Kingdom Hearts
It is only a small time frame away until the Kingdom Hearts 20th-anniversary event that is going to take place in Japan. We get to see what announcements that there will be for the future of Kingdom Hearts…hopefully. I wanted to take this time to just take a look back at my experience with the series of Kingdom Hearts. I remember first seeing the trailer of the first game and thinking it was a cool concept, combining Final Fantasy characters and Disney characters together. The keyblade was weird to me. What would the purpose of the weapon do? I thought as a kid that I would want it but would have to wait till Christmas because I usually had to wait till my birthday or Christmas for any new games. Luckily a few months after it came out I found a copy of Kingdom Hearts 1 at Hollywood video in order to rent. I asked my mom to rent it and then I was able to discover the world of Kingdom Hearts for the first time. I actually never finished it during the rental period.
I loved playing Kingdom Hearts and trying to get to the different worlds but I was only able to get to about the Aladdin world before I had to return it. Months later Wal Mart had a sale on Kingdom Hearts that made it around $29.99. I instantly took my shot. I told my parents about how it was half off and that the price probably wouldn’t last very long to try and convince them to get it before Christmas to save money. (I was a good manipulator when I wanted to be.) My dad instantly scoffed it off but my mom saw it was a Disney game and was fine with getting it.
It was around October 2022 when I finally owned a copy of Kingdom Hearts. School, homework, and life with friends took a backseat as I was sucked into the game of Kingdom Hearts and was able to play a good chunk of it before Halloween hit. I had to get ready for Halloween. I was about to start the Hollow Bastion world when my mom wanted me to come with her to get candy for trick or treaters. (My parents were procrastinators and it did not help that my siblings and I had a bit of a sweet tooth so we would sometimes get into the candy.) My friends and their parents were coming to our house for a Halloween party. We would be having homemade donuts and soda, along with finding the best neighborhoods to go trick or treating.
As a kid I had a terrible habit of leaving my console on when I wasn’t playing it especially when I was unable to find a save spot. When you first enter the world of Hollow Bastion there is no save spot there until you reach a certain cinematic. I just paused my game and went with my mom to buy candy. As I was away, my friend and his family made it to our house and in order to wait for us he discovered my game was paused. He decided to see how it played afterwards and hit the scene where Riku steals the Keyblade and Donald and Goofy.
I came back and my friend paused the game around the same place I was at before. As we were trick or treating he told me about how some character stole the weapon after he finished waiting for me. I wasn’t really paying too much attention and just was happy getting candy. I got back on to the game and holy heck I was miffed. I lost the Keyblade and Donald and Goofy were no longer in my party. I had a wooden sword that did no damage and I was not sure what happened or what my friend did.
I was able to eventually get the keyblade back and go through Hollow Bastion. After I beat the game I did something I don’t usually do in video games, I went back to that same save file that beat Ansem. I went to try and find all the treasure chests and level up to level 99. I learned fairly quickly I couldn’t find all the chests by myself. At this period of time, my family did not have a printer and I didn’t want to have to wait on such slow internet to hit and load a page, so I called that same friend I had from Halloween and asked him to print off the entire section of treasure chests and enemy drops so I could eventually create the Ultima Weapon. I went over to his house the next day and he gave me 30ish pieces of paper all for Kingdom Hearts. The beautiful glory days of cheatcc printed papers. I hit 100% completion and was so excited to get the final end credit scene due to it. It got me hyped up for Kingdom Hearts 2 even though I wasn’t sure when it would come out. I was pretty much always focused on only figuring things out from TV or from looking around at Hollywood Video or GameStop when I got to go.
Kingdom Hearts 2
Fast forward around 3 years and one of my friends and I were having a sleepover. Remember those days? When you would go to a friend’s or they would come over to your house and you just hang for a night and a day? I don’t do that anymore. Most of the time we hang it would be to play video games to be honest. My parents said they would let me get one game from GameStop for the sleepover. I entered the store and right on the front desk was a display of Kingdom Hearts 2 game copies that came out the day prior. I instantly did not ask my friend for any suggestions, grabbed the game and gave it to my mom to buy for us. Lets just say I did not do any sleeping that night. Ironically my friend who came over for the sleepover did not either.
I got sucked into the world of Kingdom Hearts 2 for the entire night. I showed up later to talk to my friend to see if he went to sleep… and he did not. He got suckered into Runescape and since the servers were not nearly as busy at night, he was up all night in World 1 buying and selling his entire inventory trying to get lots of good items and gold pieces. We were really cut from the same cloth. I actually spent time with him afterwards since I felt bad we didn’t do anything together the whole night.
Once my friend went home, I went back to the grind and beat Kingdom Hearts 2 in second all nighter. Just like Kingdom Hearts, I was not done with the game. This time though, I went way farther than I usually did with games. I 100%ed my initial playthrough of the game and then started a run through of Proud mode. I did a Keyblade Key only run and spent a bunch of time memorizing and mastering the game in order to beat Sephiroth on Proud mode. Kingdom Hearts 2 was the only game I cared enough to master. I still played other games at the time but I would always keep going back to Kingdom Hearts 2.
Kingdom Hearts 2 was not just a game to me. It was the first video game I actually recorded gameplay of. When you watch the video you will see that I also delved into gamesharks and action replays. There was so many interesting characters in the Kingdom Hearts series and only being able to play as Sora made me delve heavy into gameshark and coding. I wanted to understand how to manipulate it and what it did so I could play as Roxas, Riku, and Kairi. Heck you could blame Kingdom Hearts for being a big reason as to why I am a coder to this day. I learned so much trying to understand the inner working of game development and I wanted to be a game developer. That dream went long past as I grew older.
