Fynn
is an EoFF Hero and/or Heroine
Radical Dreamer

Most of what I want to complete in Reverse/Rebirth will is just the D-Report and the only hitch there will just be making sure I encounter the Neoshadows on the last floor to finish the Heartless section since the only other one I'm missing is a boss. Yeah, I'll probably just rush it at this point.

I'm going to try to get more revisions done today before I head into work. I've been really slacking on a few things lately, so maybe I'll spend today getting my ducks in a row or something.

I may have to do the same. Duel mode and the extra slieghts breathed some life into Riku's part of the game, but I've been playing this game a bit excessively, and I feel it's wearing me down. I can gain a few good levels here still, but I'm frankly high enough in level to probably finish the game by this point. So I'm just going to gun it myself I feel. Especially since I vaguely remember Destiny Island and Twilight Town giving Riku the worst decks.

I've honestly been pretty upset all evening from the anti-BbS video, not because "oh how dare he mock a game I like!" as much as I'm just kind of disappointed that people feel like he made a strong argument. I mean there are some strong arguments contained in the video, but half the time he glosses over the real problem areas so he can use a dumb meme and then goes on tangents over other points that either prove he just never paid attention, or just hypocritically can be applied to one of the games he's using as example of how they do it better. I mean, I was expecting to have my foundations rocked and instead, I'm kind of just dumbfounded that so many fans latch onto this half baked argument. I feel like this video has diminished both my respect for KH fans and just people in general.

In CoM news, I only got through Wonderland this evening. I even managed to make it through the boss fight without any real upsets despite him being built to wreck your deck with all his high level cards. I feel one of Riku's saving graces has always been his access to a higher jump than Sora, so whereas Sora sometimes has to deal with the table gimmick, Riku can just jump up there and smack this heartless in the face. I'm now in Halloween Town, and grateful to have a far better deck than I've had for the last few worlds. I can even Dark Aura spam if I wanted to. Unfortunately for me, unlike Wonderland which was short, this place is huge and the tedium is really starting to set in on Riku's quest. Not that Sora wasn't reaching that point by world 8 himself. I feel like I should have gotten farther in, but oh well. I need to get through this areas so I can finally start the real fireworks of Riku's quest. I'm also a bit disappointed that Nomura didn't give Riku and Mickey Halloween Town redesigns.

What really kills me, is that he's whining around about multiple keyblades being around and just fan guessing why Riku, Mickey and Sora all have one, though blatantly ignoring why Kairi had one in KHII, but then turns around and whine about the chosen one trope and how retconing this hurts KHI and how Keyblades were unique but he's kind of forgetting that all went out the window with the Deep Dive trailer anyway when we introduced the fourth keyblade wielder, Roxas, which he'a also glossing over.

Basically his argument is that he hates the retcon about how Sora got the keyblade because he personally liked him (when he first played this as a 10 year old, his own admission) because Sora was chosen by the keyblade which made him a hero in his eyes because he was a good guy, and then having the revelation it was due to having Ven in him hurts all of his character growth in KH1. The issue I'm having is that his own explanation of how events went down in KH1 is largely misinformed, which is causing the whole issue. He figured the whole thing about Riku getting the keyblade was because Riku used the power of darkness to steal it for example. Now he's basically whining because he liked the game better when it had KH1's simple plot and basically feels all the added lore ruined the series. So it's kind of getting hard to watch his story rant because it just feels like whining at this point. I think what bothers me the most about people giving KH2 a pass on the plot is that it's the game that actually started all of the "expanded lore" nonsense he's actually complaining about, but he's kind of ignoring the fact KH2 sort of ends with more questions than answers because "well all the bad guys are beaten, day is done!" nonsense. I also kind of find it amusing that he's been outright ignoring CoM as though it never happened, which tells me he's a console scrub when it comes to the franchise.

Now I'm in combat and I feel like the hypocrisy is kicking in. So he's basic argument is that KH2's combat is fun and all oiptions are viable, fair enough. He then slyly mentions how the real joy is how the special FM bosses all make you step back and play the game more like Dark Souls (at which point my own elitism kicks in because the footage he used was from easy peasy DSIII) and this somehow retroactively makes you like all the other main story bosses better when you apply this logic. Okay, whatever. Now he bitches about how overpowered the Command Deck is in BbS, and claims it's so overpowered it completely negates all the other combat options, but then, you reach end game and meet up with all the final/post bosses because they are all designed to punish you for abusing the command deck, but then some are just too easy to take out. I'll give him the fact that BbS enemies have finnicky stagger though and well, Unknown in this game is like the poster child of cheap and unfair bosses in the series. So again, he's making some valid points but missing the fact that some of his logic can be applied to KH2's combat which he likes better.

I'll give him kudos for his epilogue though, which largely is just him saying that just because he hates the game, soesn't mean that other people shouldn't like it either and says that all people have different needs and tastes. So kudos for trying to stay classy I guess, but I don't feel his arguments were really that compelling and he sort of glosses over the flaws of other entries. Again, I'm kind of amused that he never even brought up Chain of Memories, and I feel that alone invalidates a lot of his arguments when he makes bold claims about the "real direction" of KH established in the first two console entries. His argument just feels kind of juvenile, though I feel he does have a few points, just not argued very well. Kind of annoyed this is the video that is convincing people to hate on BbS, not because I disagree with him, as much as I was expecting a more solid argument I guess.

