Board 8 > Rate the VG Story Day 80: Kingdom Hearts

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Todays game is the first game in the Kingdom Hearts series, Kingdom Hearts. How would you rate the story on a scale from 1-10?

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Previous Results:
Planescape: Torment - 9.83 (12 votes)
Omori - 9.67 (6 votes)
Outer Wilds - 9.6 (21 votes)
Nier Automata - 9.25 (31 votes)
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations - 9.18 (33 votes)
The House in Fata Morgana - 9.14 (7 votes)
13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim - 9.1 (14 votes)
Red Dead Redemption 2 - 9 (8 votes)
Steins;Gate - 8.94 (9 votes)
Persona 3 - 8.85 (18 votes)
Return of the Obra Dinn - 8.85 (10 votes)
Silent Hill 4: The Room - 8.83 (6 votes)
Umineko When They Cry - 8.82 (11 votes)
Xenogears - 8.71 (23 votes)
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty 8.67 (31 votes)
Metal Gear Solid - 8.67 (27 votes)
Final Fantasy Tactics - 8.65 (23 votes)
The Legend of Zelda: Majoras Mask - 8.56 (27 votes)
Disco Elysium - 8.56 (16 votes)
Undertale - 8.44 (41 votes)
What Remains of Edith Finch - 8.41 (19 votes)
Yakuza: Like a Dragon - 8.4 (5 votes)
Final Fantasy X - 8.38 (54 votes)
Mass Effect 2 - 8.38 (28 votes)
Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective 8.35 (18 votes)
Final Fantasy VII - 8.26 (36 votes)
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - 8.13 (39 votes)
The Last of Us - 8.13 (35 votes)
The Walking Dead Season 1 - 8.13 (20 votes)
Horizon: Zero Dawn - 8.06 (18 votes)
The Wolf Among Us - 8 (13 votes)
Xenoblade Chronicles - 7.94 (27 votes)
Spec Ops: The Line - 7.9 (17 votes)
Bloodborne - 7.88 (20 votes)
Life is Strange - 7.85 (31 votes)
Doki Doki Literature Club - 7.81 (25 votes)
Bioshock - 7.64 (23 votes)
Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors - 7.7 (30 votes)
Celeste - 7.62 (25 votes)
Skies of Arcadia - 7.62 (13 votes)
Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair - 7.46 (28 votes)
Mortal Kombat (2011) - 7.46 (13 votes)
Mass Effect - 7.35 (28 votes)
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves - 7.26 (29 votes)
Hotel Dusk: Room 215 - 7.25 (12 votes)
Tales of the Abyss - 7.24 (28 votes)
Red Dead Redemption - 7.23 (11 votes)
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony - 7.17 (23 votes)
Mass Effect 3 - 7.16 (21 votes)
To the Moon - 7.07 (7 votes)
The Vanishing of Ethan Carter - 7 (5 votes)
Super Paper Mario - 7 (21 votes)
Hollow Knight - 6.98 (21 votes)
INSIDE - 6.93 (15 votes)
Gone Home - 6.91 (17 votes)
Death Stranding - 6.73 (13 votes)
Chrono Cross - 6.69 (16 votes)
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Justice For All - 6.66 (30 votes)
Firewatch - 6.65 (10 votes)
Dark Souls - 6.62 (20 votes)
Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc - 6.6 (27 votes)
Valkyria Chronicles - 6.5 (16 votes)
Xenoblade Chronicles 2 - 6.5 (13 votes)
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time - 6.31 (35 votes)
DOOM (2016) - 6.15 (13 votes)
Professor Layton and the Curious Village - 6.1 (13 votes)
Star Fox 64 - 5.79 (24 votes)
Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice - 5.72 (9 votes)
Final Fantasy IV - 5.72 (29 votes)
Uncharted: Drakes Fortune - 5.26 (28 votes)
Final Fantasy XIII - 4.82 (28 votes)
Fire Emblem Fates: Birthright - 4.83 (12 votes)
Fallout 3 - 4.76 (17 votes)
Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty - 4.72 (9 votes)
Fallout 4 - 4.43 (15 votes)
Final Fantasy - 4.14 (18 votes)
Resident Evil 6 - 3.74 (17 votes)
Fire Emblem Fates: Conquest - 3.46 (15 votes)
Starcraft II (overall) - 3.4 (5 votes)
Fire Emblem Fates (overall) - 3.32 (11 votes)
Starcraft II: Legacy of the Void - 2.83 (6 votes)
Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) - 2.77 (15 votes)
Starcraft II: Heart of the Swarm - 2.57 (7 votes)
Fire Emblem Fates: Revelation - 2.33 (9 votes)
Tales of Zestiria - 2.14 (7 votes)

You can still rate previous days games if you missed them, just write <game name><rating>. If you want to change your rating you can just specify that you are changing your rating. Nominations for future days are also welcome, nominate as many games as you like and I will get to all of them.

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7.5/10

Sora and Donald arguing for most of the game is annoying, but this is the game that uses FF and Disney characters the best. Hollow Bastion is the high point of the game.

Also obligatory DARKNESS

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1

And it somehow only gets worse.

