The face of evil

The House of Mouse has always been something of a contentious topic for me based on a couple of lingering nagging factoids. Chief of which being the fact that they pulled out of the video game market because they didn't understand us and in doing so ripped out the possibility of Star Wars games remaining as diverse and varied as they had been- any Disney games outside of the Kingdom Hearts deals- and a sequel to Alien Isolation like we all prayed for. Disney just deprived themselves and us of entire prospective worlds of engagement and I will never forgive them for that. But that's baby stuff, I'll admit. Just my own personal gripes with one of the biggest Entertainment companies in the world- and there are many out there with much more legitimate reasons to despise one of the most buttoned-up and despicable companies on god's green earth.

Losing a loved one is forever going to be one of the most harrowing experiences that all are expected to go through at least once in love. Ideally at least twice, but these are just expectations. Worse if the loss comes in a manner perceived 'premature' thanks to malpractice or maleficence or any of the other ways one might expire. (Am I talking about this weird? I don't typically mention actual death on this blog. Not really sure what kind of gloves to wear.) It can feel like all the world has sealed back off around you and that font of light and possibility has dried up and will run out eventually. Thus is the reality of facing the incomprehensible. The constraints of mortality. (Where am I going with this?) I guess what I'm trying to say is it takes a special kind of scum bag to try and take advantage of the recently bereaved. Thank god Mickey sent his best, then!

You may have heard of it. A woman with allergies visits a Disney park and apparently (should I say 'allegedly'? This is England- we have pretty regressive defamation laws. I'm going slap a big 'alleged' over this entire story, to be clear.) conveyed those allergies to the restaurant upon which she was eating. So kind of oversight allegedly occurred and the woman ended up facing some kind of reaction which ultimately had a hand in her death. A tragedy to be sure. But then if you've heard of this it's probably because you've also heard how the Husband is coming up against a request to dismiss the lawsuit he is filling against the big D due to, seriously, the terms and conditions of a Disney Plus trial he signed up to on his console during 2020. (See, I worked gaming in there somehow!)

Now- at first I'll admit to feeling a bit stranded upon hearing that. The gulf between 'my partner died of avoidable allergies at an eatery' (enough to make me terrified of eating out with anyone with any similar dietary restriction) and 'you signed up for a free trial to a subscription service' seems to wide to reconcile. I mean, maybe if her death had something directly to do with the service I could see it. Like, maybe she dropped a few too many expensive Disney Plus shows mid season and the streaming service grew sentience, hacked into her home ventilation and slowly poisoned to death- then there'd be a correlation  there! But somehow I don't think we're at that point with our technology yet. Give it a couple more decades.

So I'm sure your curiosity has read the headlines and maybe you are wondering if Disney Plus' Terms and Conditions really does hide a little nugget that absolves them of committing manslaughter against anyone you might know. Well... no, it doesn't. Instead they have a clause in which the party agrees not to engage in any dispute outside of individual arbitration- basically restricting a public jury who will surely side against Mickey's Clubhouse. It is, in the kindest possible terms, an act of sheer and complete desperation from a lawyer who, to be honest, probably just lost their job by even arguing this. They put it all on the line by conceiving of this absolute hairbrained dumpster shoot, and absolutely dropped the ball by allowing the story to turn into a public circus thus costing Disney more than they ever would have to loose by just paying this man off. Which they should have done to begin with.

But wow, doesn't that just come across as the perfect Disney-ass headline? 'Disney wants to kill your love one's and you stupidly signed off to let them get away with it?' This was literally an episode of South Park years ago where people learned that blindly signing the Apple Terms and Conditions gives them the legal right to pull a Human Centipede on you. Now I'm no lawyer, but I do know that conditional clauses do not rewrite laws by their very existence. Just as how a liability waiver does not protect a company from wilful negligence and an NDA does not cover illegal acts, I suspect a terms and conditions for a streaming service, or heck even for the park itself, could interfere with an accidental death case. That would be insane.

And yet doesn't that just fit the very brand of Disney? Litigious to the point of tyranny, Disney rules their image through fear and subjugation. Be happy your aren't a rodent or errant strolling wildlife- because Disney are more than happy to exterminate on their grounds for the goal of 'maintaining the dream'. They've hunted down tiny 'mom and pop' shops for having similar sounding names to some of their IPs, they'll reign hellfire on IP infringements. If there is any company out there with an ever more vicious approach to engaging with the public, be they fans or not, than Disney themselves it would have to be Nintendo- and that's only because Nintendo slapped a generational fine on a dude- I'm sure Disney will take the chance to surpass the pettiness once given the chance.

Disney have always been the rosey-looking company that wears the label and tuxedo whilst their bouncers break the legs of the undesirables around the back. They'll drape themselves with the kid-friendly allure because children are the easiest to squeeze fandom and money out of, and bring up the wrath of hell on anyone who gives them the wrong end of business. We might laugh at the sheer absurdity of this situation but make no mistake this isn't an example of a rogue entity, but a slip up of the mask. These behaviours are learnt within a machine that encourages dehumanisation. And remember what they say- lean a little closer- roses smell like crap.

The game Star Wars couldn't make: Force Combat.

Graduates of Teräs Käsi

It somewhat surprises me to remember that Star Wars is still technically an active brand in the video game space given the fact that, you know, we don't hardly get anything out of them but once every blue moon! When are we going to get that Mandalorian game they absolutely should have commissioned years ago? Is Knights of the Old Republic Remake going to see the light of day ever? When is Battlefront 3? I'm serious about that last one- there's absolute no freakin' reason we haven't got so much as a chirp on a Battlefront 3- 2 still has an active player base, dammit! To call this absolute wasteland an 'active brand' is like calling Tatooine a sunny sea-side resort. Arguably true but vastly overselling in some pretty important areas worth mentioning. 

I think the biggest loss in that with the lack of Star Wars games released, we're getting a distinct lack in variety. Back when it was a game ever year you'd see shooters, racing games, strategy games, action adventure games, RPGs- everything under the sun and much more under the moon. Every single type of gamer could find something within the Star Wars world that appealed to them, and as a Star Wars fan who loved games I could gravitate towards any number of different styles of game. Now that we only get one triple AAA game every few years or so, they all have to carter towards the biggest demographic of the audience in order to justify the development costs. Tactical games? Nah, they're too niche. Better make a Star Wars Action adventure game. (Jedi Fallen Order) RPGs? Market's too volatile. Better make a sequel to that action adventure game. (Jedi Survivor) Starship-themed dog fighter game? Okay, you can have that one. (Squadrons) But we get to immediately follow it up with an action adventure game. (Outlaws) It's all getting a bit tiresome, isn't it?

And in times like this who can you really turn to in order to demand more? EA like to pretend they don't even know what a Star Wars is unless they've got one coming out in the next few months, Disney treat games like gangrene, and I don't even think there is a core studio managing the Star Wars brand beyond the movies. Whom do we ask to start doing better? Well, I guess we could ask the people who care about the brand most of all. More than the license buyers or the license owners. More than the brand managers and the producers. The directors and the actors. The people who really put their heart and soul into the franchise. The fans. Who can you trust to love the brand and want what's best for it more than the fans? No one.

Which is why I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the best Star Wars release this year looks to be a fan game that dropped in front of my eyes the other day by the name of 'Force Combat'- a spiritual successor to the much... spoken of old school game 'Masters of Teräs Käsi'. Yes, that was the fighting game set in the Stars Wars AU (what little of it existed at the time) which is widely considered one of the worst fighting games of all time by people who clearly don't play enough fighting games. Not that I'm an expert on that, I'm actually rather terrible- but as a kid I did manage to push through nearly every level of Simpsons Boxing and liked it- so... you're kind of talking to an unwitting fighting game veteran right now!

