1:02:30 Wait... so if the Heartless are created from a heart that's been ripped out of a body then consumed by darkness, and the Nobodies are created from the body left behind after the heart has been ripped out... doesn't that mean that the Heartless are actually the ones with no bodies and the Nobodies are actually the ones that are heartless!?
It is implied Heartless have Hearts that basically exploded with Darkness. So it is a Heart with negative connection. Being Alone. Destroying the Light of Positive Love Emotions. They are Metaphorically literally Heartless. Callous to light beings. Nobodies are Being who "exist" close to Darkness. Darkness in Zero. So they are Nobody. Closer to Nothing.
I think its a little bit lore wise that Heartless were named such because they're trying to steal hearts, making people think they didnt have one. And Nobodies are called that because they don't really exist. But also its just 100% Nomura fucking with us like he always does
YOU LEFT OUT THE BEST AXEL LINE!! After he lets Naminé leave and tells her to make it count, he says, “Now, THIS should be interesting! Try and make it enjoyable, Sora. It’s the least you can do for me, you know. *chuckle* *moment’s pause and a gasp* Hey wait, I’m enjoying this. *looks to the ceiling with his hand on his chest* You guys ARE something else!” I love that hint that there’s something going on beneath the surface wink wink nudge nudge
I'm confused by Monty's long complaint about "Aside form all of the clear, tangible benefits of darkness, the strength and teleportation and magic powers, why would anyone use it?" (Is Monty's last name Python? "So other than all of that, what have the Romans done for us!?") And I'm surprised no-one just went "Riku is being told to use the darkness because darkness makes you strong and Riku has to be strong so he can beat up the bad guys." Or, when someone started bringing up the expanded Star Wars stuff, I'm surprised no-one mentioned stuff like the grey Jedi, who can use the dark side of the force for good things, provided they don't allow themselves to be corrupted by it. Maleficent said all that stuff in KH1 about how She can wield the darkness so long as she doesn't let herself be consumed by it. Riku could aim to do the same thing, except channelling all of his anger and jealousy and shit towards doing something good, raging against the evils of the world without becoming one himself. Dark isn't necessarily Evil, it's a tool, that comes to people with traits many would Consider evil, but not necessarily. "Rage bad" is a common thought, but one of the strongest heroes in Marvel is The Hulk.
The reason and benefit to using darkness is actually spelled out by Hades in union cross: Darkness is cosmically the power of creation. That's his understaning of it, anyhow. Both Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy XIV have an elemental/physics system based on the chinese philosopy of "Taiji" which posits there are two extreme poles, being absolute movement (energy), and absolute tranquility (entropy, stillness.) The flow and harmony of these two extreme forces phase out into the five elements and diffuse into the five seasons (in taiji.) Gamelore-wise absolute energy is darkness, while absolute tranquility/order is Light. Phases between these become elemental like fire, ice, wind, thunder, and so on. But the amount of one polar force applied to an element can enhance its overall force, via creation and energy. Dark also gives more creative control over the form something takes. But the important distinction is also in their other meanings, being fullness and emptiness. Light promotes order, but it is also the essence of emptiness, and space between, while Darkness is material and becomes the collective of all things. When random badguys ramble about "all things return to darkness," they're right in the sense its cosmically the primordial soup of all matter. But without light, it becomes irrelevant because then all things are converted into darkness, torn apart into pure energy, and then consumed into the collective body, becoming non-distinct. This happens to memories as well if they are not adapted to the overwhelming dissolution that darkness causes to individuality given by light. Its only by adapting the nature of darkness into one's sense of identity that they can be exposed to it with no ill effects. You could consider this "maturing emotionally" as dark within memories represents the complex harsher and selfish spectrum of emotions. It is only by light and dark together that things can actually be created, light separating dark out and giving it individuality. In Union Cross, Ventus realizes this and uses it (his light) on a "Darkness Being" to transform and neutralize it. So bottom line, dark is the pure energy needed to create physical phenomenon, and gives access to immense power, but enforces all into a collective, running the risk of dissolving a person's individuality into nothing, and just becoming more darkness if they are either not shielded, or spiritually and mentally adapted to it. Those who aren't may even become obsessed with it, as all darkness cares about is creating and unifying with more darkness. Harmony with light creates life and free will, as is the teachings of Yen Sid and Mickey. Too much light actually hollows you out and makes you mentally and spiritually rigid (a zealot) and ironically just ends up promoting more extreme darkness, usually in the form of negative emotions in the heart. It can also make you unable to understand or empathize with those going through more complex struggles as the fear of darkness via those blinded in light is too strong. It was through selfish greed to collect and control Lux to defeat darkness that created the catastrophe that befell Daybreak Town. (fun fact, luxuria means selfish desire.) It ain't great to stare too hard into the sun or the abyss for too long.
