(no subject)

[tammaiya]

And the natural order of the world is righted again, on so many levels

The first thing you get when you enter the world is a cutscene of Jack finding Christmas Town and being all cute and excited and, y'know, Jack. After that scene, we show up in Halloween Town, only we're a little confused and disoriented because the whole place is decked in Christmas lights. It's not until Zero comes to greet us that Sora feels really confident that this is Halloween Town, but really, with physical transformations like that, where else is it going to be? On that note, Sora is so cute with his shadowed eyes and ickle bat wings and fangs, hee.

We wander into the town and get a bit of a shock when a sleigh drawn by skeletal reindeer flies through the air to land in front of us and Jack jumps out, enthusing about Christmas. We're kind of bemused-- what happened to Halloween? -- and then really disturbed because, as Donald points out, "imagine a Christmas created by Jack."

[I just typed Zack instead of Jack there, which proves that I've been thinking about FF7 too much recently, and also makes me reimage that sentence if it were actually supposed to be Zack and start cackling helplessly. It's been done, so I don't necessarily need to write it, but nevertheless, fweehee. Okay, moving on.]

Camera: *flicks to leering skeleton reindeer, and to a creepy jack-in-the-box present, and etc*
All: *shudder* 

We then go into Dr Finklestein's lab, where Dr Finklestein is ordering around Lock, Shock and Barrel, who are carting around ingredients for him, and Sally is sewing something. The terrible trio bitch that it's heavy and toss it carelessly onto his lab table thingo and push off, having had enough, which annoys the Professor. Jack asks Sally if 'that thing' (argh, English just doesn't allow the same level of ambiguity that Japanese does) is ready. She says no, she's sorry, but he's not too fussed just so long as it's ready by Christmas. Jack says he's going to go pick up Sandy Claws, and Sora almost bursts with excitement, which makes Donald eye him very suspiciously. Jack is leaving and we're following him, Sally stopping us to tell us that she's worried and we have to stop him, because nothing good is going to come of this. 

Anyway, it seems the Heartless have shown up again down in the town. Dr Finklestein thinks they're boring now, but Jack is worried because Sandy Claws isn't going to be very happy, is he? We run down into the town, and the mayor is spazzing out, shrieking at the Heartless through his megaphone to no avail. "Help! I can't do anything by myself!" he complains, and runs off, leaving us to bash the Heartless, which we do with pleasure. (I forgot to mention earlier, I think, but Sora has resigned himself to killing Heartless and doing what the XIII want for now because Goofy pointed out that the Heartless cause trouble for everyone and there's no other choice at the moment.) Jack asks us to come along and be Santa's bodyguards, and Sora agrees almost TOO quickly, because Donald gives him that suspicious look again.

At some point aroundish now we get a cutscene of Lock, Shock and Barrel in their walking bathtub. They're accosted by Maleficent, who is talking about reviving someone and leads them into suggesting Oogie Boogie. My faith is renewed in the universe; it was a traumatic and confusing experience being saved by Maleficent in Hollow Bastion, so it's good to see her back up to her usual nasty tricks.

Well, not good, per say, but you know what I mean.

So she revives Oogie Boogie and jogs his memory about the fact Sora-tachi and Jack were responsible for his demise. He wants revenge; she has a plan. However, he's not up to his full strength so he disappears off into the ether or wherever the bad guys go to rest, and Maleficent and the trio go off to do... something. Back to us again. Through the woods we go, to the tree that leads to Christmas Town. Sora is still all with the enthusiastic and jumps through the door without waiting. Donald is about to be all *glare* at him again when they catch up and Sora is all "Uwaaaah! :D" but then Donald sees what Sora is looking at and is like "Uwaaaaah! :D"

 Lots of snow and pretty Christmas lights and candy canes and such, yay! Ie, Christmas Town. However, we find that there are Heartless even here, which is a very D: inducing discovery. Once we've disposed of them, we go into Santa's house, where he is looking at what is presumably the naughty/nice list. He's all, hello, who are you?

Sora: Sora!
Santa: Sora, Sora... *checks his list* Hm. Seven years ago, you said you didn't believe in Santa Claus.
Sora: D:
Donald: What about me? Donald!
Santa: Yes, you're here.
Goofy: Goofy!
Santa: *nod*
Jack: Jack! Jack, from Halloween Town!
Santa: Halloween Town? *does not look terribly happy*

But at that point there's a loud noise from Santa's Workshop, so we run in to see what's going on. Maleficent is there talking to the trio about the plan, not that we get to hear anything, and she disappears before we enter. The trio see us and run away, so we decide to catch them and check what they're up to. Jack tries to talk to Santa about next Christmas, but Santa is very much like "we talk later" so we leave to deal with the trio. Their tracks lead back through the snow to Halloween Town, through the forest, through the graveyard, to that curvy hill where Maleficent revived Oogie.

