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Dream Drop Distance: First Impressions

AnimeHat

Humming Swordsman
Joined
Jun 21, 2012
Location
Arkansas, US
Before I start, I just want to say that this is not a review of the game. These are my impressions after playing the game for a couple of days.

I pre-ordered KH Dream Drop Distance and I was so excited to play it, I opened the box and started playing it right there in the car on the way home. I watched the opening cutscene (beautiful visuals and music, by the way) and went straight to playing the game. I'll be addressing the game in the order I went through it.

So far, I've completed four out of seven worlds. The first world is Traverse Town. If you've played most of the KH games, then you would probably let out a moan at hearing that you have to go to Traverse Town again. But I was nicely surprised by the changes brought to it, all for the good. You won't find any of the characters included in previous versions of TT (with the exception of Moogle). They've all been replaced with The World Ends With You characters, a refreshing change. The map has also been revamped. You still have your three main districts of the town, but completely new areas have been added as well. New structural elements have also been added to old areas to compensate for Flowmotion.

I absolutely loved the combat in this game. They took everything gamers loved about Birth By Sleep and put it into this game, with some extra abilities included. Your good old command prompt is back (I mean like the reload deck, not the stupid "attack" "magic" "item" list), but the deck styles ("fever rush," "fire storm," etc.) are no longer there. Friendly Dream Eaters called Spirits fight alongside you. Surprisingly, Spirits are a lot like Pokemon. You can nurture them and they grow in level when you take them into combat. When you link with them, they will aid you in battle (in Sora's case) or enhance the strength of your attacks for a short period of time (in Riku's case).

Flowmotion is a completely new way to navigate the environment, and it works sort of like parkour. You can grind on rails, jump of walls, spin around street lamps, and even attack enemies right as you jump off of a wall. The best thing is that each map is designed to work with it, making it even better. If previous KH games had flowmotion, they would be awesome.

The Drop Gauge seems awkward at first, but it actually falls a lot slower than I expected it to. Of course, the rate at which it falls can be lowered or increased. You might be unlucky and Drop in the middle of a boss battle, whereas you will have to start the battle over again when you Drop. Fortunately, there are items you can pick up or buy throughout the game called "Drop-me-not"s that will restore your gauge and reset the Drop rate. You get use to it after awhile. You can even use the Drop points you pick up by defeating enemies on one side to give you bonuses on the other side such as attack/defense/magic enhancement or slow down the Drop rate. You can even get munny and treasure.

And this is all from experiencing Traverse Town. In between now and then I have also completed La Cite Des Cloches (Hunchback of Notre Dame), The Grid (Tron Legacy), and Prankster's Paradise (Pinocchio). I'm currently in the Country of Musketeers as both Sora and Riku. I found the boss battles to be challenging, but not difficult. The only one I had trouble with was Rinzler (The Grid). It's both hard and frustrating, and I was only playing on Standard. I was glad to have that battle over with.

So far, I think it's an excellent game. I can't wait to finish it. If you have also played the game, share your thoughts here.

EDIT: FINAL IMPRESSIONS
(The following may contain spoilers)

I really loved the game. I've beaten it on Standard and I've just started Proud Mode. I think the gameplay and creative storytelling (which we had big expectations for, seeing as how it would fill in some of the "blank points" in the series thus far) were awesome. I also think that it's one of the most difficult games in the series. Some people say the bosses were easy. Well, yeah, for the first four worlds. But after that, it got pretty brutal. I had lots of trouble with Spellican, Xemnas, and don't even get me started on Ansem.

I also like how this game showed a darker side to Sora, one that we thought would never be exposed. I mean, by the end of the game, Sora is still his usual, cheerful self, but during the game (especially in the world that never was), Sora is bombarded by some pretty dark influences. His heart is even submerged in darkness for a short time and Riku has to bail him out. I also thought that this game would give Ventus, Terra, and Aqua some closure, but I guess that'll wait until KH III. Speaking of which, Number III has also been confirmed. If you unlocked the secret message, it pretty much spells out that the next game will be KH III, what we've been waiting for.

The only thing left to do is bide our time and wait for KH III. Square Enix, you've made an absolutely awesome Kingdom Hearts game. I salute you.
 
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Garo

Boy Wonder
Joined
Jun 22, 2011
Location
Behind you
I just started the Three Musketeers world and I have been enjoying the game considerably. Features I didn't think I would like I have come to appreciate - particularly the Drop system, which adds an interesting and exciting sense of urgency to typical hack-and-slash-through-the-worlds gameplay. I'll post my full thoughts when I finish, but I've greatly enjoyed the game so far.
 

Ventus

Mad haters lmao
Joined
May 26, 2010
Location
Akkala
Gender
Hylian Champion
Sora fails the MoM and Riku passes, therefore, I hate KH3D.

No but seriously, I hate the plot and I wish Riku would explode. Everything else about the game is completely solid. People complain about how derpy Sora is, but that's still part of who he is at heart. Was Sora ever relatively serious in the series, aside from when fighting Xemnas? Nope, don't think so!
 