Now as far as fan games go, Force Combat is surprisingly well put together even in a Beta state. sure, I encountered a total crash the first time I played but such is to be expected. Otherwise it is a totally functional, if slightly janky, fighter that pretty much anyone with a passing knowledge of how these games play will be able to pick up pretty seamlessly. Having actually gone through a fair few of really old school fighting games recently as part of my Like a Dragon catch-up quest- I found quite a few similarities with the heavier feeling, less combo driven, straight forward arena brawl style of Force Combat. Of course that doesn't mean the game is without it's hang-ups. The choppy animations don't seem to have fluid transitions between movements which makes defensive play quite a hassle, but given the giant cast I can't really hold that against the team.

Oh, did I mention? Force Combat features characters from every single piece of mainstream Star Wars media that popped into the creator's head. I'm talking Sith Inquisitors and Mandalorians, Ashoka Tano and IG-88, they even threw in Mara Jade and Darth Revan for goodness sake! (I know Jade was in the original Teräs Käsi, but it still something of a deep cut even back then!) There's no Pidgeon hopping between what properties are safe to use for fear of accidentally stepping on one of Disney's mousetraps for a series they want to make which will never end up making it to the screen anyway because the Disney release slate is a joke! It's just a general celebration of Star Wars as a whole, throw in anyone. Everyone! Settle those childhood debates about who would win in a battle between Yoda and Grogu. (Even if that one sounds a little bit open and shut if I think about it. Grogu would win through the power of marketability, obviously.)

The cherry on top of the cake for me is the pre-built tournaments (or Towers) provided to the game which play out as strung together battles that simulate arcs in the various shows and movies. Whether that be fighting your way up the Sith ladder on your way up to Palpatine, or picking off bad guys in the Mandalorian list as you aim towards the Grand Moff. And some of these battles are special little one-offs like a duel between Grogu and the Mudhorn from season one which- I'll be honest I literally couldn't figure out how to play as Grogu. That ended up just being three minutes of watching the little pipsqueak get trampled. Still, very cool they even thought to throw that in.

It is always impressive how much actual content even a small team of fan-inspired creators can pack into a game when they aren't bogged down by ultimately worthless fidelity concerns and balancing giant teams of checkers and recheckers. Just focus on what works, make as much of it as you can stomach and maybe puff it up to look a bit prettier on the way out the door- that's the way of the world anyway, why shouldn't our games reflect it? Always love a fan game, and love one like this that touches close to my own fandom and heart. Although seeing the brand involved, I would probably hurry to snatch this up before Disney come with their ban hammers- you know what they're like.

95 years

 

As I'm certain everyone out there in the world is aware, the very first iteration of one of the world's very first mascots has finally come around and entered the Public Domain. Yes, the very original Mickey Mouse, as conjured up in Steamboat Willie, has hit the ripe old age of 95- which qualifies the old rat to become the latest lump of putty slapped in front of the faces of every warped and twisted mind of any and everyone who scours the interwebs. This is after languishing for decades within the wrought-steel doors of the Disney Vault hidden away from the rest of the world in the threatening way that Disney likes to keep hold of it's properties- akin to a Dragon languishing over it's hoard- flickering a forked tongue curling around wisps of his fiery breath. Whatever does this mean for the future of copyright? Not much, I'd wager.

Disney has been pushing back this day as long as they can for a good while now. Arguing their case in court to push past the requisite years to remain with the copyright realms, and as Disney used to have deep respect and deeper pockets- laws changed with their whims. Today I'm not sure if Disney are just more lax about the possibility of apocalyptic clones coming and stealing their immutable throne, or if they've lost the respect (but certainly not the money) required to drive legislation like they once did. Whatever the case, Disney does not need to worry about it's brand just yet. The Mickey Mouse recognisable across the world, sans the hat and plus the white gloves, still exists within their copyrightable brand. I do believe that the iconic high-pitched and excitable voice of the Mouse is also within their redesigned image too. But that won't always remain the case forever.

I'd imagine there are quite a few legacy studios with animated mascots that saw the buffer of Disney's Mickey as a safety net- now drawn to worry about the sanctity of their creation. One such company would have to be Warner Bros. who's own key mascot, the sarcastic and lovable Buggs Bunny, is due for his own review in about 10 years time. At least Mickey Mouse has undergone enough changes for there to be veritable different versions of him that Disney can argue about in court- Buggs Bunny is a monolith, an icon, that guy hasn't changed for nobody practically since the day of his inception- and I suspect that rigidness might come to haunt his owners in the years to come. Why are they so haunted? Well, because with the public domain comes... shudder... public arts! (The most lamentable of the many art forms known to man!)

You'll likely remember that famed cartoon bear Winnie the Pooh recently made his way to the public domain a few years back, and was immediately exploited for a low-rent horror movie that delivered the absolute minimum viable product for a return of over 10 times the development cost. 'Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey' is a pathetic splotch of a movie, but the sheer gimmicky nature of it is now indistinguishable from the wider Pooh brand. Whenever I search up 'Winnie the Pooh movie', that is what I see plastered before all of the many other movies literally named Winnie the Pooh! (That might be because my personal Google account is as twisted as I am, and thus that's what they think I'm looking for- but the point stands!) Disney and it's co-conspirators are terrified of that same fate befalling their properties.

Mickey Mouse has already found itself laboured with a horror movie soon to hit our shelves and a horror video game which had to change it's unfortunate name after discovering the hidden meaning of one of it's chosen titles. What if these imitations of their work start to take over the brand of Mickey, and laymen start confusing the trite with Disney proper? Sure, Disney have already laid out stipulations to curtail exactly that- but the general public are stupid- the mix-ups are going to happen. So what is there to be done? Well, mayhaps companies as grand and large as Disney will have to stop relying on the intellectual property of dead men in order to represent their various brands? Mayhaps we can have a world of creation spurred on by the new instead of constrained to the corpses of the old? Maybe- Disney and it's friends can learn to adapt with the times. Just a suggestion.

In the coming years we're going to see a deluge of characters, the likes of which are still recognisable and popular today, come into the domain of the grubby publics. Tigger actually joins Mickey in becoming Public Domain this year, which means the makers of Blood and Honey have everything they need for their inevitable muck-raking sequel, Pluto is headed our way next year, Donald Duck squeezes in just before the end of the decade at 2029 and in the 2030's? Pandemonium. Total anarchy. Batman, Superman, Captain America, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, the DC Captain Marvel, Jay Garrick Flash- DC is pretty much screwed come 2036. (I hope they've milked as much out of the public as possible by then because the slop is coming to clean up anything left over!)

If you think these studios defend their properties with the zealotry of a pack lion today, just wait until we enter the nitty gritty of Public Domain disputes. "Oh, you can't have Superman fly in your project, because in his first iteration he is only noted as being able to 'Leap tall buildings in a single bound'!" "Actually, DC's Captain Marvel didn't wear that uniform until 1955!" It's all going to come out then, let me tell you! The pettiness, the extra little stipulations and hidden rules! Being told your cash cow is now open to the public is tantamount to announcing your intention to whore out their first born daughter, and these companies will burn the entire legal system to the ground before they let that go without a say!

So bear witness to all the machinations of the coming year as Disney finally steps back from being the Copyright bogeyman they've loved posing as for the past century. (And yes, knowing Walt Disney's liberal use of other people's property, I consider the company a 'Copyright ghoul' from inception.) What I would be very interested to see, however, is how long before something genuinely worthwhile is afforded to us from all these repealed regulations, instead of all these opportunistic drivel that launches out the gate first. There's got to be someone out there who's great masterpiece work is held back only because of some niggling copyright axe hanging over their head- I just know it! Wait- wasn't the best of Lovecraft's works published circa 1928, particularly 'Call of Cthulhu'? (I have a book to publish, stat!)

Okay, I HAVE to talk about the Disney Marvel Games showcase

 Disaster incarnate

I have been deftly missing absolutely every single press conference that has come out this year; without the stability of E3 in my life it's almost felt like every single big developer has randomly selected their week to do a reveal event and I'm just supposed to sense it on the wind. As it just so happens I was just skimming the Youtube home page when I heard about the 'Disney Marvel games showcase', a combination of words I never quite expected to see together and so found myself more than mildly intrigued by. Why not tune in to what could very well be the first of many games showcases for the biggest entertainment conglomerate in the world that still has a centralised brand image? That could be historic! In fact, I pretty sure it will be whatever happens. So I ended up watching the event and can now, in the literal minutes after it ended, share with you that it was nigh-on atrocious. One of the worst reveal events I've ever seen, only really topped by that Gearbox showcase a while back which revealed nothing and just sent Randy Pitchford wandering around a film set for fifteen minutes.