Darkness doesn't just *corrupt* it *is* corruption itself. it's the physical manifestation of the corrupted Light in people's/world's/all world's hearts. Darkness isn't chaos and Light isn't order. Light is good and Darkness is just corrupted good. Riku doesn't use the Darkness to gain strength, he accepts the corruption in his own heart and through humility and self compassion and the love for his friends he transforms the darkness into Light, he purifies the corrupted Light inside himself, and because there's so much Darkness/corruption inside of his heart and in the world he has a near infinite source of Light. Characters in the games who say things contrary to this are either misinformed or are lying to manipulate others. the Darkness spawns Heartless, beings which while they may not exactly "kill" you, steal your heart, which is essential to your existence and who you are, and transform it into a monster that seeks out other people to do the same thing to, to eat the Light inside of you, transforming, or more accurately corrupting, the Light inside of your heart into Darkness. Now if someone destroys the Heartless and also the Nobody that the Darkness transformed you into then you can come back, but for everyone that loved you and cared about you you may as well be dead. When you are forcibly transformed into a Heartless you are essentially infected with a virus that turns you into a monster that seeks out the living in order to infect them as well. You are turned into nothing but the worst parts of you amplified, with none of the goodness left. The Darkness produces monsters that at best can be said to eat people and temporarily transform them into monsters. The Light does not do this. Darkness is just Pride, Lust, Greed, Envy, Gluttony, Wrath, and Sloth, sound familiar? Well that and every other quality that can cause people to do things that will make themselves and others suffer pointlessly. Darkness is just the worst things we can be, when our hearts/the Light in our hearts are/is corrupted.
15:04 [adjusts nerd glasses] chain of memories was originally remade for the ps2! it was released packaged as a second disc with kingdom hearts ii final mix in japan, and it was eventually released as its own standalone ps2 title in north america in 2008. eventually it was ported to the ps3 and ps4 along with everything else.
I have this on in the background as I'm grinding Riku to level 99 for the platinum for this game on PS4. Let's see which finishes first, the entirety of this podcast series or my grinding.
1:58:42 Dying at “I’m sorry who is this??” on a rewatch of this series. Ohhh Neil…you’ll find out soon enough buddy. Might make you shed a tear or two idk
I agree with Chase on the quality of this game. While it's good narratively, the card mechanics are the fucking worse. People can abuse the mechanics, but for me, it is such a slog to get through and get the cards I need to proceed.
To clear up a little about Chain of Memories and Re:Chain of Memories, the game was never turn based, but cards of higher values could cancel actions if used immediately after a card. As for why this one was remade, Re:Chain of Memories was a PS2 game. It being remade had nothing to do with these PS4 collections
@@CassiusStelar I can't, or else I'll relapse into obsessing over how bad I think the combat is. It's a little better in the GBA original, but only slightly. Battle Network meshes active combat and deck-building mechanics sososo much better than either version of Chain of Memories
@@andrewstephenson5825 I don't disagree there. Rechain started to get soooooo frustrating and boring as time goes on, I stopped having fun after the first group of worlds and didn't feel anything at all until I unlocked Riku. I actually really loved Dark Mode and Card Duels, they made me smile, but Riku's story is only 7 fucking hours long compared to Sora's 27
These games are mostly about emotions, so regardless of the complicated story, if you're in touch with your emotions, and reactive to emotional story telling, that's who Kingdom Hearts is for.
As someone who’s never played this game 2 makes so much more sense now. I recently got back into them to share with my kids and had no idea how to answer some questions they had. Now I have an understanding and will have to play everything
Growing up the only console I owned was a Gameboy advanced so this is the only kingdom hearts game I ever played. I think about the consequences of that a lot.
This is the 2nd time listening to this entire series in the past month! I think that if I keep it on repeat it might cure my depression 😂 because this series is one of the funniest things I've ever heard and I've listened to sooo many people "explain" KH lore!
I'm on round 2 in a couple weeks now too. Finished round 1, tried a couple other KH podcasts and got mad at poor information or upset by poor charisma. Lore Dump crew is peak.
Riku was strong with the power of darkness but at the very least, you were able to control heartless and use dark corridors without consequence. That kind of power is stronger than light, generally. That's the advantage that the darkness has, specifically. Also, up to the end of the first game, worlds' and peoples' hearts fell to darkness and people who had control over darkness could manipulate that to an extent. Love these videos, everyone is so engaged and the questions are so valid for understanding the series. I love them!
