Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory

Genre: Music-Rhythm

Players: 1-2 Co-Op / Competitive (Local / Online)

.

Review:

Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory is a Music-Rhythm game released on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch in 2020, and then ported to PC in 2021. This game is a spin-off of Square Enix’s popular RPG series that blends Disney worlds and characters with Square Enix’s own JRPG characters in an absurdly convoluted plot, but Melody of Memory differs from other games in the series in that it is a Music-Rhythm game.

Many have made some comparisons between this game and the Theatrhythm series, but I would argue that the only similarities between the two are on a very broad level – both are games that take long-running Square Enix RPG franchises and turn them into a Music-Rhythm experience. However, the gameplay in both games is quite different, as are elements of the presentation.

Melody of Memory has players following series protagonists Sora, Donald, and Goofy running along 3D tracks through various locales throughout the Kingdom Hearts series, with “notes” here represented by enemies they need to attack and evade. It all looks pretty good, and consistent with the rest of the series, but there seems to be something missing here – even though this does appear to be a canonical entry in the series (the series has a history of making all spin-offs canonical to the story), there’s not any sort of up-front explanation for why you’re fighting hordes of heartless on a tour of the series’ locations, and much of the game’s “story” is a recap of… well, everything that’s happened throughout the franchise.

Of course, the music is one of the primary reasons to play a Music-Rhythm game, and Yoko Shimomura’s music throughout the series has long been celebrated, only… well… here’s the thing. With the Theatrhythm games, there was a wealth of games to draw their music from, with the game’s creators presumably selecting only the most memorable and celebrated songs from each of the featured games. By comparison, the Kingdom Hearts franchise only has three mainline games and a handful of spin-off titles, meaning that Melody of Memory seems at times like it’s a collection of all of the series’ music, even the more forgettable themes.

And while you do get Hikaru Utada’s excellent opening and closing themes as part of the mix, you also get some pretty bland instrumental versions of various Disney themes, when it might have been better to just put the actual original music in the game instead. And that’s when you get actual Disney music. In some areas, you only get music that sounds vaguely like it belongs to the featured Disney film that section of the game was derived from.

Unfortunately, regardless of which songs in the series you do and don’t enjoy, you’ll have to play through most of them – you have to go through the game’s single-player campaign mode to unlock the game’s songs, and progress is barred until you complete a decent number of the currently-available songs. In other words, be prepared to sift through a lot of the disposable stuff before you can get to the series’ better songs.

Then there’s the gameplay itself. The game is a somewhat clever reworking of the Kingdom Hearts series battles to a Music-Rhythm format, with players swiping attacks at enemies in time with the music. This mostly works, and there’s fun little touches like needing to use multiple buttons to have multiple characters attack at one time, tapping a different button for a magic attack, or jumping and floating to follow a line of floating music notes.

While this mostly works, it’s not always clear what type of action will be required for each enemy approaching your characters until they get nearer to you and a timed indicator appears. However, more frustrating than this is floating enemies, who often have no such indicator, and with timing that’s not entirely clear. These floating enemies more than anything else consistently threw me off the game’s rhythm.

I still really like the idea of “Kingdom Hearts Theatrhythm”, but this is not that, and even if it was it would seem to indicate that the idea isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. The concept may seem sound, but the Kingdom Hearts series music seems stretched too thin and players are forced to go through the motions with far too much of the series’ less notable themes to unlock its better content, and the gameplay itself makes it too difficult to anticipate what you need to do in the game’s Music-Rhythm gameplay. If you’re a massive Kingdom Hearts fan, this may still be worth playing through, but it’s not the joyous celebration of the franchise that it should have been.

tl;dr – Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory is a Music-Rhythm game exploring the music of the Kingdom Hearts franchise. Unfortunately, players are forced to play through far too much of the series’ less-noteworthy tunes to get to its better music, and the gameplay itself often doesn’t properly convey the information the player needs to anticipate the timing of coming notes they need to hit. This is still probably worth a look if you’re a major Kingdom Hearts fan, but this is nowhere near as successful as Square Enix’s Theatrhythm series.

Grade: C+

^{You can support eShopperReviews on Patreon! Please click HERE to become a Sponsor!}

^{This month’s sponsors are Andy Miller, Exlene, Johannes, Homer Simpin, Ilya Zverev, Eli Goodman, Kristoffer Wulff, Gabriel Coronado-Medina, Francis Obst, and Seth Christenfeld. Thank you for helping to keep the reviews coming!}