Meanwhile, Oogie and Maleficent are going through with their end of the plan. They're going to go kidnap Santa and turn him into a Heartless, which will suit Maleficent's ends, and of course Sora-tachi will come running and Oogie can finish them off. Lock, Shock and Barrel get left behind to deal with us. They're waiting in the forest; Santa comes out looking lost and confused, and Sally comes up to him. Santa says he came to see Jack, and Sally tells him he has to leave, she has a bad feeling about this. Santa agrees, and asks her to tell Jack to come talk to him back in Christmas Town. She says no, don't talk to him, you have to ignore him, no good will come of this. And at this point, Santa gets nabbed by Oogie.

Cut back to us. We get to have a boss battle with the trio, who are in some kind of contraption, and they mention Oogie, which leaves us very confused. In the bad way. Dude, we totally dealt with him last time, WHY IS HE BACK? After that, Sally runs up to us and is like, "oh thank god, you're all together, Oogie kidnapped Santa and ran back to Christmas Town."

Well, obviously we've got to save Santa, so it's back to Christmas Town. As we depart, we get a scene of Oogie and Maleficent in Santa's workshop arguing over tied-up Santa. Maleficent wants to turn him into a Heartless, as per the plan, but Oogie has decided he wants to do his own thing. Maleficent tells him not to forget who revived him, but she gives up on him in disgust and leaves him to his own demise. Uh, devices. *halo*

He's remodelled Santa's workshop to look sort of like his old roulette wheel thing-- the area above the conveyor belts is decorated in neon gambling fashion, and Santa is on one of said belts. Sally is hiding in the room, and Oogie is being all evil and "I MINCE SANTA, BWAHAHA!" when she distracts him by throwing her leg at him, giving Santa enough time to escape to where she is. Oogie is enraged by this, and then ensues the boss battle, where we were stuck on the conveyor belts and could jump between them and Oogie was in a crane above. You had to whack boxes at him until he fell down and you could reach him.

Anyhoo, after that, Sally is done with the thing she was sewing, and hands it over very reluctantly-- it's a santa outfit for Jack. We're all a little, uh, Jack...

Santa thanks us, and Jack desperately wants to deliver the presents this Christmas-- "You must be tired, right?" However, Santa finally manages to talk sense into Jack where all others have failed. Yes, he says, I am tired, but that melts away when I see the happy faces of children. Don't you feel the same way about their scared and surprised faces? How would you feel if someone were to take that away from you? Christmas is mine, and Halloween is yours.

Just then, the Mayor runs up to ask Jack about the plans for this year's Halloween, and he's reminded anew of how much he loves being Jack, the Pumpkin King, King of Halloween and frightening children. He vows this will be the scariest Halloween yet and goes back with the mayor.

Then, Santa turns to Sora.

Santa: You're looking for your friend, aren't you?
Sora: *sigh* Yeah...
Santa: He's the one who told you Santa didn't exist.
Sora: I... yeah, that's right.
Santa: When you see him again, tell him about me.
Sora: Huh?
Santa: Don't stop believing, Sora. Just like you did with me, you'll find him one day.
Sora: *brightens*

I like how they include little details like that. At the same time it's kind of cute and kind of "oh, Riku, such a brat". *fond* The keyhole is Jack's santa outfit. We seal that, and then it's back to the Worlds Map.

Musical boss battle? Sure, why not!

Finishing the first episode in Halloween Town results in an upgrade to our magnet magic-- now we've got magnera, and can go back to get the pendant for Ariel. From here on out, things are very much like the movie condensed. Triton destroys Ariel's statue of Eric, Ariel storms off in tears and gets accosted by Ursula, who tries to persuade her to sign a contract where Ariel gets turned into a human, Ursula gets Ariel's voice, and Ariel has until the sunset of the third day to get Eric to kiss her. We're trying to stop her, but Flotsam and Jetsam stop Flounder and Sebastion from running to Triton and Ursula puts up a barrier to stop Sora-tachi coming near. Ariel isn't going to sign until Ursula starts on the reverse psychology; "Well, it was never going to work, was it, and you have so many people who love you here, like your father... best to just give up. It's so hard to give up on love, isn't it?" until finally Ariel squeezes her eyes shut and signs her life away. She loses her voice-- unfortunately she doesn't get to sing scales like in the movie to achieve this-- and is turned into a human right then and there, leaving her unable to breathe. Ursula cackles as Sora grabs Ariel's wrist and pulls her to the surface. We watch as Eric finds her on the beach and takes her back to the Palace. Aaaaaw, so sweet. <3