Now of course, one might be asking exactly what it is that makes a 'bad' video game showcase, and the truth is that there is no definitive checklist, just as there never is in matters of objectivity; but if we look at this mechanically we can actually break down the basic parameters. First of all, the event has to recognise that the ratio between games being shown and hosts talking needs to be skewered in the favour of the former. A showcase is the time to display the games that are being worked on, a deeper dive video needs to exist separately so that those who are interested in that particular product can go look it up. Think of the viewers like fish and the developers as fisherman. They're trying to bait their lines enough to lure in the fish, so they need to show off the goods and keep the line dangling to keep things lively and convince fans there's something interesting here. Let the line sit like its dead, or bait it with a lifeless animatic, and the fish are going to get bored and swim off elsewhere. And let me tell you; for this entire show I felt like dipping.

First off, our illustrious host Mr Blessing wasn't making matter easy. Now there's always going to be a friction between a showcase line-up and it's host, because every second we're looking at the host, we're not seeing new games and, usually, the host is saying nothing of any relevance to the game in question beyond repeating a release date that was already shown off in the trailer. Mr Blessing didn't even have any release dates to rattle off, he literally just hype-manned each game with a 'that looks sick' etc. For every trailer with typically sterile corporate enthusiasm. (In his defence he did, rather cringily, introduce himself as a an NPC.) I think the best way to do a host is the way that Nintendo does it. Borderline text-to-speech disembodied voice over back-to-back game coverage, and if we ever need to see a human it's going to either be the CEO or the game director coming on to beg our forgiveness before they delay Breath of the Wild 2 for another year! (Sorry, I got off track...)

But the second poison pill which killed this conference is something that our Host couldn't have saved if he was replaced with all the charisma of Lalo Salamanca; there was literally nothing to show off. I don't mean there were no new game announcements, because there absolutely were; I mean that of those games, the teams had nothing to cobble together representing the gameplay content of those games. We got cinematic after cinematic incessantly, and the couple of times there was gameplay, it was for games with painfully predictable premises! The Mario Kart rip-off? Yeah, I can imagine how that plays, thank you very much! Hearthstone with Marvel Characters? I don't even know why you're making that instead of just selling a cross-over opportunity to Magic: The Gathering like every other brand does...

The showcase did have some reveals, however, such as a cute looking multiplayer 2D platformer themed in the new Mickey show style. That was decent. We also saw some more of Midnight Suns, and I'm rapidly reaching the point where I'm seeing much more of this game then I ever needed to; I honestly don't know what I have to look forward to in the full release of the game any more at this point. I've seen all the animations, I've seen all their special moves. I think we've had every character revealed and seen how Boss fights play out. I'd just like the game now, please! And we got the aforementioned Mario kart game with a name so forgettable I'm going to guess it right now instead of look it up in the hopes that my short term memory has managed to nail it. Was it... Speedstorm? Oh my god it was! I am a king among mortals!

Also shown were those Avatar games which no one asked for- oh wait, did I forget to mention? There's two of them now, buddy! That first game by Ubisoft is allegoric to showing off footage because I suppose at this point Ubisoft knowns how instantly recognisable their tired formula is and figures that the less they show us, the better. The second game is- wait, really? Oh god. The second game is an MMO RPG, I kid you not. No doubt developed by a team who have totally no idea the amount of commitment required to make an MMO RPG function like it should and who only see the returns of the big players in the industry and simply stand there, gaping with dollar signs in their eyes. It doesn't even look visually impressive, which is literally the key selling point of the Avatar franchise: visual appeal over substance!

What else, what else? Umm... we got a cinematic for a game featuring some Disney villains with absolutely no details about what the game is supposed to be. They might as well have just posted a screenshot of their trademark filling on Twitter, we'd know about as much about the game as we do now. Then there was... geez this is hard... I think there was some sort of cinematic for a Mobile game featuring more cartoony versions of Marvel heroes... no wait, that was Strike Force, that game's already out... Oh that's right! Niantic decided they want to try and cannibalise their own audience even further with another game to slap up next to the Pokemon Go, Hogwarts Wizards Unite and Pikmin Bloom audience! (Wasn't there a Witcher themed game in there somewhere as well?) So these are all stocking stuffers; what about the big show stopper games that everyone came to this event for? What about the updates to Wolverine, Spider-man 2 or Kingdom Hearts 4?

Well there was one teaser that I think they wanted to be a showstopper event at the end of the conference. It was a big tease featuring Captain America, Bucky, Black Panther and... someone else, I actually don't know, in World War 2 Paris starring in what looks to be some action adventure multiverse Marvel game. Oh wait, Amy Hennig is involved? In that case it's going to get cancelled. That woman is cursed, I swear. How she managed to get out the hugely successful Uncharted games without a satellite falling on the development office, I'll never now. But that was everything. The whole event. No big final showcase, no update to the huge Disney branded projects that are still floating around with very few details, just a few table scraps and a pat on the back. So welcome back to the world of game development after your extended hiatus, Disney; but maybe you should wait until you have something to actually show before you waste everyone's time and energy. That would be sweet, thanks.

Sora in Smash

 Finally, indeed

And so it has finally come to pass, the clock has turned and the final Super Smash Bros. Character to be added in the largest crossover game of all time has come. I was actually late to the reveal (take a shot for me being late to a gaming event for the fiftyist time) so when I logged in all I saw was a couple of characters duking it out on a by-the-numbers stage and I remember thinking "Okay, so when does the cool stuff happen, who's the new character. All we've got here is Samus and Sora. Wait, wait a second... one of these guys isn't supposed to be here!" And that's how I learnt that our finale hero is going to be the bearer of the Keyblade himself; Sora of the Disney Square Enix divide. Aspirant of Kingdom Hearts, slayer of Heartless, friend to every single major Disney character ever, and remover of puberty during that one chase at the end of Kingdom Hearts 1 but the beginning of 'Chain of Memories'. And may I just say it's about time.

I mean the only reason I didn't recognise him straight away was because I assumed he was already part of the cast, that's how much of a no-brainer Sora was, but I guess the fact that we have him now is going to be an achievement to rest laurels on, huh. Does this make for that explosive finale we all were waiting for? I mean perhaps, for a few, but this isn't so much the mind-blowing "Oh my god, they got ____?" As it is the head scratching, "Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Doesn't it?" Then again, looking at Fortnite and the lackadaisical way they've handled crossovers throughout the years, I guess we really shouldn't just be down for anyone showing up anyway. Without Sakurai and his team of professionals leading the way, we'd be getting a procession of low effort skin jobs and not the all encompassing character creation which makes Smash Bros. creation so very special.

Whatsmore, when you really stop and think about it, putting Sora in any other video game is quite the huge deal when you consider that he is a creation of a property owned by Square Enix as well as the notoriously difficulty-to-work-with Disney. In fact, I think the only reason this deal was able to go through is because Disney relinquished it's reign of video games quite a while ago, and so Square have majority control over the direction of the series. The request for this crossover was likely just a document shoved on the desk of Chapek that he signed off on without reading a single word of it. Nintendo and Disney getting into negotiations together sounds like a recipe for abject litigational disaster as far as I'm concerned, and all the courts in the world have been spared a horrible death by paper cut.

That last livestream was a pretty emotionally charged moment for a lot of people out there, not least of all for Waluigi holdouts who don't seem to grasp the concept that the guy is already an assist trophy, thus he actually cannot become a fighter now. (I know most are just memeing, but some people get actually upset and it confuses me.) Seeing Sakurai build up to the moment was a big deal, seeing as how this game has been the ultimate culmination of all his work on Smash up until now. (And the fact that the final DLC character was supposed to drop at the end of the last DLC pack.) Though given the part of the industry he hails from it was obvious we weren't going to see any outward emotion,  I think the gravity of the finality surrounding the reveal touched us all. (Of course, for me that was in retrospect, because I turned up late.)

