Kingdom Hearts Re: Coded has always been a little bit of a black sheep in the series. It had a fairly different style while still keeping the same general action-platforming in. So what better to do than to re-release it as cutscenes!
Like with Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 ReMIX, Kingdom Hearts: Re: Coded was included in a cutscene-movie format. They completely overhauled the graphics and brought them up to par with the other two games. They went in and voiced a lot of cutscenes. They even found a way to include battles!
In a movie style like this, Kingdom Hearts Re: Coded looks great (and almost makes one want to play it… almost). More scenes being voiced was a great addition, as it meant you could just leave it on in the background if you wanted and do other things. Granted, the downside to this was it meant Genie got voiced and well… I wasn’t a fan of his new voice actor, but anyways.
One of my biggest complaints with the Days cutscenes in 1.5 was that they hadn’t included the battles in some way. This time they did, even if it is just showing Sora smacking around some data boxes. At least some effort went into that part!
If you have a few spare hours, go ahead and turn on the Re: Coded cutscenes and give them a watch. They will take you around 3-4 hours to watch them all and it’s a great way to fill in the blanks for the story of Re: Coded.
Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMIX: Kingdom Hearts Re: Coded Cutscenes Review Score
4.5/5
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It’s been quite the journey for me through this collection. Of course, it didn’t help that I decided to be crazy and do it all on Critical Mode. Yeah… Well, it provided a great challenge anyways in two of my favorite Kingdom Hearts titles. While these two titles aren’t the easiest to switch between in terms of controls, they are both fantastic in their own ways.
Did 2.5 outdo 1.5? Honestly, yes. While the loading is a massive issue (and is even worse than it was in 1.5 I believe), the sheer fact they managed to make a PSP game not look like a PSP game is amazing. Having played other PSP remasters on PS3, those definitely did still look like a PSP game. Sure, some elements of PSP-ness remain, such as the oversized UI in places, the graphics themselves look like they belong on a PS3.
I highly suggest this collection to any Kingdom Hearts fan. If you’re looking to get into the series, then Birth by Sleep is a pretty fantastic place to start in the storyline. The two HD collections released now for Kingdom Hearts definitely bring some life into the series and are both worth picking up.
Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMIX Review Score
4/5
I would like to thank Square Enix for providing the copy of this game used for this review.
Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMIX is available for purchase on Amazon.