Back under the sea, we decide not to tell Triton and see how this plays itself out over the next three days, because things at least look like they're starting well. You talk to Sebastian to go check on Ariel; the next is one big, long cutscene leading up to the boss battle that makes me so glad that KHII has an 'event skip' option. XD

Like I said, it's the movie condensed, all the bits that occur on the beach. We watch Eric and Ariel walking on the beach, and we see the 'kiss the girl' scene (although there is sadly no singing of kiss the girl. wait, sadly? I should perhaps be thankful, because the Japanese versions of Disney songs seem to throw me terribly.) Sora-tachi are periodically going off to find Ursula, but she's mysteriously missing. On the third day, we find Ariel crying alone on the beach and we are all, "wtf, what happened? they were about to kiss last we saw them, before the eels rocked the boat!" Then an obviously tranced Eric walks on the scene with a catty brunette bitch singing in Ariel's voice.

Oh. THAT'S what happened.

Sora, clever little cookie that he is, sees the shell necklace around the brunette's neck-- the one Ursula captured Ariel's voice in. He's like :O! Ursula! and zaps the necklace with the keyblade. It breaks, and Eric is freed of his trance, running to Ariel, who has gotten her voice back. She calls his name happily, and he realises that the person he loves and the person who saved his life are one and the same and is overjoyed. She tells him her name is Ariel, and then--

Ursula! She's turned back to her nasty octopus-lady self behind them and is bitchily smug because the contract said they had to kiss before sunset on the third day, and it's sunset now. She drags Ariel back down under the sea with her, much to our and especially Eric's dismay. She can of course turn Ariel into something horrible as per the contract, but as she's about to do so Triton comes onto the scene and is like RAH! THERE IS NO CONTRACT!

Ursula waves it under his nose and taunts him-- is the King of the sea just going to blast it out of existence? A contract is a contract, after all!

Triton realises she's right and they're bound by it, so he demands of Ursula that she let him take Ariel's place. She agrees, he zaps Ariel's signature off to replace it with his own using the tridant, and she turns him into a little black worm thingy. Ariel screams out "PAPA!" (or some variant thereupon, but I think it was papa) and Ursula is about to do something nasty when something gets thrown at her arm, javelin-like. Camera swings around; it's Prince Eric, here to save Ariel, who swims into his arms. AAAAAAAAAAW. <333333

We then get a musical boss battle. No, dude, really, I kid you not. There's no whacking things with keyblades in Atlantica this time, and that extends to the boss. No, it's more dancing! This is both the most AWESOME THING EVER and mildly annoying. Awesome because dude! Musical boss battle! With Ursula singing and us dodging and whacking her in orchestrated dance moves! (Well, not technically orchestrated, but whatev.) The annoying comes into it because she has a health gauge, and even if I hit excellent every single time she wouldn't die.

I begin to understand why it told me I needed an S-level Drive gauge, now. *sweatdrop* Well, there's nothing I can do here, so finally it's on to Hollow Bastion.

The Adventures Of Somebody-From-Somewhere-san, Part The Fifth!

There's no cutscene when I head to Hollow Bastion, so I shrug and go to do the next page of Pooh. It's a dark, scary cave where all the other woodland creatures are hanging around looking worried, minus Pooh. Sora asks what's going on, and we find out that Pooh has wandered off into the cave for some unknown reason, all by himself. As Gopher says, it's not like there's any honey down there...

Although there is, Rabbit realises, the sound of bees. You'll protect us, right, Sora?

They argue for a while about what they should do-- should they go after him? But what if they get lost? It's big and dark and scary... but eventually we decide to go in a group, Sora with Tigger, Piglet, Roo and Eeyore. (That last made me blink, but I'm glad Eeyore is being included in stuff. <3)

We wander off to a time limit, me surreptitiously trying to pick up treasure on the way (which is why I didn't clear it the first few times, to be honest) and accidentally doubling back because you don't get a map until after you clear it the first time. There's a brave metre, and when that runs out all the woodland creatures panic and you have to call them all together again, which wastes time. There are falling rocks and slippery ice, but the main problem is the bees. Anyway, eventually you find the cavern Pooh is sitting in (you need all four of the others with you, so if you lose one along the way, you can't go in) you ask him what he's doing there. He's tapping his forehead in deep troubled contemplation, think, think, think; it seems he made a promise to someone but he doesn't remember it or them. He thought maybe they'd be here.

We tell Pooh that it's not safe here, so we should go back-- what if he gets eaten by a monster? This of course makes Pooh worry that this someone he can't remember could have been eaten! One of the others, at this point-- I can't remember who-- asks Pooh if maybe the person he's thinking of is Sora.