As for the reveal video itself, that was pretty much as sweet and emotional as it could have been; watching the fire of the Smash logo snuff itself out for one final invitation and then seeing that Invitation be the Keyblade unlocking Kingdom Hearts to release Sora. Or rather, I think that's what they were going for. The whole 'Door to Kingdom Hearts' thing has shifted over the years to the point where I legitimately have no idea what they were fighting over at the end of the first game anymore, so speculation abounds. But seeing Sora drift into the void and float above the dozens of his now contemporaries, was heart-warming to see. And I was even more excited to see that this was Kingdom Hearts 1 Sora. Or rather, Kingdom Hearts 2 Sora in 1 Sora's clothes, for whatever reason. A real call to the past from the team there, nicely done.

Sora's moveset was also touched upon with great detail, but anyone who has played the original games to their completion probably knows a great deal of these moves anyway. A lot of it just naturally flows from the combos in the old games just fine, because these franchises have been destined for each other for so long now. The only move I would personally call to question would be that Final Smash, which has Sora trapping his enemy inside of Kingdom Hearts (as it's identified in KH1, not the KH2 Moon) and then exploding it? Is that- is that a good thing? Isn't Kingdom Hearts integral to the fabric of the universe or something? And since when can the Keyblade blow up doors? I thought that keys opened things in much more traditional ways.

Yoko Shimomura's wonderful suites make for a much welcome edition to the Smash Bros. line up of tracks, and the fact that there won't be any original compositions is just fine when we're talking about tunes this iconic and great. (Except, of course, for the victory fanfare which was composed especially by Shimomura herself.) Swashbuckling adventure pieces really do highlight the similarities I find, and I mean this in the best of ways, between Sakurai and Tetsuya Nomura. Both are visionaries who dance to their own tune, for better or for worse. Both created fabulous and memorable series' that touched the hearts of millions. And now both have their DNA within Smash Bros. given that Nomura's baby, Sora, is fighting inside of Sakurai's baby colosseum game.

If you've been around here for any length of time you'll know that I'm a huge Kingdom Hearts fan (except for Chain of Memories) and thus I couldn't think of a more fitting end for the Smash Bros. lineup than what we've seen today. Except for, I dunno, a crossover with 'Heritage from the Future', but let's not go talking any more craziness up in here. Heck, I already got Pyra, I shouldn't start getting greedy with demands and such. Putting Smash Bros. to rest is a surreal thing to be doing, especially as I, for one, was sure that a third character pack was due to be announced anyday now, and who knows how many years it'll be until a follow-up. (if, indeed, there ever is one.) But all good things must have an ending, and I think we can all agree to some extent that Smash Bros has had this one a long time coming. Till the next one, Sakurai.

Lego Stars Wars: The Skywalker Saga

The legends said you would return, but I must confess: I never truly believed... 

There are few titles out there that are a guaranteed hardwire directly into my heart through the back-door artery labelled 'nostalgia'. Games that, from their very name alone, can perk my head up and have me all over them, drooling with anticipation and memories-to-be-made, with only so much as a small tease to keep me hooked. In fact, right now I'd say the only three game series' which could manage such a feat would be Metal Gear (which is so unbelievably dead right now that I can't imagine falling into that trap anytime soon), Persona (For the love of god give me Persona 5 on PC, ATLUS! I'll do anything!) and LEGO Star Wars. Yep. Not even if Knights of Old Republic turned around and slapped a surprise KOTOR 3 announcement, would I lend it such unchallenged reverence as I do to LEGO Star Wars. (Although that might be because EA holds the rights to KOTOR, and EA currently has no decent RPG developer within their stable.) And I might go so far as to extend that to maybe one other LEGO sub-division in LEGO Batman (especially given the fact that I've literally been replaying that game series over the past week) but it's the world of LEGO lightsabers, blue glowing build piles and increasingly more complicated Death Star levels that has me hooked.

My history with this series actually goes all the way back to the original on the PS2 days, back when I was still fresh in love with Star Wars. I would consume anything from that medium and it would trickle down towards me thanks to a Father who loved the series too. I would get Star Wars Bounter Hunter in this time, (I need to emulate that someday. Such a classic) LEGO Star Wars, and even a few of those legendarily weird Star Wars titles that people debate the existence of. That's right, I used to own Super Bombad Racing and Star Wars Demolition. (Those goes back into PS1 actually.) But LEGO Star Wars, alongside Star Wars Battlefront, were the gems of my collection in the days that I got them. Battlefront would become my dad's favourite game to play, LEGO Star Wars would become my favourite, and when I got Lego Star Wars 2 The Original Trilogy, that would be the middle ground we'd play together. As you can likely deduce; this series means a lot to me, emotionally.

But even divorcing that sleight context from the whole affair, Lego Star Wars was the first example for me of a 'forever game' before I even knew what that term meant. The sort of game I could come back to again and again in perpetuity, driven by an engine that seemed to say 'yes' to me as much as I wanted it to. Were there secrets and collectibles to return to levels looking for? Yes. Was there enough sprawl to your levels for me to go off and create my own fun, such as pretending to be a clone troop fighting across Federation trade ships? Yes. Could I even go so far as to design my very own Jedi and jump across these levels living the Star Wars power fantasy that every kid of that age has? Of course, go nuts. I think I might have rivalled my several thousands hours playing Skyrim with the amount of times I kept coming back to LEGO Star Wars and reliving my fantastic golden dream. No other LEGO game quite captured that exact charm for me, except Batman, (I never had the chance to play Lego Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings, though. They might have been good) so I've yearned for that sprawling majesty ever since.

Thus when I heard that TT Games were moving on to covering the new trilogy I was beyond excited, although confused about why they were going one movie at a time. I mean, I loved more LEGO games, but I couldn't be focusing on one narrative like this was some petty story game, I wanted to jump around from Episode to Episode, crafting my own stupid events on the workbench in my imagination shack up in my noggin. And so I eventually figured that I was better off waiting until they finished the movies so that I could pick up the 'collection pack' or whatever they ended up doing. As you probably know, that ended up not happening. Whilst working on a Last Jedi pack, plans changed and the entire project was directed into creating Lego Star Wars The Skywalker Saga, a reworking of the entire Star Wars movie franchise in Lego form to create the largest game TT have ever made. So the disappointment from the cancellation news didn't last too long, at least not in this neck of the woods.

And since then it has been silence, crippling, aggravating, silence. Don't get me wrong, I understand what incredible feats of engineering these games are, what with their tactile level design, heavily destructible environments, near-endless replayability, I recognise that all takes time; but good god it felt like they announced the game the same day the project was greenlit, because we had been waiting a hot minute for anything resembling an update. But that doesn't mean the team didn't want to waste our time by announcing DLC. Yep. DLC for a game that doesn't even have a release date. Ya'll serious? Now we could stew in our lack of patience whilst ruminating on the fact that Rogue One, Solo, Mandalorian and Bad Batch would all be getting extra paid content at some point whenever this game launched, also 'at some point'. What a time to be a ravenous fan of this franchise, a time where we were being poked and prodded to see how much we could take without breaking and loosing our damn minds.

Yet I speak of the past, because the wait is oh-so-nearly over. Recently at Gamescon our frustrations were rewarded with an honest-to-goodness look at the meat of what this game is, this New Hope for the Lego Stars Wars Universe, Episodes 1-9. A complete trailer, gameplay and all, covering the breadth of the franchise, and from the very get-go my reaction was "Oh, they're remaking the originals". Yes, I know I might have been late to this particular revelation, but for some reason I just assumed this upcoming game was going to be a repackage of Lego Stars Wars 1 and 2 with a new 3rd era tacked on top for completion's sake. But I may have been feeding my own misconceptions there. Instead, the team have made Episode 1 and 9 from scratch with their modern design philosophies and I am... scared. Excited, but very scared.

