Square Enix
Kingdom Hearts 2

To understand the difference between Kingdom Hearts and its sequel, you only need to play both for less than an hour, up to the first boss of the tutorial. In the first video game, we see Sora, the protagonist of both games, fighting a gigantic shadow that threatens him and, at the end of the fight, melts away, swallowing him and waking him from a rather unsettling dream.
In Kingdom Hearts 2, the situation is almost identical: Roxas, the character we control during the tutorial, finds himself in the same surreal scenario, fighting against an overpowering enemy that falls on him at the end of the fight. A familiar scene, but something has changed: the battle in the new chapter takes place in a chaotic atmosphere with extremely fast dodges and spectacular Quick-Time events.

What Kingdom Hearts 2 loses in terms of atmosphere compared to its previous chapter, it tries to make up for in spectacularity, special effects, and acrobatics.

And I would say that to some extent, it succeeds. In this game, everything really happens: people scaling skyscrapers while running, exploding spaceships, battles with two swords, meteor showers. The characters are more theatrical, each having a moment to showcase their skills, especially the Organization XIII enemies who manage to turn anything into a weapon. More than once, we will be asked to face hundreds (and I'm not kidding) of enemies alone. Things that were impossible to find in the first Kingdom Hearts, yet they manage to avoid becoming overwhelming or boring.

But let's go into more detail: the biggest improvement from the first episode is the gameplay, which was already an excellent mix of real-time action and RPG in the first chapter. All the acrobatics I just mentioned are performed using the triangle button to activate a "reaction command," which makes the protagonist execute a special move or triggers a Quick-Time event. Using them is generally not complicated (except against certain enemies and bosses) because they appear during the opponents' animations and are clearly visible on the screen; they also contribute a good 50% to the spectacularity I talked about. They are also quite fun, after all.
The system for casting spells has been greatly improved, making it easier to use them and integrate them into battles. Some abilities that in the first chapter were determined by the initial weapon choice are now automatically assigned after completing certain battles. This makes the game much more balanced compared to the first chapter, where a wrong choice in the first two minutes could lead to not learning useful abilities before level 40-50 (for example, Second Chance, which will be rightly assigned at the start of the game in all future Kingdom Hearts); additionally, this system provides the player with some area attacks already before halfway through the game.
Further increasing the available acrobatics are the drives, or the ability to sacrifice a companion to gain certain enhancements, like two-handed attacks, wider attacks, and floating. In general, their use can truly turn the tide of a battle, but they suffer from the fact that the gauge that fills up to use them is also used for summons and takes a while to recharge. Which is a shame because, considering their use allows unlocking some fusion-exclusive abilities even when it isn't active, any player would have used them more instead of reserving them for particular situations.

From the story and setting perspective, we remain at high levels. Here Sora, who was left in suspended animation following the events in Chains Of Memories, awakens and begins to travel the worlds again to defeat Organization XIII, a group of Nobodies (which, as explained, are nothing more than the empty shells left behind by those whose hearts were stolen by the Heartless) trying to build a copy of Kingdom Hearts to gain its power. The plot, far from predictable, is gradually revealed to the player, sometimes with sudden twists, engaging the player.

However, not everything is sunshine and roses: this is where the tendency begins, on the writers' part, to ignore details and laws from previous chapters at their discretion, although for now, at least, they try to provide an explanation. For instance, Sora's adventures in the first chapter were supposed to make the Heartless disappear and prevent travel between the worlds. But in the second chapter, the Heartless still exist because "they are the darkness in men's hearts, so they will always exist," and travel between worlds is made possible by special corridors meant for those possessing the Keyblade, while the Organization achieves it with some kind of portable black holes, which are given little to no explanation. Perhaps I'm not the only one who thinks they could have provided better reasons for these small plot holes, which, however, do not ruin it, at least for those who haven't played the first Kingdom Hearts attentively (unlike what will happen with the saga's following chapters). On this note, certain parts of the story might not have needed to depend so much on what happened in Chains Of Memories, a secondary chapter, almost a spin-off, which not everyone had played (I, for example, had to ask friends for some details).

The main story, as in the first chapter, should offer the player a pretext to explore the various worlds (read "levels"), each with its own story stemming from Disney feature films or the Final Fantasy series. The worlds are not more numerous than those in Kingdom Hearts, but each must be visited multiple times to complete the game, facing stronger enemies each time. This choice significantly extends the game's longevity without losing freshness. Indeed, while in the first half of the game, the Disney worlds' stories try to follow the corresponding films as much as possible, in the second half, this tendency decreases, returning to mix childhood characters with an alien universe. Additionally, almost every world features some mini-game that players might want to tackle. Among these, the Gummyship flying sequences stand out, where one could spend hours. The only really glaring mistake in level design is transforming Atlantica (the world of "The Little Mermaid," one of the most beautiful from the first chapter) into a gigantic Quick-Time Event mini-game where everyone sings and dances, with one of the items needed to build the game's strongest weapon hidden at the end: possibly influenced by the contemporary success of the Disney musical "High School Musical," it remains an alien segment to the game that few will complete (and with little enthusiasm) and did not in any way expand the series' audience. At least it has the decency of being optional.

What we have here is nonetheless one of the most successful video games from two companies certainly not accustomed to seriality, in which both a fan and a newcomer can enjoy themselves without being able to say they've played a bad video game. The dark and apocalyptic atmosphere thins out, but the battles' pathos and a general sense of epicness gain from it. Perhaps the last Kingdom Hearts worth playing, even if you're not a fan.