#especially on KH and SPECIFICALLY Soriku/Riku....

[dotted-clouds]

silly guys who live in my brain

#my art #kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts 2 #Sora #Riku #Soriku #sora x riku #i'm hyperfixating again #especially on KH and SPECIFICALLY Soriku/Riku....

[smartzelda]

Okay for the Character ask:

Riku KingdomHearts

Ooooooh my boy

Okay okay so

First impression: So DDD was my first kh game, okay. I had seen kh crossover fanart with mha and stuff before. So when I witnessed him the first time in this game I thought Riku was cool and very pretty. Instant fav.

Impression now: Still very cool. Still fav. Now he's just much more of a dork. Pretty gay dork who seems cool on the surface but cares about his best friend. Dude has been through a lot and I love him and he's just really growing up but also finally getting the chance to just *be* instead of being forced to grow up too fast. I want great things for him and would write essays for him

Favorite Moment: Hmmmm that's a really hard one (There are just soooo many good ones). So off the top of my head I'll say...the scene in the RoD in kh3 with Mickey. I'm trying not to make everything with him about Sora, but it's just one of those scenes that both proves to us the nature of his feelings for Sora AND shows how far he's come. Sure he's still got his regrets and demons, but for a boy with so much trauma and mistakes, it's...monumental almost that the realm of darkness doesn't suffocate him. He's *healing*. He's reaching the metaphorical dawn. He's finally achieved the balance of light and dark, his past is no longer an anchot dragging him down and constantly haunting him. He's accepted who he used to be, what he did, and who he is, and in a combination of his growth and his love for Sora, it's as if no other feelings matter. He can’t be afraid, because all he can feel is love. He can’t be afraid, because this place doesn't hurt like it used to. My boy is growing and accepting things about himself, and although his arc is nowhere near over, it's a moment that helps solidify how far he's come over the series.

Idea for a story: Like, story about him? Like a fanfic? Or where I would like to see him go? Au wise I've got plenty, one of my favs in the drafts being the Barbie and the Nutcracker inspired Soriku au where Riku is the once prince turned nutcracker. Canon wise, I'd love to do some explanation on how the year where Sora was missing has affected him or even focusing on him during the year Sora was asleep. Idk. At the moment though I've been working on post canon type stuff where dude is just domestic with his husband and mostly free from the responsibilities of being a keyblade master. Idk.

Unpopular opinion: Can't say I'm too good at these because it's hard to determine if my opinions are *actually* unpopular sometimes. I guess mine is that I actually loved his Semi long look, especially at the beginning of kh3 when he was wearing his new clothes. Like obviously I'm more of a long haired Riku lover, so kh2 riku hair is more my style (although I would love him to have that kind of long hair but out of his face so it looks like he's properly caring for it), but shots of kh3 Riku semi long hair version in the realm of darkness are some of my favorites and I reject the horseshoe crab hair slander

Favorite relationship: Okay yeah this is no secret. Soriku. And in any flavor. Romantic? Check. Queerplatonic? Check. Best friends? Check. Ex best friends current angsty enemies? Check. They are versatile to so many good flavors and all I care about is that they get to be together forever, no matter the nature of their relationship. While I am a huge fan of Soriku becoming canon as long as they both get to be alive and happy with each other I could not care the nature of their relationship in canon specifically. I just want Riku to be happy.

Favorite headcanon: This is probably a dumb one, but my fav is that Riku just like could barely handle sweets until he became Sora’s dreameater. Like Terra, he's not much for sweets, but then he becomes a dreameater and has more of a sweet tooth than Sora. Riku is definitely not the only fictional character I've inflicted this headcanon on😂

#riku kingdom hearts #riku kh #Riku #kingdom hearts #soriku #tagging it since I talk about it #asks #as a treat I'll add in another headcanon I love #Since becoming Sora's dreameater Riku can’t remember his own dreams. he can’t tell if he doesn't dream or if he just can't remember. he can #only really remember dreams when he’s sharing Sora's #also thanks for the ask happybunnykat I rarely get them so this really made my day😊

[sanitizarium]

since u said it was alright to talk to u abt KH -

how’d u get into it? what made you stick around? what’s ur favorite/least favorite game (and how many have you played/watched)? Favorite characters narrative-wise and design-wise? do you like the gameplay or the story more? have u read the manga, and if you have did you like it? is there anything you wish there was more of in the series? anything you feel like is under-appreciated about it? 

sorry if that’s a weird amount of questions lol ive just been into this series since i was in middle school and my brain is [static] [explosions] about it by this point

Also i LOVE your art style and especially the way you draw KH characters!!! I am taking notes!!

OGHHH OKAY OKAY HOLD.ON THANK YOU SO MUCH [EXPLOSION SFX]

i got into kh initially through the mangas around 2012 (my library had the chain of memories manga :] and the kh1 ones) and through seeing dream drop distance on the 3ds eshop but i only got rlly into it after the sora smash reveal!! i stuck around afterwards cuz something about it itches my brain really good......the characters and their interactions make me EXPLODE theyre so good

ive played all the games minus dark road and part of union x (ive played x and unchained x though!!) my favourites are dream drop distance and kh2 :D im also very partial to com on gba... my least favourite is probably kh1? i have nothing against it it just does nothing for me.....

my fav characters design-wise are terra, xigbar, ira, gula, vanitas and roxas!!! and my favourite characters narrative-wise are sora, riku, lea, isa and roxas :] bonus shoutout to xion and namine also for both

i like the gameplay a LOT but for the most part i like the story over the gameplay!! HOWEVER kh2 ddd and kh3 have really good gameplay i love playing those three specifically a lot......

I HAVE READ THE MANGA AND I LOVE IT A LOT it is my favourite way to go through kh its So good... added bonus is the fact that the kh2 manga scans i have are partially very badly translated and its really good

ignoring the obvious stuff id like more of (SORIKU), id really like some more focus on the ff characters and interactions between some characters!! i Need ventus and roxas to talk that glance in kh3 wasnt enough... also i wanna see more namine :( i miss her can we get more namine as a treat

i think on a surface level glance most people just look at kh and go "hehe that one has funny lines" but it isnt enough to see the Absolute Fuckign Sincerity that kh has.... like yes its silly but its sincere!!!! it is genuine and always takes itself super seriously and that has so much charm to it which i dont think most people see :( which is why i think kh is like. a must play series because you genuinely cannot grasp the sincerity behind some of the funnier quotes without having knowledge that isnt surface level (every time i see ppl joke about who am i gonna have ice cream with i wilt a little HES ASKING WHO HES GONNA BE FRIENDS WITH)

#ty for the ask!!! #AUTISM BEAM [CRUSTY EXPLOSION GIF] #i have only seriously been into kh for a year and a half. it has me under a grip i cant leave and i dont want to

[whyarewecalledtheshipname]

i understand where you’re coming from with that soriku post and kairi, but it feels like you’re completely undermining kairi’s bond with the both of them. a friend or lover does not have to spend time with someone frequently to conserve a strong bond. it doesn’t mean that she loves them any less. it doesn’t mean her relationship isn’t as good as soriku’s. time does not have any bearing on someone’s relationship. not to mention there’s YEARS of off screen interaction between the three of them that we never got to see.

also it’s very common that, even in close relationships, people will feel isolated and alone when apart from their loved ones. i’ve had a best friend for over ten years and i still end up feeling like that sometimes—it’s just part of life and human nature.

i know you don’t mean your words in a negative sense, but… it really sounds like you think kairi’s feelings and relationship with them is lesser. and this is coming from someone who ships soriku but doesnt ship kairi with either boys.

