Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory Is A Good Reintroduction For Lapsed Fans

Kingdom Hearts is a series with three main games and a slew of offshoots that are hard to follow, so no one was surprised when the trailer for Melody of Memory dropped and it was revealed to be a rhythm game featuring the biggest characters from the IP running along themed music sheets. It’s quite on-brand for the series, if we’re being honest.

As someone who hasn’t played a KH game since the second one, I was interested in this new installment that retells the story of what has happened so far, hopefully helping me understand an extremely convoluted lore, but with music to distract me.

The demo starts with a tutorial that explains the basic controls, using the X, L1, and R1 buttons to attack, while circle is pressed to jump and fly, and triangle activates special attacks on the DualShock 4. The mechanics here sound simplistic, and they are, but juggling them at the same time can be a bit bonkers when put together on tougher songs or harder difficulties. The tutorial explains almost everything, but then it drops the player into the pool and watches them sink.

There are three styles that can be selected. One allows the player to put all of the actions on a single button, making it easier to focus and being more enjoyable for those with cognitive or physical disabilities. I thought it might help me, since I possess negative rhythm, but I actually had to take a couple of songs to relearn how to play with this remapped scheme. There is also a Performer style that adds extra buttons. These new targets do not penalize the player for missing them but rewards better performance with the extra obstacles in the form of chain combos. There are multiple difficulties, and anyone who plays on Proud mode with the Performer style selected is either just that damn good, or a masochist.

I’m uncertain if the added difficulty and complexity on tougher songs are going to translate to fun and engagement for everyone, but this does seem to be just a small taste of a meatier game, so I could be wrong when all of the elements are in play. There is a leveling system and character stats, as well as some items that aren’t available in the demo version, and I am curious to see these boss battles in action.

Diehard fans will also be getting a bit of new plot that goes past the events of the last main entry, but don’t expect too much. There isn’t even a secret movie. These elements make it seem the developers did want to put a bit more into the game that could keep the monotony at bay. With that said, my wife had trouble putting it down initially, whereas I realized my ranks were simply not going to go up without a lot more practice.

I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that Melody of Memory was in fact a mini-game meant for Kingdom Hearts III, since the two were developed alongside each other, but then someone realized they could make more money off of it separately. This could easily be retooled to work on mobile devices, but that might take away some of the work the team put into making the combat feel more like Kingdom Hearts, rather than a throwaway app.

The developers also wanted to make sure they didn’t leave much out when it comes to the music itself. The full version will supposedly have 140+ songs — some being popular Disney hits — but the demo contains just six tracks. The main four are: Welcome to Wonderland, Hand in Hand, The Rustling Forest, and Wave of Darkness 1. Two additional songs can be performed during co-operative play: Sinister Shadows and All for One. They were smart not to include Simple and Clean or Let it Go on the demo, because then no one would buy the main game (or is that just me?).

There are currently no plans to release DLC for the game. However, that must seem like a goldmine if the rights to other Disney songs could be acquired. Thankfully, Melody of Memory doesn’t come off quite like a cheap cash-in. There seems to be a little bit of heart there for those who crave yet another off-shoot in their favorite series or just a new rhythm game.

It’s a strong formula, 20+ favorite characters (like Beast, Aladdin, and Simba, along with the Keyblade wielders) running around together in familiar zones. The main three are also animated as small chibi versions on the loading screens, which some will find cute, and songs from across the whole franchise are going to be playable to satisfy everyone. These ballads are also guaranteed to inspire a lot of players to go back and run through the series again when this is done. For a large portion of the audience, this game will have built-in replay value, but for someone like myself, I’m not certain I could pay full price for it without being more committed to the franchise. The thing that is selling me the most right now is the couch co-op play and the prospect of potentially making sense of the story finally.

The demo itself has been enjoyable either way. The art of the demo seems lost these days, but the time I put into it did what great demos do: gave me a taste of the gameplay without offering too much and had me firing back up multiple times to experience it again. It won’t be hard to imagine that the Melody of Memory demo will work its magic on a few people who play it and help sell some copies when the full game releases on November 13th.

An early demo code was provided for PR for the purposes of this preview. The demo itself will be available publicly tomorrow, October 15th. 

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