JuicieJ

SHOW ME YA MOVES!
Joined
Jan 10, 2011
Location
On the midnight Spirit Train going anywhere
I'm quite impressed with it. The controls are tight, the combat is some of the best in the series, and the Flowmotion is pure bliss. I'm mixed on the drop system -- it's pretty annoying to drop during the middle of a battle -- but it's a pretty cool way of telling two side-by-side storylines. I'll have to get further to truly expand on what the game does well and what it doesn't do well, but overall this is shaping up to be the best KH experience in quite some time. It's no KHIII, but it's the closest we've ever had to it without a doubt. There are most certainly some features from this game that should be carried over into III. It's just been that good.
 
Joined
Jul 18, 2012
How far are you? If you haven't reached the last world, and you think the bosses are hard... oh boy, do you have another thing coming.

Here's a basic +/- list of what I thought:

+ Drop system. I actually was surprised by how much I liked it, especially once I figured out exactly how the bonus system works. The Forecast idea is really interesting and I want to try to exploit it a bit more on playthroughs of tougher difficulties. Someone in this thread mentioned something about urgency, and it's totally true. The only annoying part was Dropping in the middle of a boss battle - I understand that to some extent that NEEDS to happen to push you to play at your best, but at the same time I didn't really like working really hard to get really far in a world in one shot, only to have to start the boss over.
+ World choice. I kind of thought the two Mickey worlds thing was redundant, but Symphony of Sorcery (Fantasia) is now officially my new favorite level in the entire franchise. So much nostalgia.
+ Level design. This game was surprisingly full of some pretty nicely-built levels. Each level's "gimmick" is nicely executed and there's a good degree of free-roaming exploration and linear trail-following. Secrets exist, but aren't really anything too special, especially since...
- Flowmotion completely killed any "challenge" to the level design. Want to try to get somewhere? Just wall-jump up the side of that building and you can probably reach it. Flowmotion also revealed the only real major flaws in the level design, such as objects you can't jump onto/over, even though it looks like you should be able to.
+ Flowmotion combat, however, was godly and probably my favorite thing about this game. Bosses teleport all over the map, and whatever bro, it's cool, because I can rush my way on over in a matter of seconds in most cases - usually with a flurry of attacks to announce my arrival.
+ Combat in general was pretty nice. Avoiding bosses' attacks while getting in position to deliver combos of your own was really satisfying, just like the previous games. It feels pretty much just like the console games in this department.
- The camera was horrendous, however, and made it unnecessarily difficult to keep track of some bosses, since it tended to point at the edge of the arena instead of at the boss. If there weren't a map on the touch screen, this would have really pissed me off, but it was usually pretty easy to get your bearings again by glancing down at the second screen.
+ Reality Shift was really fun. Took a while to get the hang of the Symphony of Sorcery variety (the sliding part), but I really enjoyed basically everything this offered. Great use of the touch screen that replaces Reaction Commands nicely. Still basically a QTE, but it felt more interactive.
- Dive Mode. It's basically an even less fun version of the Gummi Ship, and they shoehorned it into a couple bosses that would have been much cooler without it.
+ Bosses. This game has some pretty awesome boss fights. I found myself wishing there were a few more, but the ones that were there were all top-tier (apart from the aforementioned Dive Mode bosses).
+ Dream Eater skill trees were a cool idea, and a good alternative to equipment-based and level up progression.
- Dream Eater AI, on the other hand, was absolutely horrendous and might as well have not existed. I don't think my Dream Eaters ever actually gave me any meaningful help.
= Raising Dream Eaters. It was a nice feature, don't get me wrong, but I felt like it severely broke up the tempo of the game to have to force those "pet" minigames in to actually meaningfully build them up. I'd rather Affinity and so on be more heavily based on combat performance.
+ Playing as Riku.
+ Story. There's a lot of stuff from the previous games that you'll realize was pretty blatant foreshadowing once you finish this one. Either Nomura is a badass at improvisational storytelling or he really had everything planned out from the beginning.
 
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AnimeHat

Humming Swordsman
Joined
Jun 21, 2012
Location
Arkansas, US
Sora fails the MoM and Riku passes, therefore, I hate KH3D.

No but seriously, I hate the plot and I wish Riku would explode. Everything else about the game is completely solid. People complain about how derpy Sora is, but that's still part of who he is at heart. Was Sora ever relatively serious in the series, aside from when fighting Xemnas? Nope, don't think so!
It's called "spoiler alert," Van. Just sayin'. But seriously, I also think the bosses in this game are hard. I also think that the level you are required to be at in order to stand a chance in each world is rather high. I mean, the combat level of Traverse Town is 6. The next world is 12? That's double the first world, and leveling up in this game is a long and weary process. I think Square Enix is kind of overestimating the player's abilities.
 