(link to the post in question)

this reply is going to seem disjointed bc i replied to specific points as i went:

i’m not undermining their bond. kh is. (that’s hyperbole, for the record.) it’s a repeated and repeated theme of kh3 that bonds can weaken. sora, and the audience, are meant to understand that regarding sora, this applies to kairi.

i didn’t say people had to spend lots of time with each other to maintain a bond. but they do have to spend at least some time together, in some capacity, in a way that’s meaningful, to do so. this was also a repeated theme in kh3.

“One day isn’t enough time.”

“Oh, there’s always enough time for hearts to say what’s true.”

Sora himself is being taught this lesson. What I said was that Kairi and Sora specifically have spent virtually no time together since kh1.

Riku and Kairi have. Relatively little time, but meaningful time nonetheless. In kh2, Riku spent time protecting Kairi. After DDD, Riku brought Kairi to come train with them. In 0.2, Kairi and Riku talked about the ways Riku has changed throughout his journey.

Right after kh2, Kairi brings Sora the letter from Mickey. That letter detailed the events of Recoded, where Sora learned about the people trapped in his heart. He even has a scene specifically apologizing to Kairi for leaving to address this very issue, and that leads directly to DDD. After DDD, Kairi is sent to train with Lea under Merlin before Sora returns, and therefore she and Sora spend a majority of kh3 apart as well. This is why Sora goes to the extra length at the end to spend his last day with her, with purpose: to reform a new connection. Merlin literally says it.

I never said Kairi loves/cares about them less. That logically wouldn’t make sense for one of the first sentences of the original post. Why would Kairi miss people she didn’t care for/love?

I never said her relationship with sora and riku has less value than sora and riku’s own. It is literally just /weakening/. It is not /inherently weak/, or gone, or nonexistent. There had to be a pre-existing connection there in the first place for it to weaken. That’s logic.

I /did/ say that kairi and riku have spent time together throughout the series. The series being what we /do/ see on screen, starting at kh1. I /did/ say in the very same sentence, that sora and kairi haven’t spent much time together at all, especially compared to kairi and riku. I didn’t specify that the time frame was the timespan within the games, but I assumed it was understood given the context of the words /right before it/.

I never said Kairi was somehow wrong for missing Sora and Riku. I never said her relationship with them was an outlier in regards to its strength or lack of it. I even went as far as to suggest the reason Sora and Riku feel their togetherness at heart so prominently is because their bond is /especially/ strong, making other bonds between other people look less strong by comparison. Not to mention Sora and Riku actively miss each other when they’re apart, too. But it has been stated by the developers themselves that the bond between Sora and Riku’s hearts closes the distance between them, even when they’re physically apart. And we see that in the games. My point was that Kairi’s own bond with them doesn’t quite close the distance to the same extent.

Of course, it’s completely fair for someone to feel that my post was negative. But perhaps it feels that way because when you compare the two relationships side by side, one has evidently weakened more than the other. As is showcased by the games themselves. As was directly stated and addressed in Kh3 itself.

I also failed to mention i have posted several other kairi “essays” detailing more of my feelings about kairi and her character in more depth. So this standalone post might read as negative in comparison. I also didn’t plan out this post or write every little thought i had. This wasn’t meant to be taken as a full fledged essay. I was stating the more obvious details. But again, if you felt it was negative, that’s fair. It’s hard to convey feeling when you’re making a list. Let me make one more thing clear: I don’t view her bond with them as inherently lesser. Though in regards to the story, it’s definitely less focused on. But I’ve even posted about why i think this is the case, too, already, so i’m not gonna repeat myself. I know this answer might seem cold or rude, but I don’t want people getting any funny ideas about me somehow hating Kairi, and coming at me because of it. Recently, I was posting more about Kairi than soriku, and I am not gonna start putting disclaimers in all my posts to pacify others. So i’m letting y’all know now that you can go through my kairi tag and read my feelings about her for yourselves. bc arguably, i don’t have to defend or prove anything on my own blog.

#ask #reply #this sounded angry rest assured i’m not trying to come off as aggressive lol? #kairi thoughts #kairi #if anyone doesn’t wanna see my posts in the tags the block button exists #sora #riku #my ramblings put to paper #again this sounded aggressive but my blog does have a rant warning AND im trying to out this matter to rest #*put #the main reason i’m even explaining myself to any degree is bc posts CAN be taken out of context #again i’m not tryna demonize kairi im literally just describing her role in the story at this point #<- that’s a reused tag. i’ve used that tag before. i wonder where. i wonder why. #fr everytime i post about kairi im like ‘pls don’t assume i hate kairi’ in the tags #even when it’s a whole essay about how great and valuable i think her character is #the whole point of half my kairi essays is that it is easy to dislike kairi but that i think it’s semi on purpose #and yes i read that the anon ships soriku and whatnot but that’s the thing our feelings towards characters and opinions outside a ship #doesn’t dictate my feelings about said outside characters and opinions #for the third time this sounds angry or rude but well i’m cutting straight to the point. #and yes i acknowledge that anon recognizes that i didn’t intend my post in a negative way but regardless i’m laying it out straight. #i like kairi #also i am not a fan of the trend lately on twitter and such—that any discussion about kairi immediately falls under suspicion #like bruh let us talk about kairi without stigmatizing discussion of her character. #also if someone hates whatever character—who gives a fuck? if they’re being especially toxic trash on their acc? block. #if they’re hopping onto other people’s posts and into other spheres of the fandom to be toxic and horrible? report. #let people hate characters. no ones obligated to interpret the game like you do and it goes both ways. #just don’t attack people over it when they didn’t ask #these tags aren’t AT @ the anon ok i literally specified i was talking about twitter just clarifying #basically i very much encourage discussion but i won’t discuss this more than once.

[komoryriku]

Queering KH: Part 2

How to Queer this Anime Game? By me, an American nerd lol

Pictured: Dream. Drop. Distance. Sequel. 8)))

What is Queering 

I’m so excited to talk about this okay this is literally the only fun thing I get to do as an English major anymore lmao.

“Queering a text” is the academic term for taking a given text and extracting the queer subtext of it, or applying a queer reading to it. It is taking a piece of literature, film, or art and reading into it for the gay coding. It is an especially important tool for reading old literature written during periods of extreme homosexual oppression, wherein the author would be forced to hide hints of homosexuality under layers and layers of superficial text.

Pictured: Sora and Riku battling Ursula as she means to wreck their ship, mirroring the disaster that Sora’s friends Eric and Ariel (lovers) faced at sea.

As a post-structuralist, I am also here to inform you that every text is made up of intertextual influence. This means whether the JK Rowlings of the world intended it or not, their characters may well be queer coded because of the unconscious influence of homoerotic customs in our culture that have permeated the text. It’s why people speculated that Newt Scamander was gay, because he showed little interest in Tina and preferred to focus on his beasts, which is not normative for a male protagonist in straight media. People likewise considered that Merida from Pixar’s Brave might be gay, because she had no interest in dating men and wanted to live a wild lifestyle traditionally associated with masuculinity, things that are pretty in line with lesbian coding. And let me tell you, lgbt claimed Queen Elsa IMMEDIATELY for very good reason. Pretty much everything about her journey, purposefully or not, makes for an strikingly overt gay metaphor. Let it Go is a coming out song for a woman suffocating under normativity all her life, deal with it.

Same, Elsa.

Oh whoops I accidentally pasted this picture of Riku here.

Keep Cultural Distinctions in Mind

Something else important I want to point out is that different cultures are- different lol. They are going to vary. What is queer coding here is not necessarily queer coding in Japan. A man presenting femininely in American media would certainly get him coded as gay. A bishonen in an anime though? Not so much. Men bathing together in Japan is common practice so that would mean nothing gay over there. In America however, you have things like this vine. 

In which 2 dudes are chilling as far away as possible from each other in a hot tub to prove they are not gay lol.

