Kingdom Hearts II.8 HD – 0.2 Demo (with Direct Audio) + Some Impressions from Footage
The above video is another look at the 0.2 Portion of the KH II.8 HD Collection releasing worldwide on PS4 this December. I want to share some impressions based on the footage, as I personally really like the Kingdom Hearts series a lot.
Gameplay: The gameplay here is a demo for what we will be getting with the final version of Kingdom Hearts 3, but a lot of little things are present to have the feel from Birth By Sleep intact. The slot-lock mechanic, the Keyblade-Surge styles and Aqua still being focused on magic-based attacks are examples of this. The gameplay looks very fun, with the movement looking swift, the combat looking responsive and the game running well.
Presentation: As noted above, it runs quite well, so combat can be rewarding. The location of the demo looks fantastic, with lots of great usage of color and styling pulled from Disney’s Cinderalla movie (what this location is based off of). However, the character models need a lot of work, as they have no shadows and stick out. This could be due to how the Kingdom Shader, something Square Enix planed originally for KH3 when it ran on the FFXV engine, still being ported into Unreal Engine 4. That is the games new engine and it still likely needs some work. Otherwise though, the game looks solid.