Ventus

Mad haters lmao
Joined
May 26, 2010
Location
Akkala
Gender
Hylian Champion
It's called "spoiler alert," Van. Just sayin'. But seriously, I also think the bosses in this game are hard. I also think that the level you are required to be at in order to stand a chance in each world is rather high. I mean, the combat level of Traverse Town is 6. The next world is 12? That's double the first world, and leveling up in this game is a long and weary process. I think Square Enix is kind of overestimating the player's abilities.

I'm sorry, I just have to say things...like Kairi getting Keyblade Training being the bulk of the 'secret' ending and stuffs (we kinda already knew she'd be trained eventually; she didn't get a Keyblade in KH2 for no reason haha).

Anywho, I absolutely loved the bosses. If there's anything that REALLY makes me mad, though, it is this:

The lack of command melding and leveling up commands. The previous KH game, Re:Coded, had the perfect idea behind melding and leveling up commands. Sure, the Bonus! thing was far too common (it occurred anytime and everytime you melded), but leveling up your commands to make said commands stronger outside of Sora's base stats? Absolutely amazing and the way to go, IMO. In KH3D, though, if you're not using Shadowbreaker among other top tier skills, you're doing it wrong for whatever reason.

I honestly hate how you have to level up your dream eaters to get certain commands. I miss the whole "mix and match" features behind BBS and Re:Coded's commands :/
 
Joined
Jan 1, 2012
I have around 4:36 on the clock so far. My impressions are that this game is absolutely fantastic. I know it may be a bit early to say so, but this is shaping up to be my favorite game ever. The gameplay is phenomenal. Flick Rush is a blast. Everything's a blast, really. I'm trying to nab all the chests in Traverse Town. I'm going to be playing so many consecutive playthroughs of this game.
 

Garo

Boy Wonder
Joined
Jun 22, 2011
Location
Behind you
Credits just rolled - be warned, the entire ending sequence is like an hour long, and they toss boss fights in there where you expect the game to finally have winded down.

At any rate - this was a stellar game and a very admirable entry into the Kingdom Hearts franchise. That said, it didn't quite reach the heights of Kingdom Hearts 1, 2, or Birth By Sleep, but it is easily the best title outside of those three. I'm going to follow suit with Lex and do a short pro/con list before getting to bed, as it's quite late.

+ Flowmotion. I love it so much that when I went back to play Kingdom Hearts 2 yesterday I found myself trying to bounce off walls. It's so fluid and natural that you'll wonder how you'll ever play a Kingdom Hearts game without it.

+ Drop system. Annoying at first, but it eventually became a very cool mechanic to keep track of - as I said earlier, it adds a sense of urgency to your gameplay that drives you to really push out as much damage as you can and get as many DP so you can get as many bonuses as you can for your next Drop. It's exciting and really engaging, even when it sucks to drop mid-boss fight - but hey, should have used a Drop-Me-Not!

+ Level design. Top notch as always, really, but there were a few standouts - I particularly enjoyed both the new rendition of TWTNW, as well as...

+ Symphony of Sorcery. Just oh my god. Easily my favorite level in a video game ever.

+ Bosses! I must say, while I found most combat very easy (I played on Standard; Proud mode will come later), the bosses were a very welcome challenge while rarely feeling unfair (with the notable exception of Ansem 2, which was more a battle of "ENDURE MY UNAVOIDABLE DAMAGE!!!!" than "Avoid my attacks!").

+ Story. I really dug the story of this installment and how well it was told, with the Drop system providing some neat parallels.

+ Riku. Yes, Riku! Riku is one of my favorite characters in the series, and it's nice to see him get a spotlight - by the end, I felt more attached to him than Sora. Sora in this game felt more relegated to Ventus' status of "I'm just here to make friends!" rather than "I'm on a mission from God Yen Sid".

- Spirits. Yeah, I'll get flak for this, but I did not care for the Spirits system. Nintendogs-esque minigames in order to gain Link Points to gain abilities needed for my character? No thank you. I missed the personality of Donald and Goofy; but even without them, the Spirits system replaced one of my favorite parts of Birth By Sleep - command melding! It made for an interesting combat system where you had to constantly upgrade your deck and make new combinations. But in KH3D, it was "load it up with the best commands when you find them/get them from Ability Link". Little experimentation, which was disappointing.

- Control quirks. Often when using Flowmotion, Sora/Riku will fly off in a random direction, and since it's Flowmotion, you go very far off course really quickly. In addition, things felt cramped on the small 3DS screen, and with so much going on at the same time, there were a few issues with working out exactly what was happening in combat - I died a few times due to hindered situational awareness due to too much crap on my screen at once. A moderate frustration, but it didn't detract too much from the overall experience.
 

HyruleLove

Twilight Princess
Joined
May 9, 2011
Location
Puerto Rico
I am TOTALLY loving it! The drop system kinda makes it feel like Majoras Mask...you`re in a hurry to get as far as you can with Sora before you go back to Riku. Im gonna sort out my thoughts once I play it completely, but so far, Im LOVING it!
 

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