So when I say the male members of Organization XIII bathe together, it means literally nothing in a Japanese context.  

But let me tell you this: homosexual mlm tend to enjoy bathing with other dudes. Sexual attraction is sexual attraction no matter where you go. So how would you queer code a Japanese character as gay in a hot tub context? 

By American logic, if the straight thing to do is sit 5 feet apart in a hot tub, then the inverse, the gay thing to do, would be 2 men sitting very close together in a hot tub. So if I were to code 2 American male characters as gay in a hot tub context, that is what I would do. But if I really wanted to hammer it home, I would ALSO have them blushing so there is no straight explanation for their closeness. 

And for a Japanese character, for whom bathing with men might well mean nothing, I’d definitely have them physically blush, so that you know it does NOT just “mean nothing” to him...

Oh look at that. Amano went out of her way to draw Roxas blushing at the concept of bathing with men. So when I say “the members of Orginization XIII bathe together”, you know that means something to Roxas, cuz the coding tells us so. There are indeed certain ways you can depict a shonen being either interested in or at least affected by that idea. You just have to mind those codes telling you what the character really feels, especially when they can’t really say it.

Speaking of blushes, Amano uses them a lot. 

They’re a pretty effective tool for hiding gay coding into your characters cuz an anime character might blush for any number of reasons, from being flustered by their crush, 

to being flustered because they don’t have a crush.

If you’ve ever translated Japanese media, (I haven’t, but I have friends who do), you know that Japanese is very vague which means you need the whole context to properly understand a scene. It’s a similar situation with queer coding. Consider this scene of Roxas blushing. 

If Roxas felt positively about the insinuation that he and Xion are holding hands, how might one code this? Well, if he’s feeling really excited about it in a positive way, you might draw him smiling or expressing flattery on his blushing face. However, Roxas reacts negatively, with a frown on his blushing face. This insinuates he does not like this idea at all, especially since he also shuts it down right away in his dialogue.

But you might say “Well how do we know he isn’t just shy?” to which I say- well we can’t know. That’s the whole point of queer coding in literature. It is to say a character is queer but without actually saying it, to give plausible deniability for safety. It is to suggest a character is queer but without any confirmation. It does not mean that the character isn’t queer, however. It just means it cannot be confirmed by the text alone. However, a bold text that is very determined to have hidden queer characters without any straight explanations, will provide coding that has very little or no straight explanation. 

Back to the Roxas and Xion dialogue^. This scene alone cannot confirm or deny anything. As I explained however, the suggestion that Roxas is not straight IS there. Considering the whole context, also, this scene is another piece of “evidence” to add to the pile of suggestions that Roxas isn’t straight. This coupled with the bathing panel, and this panel of him admiring Axel, his male mentor, with deep flattery during his first day of adventuring, all exist.

Roxas does not express negative sentiments in his blushing at men, nor does he say anything dismissive to them. When he blushes at Xion’s comment, however, it is with a negative reaction. Consider also that if the author wanted Roxas to appear straight, she would present them in ways that allude to straightness and NOT in ways that allude to queerness. Roxas would not do suggestively queer things like blush in flattery at Axel calling him special and then dismiss Xion’s suggestion that they are holding hands if he were simply coded as straight. Queering a text sometimes requires a lot of critical thought like this. This is because again, these things are hidden, and sometimes hidden really well so that unsuspecting straight people will not even consider the queer suggestions. This is one of the advantages Nomura has in his favor with Kingdom Hearts: by making it so convoluted, the gay text can be forward, strong, and blatant but remain undetected by straight powers. This keeps the series safe from oppressive scrutiny. Characters like Namine and Xion can exist as literal illustrations of compulsory-heterosexuality. And people will still think Sora and Riku are straight. 

Even if I don’t know all the queer codes Japanese culture might specifically have, (and I do not, I do not live in Japan nor have any semblance of what that is like beyond what my friends who have lived there can tell me, and what I can research while sitting in my pajamas in Kentucky lol), there are certain things that are rather universal. Blushing, physical contact, lingering gazes, etc etc. Attraction is attraction and certain body language and other physical symbols will translate and will travel. So that’s the majority of what I will have to focus on. 

But I do want you to know that rainbows are still gay in Japan. 

Finally I also want to express that cultural intermingling is a thing. We do not live in bubbles, especially with the internet. Our cultures affect each other ALL the time. Although Kingdom Hearts is primarily a Japanese series, it is consciously tailored to appeal to both America and Japan. This is by design given the idea was to marry a Japanese hit like Final Fantasy with an American phenomenon like Disney’s media. This is why they take special care in minding the English translations and dubbing of the KH games (when they are able to do so, mistakes are still very often made and i hate it cuz they’re usually heterosexual-agenda-pushing “mistakes” =~=). The games are so intimately tied to both the Japanese and American cultures they are derived from which is part of why accurate translations are so important. And given what they would mean for queer audiences, what they represent for queer people makes accurate translations even MORE important. Some things get quite lost in translation, and some things are grossly added in translation. We will discuss that down the line...   

A brief aside that I implore you to ignore:

On the subject of Roxas not being straight, I have heard of one really fun queer motif in Japanese media which is ”ryoutoutsukai (両刀使い)”, “the two sword fencer”: the dual wielding bisexual. Now- I do not necessarily think this is a means of coding Roxas as bisexual, and beyond that, from what I’ve heard in my research on bisexuality in Japan, certain age groups don’t even believe in bisexuality there. However, a love of more than one gender exists no matter who is willing to acknowledge it or not, and this motif is there. And Promisekeeper and Oblivion do rather fit the bill of representing homosexuality (Oblivion/Soriku) and heteronormativity (Promisekeeper/Sora and his childhood friend Kairi). So- while i don’t think it means anything, this fun idea is there~  I will say, however, that as far as I can tell, Nomura and his staff know exactly what they’re doing with their queer coding and are well connected to it in both cultures. So I mean- if any anime team would know bisexuality exists and how to code it, I firmly believe the KH team would, so. There is some food for thought for you~

Get ready for part 3, I hope you like TWEWY~ B)

#kingdom hearts #kh #soriku #sora kh #roxas #riku kh

[snowflake-of-destruction]

This isn’t something I normally participate in, but, since I didn’t write much in June and shared hardly anything(something I plan to change in July if I can), I thought I should give some proof of (creative) life if anyone wants it.

Under the cut, a series of tiny excerpts, most more than six sentences, of different Kingdom Hearts pieces to be rescued from the limbo of “half finished chunk of something in a google doc.” Some of them belong to WIPs and some are from various other things started and then interrupted or....we’ll say set to a back burner.

All excerpts headed by a bolded header in the style of 

Title of Piece This Belongs To (Brief description of what kind of fic that is in between parenthesis)

Advantage Rule (Isalea Modern AU. First Chapter Up On AO3. More Info There.)

"You lost or are you the new caulk?" The speaker didn't fit the typical profile of a tech professional, especially one that worked behind the scenes with the coders. Mid-fifties judging by the lines on his face with thinning blond hair so light you could hardly tell where some parts had gone silver combed to stick up as a compensation for where it threatened to recede and leather skin that said he'd worked outside in some decade past, paired with a southern accent that seemed stronger than it was with the effect added by the toothpick precariously balanced in the corner of his mouth. He'd rejected business attire in favor of cargo pants and a dark blue flight jacket that looked like they'd been bought in the last century, and the look in his eye was so fierce without prompting that Axel had to wonder if he was a failsafe for the air conditioning breaking down.

"Am I the what?"

"Caulk." The toothpick switched sides of the man's mouth with a roll of his bottom lip. "Fixing the leaks? The cybersecurity specialist? Axel Lea?" His impatience mounted by the moment. Working on the fourth floor would certainly be interesting.

