The Repliku speech about trying to be someone but still being empty and feeling everything he is is borrowed.. it hits different once you've grown up

Naminé is just your average KH fangirl, writing self-insert stories about being fought over by Sora and Riku.

More than people just smelling in this game, it’s unreal how accurate everyone can throw and catch a card with excellent precision

Riku's final exchange with the Replica is wonderful. it showcases the maturity that he's starting to develop, as he drops his whole cool guy act. before the first game's ending, i really could have seen him saying some one-liner or something like it, something to dismiss or humiliate the replica - but instead, since he is trying to redeem himself, he asks the replica about what he feels. in his final moments, Riku chooses to comfort him. and i think this more lowkey, personal and intimate way to see him off is really great.

Only the Japanese could invent the world’s first rogue like deck building action RPG

This game was released for the ps2 in 2008 in North America. I played when I was in elementary school.

1:07:53 The disembodied voice sounds hilariously condescending though “You cast away your home, your friends, everything... But at least they gave you a nice room."”

1:25 It *was* actually released in the west on the PS2 back in 2008. I actually have a copy on my shelf, though I prefer the GBA original. It wasn't released in PAL regions until the 1.5 remix, however.

I have soft spot for chain of memories. Axel is my favourite character in the whole series. My only criticism of the original GBA is that it’s required to fully appreciate KH2. Not everyone could afford a PS2 and a GBA, so the poor kids back them were almost punished. Axel is especially an important character in chain of memories and this being key to his development in 2.

Being able to smell spiritual energy is an ancient yet not often referenced element of Japanese mythology, you can see it pop up every once in a while in other media. They probably dropped it after CoM because they realized it was something unique to Japan that wouldn't translate culturally elsewhere.

Sora advocating gaslighting and guilt-tripping Namine to stop expressing her genuine emotions has got to be one of the most sigma male things I've seen in a children's card game.

Not sure if that's a genuine question about the smells, but just in case anyone else is curious I'll explain it anyways. To put it simply, it was just a bad translation. The word they are using 匂い (nioi, pronounced knee-oy) in most contexts does mean smell, scent, or odor. For example いい匂い (ii nioi) is an exclamation when you smell something pleasant. However, another meaning to it is aura or vibe, in that Riku could sense Ansems aura within the castle and how he could feel the same vibe coming from Namine as he does with Kairi.

A big part of why Lethal Frame is so overblown: it seems that when adding in both it and magnet spiral that the neglected to define the damage type. Most sleights are either elemental (i.e. fire) or neutral damage types (though apparently Reflect Raid was made to be physical in the remake for some reason). The only other sleights that are typeless for damage are those that deal no damage or which only cause status effects. By having no defined type, Lethal Frame actually bypasses all enemy defenses. Most bosses are actually resistant to sleights because they take only 50% damage from neutral attacks, but Lethal Frame is completely exempt!

Aww yiss, the comfy series continues.

The fact that Larxene's voice actor has only really voiced Larxene is so impressive to me. Primarily a TV actor, a bunch of nothing voice roles, and then there she is slamming it as Larxene in every game she appears in.

34:35 "An over-exaggeration of flashy abilities that require almost no player input or thought would harm the series going forward if they were used in a more traditional KH action RPG" *SCREAMS IN KH3 ATTRACTIONS*

27:08 Rikuplicas " 'gotta be kidding" might be the most relatable thing he could say to the player in that situation.

Best KH critiques on KZfaq returns. Yessir. 👍🏾

the scent thing was like tying darkness to this more beastly power imo. thats how it made sense to me. cuz you only ever hear darkness aligned characters say it. n its very..... predatory animal vibes.

Sora whipes them out because they are still fighting a legendary keyblade wielder the keyblade is a powerful weapon. That's why everyone doesn't get one.

KH2, then Outer Wilds. I have never been as interested in the design of a Final Fantasy game before finding your videos on KH.

29:25 - 29:35 i love how its always at the same angle

Watched your KH2 vid(took me couple days), then this vid popped up next, and I just gotta say the detail and heart you put into these vids is incredible. Such a joy to experience and relieve these games thru ur very thorough analysis, I hardly ever comment on vids but just had to thank you for the entertainment 🙏 you deserve more views my guy, got my sub for sure tho

Wooo, it's out! Although I don't think it quite jumped the shark already, I feel like this game really defined the tone and story direction going forward for the series, maybe if just because it introduced the organization and the nobodies. I'll be curious to see your thoughts.

