4, I say you should have taken them one by one. I also expected a different order because (we all knew this was coming so it's not a spoiler) but I thought they were going to make us fight Xemnas and Ansem then Old Man Xehanort because if we beat Young Xehanort first then wouldn't they all disappear? I mean it does work out in a way that makes sense but I just would have liked that way too.

Also aging, we can see visible changes to Sora, Kairi, and Riku from age but what about the rest? Will it just continue like nothing ever went wrong or…I mean they left a few things open for future games but don’t think they ended it on a cliffhanger to where you feel cheated in any way. It’s not like that, it still makes you want to play future games without cheating you of the full experience. I know that’s a concern for some people. Critical mode doesn’t make an appearance but that’s fine, if they end up releasing it in a patch or something I might play it but it’s nothing bad, just some people complain about it and say that they left it out on purpose for DLC but I highly doubt that and even if they do put it in a DLC be rest assured that won’t be the only thing. I don’t know Square Enix to cheat fans, you get what you pay for and DLC is a new avenue for KH if it decides to go that way, if it does I’ll be there for it but I think it’s fine without it. Look at FFXV for example, they put out full episodes based on the side characters with new gameplay, story, and various weapons and skins, I’d say that’s a pretty good deal and if I get far enough in the game I might get it and I’m not one who buys DLC at all unless it comes with the deluxe edition. So stop complaining about that, you don’t know what will come of this game.

I love the recovery command, I never used it in the older games (inexperienced noob) but this is more or less my first experience getting strategic. As well as the kupo coin where you get one last shot after a fatal blow. I can't tell if I actually got good at the game or it's just that easy but because of that Kupo Coin, I only actually died once or twice.

I cried. Once (before all the soras ;)) and of course at the end and even just thinking about the end afterwards. They throw back to one of the most well known gameplay parts in KH2 and in my opinion made it even better. Goofy is the smartest one in this game, like I found myself surprised at how aware he was. I knew the Big Hero 6 keyblade would be my favorite the moment I saw it in the trailer, I was right, I played with it until the very end and upgraded it (The monsters keyblade is a close second along with the one you get from Classic Kingdom). However...the snowball is the most powerful weapon hands down.

Flowmotion is fixed, but the shimmer effect doesn't need to exist. The sparklies that indicate that you just hold the control stick in that direction and they'll parkour it wasn't always as functional as you might like, I found myself just jumping my way up whatever villain had it some of the time, but again it's no big deal, it gives you that freedom to do whatever you want.

The attraction flows are fun but what threw me off is that you get more or less all of them from the start, you don't progressively unlock them. This led me to think that they will get repetitive but no they really weren't, I ended up skipping some of the events from time to time just to challenge myself but I never found myself bored with playing with any of them. I will say that once the command pops up, there can be another one above it and there's a time limit for each of them, I actually didn't know that you can choose between reaction commands (using L2) until after I finished it...so that happened. As well as learning that you can change keyblades on the fly just using the D-Pad.

My favorite attraction is either the teacups or the Buzz Lightyear blasters because the train is awesome but you only get to use it in certain parts of the game. The worst one is probably the carousel in my opinion just because it's more rhythm based and overall doesn't seem to do much damage. Some of the finishers get stuck or caught and I think that's a little bit of a problem, like the Pegasus chariot that you get with the Hero's Origin keyblade; I wish you could actually control that rather than Pegasus doing whatever and you just press X but there's such a variety of them so there's bound to be a few that aren't as good.

This game reminded me why Sora was originally my favorite character. You can look at him as naive but it's part of his character, I actually want to be friends with this dude in real life. All of them really but Sora has that vibe where he'll accept just about anything and find a way to work through it. You can play as a few of the characters and they all feel different to me, I like the subtle differences in gameplay but having the same core, it's very fun which makes me wish there was more of us playing as them.

How does it stack up versus the rest of the games? Well it's hard for me to say because I love them all, KH2 is my favorite game of all time and this is actually giving it a run for it's money. I do like this better than KH1 though (KH1 is my second favorite KH game so it's better than the rest too)

The graphics are impeccable, like I literally can't say they could have made this look any better, even going farther into the game it almost looks better than the rest (given there are more higher quality cutscenes such as the end of the Disney worlds just because of their importance) I was a bit worried about a few of the characters from the trailers such as Xemnas and Young Xehanort. In the earlier trailers they looked just eh but in the actual game they look way way better. Mickey even has fuzz on the top of his head but just by the secret ending alone, I was blown away by how real it looked for a cartoonish styled game.

Speaking of the secret ending I mentioned earlier, it took a hot minute to realize what it meant exactly, until I found a post on tumblr (on reddit too) about it. I won't link it or anything but just know there's an explanation/theory out there if you end up watching it. It makes me give it more credit for what it's worth.

Now the big part...how long was it? I won't tell you how long it took me to beat but I will say it logged more hours than any of the other games. I knew this was coming, because no matter how long this game was, I was going to want more, I'm actually going back to play through some stuff since it lets you keep your stats and puts you back before the final bit, so I will keep playing it and I will more than definitley play it again. I've played the beginning of the first game so many times, just haven't beaten it as much, same with KH2 (though I always end up farther in KH2 than 1) . I want to challenge myself, I want to take on hard mode, see how far it goes since I beat standard already, collect the secret reports, get ultima weapon (first time in a KH game if I can beat this stupid Frozen minigame). I kind of see where they changed some stuff from its original state, perhaps way back from the conception in 2013 but still to see the growth and adaption makes me feel really connected to it.

I will probably post updates to the review whenever the DLC comes out or once I get level 99, ultima keyblade, etc. so take what you will with it. It is currently up there with my favorite games of all time which isn’t so easy to get to.