"Yes, sir. That would be me." Axel tried to smooth the way with deference and the easy smile that rarely steered him wrong. "Does that make you...?"

"Cid Highwind. I'll be showing you the ropes. Now that you've seen fit to grace us with your presence." Cid continued to stare him down and Axel wasn't sure if he was supposed to apologize or bare his teeth and smack his chest like a gorilla to challenge the alpha.

Without False Hope ( First Chapter Up On AO3. More Info There. Akuroku KH/FFX crossover)

Axel was waiting for them, or  it seemed that way at least and Roxas didn’t think himself vain for thinking so, when Roxas spotted the lanky redhead not jogging himself but leaning against a pole until he saw the Crusaders approaching and then falling in next to Roxas just behind Xion as she bellowed, "Young Crusaders gather 'round,"  the beginning of a call and response chant that the rest of them would answer with a promise to knock enemies back and stand their ground or an alternate about beating Sin beneath the ground if they were feeling

Axel finished the line a beat before the Crusaders would have, substituting his own words. "...Eager for Sin to put you in the ground." Roxas's heart, which had soared for a moment when Axel had come up beside him and dared to hope that Axel's first words would be a version of sorry or an invitation out somewhere without other people, took a sharp plummet to his toes then returned to his chest angry at being mocked.

Assorted grumbles and shouts showed many others felt the same way, but Xion seemed to take it in stride, sing-songing her own improvised lines that continued the cadence of the original chant without missing a beat, "Young civilian come to heckle and stare. What would you do if a fiend attacked and we weren't there?"

Axel near stumbled but recovered and let out a short bark that might have been a laugh he wasn't sure he was allowed without inviting training Crusaders to make him pay for it, afterward rumbling in an impressed tone, "You, I like,."

"You should. " Xion shot back and her casual tone alone was enough that everyone else in the formation knew Axel was an acceptable stranger even if he was rude, and that they should ignore the intrusion. "I'm not sure I like you back. Roxas has been mooning and it makes him impossible."

Guardian Force (Akuroku. Axel and Roxas in the next life, living as NPCs in the world of/during the story of FFVIII. Part of my eventual plan to show Axel and Roxas living out every Final Fantasy game. Unpublished/First chapter never completed because I decided on Without False Hope/a FFX crossover instead)

"You often talk to yourself?" an insolent lazy drawl came from somewhere to Axel's left and he turned, eyes narrowing to see a boy in a rumpled Balamb cadet uniform lying across the second highest step, book in hand, vibrant blue eyes, ice eyes like he'd junctioned Shiva right to his vision, trained on him over the spine.

"To my Guardian Force," Axel explained, though that seemed worse. Over six foot of height and lean muscle and the SeeD uniform Axel wore at least enough parts of for it to be vaguely recognizable that he belonged to the elite unit, all usually worked together enough that there was usually no reason to be embarrassed by anything he let slip out.  Nobody would laugh even if Axel welcomed it.

"Thought you didn't like using Guardian Forces," the lounging student's voice was just as nonchalant as it was before, but his gaze was sharp, interested, and he spoke as if he knew Axel.

"Have we met?" Axel knocked the sole of his left boot against the side of his right as if scraping mud off the bottom. It wasn't odd for him to shift constantly even when mostly still, unless he was specifically called to stand at attention. There was an air of discomfort about the present action though, when taken with how jade eyes known for constant analysis on and off the battlefield, seemed attracted to the handrail of the steps rather than searching the face of the boy that had just spoken to him with familiarity.  Axel's normally iron stomach soured immediately at the idea they had met and he'd forgotten, to the point he couldn't even bring himself to try and jog his recollection. All he could do was force out his least favorite question next to 'when did that happen?'

Lollipop (Soriku and Akuroku. College AU/Modern AU. Unpublished. Sora and Roxas in an acapella group because that was the only way I could work out how to get them to sing and do choreo for songs that get stuck in Shaky’s head, which was the Goal of the Day one day before I got distracted)

When Sora said he had a new idea for a piece for the CrescenDudes' next performance, Roxas had been more than happy to volunteer to work on the arrangement with him. Sora was great for ideas, large picture and little flourishes that made a song a show, and he was, hands down, who you wanted doing choreography, even if he tended to get carried away and not realize there weren't many others with the dance and movement background he had in their group, but he wasn't suited for the musical side of sculpting a piece. He'd sing what he was given and he'd stay on pitch doing it, but he had no idea to weave songs together to form a mashup that sounded natural and created the right feeling in a crowd,  and he'd forget to accommodate  for everyone's voices or go the opposite direction and try to highlight everyone and have twenty solos. So it was up to Roxas to take his vision from neat idea to reality, and he jumped at the chance. He'd do anything at this point to distract Sora from dragging him into wedding planning for a few days when that should be Riku’s job as the other groom.  

Hourglass (Unpublished. Self-indulgent BBS Era--at least for this excerpt-- story about KH Squall/Leon and Seifer growing up in Radiant Garden and explaining how they got to be on separate planets and separate ages by the time KH1 rolls around. May be competed and posted to AO3 or just used as a base/record of headcanon for sprinkling backstory references in other pieces.)

Seifer challenged Lea and Isa to break back into the castle and come back with proof this time. He would have just called Lea a liar, but that would lead to Lea trying to fight him, which would lead to Isa trying to fight him, which would lead to Squall getting in the way, thinking Seifer couldn't handle a two on one fight with some chicken wusses. Then Squall would still try to sneak into the castle himself to see Ellone anyway--and she wasn’t in the castle in the first place...probably. Seifer would have to drag Squall’s ass out of there, and, if they got caught by the Royal Guard, then they’d be the next rumored prisoners in the basement.  It was safer to make it be Lea and Isa's challenge.

Lea took the bait. Isa, surprisingly, added they were planning a return trip anyway. Squall shot Seifer a questioning look, which he ignored in favor of taunting Lea and sealing the deal, "I can't wait to see you two hobble in tomorrow after getting your asses beat by the Guard. Try not to hit your thick skulls on the flagstones when you get thrown out."

Drowning (Unfinished/unpublished. Placeholder name. Sorikai. Supposed to be for the Sorikai Summer Event. Prompt: Drowning. Long one shot about eight times one of the Destiny Trio has nearly drowned and then been saved by the others)

Their first prototype of a raft had fallen apart underneath them in open water, the ties that lashed the planks together having not been as securely tied as they could have been--the book on sailor's knots Sora had provided was a lot more obtuse than it had seemed at first, descriptions dense and picture demonstrations too sparse. Kairi and Sora each fared well, each grabbing onto a floating plank to drift a minute and orient themselves after being plunged into the water. Riku was less successful, being fixated on saving as many of the supplies Kairi and Sora had gathered (coconuts, mushrooms, and bottles of water mostly, though there had been a tackle box that Riku's father would kill him for losing if he had to go back and face him, and that was what Riku was primarily focused on) and exhausting his breath on too many dives in a row without recovery in between until he was lightheaded from not taking in enough air in his hasty gulps when he broke the surface and increasingly imprecise in where he chose to come out of the water until he hit his head on the bottom of the plank he was loading the recovered supplies onto and went down without resurfacing.

No Set Recipe (Unfinished/unpublished.  Sorikai. Supposed to be for the Sorikai Summer Event. Prompt: Ice Cream. Kidfic. Sora’s mom is left with the job of explaining polyamory while making homemade ice cream with a group of five and six year olds.)