Pooh turns around to look at Sora's hopeful face, and-- "Sora!" Yes, he's remembered your name, we're all very happy, and we wander out of the cave to join the others again, Pooh putting his paw into Sora's hand. Cute. <3

That means there's only one page left, and we're done!

Right, so... NOT Sephiroth/Cloud. *disgruntled*

I went for a vaguely thorough search of Hollow Bastion, by which I mean I checked everywhere but Tron's world. Apparently I was wrong, no new episode in Hollow Bastion. Admittedly, I did not read the popup very closely-- read "new episode" and glazed over. Suspect it said "new episode completed", in reference to Port Royal. XD  (Though retrospectively, new episode may have been referring to the 100 Acre Wood.) Was also wrong about Number 3 being Axel, but more on that in a moment. So, next location: Beast's Castle! Beast and Belle are dressed for the "Tale As Old As Time" scene, and everyone is buzzed and we're curious, but when they're about to start dancing, who should reappear but... Zarudin!

Yes, that's right, the XIII from the first episode of Beast's Castle, who turns out to be Number 3. For some reason it said he was 3 on the Beast's Castle journal character page, but didn't say 3 was Zarudin on the overall character map. This is odd. Also, it means that Axel is not on the character map. Huh. This kind of explains why Roxas isn't numbered, though; clearly they get replaced as soon as they leave for whatever reason. Who knows how that works, really. And knowing Square, Roxas started his 'life' in Twilight Town a year ago, when Sora entered the Castle of Oblivion.

...Hm. Got a little sidetracked, there. So Zarudin interrupts and tells Beast he'll steal the thing most precious to him. We are all of course "omfg, protect Belle!" which we manage.

Sora: Thank god, we saved the thing Beast treasures most.
Beast: ! *runs off*
All: ? *chase after*
Beast: RAH MY ROSE.
Belle: ... There are lots of roses around the castle...
Beast: *SNARL* BEGONE.
Belle: Eep! *runs off*
Sora: :O wtf is up with you, yo?
Assorted talking furniture: The only way to break his curse if he learns to love and be loved.
Sora: Yeah. you TOLD us already.
A.T.F.: ... It has to be before last petal falls from that rose. It's his last hope. Uh, and ours.
Sora: ... Well fuck. Gotta get that rose! Beast, you're coming.
Beast: *is emo*
Sora: Don't let the thread of your last hope be snapped! Think of life pre-Belle! We can get that rose back!
Beast: ... I don't like being made to do what those people want. >O *is Jack Sparrow?*
We: *chase Zarudin to the front room*
Sora: What are you trying to achieve?!
Zarudin: Kingdom Hearts! It will be ours and we will have a complete/perfect existence!
Us: Um... clarify?
Zarudin: You wish. *vamooses*
We: *chase Zarudin outta the castle*
Belle: *is on the balcony, finds the rose there, calls out*
Zarudin: *nicks off with Belle AND rose*
Us: FUCK.
Zarudin: Bwahahahah! This luggage is a little heavy, so I'll drop one. Which do you choose, Beast? Rose or Belle?
Beast: ... *torn*
Belle: *worried*
Beast: ... Belle!
Belle: *has guts!* *elbows Zarudin and gives him the slip, making off with the rose back into the castle*
We: *pound on Zarudin*
I: *get fed up with turning into a heartless every time I use drive in this battle*
Zarudin: *goes poof! in a way that suggests he is definitely an ex-being*
This: *does not bode well for Demix*
That: *saddens me*

Belle asks Beast if he still wants her to leave, and says it's good that the rose is safe. He is very awkward and shy. "I'm... glad that you got the rose back. I'm... even more glad that you're safe." and she's mildly bemused, thinking that he's just showing his gratitude before he throws her out. I feel very sorry for Beast, because he has Sora-tachi and Cogsworth-tachi as an audience shouting out supportive comments that are not quite as bad as "go get 'em, tiger!" but really may as well be. if it were me I'd just get even more embarrassed. XD but Beast tells her no, he wants her to stay with him in the castle forever, and they clasp each other's hands. Then we FINALLY get the dancing scene, though they're outside and not in their ballroom clothes now. Aaaaaaaw. <3 And that is the end of Beast's Castle. Beast stays himself so we can keep him on our team, but the journal says that it seems the spell will soon be broken.

Note to self: rewatch the movie.

A fool for love!

So, now Beast's Castle is completely cleared, Olympus reappears on the map. When we show up there, it seems that Hercules is still depressed and lacking power because of it. Hades shows up for his favourite pastime, ie mocking Hercules. Aww, he went to all the trouble of unsealing the Underworld Coliseum and Hercules is not even participating? He decides to hold a new cup, the Titan Cup, with all the most powerful people. Hercules and Sora-tachi enter together, Hades commenting that Meg and Hercules will never see each other again.