Man I just finished your KH Re CoM retrospective and I will be frank with you , you have made one of the best KZfaq videos that I have seen this year 👏👏 I can't wait for your retrospective about KH II 😁

There were fmvs throughout the entire game. The beginning and end were just more significant… The opening, Larxene swapping kairi’s charm, the ending for Sora, the ending for Riku.,, I’m sure there were more.

Never played this back in the day, never knew it existed till folk started making 'everything you need to know before kh3' video's lol love seeing you break it down and really enjoying your take on it.

29:58 love the STS reference

Looking forward to the KH2 vid also, holy jesus I thought they started smoking that GOOD shit after KH2, didn't realize it started here

Ohhh, it finally clicked. They talk about scent so much because scent is the sense most tied to mem---

Im real curious to see how you cover 358/2 I remember really really liking it, but its also been years since I touched the game.

Another great video, see you in the next one

It is a completely bizarre thing for somebody to ask MICKEY MOUSE to kill them with a straight face. Also “the organization” might be the worst name possible for what are unexpectedly interesting characters. Really looking forward to seeing what you have to say about KH2 and how it handled the story.

Duels were absolutely made with the bosses in mind, as all their decks are made to match yours. The best strategy is to do dark mode/maleficent card/ spam duels to clear bosses lol

Babe, wake up! Tetramorre dropped a new kh video essay!

Coming here from your KH1 video, loved the content, ty again ! Wanted to request adding the 358/2 video to the "FOTK" playlist. I normally will "watch later" a bunch of videos while I'm doing something else and when I went to your channel to just save the whole playlist I saw that one wasn't on there. Was a nice little surprise to see an addition though!

Excellent video man. Criminally underrated channel.

1:00:27 WOOOOW, I can't tell you howmuch I loved this cutscene, and it makes me suddenly appreciate Namine more as a character, and wish we got more from her, unfortunately a lot of the female characters get shafted in the future, it seems like all of them when they are first introduced (except Aqua) are really interesting until another game appears and they become boring puppets that get nothing, no wins character writing wise, Kairi being the biggest example. I really like this cutscene because the animation and voice acting are ON POINT, the way she looks away and back at the screen, the fake smile, the little movement with her shoulders before she turned around, the shrugs she does and the tilting of her head as she talks, and looks down. The voice acting compliments it super well, and makes it all come off as kind of passive aggresive and kind of manipulative from her, which I find is really interesting from a Kingdom hearts character, who eventually become planks of wood. You can hear little tones in the voice, like she forces a little laugh when she says "the people who are really important to you "ha" to appear positive. I've never seen this scene because I generally ignored Chain of memories, but holy crap I missed out, because I had no idea Namine could be like that. I always thought she was just the innocent angel version of Kairi. But seeing her be a little passive aggressive and slightly manipulative is very interesting considering her innocent look. Of course thats not intentional from her, but you can't blame her for feeling miffed since shes lonely and doesnt want to be forgotten. Very Awesome. It makes me sad because I dont expect to see anything like this from Kingdom Hearts anymore. Just more people waffling on about hearts and darkness and friendship and light a KEYBLADE!!! Also this video was very high quality, excited for the kh2 one

People have covered that 'smelling darkness' is a mistranslation, but to shed a little more light on it, localization is often outsourced (especially back when this game was originally re-released with Riku's story, in 2008). They're basically just handed the text dump of yhe script and given no full context, so when they see a word that usually means 'smell' they don't have full context to know that, here, it's meant to mean 'sense'. Riku's story was added later, and the bigger KH games probably had in-house translation teams by that point to make the games more cohesive, so we wind up with an outlier in the translation that accidentally establishes the Organization doesn't shower.

