Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1394 in Computer & Video Games
• Brand: Square Enix
• Released on: 2006-09-29
• Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
• Platforms: PlayStation2, No Operating System
• Number of items: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review:
The strangest team-up in gaming returns as Disney and Square Enix join forces for their biggest budget adventure yet. Taking in more Disney movies than ever before you’ll find the fight against the Heartless has only just begun.

The lowdown:
As Square Enix’s most successful game in the West this latest entry in the Kingdom Hearts series sees Sora, Donald Duck and Goofy recruiting allies from all over the Disney universe to battle the evil Organization XIII. The game’s action based combat has been significantly improved from last time, with new abilities including the chance to fuse with other characters. The camera is also a lot better at keeping its eye on the action and the Gummi Ship sections between levels are a lot more fun. As you explore each world some of the Disney films featured are obvious choices, including Mulan, Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King, but others are more unexpected including the first ever Mickey Mouse cartoon from 1928, Pirates of the Caribbean and Tron. The graphic style changes perfectly for each, creating the ultimate tribute to both Disney and Square Enix’s gameplay.

Most exciting moment:
The real draw in the game is the chance to interact with such an odd bunch of characters. One of the best ways is via the summons spells that let you call in extra help from characters as diverse as Chicken Little, Stitch, Peter Pan and the genie from Aladdin.

Since you ask:
As well as Disney characters the game also features several from Square Enix’s Final Fantasy series, although most are slightly renamed. These include Auron from Final Fantasy X, Squall Leonhart from Final Fantasy VIII and Cloud Strike and Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII.

The bottom line:
Back and better then ever this is one Disney adventure that really is for all the family. -HARRISON DENT

Manufacturer’s Description
Kingdom Hearts 2 follows Sora, Donald, and Goofy on their continuing quest. Sora is looking for his lost friends Kairi and Riku, while Donald and Goofy are searching for their missing king.

It has been a year since the events of Kingdom Hearts. Sora and friends are joined by a vibrant new cast of characters, including the king himself! Together, they will encounter countless dangers in worlds both familiar and brand-new. It seems the Heartless, or at least some form of them, still exist. A new villain also awaits, hidden by a mask. Is it someone familiar or a new opponent to be confronted? This mystery and others will be solved as the story unfolds in a grand adventure.

Manufacturer's Description:
In a nutshell:
The strangest team-up in gaming returns as Disney and Square Enix join forces for their biggest budget adventure yet. Taking in more Disney movies than ever before you'll find the fight against the Heartless has only just begun!

The lowdown:
As Square Enix's most successful game in the West this latest entry in the Kingdom Hearts series sees Sora, Donald Duck and Goofy recruiting allies from all over the Disney universe to battle the evil Organization XIII. The game's action based combat has been significantly improved from last time, with new abilities including the chance to fuse with other characters. The camera is also a lot better at keeping its eye on the action and the Gummi Ship sections between levels are a lot more fun. As you explore each world some of the Disney films featured are obvious choices, including Mulan, Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King, but others are more unexpected including the first ever Mickey Mouse cartoon from 1928, Pirates of the Caribbean and Tron. The graphic style changes perfectly for each, creating the ultimate tribute to both Disney and Square Enix's gameplay.

Most exciting moment:
The real draw in the game is the chance to interact with such an odd bunch of characters. One of the best ways is via the summons spells that let you call in extra help from characters as diverse as Chicken Little, Stitch, Peter Pan and the genie from Aladdin.

Since you ask:
As well as Disney characters the game also features several from Square Enix's Final Fantasy series, although most are slightly renamed. These include Auron from Final Fantasy X, Squall Leonhart from Final Fantasy VIII and Cloud Strike and Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII.

The bottom line:
Back and better then ever this is one Disney adventure that really is for all the family. - HARRISON DENT

Customer Reviews

I recommend that you don't buy this game.
This game is part of a series about a 15 year old boy named Sora who sets out to find his friends along with Disney cartoon characters Donald and Goofy who join him to find their king; Mickey Mouse.

The graphics are excellent and are animated well. Throughout the game there is colourful Disney settings which are divided into different "worlds". The worlds vary and most of them are based on classic Disney films like The Lion King and Mulan and even The Pirates of The Carribean. Sometimes Sora and his companions will change costume to match the world's settings, for instance in Atlantica Sora becomes a mermaid. Instead of just Disney cameos, a few Final Fantasy characters appear aswell but their personalities are not the same as they are in the games they come from. It sounds like not a good mix but it works well. However you never really feel any sense of adventure becuase the worlds are very small and there is a lack of envoirment interaction becuase there is usually some invisible barrier that stops you walking into plants so you can hear the rustle. When you go through a door you cannot see Sora opening it and slamming it behind him. When you hit a peice of fabric it makes the same sound as when you hit a wall and does not move like fabric.