Imo the GBA version of the game is so much better gameplaywise than the remake. Everything from the card mechanics to the gameplay loop and deck building works so much better in the form of a portable game that you can pick up and play for a while then set down whenever. The nature of the game as being a "retread" of KH1 also makes so much sense as a GBA game since they obviously had much more limited assets and space compared to a console game so the way the plot is setup is a consequence of that. If they were gonna remake CoM they needed to either keep it 2D and just improve cutscene graphics and add voice acting where needed or to change it to 3D but reduce or straight up remove the card battle dynamic and just make the game play exactly like KH1. They tried to do both at the same time (that is, keep card mechanics but use the KH1 engine for the game) and it ended up with a half cocked gameplay loop that makes enemy encounters take too long and leaves the player feeling ineffective during battle due to the card system not translating that well to 3D space. The only true benefit to the remake compared to the original are the much higher quality cutscenes and voice acting, along with some of the added story details given to the remake in order to better line it up with future games.
I can actually explain the "memory recreation" of characters like Aerith. In the universe of KH, memories are solely the most important resource that anyone has. In general, a collection of living memories takes the form of a heart, inside a body. Think of it like a video file. Hearts can be unstrung like a roll of movie footage, and individual cels are a memory alone. This is represented physically in the series by literal chains (and chain links.) Bodies can live without memories, but memories give them both identity and power. Characters like Xion can live on only a minimal amount of broken memories and still be a living being on her own, as she was made from a small portion of soras memories. During the events of CoM, namine is using her connection to sora to essentially unroll the footage of his entire life, cut huge sections of his memories out (replacing them with bullshit ones she made by drawing them) and then transfer the stolen piles of memories to both Roxas and Xion, in an attempt to turn them both into genuine keyblade wielders, but have them alright working for the organization, instead of having to change sora's alleigance, which just wasn't going to happen. So simply, unravel sora by the seams of his identity, and use that to sew a new, evil sora. So in essence, since memories alone can give life and personality to someone, wholesale, those recreations in the memory worlds would be almost no different than the actual living articles, and still react like living beings, but their own memories and motivations would be limited to what sora remembers and understands about them. Its also possible, due to -links between hearts-, which are long distance connections between two hearts via memories, that the recreations are actually pulling data slightly from the real deal, but using sora as something like a wifi router to do so. This ability also what Namine is taking advantage of to disassemble his memories, as she is connected to him more closely than most. She's basically his editor, and can freely take him apart, AND alter those connected to him, and inside the castle (which is how she can fudge dolan and guffles heads a bit.) I am fairly certain that fake riku was made from Sora's memories of Riku as well. So those cards he uses in com are basically individual cels of his memories, printed onto paper. A bit fucked up haha.
Re:CoM was made in like 2007 as a bonus for KH2 Final Mix in Japan. It got released standalone in the US since we didn't get the FMs until the PS3 HD Collections. If Re:CoM didn't already exist, CoM would have definitely been a Days/Coded style cutscene compilation.
Just one piece of info. Re:Chain of Memories didn't get made for the HD remasters. It was a Japan exclusive remake on PS2. Similar to the Final Mix Versions of the other games that also never came to the west until PS3. That's why the "GBA" game got a full game and Re:coded and 358/2 didn't. Because it was already on Playstation hardware and therefore could be worked with
Monty I think you need to watch inside out, sometimes negative things are a positive - anger lets you combat injustice for example, or fear keeps you safe from danger. AND anything in extremes are bad - toxic positivity. I realise this is very late and am excited for you to get more frustrated as I watch more of these ahaha
"It's a gameboy deck-builder card game and it's essential to the canon" Oh, so THAT'S why I skip 90% of the cutscenes in these games. When some guy steps out of a portal and goes "HAHA! IT WAS ME! GENERIC ANIME HAIR MAN YOU'VE NEVER SEEN BEFORE, BUT I WAS IN THE CARD GAME!" it just doesn't land that well.
I should say, the coats being a shield to darkness is not a retcon, because this is explained in Chain of Memories, the same game you first see the coats😅
To add a bit of background about the creation of this game, the 3D remake was originally created for the PS2 KH2 Final Mix edition that never released outside of Japan. I remember being super salty about the fact that I couldn't play it at the time. That version was updated for the 1.5 collection and (I believe) given an English dub for the first time. That's why some of the cutscenes in this game are noticeably lower quality than others in the collection.