We fight the first round. At the end, Hades is miserable that he's just getting in our way and he's not helping at all. We then go look at the match board, and it seems Auron has entered too. Sora's excited that maybe we'll get to fight him, but then Auron walks past us and doesn't respond at all when Sora calls out. 

Sora is confused and hurt, but there's no time to dwell on it, because we have to fight the second round. Hercules is still not himself, and is still being all emo. After that round, Sora-tachi wander off to see where Auron went and oversee him talking to Hades. Hades is saying something about how Auron's sins are unforgiveable, but how he'll overlook them if Auron kills Hercules and the kid, ie Sora. Auron balks at the idea of killing a child-- didn't he just have to kill Hercules?-- but isn't actually showing any recognition of Sora. Hades holds up his hand and a little voodoo doll of Auron appears. He reminds Auron again that it's the only way his unforgiveable sins will be pardoned, and squeezes the doll.

We go running back and tell Hercules what we saw. He says he's heard of that kind of thing, and that Hades is using the doll to control Auron. We find out that the doll is Auron's heart, and to return Auron to himself we need to get it back. The next round is us vs Auron; Hercules asks Hades to fight Auron one on one, and Hades agrees on condition that Sora-tachi fight the victor. This is so we're free to go find the little voodoo doll, which we then do. We come back just as Auron is about to kill Hercules and toss the doll at him. It explodes in the air in a shower of sparkles and he comes back to himself, joining us once more. Hades not impressed by his plans being ruined again. He reminds Hercules about what he said about him and Meg never seeing each other again, and then poof!, Meg is tied up hovering over this vortex whirlpool thing. Once you go down there, he says, you're gone for good. He clicks and Meg drops. Hercules screams her name and jumps after her. We're left to fight Hades, but we're not landing any hits. Hercules jumps back up with Meg in his arms, saying to beat the god of the underworld on his own turf we need the power of a true hero, and begins to glow golden. Hades is like "WHAT HOW" and Hercules says that when Meg was in danger it gave him the strength to be a hero again. From a zero to a hero! We beat Hades, and he's all "it's not over yet!" but then he falls back into his own vortex. Sora asks Hercules how he could jump down there if he didn't know he still had it in him, and a bit embarrassed, Hercules says "Love can make you do some really stupid things." We make a sly comment about how well they're getting along (they're standing really close) and they jump apart blushing. AAAAAAAAW. <3

Back above, Phil proclaims Hercules a true hero and says he doesn't need training anymore, though Hercules says it's good to keep fit etc just in case. We demand to know what about us, and Phil hems and haws and we are all >O! and he says hey, it's not up to ME-- but eventually he admits okay, you guys are real heroes now, not just junior heroes, and Donald and Sora chase him around trying to get him to say it again. Then Hercules points to the sky-- obviously the gods of Olympus approve, because the stars have rearranged themselves into the forms of Sora-tachi. Awesome!

Then I go through the Titan Cup again to clear it as a minigame, and when I look at the perfect clear requirements, you have to score 5000. My top score: about 500. It's even more crazy than scoring 1000 in Phil's training!

Olympus, land of IMPOSSIBLE SIDEQUESTS.

Ooh, sneaky.

Back to Halloween Town! We get a cutscene of Dr Finklestein being very cranky, because his large mechanical doll (by large I mean think Frankenstein, though it's not actually human shaped) doesn't seem to work. He's wondering about what could have gone wrong with his creation. Obviously the three little terrors picked up inferior ingredients, because there could never be a mistake with his calculations. They were perfect!

While he is puzzling over this there's a noise from behind him and he demands to know who's there. He turns around, freaks out, and that's all the player sees before he blacks out, and it's back to us again.

We turn up in the woods, where Jack is still dressed in his santa outfit and is picking up presents from the ground. We're like, "uh, JACK..." and he says don't worry, he's only wearing it because it's a present from Sally. He then explains that the presents have been dropped here somehow and he's taking them back to Santa.

So, off we head to Christmas Town, where we give Santa the presents we found but he doesn't seem too happy. Turns out they were stolen, and this isn't all of them. Jack insists that he didn't steal them, and he vows to catch the thief! Right, Sora? Of course then there's noises from the workshop again, and when we run in there the trio are going through toys going "BORING!" "Don't like it!" "Next!" We of course jump to conclusions and get into a fight with them where you have to run them out of health and catch them in boxes, but if you don't box one soon enough after their health runs out they revive. After that they're very sulky, and it turns out they were just looking for ingredients for the professor's creation, but nothing here is scary enough and it's boring, che'! They didn't steal any of these stupid presents!

