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queenluaKingdom Hearts 2, when it feels like it, is a nearly-perfect combat system.
The "when it feels like it" is key, there. Most of the time, this game's reputation for "mash X to win / hit Triangle to win" is well-deserved. Most battles are mob encounters; the pace of most battles is relaxed enough that you can whip out any number of slow-yet-overpowered finishers (summons, limits, etc) to bail you out of a tight spot; most of the time you're playing in a chilled-out just-here-to-bash-some-baddies state.
But.
Last night I played the Roxas fight, and it was so, so satisfyingly tense. Reading your opponent's moves, the split-second timing for your blocks/relects, oh-so-careful positioning, carving out a heart-pounding second between volleys to dare a desperately-needed heal attempt, and of course, lunging the second there was an opening—every single thing I did mattered. It was exhilarating. It took me like two hours and I was smiling and screaming and my heart was pounding the whole time.
I'm told that Dark Souls combat feels a bit like this. But, god, KH2 nails the aesthetic on top of all that. Part of the reason I've never gotten around to trying Dark Souls is how blah-generic-brown-and-gray the palette is, and how lumbering-slow-uncool the combat looks. Whereas, during the Roxas encounter, I felt every bit like I was in an anime battle—everything was flashy, colorful, quickquickquick, one false move and you're dead, kid. Bird Guy started watching, entranced, drawn in by the panache; Nomura's aesthetics are a mess much of the time, but goddamn, the dude understands how much they matter.
The Xaldin boss fight was another standout—moreso than I remember when I played the game as a kid. I love how the enemies throughout the dungeon teach you how you're going to fight Xaldin, oh-so-subtly, with that "Learn" mechanic; I loved how punishing yet entirely learn-able Xaldin's attacks were; and I loved the win-more aspect of, once you get good at executing Learns, you don't get just one counterattack on Xaldin—you get, like, six. Returning fire on Xaldin with a whole storm of spears, after pulling off some REALLY tight timing, is such a thrill.
The trouble, of course, is that KH2 has a billionty combat subsystems, and while the Roxas & Xaldin battles bring out the best of them, my limited experienced with KH3 tells me that Nomura & co were interested in... the systems I'm not interested in. The first few hours of that game were such a mess of mobs and confusing hit-Triangle-to-execute-extravagant-dumb-OP-theme-park-ride and such that I couldn't really enjoy iteven with a lot of beer. Nothing was precise; nothing commanded my attention.
And even Kingdom Hearts 2 is not interested the systems I'm interested in, most of the time. All the interesting bosses are in the last half of the game; incidentally, that's where all the interesting aesthetics are (I'm not really one for the Disney-themed stuff, sorry guys).
But I'm in the market for any games that do have this kind of feel, fwiw.
This is very similar to the feeling I had after playing Final Fantasy XIII, actually—in that game's case, it was, "this combat system is amazing, but the difficulty is too easy, and thus doesn't really push you to really immerse yourself in it"—but there's definitely no game I know of with a combat system like that, which is a crying shame. Basically, if someone made me KH2-but-it's-just-Roxas-style-fights, and also FFXIII-but-everything's-twice-as-hard, those would be my two perfect games. Things to fund if I am ever an eccentric billionaire, etc
The "when it feels like it" is key, there. Most of the time, this game's reputation for "mash X to win / hit Triangle to win" is well-deserved. Most battles are mob encounters; the pace of most battles is relaxed enough that you can whip out any number of slow-yet-overpowered finishers (summons, limits, etc) to bail you out of a tight spot; most of the time you're playing in a chilled-out just-here-to-bash-some-baddies state.
But.
Last night I played the Roxas fight, and it was so, so satisfyingly tense. Reading your opponent's moves, the split-second timing for your blocks/relects, oh-so-careful positioning, carving out a heart-pounding second between volleys to dare a desperately-needed heal attempt, and of course, lunging the second there was an opening—every single thing I did mattered. It was exhilarating. It took me like two hours and I was smiling and screaming and my heart was pounding the whole time.
I'm told that Dark Souls combat feels a bit like this. But, god, KH2 nails the aesthetic on top of all that. Part of the reason I've never gotten around to trying Dark Souls is how blah-generic-brown-and-gray the palette is, and how lumbering-slow-uncool the combat looks. Whereas, during the Roxas encounter, I felt every bit like I was in an anime battle—everything was flashy, colorful, quickquickquick, one false move and you're dead, kid. Bird Guy started watching, entranced, drawn in by the panache; Nomura's aesthetics are a mess much of the time, but goddamn, the dude understands how much they matter.
The Xaldin boss fight was another standout—moreso than I remember when I played the game as a kid. I love how the enemies throughout the dungeon teach you how you're going to fight Xaldin, oh-so-subtly, with that "Learn" mechanic; I loved how punishing yet entirely learn-able Xaldin's attacks were; and I loved the win-more aspect of, once you get good at executing Learns, you don't get just one counterattack on Xaldin—you get, like, six. Returning fire on Xaldin with a whole storm of spears, after pulling off some REALLY tight timing, is such a thrill.
The trouble, of course, is that KH2 has a billionty combat subsystems, and while the Roxas & Xaldin battles bring out the best of them, my limited experienced with KH3 tells me that Nomura & co were interested in... the systems I'm not interested in. The first few hours of that game were such a mess of mobs and confusing hit-Triangle-to-execute-extravagant-dumb-OP-theme-park-ride and such that I couldn't really enjoy it
And even Kingdom Hearts 2 is not interested the systems I'm interested in, most of the time. All the interesting bosses are in the last half of the game; incidentally, that's where all the interesting aesthetics are (I'm not really one for the Disney-themed stuff, sorry guys).
But I'm in the market for any games that do have this kind of feel, fwiw.
This is very similar to the feeling I had after playing Final Fantasy XIII, actually—in that game's case, it was, "this combat system is amazing, but the difficulty is too easy, and thus doesn't really push you to really immerse yourself in it"—but there's definitely no game I know of with a combat system like that, which is a crying shame. Basically, if someone made me KH2-but-it's-just-Roxas-style-fights, and also FFXIII-but-everything's-twice-as-hard, those would be my two perfect games. Things to fund if I am ever an eccentric billionaire, etc
