rionaleonhart | You Just Call Out My Name.

Just played through my fourth Kingdom Hearts III world: the last in the first section of space! But it's probably the world most people will play third. The one with the shopping centre. Thoughts on it under the cut!

VERUM REX

WHAT???

Toy Heartless! This is so cute!

Oh, wow, is this a universe that was built specifically for the purpose of separating Andy's toys from Andy? What a weird, dark position for the toys to be in. This world was created solely to make them experience loss.

I love that Buzz dismisses Sora's explanation of this because 'you're from a videogame'.

BUZZ JUST CALLED US OUT FOR DESTROYING AN INNOCENT TOY THAT WAS JUST BEING CONTROLLED TO ATTACK US BY SOMEONE ELSE, I WASN'T EXPECTING THE TOY STORY WORLD TO BE SO DARK.

Goofy: Sora can be reckless—
Sora: Hey!
Goofy: And Donald grumbles a lot—
Donald: HEY!
Sora, simultaneously: It's true.

Aww, it's very cute when Rex tries to back out of the mission - 'my tail wouldn't fit through the vents' - and Buzz, seeing Sora's well-meaning 'I'm sure it would!' cluelessness, intervenes to spare Rex's feelings.

I really like Buzz bringing up the 'what if we get possessed and attack each other?' question (after the TERRIFYING DOLL FIGHT).

Even though I have way more attachment to Tangled than to Toy Story, the Toy Story world is better by virtue of being something new.

In fact, I'm glad I went to the Tangled world first, because it left me thinking 'so are all the worlds just going to be direct retellings of the films? that's a shame,' and I was not prepared for the Toy Story world to have the WILDEST PLOT. I can't believe Buzz Lightyear was possessed by dark forces and attacked his friends and it was our fault. I can't believe we were thrown into a videogame.

Everything's so dramatic! We're in a seething sea of darkness! Our friend is floating unconscious in the air, impaled on a pillar of darkness! Our steps send out light to drive the darkness back! WE'RE ALL TOYS AND OUR UNCONSCIOUS FRIEND IS BUZZ LIGHTYEAR.

I'm fascinated by the 'we guess we're stuck in this world now, without Andy, but maybe we can accept that and create our own lives here, and at least we have new friends in you guys' ending for the toys.

('Is Woody trying to fuck us?' Rei asked, watching the Toy Box ending cutscene. 'Woody definitely wants to fuck us.' Honestly, it did sort of feel like Woody was flirting with Sora.)

Okay, the Toy Story world was incredible and I am in awe.

The writing on Kingdom Hearts III is noticeably better than on any previous Kingdom Hearts game. I'm surprised and impressed.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I'm really enjoying hearing your comments on KH3! :)

I've been thinking 'am I posting way too much about this game?', so that's really good to hear!

Haha, yeah; I don't think it's too much, and it's also the sort of thing that people who aren't interested in can scroll by easily, since it's mostly cut-text. :)

The Toy Box plot was W I L D. They're just... trapped in an empty alternate dimension because tiny!Xehanort wants to see if toys have souls? Angsting about hurting mind-controlled toys? POSSESSED BUZZ LIGHTYEAR? Sure, why not, I love it.

I definitely enjoyed Toy Story World a lot more than Tangled world too. And in fairness I'm pretty neutral on Tangled to begin with, so I had no special attachment to it anyway, but the story of that one was also just 'Tangled, but shorter'. I like the intense OTT KH-y new plot Toy Box had much more.

(Also, Toy!Sora is fantastic. I swear I thought he had cat ears for a hot moment, those little plastic chunks of hair make him look even more intensely anime than usual.)

Going straight to this world from the world that was Literally Just Tangled was a deeply weird experience. 'Okay, I suppose this'll pretty much just be Toy Story.' NOPE.

Toy Sora is extremely cute.

Toy Sora is great! I googled 'Toy Sora' to see if any of that version of were released/going to be released as figures... then realized my crucial mistake about a second later, haha.

I'm loving all these posts.

I'm glad to hear it, because apparently I can't stop talking! This game hits me in the same 'I see its flaws and I DO NOT CARE, THIS IS GREAT' place as Final Fantasy XV.

I had to go back a bit to find a post where I wouldn't spoil myself re: the worlds and other content, hence the late comment. (For the record, I'm in Arendelle, haven't gone to the Monsters Inc world yet because I'm so bad at navigating the Gummiship, I keep ending up at the wrong waypoints - such as doing Toy Box before Corona and not after.)

Have some excerpts from me liveplaying at fried over Discord because I can't possibly reiterate all my nitpicky little criticisms or sheer ??? with as much grace as I could in the moment.

jesLast Wednesday at 3:02 PM
This first scene with Kairi and Lea is so weirdly localized, this is not how people have a conversation, also he carries ice cream in his butt?