What if they screw it up? What if the simple fun of those original games gets lost beneath cinematic sequences and gimmick new minigames that aren't as good as the developer thought they were? Granted, TT themselves have never given substantial fuel to feed these doubts, but isn't it just the pattern of modern storied game developers to screw everything up? Play things too safe or veering too far off the beaten course, and who knows what we'll be getting? Well, in their defence, what I've seen so far is more cool than worrying, but who can rightly say from but a single trailer? The graphics looks perfect, the animations are wonderful, the gameplay seems to have been touched up, the humour is... different, (I preferred when they didn't speak) and I have no idea what that galaxy-map stuff was all about but I want to find out! It just feels like everything is riding a pinprick's edge from tumbling into mediocrity, and currently I've no earthly idea whether or not it'll balance or fall.

One thing I do know, however, is that for this game to finally get a release date is a miracle worth celebrati- Spring? Spring 2022? All these years and you couldn't even hit December? Heck, Spring isn't even a date, making it seem like they still haven't finalised and it could be pushed back even further! Good god, what are they doing over there; genetically cloning a real living LEGO model of Rey to sell with every copy of the game? Wow. At least this means the final game is getting it's polish, and that when it does arrive, it'll be every bit that spotless LEGO experience we remember from our youths. (Except for LEGO Batman, which is unplayable without VSync) But then I did say this series would receive 'unchallenged' reverence, did I not? I didn't think trusting in this game would be as much of a gamble as it's turning out to be, but I'm throwing in the chips. I want to be excited, and from the little we've seen I think that excitement is warranted. Welcome back LEGO Star Wars, I've needed you in my life.

Knight of the Old Republic: Rumors Swirling

 Don't do that. Don't give me hope.

MrMattyPlays got something to tell the world, does he? And it's not related to Fallout? Why then, that only leaves- no, it couldn't be. I can't get myself excited like this, not to be let down once more; what point is there in persisting if reality springs back to knock the wind out of you time and time again? What's the point in any of it anymore? But then if we don't have hope, then why do we continue at all? Damn it all, I may actually be giving into the rumours, the welling of the chorus, the whispers on the nape of the wind, all telling tales of an incoming game which is the second best news that Star Wars fans like myself could hear right now. That after all these years of missteps and failures, with the mess of the modern Star Wars world before us, hope will lie in an upcoming remake of the classic game: Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic. (But still no word on that actual threequel which we've all been asking for. Stepping stones- I guess)

Now I certainly haven't said this nearly enough on this blog (though right now I'm actually wondering if I've said it at all) but Knights of the Old Republic is quiet literally one of my favourite games of all time. I place it third on my top list, in fact, as easily the best RPG out of the dozens that I've played and loved, pretty much making me a prime member of the target audience for this prospective remake. I rate Kotor above Dragon Age, FF7, Fallout, Wasteland, all of those formative roleplaying games of the genre, and to be honest a good chunk of that adoration arrives merely from the property in question and how Bioware-of-the-day managed to grab ahold of Star Wars and make something that felt deeply personal and cleverly crafted from it. These were in the blessed years before Disney, because everyone knows this sort of game would never have been made under their stifling grasp; it's just antithetical to the whole 'make everything boring' model they've got going over there. As a a relic to how better Star Wars was as a free agent, Disney would never allow anyone to touch back upon the Kotor days, would they? And yet-

We're far away from an official announcement, Disney's Star Wars is still well aboard delivering us that awful looking 'High republic' era of storytelling which looks to just retell the Old Republic in a manner lacking the ambiguity which makes those stories so interesting. What made The Old Republic great was the fact it was an era ushered in with a fantastic comic book story and a fantastic game at practically the same time. Both were darker in tone, but rekindled that adventurous spirit of old school Star Wars; and even going back to revisit either of them would signal a Star Wars landscape that's got a bit more legs to it then we originally thought. And whilst that may seem impossible, leakers and in-the-know commentators seem to be telling us that gears are moving somewhere in the background, willing to prove all of us naysayers wrong that Disney will in fact go the distance and- hire someone else to do the work for them because they're still personally clueless when it comes to Star Wars.

In fact, one such commentator, this MrMattyPlays who I've mentioned, seems to believe he's narrowed down the actual studio that has been hired to covertly make this Kotor remake. And given that he's an even bigger fan of Kotor than I am, (I think I recall him saying that he replays it every year) I'm willing to concede that he likely has a more ready finger on the pulse of this franchise. MrMatty has in the past signalled out Aspyr Media as having worked on improvements and a complete mobile port of Knights of the Old Republic 2. In fact an actual reporter, Jason Schreier, seems to be convinced that this is definitive, and pretty much public, news at this point; pointing out that Aspyr has ported "A bunch of Kotor Games". (I'm assuming that's a misquote. There's only 2 Kotor games as I recall. Can 2 be considered a 'bunch'?)

And yet there's no word on the remake. Why? Why not celebrate this and raise a flag of glory to let the Star Wars fandom know that there's an actual future in the series that they know and love? Is it because things aren't quite so straightforward? Perhaps. I've also seen news, though without any publicly available announcement it's hard to say where these specifics come from short of just saying Aspyr is the leakiest ship in the industry right now, that Knights of the Old Republic is going to see a complete reworking of it's gameplay to move away from the turn-based-but-actually-free-action hybrid gameplay of the original and into something more action adventure. I'm not sure what that entails, but I honestly do like the idea of changing up the gameplay to the point where this isn't just a supplanting of the original game. If this is true then both games can coexist with differing merits instead of one just becoming the definitive, and I like that.

What I don't like is reports that elements of Kotor 1 and 2 are being rewritten in order to fit into the new Disney canon. Good lord no, forget that idea; scrap and burn it to the ground alongside the rest of the Star Wars universe. Disney's new canon is directionless trash, no one should have to disform themselves in order to fit into that narrow-minded scope. If anything, Disney's canon should be morphing to fit around the more interesting and less rigid concepts of Kotor, opening the way for less predictable stories to be told as we go forward. Why not let us explore a world where Jedi's can't always be relied upon, or where the people that you trust can be more than they appear to be? I don't think that's much to ask from a storytelling standpoint but Disney certainly don't seem willing to embrace it if any of their works is an indication of what to expect. 

But even in the Disney cabal of mediocrity, there has sparked some more promising tidbits to get all excited over. In particular I saw one tweet by director James Gunn, noting the trending of Kotor and commending it; calling Kotor the best game ever made and his favourite Star Wars product. (Never through I'd be of such similar minds with James Gunn.) Now of course, Mr Gunn knows about as much regarding the inner workings of Aspyr and Disney's game licencing department as anyone else, but as far as signal-boosting goes you can't get bigger than someone on the verge of releasing a hyped up superhero movie. At this point, even if Kotor wasn't being remade, the suits in charge would have to get on it else risk wasting the plethora of free press literally lined up outside their door.

All this has me in the mood to give good old Kotor another run through, as it truly is that Star Wars adeventure that never gets old. Even as the elements which founded it steadily fall to ruin, Star Wars becomes lame and Bioware falls off the wagon, the original product glimmers with potential, and if something truly is due to come from that then consider me beside myself. And for anyone who needs that fix right away, I direct you to Unreal Cinema on Youtube who are currently creating short movies on Unreal Engine 4 that tell the events of Kotor in a fantastically updated visual style. (And apparently they've got permission to do so from LucasFilm, so that's exciting!) I may be of two minds in the world of remakes and reboots, but even I have to stop and appreciate it when something with remake potential enters the crosshairs. Just, you know, don't fudge it up.

Lucasarts is back?

 I thought you died alone, a long long time ago.

