Spoilers ► KH1 Riku is a Mother F*%#er, y’know that?!

[Sonofjafar]

Let’s review:
He messes with Sora’s feelings for Kairi even before Destiny Islands is destroyed with that paupu fruit race bet.

He’s willing to trust the word of a Disney villain over his best friend

He adds injury to insult when taking the keyblade by manipulating Donald and Goofy into ditching you.

Until KH2 this little bugger was the bane of my existence and I was honestly disappointed we didn’t leave him a stain on the carpet after the first time ya beat him up in hollow bastion

 

[MATGSY]

Sora's mother in particular.

 

[Sonofjafar]

Sora's mother in particular.

 

[Elysium]

LOL, yes. You know I was thinking as I was re-playing KH1 a few days back that him being a villain for the most part in that game may be why his design was better in that game. They gave him a look that accented his flashy, show-off, in-your-face personality in that game, whereas he's more hesitant, with more of a quiet confidence, in the post-1 games.

 

[Zackarix]

KH1 Riku is probably one of the best examples of the "best friend turned rival" archetype. Sora and Riku feel like friends from start but you can see the places where the cracks eventually form. But said cracks only deepen enough to cause problems because of the extreme circumstances they were facing. The best part is that after their friendship falls apart their relationship actually feels like a "friendship gone sour due to bad influence" instead of them being enemies. Which is why Riku works so hard to fix things in the following games.

 

[Sakuraba Neku]

I only started to like him CoM, because he was such a jerk to Sora in KH1. Sora could've have died and he didn't care.

Now he's one of my favourite characters in the series. That's how good his development has been, because when I don't like a character I rarely change my mind.

 

[vaderskywalker]

I was the same way until KH2. yes KH2. You're probably wondering why KH2 and not chain of memories well you know how most fans of KH skipped the portable games? for me it was worse. I was kind of late getting into KH. I didn't play it until a friend loaned me his in 2004 or 2005. so not that late but chain of memory's was coming out around that time, and I thought it was a remake for the gba so I skipped it and the ending of KH1 because I got stuck on the first maleficent boss fight, so I beat KH2 first then went back and beat kh1 thinking it ends on a cliff hanger leading into kh2. I was wrong. I Then realized chain of memory's was not a remake, so I ordered it off a website then beat that. Point is I didn't like Riku until kh2 now Hes one of my favorite characters.

 

[Elysium]

I was kind of late getting into KH. I didn't play it until a friend loaned me his in 2004 or 2005. so not that late but chain of memory's was coming out around that time, and I thought it was a remake for the gba so I skipped it

That's a reasonable mistake to make, considering that generally the same roster of worlds were used.

 

[BufferAqua]

He messes with Sora’s feelings for Kairi even before Destiny Islands is destroyed with that paupu fruit race bet.

To be fair that was mostly a light-hearted joke that Sora got over pretty quickly lol