KH3D - Did You Feel The Absence of Command Melding Made The Game Feel Flat?

[525055]

I bought Kingdom Hearts 3D about three months ago (was it three months? August 2012 was when I got it), expecting a Birth by Sleep quality experience via gameplay at the least, and a Kingdom Hearts II quality experience via gameplay at best. However, what I received was something below even Kingdom Hearts Re:coded quality experience; KH3D completely and utterly lacks command melding. Instead, we have to raise our Dream Eaters--essentially playing a minigame--to collect our abilities and commands.

Now, I personally felt like Square Enix threw all loyal fans to the side in order to grip at a child's audience with KH3D. You know, as if they did not even try with KH3D. By not being able to meld commands and instead having to go through arbitrary loops and bounds to get commands, I felt the game was largely flat. But what about you? What did you feel about the lack of command melding?

 

[Ruran]

There's been a few complaints about this before, but you get commands through raising you Dream Eaters. There are less commands than in BbS but not significantly. It's a simple matter of if you don't bother attaining or raising Dream Eater you don't get commands.

 

[Sign]

They didn't promise command melding nor was there any obligation for them to utilize it in every title, so I honestly didn't miss it at all. Obviously we've gone without it in the beginning. It wasn't that big a deal, and I personally found the Dream Eater system rather enjoyable.

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

I felt no loss by not having the melding system. It was fun and all in BBS and Re:coded but it was their thing. I never enjoyed synthesis in past KH games besides the last three titles. KH3D had something new and it was fun and interesting. I never associate children with the collectable monster genre thing. Look at Pokemon which has mainly grown adults playing it.

This was just Osaka trying something out new. I think they succeeded in it pretty well, as I seem to find the entire DE system to be one of the more interesting systems they've introduced in the series so far.

 

[DropDistance]

The dream eater system was pretty cool, it allowed you to have some unique abilities, but sometime it got annoying mainly because you were forced to raise certain dream eaters to get certain moves, that and if you change dream eaters you would lose that stat increase, like hp boost for example. . I prefer command melding, which allows me to get any ability I want, and is more efficient/ fun to play with due to all the possibilities.

 

[Megavoltage]

I still love Dream Drop Distance but I didn't like the Dream Eater leveling system. Having to do those bizarre mini games, feeding animals, poking them in the belly and having to do all of this repeatedly to unlock the stronger commands wasn't fun for me. I would of enjoyed DDD a lot more if it had melding commands instead of taking care of pets. I'm hesitant to do a second playthrough because it bothered me so much and I usually love to beat Kingdom Hearts games over and over. It's cool that they're trying new things but I didn't like this.

I had to turn the volume off when doing the water barrel mini game because I got so sick of hearing "La...la...la la-la-la..."

 

[OathkeeperRoxas XIII]

Correcting if I am wrong, but the Command melding, didn't it break the game in a way?. I mean, the sleights in COM are a different story but wouldn't getting the strongest commands make the game far too easy since yoy acquired them at like the 4th/5th world of the game? Radiant Garden. And Dream Eaters, I think I and many have said that monster catching goes back more than just Pokemon. And a few commands aren't there, well... There is nothing we could do about that right?

 

[Decrith]

I think it was good they didn't have it, the command melding was OP for me, and since they wanted us to focus on the Dream Eaters and Flowmotion, it was a familiar yet brand new experience. Basically getting the job done.

 

[Hillboy]

I thought it was fine, a bit tedious at times yes, but it wasn't that bad. Certainly not behind ReCoded to say the least

 

[Sora2016]

Everyone has already stated my opinion, but I will chime in anyway I suppose. As others have said, the command melding system was kind of broken in ways that you could get -ga level spells by the second or so world if you really desired, and unless you had the special AR card Dream Eaters (which are S-ranked and everything to begin with) that was not possible in DDD.

Also, I really did enjoy the Dream Eaters as I am a fan of adorable animals and Pokemon I won't pretend like I didn't waste a lot of time playing with my Dream Eaters and taking pictures of the adorable things they do because I totally did But I know that isn't for everyone. However, I still felt having to focus on your Party members to grow was definitely unique and kind of a nice change of pace. Plus their level of customization was incredible compared to the past games. I would love it if the future games had some way to customize your party members like that again.

 

[Roronoa Zoro]

No, but I sure would've been happy if they had put that in the game

 

[Vəntus]

I didn't think it made the game feel flat but more fluid, since you'd have to use the Dream Eaters to get commands, but if anything, BBS Command Melding is much better than Re:coded... believe me.

 

[Taochan]

Now, I personally felt like Square Enix threw all loyal fans to the side in order to grip at a child's audience with KH3D.

Really? I found the system in KH3D to be so much more tedious than the system in BBS and Re:Coded.

I felt as though a huge fault with BBS was how easy it was to have ridiculously overpowered commands due to how the command deck worked, which made the game easier than it should have been.