The cut to kiri when saying flat and uninteresting 💀

This was certainly an interesting video! Note that I haven't played the game so everything I'm going to say is going to be informed by the video alone but for what you bring up around 1:01:00 the organisation's plan probably wasn't to actually pull sora into their rank, instead I think they aimed to have him work unknowingly for them while having him believe he's working against them. Given that they can't outright change memories and only slightly alter them (from what I understood) it's still easier to have Sora believe that he's working against the obviously evil organization rather than twist his world so much he'd work for them (which would probably cause him to lose the keyblade). Overall I'm usually not a fan of the whole "Memory vs heart" trope but I feel like it was done pretty well in this game although I'm not sure why Vexen seemed to literally tell Sora "Yeah Naminé's memory aren't important what are you doing lmao". Good video tho!

He's done them in order, I'm so invested I stopped by 2 to watch this

25:53 This seems to be a ReCoM specific where attacks are much harder to dodge as opposed to GBA. A prime example of this is Axel 1's Fire Wall, in GBA its a slow moving attack attack with an obvious telegraph that doesn't even always the edge of the screen essentially serving as a soft tutorial on the invincibility that rolling gives, as opposed to ReCoM where the move has a weird telegraph, moves very fast and covers the entire arena and lingers long enough that it can pretty easily catch rolls and this is only the 2nd boss. And Larxene 1? Found out when playing a Randomizer just how BS she can be when not able to sleight spam, like we're talking straight unavoidable damage and my winning attempt is just because she decided to not use 0s.

Hey I know that im watching this really late but CoM came out on ps2 back in 2008 in the US I bought a copy when it came out and I still own it and on display to this day

Re:Com did release outside Japan on Ps2. It was a standalone release in North America while I believe it was packaged with 2FM in Japan. I played through it in early high school which was long before the HD collections or I had anything capable of emulating a Ps2. Haley Joel Osmont's voice was added to Re:Com in 2008, before he voiced a digital recreation of 1 Sora in Re:Coded. Still long after he lost the KH 1 voice but not over a decade after he first took the role

Also is it just me or does Chain of Memories feature stronger language and imagery than KH1 and even KH2? Words like "jerk, manipulative witch, slave, enslave, a pack of hunting dogs, ..." etc. Sure, they're nowhere near "foul", but for KH and what's essentially a kids game and compared to some of its other releases, they kinda do stand out. I also feel like they use words like "death, die, dying" more openly in this game than KH1. (maybe KH2 too but I don't remember it that well)

I know the video is old, and you might have learned this by now, but ReChain of Memories didn't first release in the West via the 1.5 ReMix collection. It was released by itself for the PS2 in 2008 in NA

The remake actually got a ps2 release outside of Japan in December 2008

There actually was a English ps2 version in the west they just released it without basically advertising it at all. That’s how I first experienced the remake. I actually still have my copy I think.

I don't know whether they wanted you to actually look through your deck for cards during duel mode because I just spammed every card in my deck to usually win the duel and this led to me doing good damage almost every time

underrated video loved it

2:50 re:com was localized 5 years after kh 1 in 2007 on ps2. I know caused I played it back then

The slate vs sleight thing really resonated with me, vividly remember my friend and I arguing the pronunciation (I thought slate sounded cooler too!)

yo is that the sly cooper soundtrack in the background??? omg 🫶🏻

why the flying f doesnt this have more views >,< also just found this series tho xP

i like the sly cooper music thrown in

cp has to be one of the most unfortunate acronym coincidences i have ever heard

Honestly can't wait for your thoughts on Kh2. Out of all the KH games this is the one I remember the least somehow.

This is another great video, I find the series extremely relaxing to watch. The only thought I have here is I would be interested to know what other viewers think about the use of music from other series in a video game review? I noticed the city of tears ost and maybe a civ soundtrack? But generally think it keeps tone more consistent using purely music from the series being discussed

I wonder how things would've turned out if they went a more FF route and had a different main character in each game. S, D & G, could have still been important to the story and they wouldn't have had to reset Sora over and over again. As long as the main character uses a keyblade they wouldn't have had to change the basic movement and battle mechanics either.

Never played the game, but the dissidia FF on psp used the same method of progressing through the world in coliseum

absolute fucking crime how this video has under 1000 views

The lessening of the actual importance of the Disney crap is my biggest pet peeve of the series. Peak KH for me was in the first game when the Disney villains were gathered around a table having a dumb meeting about Sora. The more ponderous and Final Fantasy it became, the less interest I had.