Re watching these because they are hilarious. Though Chase sounds like a guy who was hosting a Mega Man timeline panel. Which I feel the Lore of that will end friendships lol
I feel like only light means stagnation, light doesn't make things grow because there's nothing truly dead to compost, the movies repeat endlessly, the destiny is pretty but it is a purgatory, every character that lives in world dominated by light is unsatisfied with their life. On the other hand the darkness is a massive compost heap full of new and innovative life forms that are disturbing to look at but noone said that water in spring of life runs clear - too much darkness creates meaningless abundance, too much light creates meaningless stability.
Shadows and the light that casts them, that kinda thing. The balance is important, and sometimes in KH the balance of light is more out-of-wack than they truly acknowledge.
I think the contained plot of this game is the best. The card combat system i didnt like my first time around but the second time i played it i enjoyed it alot more. When you understand how it works you can make yourself so overpowered easily. The game is really tedious to play for long stretches of time though. Its deffo a game to have constant breaks during a playthrough
Okay, this has been bothering me so i have to say it here. They didnt remake the games for PS4, 1.5 and 2.5 where two seperate rwmakes for the PS3 which where joined and later released on ps4. As far as re:chain of memories goes, the remake was actually originally on the ps2 before being ported to the ps3 later in 1.5. the reason this was ported and not the DS games is because its not a port from the gameboy to ps4, its from the ps2 game
You just needed a sign that said "Don't ask Future questions" that you held up every time people started to do exactly that. "Maybe if you let me get to the part of the story than answers the questions you have now, it will surprisingly answer your questions."
I feel this so hard, like SERIOUSLY just let a mystery soak in suspense. Its more understandable in lore dump because this is second hand information and some details might be glossed over by accident but I've seen lets players pause games like Metal Gear, Dark Souls and yes Kingdom Hearts because they want answers like *right away.* and it kinda gets annoying after awhile.
@@sasaki999pro "I could answer your question now and have it make no sense to you or the listeners, or you can wait for me to get to the part where it DOES make sense and your mind is blown"
I can imagine an entire FF7 series lore dump... and then at least one of them is completely oblivious to Remake actually being a sequel and then for the next one in the series, they just see the title screen and are like "...Wat?" followed by the absolute chaos that is that game's story.
The coat shielding against darkness is revealed in rikus story in this game Also the confusion of goofy forgetting the castle name is correct but he didnt mean castle oblivion. The trio are worried about forgetting each other and goofy reassures nothing could erase the memory of how sad he felt when sora became a heartless in hollow bastian. Everyone doesnt remember that happening in a castle and when goofy tries to recall its hollow bastian which he cant remember the name of. I think the sealed marluxias door because his corpse/grim reaper machine thing was collasping and exploding and they were just trying to make sure the explosion didnt escape the room. Light and darkness is similar with that they are strong against each other. Too much light is bad with that it causes fear against darkness and probably concentrates darkness in people and too much darkness is bad as it can end the world. If its balanced the world can just exist without ending. The balance constantly shifts but both are needed. Eraqus in bbs was basically fearful of darkness and it caused him to try to kill ven. Riku accepting light and darkness is significant becsuse people either fight for light or darkness and generally arent able to perfectly balance their own light and darkness.
Definitely a lot of facts missing or wrong from these 2 videos but honestly they're mostly unimportant details. Re:com was a ps2 remake of com that came out after kh2
*DISCLAIMER*
Thanks for being here! This episode is a reupload, transferring our backlog of Lore Dumps from the Monty Zander youtube channel.
22:38 Monty absolutely losing it at the notion that Goofy lost all his new memories KILLS ME. One of my top moments in all the KH Lore Dumps!
I am currently losing it and stuck in laughing loop because Montys reaction and the chaos that eneues and I love it!
1:02:30 Wait... so if the Heartless are created from a heart that's been ripped out of a body then consumed by darkness, and the Nobodies are created from the body left behind after the heart has been ripped out... doesn't that mean that the Heartless are actually the ones with no bodies and the Nobodies are actually the ones that are heartless!?
It is implied Heartless have Hearts that basically exploded with Darkness. So it is a Heart with negative connection. Being Alone. Destroying the Light of Positive Love Emotions. They are Metaphorically literally Heartless. Callous to light beings.
Nobodies are Being who "exist" close to Darkness. Darkness in Zero. So they are Nobody. Closer to Nothing.
Yes
Greenland and Iceland, basically.
I think its a little bit lore wise that Heartless were named such because they're trying to steal hearts, making people think they didnt have one. And Nobodies are called that because they don't really exist.
But also its just 100% Nomura fucking with us like he always does
Its easier to just think of it in a metaphorical sense.