 

[ajmrowland]

There's been a few complaints about this before, but you get commands through raising you Dream Eaters. There are less commands than in BbS but not significantly. It's a simple matter of if you don't bother attaining or raising Dream Eater you don't get commands.

Problem is I dont really easily function with raising a Dream Eater without knowing where I'm going. With regards to things like this, I need a plan and a goal. Otherwise I dont really bother.

Dream Eaters were still fun, but I just didnt want them for commands. I wanted to collect and play with them.

 

[skyfoxx]

I was okay without the command melding. But I know so many people who missed out on getting really good commands because they didn't interact with their Dream Eaters. And to be honest, I think that's bad game design. You're forcing players who are used to this fast-paced action game to suddenly play this Nintendogs mini-game just so they can get decent skills.

If I had to choose between the way BBS did it and the way KH3D did it, I'd have to choose BBS.

 

[Sephiroth0812]

Personally I felt that it was good that they ditched Command Melding since in BBS you could pretty much abuse it and create very strong commands already by the second world for each character.
I know it was one aim to show that since TAV were trained professionally that they could pull off more flashy and effective moves, but I doubt it was meant in this way.

In DDD you have to actually work to get your commands and get the strong ones only mid-game (if you're really investing in Dream Eaters) or late-game.

The thing that slightly "bothered" me more was that your commands in DDD cannot get stronger by leveling. That's something they should have kept from BBS.

That's not to say I would prefer DDD's system though. I still favor BBS' system overall more, although they could have balanced the command melding more by only making certain combinations possible when you get the corresponding recipe for the command-class in question (so there would be no Mega-Flare already in the second world).

@skyfoxx:
It's still a fast-paced action game without needing to play too much "Nintendogs". Dream Eaters also gain Link Points just by participating in battles and you can only go and unlock their boards just like you go to the Sphere Grid in Final Fantasy X. The further you get in-game the more commands also become available in the shop (and more rare ones in the Medal shop in TT).

There are already quite some "decent" skills available from this already, not to mention you can get some very good commands without even touching a Dream Eater (like Dark Firaga or Dark Break from a Drop Bonus, Meteor from the Dive mini-game and Sora can even find Salvation and Sparkga in a simple treasure chest while Riku gets Dark Splicer and Shadowbreaker (which can also be used by Sora) from chests as well).
Furthermore, unlike in BBS, in DDD Sora and Riku share an Inventory, meaning all non-exclusive commands can be used by both.

So, all in all, I would say that it depends on if you are looking for some specific commands you really wanna have no matter what and which are in the upper tier of effectiveness. For a working deck of "decent" commands a casual player does not need to excessively pet his/her Dream Eaters.

 

[theirlosthearts]

Not having command melding was not a problem for me at all. Command melding is very fun, but I don't consider it essential to a good Kingdom Hearts game. I do miss item synthesis as was in KH1 and 2 though. But that may just be nostalgia speaking.

As for DEs, you didn't have to pet them or play the minigames if you didn't want to. You could get all the link points you need by battling. As for anyone complaining about having to change dispositions to unlock different parts of the board, that's like complaining about not getting a side quest reward without doing the side quest. And really, those extra commands/abilities weren't ultra essential. If you make strong DEs, you'll get all of the strong commands you need without unlocking new sections or having to pet/poke/play minigames. I thought the DE system was nice since it was there if you wanted to put a lot of effort into it if you wanted, but you didn't have to put in a lot of effort if you didn't want to.

 

[KeyofEvil'sBane]

I never really had too much of a problem with DE's. I would just pet them occasionally and forget about the skill board, then by the time I remembered, I would have a couple hundred points on each lol. I actually grew kinda attached to them too, as when one would run out of HP, I sprinted to go revive it, then tore up who/whatever was responsible

The main issue I had was that the commands themselves just seemed kinda... weak. I really did miss the level up system from BBS, and all the commands just seemed slower and easier for enemies to break.

 

[Neko]

I did not particularly miss the command melding in KH3D. I had fun playing with my DEs and having them as partners. It was quite different from past games, but I found the change refreshing. I can see why some people might not enjoy it as much though because it means spending the time with the DEs to get all the abilities and everything.

 

[ajmrowland]

Personally I felt that it was good that they ditched Command Melding since in BBS you could pretty much abuse it and create very strong commands already by the second world for each character.
I know it was one aim to show that since TAV were trained professionally that they could pull off more flashy and effective moves, but I doubt it was meant in this way.

But in DDD, they tied it to the dream eaters which is something else entirely in gameplay. I understand the need to withhold powerful commands but there are better ways to do. Flick Rush might've been better suited for that, since there's no other minigames, and if worse comes to worse, simple stage completion for each world unlocking certain commands and command tiers, encouraging play through the story.