Disney. How do you face up to a corporate giant as powerful and unscrupulous as 'family friendly' as them? These are the sorts of people who will brutally crush anybody they could perceive as a mild hinderance, but they get away with it all either due to that faux happy face and welcoming arms, or just the sheer fact that they own every single property you used to love as a child so there's no defying them. By their word, storied studios will die without a second thought, and under their dark necrotic magiks studios can be resurrected against all the holy laws of man. Thus was true this week past when these literal studio murderers reached into their graveyards to drag out Lucasarts' battered and slain body, and after their Frankenstein-esque experiments, the thing was reborn as this unrecognisable monster known only as 'Lucasfilm Games'. Wait, Lucasfilm games? Seriously? What, you guys weren't allowed to call it Lucasarts again? Did you get pulled up 5 seconds before the announcement and couldn't fit in a brainstorming session? What the heck is a 'film game'? We making nothing but David Cage sequels here, or what's going on?

But yes, barring the absolutely atrocious name, Lucasarts are been reborn under the Disney banner a mere... 9 years after her murder. Oh and yes, before ya'll start; I know that under all technicalities the Lucasarts brand was never actually killed off. (Which makes it even weirder why they didn't just build up that studio. There's gotta be some contract stuff we don't know about.) But let's be honest here, gutting a promising studio by cancelling all their projects, firing 99% of the staff and turning a company that used to be on the cutting edge of development into a licenser; that's as close to studio murder as I can see. And now they've turned around and invoked her name to their own ends in an effort to ride this train of Star Wars revitalisation to glory. Nevermind the fact that, just going by pure statistics, at least 1/4 of the 20 new Star Wars projects they announced are probably going to fall flat on their face, meaning that unless the other 3/4 picks up serious slack, this Lucasfilm games experiment could go the way of the last company. (Afterall, we know how Disney's crack team of problem solvers deal with the most minor of inconveniences "Kill it with fire.")

Let me be frank for a second; I will not commend Disney for this move, because even at it's most basic they are missing the point of why killing of Lucasarts was so hurtful in the first place. Essentially Disney, at the time of the Star Wars acquisition, had but dipped their toes into the video game market and they bristled when they realised it wasn't a money printing machine; they actually had to put in work and make good games with mass appeal. As the dinosaurs that they are, rather than put in the work to get ahead of this burgeoning industry and install themselves in it as a powerplayer; Disney just said "it's too hard" threw in the towel and gave up. And after buying Lucasarts, a studio renowned for it's ability to make new and innovative products, they thought that the best move would be to fire everyone and kill it off rather than make use of the literally gift horse they'd just bought for their stable. (Are you starting to pick up on the way I don't particularly like Disney yet? I'm pretty subtle about it, you might not have noticed.)

Now they're realising that they were missing on literally stupid amounts of money and are slowly turning themselves around like the mile long ship that Disney encapsulates. But at the end of the day, is this all that Lucasarts ever was? Were they just a vehicle for George Lucas properties to be transferred into the gaming world, a creator of endless Star Wars games? Of course not, they were innovators! Look at their contributions to the, since stagnated, world of 'Point and click'! Ever heard of 'The Secret of Money Island?', literally one of the most famous Point and clicks of all time? That was them. How about 'Grim Fandango', the game which started the legacy of Tim Schafer even before he founded Double Fine? That was them. Day of the Tentacle, a lesser known classic that's just as brilliant? Lucasarts. And yes, a bevy of Star Wars games among them, but even then there they weren't slackers. Force Unleashed was responsible for real steps forward in ragdoll technology, and their contributions to the wider gaming world merely grow for there.

But all that means nothing now. Today their image and brand merely exists as a face for Disney who are still too cowardly to put their own face on front of their games unless it doesn't do well. Is that a promotion from simple licenser? I guess so, although we haven't really gotten confirmation whether this is actually the new form of Lucasarts or if they just stole the legacy of that studio in order to make a new company, so I can't even award Disney that slight praise just yet. At the very least this announcement could herald something positive; perhaps even an end to the tyrannical 10 year saga of Star Wars games that are published solely by EA. A decision which has cut down on the nearly yearly release of Star Wars games before the deal by about 300 percent. But as I don't believe that deal has technically run it's course just yet, I suppose we won't be celebrating liberation from that empire anytime soon. So in that case, why bother announce this at all?

Oh that's right, in order to precede the Bethesda announcement. That's right, Bethesda, makers of those RPG franchises you used to like, are teaming up with MachineGames (If you can even call it 'teaming up' considering that they already work exclusively with Bethesda) in order to make an Indiana Jones game. And I am... conflicted. On one hand, I still remember how much I loved 'Indiana Jones and the Emperors Tomb', but that was literally in the PS2 days, I'm not really sitting here with a candle in my window anymore. There was another game for the Wii, but by all accounts that was nothing to write home about. So now we've just got another game to coincide with the ramp up of marketing around this franchise that, rumour is, Disney wants to reboot. Call me a cynic, but I just ain't all that excited.

I mean sure, maybe once upon time merely hearing the Bethesda name would be enough to light a fire on my tail, but we live in enlightened times. They're handing this off to MachineGames, and even that has me a little confused. Those guys who, up until now, have focused on first person satirical action? Is Indiana Jones going to be a first person game? Would that work? Maybe, but something tells me that without getting to look at a digital recreation of Harrison Ford, (or, possibly, the next actor they bring in for this alleged reboot) selling the adventure might be hard. And it doesn't even make any sense conceptually. The fantasy isn't to replace Indiana Jones, we want to be him; so at least let us look at the guy. Yeah, there's no way this is going to be first person, I'm working myself up over nothing... probably.

Somehow it seems wrong to revive Lucasarts for an Indiana Jones video game, but I suppose it does send the message that this new 'Lucasfilm Games' isn't going to be a onetrick pony. (Although, given that they appear to be a pure licenser, maybe they will be anyway) Also, not the biggest fan of the 'absolutely nothing' teaser trailer approach to announcing games; I thought we outgrew that 5 years ago, but Disney and Bethesda are nothing if not behind the times. (They deserve each other) In my heart of hearts I want to look at this and nod my head that good fortunes are coming from this decision, and maybe they will be. Heck, perhaps Lucasfilm Games will slowly grow into independency once more and become a force for positive growth in videogame technology once again. Or maybe not, I dunno. At least I can say that all the ingredients seem to be there for a potentially cool game. (But experience says that'll just make it all the more heart-breaking when everything goes down the drain.)

Fortnite and Disney; The summer love story that just won't end

 Coming to a theatre near you!

So we haven't spoken about Fortnite for a hot minute, and that's because nothing has really come out of the "Biggest game in the world"(or, formerly, I guess, now that the age of 'Among Us' is here) since the advent of Chapter 2. Oh who am I kidding, tons has happened in Fortnite but it's all just been so far afield of the game that I used to casually play that it seems just wrong for me to try and immerse myself in this title that has been pushed so far outside my demographic. What started as a fun Battle Royale title has morphed into the early stages of this virtual social platform/ jack of all trades/ official Disney Marketing blimp which, on my more neurotic days, just shimmers with an air of 'Soulless machine' more than anything else. I mean, if Cyberpunk 2077 is a game about trying to save oneself from a world built and paid for by the cynical profit margins of shady megacorporations, than Fortnite is perhaps the exact opposite of surrendering yourself to them happily and engaging in their most intimate spaces. When you see all those mindless automatons in their 'happy state' with the VR pods, imagine Fortnite within their headset world and see how well the image fits.

But the good fortunes of the Fortnite creators mustn't be forgotten or diminished, because they have reached that golden level of pop-culture relevancy where their very name carries universal definition. Just like Minecraft, GTA or Call of Duty, no one is ever under any delusions about what you mean when Fortnite is bought into the conversation, and if the longevity of those other titles is anything to go by, I guess that means Fortnite is around to stay. (If you ever had any doubts about that.) One of the most transparent ways through which this fact has become obvious is in the way that the old guards of Entertainment have found themselves coming around to it's shores, like the music industry through Travis Scott and Marshmello. But perhaps the oldest of the giants who has settled themselves firmly with the Fortnite Kingdom is no longer than the sleeping beast of Disney, and that is a relationship that just fascinates me.

