Kingdom Hearts (PS2, 2002)

• Partially non-linear structure after the first two areas (can travel to three different worlds with the ship though they vary in difficulty (enemy strength is shown as "battle lvl" on the hub map screen) and world 3/deep jungle right away is quite tough (unless you grind and/or go back and stock up on a bunch of potions, same with world 2/coliseum), have to finish Deep Jungle before you can talk to Cid about navigation gummi blocks even if you got one from elsewhere before that; after returning to traverse town and beating a boss you can go to the battle arena or two new worlds (or the first chapter of 100 acre wood though there's not much to it) - these are hidden before getting to them so you can't see which one is easier, three new locations become available after finishing agrabah (monstro, halloween, atlantica (after beating halloween (or atlantica?) you can go to neverland as well); one new chapter of 100 acre wood as well), one new coliseum cup and one more book page (100 acre wood chapter) become available after finishing the whale/monstro world), Some branching paths during the rail shooter segments while moving between some locations

• Pretty frequent save points which also restore HP and MP (multiple slots, shows location and current lvl+money+time taken)

• Learn some new movement abilities as you go (dodge roll - after first boss (lets you move faster), high jump - whale world, glide jump - neverland, super glide - end of the world)

• Some backtracking for optional items with new movement abilities and elemental spells and sometimes to progress (atlantica water current, high jump to finish monstro and bastion, glide jump is quite helpful in the bastion dungeon but might not be mandatory)

• Some spell interaction with the environment for optional rewards (potion creation in the jungle camp w/ ice and fire, shocking some of the flowers in wonderland, gravity to pull down some chests, etc.)

• Gain a homebase spaceship (gummi ship) early on that can be teleported to via most found save points. After the first three worlds you'll also be able to warp between visited worlds meaning you don't have to play the rail shooter mini-game to travel to them

• Named rooms (Jet Set Willy)

• Some minor sequence breaking possibilities (attack repeatedly in mid-air to reach further when jumping - lets you reach some chests earlier)

• Encourages aggressive play by letting you regain MP by hitting enemies - later used in Bunny Must Die and Hollow Knight for example

• Some shortcuts (there could've been more of them at times though)

• Some decent puzzles (mushroom "enemies" doing pantomimes to clue you in on what spell to use one them, spatial reasoning, clock tower's small doors, bastion library and hovering chests)

• New enemies sometimes appear when revisiting previous worlds with new abilities or trinity keys (generally they are enemies you've seen elsewhere before though)

• Pretty good sense of vulnerability during the bastion world

• Some choice over your starting stats however the effects could've been explained better, There's also a short "personality" quiz after the stat priority choice and this actually affects how long it takes to level up at certain points of the game - should've been at least hinted at, Which abilities you gain earlier based on if you picked sword/shield/staff in the intro doesn't really make sense

• There's a basic journal feature to vaguely recap what you've been doing+it includes a character encyclopedia and a bestiary but no real quest log and no message log and you can't talk amongst the party to recap what you were doing/about to do if you've taken a break from the game (see PSIV). While there's a basic trinity location list in it, it doesn't show per location progress, only totals for each color.

• The game doesn't pause when browsing commands or your item inventory during combat

• Limited control over ally behavior (they die pretty easily if you do the worlds in a different order and it would've been useful to have them rush certain enemies or bosses at key points to distract them, they can also be unreliable at using healing items when you're near death and a boss is spamming strong attacks that take priority over your healing yourself; categories: regular attacks, offensive and defensive magic, advanced magic, hp items, mp items) - Secret of Mana

• Final Mix (JP re-release, late 2002) includes the content from the North American release and additional enemies, cutscenes, and weapons.

Some notable cons:

• Repeated alarm sfx at critically low HP

• Some control/interface issues (no control config (bosses can spam strong attacks that take priority over your healing yourself (some delay for an animation)+no shortcut combos for healing items, kinda weird mappings - jump on circle/attack on cross/dodge on square, can't map right stick to camera control - uses L2 and R2 (fixed in remaster)), some movement delay after landing from a jump, attacking near a ledge makes you move forward and fall off (particularly bad when you get attacked during platforming segments or at the tower in halloween land+a couple of places in the bastion dungeon), etc.)

• Some trial & error (some shots from off screen, the game sometimes doesn't show what opened when activating a switch, the stat choices in the intro have another fairly important effect in that you gain certain abilities sooner or later depending on them if you go to world 3/deep jungle then you'll end up crashing there (even if you went there first) and have to explore that world though it's possible to exit the world before completing it as soon as you reach a save point, most boss patterns, etc)

• Unskippable cutscenes including summons (would've been best if you could skip dialogue on a per sentence or at least scene basis, some rather slow scenes)+unskippable staff rol - fixed in remaster

• Sometimes uneven difficulty

• Some dead space

• Some tedious aspects (no automatic re-equipment of used consumables (from the party stock) - added in the sequel, sometimes long pauses in the action during rail shooter segments, the vine swinging part in deep jungle would've been better if you could alter the trajectory of a vine or at least if it was consistent about using the jump on/off command instead of manual jumping (the lock-on also could've prioritized a bit better here), game could've let you unlock a shortcut to the tree house in the jungle area since it makes you backtrack there several times during that segment, no shop outside of the first world, drawn out final dungeon and boss fight, etc)

• Some arbitrary invisible walls (gets pretty bad in the area before the final dungeon)

• No 2-player co-op - Secret of Mana, Can't switch to the other party members - Secret of Mana

• Many chests contain ship upgrades which is bad since that mini-game isn't particularly good and you can skip a big chunk of it

Playthrough - Mini Review

Influenced by: Secret of Mana/Seiken Densetsu, possibly SMW/Clash at Demonhead/Tron Bonne, Golvellius or Guardian Legend, Dark Cloud, Brave Fencer Musashi, DMC series, Phantasy Star Online

Influenced: Possibly Tales of Symphonia, Rogue Galaxy, FF12