YOU LEFT OUT THE BEST AXEL LINE!! After he lets Naminé leave and tells her to make it count, he says, “Now, THIS should be interesting! Try and make it enjoyable, Sora. It’s the least you can do for me, you know. *chuckle* *moment’s pause and a gasp* Hey wait, I’m enjoying this. *looks to the ceiling with his hand on his chest* You guys ARE something else!” I love that hint that there’s something going on beneath the surface wink wink nudge nudge
Chase is doing a fantastic job
I'm confused by Monty's long complaint about "Aside form all of the clear, tangible benefits of darkness, the strength and teleportation and magic powers, why would anyone use it?" (Is Monty's last name Python? "So other than all of that, what have the Romans done for us!?")
And I'm surprised no-one just went "Riku is being told to use the darkness because darkness makes you strong and Riku has to be strong so he can beat up the bad guys."
Or, when someone started bringing up the expanded Star Wars stuff, I'm surprised no-one mentioned stuff like the grey Jedi, who can use the dark side of the force for good things, provided they don't allow themselves to be corrupted by it.
Maleficent said all that stuff in KH1 about how She can wield the darkness so long as she doesn't let herself be consumed by it.
Riku could aim to do the same thing, except channelling all of his anger and jealousy and shit towards doing something good, raging against the evils of the world without becoming one himself.
Dark isn't necessarily Evil, it's a tool, that comes to people with traits many would Consider evil, but not necessarily. "Rage bad" is a common thought, but one of the strongest heroes in Marvel is The Hulk.
The reason and benefit to using darkness is actually spelled out by Hades in union cross: Darkness is cosmically the power of creation. That's his understaning of it, anyhow. Both Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy XIV have an elemental/physics system based on the chinese philosopy of "Taiji" which posits there are two extreme poles, being absolute movement (energy), and absolute tranquility (entropy, stillness.) The flow and harmony of these two extreme forces phase out into the five elements and diffuse into the five seasons (in taiji.) Gamelore-wise absolute energy is darkness, while absolute tranquility/order is Light. Phases between these become elemental like fire, ice, wind, thunder, and so on. But the amount of one polar force applied to an element can enhance its overall force, via creation and energy. Dark also gives more creative control over the form something takes.
But the important distinction is also in their other meanings, being fullness and emptiness. Light promotes order, but it is also the essence of emptiness, and space between, while Darkness is material and becomes the collective of all things. When random badguys ramble about "all things return to darkness," they're right in the sense its cosmically the primordial soup of all matter. But without light, it becomes irrelevant because then all things are converted into darkness, torn apart into pure energy, and then consumed into the collective body, becoming non-distinct.
This happens to memories as well if they are not adapted to the overwhelming dissolution that darkness causes to individuality given by light. Its only by adapting the nature of darkness into one's sense of identity that they can be exposed to it with no ill effects. You could consider this "maturing emotionally" as dark within memories represents the complex harsher and selfish spectrum of emotions.
It is only by light and dark together that things can actually be created, light separating dark out and giving it individuality. In Union Cross, Ventus realizes this and uses it (his light) on a "Darkness Being" to transform and neutralize it.
So bottom line, dark is the pure energy needed to create physical phenomenon, and gives access to immense power, but enforces all into a collective, running the risk of dissolving a person's individuality into nothing, and just becoming more darkness if they are either not shielded, or spiritually and mentally adapted to it. Those who aren't may even become obsessed with it, as all darkness cares about is creating and unifying with more darkness. Harmony with light creates life and free will, as is the teachings of Yen Sid and Mickey. Too much light actually hollows you out and makes you mentally and spiritually rigid (a zealot) and ironically just ends up promoting more extreme darkness, usually in the form of negative emotions in the heart. It can also make you unable to understand or empathize with those going through more complex struggles as the fear of darkness via those blinded in light is too strong. It was through selfish greed to collect and control Lux to defeat darkness that created the catastrophe that befell Daybreak Town. (fun fact, luxuria means selfish desire.) It ain't great to stare too hard into the sun or the abyss for too long.
Darkness doesn't just *corrupt* it *is* corruption itself. it's the physical manifestation of the corrupted Light in people's/world's/all world's hearts.
Darkness isn't chaos and Light isn't order. Light is good and Darkness is just corrupted good.
Riku doesn't use the Darkness to gain strength, he accepts the corruption in his own heart and through humility and self compassion and the love for his friends he transforms the darkness into Light, he purifies the corrupted Light inside himself, and because there's so much Darkness/corruption inside of his heart and in the world he has a near infinite source of Light.
