It’s still a title that doesn’t make much sense to me. And I’m an avid fan of the series.

In my quest to play every Kingdom Hearts game in chronological order before the release of Kingdom Hearts III, which seems like an easily achievable mission at this rate, I started Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep -Final Mix-. Originally released on the PSP it’s one that may have slipped a lot of people by, mostly due to it being on the PSP, which had a rather mixed uptake, outside of Japan. It was then eventually ported to the Playstation 3 part of the Kingdom Hearts 2.5 compilation in which it was given shiny new graphics and even the sub-subtitle of “-Final Mix-” which doesn’t have quite as much sway as it would if it were a film. Finally, in a release system almost as complex as the franchise’s plot, it was released once more onto the Playstation 4 in the Kingdom Hearts 1.5 + 2.5 Remix, which is how I got my hands around it.

Birth by Sleep has always been a fan favorite within the franchise and, having never played it before, I was eager to find out why. Ultimately it’s the better of the spin-off games with a strong mechanical approach that adds enough to the game’s mechanics to keep things fresh and interesting without cutting too deeply into the way in which Kingdom Hearts games work. It also continues working with the story of Kingdom Hearts as if it was a series that wanted to have a story, and not just be a best of series for Disney films. Although, the ever prominent presence of Disney franchises slows the game down heavily and this isn’t aided by the story being split into three which just makes the more repetitive features stand out all the more.

Birth by Sleep is set many years before the events of Kingdom Hearts and follows three young up and coming Keyblade Warriors. Keyblade Trainees? Keyblade Disciples? Through the subtle intervention of Master Xehanort the youths set out independently on their own journeys, without realising they themselves are being manipulated the entire time. It’s impressive that, despite being a prequel, the Birth by Sleep is capable of building a hefty level of suspense in a story that the player should know the ending to already, or at least as much as anyone can ever truly know what’s going on in the story of Kingdom Hearts, which is vaguely.

It sets the stage for the rest of the franchise with characters that are wholly reflective of our modern day protagonists. Terra is the older brother of the group of desperately craves power, only so he can keep his friends safe, but in doing so becomes lost to darkness and loses his own body, much like Riku. Aqua is the level headed and reasonable one who is the pure light of the group, much like Kairi. Finally you have Ventus who is the neutral party looking to make friends who turns out to be involved in everything to a much higher level than he first expected, much like Sora.

There’s a fairly large flaw that occurs with Birth by Sleep and that’s it’s split narrative and presentational style. With each character you play through their entire story and then move on to the next protagonist, which has it’s wonderful moments as you see how each character fits into the story. One character may be the first part of the story of one section and then the last part of another, so seeing which characters fit in and where can be greatly interesting, the main issue though is that the levels themselves can become quite repetitive on your third go as you pass through the same maps for the third time, more or less in the same direction, or for a real twist, in the other direction. How many times can you play the barrel breaking game at Olympus Coliseum before it gets annoying? Once, because by the second time it is all too familiar. It’s also so overwhelmingly Disney. For a game that deals with the darkness in one’s heart, people being possessed and also having their identity split in two it feels odd to then have Cinderella walking around saying that all you have to do is believe in your dream because she literally lives in a fairy tale.

With each world the characters visit they dip their toes into the story just enough to meet the characters and fight a boss before rushing off again without having learned some form of moral that I can only presume was the point of their journey. Too many worlds in the first third feel throw away and of little consequence to the story, mostly acting as a means for the player to point and shout “Look, it’s the other Princesses of Heart, or was it light? I’m fairly sure it’s heart but now I’m really conflicted because everyone’s talking about light” which is great if you’re a mega-fan, but otherwise they’re just really boring Disney films to have to go through, with some rather odd characters.

It’s a bit of a shame as well, as the actual story of the Kingdom Hearts characters is quite interesting and engaging, but is so horribly lost inside Cinderella’s dress and some weird talking mouse or having to walk to a glade and back for no reason because Terra decided that he isn’t going to kill Snow White. That said, there are still wonderfully intense moments with a massive climactic finish that reveals all sorts of information.

It’s not all bad, well, not much of it is bad. The combat is one of the stronger additions to the series with deck commands making their return from nearly ever other spin-off Kingdom Hearts game, but with the addition of style commands, to give your hero of choice a sudden change in attack pattern, and a whole host of other mechanics that keep the combat still quite grounded, but with more going on.

Birth by Sleep is really it’s own standalone prequel, which is great because you don’t have to know much of what’s going on in Kingdom Hearts to play it. This does also mean that really the ending and events introduced in the game can almost be completely ignored for the rest of the Kingdom Hearts games, minus Kingdom Hearts III which looks to tie everything together.

If you’re a fan of the series ask yourself this, did we need to know that Xehanort, who would go on to take Ansem’s name and form the heartless Ansem Seeker of Darkness, and the nobody Xemnas, was originally an old man who had stolen the body of someone else? Not really, he could’ve just been the actual Ansem’s upstart apprentice. Did we really need a reason for why Riku, Sora and Kairi can posses keyblades? No, they could’ve just been the ones chosen by the plot in a mysterious manifestation of power. Heck, did we really even need a reason for why Sora’s nobody, Roxas, looked nothing like Sora, as well as how Sora could exist at the same time as his nobody? Even then, not really. It fixes a small plot hole by introducing Ventus and connecting him with Sora, but ultimately it doesn’t add all that much. It’s the odd case where the ending of Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep could just have been the beginning of the entire franchise, with Xehanort being the new and mysterious apprentice under Ansem within the castle in Radiant Garden, almost making the entire game pointless.

But that’s me getting caught up in the nitty gritty of Kingdom Hearts lore that very few understand. Overall Birth by Sleep is still a good game. It plays very well as the combat is pretty fluid and involved and being able to swap out your skills was great fun when you discover some truly powerful spells. It made acquiring bits and pieces a bit of a pain, but it also made magic a worthwhile use of your time, outside of healing. There’s a lot of the game that can come across like a copy and paste of previous games, be it the enemies or even the protagonists, but it acts as a greatly condensed Kingdom Hearts game that more or less gets across what it needs to.

You can check out more Kingdom Hearts reviews here: Kingdom Hearts 2.8: Final Chapter Prologue