Ever wondered what would happen if the worlds of
Final Fantasy and Disney collided? It's an odd concept, but from the most schizophrenic of acorns the mighty gaming oak of
Kingdom Hearts has grown. Legendary role-play game-maker Square has been given unprecedented liberties with the entire Disney universe and has created a game featuring everything from
The Nightmare Before Christmas to
The Little Mermaid.
To have characters as disparate as Tarzan and Donald Duck teaming up is odd enough, but it becomes very freaky when Square throws in a variety of its own characters, such as Cloud, Squall and Aeris from the various Final Fantasies. We are, in short, talking Incongruity City. But this has one side benefit in that the storyline behind the game is by necessity rather vague, which seems to have stopped Square from filling three CDs full of new-age whining about Mother Earth, as is its usual wont. Instead it has spent even more time on the graphics and the end result is a quite stunning three-dimensional cartoon.
As for the gameplay, it may come as a surprise to learn that it doesn't actually feature--as all the Final Fantasy games do--turn-based combat. Instead it's essentially a scrolling beat-'em-up-cum-platformer with exactly the kind of complicated Square-style knobs you'd expect. The game may be a little shallow but it's an impressive artistic achievement and any title that allows you to magically summon Bambi out of thin air to attack evil demons of the underworld has got to be worth some sort of recommendation. --David Jenkins