Characters in the games who say things contrary to this are either misinformed or are lying to manipulate others.
the Darkness spawns Heartless, beings which while they may not exactly "kill" you, steal your heart, which is essential to your existence and who you are, and transform it into a monster that seeks out other people to do the same thing to, to eat the Light inside of you, transforming, or more accurately corrupting, the Light inside of your heart into Darkness. Now if someone destroys the Heartless and also the Nobody that the Darkness transformed you into then you can come back, but for everyone that loved you and cared about you you may as well be dead. When you are forcibly transformed into a Heartless you are essentially infected with a virus that turns you into a monster that seeks out the living in order to infect them as well. You are turned into nothing but the worst parts of you amplified, with none of the goodness left.
The Darkness produces monsters that at best can be said to eat people and temporarily transform them into monsters. The Light does not do this.
Darkness is just Pride, Lust, Greed, Envy, Gluttony, Wrath, and Sloth, sound familiar? Well that and every other quality that can cause people to do things that will make themselves and others suffer pointlessly.
Darkness is just the worst things we can be, when our hearts/the Light in our hearts are/is corrupted.
15:04 [adjusts nerd glasses] chain of memories was originally remade for the ps2! it was released packaged as a second disc with kingdom hearts ii final mix in japan, and it was eventually released as its own standalone ps2 title in north america in 2008. eventually it was ported to the ps3 and ps4 along with everything else.
I have this on in the background as I'm grinding Riku to level 99 for the platinum for this game on PS4. Let's see which finishes first, the entirety of this podcast series or my grinding.
Any update on how that went?
@@GrAvYxxBooN some say both are still playing to this day...
@@GrAvYxxBooNlol got it, then later traded in my PS4 for a PS5 and realized to my chagrin that for some reason the CoM trophies didn't transfer.
1:58:42 Dying at “I’m sorry who is this??” on a rewatch of this series. Ohhh Neil…you’ll find out soon enough buddy. Might make you shed a tear or two idk
I agree with Chase on the quality of this game. While it's good narratively, the card mechanics are the fucking worse. People can abuse the mechanics, but for me, it is such a slog to get through and get the cards I need to proceed.
To clear up a little about Chain of Memories and Re:Chain of Memories, the game was never turn based, but cards of higher values could cancel actions if used immediately after a card.
As for why this one was remade, Re:Chain of Memories was a PS2 game. It being remade had nothing to do with these PS4 collections
I still refer to reloading cards as "turns" the same way that Mega Man Battle Network does
@@CassiusStelar I can't, or else I'll relapse into obsessing over how bad I think the combat is. It's a little better in the GBA original, but only slightly.
Battle Network meshes active combat and deck-building mechanics sososo much better than either version of Chain of Memories
@@andrewstephenson5825 I don't disagree there. Rechain started to get soooooo frustrating and boring as time goes on, I stopped having fun after the first group of worlds and didn't feel anything at all until I unlocked Riku. I actually really loved Dark Mode and Card Duels, they made me smile, but Riku's story is only 7 fucking hours long compared to Sora's 27
These games are mostly about emotions, so regardless of the complicated story, if you're in touch with your emotions, and reactive to emotional story telling, that's who Kingdom Hearts is for.
As someone who’s never played this game 2 makes so much more sense now. I recently got back into them to share with my kids and had no idea how to answer some questions they had. Now I have an understanding and will have to play everything
Growing up the only console I owned was a Gameboy advanced so this is the only kingdom hearts game I ever played. I think about the consequences of that a lot.
This is the 2nd time listening to this entire series in the past month! I think that if I keep it on repeat it might cure my depression 😂 because this series is one of the funniest things I've ever heard and I've listened to sooo many people "explain" KH lore!
I'm on round 2 in a couple weeks now too. Finished round 1, tried a couple other KH podcasts and got mad at poor information or upset by poor charisma.
Lore Dump crew is peak.
I do love that Heartless are made of hearts and Nobodys are made of bodies... objectively the wrong way around naming wise lol
I love the "wait why does blank thing do blank? Or is that a spoiler" "No QUESTIONS" 😂
Riku was strong with the power of darkness but at the very least, you were able to control heartless and use dark corridors without consequence. That kind of power is stronger than light, generally. That's the advantage that the darkness has, specifically. Also, up to the end of the first game, worlds' and peoples' hearts fell to darkness and people who had control over darkness could manipulate that to an extent.
Love these videos, everyone is so engaged and the questions are so valid for understanding the series. I love them!
Listening through all of KH for a third time since it’s release. I am okay, I do not have a problem.
Remaking this instead of 358/2 Days was such a mistake. This game is infuriating.
You do know Re COM released 2 years prior to 358 2 Days right?
