KHII Level 1 Run?

[ZaXo Ken'Ichi]

Anyone else tried it? I've already 100%'ed the game on Critical twice. So I decided to try, and it's really fun! A bit of a difficult start, but it works extremely well.

Figured we could share experiences.

 

[shivas]

oh boy hard/critical modes in any game is not for me I suck at it!
but I enjoy watching playthroughs! my fav kh streamer is bizkit047, it's fun watching him play

Spoiler

 

[ZaXo Ken'Ichi]

Yeah, his stuff is super rad, and he makes some pretty informative videos on occasion too. I'm watching through his third KHII Randomizer run right now.

I'm increasingly surprised at how well harder challenges work on KHII. KHI kinda sucks in that regard. I was impressed with Proud Mode's balance when I first tried it. But going back to it after KHII's Critical mode, it's kind of a mess in comparison. KHI turns into an aggravating war of attrition at points, because you do so little damage unless you grind. Funny, because it actually becomes a bit easier at level 1, since you do more damage (due to under the hood damage scaling depending on the battle rating of the world). But since it wasn't designed for level 1, you also lack nearly all keyblade focused combat options at level 1. KH2 by contrast puts most of it's abilities behind story events, side battles, and drive forms. In doing so, your options still grow at level 1, meaning the game still feels great to play. The biggest difference between each KHII difficulty, including level 1 becomes that you have fewer chances to make mistakes before you die. But damage levels and everything else are also really well balanced both on Critical, and level 1 in KHII, which makes a huge difference to playability compared to KHI.

If you're ever interested in a KHII experience where all of your options are valid in combat (rather than just mashing being more than optimal), Critical is astonishingly balanced. And level 1 -something I thought would be for masochists who like cheap deaths and spending twenty minutes on each successful boss attempt without speedrun strats- is much more doable and enjoyable then I could've ever imagined It's actually most difficult at the beginning, since you lack options. Well, until you get to the Data Organization fights probably, lol.