My Friends are My Power
Next on the list of games that impacted me in the Kingdom Hearts series is Kingdom Hearts Birth By Sleep. I was much more aware of the game industry and was actively saving money for when this game came out. I already had a PSP so I didn’t have to care about finding one to play the game. I will just say you should visit my editorial about the PSP to help see my thoughts on this game by itself. I don’t want to take the whole article discussing the entirety of the Kingdom Hearts games and their impact, I want to discuss the value of the series itself and what it means to me.
Sora is a huge influence on the feel of these games. He is constantly optimistic, friendly and always ready to help with open arms. It is great to see his character go from the kid who was lost and abandoned in Traverse town to the one who stands up for his friends against universal threats. Even though I was not a big fan of some of the story that was added in Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance, I loved and hated that the thing that turns Sora towards the darkness is his love for his friends. Sora was also big on giving multiple chances for change. Riku has turned towards the darkness multiple times in order to fulfil his own desires, whether it be to rescue Kairi, or to lead Sora to Organization XIII. Sora did not care either way.
Sora just wanted to spend more time with his friends and to be there for them when they needed him. Everyone who you encounter instantly falls in love with Sora’s personality. It makes sense since Sora has such a charismatic personality and it is a contagious mind set. He was even able to melt the stone heart of Leon that resulted in mushy speeches towards Sora. It was amazing to see characters that develop due to their interactions with Sora. In Kingdom Hearts 1 Donald and Goofy even give up their orders to follow the keyblade wielder in order to save Sora from Riku who was going to try and kill him with Sora’s own keyblade.
Sora by himself would not have been able to save the universe from all these threats from the Darkness. He had a lot of help in his journey to find his power as a strong Keyblade Wielder. I think my favorite example is his friendship with Hercules. In all the Disney worlds a lot of the importance of their story is more based on Sora and his understanding than on any of the overall plot itself. Sora goes to wanting to be a hero like Hercules but is actually the one who helps Hercules see the strength of the heart. In Kingdom Hearts 3 when Sora is meets Hercules, he is downtrodden and a bit depressed that he failed the Mark of Mastery exam. He was tasked to find the power of Awakening in order to help them find Aqua. Hercules was able to help Sora find his spark that set the stage for the rest of Kingdom Hearts 3. It came full circle. Sora helped Hercules find the strength of his heart, and Hercules was able to return the favor later on.
Sora is not actually my favorite character in Kingdom Hearts even though he was an extreme impact on my life. There is one more character that has pushed me to being the person who I am today. Riku was a character who gave into his darkness to accomplish what he thought were good deeds. He wanted to save Kairi, but couldn’t do it without the power of his inner darkness. He cultivated and assumed he mastered the power. Unfortunately, he couldn’t control the extent of the power as his darkness then lured the heartless Ansem into his heart that helped take the body of Riku over.
In Kingdom Hearts 2, Riku has given in completely to his darkness in order to protect Sora and got him to awaken by defeating Roxas. After Sora meets Riku again, Riku doesn’t think Sora would recognize him and wanted to keep his distance. Sora instantly is able to recognize Riku is not Ansem even though the body of Ansem has taken over the body of Riku fully. Seeing the face and the love that Sora has for Riku is enough for him to regain his own power and control the darkness within himself.
Just because Riku gave in to his darker tendencies, it doesn’t mean he isn’t worthy of having love in his life. Even though his first attempt and even his second attempt ended in failure, doesn’t mean he can’t control it. Riku’s story is a tale of someone who loses control of his life but is able to work through his problems and come back on top even becoming a Keyblade Master. His self control is ultimately what put him above Sora in the Mark of Mastery. Sora gave in to his dark tendencies in wanting to lose himself to protect his friends. He wasn’t used to it being a dark tendency and ultimately lost himself trying to figure it out on how to control it. Riku had to face it multiple times before being the one in control. Sora still needs to face it. Riku’s story is the one that I relate to more as he fails constantly but uses that failure as an avenue to find success. Sora was able to succeed through the help of his friends in every fight.
May Your Heart Be Your Guiding Key
Overall Kingdom Hearts is one of the most influential game series in my life and it has shaped me to be more accepting, and caring of other people. There are always hidden problems that people are dealing with. Don’t add to their darkness. Be a light to help them handle their darkness in order to help them stay in control. I love the dynamic of so many characters and moments in Kingdom Hearts. Sora and Riku is only one character story of many many others that are in this game series. Kingdom Hearts is a series about connections. Connecting to other people. Connecting to yourself. Connecting to your future. I would highly recommend playing this game series to all I meet. It is 100% worth your time and money in order to experience the rich story, characters, and gameplay that surrounds this series. We live in a period of time where you can experience almost all of the games in just one purchase. Kingdom Hearts All in One package.
You may not have the moments I had in playing this game, or even the experiences. Just know that there is a unique connection Kingdom Hearts has with its many fans. There is a reason Sora was the most voted character to appear in Super Smash Brothers. It was because everyone has a connection with Sora who plays this game and he is a huge icon for many of us. Especially for those of us that love crossover games, comics, movies, etc.
Kingdom Hearts 20th Anniversary Event is on April 10th in Japan. Find out about any announcements here on The Outerhaven!
