Wednesday, October 18, 2017

Kingdom Hearts Primer - Birth By Sleep - Episode 14 - There Are No Coincidences

It's getting close, guys. Big reveals are going on and there's a lot to take in. Buckle up!



So much goes on in this episode that it's difficult to delve into it in a single post. The big problem is something I've talked about multiple times in these write-ups: Birth By Sleep obsessively explains away almost every single detail from previous games by saying that it's something Terra, Ventus, or Aqua did.

But we see another problem in this episode, and towards the end of the last one, where it's not content with just explaining away details in previous entries. In a lot of the endgame dialogue, the characters in this game reuse speeches and phrases that characters in earlier Kingdom Hearts games used. Sora's "part of their heart" speech and Billy Zane as Ansem's infamous "All world's begin in darkness" monologue are taken almost verbatim. Unfortunately, they are also recycled in contexts that rob them of their original meanings.

There is debate as to exactly when Kingdom Hearts "jumped the shark". Some would say it was Kingdom Hearts 2. Others would point to Dream Drop Distance, which we will cover soon. If I were asked where I thought the Kingdom Hearts franchise got too bloated and out of control, I would say this game. Fortunately there's an HD version of this game on the PS3 and PS4, because otherwise it would be criminal for all of this important plot information to be buried in a portable many fans didn't play.

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