It was all Selphie's fault to start with, though if she was going to be ascribed the blame for the hurt feelings, she would have to be given credit for all that happened after, which Riku and Sora both agreed she did not deserve, even if Kairi was more magnanimous, so it became habit just to talk of the ice cream and the impact it had on their future. Still, the most accurate account begins with: one day when they were all young-- too young to even be allowed to swim in the water surrounding play island without an adult in the surf with them, if that gives perspective--Selphie, to everyone's surprise, scored the winning goal in the game of land-blitzball the group of them were playing in order to decide what game they would really spend the day playing, and chose, to absolutely nobody's surprise, house.

Everyone accepted their fate and divided into family units with minimal grumbling, phrasing which means that Wakka threw the blitzball into the sea and lost it forever when Jecht--the parent chaperone on play island that day who was five minutes away from falling asleep on the sand and typically didn't care what they did, unlike most parents who at least had restrictions about not hitting each other in the head with wooden swords or throwing sand, and was the favorite of the children for that attitude of freedom to make mistakes being a better teacher than rules--refused to go into the water after it.

Selphie, however, found a problem with Sora, Riku, and Kairi's family. Specifically, she didn't like that the family was Riku, Kairi, and Sora all together parenting a yellow coconut Kairi was trying to rock to sleep while Riku built him a bed out of sand and palm fronds and Sora cooked dinner for the household--a savoury stew of sticks, sand, and mushroom. She stood with pursed lips and hands on hips, and declared that their proud coconut son, Rekka, couldn't have all three of them for parents because that wasn't how things worked.

"Why not?" Sora asked with all the curiosity and innocence of a child.

Riku tried a more practical, solution based approach with, "Can we change the rules?"

Kairi was more direct and firm, her, "It does if I say so," leaving very little room to argue.

#snippets #not clogging tags with this though

[blasphemous-tiefling]

I’ve been thinking...

As is the tradition with Kingdom Hearts, Re:Mind has left me conflicted.

On one hand, we get some super sweet cutscenes between some of our characters and we get some great additional dialogue that makes certain scenes much more impactful.

On the other hand, why was that stuff not in the base game? Why did we not get this scene with Kairi giving Xemnas the hands? Why did we not get this scene of Xion recognizing Axel’s name before even fighting him? Why did we not get Roxas’ heart waking within Sora? I can’t think of a good reason to cut that stuff out.

My other beef is... I hate to say it... but Soriku. I’ve never been a solid shipper for anyone in the KH series because it just doesn’t work. There’s no point in wasting your time and energy caring for a particular pair when “everyone is friends” and that’s basically all it’s ever gonna be. But after KHIII, there was this weird undeniable feeling left within me that this whole series was leading up to Soriku. And I don’t know why KHIII did Riku so dirty by basically making him worthless. And then it’s as if they forgot about him entirely in Re:Mind. I just don’t get why for the past ten years specifically we’ve been focusing on Riku and how much he’ll do for Sora and then we get KHIII and suddenly it’s all about Sora and what he’ll do for Kairi. It doesn’t flow to me. Re:Mind left me unfulfilled simply because Riku never had a difinitive role in KHIII, and he was still given crap in Re:Mind.

It is clear that Nomura is butthurt about FF XIII Versus. It is clear that he wants to do something else with Kingdom Hearts that’s not just “my friends are my power!” gallavanting through Disney worlds and fight a Disney boss. The Disney worlds in KHIII served little to no purpose to the overall plot, and I felt like I needed to rush through them just to get to the KH specific stuff. I was drawn to KH by the Disney properties. I stayed for KH original content. Now, with the inclusion of TWEWY and Shibuya and now Verum Rex and Yozora, it’s clear that Nomura is trying to take KH to new places. The thing is, this series was complicated enough with its own worlds. We didn’t need to include an all new universe.

I’m upset about Yozora simply because I don’t know who he is. He’s a video game character from a fictional video game from the Toy Story world in KHIII. That’s the first I’ve heard of him. That’s the first I’ve seen of him. And yet his world and story seems to be fleshed out as if it’s been here the whole time. I have no real reason to care about Yozora or to want to figure out who he is. New characters are not a bad thing. But you definitely have to be careful as to how you introduce them. Especially in a series that is so character-driven. To be completely honest with you, right now, the only redeeming quality Yozora has is that he’s voiced by Dylan Sprouse and homeboy seemed so excited to be able to say just a few lines and I’m in love with Dylan Sprouse and I’m so happy that he’s happy.

It’s weird because I’m upset that Re:Mind was so good because why was KHIII so bad? Why did I wait five years for KHIII, was left utterly disappointed, and then got Re:Mind one year later and was pleasantly surprised? Why was that stuff not just in the base game? I get that DLC is on the rise, and I’m not saying I want bad DLC. But I want a good base game with good additional stuff. Not a bad base game with some additional stuff that’s kinda neat.

Also, Square, I appreciate you giving me some dialogue of Jesse McCartney talking to himself, but I wanted a scene. A SCENE between Roxas and Ven. Not just some dialogue between battle. That’s a tiny complaint. It wasn’t important. I just adore both Roxas and Ven, and I wanted them to have a moment.

TLDR: This is not at all an intelligent conversation. These are raw thoughts that I had to spit out somewhere. I’ll probably come back in a day or two talking about how great and adorable this series is. KH does me like that. Right now Re:Mind has me conflicted.

#kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts 3 #khiii remind #remind #kh3 remind #kh3 dlc #soriku #raw thoughts #yozora #i do love dylan sprouse tho #maybe im butthurt about the lack of soriku #sue me

[icing-on-the-icecream]

how do you picture soriku being canon

imo they already are

Nah but seriously, jokes aside, by the series own definition of true love, they truly love each other. Whether that love is romantic or platonic is secondary; that’s how it’s always been in KH. KH3 made that near explicitly clear: one of the main messages in that game is that true love isn’t any specific label, it is the strength of that connection that matters.

The easiest way to tell if an element is important to the story is to take it out and see what changes. If you remove Sora and Riku’s love for each other, EVERYTHING changes. Hell, neither of them would even have keyblades. Kingdom Hearts as we know it could not have happened if they didn’t care deeply for each other.

That’s why I’m not really concerned with whether or not they’ll be canon. Don’t get me wrong, the representation would be huge, it would make me so happy, but KH has been treating their relationship with the utmost of respect for the past 17 years, odds are that’s not about to change any time soon. Even if they never become officially “canon”, they love each other, that’s a fact you can count on.

All that being said though, a few important things need to happen before Sora and Riku can progress to the next stage in their relationship. Namely, they need to sit down and talk to each other about how they really feel; much like the Dark Margin scene at the end of KH2, which was a huge step in the development of their relationship.

However, even before that can happen Sora in particular, needs to realize quite a few things. He doesn’t fully understand how much Riku means to him, hasn’t quite figured out that Riku is the light. As heavily implied in KH3, Sora is having trouble distinguishing between platonic and romantic feelings, which is perfectly natural for a 15(16?) year old, especially one that’s hardly had any time to worry about normal teenage things. He cares about Riku deeply, but the full extent of these feelings as of yet remains unexplored by him.

To make matters even more difficult for the poor kid, Sora has forgotten several extremely important memories related to Riku that would make this realization easier to come to; his sacrifice to Sora–in both timelines–the events of Castle Oblivion, and, perhaps most importantly, the fateful night of the meteor shower.  

And that’s where DDD2 comes in. Obviously, it’s too soon to say anything with 100% certainty, but it’s very likely this game will deal heavily with themes of death, dreams, and memories; put simply, it’s the perfect opportunity for Sora to explore his true feelings, his lost memories, to finally figure out for himself who his light is. I’m not saying they’ll become canon next game, but I’m confident DDD2 will be instrumental in the progression of their relationship.

tldr; soriku endgame actually

#anonymous #soriku #sorry this took so long anon I can't do words #but thanks for asking<3 #if anyone wants me to elaborate on a point feel free to ask #I had to cut down quite a bit before I accidentally wrote an essay #which...I still kinda did huh....