I hardly need to tell you, with it happening in one of the biggest movies of all time, but perhaps the first time there was any indication this fancy wasn't just passing and it would hold, it would have to be the scene in Avengers Endgame which featured Fortnite. How incredible, for a non-stock-composite game to feature in the highest grossing movie of all time; I would have loved to be a fly on the wall during that conference call. (Which windowless room full of stuffy executives erupted with more excitement over the prospect? I genuinely can't decide.) And as if that wasn't enough, Fortnite themselves held Avengers themed events over the release of the two movies which was a close enough marketing tie to actually warrant the use of Thanos in their game, even when Thanos was at the height of the storytelling! (Note how remarkable this is because old school marketing heads generally hate having their characters portrayed anywhere else simultaneously because they're all so far out of touch it isn't even funny.)

However, since those crazy times the Marvel Cinematic Universal has wound itself down for a while in order to give everyone a sufficient enough break not to become too sick with Marvel movies and you'd be forgiven for expecting Fortnite's collaboration with Disney properties to do the same, except nope. Fortnite manged to team up with Disney again for a 'Star Wars The Last Jedi' celebration, proving that theirs is a love written in the stars. If things progress like this it won't be long before all these big clueless companies begin looking about Fortnite as the 'front page' of gaming (provided that they don't already) and flood the game with their offers. Of course, in such a situation I'd imagine the buck would fall with Disney and how they feel about the prospect of open relationships, but I'm sure Fortnite will always find room for everyone else somewhere in their vacuous maw.

What really drove me to make this blog was actually something that happened really recently with Fortnite, in relation to the sort of events they were conducting in the here and now. Right in the middle of this new Galactus themed Fortnite story arc (yet again, Marvel is more active in Fortnite than in the movie world right now) they launched an initiative involving 'Hunters' and a collection of really enticing looking skins and such. At the head of all these, however, is a face that should be familair to anyone who's had interest in Disney of late, because it's the actual Mandalorian. That's right! The Mandolarian, or Din 'no one cares we're calling him Mando anyway' Djarin, and Baby Yoda, or I-refuse-to-call-him-that, have come to the world of Fortnite and it's their Season 2 iterations to top it off. (You can tell by the Mudhorn emblazoned on Mando's shoulder) And I for one am struggling to put my indignation into words.

"'Indignation', you say?" Why yes I do, because bare in mind, dear reader, that these are the single most popular characters to come to the Star Wars world since... Well, Ashoka Tano. These are literal super stars in the Star Wars landscape, and yet their first (and so far only) foray into the world of gaming hasn't been through a tie-in to an official Star Wars game, but through a Fortnite brand deal! Their first game! I honestly thought that Battlefront would get in on the action back when the first series was still around, but at that stage the team were busy wrapping things up in terms of new content so they couldn't quite manage it. Instead the golden goose of Fortnite gets to lay the golden egg and have Mando themed content installed, and I'm starting to worry that this might be a prelude to the sort of direction that Disney is heading in when it comes to the licencing of their ludicrously valuable properties.

Most in gaming remember how Disney squeezed themselves out of the gaming market after their own inhouse studios couldn't manage to score a decent hit, and since then they've had to make do with licencing out their games. Most contentious of which was the decision to licence exclusively to EA for what feels like ever, but their other titles have been around the place. Square Enix, through Kingdom Hearts, still has access to Disney original content, but that may be starting to change all because of a little game called Avengers. Now bear in mind that this is just my personal interpretation of Disney's actions, but I think I've got a decent grip of things. So Disney, recognising the great relationship they share with Square, probably thought it safe now to start diversifying their marketing through the game industry and thus authorised a persistent platform for Marvel marketing through 'Avengers', a game that was destined to do well because of the attached name. Yet now that things have gone the other way and Square's Avengers has not only failed to cement itself in pop culture but also hasn't managed to generate a profit yet; (as of the making of this blog) that is seriously going to shake Disney's confidence. My suspicion is that their relationship with the tried and true Epic games is only going to grow as Disney leans on them more and more, and in doing so we'll start to see ever less of our favourite, now Disney owned, franchises in the gaming world. The name is just too big to risk failure now.

Maybe just seeing the Mandalorian pimped out in this unceremonious attempt to sell battle passes is what's standing out to me here. There seems to be a lot of dignity imbued in him that's hard to play out on the stage of Fortnite, and that might be my own bias speaking but I believe it none the less. As a lifelong Star Wars fan it's no surprise that all I really want is a space to live out my Scoundrel fantasies, and Fortnite just doesn't really pull that off me, so I guess fans like me are SOL for this new phase of Disney property management. Only Spiderman is really safe to still make it to imaginative and risk-taking game fronts because that's lucky enough to have Sony backing, who's to say what the future holds for Star Wars. I'd imagine, however, that given the strength of their partnership, Fortnite's going to be taking a lot of Disney's gaming firsts for the forseeable future.

Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days was not what I expected.

Got it memorised?

Okay, so let me get one thing straight; when I purchased the entire remastered Kingdom Hearts story it was so that I could get abreast of the story in the most engrossing and true-to-the-intent manner. This meant playing through the best versions of almost all the games ('KH3 Remix' obviously isn't out yet) in canonical order even if that doesn't happen to be the same order in which the titles originally released. In that way, the collections that I acquired were just about perfect, however there is one issue I was alerted to once I started 'playing' 358/2 Days, and here's how it panned out. First I sat down to play the game with my brother present as we were both curious, and we watched the beginning cutscenes whilst trying to reconcile all the new names, faces and lore. (Seriously, for the first couple of minutes, these are packed!) After about five minutes I jokingly put down the controller and remarked "Okay, I guess this is a movie then." Only to then be greeted with text over a screenshot followed by another 5 minutes of cutscenes. Slightly taken aback by this development I took to google: "Is Kingdom Hearts 358/2..." and there was autocomplete there to finish my thoughts. "... A movie?" Uh oh...

So yeah, even though Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days was a Nintendo DS title released 4 years after Kingdom Hearts 2 (And yet set just before KH2 for some reason), the HD remaster is very much not a game, but an almost 3 hour long collection of that game's cutscenes into a mildly coherent movie. (Don't people do that crap on Youtube for free?) Now I have no idea what prompted this choice, perhaps the team couldn't figure out how to import the stylus-based controls to traditional controllers, or lacked the time and resources, (probably the latter) but the result is a whole game without any actual gameplay. And you wanna know the worst part? After 'Chain of Memories' I actually sort of welcome this sort of storytelling, at least this way I won't be crying in pain once the story scenes start. So well done Square, you've turned me into a movie review blog. Bully for you.

Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days is the culmination of the 3 arc story established by Kingdom Hearts 1 (Albeit, mostly in the final few seconds) and set-up by 'Chain of Memories'. It serves as a bridge between the characters and how they appeared in the first game to the vastly different case of the second game whilst also serving as an explicit introduction to the franchise's previously obscure badguys, Organisation XIII. Honestly, I was a little surprised to see how much of that vague set-up from the true ending of KH1 was actually paid off in this story, to the point where even that 'Final Fantasy Versus 13'-looking taster reel turned out to be an actual scene from the climax of this title. They really went to put in the effort, didn't they? I mean, I can genuinely look at some of the more obscure scenes in this franchise and actually know what they were referring to now, and I honestly thought I'd never get to this point! There are still some mysteries, like why folk keep referring to Riku as "The Superiors'...(dying breath)" or where the hell Kairi actually comes from, but those are just hooks for the later chapters, the basic what why and how is laid out plain as day, and I appreciated that greatly.

The story starts off at... well, it's not actually made abundantly clear. But I think it's just after that moment in the first game where Sora sacrifices his heart in order to release Kairi's heart. (You know, just before Sora magically restores his own heart again through the power of love or something, I don't know I just work here.) We're put into the shoes of a new kid who's just been 'created' and the movie sort of blows it's load a little early by literally showing us the process by which Xemnas comes up with his name. ("Uh, shall I just call him 'Sora'? Nah, too obvious,  I should probably mix it up a bit. Roas? Still kinda dumb... I know! I'll just throw an 'X' in there. Roxas. Perfect!")