I've always called Replica Riku Repliku.
Relistening to this series for the happy vibes and "speaking of war criminals, Donald is..." Made me laugh out loud.
Imo the GBA version of the game is so much better gameplaywise than the remake.
Everything from the card mechanics to the gameplay loop and deck building works so much better in the form of a portable game that you can pick up and play for a while then set down whenever.
The nature of the game as being a "retread" of KH1 also makes so much sense as a GBA game since they obviously had much more limited assets and space compared to a console game so the way the plot is setup is a consequence of that. If they were gonna remake CoM they needed to either keep it 2D and just improve cutscene graphics and add voice acting where needed or to change it to 3D but reduce or straight up remove the card battle dynamic and just make the game play exactly like KH1.
They tried to do both at the same time (that is, keep card mechanics but use the KH1 engine for the game) and it ended up with a half cocked gameplay loop that makes enemy encounters take too long and leaves the player feeling ineffective during battle due to the card system not translating that well to 3D space. The only true benefit to the remake compared to the original are the much higher quality cutscenes and voice acting, along with some of the added story details given to the remake in order to better line it up with future games.
I can actually explain the "memory recreation" of characters like Aerith. In the universe of KH, memories are solely the most important resource that anyone has. In general, a collection of living memories takes the form of a heart, inside a body. Think of it like a video file. Hearts can be unstrung like a roll of movie footage, and individual cels are a memory alone. This is represented physically in the series by literal chains (and chain links.) Bodies can live without memories, but memories give them both identity and power. Characters like Xion can live on only a minimal amount of broken memories and still be a living being on her own, as she was made from a small portion of soras memories.
During the events of CoM, namine is using her connection to sora to essentially unroll the footage of his entire life, cut huge sections of his memories out (replacing them with bullshit ones she made by drawing them) and then transfer the stolen piles of memories to both Roxas and Xion, in an attempt to turn them both into genuine keyblade wielders, but have them alright working for the organization, instead of having to change sora's alleigance, which just wasn't going to happen. So simply, unravel sora by the seams of his identity, and use that to sew a new, evil sora.
So in essence, since memories alone can give life and personality to someone, wholesale, those recreations in the memory worlds would be almost no different than the actual living articles, and still react like living beings, but their own memories and motivations would be limited to what sora remembers and understands about them. Its also possible, due to -links between hearts-, which are long distance connections between two hearts via memories, that the recreations are actually pulling data slightly from the real deal, but using sora as something like a wifi router to do so.
This ability also what Namine is taking advantage of to disassemble his memories, as she is connected to him more closely than most. She's basically his editor, and can freely take him apart, AND alter those connected to him, and inside the castle (which is how she can fudge dolan and guffles heads a bit.)
I am fairly certain that fake riku was made from Sora's memories of Riku as well.
So those cards he uses in com are basically individual cels of his memories, printed onto paper. A bit fucked up haha.
Re:CoM was made in like 2007 as a bonus for KH2 Final Mix in Japan. It got released standalone in the US since we didn't get the FMs until the PS3 HD Collections. If Re:CoM didn't already exist, CoM would have definitely been a Days/Coded style cutscene compilation.
Just one piece of info.
Re:Chain of Memories didn't get made for the HD remasters.
It was a Japan exclusive remake on PS2. Similar to the Final Mix Versions of the other games that also never came to the west until PS3.
That's why the "GBA" game got a full game and Re:coded and 358/2 didn't.
Because it was already on Playstation hardware and therefore could be worked with
Recom was released outside japan on ps2. In japan it was a bonus included with kh2fm, in the US it was released as a standalone ps2 game.
I love them all but Monty is absolutely brilliant LMAO
Monty I think you need to watch inside out, sometimes negative things are a positive - anger lets you combat injustice for example, or fear keeps you safe from danger. AND anything in extremes are bad - toxic positivity. I realise this is very late and am excited for you to get more frustrated as I watch more of these ahaha
"It's a gameboy deck-builder card game and it's essential to the canon"
Oh, so THAT'S why I skip 90% of the cutscenes in these games. When some guy steps out of a portal and goes "HAHA! IT WAS ME! GENERIC ANIME HAIR MAN YOU'VE NEVER SEEN BEFORE, BUT I WAS IN THE CARD GAME!" it just doesn't land that well.
I should say, the coats being a shield to darkness is not a retcon, because this is explained in Chain of Memories, the same game you first see the coats😅
The coat protecting from darkness is not a retcon it is literally established in this game
To add a bit of background about the creation of this game, the 3D remake was originally created for the PS2 KH2 Final Mix edition that never released outside of Japan. I remember being super salty about the fact that I couldn't play it at the time. That version was updated for the 1.5 collection and (I believe) given an English dub for the first time. That's why some of the cutscenes in this game are noticeably lower quality than others in the collection.