[thechocobros]

My little (not so little) Kingdom Hearts III’s review :)

(possible spoilers under the cut)

Somebody asked for my personal opinion about the game, so, here I am! I’ll try to be as objective as possible, even if you probably know already my deep affection for this saga and for its creators XD

Let’s start with the positive things, the things that really impressed me the most about KH3, which are: the graphic (even the in-game one), the gameplay, the huge amount of enjoyable exploration. And then I’ll start voting the rest, by giving my opinion. 

 - Graphic: 10/10. I was able to see the pores on Sora’s face and on Terra’s hands. I was able to zoom on the smallest details with my Gummiphone and still find some amazing details in the landscape. Literally EVERYTHING was so well done i had to stop more than once to admire what i was playing. It was stunning. Let’s not even talk about the Disney cutscenes, because those were a masterpiece and i have no words to describe them. 

- Gameplay: 10/10. Listen, i never played a game where there were so MANY options for the gameplay. I beated the 13 darknesses by using attractions, limits, different forms, combined moves, special abilities, combos, different keyblades ... There were so many minigames, ideas, i fought on Baymax, i fought as a captain of a ship, i cooked, I did treasure hunts, took pictures, the gummiship style too ... every fricking world offered so many different gameplays options i even freaked out because i wasn’t able to learn them all. It was so FUN!

- Exploration; 10/10. Let’s be real, every world (except Twilight Town lol) was as huge as all the Disney worlds of the previous KH games together. Really, i was lost. It was even too much. It will take me a lifetime to explore all the worlds in all its beautiful details xD for ex in the POTC’s world we are able to access to at least 6 different islands + Port Royal + underwater + the battles setting + we command an entire sailing ship. Also, have you try to collect all the lucky emblems? Because I think they all are in some areas i still don’t know they exist. It was AMAZING. 

- Music: 8/10. I love “Face my fears” so much, i like “Don’t think twice” a lot, Utada is always a queen. As for Yoko, she never dissapoints me either, even though this time she didn’t came out with “new” brilliant melodies like she did in the other games. She mostly arranged differently songs and themes we already were familiar with, which is nostalgic and happily welcomed anyway. + Bonus Points to Somnus song mixed together with Hikari. Wow. 

- Plot twists/Surprise/content/plot elements: 8.5/10. Every Kingdom Hearts game needs a huge amount of “WHAt-THE-moments” and KH3 makes no exception. The final battles and the endings were a concentrated of twists and turns, starting from Yen Sid, to Ephemer, from Sora dying (like twice, during this game? the last one almost got me tho), to Kairi dying, from Xigbar’s real identity to Yozora officially inserted in KH’s main plot etc etc. It was a rollercoaster. And I loved it. Funny enough, the only “secret” that didn’t feel like a “secret” was the “secret” that Nomura defined the “biggest secret” XD ... aka Roxas xD I mean, they talked about making a replica for Roxas all the game long, so when Roxas actually appeared and claimed that Vexen made a replica for him, i was like ... yeah, thanks, that’s not a brand new information xD Talking about Vexen, him and the rest of the Organization had some really nice surprising elements, their story was worthy. 

- The narrative/structure/pace: 6.5/10. Ok, here’s the thing. Even if the actual story content was interesting and pretty good, there were problems in the pace and we all hardcore fans noticed it. Why was that? Because they changed some things they shouldn’t have changed in order to give more space to Disney worlds. 

For ex, I’m talking about the fact that we started our adventure in ... the Olympus world. I have nothing against that world of course. But in KH1 we started in Destiny Islands/Traverse Town. In KH2 we started in Twilight Town. In KHBBS we started in the Land of the Departure. In KH3 we should have respected traditions and start from an original world. Why? Because original worlds are strictly connected to the original characters’ development + main plot. By making Sora starting in a Disney world, they cut out an extremely important part in the KH3 story’s development, aka the very own basis. And  no, Twilight Town arrived 3 hours later, and was half as big as the other Disney worlds, so it doesn’t really stand the competion. 

  So, by putting so many Disney worlds and cutting out the original worlds, they confused the storyline’s pace. The actual story’s progression was reduced to some cutscenes between a world and another which is ... not a really good idea. We needed at least one or two more playable original worlds somewhere there in between, like KH2 had Radiant Garden and KH1 had Traverse Town, so that the story could have been developed  and the characters would have been able to meet and interact properly.

  In fact, the biggest problem is that the entire main plot is rushed in the last hours of the game. 35 hours of funny happy Disney gameplay. 5 hours of actual plot. It’s not balanced. The player didn’t feel the rising pressure for the final battle of light against darkness. No matter how epic the Keyblade War actually was, of course it felt a bit rushed, because it popped out all of a sudden and wasn’t smoothly inserted from the beginning of the game. 

  I can actually justify this choice though: KH3′s purpose was to give a conclusion to Xehanort’s saga. Which means they didn’t plan to develop the story or the characters more than what they already had in the previous games. They just wanted to show a proper “conclusion”. Not “development”. 

  It’s not the choice i would have taken in terms of storytelling, but it’s an option so i’m not really angry about it. It worked anyway because almost all the characters really had a solid background plot. .... almost. Which sadly leads to the sore point of the game. Here we go.

- Characters development: 7/10. Kingdom Hearts has a large quantity of very developed characters. Kingdom Hearts’ original characters are the ones who entered in out hearts years ago and we love them for a reason. They’re all well characterized, with specific strengths and weaknesses. Which means that no matter how weird the pace of KH3 could have been, the characters have been so well written in the previous games that they were able to tollerate everything in terms or story telling. Sora, Riku, Aqua, Roxas, Axel, Ventus, Xion, Terra, Naminè .... they all had a major role in KH’s plot on their shoulders and unique facets. But one character was strongly penalized by this the rhythm of KH3: Kairi. 

  Unlike most of the other characters that belong to the famous trios, Kairi could never count on a strong background, nor a good characterization. 

  Even though i liked her in KH1 (where she at least interacted with both Sora and Riku multiple times and had a part in the main plot, even if she was comatose for 80% of the time), it’s not a secret that she got benched immediately after that. KH2 didn’t make her justice with all that being kidnapped, and in the next games she completely dissapeared even. She was never involved in the story ever again. What am i referring to?

  In Birth By Sleep, only Sora and Riku met all the members of the wayfinder trio and played an actual part in their lives. Kairi barely meet Aqua once, and never played an active part in her life anyway. I mean, Aqua never needed Kairi for anything, never. On the contrary, both Sora and Riku were vital for all the members of the wayfinder trio, back then and later on.

  In Chain of Memories, Coded, 358/2 days ... Kairi was replaced with two other girls that quickly became more interesting than Kairi herself, aka Naminé and Xion. In those stories Kairi is barely mentioned and almost never appears. But Sora and Riku ... oh, Sora and Riku! They’re the PROTAGONISTS. They always interact, they always appear, they always do stuff. 

  Let’s not even talk about Dream Drop Distance, where it’s JUST Sora and RIku. 

  What’s my point? The Destiny trio isn’t a trio, it’s a duo. Kairi is ALWAYS put in a corner, she never has a part in the story. 

  I’m not talking about ships, i don’t care about ships, I don’t ship Soriku nor Sokai, it’s not about this. The problem is Kairi’s character development, which did not exist. Not only a development, but even a purpose was missing. 

