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Now that Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days is out in the wild, it’s time to turn to the next entry in the series. Birth by Sleep refers directly to the secret ending at the end of Kingdom Hearts II that shows three armored keyblade bearers wandering through a desert plain surrounded by thousands of keyblades stabbed into the ground. The Japanese-only edition, Final Mix, shows the three battling a powerful bald man and his apprentice. We now know that these events took place nearly a decade before the first Kingdom Hearts, and that Birth by Sleep is the direct follow up of to KHII featuring new worlds, characters, and combat options.
The three, Terra, Ventus, and Aqua, all share protagonist duties in the game, and are obvious parallels to Riku, Sora/Roxas, and Kairi respectively. Their master dispatches the group to track down Master Xehanort, the villain from the KHII Movie. Featured stages this time around include new areas such as Cinderella’s house and castle, the woods from Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, and sci-fi spaceships from Stitch’s world.
Players tired of bashing through the same old Nobody and Heartless foes will be glad to know that these new enemies predate the aforementioned creatures and are completely different. During some hands-on time with the game we found them slightly faster and creepier. Combat is Action-Focused rather than relying on cards like Chain of Memories. Terra’s special moves include a crystal freeze, a flaming keyblade, and a blast of fragmented energy that spreads out to hit multiple foes. With Ventus we brought up a first-person targeting reticule by holding L and R triggers that eventually unleashes a crazy combo that attacks everything in range. He finishes with an impressive energy-based area attack. My brief time with Aqua involved visiting Snow White after she is knocked out by the poison apple.
Birth by Sleep hits Japan in January so expect a U.S. release in mid to late 2010. >> Bryan Vore