59:06: I will partially disagree with that assessment. What you said would unquestionably have been true in the 90's (our family, for instance, always picked Nintendo over Sega), but even by the late 90's more families were able to afford more than one gaming console per generation albeit by getting certain systems late in the cycle (i.e.: getting a PS1 in '99 three years after getting a N64). Even disregarding the above statements, by the mid-2000's most families were able to at the very least have a home console and a portable console, at least in the areas that I lived throughout the years. Part of the reason for this was due to just how cheap GameBoy Advances were at the time. $100 might seem steep by the standards of 2004, but most gaming consoles at the time were going for double that price just by themselves and more with the accessories that one may or may not get. By point of contrast, the GBA was already in its twilight years by the English release of Chain of Memories since the Nintendo DS was also released that year. Even of the GBA's weren't released st reduced prices, it was still at a cheap enough price to act as a supplement console for parents to give their children. However, there is another reason why most kids and teens were likely to have at least on portable console in conjunction with a home console: Pokémon. Almosr every kid had a Pokémon game because they begged their parents to get one. With this in mind, it made sense for Square to release a game on a console that most kids were going to have regardless due to the popularity of a guaranteed system seller in Pokémon even in spite of the controversy over Gen 3's incompatibility with the previous generations (Dexit be Dexit, in other words). However however, I do agree with you that there are some that most likely couldn't follow the story of Kingdom Hearts because they couldn't afford both consoles. My only contingency here is that most of them that couldn't afford more than one were more likely to own only the GBA and were thus formally introduced to the series through Chain of Memories (I do know one such person myself). It's less likely that one would only own a PS2 and not a GBA since by that point in time, if you could afford a hone console, chances are you could also afford a portable one. Anyways, my apologies for the wall of text, but I also wanted to say that I've really enjoyed your video. You're one of only two people on the internet to suggest what many of us veterans do in layering our deck builds for better sleights. Keep up the good work! It's always good seeing this game get the recognition that it deserves. I'll be very interested on your thoughts on Birth by Sleep when you inevitably get to that entry. It's a game I hold in high regard alongside Kingdom Hearts I and II: Final Mix, but that regard *does* come with an asterisk due to the problems inherent to that game.

I know that the Organization are supposed to not have hearts (purportedly) and are typically very ignorant to the power of friendship, but I kinda had to agree with Marluxia and Larxene when they're pointing out that Sora is being ridiculous for holding onto a promise that he outright knows is fake. It's one thing if he wants to protect Namine on his own after learning what's going on, but just outright saying things like "No, the promise is real to me!" or "I'm going to uphold my promise to Namine, even if it is a lie!" just feels like he's missing the forest for the trees.

Ladies and Gentleman, imagine: you're a young person who recently beat Kingdom Hearts, a story about a boy looking for his rival and girlfriend, whom he sacrifices himself to save, only to come back to life and beat an Offbrand Final Fantasy villain to save the universe, at the price of being forced to have more wacky adventures. Simple story right? Nice and clean. Now you're playing some GBA spinoff, and there's a guy in a black hood talking to you, Aeris is called Aerith now and is talking about actually being a memory, and we're just weirdly recapping the plot but with memory subtext, I guess? Now there's some blonde ghost girl who came from nowhere, and some OG bad guys keep teleporting and talking politics, and Pooh Bear won't let me access my menu, and some dude just got EXECUTED in front of Sora, and seriously, WHAT? Kingdom Hearts didn't just go off the rails, it crushed them up and snorted them. I don't know what I was expecting, but it sure as heck wasn't THIS.

Of course summary parts may be needed, but for people who've already experienced the stories, maybe you could separate the summary parts and the review parts in the video description

5:32 🤌

I like American mcgee alice but seriously that all they could come up with

What you say about the Disney worlds is mostly true (I feel they're done this way for people who skipped KH1, which...isn't all that likely for people playing the game to have done), but I will go to bat for Hollow Bastion. In the first game, rescuing Belle from Maleficent was purely plot-based due to Belle being one of the Princesses of Heart, and we didn't get a good sense of her and Beast's characters or their relationship. I liked that this game fleshed that out more, it helps segue into the Beast's Castle plotline in KH2 nicely.