  So, since i kinda liked her in KH1 and the potential was there, i thought that KH3 would have set things right for her. I had high hopes especially because of Axel, I was like, “WOW here it is a great potential for a good, healthy, platonic relationship, finally Kairi found someone to be paired with and do stuff. We will finally see her being weak, finding her power again, maybe she will be a playable character, maybe she will interact with BOTH Sora and RIku too, making jokes, express her preferences etc etc” yeah and what we got? Kairi is reduced to a mere man pain object again. She almost forgot about Axel once that Sora appeared. She got kidnapped here and there all along. Again. She kinda forced Sora to eat that fruit and never asked for his opinion, while Riku was having an existential drama going on just some steps away. But i don’t think she cares for Riku anyway since she never had any kind of bond time with him and isn’t interested in his problems. She fought once (badly), revealing that her training was somehow useless (she had to be saved by Sora and the others). She gets killed (pretty stupidly too) and Sora had to sacrifice to bring her back. And what made me angry the most: Sora’s heart gets lost in the process of saving her but it’s NOT Kairi the one going after him in the secret ending. IT’S RIKU. LIKE WHAAAT?? Riku?? She can’t even take her girly keyblade and go after the boy she is supposed to love and that died for her?? Riku has to do it? Really? It’s ridiculous. ... 

  Furthermore, she wasn’t a playable character. The only characters that we were able to play were Sora, Riku and .... Aqua! Pretty funny. (I think they are Nomura’s favorites, i don’t know.)

  Kairi’s only part in KH3 was changing outfit and “being Sora’s light” somehow but ... that was so much out of the blue and most likely an isolated moment. It could have been a nice coronation for a developed love story but the problem is that no development was there before.

  So, going back to my point.

  Even if i would have chosen another way to tell the story, the rushed pace of KH3 worked for everyone anyway, except for Kairi. Kairi needed a different treatment.

  But at this point i don’t think she will ever get it, probably Nomura doesn’t like her too much since he decided to make another DreamDropDistance game settled in Insommia next time xD so i give up on her. I’ll focus on the other beautiful female characters of this game.

  Anyway, even if i talked a lot about why Kairi was another flop, i want to point out how interesting some characters got instead. I’m talking about Xigbar (great plot twist), Saix, Demyx, Vexen (Vexen had so much importance, i mean, i didn’t expect him to be the one moving kh3’s plot), Luxord, Marluxia, Larxene and Repliriku! They used to be marginal characters and now they turned out to be protagonists, it’s amazing.

- FF characters: 7/10. I really loved Verum Rex’s surprise, it’s a clever idea to recycle the Versus characters and concepts Nomura couldn’t bring to life. Now that Nomura turned them into original characters, he has the copyright over them again thanks to Disney and he can use them as much as he wants, bringing the “ff characters cameos in kh” on a brand new level. Starting from the next game, we will have semi-FFcharacters included in the main plot, not just having a cameo here and there, which is amazing!

  But. This doesn’t mean i didn’t miss actual FF characters in Kh3. Cloud, Leon&Co left a hole in kh’s tradition.

Let’s sum it up my notes: 

Graphic: 10/10 +

Gameplay: 10/10 +

Exploration: 10/10 +

Music: 8/10 +

Plot twists/Surprise/Content/Plot elements: 8.5/10. +

The narrative/structure/pace: 6.5/10. +

Characters development: 7/10. +

FF characters: 7/10. +

Total = 8,3

AND ... THAT’S IT FOR NOW I GUESS? xD

#kh3 spoilers #kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts 3 #kh3 #obina plays kh3

[themattress]

That’s my response to KH3′s secret ending video.

While @ultraericthered summed a lot of what’s wrong with it up here, I have some other points to add. Five specific points, in fact, about why this whole thing grinds my gears.

1. The influence of both The World Ends With You and especially FF Versus XIII are apparent here, and given the timing of when Nomura was taken off of the latter project and when it became evident that he was not going to be able to make a sequel to the former given how much Square was overworking him with shit like the FF7 remake, it’s clear that Nomura is using the KH franchise as an outlet where he can actually do those things he wanted to. What really astounds me is that he was already using KH to do the stuff he wanted to with this whole “Dark Seeker Saga” rigmarole, and yet he couldn’t wait until that was over before starting on this new manic ambition of his. He couldn’t just fully wrap the Dark Seeker Saga up and then start fresh with his new saga, he had to get a jump-start on the new saga because it was where all his interest now was and he’d gotten bored with the saga he’d twisted the series canon inside out to bring into existence. I have long said the decision to make the KH series into the Dark Seeker Saga was the franchise’s ruination...but now it seems as though he ruined the series for nothing, since he ended up losing interest in the Dark Seeker Saga in its final stretch and just wanted it over with ASAP. It’s unbelievable!

2. Fucking Yozora is here, and like ultraericthered, I’m assuming that he’s actually an adult Ephemer and that the Stella look-alike from the Verum Rex trailer is actually Ava (tellingly, Ephemer’s only scene in X: Back Cover was a Ship Tease with Ava). Not only is this more of the “multiple names or incarnations of the same character” crap I think just about everyone who’s played through the KH series is sick to death of by now, but the introduction of the “worldline” concept in UX and KH3 (and the setting in this video is almost definitely a whole other “worldline” from the KH universe we know) only serves to make the cosmology even MORE convoluted than ever before!  Tetsuya Nomura is a real-life case of someone who suffers from Complexity Addiction - he sincerely believes that making things more and more convoluted is a good thing, that it gives “profound depth” to his stories, that simple and easy-to-grasp stuff is bad. But it’s not deep, it’s not interesting, it’s not enjoyable. And it’s certainly no substitute for emotional resonance and interesting characters, which are in increasingly small supply because of this shit. If anything and everything can change on a whim, if concepts you thought you’d grasped are suddenly retconned into something far more confusing, and if the characters are to be constantly sacrificed for all these “surprising twists”, then there is no reason to care. What is the point in investing in this series? There is none.

3. It’s just Sora and Riku once again, in what seems to be a retread of Dream Drop Distance. Fuck that shit. The one chance to redeem Kairi’s usage in the series past KH2 and especially in KH3 would’ve been to give her a game where she journeys to find Sora, but no, of course that’s not happening. Of course it’s going to be fucking Riku, because he’s a Creator’s Pet character and Square knows that pandering to Soriku shippers with their queer-baiting plotlines are guaranteed successes for them given how much they constitute the core KH fandom they hear from online. And even putting that factor aside, they’re fully back at operating under the fallacy that Riku should be the series’ deuteragonist. No. He shouldn’t be. It has literally never worked and never made sense. Maybe it would if KH was supposed to be your run-of-the-mill shonen series, but it wasn’t, it was supposed to be a predominately Disney series about the power of friendship and the triumph of light over darkness, and having your secondary main character be this angsty, aloof, cliche “cool guy” anti-hero who STILL uses the powers of darkness despite that being the very thing that made him a fucking villain in the original game just does not fit. The main protagonists of this series should be Sora, Donald and Goofy, period, and this constant pushing of Riku has utterly destroyed the character for me, which is terrible since he was a really good character in the old days.

4. As horrible as Xehanort became as a concept, character and villain, the Master of Masters is still somehow an even weaker replacement. Not only is his very existence contrived, not only is he nigh-impossible to take seriously given all we’ve seen of him so far, not only is his omniscient “just as planned” Villain Sue-dom just as frustrating as Xehanort’s, but above all, he’s another asshole in that goddamn black coat! Good lord, I am sick of these guys! It’s a disgrace how lazy Nomura is that he would reduce what used to be an iconic look for a specific group of characters into just something anyone who wants to be mysterious and hide their face wears. There is literally nothing special about the Master of Masters, nothing about him that excites or interests me in any way, and even Xehanort had that factor going for him.

