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Is Kingdom Hearts really all that confusing?
- Thread starter Sats
- Start date
razgriz417
Member
Didnt Gametrailers.com make an Hour Long special explaining the storyline of Kingdom Hearts?
IceDoesntHelp
Banned
What is he confused about?
The darkness (evil) and the light (good) in everyone's heart. The importance of memories and friendship. Courage. The connections between people, and the connections of Sora. If someone without a heart (soul) can be a person. Promises. Trust. Identity. Hmmm...Sounds a lot like Disney to me...
These themes cover the entire series.
yea I thought that video was quite good.
Vire
Member
How Square Enix could be so bad at storytelling.
Want to elaborate on this?
I am talking more about Oganization 13 and other stuff.
But look at the doc explanation !
"Out of Character Bad Ass Mickey", Donald, Goofy, Yen Sid, Pete and Maleficent.
The only KH character that somehow fits the disney character is Maleficent =P
And I guss you can put Yen Sid there since he is basicaly a blank character in disney canon anyway
Anticitizen One
Banned
First game was fairly straight forward
Second game became way too convuluted
Let's see if they straighten things out in part 3
Second game became way too convuluted
Let's see if they straighten things out in part 3
Grizzlyjin
Supersonic, idiotic, disconnecting, not respecting, who would really ever wanna go and top that
It's convoluted. And that's being polite. The first game? Nah, pretty straightforward. The story isn't really more complex than your average Final Fantasy game. Everything after that is a mess. I think they've just been trying to come up with excuses to reuse the same worlds and characters.
It's complicated for absolutely no reason either. Like there honestly isn't any point to it, it's an original story that is making its own history. If the franchise was one continuous story that has been written over 40 years, yeah I could understand all the wackiness. But it's not.
It's just bad writing. It's honestly just bad anime tropes and amateur hour storytelling. The entire irony of the entire situation is that it's suppose to be something that is accessible for children. And I'd agree that people were being too critical of the story if they were over analyzing it, but that's not the case. The plot is just layers and layers of garbage and new concepts, and they just keep piling the shit higher.
It wouldn't matter if it was a book, movie or video game, the explanation behind "Ansem" pretty much sums up everything wrong with KH's story. It's stupid. And completely obvious that there was never any long term plotting for the story, just people inserting what they want for this entry or that entry when they come along.
It's stands out even more when you think about how simple Disney is with storytelling. They don't go into huge explanations of why someone is a villian. They're just bad, and want to do bad things and need to be stopped.
It's complicated for absolutely no reason either. Like there honestly isn't any point to it, it's an original story that is making its own history. If the franchise was one continuous story that has been written over 40 years, yeah I could understand all the wackiness. But it's not.
It's just bad writing. It's honestly just bad anime tropes and amateur hour storytelling. The entire irony of the entire situation is that it's suppose to be something that is accessible for children. And I'd agree that people were being too critical of the story if they were over analyzing it, but that's not the case. The plot is just layers and layers of garbage and new concepts, and they just keep piling the shit higher.
It wouldn't matter if it was a book, movie or video game, the explanation behind "Ansem" pretty much sums up everything wrong with KH's story. It's stupid. And completely obvious that there was never any long term plotting for the story, just people inserting what they want for this entry or that entry when they come along.
It's stands out even more when you think about how simple Disney is with storytelling. They don't go into huge explanations of why someone is a villian. They're just bad, and want to do bad things and need to be stopped.
As in.. Confusing a confused confusion?
Vire
Member
Considering each game has gotten progressively worse in terms of story telling ability, I wouldn't hold my breath.
Unless they completely retcon 90% of the things that happened in the handheld games and act like they never happened.
Since when did KH need outside sources to completely understand? I mean...its not hard at all to understand unless you just not giving one iota about the plot and/or not paying attention or if you skip entries, which would be all on the player's fault.
decoyplatypus
Member
That's not really true. There are people who are intensely interested in Halo's lore. Aren't there even novelizations?
It's probable that a greater percentage of KH's fanbase is interested in the story, as much of that fanbase overlaps with Square-Enix/RPG fans, but I'd wager the main reason that people talk more about KH's story is that KH is a story-driven, single-player adventure game, while Halo is a multiplayer-focused shooter (albeit one with an extensive campaign). It's pretty hard to avoid interacting with the story if you're playing KH.
Perfect Cha0s
Member
And I, on the other end of the spectrum, am incredibly invested in the story and all the characters involved.
PshycoNinja
Member
I've never had a problem following the story. Like at all. But then again I actually play the games and follow along unlike others who skip games and only read Wikipedia entries to try and keep up.