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Darkness/10

I've never finished this, but I imagine I'd have quite a bit to say if I did

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6

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4.5

This is the best Kingdom Hearts story, since it's the point where it's least bogged down with inscrutable lore and nonsense continuity, and I thought the kid versions of Sora and Riku were a little more identifiable as characters with their simple goal of leaving their island. Still, they barely escape from being one-dimensional and are generally pretty dull on top of that, and the storytelling mostly comes down to excessive cheesy dialog about hearts and darkness. It wouldn't be safe to play a drinking game where you take a shot each time one of those words comes up.

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9

Excellent shonen type story with FF overtones and the great Disney blend. The tone is basically perfect and the pacing is kept up with genuinely fun encounters with Disney villains. Knocking em out one by one gives me that foxhound vibe. Cheesy? Sure but it carries it so well, and much better than anything that came after.


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nominate Sonic Adventure 2

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The very first game of the series, taken alone, is a decent 5/10.

It's a goofy story with silly plot devices to make all the cameos stick, but it plays exactly into what its target audience signed up for, and it mostly lacks the pretension that would plague the later games.

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7.5. The series obviously got worse with each installment, but the first game's plot was at least good for what it was.

Retroactively vote:
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations - 9.5
Persona 3 - 9
Undertale - 9
Final Fantasy X - 6.5
Final Fantasy VII - 9
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - 9
The Walking Dead Season 1 - 9
Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair - 7.5
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony - 7.5
Super Paper Mario - 8
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Justice For All - 7
Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc - 7
Professor Layton and the Curious Village - 7
Star Fox 64 - 6
Final Fantasy IV - 7.5
Final Fantasy XIII - 4
Final Fantasy - 6
Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) - 1

Nominate:
Chrono Trigger
Snatcher
Phantasy Star II
No More Heroes
The Legend Of Zelda: Link to the Past
Final Fantasy IX
Super Mario Galaxy
Art Of Fighting
Pokemon Red/Blue
DISSIDIA Final Fantasy
Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney
Plumbers Don't Wear Ties

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6/10 I guess? I don't really know. It's fine I suppose and has a cool atmosphere at least in the first half of the game.
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5.5 I suppose.

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3.5

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It's like a 10-year old wrote a really bad fanfiction of a Disney and Final Fantasy crossover and then someone made a game out of it.

2/10 for original only.

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I've only watched it be played, so don't count this if you wish

5

it's cliched and goofy and not well-written or acted, but it's not like, offensively bad like the later games. it's just a dumb kids' game story with a bit too much anime shoved in

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6.5

7

I guess, this is like the hardest series to rate

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2.5/10

Traverse Town is amazing and I generally like the Disney settings and sidekicks, but the main KH cast is absolutely horrendous. Sora, Kairi, Riku, Ansem... I can't stand any of them.

And the plot... well, let's not go there.

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5

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8

It's really corny and the later games get ridiculous, but I can't help but enjoy it for what it is.

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6.4

Kinda crazy that some people hate all the KH stories and still played all of them.
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8/10. Not amazing, but I found the Disney and FF blend enjoyable and honestly I actually liked the story of the first game. Its kinda cheesy, but its fun and it works.

3.0

and then II managed to be even worse, so I didn't play the franchise ever again.
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6

I love the game, but six feels like the highest I want to go for the first game's story.
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3/10

3 for the Disney and FF crossover moments, 0 for everything else it tries to do.

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7.5/10

Scores only get better from here

4/10

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6/10

I wish there was more actual crossover-ness to it instead of the worlds being largely self-contained, but it's fine. There are some really good moments and nothing too terribly stupid... yet...

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5

Kingdom Hearts II has aged much much much better in terms of everything including story and dialogue when I did a series replay a few years before Kingdom Hearts III came out.

The dialogue and delivery of lines in general are noticeably very wooden and story is just not as interesting as I once thought it was.

I love the series and Kingdom Hearts 1, but the story, I'm not a big fan of it.

8

I basically agree with everything pjbasis said. I dock it for the upped cheesiness at the end and the dialogue has problems kind of all the way through, but it's a really, really solid hero's journey that utilizes its crossover franchises almost perfectly.

The series narrative degenerates into absolute nonsense with CoM and only gets worse from there on in, but that first game will always be a shining spot.

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6.5.

Very difficult to rate but the characters are great and the emotional resonance works along with some solid pacing also some less than good writing. I prefer KHII.

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7

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3

KH is very weird. I did a playthrough of KH2 recently where I skipped every cutscene and it's wild how much more enjoyable the game was as a result of doing that. And yet, I think I actually prefer KH2's story to KH1's. At least it's honest and does this ridiculous, absurd story that captures its weird Disney -> FF edgy teenage phase really well, even if the story is completely nonsense. KH1 does set nice parameters and I especially like Riku, who really embodies the KH aesthetic more than any other character. But man, I never liked anything about Sora and I'm not really into exploring a bunch of half-assed Disney movie retells.

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Just KH one huh...

Plot wise it's all nonsense, but the bond between the characters is real. Also the story has yet to become overly complicated. The Disney worlds themselves are flat out boring.

5/10

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6

It's serviceable, it's mostly a framing mechanism to get you from world to world with some cool original spice thrown in at the beginning and end. And those are the best parts! It doesn't yet have the flaw of the Disney and KH-specific elements clashing too hard (in bad ways, occasionally that is great), but generally speaking everything is very neat and tidy. Maybe a little too much so.

I won't call this a hot take because I see some other people in here thinking along these lines, but I generally think KH's story improves as it gets more insane. It's good! It gives the series a lot of character.

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