They run off, and we're left wondering who the real thief is. Santa asks if those children were the culprits, but no, we don't know who the thief is yet. We're still going to find out, Jack assures him.

Back to Halloween Town-- the mayor is once more screaming about how he's the mayor, help, he can't do this by himself. There are Heartless in the square, and they've got the stolen presents. :O! It was the Heartless! So we fight them to get the presents back, and afterwards, Jack picks up a crumpled box (coincidentally stepping on the doll that had been inside it) and asks who could do such a thing to a present. Sora's expression is priceless, but he obviously doesn't have the heart to correct Jack.

At this point the Professor runs out screeching that there's an emergency, his creation has been stolen! He doesn't know by whom, they knocked him out and he only just regained consciousness. We suggest maybe it was stolen by the same thief that stole the presents-- the Heartless. Professor says no, no, no, it wasn't those boring things, the feeling was completely different.

Well, now we're back to square one, because it seems we were wrong about the Heartless being the present thieves.

Jack has a brilliant idea-- well, he thinks it's brilliant, the rest of us aren't so sure-- that we should use presents as bait to lure the thief, since it seems to like them so much. We go back to Santa, and he really doesn't like the idea of using presents for such nefarious purposes, but he concludes that in this case it really can't be helped. He tells us the toy-making machine is on the second floor of the workshop, and to make sure to put our hearts into the presents.

We then play a present boxing minigame. Once that's cleared, Santa tells us he has just the place, and unlocks the large gate in Christmas town that leads to an open clearing with a Christmas tree in it. In the middle of all the presents is one large box, which is where we're hiding. And, might I add, not very well, because we keep arguing-- Donald repeatedly complains about people's legs getting in the way, and we're generally not very stealthy about the whole thing. Anyway, it works-- we hear something approach, and when we jump out...

It's the Professor's creation!

After we destroy it, Santa comes and asks if we've caught the thief, and we answer the affirmative and explain what happened. He's like "Hm, a moving doll..." and seems intrigued by this. Jack, very excited, starts to ask Santa again if he can deliver the presents this mphm mm mmph! (Sora clapped his hand over Jack's mouth mid-sentence.) Well, Santa is in a magnanimous mood, and says to Jack he can have a little taste of what it's like to be Santa, and lets Jack go for a spin in the sleigh.

When we go back to Halloween Town, we talk to the Professor. He's very excited about the fact that it moved, a moving doll, but we're curious about why it wanted presents. The professor tells us that unlike Sally, the doll was created without a heart. Presents are something that you put your heart into, so by gathering them together, it was trying to get a heart. Sora murmurs to himself about something without a heart wanting one. I take a moment to marvel at Square's sneaky use of parallels to illustrate a point about the Heartless and the Nobodies and presumably the XIII.

Anyway, it starts to snow, and we're all like "oh, wow!" Sally says it must be a present. Jack is really confused-- where's the ribbons? the wrapping paper? the box? Sora says that it's not the box that's important, it's what's inside it.

Sally corrects him-- no, it's not that either. What's important is that it came from the heart; that the person giving it thought about what the recipient wanted, and gave it to show they care. Jack contemplates this, and says thank you, deciding that this knowledge of what a present really is is a present itself. He then asks Sally what she really wants. She tells him that all she wants is to be by his side always, and he says that what she asks is very easy to give. He sweeps her off her feet, picking her up in that really romantic way so she's cradled in his arms, and then we get a scene of them waltzing in the snow.

Sora-tachi watch, Sora thinking about the kind of present he'd like to give Kairi, and Donald and Goofy suggest that she's like Sally and would appreciate the same kind of gift. Sora imagines he and Kairi in Jack and Sally's place. I am mildly grumpy about this before I remember there's a least a fifty/fifty split of worlds where he thinks about Kairi and worlds where he thinks about Riku. KHII really is into those threesomes.

The plot thickens! ... Actually, this is just a really short bit about changes to the map and we don't find out anything. We do however get more confused.

When Halloween Town is completely cleared, the Prideland reappears. At the same time, this sort of hazy castle up the top of the map becomes clear. There's a castle both on and beneath the surface of the glassy dark waters of the map floor, reversed like a reflection in a pool. Is it the Realm of Darkness? Is it Kingdom Hearts? Or is the dark reflection the former and the light castle the latter? Whichever way, it's also done something to Twilight Town, which is clearly our cue to go back there. There's now a gummi gate in the way, impeding our progress.

