Why do people hate Kingdom Hearts 3D?

[2 quid is good 2,209]

I thought I had posted in this topic but it seems not. Quite possibly the best thing about KH3D is the opening. Some of the indivdual Disney worlds were nice and I did like the expanded Traverse Town, but practically everything else is a dumpster fire. I played the game last year just before KH3 released as I had never fully experienced DDD before, I only knew the main story beats from cutscenes and interviews and the like, and I played it on beginner because I wanted to rush through the story. Oboy. 

The gameplay is awful for one. You can get hitstun out of any commands that you used even before the animation is done. Abilities being tied behind dream eaters is somehow far worse than BBS tying them to command melding. At least that required some knowhow. Here I was forced to play nintendogs just to unlock some useful commands (balloonga). Abiliities should never be tied to anything that doesn't require combat to achieve. I haven't even talked about the stagger yet, or the drop system which is infuriating. 

The story also took a complete nosedive, and for the worst in my opinion. Not only did KH3D make a ton of retcons, it ruined some characters (Xemnas, for one) by completely changing their motivations. KH3 at least did a little course-correcting here, but I won't get into that. The whole "13 v 7" and time-travelling was such a crock of shit but hey ho. I also just remembered thw frankly terrible voice acting by HJO, that was a bit of a hot topic, as well as Sora's complete flanderisation.

 

[Kittenz 4,281]

On 4/26/2019 at 3:41 AM, 2 quid is good said:

I thought I had posted in this topic but it seems not. Quite possibly the best thing about KH3D is the opening. Some of the indivdual Disney worlds were nice and I did like the expanded Traverse Town, but practically everything else is a dumpster fire. I played the game last year just before KH3 released as I had never fully experienced DDD before, I only knew the main story beats from cutscenes and interviews and the like, and I played it on beginner because I wanted to rush through the story. Oboy. 

The gameplay is awful for one. You can get hitstun out of any commands that you used even before the animation is done. Abilities being tied behind dream eaters is somehow far worse than BBS tying them to command melding. At least that required some knowhow. Here I was forced to play nintendogs just to unlock some useful commands (balloonga). Abiliities should never be tied to anything that doesn't require combat to achieve. I haven't even talked about the stagger yet, or the drop system which is infuriating. 

The story also took a complete nosedive, and for the worst in my opinion. Not only did KH3D make a ton of retcons, it ruined some characters (Xemnas, for one) by completely changing their motivations. KH3 at least did a little course-correcting here, but I won't get into that. The whole "13 v 7" and time-travelling was such a crock of shit but hey ho. I also just remembered thw frankly terrible voice acting by HJO, that was a bit of a hot topic, as well as Sora's complete flanderisation.

 

I completely agree and I just want to say that maybe HJO isn't entirely to blame for the voice acting in 3D. Weridly enough, his Sora voice sounds younger 6-7 years later, which leads to believe the voice direction probably plays a big role. 

theymightalsobepitchingitnowbutican'tdetectany

[Allwil13 754]

Hmmmmm.... There are some interesting opinions here. Thanks guys for sharing your insights; I never really thought about these things before. I do still love the game, though. Still one of my faves. But I get a lot of the complaints now. Totally fair opinions.

[The Transcendent Key 12,109]

On 4/30/2019 at 3:56 PM, Allwil13 said:

Hmmmmm.... There are some interesting opinions here. Thanks guys for sharing your insights; I never really thought about these things before. I do still love the game, though. Still one of my faves. But I get a lot of the complaints now. Totally fair opinions.

Yeah, this game will always be one of my favorite entries in the series. For me it goes with KHIII, BBS, KHII and DDD. 

[The Transcendent Key 12,109]

On 7/27/2019 at 10:03 AM, hanifanze said:

 love how characters from the world ends with you were included into the game as it was something I never really played all that much but did find interesting. and I hope they reappear in a future game someday too.

Same here! I'd always heard of the game but had never played it, so seeing them in KH3D was pretty cool! I'd probably have understood more about their stories if I had played TWEWY. But hey, maybe someday!

But yeah, it was interesting!

[FadedSparkle 18]

The criticisms toward Dream Drop Distance are honestly much too harsh:

1: Plot Takes a Nosedive.
 -This is a myth. There were several hints in previous games that Nobodies could either grow a heart or had hearts all along. Turning back into a Somebody after your Heartless and Nobody get destroyed is hardly the shocker that the fans tend to make it out to be when they first play this game and this is revealed to them. Time travel is a necessary evil and honestly a long time coming. There was simply no way they wouldn't tie the era of the original keyblade war and the current one together somehow and the mysterious origins of certain characters was all pointing towards time travel. Nevermind Xehanort himself doing it to play puppet master over so many individuals and lend himself more and more credibility as a big bad for the saga as a whole, time travel was essential for the future of the series itself.
-Within the confines of the game itself the plot is operating by way of natural progression and makes sense. Xehanort's Heartless and Nobody have been destroyed thus the return of Xehanort himself is eminent so it is time to put Sora and Riku through the Mark of Mastery exam. There is nothing wrong with that base. It's a perfectly logical place to go after KH2. The twists that arise are perhaps jarring at first especially if you haven't been able to keep up with the plot of all the previous games, but not anything so out of this world that they couldn't be anticipated and they do exactly what they were intended to do which is set things up for KH3 while bringing all the previous games together in one neat little package.

