Part 2: Episode 2: Tutorials Abound.

Nice key . And yes I'll be doing the extended game, which was actually more plot relevant than the base game if I recall rightly.

And now for...

Episode 2: Tutorials Abound.

As you can tell by the title this isn't going to be the most action-packed of updates, so I will be doing episode 3 later tonight as well, wherein plot begins to happen. On with the mechanics lesson! This is the last giant update I promise.


Remember how I said he was gone for a while? I lied.


Sora is now in the Matrix.




Donald and Goofy are no where to be found.



Sora feels insecure without his friends.



Aha! We've been plot device'd again.


Oh. Ok.


Here we have our battle screen. Donald and Goofy aren't going to be following us around this game except for cutscenes. Instead little Donald and Goofy cards will occasionally fall from the sky during battle, where you can pick them up for that battle only and use them as a summon card.




Like so. The Donald and Goofy cards are a bit special in that they are one-use only for that battle.


All right here's the rundown. When you hit the attack button in this game it uses the card at the top of your deck. You can pretty much spam without penalty at this point although doing so will cost you later. The opponent also has a deck (normally, the tutorial man doesn't,) and will be playing his cards. If your card is higher than his, say you play an 8 and he plays a 5, then you win the bout, his card is 'broken' and he gets knocked down. You can cycle through your cards as well with the left and right triggers and can play any card in your deck you want. You can set up your deck in the main menu to go in the order you want, although that is mostly useful for special abilities (sleights,) we don't have yet.

Just to clarify though once you play a card it sits in the center of the screen for several seconds, so there is plenty of time to find a better card than your enemy's and break it or vice versa. You can generally play 3-4 cards in the time it takes your enemy to play one at this point and the enemies all have terrible cards (1's and 2's) which are easily broken. This will change as we go. Last note is the 0 card, which can break any card but can also be broken by any card. You play this one second when your opponent throws a 9 or higher, and it will shut down his combo. I usually put these at the very bottom of my deck for easy reach when I need to break enemy sleights. (Sleights explained in detail shortly.)




When you use your attack cards they are discarded.


Curse you, Tutorial man and your infinite hp!




Oh... So if I...


Stand still and hold the A button, I'll recharge my deck. Note that the enemy can still attack you while charging, so it's best to run a bit, charge some, run a bit more, etc.




You can charge your deck whenever you want to get your spent cards back (this is useful for grabbing your heal card, or some 0's if you run out and need them.) However the charge time extends every time you recharge up to needing 3 full boxes of charge. Not really a problem except in long boss fights.



In this game, the best defense is a good offense. I'm not even kidding.



Donald and Goofy poof into existence via cutscene magic. To be fair, the guy in black kinda said where they were. In little cards that occasionally rain down from heaven.



Apparently the boys aren't conscious when they're in card form.


Jiminy is apparently immune to the "Your friends must be turned into cards!" law. His latest entry in LiveJournal is about how that must mean he isn't Sora's friend.



Zippers are all the rage now Donald.



"A wizard did it."




Get in your cards bitches. I'm running this show.





At no point does Sora disagree with his friends being cardified or having to go it alone. I thought you cared Sora.



Man in Black vanishes with that last little bit of advice. I've got a ba-


e:fb again.




Cards don't scare Sora one bit. He was a Magic:The Gathering master back on Destiny Isles.


Here's how doors work. When you defeat an enemy, you get a random door card. The cards act as keys to the doors and also affect what's in the rooms beyond them, adding a random factor to the level design. The door will require a certain type of card as it's key (this one wants a card higher than 1.) The only card I have at the moment is a save room card. There are lots of different door keys and I'll explain what they do when I use them.


In we go! The door ate my card.


Ahah! Now we've gotten past the tutorial and have reached Traverse Town proper. Its still not the real Traverse Town though.


This is my friend the save cube. It's here because I used a save card at the door! There aren't monsters in a save room normally but there was one tutorial monster here to give me a card to proceed. It died in 2 hits and I didn't bother screenshotting it.


Nameless tutorial monster did give me a present though, a lvl 2 Tranquil darkness. This door key gives me a room with few enemies that move pretty slow. A nice starter room.


In we go again! Sora actually walks while the room loads instead of it saying "LOADING" in the bottom.


Ah little Heartless come to me, feel the wrath of my cards! When you enter a room the heartless will be walking around. If you run into one you get into a fight. If you smack it on the head with your keyblade on the outside map, the heartless will be stunned at the beginning of the fight for maximum stabby goodness. When killed the enemies will explode into little blue/red crystals. Those are your exp and you have to chase it down or you don't get it.


There's also crates to smash and lightposts to whack which can drop green balls (HP), red balls (Money) and the occasional free card.




Level 2! Let's grab Sliding Dash to get it out of the way. Sleights are combos in this game, if you hit both trigger buttons you can stack 3 cards into a little play and throw it for a combo. If the cards you stack meet certain requirements, (Sliding Dash wants 3 attack cards that add up to 10-15) then you'll do a special ability. You cannot spam these however because when you use a sleight the 1st card in the sleight is removed from the deck for the duration of the battle. It no longer comes back when you recharge. Sleights are strong but use sparingly or you'll run yourself out of cards and have to recharge your last couple every 10 seconds.




More fighting! Levels 3-6 I'm pumping into HP. CP is your Card Power, it affects how many cards and how good of cards you can put in your deck. But the deck they start us with is plenty strong for a long time and Sora's HP is terrible so let's work on that first.


The tutorial man's last gift to me was a Gold Key of Beginnings card. This opens the 1st plot door of the level. There are 3 plot doors in each level, and you get the keys for them in the previous plot door. Its pretty nice.



Sora is being silly. The monsters were easy. Donald and Goofy cards float down from heaven to cutscene it up.




I thought you were unconscious while in card form. And besides that I've been using you when you happen to show up so you're still helping... Sigh.



A new challenger approaches!

Who could this phantom figure be? Was that the end of the tutorials? Will we fight our first boss?

Find out next time in:
Episode 3: Wherein Plot Begins to Happen.