Roxas is the 13th member of Organisation XIII, the group of black hood donning creeps who have taken an unhealthy liking to Sora for the past two games, however he is special amongst them as the only one who can wield a Keyblade. Most folk would be a little shocked by this due to the fact that as of so far only Sora and supreme-leader Mickey have been shown to be Keyblade chosen (and Riku, maybe) but the movie just plays it off like no big deal. This highlights one of the problems of experiencing these products in canonical order (something which my collection of the games encouraged, by-the-by) because as I said previously this title was made after KH2, and thus expects you to know of the events of that game. For me it wasn't a huge problem until I played KH2 after this and realised that I already knew all of the plotpoints they were being all coy about. (Whoops.) But I digress.

As a member of the Organisation that marks Roxas as a Nobody, which we learn to be a special type of individual who is born without a heart. Thus the organisation want to use the power of the Keyblade in order to 'complete Kingdom Hearts' under the vague impression that doing so will grant them their own hearts. (Wait, 'Complete Kingdom Hearts'? What does that mean? Why do they want Hearts? What the heck is going on?) Soon we start to meet the other members of the organisation, as well as Axel who seems to take a liking to the blank-slate which is Roxas. They even start to form a tradition of eating sea-salt ice cream at the top of Twilight Town's clocktower before a new member of the organisation is introduced in Xion.

Now, immediately upon seeing Xion you'll likely think one thing; is that a fan OC reskin of Kairi? And yes, yes she is. But she is still treated as her own person by the lore so I suppose we're all supposed to just ignore the glaring similarities in a sort of Eva from MGS3 situation. Xion is presented as sort of a mirror of Roxas, going through a similar journey of filling in her blank slate personality whilst becoming close friends with Axel and Roxas. (She's also another Keyblade wielder, but that's beside the point right now.) We see the two of them evolve from literally nobodies, with no hopes and dreams, to passionate friends who look out for each other. Likewise, Axel goes from an aloof chap intent on playing all sides within the contentious Organisation to one of the team and an absolute push over to Xion when she starts challenging his orders.

'358/2 Days' follows these three's friendship through their year working as unwitting accomplices to whatever the heck it is that Xemnas is planning. (It also goes through 359 days, but I'm not going to start splitting hairs...) As the story progresses you'll become aware of events happening in the background, like 'Chain of Memories' in which half of XIII's number is cut down and Sora is sent into a coma, or Riku growing several feet and deciding to don a blindfold 'Nier: Automata' style. (I know the movie tries to play him off as someone new, but again, no one else has hair that spiky.) The real rub of the plot comes once Xion starts to question who she is and goes looking for answers at Castle Oblivion, which highlights one of my biggest problems with this story.

Throughout the tale all three of the protagonists, Xion, Roxas and Axel, go through journeys, but Roxas is probably the person who evolves the least, yet he is our focal point throughout it all. And yes, having completed the prologue of KH2 I know this is because his big moment had to be preserved for that game, but it does mean there's several points in the story where you're just standing around whilst other people do interesting stuff. Heck, the story even has to shift perspective to the other two every now and then because Roxas' daily going-ons is just so dry by comparison. Personally I think Xion would have made a much better main character, as her journey was one of the most heart-wrenching in the entire franchise. She starts off as a emotionless husk who develops feelings, friends and an unquenchable love for life. Then she learns the truth about what she is and realises something horrible, everything she's taken for granted is at the cost of someone's else life and love; so should she continue to be in the knowledge that she's hurting someone else or give up her happiness for someone that she'll never meet? It's truly grippingly emotional stuff.

Okay, so I'm about to spoil the rest of it in these next few paragraphs, so skip to the verdict if you wanna watch this 3 hour movie instead. Through a whole lot of sleuth work, sideways cutscenes, and a endgame surprise appearance from Naminé, we learn the truth that Roxas is the Nobody that belonged to Sora, created when he gave up his heart for Kairi. (Which explains why Roxas can wield the Keyblade) whilst for Xion things are a bit more complicated. Xion is, and forgive me if I'm off base here, a physical manifestation of Sora's feelings for Kairi that was channelled through Roxas and given sentience by... The Organisation? (And I used to think Metal Gear was peak convoluted storytelling...) This presents a problem as Naminé promised to put Sora's memories back together at the end of 'Chain of Memories', but she can't do that whilst those memories are running around with in goth get-up calling themselves Xion, so a sacrifice has to be made. In order to successfully wake up Sora, Xion needs to be destroyed so that Naminé can weave those memories back into Sora's mind. (You still with me? Good.)

Honestly, this all builds upon 'Chain of Memories' relevance a lot more than I ever considered at the time. I thought CoM was just a silly little story that completely invalidated itself at the end with a 'We're just going to erase all your memories about this adventure' ending, but now I'm learning that it contained a super pivotal plot point that pushed the entire franchise forward by a whole year. (Now I could almost look at Chain of Memories with a whole new respect, if the gameplay wasn't complete and total trash.) It set's up CoM as the middle act to a three act tale about the ascension of the Keyblade master, in a manner that vaguely mirrors the 10 year sleep of Noctis in Final Fantasy 15. Did Tetsuya Nomura literally make FF15 to be a remake of Kingdom Hearts? (Big if true...)

Ultimately Xion has to make a terrible choice for the good of a person she doesn't even, and will never, know. In order to wake up Sora she has to give up her existence. That's more than just dying, that's erasing every single trace that she ever existed along with the memories of her inside of her friend's heads. What a terrible way to go for someone who had just learned how to love! Xion ends up making that choice and the rest of the game is just dedicated to the movie quickly speeding through events so that everything lines up to the beginning of Kingdom Hearts 2. ("Uhh- Riku has to give into his Ansem form for vague reasons... Roxas has to get captured by Riku/Ansem despite winning the fight. Axel has to decide to bring his friends back to the organisation against their wishes in a vague desire to put things back to the way they were so that it makes sense for him to be slightly homicidal towards Roxas in KH2.") And at the end of the day Xion is eliminated and everything is ready for Sora to finally wake and continue his magical journey through the cosmos. Except for Roxas still being alive and kicking, but they can worry about that in KH2. No need to even bring that up now.

Verdict

So, in terms of story I have to say that I really did love 'Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days' a lot more than I though I would. It bought a lot of ancillary characters to the forefront and made them relatable and interesting in a way I wasn't expecting, putting a lot of weight behind their former and later actions. It also nailed consequence and pathos, at least for every character who wasn't named Roxas. My only nagging desire by the end of it was that I wish I could have played through this story, as that seemed like it would have been the ideal vector. The whole 'string all the cutscenes' together approach seems to work fine enough in order to convey the relationships, but some of the impact of the big battles are lost when all we see are the starts and finishes of these fights. In normal Kingdom Hearts battles that wouldn't have been too much of a loss, but KH2 has shown me that the team learnt how to tell a story within those fights, so I feel like I'm missing out on a layer of the storytelling. Plus, this presentation does mean that some smaller plotpoints go completely unexplained. (What the hell is a Dusk and why is Xion at danger of being turned into one? Is that giant heart shaped moon in the sky Kingdom Hearts? Why does Roxas not have the same hair as Sora? Explain, movie! EXPLAIN!)

But in terms of satisfaction I will say that I came away from '358/2 Days' feeling like a great deal of the first game's mysteries had been solved, prepping for a whole smattering of new ones. (There are a total of 5 games between Kingdom Hearts 2 and 3, I'm expecting a freakin' opera's worth of tales) Whilst I still love Kingdom Hearts 1 the most (You know, because it was an actual game) I'm willing to concede that this story has shown me that the franchise has more legs than that title, and I want to see where those legs will take it. (Already having jumped into KH2 I'm beyond impressed, so things are looking good so far.) In summary, I think that I would recommend watching through '358/2 Days' and I now understand why the team felt the need to present it even if they couldn't translate the gameplay through. Although, that isn't to say that one couldn't just play the main entry Kingdom Hearts games and get a decent sense of what's going on, the games are written like that fortunately. But if you're unfortunate enough to have thrown yourself through 'Chain of Memories' then trust me, you need '358/2 Days' as a palette cleanser, if nothing else...

Search Results

Web result with site