Instead of going on with what will obviously be thickly plotty, I tried to beat Ursula again now my drive gauge had levelled up (I got Brave form to level 5, which is the highest level it reaches, though Wisdom, Master and Summon were all still hovering around 2) but alas, no dice, still not good enough. Though I think it did seem to do more damage. Cunning, Square, very cunning. Now we HAVE to level up our drives and summons. Curse you, Square! *shakes fist*

Oh well, since The Prideland was available once more, I went to clear that next instead.

And that's MISTER Pig to you!

First thing you see when you enter the Pridelands is a cutscene of the bit where Mufasa dies.

YEAH, THANKS. They just had to start with that bit, didn't they? The Lion King was one of my favourite movies as a child, and that bit always made me cry. ;_; Anyway, Simba is screaming out to his father, and then suddenly we cut to adult Simba, who wakes up from the nightmare screaming likewise, miraculously managing not to wake up Pumba and Timon. Cut back to us; we land ourselves in the Elephant graveyard in our animal forms-- Sora as a cute brown lion cub, Donald as some kind of bird, and Goofy as a tortoise, which made me laugh long and hard at his expense. Sora trips over his own feet, not used to having four of them, but we don't have too long to get used to our new forms before the hyenas come to torment us. Nala jumps in to save us, and the hyenas get called off by Scar from the distance (we don't actually see him on screen at this point). Nala explains about how the Pridelands are all messed up because of Scar, how he lets the hyenas run free, how they need a new king. She asks if Sora would defeat Scar and be the new king. Sora is obviously enamoured at the idea of being a king (though Donald is dubious, and I'm totally with him) and although he has a moment's pause over the idea of going against a king-- it doesn't feel right-- he agrees.

We run through the Savannah to get to Pride Rock, Nala warning us to be careful and try to avoid Scar. She takes us to Rafiki, who is like, no, he can't be king. All the female lions deflate and Nala apologises. Sora is disappointed. Scar happens along at this point, with Pete, who-- especially given that he's a cat-- really does make the stupidest lion ever. Nala pins Scar when he's about to attack us, and we all run off together through the Savannah. Sora asks Nala if there are any other candidates to be King; Nala says there was one, the son of the last king, but he's been missing presumed dead since Mufasa's death. She wonders to herself where Simba is, and Sora-tachi are like "!" We tell her that Simba isn't dead-- he fought alongside us during our journey a year ago, but we don't know where he is now.

Cut back to Simba, Timon and Pumba. Simba is being emo, and Timon and Pumba are trying to cheer him up, reminding him of their motto-- Hakkunah Matata! only the way they said it I couldn't even RECOGNISE it for a moment. Haha, maaan. The stresses were all wrong. Anyway, Simba isn't in the mood to be cheered up, and goes over to that cliff ledge to flop down on his stomach, sending pollen and such swirling through the air. Cut to Rafiki, who catches them and does his thing with the wooden bowl, going "!" when he sees the result and adding a mane onto his little cave painting of Simba.

Back to us-- we go to Gnu Valley, the place where Mufasa was killed. There's a big jump we have to make, and Nala has to teach Simba how to get over the gorge because he says he can't jump that. She mutters to herself "if you can't do this you definitely can't be king" but when Sora asks her if she said something she says no, nothing. Rafiki catches up to us and says something vaguely enigmatic, which leads Nala to conclude that omg, Simba must be in this direction!

We run onward, and reach the jungle. The oasis with the cliff is just past that, and we run into Simba there, who growls and is about to attack when we're like, whoa, dude, don't you remember us? It's Sora! He squints at us and for a moment it flicks to our normal selves. Apparently he caught some kind of resemblance between animal!Sora-tachi and normal!Sora-tachi, because he's like, yay, s'up, been ages and we all happy reunion times.

Until we hear Pumba and Timon screaming from the jungle about how she's gonna EAT us and I start laughing because I know what happens next. We run back and yes, there's Nala in hunting mode and Timon and Pumba scared out of their WITS. Simba leaps at her and they fight, with Sora calling out weakly that hey, Simba, that's Nala! Nala, that's Simba! but they don't seem to be paying a lot of attention. Nala pins Simba, growling, and Simba, very bewildered, is all, "... Nala?" (This lacks the context in the game, but if you've seen the movie it's cute.) Nala is confused. "Nala, it's me, Simba!" "... Simba?"