The music sounds good and matches the setting well however it can be overshadowed by sound effects.

Despite this the gameplay is terrible. It is very shallow for a RPG made by the same company that made Final Fantasy. The gameplay simply consists of mashing X, it soons becomes boring and tiresome and very repetitive. Magic is useless apart from Cure (which is only used in boss fights and the same goes for items.) The new Drive aspect of the game (where you become more powerful in exchange for the absence of party members) adds no real depth to the game neither do limits, with limits it is just a case of pressing another button for attacking. Summons are really a waste of time and are useless. The game can be unfair at times. Enemies move at the speed of light. Once an enemy jumped ten times Sora's height as quick as lightning, puased midair while I was wondering how unfair it's speed was, then came down just as fast; attacking. Battles are also very confusing becuase you can barely see what is going on behind a lightshow that is part of the spell that Donald loves to cast. Sudden bursts of light hide your enemies next move. Although mostly the camera is very smooth and flexible, targeting an enemy puts it on a very frustrating angle and while you try to correct it by moving the camera's angle, it just changes to another annoying angle. This becomes ridicolous becuase while you run away from an enemy in the middle of a powerful attack the enemy is performing, and then accidently run into another enemy you could not see becuase of the camera, doing that same powerful attack.

Also I have not come across any dungeons or puzzles in this game which I find are key points of any game in this genre. You really don't need to do any thinking becuase what you need to do next is obvious. The whole idea of exploration goes down the drain.

Also in one of the most interesting worlds they completely stripped the gameplay, made it very small and put a poor rythm game to replace the gameplay and put it as a poor sidequest and speaking of sidequests, apart from item fusing, there is only one other sidequest.

Another boring thing is the unravelling of the plot, when visiting the Disney worlds it is usually just the same events that happened in the movie it is based on apart from that Sora usually helps out the protagonist and Pete (one of the main antagonist in the beggining) teams up with the main antagonist of the movie the world is based on and leads an army of heartless (the ememies of the game.) However the beginning of the game was very emotional and made my eyes water.

This is a game just for show and has very shallow gameplay. I recommend not to buy this game.

Not just the king of the keyblades
After years of waiting finally this masterpiece was brought to the UK. The story is mainly based on the nobodies of several people; they have created an organization named "Organization XIII" which includes the nobodies of Diz and Sora. Everyone that has been turned into a heartless also has a nobody, even if they didn't stay heartless e.g. Sora. The game starts with you playing as Roxas (Sora's nobody) who is in the organization but can't remember that he is, after you have played the days in the life of Roxas you then play as Sora. When Roxas finds Sora to anyone that hasn't played Chain of memories won't really understand why Sora is in a dome thing, however the intro at the beginning shows in short what happens in Chain of memories however I thought that it was a little unclear, however once I was playing the game boy advance game I realized what the intro meant. In short it shows Sora and Riku travelling up a flight of stairs, in Chain of memories Sora, Donald and Goofy are travelling to the top of castle oblivion which is really just really s flight of stairs. When he reaches the top he meets Naminae, now she has changed his memories to memories of her for the Organization, however once the organization are defeated she puts Sora in a dome type thing like in the intro, she puts him in there so that he can get his original memories back. After you finish Sora's part of the game you play as Riku which is why at the start of KH2 both Riku and Sora are travelling up the stairs. KH2 is not as good as KH1 due to the fact that when I played it I thought that it was shorter and easier (I played the game on the medium difficulty like I did with KH1), however the game play was better and there were still fantastic worlds. At the end of this game you will feel partly satisfied however you will likely feel that there was more to do in the game e.g. finally get the ultima weapon or defeat Sephiroth. This game is fantastic I would suggest it to anyone that enjoys playing god games; I would suggest it to anyone that likes the final fantasy series also due to the fact that it is made by the same creator and to anyone who likes Disney. If you hate all of these things maybe this game isn't for you however the first one is the best game that I have ever played and this one is a very close runner up. A fantastic game with a delightful storyline.

One of the greatest spin-off games ever
Kingdom hearts is a long running series with an incredible storyline,but some bad sides in gameplay.This game makes up for what the original lacked. What I think is the best improvement is the new reaction comands. Triangle can unleash combos and limit attacks,which are attacks that your party members help with and are really strong but waste all your mp (magic points). Gummi-ing (travelling from world to world)has been improved and made easier. There are more improments but some of them are best for you to discover. Poeple who are new to Kingdom hearts don't worry! The game will explain what has happened in the other games (but you may feel after completing this that you want to play them). The only down side is sometimes the gameplay gets a bit repetitive or easy. The game is about 45 hours long! Remember if you're looking for a disney/Final fantasy experience with a great storyline,gameplay and characters then this is the one for you