TGS 2009: Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep Hands-on

Tokyo Game Show 2009 played host to a magnitude of PSP games. Outside Microsoft's own booth, there seemed to be a PSP demo kiosk at every turn. Square Enix in-particular knew that Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep for the PSP would be particularly popular among press and show-goers, and devoted rows and rows of tethered PSPs behind a winding waiting-line to showcasing the title. Luckily on the press days the lines were very short, and Gaming Union managed to pick up Square Enix's demo of Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep not once, not twice, but thrice.

Three times might sound like a bit overkill, but the demo of Birth by Sleep actually consisted of three different stories to play through, as well as a multiplayer battle mode. Birth by Sleep's three lead characters have one story-based demo each, Ven goes to the Castle of Dreams, Terra goes to Enchanted Dominion, and Aqua takes on the Dwarf Woodlands. The game's presentation was extremely polished, with graphics on-par with Kingdom Hearts 2. Clothing and hair swayed while walking, magic sparkled and wowed, with superb animation to back it all up.

Playing as Terra first, controls were actually an improvement over the PS2 installments of Kingdom Hearts. Square still served for blocking and dodging, with X for Jump and Circle for Attack as per usual, however, camera control was mapped to L and R much like in Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII. The battle menu has been revamped as a battle deck as well. In Kingdom Hearts 2 the battle menu on the bottom left of the screen was accessed with the d-pad, listing attack, magic, and item options, with sub-menus to select different spells and items. In Birth by Sleep this is not the case, instead the deck has no sub-menus, and only lists pre-set actions, like spells and items. Using the d-pad to highlight an action, hitting triangle during battle will use whatever action is highlighted. So with this new aspect of the battle system, players can attack, run, dodge, block, use magic and control the camera all at the same time without fumbling with the controls.

Battle mechanics were fairly good, like Birth by Sleep's predecessors however, being attacked during a combo was continuously annoying as neither Terra, Aqua, or Ven could quickly discontinue their combo to block or dodge, even if an attack is imminent. MP has also hit the road, instead spells simply recharge for further use. Attacking repeatedly also built up the Command Charge, and when full, continuing to attack would unleash the equivalent of a limit break. Together with using L + R to lock-on to enemies, the battle system feels to be the best-yet in Kingdom Hearts, a surprise considering the PSP's reduced button-count.

Kingdom Hearts historically has a very heavy emphasis on story, and while it was all in Japanese, the series continues its quality of presentation and cinematics on the PSP. Character models were detailed, environments were imaginative and allowed for sprawling battles, and boss battles were challenging. With the large bosses however, not being able to angle the camera upwards was a draw-back. Nonetheless, it's exciting to see the series make it's way to the PSP so un-compromised, here's hoping to a speedy localization.