Well, the story all started when someone put on a blindfold in order to harness the power of darkness and in turn transformed into someone 20 years older than said person...
Main Plot =/= Lore.
Halo's main story has always been pretty simple; Covenant are alien zealots, they worship Halo structures which were built by an older race to both contain parasitic spawn and wipe out its food source across the galaxy (ie, sentient organisms), but said alien zealots are colossal morons and want to activate Halo anyway. Are you a bad enough dude to stop them?
Reach and ODST were even more simple when considering its story can be boiled down to "are you a bad enough dude to stop alien zealot invasions?"
The only parts where it gets dicey are some parts of the backstory (not helped by retcons between games and authors) and Halo 4. But it's never really needed to understand the main plot, unlike KH where you're going to have to deal with that convoluted story one way or another.
I had to read wikipedia entries after every episode of Game of Thrones for the first season, and it was still amazing.
I think I may actually be a hypocrite, because I just realized how much I can't stand Homestuck because of its plot
I dont think it was specially terrible but I feel like the disney aspect of it wasnt explored in the ways I would have wanted. I dont mind square stories for the most part but at a certain point I just want something else
AHEM I SHALL NOW SUMMARIZE THE RIGHT AFTER KH1- DDD.
AHEM
* horns play*
RIku is awesome and he fixed it, and he is a keyblade master.
^
You think this is humor, that is a valid summary of everything after kh1.
You should have said that first to be honest. Instead of just calling it "bad".
it was bad by my standards, but I didnt say specially terrible
I also asked for confirmation since it's been a while, but I dont remember people raving about the story as much as other aspects of it
Here you go.
Vire
Member
decoyplatypus
Member
I remember a thread a few years ago where a poster insisted that KH's story was not convoluted. Someone else asked him to explain what Kingdom Hearts was. Hilarity ensued.
I've only played KH, CoM, and KH2, so I can't really comment on how the story is doing these days. I imagine a lot of things have been explained, then unexplained, and then explained again. The main problem I saw was that the script was horrific and gave multiple, vague, and seemingly inconsistent descriptions of key game concepts. Of course, much of this could possibly be attributed to characters operating with partial information, but it felt more confused than that.
I've only played KH, CoM, and KH2, so I can't really comment on how the story is doing these days. I imagine a lot of things have been explained, then unexplained, and then explained again. The main problem I saw was that the script was horrific and gave multiple, vague, and seemingly inconsistent descriptions of key game concepts. Of course, much of this could possibly be attributed to characters operating with partial information, but it felt more confused than that.
IceDoesntHelp
Banned
But Kingdom Hearts can't be confused on his own story.
Ok, you make a very good point here. It is a bit ignorant of me to say "no one cares about Halo's story." I do believe that more people care for the KH story, as you also said. As evidently the multiplayer takes top priority in Halo, while the story takes top priority in KH.
This is mostly because the Kingdom Hearts narrative has branched out, and many of the characters are so intricate to the story that their plot lines become as important as Sora's.
I don't think this is the case in a game like Halo, where the MC's perspective and plot is the most important and only one to follow.
Kingdom Hearts is pretty much the Game of Thrones of gaming.
Laughing Banana
Weeping Pickle
To attach such legendary, lovable characters like Donald or Goofy or Mickey to something that pretends to be "deep" and "sophisticated" when it is actually anything but is actually one of the most offensive things I found about Kingdom Heart.
I mean, the 1st Kingdom Heart was alright, I guess, but then they started to throw shits like Organization XIII or Shadow this Shadow that--in an effort to make it sound oh-so-serious-and-complicated I guess?--then I couldn't help but to just roll my eyes.
It's like "simple" is a word so deeply hated by the folks creating the games.
I mean, the 1st Kingdom Heart was alright, I guess, but then they started to throw shits like Organization XIII or Shadow this Shadow that--in an effort to make it sound oh-so-serious-and-complicated I guess?--then I couldn't help but to just roll my eyes.
It's like "simple" is a word so deeply hated by the folks creating the games.
You are, guess what happens in KH3, riku gon fix it again.
Hopefully he is playable , unlike in KH2, where having him playable would have explained a lot of things, while he fixed it.
Why do you automatically assume that things have to be "pretending" to be "deep" and "sophisticated" instead of just being what they are?
Since we're extending the medium past games, I will refute your belief saying that some of the best novels are the ones with complex stories that have to be analyzed and criticed in academics.
Thomas Pynchon writes complex novels. "Reading Guides" have been written in order to better unerstand his novels.