2: Nevermind the gameplay being difficult to get used to or the fact that sometimes what I elected to do was cancelled out by the enemy, the drop gauge makes it unplayable.
-This is a flat out lie. In the case of enemies cancelling out what you're trying to do I notice from personal experience with the game and from watching many a let's play that it mostly happens in boss battles. The standard enemies don't normally give trouble with cancelling out what you're trying to do. And then there is the drop gauge. This is honestly not an issue. Drop Me Not and Drop Me Never are a thing. Furthermore there is zero negative consequence to dropping unless you're stupid enough to head into a boss fight when you're low on time. The majority of the bosses in this game are located seconds away from a save point for a reason. If you don't think you have enough time to beat the boss don't go fight it during your current session. Drop to the other character and then come back.

3: The Virtual Pet Aspect
-The Dream Eaters you can make to have as allies on your team are treated as an inherent problem when really they're just a pet peeve. Some people simply didn't appreciate having a dose of Pokemon/Nintendogs/Nanopets/Gigapets/Tamagotchi built into a Kingdom Hearts game. I always found it quite silly that this was something to hate about this game. Mainly because you only need to make a handful of Dream Eaters at best to get through the game.

4: Sora's character does a 180.
-This one just always makes me laugh because Sora is so Sora in this game that it hurts.

Edited August 18, 2019 by FadedSparkle

[jbmasta 67]

On 8/18/2019 at 10:01 PM, FadedSparkle said:

The criticisms toward Dream Drop Distance are honestly much too harsh:

1: Plot Takes a Nosedive.
 -This is a myth. There were several hints in previous games that Nobodies could either grow a heart or had hearts all along. Turning back into a Somebody after your Heartless and Nobody get destroyed is hardly the shocker that the fans tend to make it out to be when they first play this game and this is revealed to them. Time travel is a necessary evil and honestly a long time coming. There was simply no way they wouldn't tie the era of the original keyblade war and the current one together somehow and the mysterious origins of certain characters was all pointing towards time travel. Nevermind Xehanort himself doing it to play puppet master over so many individuals and lend himself more and more credibility as a big bad for the saga as a whole, time travel was essential for the future of the series itself.
-Within the confines of the game itself the plot is operating by way of natural progression and makes sense. Xehanort's Heartless and Nobody have been destroyed thus the return of Xehanort himself is eminent so it is time to put Sora and Riku through the Mark of Mastery exam. There is nothing wrong with that base. It's a perfectly logical place to go after KH2. The twists that arise are perhaps jarring at first especially if you haven't been able to keep up with the plot of all the previous games, but not anything so out of this world that they couldn't be anticipated and they do exactly what they were intended to do which is set things up for KH3 while bringing all the previous games together in one neat little package.

2: Nevermind the gameplay being difficult to get used to or the fact that sometimes what I elected to do was cancelled out by the enemy, the drop gauge makes it unplayable.
-This is a flat out lie. In the case of enemies cancelling out what you're trying to do I notice from personal experience with the game and from watching many a let's play that it mostly happens in boss battles. The standard enemies don't normally give trouble with cancelling out what you're trying to do. And then there is the drop gauge. This is honestly not an issue. Drop Me Not and Drop Me Never are a thing. Furthermore there is zero negative consequence to dropping unless you're stupid enough to head into a boss fight when you're low on time. The majority of the bosses in this game are located seconds away from a save point for a reason. If you don't think you have enough time to beat the boss don't go fight it during your current session. Drop to the other character and then come back.

3: The Virtual Pet Aspect
-The Dream Eaters you can make to have as allies on your team are treated as an inherent problem when really they're just a pet peeve. Some people simply didn't appreciate having a dose of Pokemon/Nintendogs/Nanopets/Gigapets/Tamagotchi built into a Kingdom Hearts game. I always found it quite silly that this was something to hate about this game. Mainly because you only need to make a handful of Dream Eaters at best to get through the game.

4: Sora's character does a 180.
-This one just always makes me laugh because Sora is so Sora in this game that it hurts.

1. The plot grew in complexity when CoM and KH2 introduced Nobodies, which made identity significantly hard to wrap your head around. Birth by Sleep added fuel to the fire with Vanitas and Xehanort possessing Terra. So while the time travel element is a curveball, it's not the first one the series has thrown at players before.

3. The only Dream Eaters the plot forces you to make are Meow Wow and Komary Bat in Sora and Riku's Dream Eater tutorials. Choosing not to spend much time creating and raising Dream Eaters is like not putting much focus on things like synthesis and command melding, you can still play the game fine and obtain techniques through plot progression or chests, but risk missing out on abilities, techniques and items that might make it easier.

4. If anything Sora's character gets flanderised (characterisation becomes less nuanced and focused on their prominent aspects, like Ned Flanders in The Simpsons). Within the dream context it makes sense, but lots of players do miss the nuance.