They did release Re:CoM on PS2 as a standalone game in the US with English dub a year or two after KH2. I have it
Re watching these because they are hilarious. Though Chase sounds like a guy who was hosting a Mega Man timeline panel. Which I feel the Lore of that will end friendships lol
of course monty goes along with it when the narrative goes remedy weird ! haha
You had post credits in kh1
Another excellent writey long long boys
I'd love a lore dump of the metroid series!!! ❤❤❤ you guys are the best at this
Zelda would be another
I feel like only light means stagnation, light doesn't make things grow because there's nothing truly dead to compost, the movies repeat endlessly, the destiny is pretty but it is a purgatory, every character that lives in world dominated by light is unsatisfied with their life. On the other hand the darkness is a massive compost heap full of new and innovative life forms that are disturbing to look at but noone said that water in spring of life runs clear - too much darkness creates meaningless abundance, too much light creates meaningless stability.
Shadows and the light that casts them, that kinda thing. The balance is important, and sometimes in KH the balance of light is more out-of-wack than they truly acknowledge.
I think the contained plot of this game is the best. The card combat system i didnt like my first time around but the second time i played it i enjoyed it alot more. When you understand how it works you can make yourself so overpowered easily.
The game is really tedious to play for long stretches of time though. Its deffo a game to have constant breaks during a playthrough
I hope at some point someone mentioned that this game was remade for the ps2 well before the ps3/ps4 remakes
Poor Chase, explaining the unexplainable
This series is so hard to explain to someone who hasnt played.
Okay, this has been bothering me so i have to say it here. They didnt remake the games for PS4, 1.5 and 2.5 where two seperate rwmakes for the PS3 which where joined and later released on ps4. As far as re:chain of memories goes, the remake was actually originally on the ps2 before being ported to the ps3 later in 1.5. the reason this was ported and not the DS games is because its not a port from the gameboy to ps4, its from the ps2 game
You just needed a sign that said "Don't ask Future questions" that you held up every time people started to do exactly that. "Maybe if you let me get to the part of the story than answers the questions you have now, it will surprisingly answer your questions."
I feel this so hard, like SERIOUSLY just let a mystery soak in suspense. Its more understandable in lore dump because this is second hand information and some details might be glossed over by accident but I've seen lets players pause games like Metal Gear, Dark Souls and yes Kingdom Hearts because they want answers like *right away.* and it kinda gets annoying after awhile.
@@sasaki999pro "I could answer your question now and have it make no sense to you or the listeners, or you can wait for me to get to the part where it DOES make sense and your mind is blown"
I have not played this series, but it has the most confusing worldbuilding I've ever seen in anything. And I've played the Xenosaga trilogy.
Chug on everyone!
I just want to know if any of your guys ever played Yu-Gi-Oh before?
All three of us have back in the day, and watched the anime! - Monty
@@MontyZander have you seen any of the new anime?
i cant wait for the 7R series to be completed cause i need to see that conversation XD
I can imagine an entire FF7 series lore dump... and then at least one of them is completely oblivious to Remake actually being a sequel and then for the next one in the series, they just see the title screen and are like "...Wat?" followed by the absolute chaos that is that game's story.
11.46Harry Potter games one and two
The coat shielding against darkness is revealed in rikus story in this game
Also the confusion of goofy forgetting the castle name is correct but he didnt mean castle oblivion. The trio are worried about forgetting each other and goofy reassures nothing could erase the memory of how sad he felt when sora became a heartless in hollow bastian. Everyone doesnt remember that happening in a castle and when goofy tries to recall its hollow bastian which he cant remember the name of.
I think the sealed marluxias door because his corpse/grim reaper machine thing was collasping and exploding and they were just trying to make sure the explosion didnt escape the room.
Light and darkness is similar with that they are strong against each other. Too much light is bad with that it causes fear against darkness and probably concentrates darkness in people and too much darkness is bad as it can end the world. If its balanced the world can just exist without ending. The balance constantly shifts but both are needed. Eraqus in bbs was basically fearful of darkness and it caused him to try to kill ven.
Riku accepting light and darkness is significant becsuse people either fight for light or darkness and generally arent able to perfectly balance their own light and darkness.
Definitely a lot of facts missing or wrong from these 2 videos but honestly they're mostly unimportant details. Re:com was a ps2 remake of com that came out after kh2
Algorithm boosting comment!