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What is your favorite side game?



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What was your favorite side game


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redcrown

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So out of all the side games in this series that you've played, what game has been your personal favorite so far? Before people say that there are "no side games because they are all relevant to the plot" I mean specifically the non numbered games; KH1 and KH2.

And this isn't about what of these games is "objectively" better, I mean what game is YOUR personal favorite.

This would be based off of what was your favorite that personally connected to you:
Gameplay
Story
Character Arc(s)
Platforming/Exploration
World choices and designs
Overall atmosphere and feeling

I'll start with mine.

I would say my favorite would be DDD; I love the feel of this game, it's dreamy atmosphere and world choices like Fantasia and Hunchback of Notre Dame gave me great nostalgia for KH1 and even for Disneyland in general. The worlds were few but felt huge and more alive with lots to explore, and the flowmotion mechanic just really made this game feel magical to me.

It also helps that the characters we played as hadn't been seen since KH2 (Sora and Riku); it felt so long awaited and had arcs that naturally fit where they were left off 6 years before: Sora actually having arrogance and his near sighted optimism being the path to his downfall and failure, and Riku coming to terms with himself and realizing he doesn't need to carry his burden of guilt anymore and can still be a good person.

I even loved the added element of Sleeping Worlds, before the plot went off the deep end with the time travel. Even with that convoluted plot twist I still liked the concept of the Sleeping Realm.

Second for me would be Re:CoM, then third BBS.
 
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DiscordSparkle

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Haven't played Coded or X so they're immediately out. Beat CoM when it first came out but when I recently tried to play Re:CoM I just couldn't be bothered. Haven't replayed Days in a while but I like its story. And I don't really like BBS. So I guess that just leaves DDD.
 

Elysium

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3D easily. I'm replaying the game right now. :D I love CoM and Coded.
 
D

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BBS is the only game I've played so.....:confused:.

I've seen the stories on youtube so i can judge those :cool:.

From greatest to least storywise...
Re-COM
BBS
Back Cover
358/2 Days
DDD
Coded.
 
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Recon

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BBS for sure. I was so hyped for that in 2009. PSP was an amazing era. Next DDD, then Re:COM, then 358/2 days, then Re:Coded.
 

Raz

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CoM -- great story, plotting, and villains. BBS was fascinating in that it answered a lot of questions about the series, plus I liked the diversity in game-play styles, as well as the choice of Disney worlds that time around.
 

sephydark

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358/2 Days is my favorite. I know the pace is a bit slow, but I think the plot itself is really good and the themes really resonated with me. Plus I really like the main characters; I already liked Roxas from KH2 but Days made me feel a lot more sympathy for him, and I felt like Xion was a great character. I also felt like the combat was a lot more strategic than a lot of the later "side games" and I enjoyed it a lot more (well, except for Ruler of the Sky and Leechgrave; those two were garbage).

Actually a little surprised to see 3D winning right now, since I felt that one made a lot of storytelling missteps that held it back from true greatness.
 

phoenixmiko

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My favourite side game is DDD. I love how it ties all of the story points so far together and what it does with Riku's character arc. Being able to play as Riku was great. I did not finish ReCOM so I did not get to play as him until this game. It was one of the entries (the others being KH2 and BBS) I was most hyped to play while catching up with KH's story this year.
 

okhi12

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Story wise, BBS and Days.
Gameplay wise, I loved re:coded because it experimented with some weird things like the side scrolling phase of TT, the automatic forward progression of Wonderland, the final fantasy like fights of OC, etc. The command system was very polished as well and it was fun. Its story is... leagues behind the rest.
Overall, BBS final mix had nice additions and it is my second-third favorite KH game (can't decide between 1 and 2 for first place).
But the side game that has a special place in my heart is the original CoM. That game was amazing for a GBA.
I have not mentioned DDD because I like it but the other games have more remarkable aspects to me. And I won't judge 0.2, too short to be considered game on its own.
 

Veevee

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Up to this day, I still hold Re:Com in high regard. I hated the empty worlds as much as everyone else, but liked the bosses, found the card system interesting and think it has the tightest story of the spin-off games. The dialogue was sharp and witty, we got to see a lot from the orga members, the writing was exciting while being clear ... I really like it.
The problem I have with the other side-games is that I get what message they are trying to convey with each game, but they all fail miserably in the execution (for example, in BBS: Three best friends falling apart through schemes - never believed the best friends part to begin with). DDD was, after Re:Coded, the worst of the playable games for me because it spends so much time on irrelevant stuff and glosses over the actually interesting stuff in an hour and makes the whole thing so vague and unclear that it kinda kicked the KH franchise in the nut instead of helping it, because up to this point, the KH games were pretty understandable if you payed enough attention and then the time travel came (I don't want to say it's not understandable at all, but the rules are pretty flimsy, hardly explained and the whole game was confusing as heck). So, yeah, more love for Re:Com <3
 

alexis.anagram

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It's a tie between Days and CoM but I tend towards the former because it's the only game to feature my favorite character in the series (Xion) in a lead role. It's as good a tie breaker as any.