Haven’t seen it posted here yet, but Re:CoM was released for PS2 in the USA in 2008. We definitely had Re:CoM before 1.5 in US. Love your videos though, just remembered playing it as a kid and couldn’t help myself to not mention it haha

For all the weirdness COM has it's the best the Organization has ever been. Vexen and Axel absolutely steal the show in this one. Honestly, the fact the game had to fit on a GBA is probably why the dialogue is so good: there just wasn't any room for bloated cutscenes or obsessively vague dialogue. It's also kind of the best that Sora's ever been, too. Then again I'm a sucker for sensible character conflict. That kind of drama I just eat the fuck up, and Sora really delivers here. A shame that it was initially relegated to the mobile game, and has an off-putting gameplay loop.

Desperately awaiting the next kh retrospective. Any timeline for the next installment?

I played this on the GBA, but I remember almost nothing.

Technically, they're not humans (you're fighting against). They're Nobodies. I just bring it up because you distinct between Heartless and "humans".

Never played KH games so can't offer anything useful But I'll say this - TLJ soundtrack for the video is an inspired choice!

I own Re:com on ps2 so I do think it was released at some point in the west before 1.5

The 3D remake was absolutely released in the west BEFORE the PS3 version. I bought it on PS2 at launch in the US.

Uhm achtually... Re:Chain was released stateside around the time of KH2's original release.

Just when I needed something meaty to watch! Gotta say, trying to understand and master the card system would boggle my mind, deck UI itself makes me super confused. I bet fighting and using the cards was somewhat easier in the original due to 2D gameplay. That boss fight at 26:25 is like. *Let's go!* I feel like this story is growing on me. Like a fungus.

Someone else may or may not have already mentioned this, but Re:CoM actually released in the West in December of 2008 on the PS2. I still have a physical copy of the game for the PS2 and I first played it on that system if I recall correctly, though I could be misremembering. It even had extra attack cards (and I think enemy cards as well) that you could unlock in the Treasure Rooms (the ones that require the special Key card, not stuff like Calm Bounty, at least not to my recollection) based on KH2's keyblades, such as the Photon Debugger, if you had a save file for KH2 on your memory card, similar to how in the 1.5 ports you can unlock extra attack cards based on keyblades from 358/2 Days if you watched the entire 358/2 Days cutscene movie.

I thought the CoM remake made it to the US on ps2 as well. Unless you mean just the ps3 remaster.

Why is “slight” worse than “slate”?-especially when one is clearly the correct pronunciation and the other is wrong lol. Did you just record all your footage pronouncing it incorrectly and add that “critique” afterwards when you realized your mistake?

The GBA version plays better than the PS2 version. It's unfortunate everyone gravitates to that release. Some of the disney worlds reinforce the theme of memories and their meanings, but that's kind of their only saving grace.

I basically never used enemy cards in my playthrough. cuz was stupid and didnt understand them,

34:35 Is that sentence forshadowing towards KH 3? I mean...it's the worst example, but BBS is also pretty bad. xD

LFGGGGGGGGGGGGGG release the kh2 vid next ;)

Any chance you’ll cover Nier and it’s sequel while we’re on the subject of action jrpg’s?

Hearing you pronounce sleight as slate, not slight fucking killed me off. I'll be back for kh2, i cant listen to any more of this.

1:29 this is wrong, re:com came out for the ps2 in 2008 at least here in the US I actually have the copy of the game

Ok so little known fact about the gba version is that it had a vs arena to play your deck against a friend. I actually wonder how this system would work as a 3d vs arena game.

ReCoM actually released in the west on PS2 before it released on PS3, I bought it in early 2009. Otherwise... I just started the video so I don't have anything else to say yet lol oh except for I love the use of Sly 2 music :)

I love your videos but did you not look anything up for the dates and double check your info? USA had re chain on ps2 in 08, yes he was older but only by 5 or 6 years not 10.... what happened there?

What you said about Re:Com release in the west is WRONG. That game was released for Ps2 in 08 in the US. It was available well before 1.5remix.

Blizinga

Actually I have a remake ps2 that is a na release. So of your info is wrong. But so far it is a good video.

I always thought it was so odd to have so much story relevance in a GBA game.

No pun intended but I have a memory of playing re chain of memories on ps2 in the states at least once and realizing it was kind of boring. But I could be wrong and it was just me trying it out for the first time on the hd remake on ps3.

1:08:37

Hollow knight music?