[my friend]Last Wednesday at 3:02 PM
HWOIELKNAHIWEGK
THE ICE CREAM IN HIS BUTT HAD US BOTH HOWLING

jesLast Wednesday at 3:04 PM
IT WAS SO WEIRD also
He’s reminding me of Pennywise from IT
Idk why

[my friend]Last Thursday at 7:39 AM
PENNYWISE
I JUST NOW SAW THIS WTF WHIEOKGAEWG I'M DYING

jesLast Thursday at 8:00 AM
HE IS JUST THIS TALL RED THING

jesLast Friday at 8:47 PM
Could Woody and Buzz be any gayer.

[my friend]Last Friday at 8:56 PM
They are max gay.

jesYesterday at 6:30 AM
SORA’S SHORT TERM RECALL IS REALLY WORRYING ME.
Twice, now, he’s told Flynn (+Rapunzel) to run so he can fight; twice, he’s been like WAIT WHERE DID FLYNN GO as soon as the battle is over.
I think Sora needs an MRI.

jesYesterday at 4:25 PM
CORONA SUCKS.
Like, aside from my map woes, the plot is just Tangled, Abbreviated so anyone who didn't see Tangled will be majorly confused.
Like, Rapunzel's healing hair isn't made clear until the end, Mother Gothel isn't telegraphed as an abusive mother until she... does her thing, at the very end.

[my friend]Yesterday at 4:27 PM
Honestly every world has that problem.

jesYesterday at 4:27 PM
She sends Flynn off, unconscious, tied to a boat, with the tiara - he escapes, it's never explained how.

[my friend]Yesterday at 4:27 PM
Corona drove me mad the most though.

jesYesterday at 4:28 PM
ALSO. Rapunzel hides the satchel with the tiara, claims Flynn will never find it, they leave the tower. Fine. Gothel returns, trips over the satchel, the tiara spills out.
Then on the boat during the lantern festival, Rapunzel pulls the satchel out of her dress?
I guess it was in two places at once. Also, where was she even keeping it? It couldn't have been in her hair by that point, her hair was all braided up.

[my friend]Yesterday at 4:29 PM
Butt ice cream, Jes.
BUTT ICE CREAM

jesYesterday at 4:29 PM
WHY DID YOU REMIND ME.
BUT THEN I SAW SAIX, my reason for living. And he was........ on top of a giant stone pillar in, ig, the desert.
I'll never get through this game if I keep asking why people are just randomly on top of pillars.

[my friend]Yesterday at 10:29 PM
DON'T QUESTION IT
PEOPLE LOVE PILLARS
THAT'S THE BEST WAY TO GET A 40/40 FROM FAMITSU NOW

VERUM REX WAS RIDICULOUS THOUGH, but I also thought it was Riku to begin with? Like, I legit thought Riku had gotten a new Keyblade and found these other two people and was off being badass while Sora tried to regain his strength. Then I noticed the heterochromia and thought Square was legit playing an advert for a future game inside KH. (It, uh, it took me a while to figure out what the Toy Box world was.)

Late comments are extremely welcome! I knew when I made these entries that people might want to look up discussion partway through the game, which is why I tried to make it clear where I was up to in every post.

I keep ending up at the wrong waypoints - such as doing Toy Box before Corona and not after.

Doing Toy Box before Corona was the intended order, I think, going by the battle levels; doing Corona first was my mistake! (Although it's a mistake I'm happy to have made, because, as you say, Corona's plot is just the plot of Tangled, so I went into Toy Box expecting it to be the plot of Toy Story and was extremely surprised.)

Could Woody and Buzz be any gayer.

A friend of mine who loves Toy Story but does not ship Woody/Buzz played through the Toy Box stage last night, and she kept sending me increasingly distressed messages:

i hate that buzz and woody are boyfriends
EVERY TIME WOODY AND BUZZ ARE BOYFRIENDS I'M MORE ANGRY ABOUT IT
please stop making woody and buzz in love, i'm dying

I also thought for a moment that Square were genuinely announcing a new game by putting an unrelated advertisement inside another game. I'd believe anything of this developer.

Returning to this because I have a new grievance.

I can't make myself go back to this game.

I died without saving and can't listen to Let It Go again. I won't do it, game. Arendelle is The World That Broke Me. Not even The Little Mermaid minigames in earlier games did that.

That's strange; it should have given you a 'retry' option on the game over screen! In any case, this game auto-saves (although I don't know exactly how frequently), so try continuing; it's possible you'll have an auto-save later than your manual saves and you'll be spared Let It Go.

If all else fails, there's cutscene skipping!

I died during the avalanche minigame! Turns out, it is not easy to do when one is, let's say, really effing inebriated. Instead of retrying, I accidentally went to continue, which dropped me back at the last save point - pre Let It Go. Mainly, I'm filled with horror that they even did the thing, and after the punishing experience that was the Ice Labyrinth. My heart can't take the entire plot of Frozen, Abbreviated (featuring ~~Dante from Devil May Cry~~ Sora, Donald and Goofy from Kingdom Hearts) after all this.

You Just Call Out My Name.

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