And then we get a really adorable reunion scene where they nuzzle and butt heads and stuff. We also get Timon's hilarious jawdrop expression, heh. (And on a side note: Yes. I DO know this movie far, far too well. I can say the lines at the same time as the characters for large chunks of it. *cough*)

However, there's a bit of a hitch in paradise-- we don't even get the Can You Feel The Love Tonight scene first D: -- when Nala tries to talk to Simba about coming back to the Prideland and challenging Scar and he tells her no in no uncertain terms. She says he's changed, he's not who she thought he was, and leaves. Simba goes off to angst and be emo some more (with a change from day to night) about it being his fault that Mufasa died. We get a flashback of that scene where Mufasa tells him about how all the past kings become stars when they die, and one day, when Simba is alone, Mufasa will be watching over him. Simba wonders if Mufasa is one of the stars, and then we get Mufasa appearing in the sky among the clouds to tell Simba that who he is now is not who he truly is. This world follows the movie quite closely.

Simba is all, but I can't go back!

Mufasa: Remember who you are. *disappears*
Simba: You saw that?
We: *are totally hanging around impinging on his privacy, as we are wont to do-- think Beast's Castle* :D

Simba decides it's back to the Prideland, so off we go. He's appalled by the complete devastation, and Timon is all, you're fighting for THIS?

Simba: *woobie face* Yeah. It's my homeland.

We go off to Pride Rock, where Scar catches sight of Simba and Simba growls. Scar is like, what are you doing here? and Simba says that this is no longer Scar's kingdom. Nala says that Simba is their only king, and Simba tells Scar to secede or fight.

This bit kind of lacks the emotional power of the movie, but is still pretty cool.

Scar is all let's not fight about this

... In my notes I mention that I was getting freaked out by the possum outside the window making horrible noises at this point. I'm sure you care.

Ahem, anyway, Sora says we'll handle the hyenas, you chase Scar. Timon and Pumba rush the hyenas and then run away into the cave. I am reminded that again the wacky crossdressing hijinks are skipped, but it's clearly not because Square disapproves of crossdressing because Cloud got to crossdress in FF7. *g* Um, yes, the point. We go and save Timon and Pumba-- you just have to beat Banzai, Shetzi (?) and Ed without Pumba and Timon taking too much damage. The hyenas scoot, and we go up to the top of the rock where Scar and Simba are fighting.

Donald wants to help, but Sora in a rare moment of intelligence says that no, this is something only Simba can do. Scar leaps at Simba, and Simba kicks him off the cliff. We're all, yay! but then Pete shows up and tells us, very smugly, that it's not over yet. Scar claws his way back up over the ledge, and Pete says that he's become a Heartless. Now it IS time for us to step in, and we join Simba for a boss fight against Heartless!Scar, whose continul use of lightning is very irritating.

Scar finally dies, and we get the scene where Simba become king, with all the lions roaring. Mufasa-inna-sky turns out to be the keyhole, which amuses me for some reason. Sora swings the keyblade around with his tail in a very nifty fashion to seal it. I still find it both bizarre and hilarious that Sora runs around with the keyblade in his mouth when he's a freaking LION and has claws and teeth and such, but hey.

Afterwards, Timon is bitching about the possibility of Simba forgetting them and eating Pumba like a pig. Donald is like, Pumba IS a pig (which he said earlier on, too), and Pumba is all "I AM NOT A PIG! ... but I don't want to be eaten aiyeeeee!" and runs away. Sora says that Simba won't forget his friends, and that's the end of the Prideland.

The Worlds Map changes again, and I am vaguely miffed.

Right, so, I leave the Prideland and it turns out there IS a second episode. I thought there wasn't because before I beat the first episode there was only one episode slot, but a second one appeared after I cleared it, which makes me suspect that there could be a second episode at Atlantica too, if I ever build my drive gauge up enough to beat Ursula (SIGH). So I was a little miffed about that, but in the good way. Other changes-- there's a new episode at Hollow Bastion (I think for memory I'd picked up the last torn page) and at Olympus. So of course I go to Olympus first, it being less plotty-- there's a new tournament, the Cerberus Cup (wow, THAT sounds familiar). Everything seems to be ten rounds in this Underworld Coliseum, which I approve of, because I still shudder remembering the Hades Cup. The catch with Cerberus Cup is that you have a time limit for every battle, which is between 2-3 minutes. This is fine until you get up to the last round, which is (obviously) versus Cerberus. The last 3 rounds are all in darkness except for a small circle of light that follows you around, and you fight with only Sora. Despite this, you can use all your Drives, and your drive gauge fills up super fast.

I was like, whoa wow! A great way to level up my forms! Until I read the fine print. Which said no experience. AGH. After that I said "screw Wisdom form for a lark!" because it takes me longer to kill stuff than in my normal form, christ, and just used Brave form. Which got me over 1000 points, the requirement for a perfect clear. Hoorah!

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Next time: AFDJKSLDFJKLSD EXPECT NO COHERENCY OMFG IT'S CANOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON. (no, I'm not explaining that until I get up to it chronologically, you can just wait. >D)