| | Square does Disney really well. So far I much prefer the bold, assured Disney characters to the young, bizarrely-coiffed, naive and angst-ridden Square creations (with floppy feet--to fit in with the Disney gang, I guess). I'd love to see Square do a completely Disney game. Donald is a treat.
Two and a half hours in, I still haven't found anything that doesn't impress me immensely. Wait, I lied--young Wakka's voice is terrible, and there's some of the "falling through dream worlds" that was so vague and and story-killing in Final Fantasy X. But at least here you get to beat up on Tidus right off the bat, so that sort of makes up for a lot.
The real-time combat is quite a bit of fun even with just one attack button for my strength-oriented character--movement, positioning and timing make a big difference and this keeps things interesting. Even the camera hasn't bothered me, though I think the auto-targetting helps this because you don't really have to see your target in order to hit them.
It also helps that all the characters, settings and effects look smashing. Not having to go for the realistic look of FFX seems to have helped Square's artists immensely and the color and vertex shading they use gives everything a rich, smooth, vibrant look that's really in a league of its own. The settings, fully 3D instead of the fixed-camera facades of FFX, are simply a joy to navigate and explore.
Square has gone and made a platformer/beat-em-up and it looks and feels great. As long as the story doesn't go getting all morbid like FFX, I think I'll be enjoying this one for many hours to come. |
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