Anyway, I love how dense its narrative is and how thematically fulfilling it feels. From start to finish, it's one of the best examples within the series of how to properly set up and pay off a story, as well as how to root the ideas and concepts driving the story within the ongoing character drama. The characters are flawed in both obvious and not so obvious ways and feel more human for it. The central conflicts, despite being ornamented by the usual KH window dressings, are all established and intentionally grounded in a sort of common language that extends beyond the weird otherverse of some of the series' offerings: Kanemaki's guidance is, I think, felt keenly throughout. There's a patience to it and a notable lack of interest in pulling the rug out from under the audience. It (gasp) even manages to be restrained in its execution: not everything it's trying to say or do is overtly stated, subtext and symbolism is invoked deliberately and thematic refrains are plentiful. Shimomura does three of her best pieces for the game, too (Musique pour la Tristesse de Xion is, flat out, my favorite track of hers). Quality output all around.

Though it is in its technical manners a very different animal, I place it spiritually closest to KH1 out of every game in the series, including CoM and KH2.
 

Tempo

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i can't believe you're all sleeping on Re:coded like this. absolute best gameplay of all the side games, uses deck commands without being weirdly unbalanced or making regular combos feel obselete, the clock system gives you reason to use all your different keyblades for different purposes and makes each one feel unique and fun to swing around, and the stat matrix gives you the most customisable game options you've ever had in a KH game. they even mix up the regular gameplay here and there and throw in sidescrolling and shoot em up segments. Re:coded does so much with so little and everyone hates it bc they STILL think the story isn't relevant. smdh give this game some love :'(
 

Megavoltage

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Re:coded does so much with so little and everyone hates it bc they STILL think the story isn't relevant. smdh give this game some love :'(
I’m fine with a story not being important, not every game needs to shake the universe. It was just nauseating to live through KH1 so many times. KH1, CoM, KH1 in Recoded, CoM in Recoded. Four times we danced this dance! FOUR! But the gameplay is great and I do hope the Datascape is expanded upon in a future title but preferably with Realm of Light keyblade masters visiting the Datascape instead of another romp with Secondary Sora. I especially liked the traditional JRPG stage in Olympus, that’s something that really needs to return.
 

Tempo

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It was just nauseating to live through KH1 so many times.
Yeah, I understand where you're coming from on that point. But I also feel that's not too fair to say, because they at least did their best to change up the stories each time. It's more than "meet characters, go to place, fight villain" and I really like how the plots are re-worked to revolve around the core themes of each game. Like with Alice tricking the Queen of Hearts into remembering something she didn't and Cloud working for Hades to get his memory back in CoM, and with Jafar creating a data replica of the lamp and the coliseum getting altered into a big maze and such. I get the gripe that it's gotten too repetitive, though.
 

TheMostRad

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Birth by Sleep is my favorite side game by far, but I know I'm also looking through this with rose-tinted glasses.

Objectively, I could ramble about how cool I thought the 3-sided gameplay came out, about the hours upon hours I put into the multiplayer Mirage Arena (still a small disappointment of mine with the 2.5 re-releases), or about the plethora of plot info BbS provided. I could personally talk about being in high school and saving up for a PSP specifically for this game, then proceeding to throw a good chunk of my freshman year of college into it when it finally came out.

My runner-up would go to DDD, because I actually had a ball with the time-travel twist and I think I love it.
 

Amadeus

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This one's hard for me. Days was my first KH game, and I love it dearly. The gameplay is a hot mess, but since it was my first game I didn't know that at the time. The story stands apart from the other games because it's a real tragedy: there are no happy endings. Xion dies, Roxas loses his memories, and Axel is left alone. It's sad as hell, especially because Xion is my favorite!!

My favorite gameplay has to go to either BbS or DDD though. I really like the command deck, because I feel like it requires a little more strategy than the numbered titles, without requiring mad thinking ahead like CoM requires sometimes. I did enjoy CoM a lot though (on GBA; haven't gotten around to Re:CoM yet). I haven't finished re:coded (barely even started despite getting it on release day...) but I watched it and I cried. The first two thirds/three quarters was literally the same two cutscenes over and over again (Sora goes and fixes a world, Sora reports back to Riku). But then Roxas came in and oh boy, the whole thing about hurt hurt.

I think every "side game" is really great in its own right, but tl;dr Days is my favorite over all.
 
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