James Joyce also writes some fairly dense stuff.
David Foster Wallace has about 100+ pages of footnotes in the back of Infinite Jest.
Faulkner also has extremely dense and complex stories.
Their novels are extremely well written; however, they are complex and some may say convoluted at first. They require discussion, research and analysis to understand.
That being said, I'm not comparing Kingdom Hearts to any one of those writers, and the story is convoluted. I thought Kingdom Hearts 1 was extremely easy to follow. Nomura wanted to make the story more complex in later games because he was afraid it was to simple and it would lose interest.
Vire
Member
There's a difference between something being analyzed for its complexity and something that needs to be resummarized because it's so incredibly convoluted and poorly written that there is no other way to understand it.
Kingdom Hearts falls under the later category.
Kingdom Hearts does not have depth or complexity, it's just bad.
It kind of is when you're thrown into a fight against a whole new set of enemies led by a giant asshole who has no reason to be one unless you read the books.
First trilogy was done great. Covenant think the Halos are religious relics and want to set them off to start their rapture. Halo 4 made the story a mess by not explaining what you're doing unless you do outside research. Apparently the terminals make it better to understand, but even those are out of the way. You have to find them hidden in the levels, then go somewhere out of the game to even watch them!
Kingdom Hearts, everything is in those 7 games to understand the Lore. Halo, it's in 7 games, 12 books, comic series, animated "movies," a live action "movie," and now an upcoming "TV" show.
R_thanatos
Member
I'll say this :
If KH3 is not the final battle between the Two forces for teh kingdom hearts , then i'll be angry.
i'll just say that i lost it when the main vilain just picked 13 version of himself to fight , because any other ally would have been useless.
This act deserved an applause ...trully the best way to run an evil organisation and not be betrayed.
If KH3 is not the final battle between the Two forces for teh kingdom hearts , then i'll be angry.
i'll just say that i lost it when the main vilain just picked 13 version of himself to fight , because any other ally would have been useless.
This act deserved an applause ...trully the best way to run an evil organisation and not be betrayed.
Laughing Banana
Weeping Pickle
*Shrugs*
It's just the way I see them.
But alright, even if they are not 'pretending', the Kingdom Heart series can really use 'simple' to improve its storytelling. No need for everything to be so intertwined and needlessly complicated. I mean, for whatever reason? For whatever improvement these kind of direction carry for the franchise? Judging from the general sentiment displayed by many towards their story, I'd say they have been failing rather miserably at this.
Also, how should I say this.... despite the Disney folks attached to the series, the way they handle stories and such and such is so... anti-Disney.
Of course, the fact that you basically need to cross platform so many times in order to follow whatever the hell is going on does not help matters too.
Because everything can't just be a cool thing anymore, if it tries to be cool its dark an edgy. Didn't you know , only shit from the 90's and children cartoons and super simplistic things are cool now. Anything outside of that is just some failed attempt at being sophisticated or cool, no matter how successful it is. Didn't you know?
This is satire, but there is actually a point in there, .
You jest about this, but that is honestly the vibe I am getting from Kingdom Heart series. Complicated just for the sake of being complicated; proper story-telling be damned.
Because everything can't just be a cool thing anymore, if it tries to be cool its dark an edgy. Didn't you know , only shit from the 90's and children cartoons and super simplistic things are cool now. Anything outside of that is just some failed attempt at being sophisticated or cool, no matter how successful it is. Didn't you know?
This is satire, but there is actually a point in there, .
I had to take a moment and read a wikipedia entry to follow Gravity's Rainbow, but I think I also highlighted the fact that I wasn't comparing those authors to Kingdom Hearts plot. I was just saying there are quite a few instances in where "convoluted" and complex plots aren't necessarily a sign of poor writing.
davepoobond
you can't put a price on sparks
if you think the story is confusing then you might want to steer clear of any subject matter that has any particular weight to it.
anyway, the only "confusing" thing was how the gummy ship shit made its way into the first game. KH2 is an amazing game just because it got rid of that whole system.
anyway, the only "confusing" thing was how the gummy ship shit made its way into the first game. KH2 is an amazing game just because it got rid of that whole system.
You've been spewing your opinion all over this thread, and now you're throwing out false claims like this?
The reason people "resummarized" the story was because of the many complainers who had not actually played each game to get the full picture. Clearly there are entire communities of people who understand the story enough to resummarize it, discuss it, and find pleasure in it.
But KH2 did have Gummy Ships. Unless you mean the changes they made to it made it better. Honestly the entire Gummy Ship mechanic in KH2 could be a game on its own.