I feel someone who gave a more compelling argument about something is this guy:


I'm not a fan of KH2's combat, but I feel this guy addresses my issues with it, and even though this video is largely a defense of the gameplay mechanics, it's actually really eloquently made which is a more compelling than "BbS's plot is retconning my childhood and combat is too easy because I can spam one button moves"

Yeah, I was a little worried myself until I really started blasting my way through the game. Thank goodness I'm not too OCD about trophies, because I will willing admit that CoM has the worst requirements from the 1.5 collection. I think the two worst ones in KH1 is the "don't change equipment" trophy and the collect all of the Gummi Ship blueprints. CoM trophy lists is basically a completionist run requiring max levels and obtaining everything in the game. I'm grateful they didn't ask for something really ridiculous like having a Premium version of every number of every card or some trout.

I've been slowly going through this fan video by an infamous speed runner who seems to be the source of a lot of the BbS hatedom on Youtube. I feel like his core issue with the plot of BbS rings true, but I also feel like he's glossing over the fact that a lot of the other issues he has with the story have been a growing problem within the series far earlier than this one, but he's kind of treating BbS like it did it first. Ultimately, his issue with the plot is that it's an idiot ball plot, which I'll concede is true, but his other issue is how much it retcons the canon from KHI, but it's obvious this guy was too young at the time to really know about a lot of the plot changes going on in the Ultimania. Not helped that he openly admits he doesn't really play games for story, which is probably why he's been glossing over a lot of KHII's story problems because he loves the gameplay side of things too much, though he does mention that KHII started a lot of the story problems but it's becoming increasingly obvious he never really followed the plot and greater lore of the series, which is why BbS was probably a real shock to him. Like he's whining about the whole keyblade chose Sora/Riku versus the implications of the three getting keyblades because they were picked by Terra and dealt with Aqua and Ventus, despite the fact Riku flat out tells you he was chosen by the keyblade in KH1, but this creates a plot hole because we never knew until BbS how he knew he was the chosen.

I haven't even gotten into the gameplay part of his video, which is where I imagine the hate is really going to come in.

I'm like Lv. 38 right now in Wonderland, so I'm not too concerned. I'll probably be around Lv. 50ish by the time I reach Ansem. Contrast that to Sora where I was Lv. 75 when I finally beat the game with him.

I didn't have too much of a problem with Atlantica, I think the key to victory in that place is spamming the new Friend Sleight with Mickey. I'm more concerned with when the Neoshadows show up in the last area cause they were a handful with Sora, and he at least had access to Mega Flare and Trinity Limit.

I understand how children become a handful once they're mobile. No worries about the story stuff, I'm not in a hurry at the moment. I've been struggling to get anything on paper myself so I can understand that as well.

In CoM news, I finished Olympia, finally saw the final new Sleights for Riku fighting Hades. I enjoyed the fact Riku's deck in this world is practically designed for the Duel system, fitting since it's the Coliseum. I forgot to mention that I really do enjoy the Duel system. Shame they kept it exclusive to Riku's scenario, but the guy does need it far more than Sora did. I guess Sora gets version of it in the final boss battle when Marluxia plays his 666 Sleight that casts Doom on you until you break all of his cards.

I peeked into Wonderland, and now we're at the point where I start to bang my head against the wall for Riku's whole "my deck changes based on the world" scheme because holy hell if Wonderland doesn't hand you one of the worst decks in the game. I'm already dreading the Taskmaster fight...

I'm on the second half of his levels. Just finished Atlantica, going to tackle Hercules and then Wonderland before hitting Halloween Town. Being reminded of how OP his Dark Mode is. In fact I always forget that his Sleights are kind of a red herring and his basic combo and innate stun effect is usually better against bosses than trying to use them. I'm curious to see if they "fixed" Asnem and got rid of the easy way to stun lock him by abusing Riku's Double jump attack.

So I'm at a pretty good pace, my only issue with Riku's scenario is that it's a bit bare bones over all. Kind of wish they did more for the Disney Worlds, at least the two Riku actually visited. Would have been interesting to see him feeling remorseful about Pinocchio in Monstro, or elaborate more about his time on Captain Hook's ship. Yet like Sora, it's the in-between sections that are all the juicy parts. I also feel vindicated because I learned that Re:CoM did change up the bosses a bit and added in some of their new moves from Final Mix, which was why the Org. Members gave me issues in Sora's story and I'm sure that will repeat itself in Riku's plot.

I will say that after listening to more fan videos online, I am really starting to hate large parts of the KH fanbase like yourself. My goodness the speedrunning community has really sucked the fun out of the series since all their videos are kind of single-minded. It's feeling eerily similar to the PvP community in Dark Souls, which loves to suck the joy of the franchise out of every new installment because one lousy element is not the same as the one from the game they liked. I have been noticing that a lot of the hate against BbS seems to stem from a particular speed runner who made several videos bemoaning that particular entry. I've been trying to get myself into a relaxed enough state to check out his more thoughtful video on the issues he has with the title.

Other than that, I've been trying to implement the changes from the Elly story you did for me, I'm at the difficult task of changing Child Elly's speech pattern to be less annoying and cringy. That and all these mechanic videos is inspiring me to finally get around to writing the retrospective on FFV. How is your writing going?

Oh no, I get that. In fact part of me was thinking of skipping his part until I remembered that his scenario is actually really short since the only thing that really matters for him is his levels. It's also just amusing playing the whole scenario backwards and having end game Heartless and bosses come across as weaklings. The battle with Maleficent in his scenario is rather cathartic.