Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories GBA USA

[Angelo]

In all honesty, I have always been a Kingdom Hearts fan. There was something I loved from the first ever promo trailer of KH for the PS2 and I have got every incarnation of KH since its release. KH:CM worried me when I first saw pics of it. The game looked good for a GBA game and I was impressed with the video cutscenes, but it looked like SquareEnix were just useing old ideas and simply makeing a KH remake on the GBA to boost sales. This isnt the case!

The game starts of exactly where the PS2 version left off (yet for some reason, Sora and the crew dont seem to have caught up with Pluto and King.M's letter), with the hero, Sora and crew finding themselves at a place called Castle Oblivion. While not trying to spoil much of the story, Sora's memories creates the castle floors, however the higher Sora goes, the more he forgets and the more the stories in each of the KH levels differs from PS2 game. If you love how KH's story was told, you will love this. If you havent played the PS2 version then you can still play this - but I wouldnt recommend it. KH:CM is purely for those who have played the PS2 version and want to know what happens between the two PS2 games, square spend next to no time explaining what happened in past.

Gameplay wise, I'm split. The game's mechanics work well, the battle engine works like a cross over betwen a card collecting game and a Star Ocean style battle field. Down side to the game is that it is very repetive (so far, if the game is purely based on memories, then Im about 80% complete) - You Enter floor, story cutscene, enter level, get a card that lets you in turn get another card, repeat, boss battle, end of level and then another floor up etc. The game isnt boring however and the battles are interesting. Ultimatly if your still looking for a GBA game to put in your SP or DS I would say get this one - but again, only if you have played the PS2 version.

[Bojangle]

I've got this, not played much of it though, just done Traverse Town and moved into Halloween World.

I've not really enjoyed it 'that' much so far, it just doesn't grab me unfortunately.

It does look really nice though, and the battles are quite well implemented. When I heard it had cards in I groaned, but it works quite well thankfully.

[Angelo]

Again, I purely bought it because I wanted to see the next chapter in the KH story.

[SunLolly]

I finally had a go with this today and to be honest, im not impressed.

The battle system is slow and slugish. Im very dissapointed with the worlds. You can't explore them, you just run around in a bunch of square rooms looking for the next door. Even the crappy Sword of Mana is better than this guff >_<

I will give it another hour or so to see if it gets better. If not, then off to ebay it goes. Should be able to get about ?20+ for it.

I am a fan of the original but this is just sloppy. Only the super hardcore fanboys/fangirls will like this just because its from square and features FF characters.


Avoid and wait for KH2.


Very dissapointing.

[Dogg Thang]

For anyone who has perservered with this game - does it get any better?

Dogg.

[pspfreak]

I eagerly awaited this game as I was a huge fan of the first one, got every weapon, beat it five times, got the awesome secret ending.... That kind of stuff. I am hugely dissapointed in this, It's gotta be square's worst outing since ff:crystal chronicles.
the card combat turns me off, the graphics aren't great(I was expecting golden sun calibur graphics), and the battles overall, are very slow and dull, not to mention messed up. I died at hades one time, and the next time, I beat him with near-full health. I've always been a huge fan of square, and I've got every one of their games, but this is not a greatest hits game.