5. Finally, KH3 itself has proven something that the secret ending only reinforces: the Disney side and the Square side of the franchise have become utterly incompatible. As cool as it is to see anime-looking mofos in Disney worlds interacting with Disney characters, the way all the Disney story elements are styled and presented are just too diametrically opposed to the way the KH-original lore and narrative are. The Disney stuff is simple and charming and joyful, while the KH-original stuff is anything but. How does any of this “Subject X”, Foretellers, black box, time travel, datascapes, replicas, wordlines, body-swapping crapola remotely connect with anything you would ever associate with Disney?  How does it connect with the actual Disney worlds and characters within the game? Once upon a time, the styles actually were balanced and blended together surprisingly well, the Nomura-made concepts actually fitting with all the Disney stuff. But that is no longer the case, as Nomura has clearly left Disney far behind in his consideration for developing his stories. And this calls to mind another post that ultraericthered made, which makes a valid point: Disney doesn’t NEED Kingdom Hearts anymore. They had begun a downward spiral when they first joined forces with Square, but now they’re more powerful than they have ever been, with successful IPs up the wazoo. Square, meanwhile, is struggling and clinging to KH as one of their few surefire money-makers, in essence using Disney to help stay afloat. And I’m sorry if it sounds cold, but Disney ought to cut them loose and cancel the KH series, since it’s now one of their weaker IPs given how badly Square - Nomura in particular - has butchered it. Sure, the Disney stuff in KH3 is stellar, but how long did it take for KH3 to come out again? Does Disney really want to have that kind of situation repeat itself? Hey, since KH3 incorporated Pixar, Disney might want to remember the ants and the grasshoppers from A Bug’s Life and apply that lesson to what’s going on with KH: “Disney doesn’t serve Square Enix! It’s you who needs us!” And just walk away from a partnership that is no longer working nearly as harmoniously as it used to.

But whether Disney does this or not, the result is the same for me.  It’s been a wild ride, but I am thoroughly over the Kingdom Hearts franchise and am leaving it behind for better things. I will always cherish how it was in its prime and the wonderful memories and feelings that it left me with, but as it stands such memories and feelings are never going to come from this series again, and so I wish it not only a goodbye, but a good riddance as well. FAREWELL!

#Disney #Square Enix #Kingdom Hearts #Kingdom Hearts III #Opinion #Analysis #Jumping the Shark #This Franchise Got Screwed Up #Anti-Square Enix #Anti-Kingdom Hearts #Anti-Nomura #Anti-Tetsuya Nomura

[beabaseball]

I didn’t want to do anything productive so I did a rudimentary analysis of KH opening songs

(let’s put this here right away that I understand if people think one relationship has more weight than another--soriku, sokai, i’m an ot3 person and am not taking sides-- so interpret whoever you will as the ‘designated person being spoken to.’ A lot of this does feel very much like Riku, since he’s the one actively doing things and giving us more characterization, rather than Kairi, who is already set up as pure of heart and is comatose for like two games straight until she jumps off a balcony and destroys my little gay heart, but it’s like… obviously pretty vague in a lot of ways and up to interpretation.)

So there’s always been something that sort of struck me about the KH opening songs that I’ve been trying to define since Don’t Think Twice got partly released, and I think maybe part of it is the forthrightness of the narrator. Especially since it’s a woman singing about love. It could be the POV is actually Sora or Riku, etc. (probably sora, but to cover my bases), so the gender is a little muddy towards interpretation, but singer-wise it still sort of strikes a chord in me because of how forthright it is about not wanting to tie the other person down:

“When you walk away You don't hear me say, "Please, oh baby, don't go."”

For most of my life, I interpreted that as the person running away was not listening when the singer was trying to make them stay, but after listening to ‘don’t think twice’ I realized another possibility-- that the singer is willing to let the other person leave and be comfortable with that.

“Simple and clean is the way that you're making me feel tonight It's hard to let it go”

The current relationship is already simple and clean. They come and go as they please without strings attached, in a pure sort of childish love that doesn’t need to be complicated in order to be strong. Which is very much how Sora, Riku, and Kairi are at the beginning of the first game: they don’t have much complicating their friendship except a pretty convoluted love triangle over that’s never really mentioned again or built on at all--it’s just kids squabbling a little--but that also means it’s easy and uncomplicated, and it risks being made messy by trying to deepen the bond, even though they want to. They’re on the precipice of change lately (“it’s hard to let it go”)

"Don't get me wrong, I love you, But does that mean I have to meet your father?" When we are older you'll understand What I meant when I said, "No, I don't think life is quite that simple."

The speaker wants things to be deeper, though. ‘Does that mean I have to meet your father?’ / ‘No, I don’t think life is quite that simple,’ has always sort of struck me as a powerful line. The other person is trying to do what they think is expected of them, perhaps? Or yielding to another authority? Regardless, what they are trying or assume they are being asked to do is not at all what the speaker actually wants-- very much like how Riku fails to listen to Sora during the first game, exploring without really paying attention to the damage he’s causing and ending up sided with Maleficent and blinded by ego long enough for darkness to really sink its claws in.

The daily things (like this and that and what is what) That keep us all busy are confusing me That's when you came to me and said, "Wish I could prove I love you, But does that mean I have to walk on water?" When we are older you'll understand It's enough when I say so And maybe some things are that simple

This is basically a whole summary of the game. Sora is getting run down and confused, but searching for Riku and Kairi keeps him going--and yet, when Riku finally is able to listen, it’s too late in a lot of ways. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t still love.

Sora loves them because he says so. And sometimes it’s exactly that simple-- that love conquers and you can both come back from the brink and bring back others from the brink through the love you share: like Kairi bringing him back from darkness, and Riku returning to aid one last time. There is no ‘perfection,’ but that doesn’t mean Sora has to settle for anything, either. “It’s enough when he says so.”

Hold me Whatever lies beyond this morning Is a little later on Regardless of warnings the future doesn't scare me at all Nothing's like before

As long as that concrete love is under his control, he’ll be okay, because his friends are his power. With them, he has nothing to fear.

By the second game, Sora has something to fear!!!!

Sanctuary from the second game is…. More upsetting in a lot of ways. It’s obviously a lot more jumbled than ‘Simple and Clean,’ and much more alarmed. Sora’s gone through a lot and spends most of the game searching for answers, for his friends, and for a way home. The adventure has definitely lost a lot of its charm and now he’s more focused on survival and carving out his place as a person--which is important in a game largely about identity.

In you and I there's a new land, Angels in flight My sanctuary, my sanctuary, yeah Where fears and lies melt away Music will tie What's left of me What's left of me now

In-game we’re aware of Roxas, and externally of Xion, Vanitas and Ventus. Sora’s also undergone puberty which uh is a whole new fucking land, but it’s probably more literally about being in a strange new situation which sometimes includes new worlds. They’re no longer on the island and searching for sanctuary in what is familiar: each other.

I watch you fast asleep, All I fear means nothing

Riku could honestly be the singer of this one I think, if the songs shift POVs. The only thing here to fear is losing the other while they’re out of sight, and while, literally, Sora is asleep and may not wake up for the first part of the game.

But to also put back that Riku could be sharing the song, if not singing it, Sora is also helping him on his journey of traveling between Light and Dark:

My heart's a battleground

You show me how to see, That nothing is whole and nothing is broken,

This can also be still Sora, of course (woo hoo, overlapping themes!) who has Literally both Light and Dark inside him as whole fucking people-- and more specifically, who has a doppleganger running around trying to find his own identity, which in turn makes Sora question his own internal self some, while never doubting his own personhood, only insisting on Roxas’ personhood: but they can only both be whole people, if you dismiss the idea that things only have the states of ‘whole’ or ‘broken.’

Woo. Now the last one:

We don’t know a ton about the 3rd game yet, but…

“How did I live in a kingdom of thieves And people who say things they don’t really mean (really mean)?

You’re all the everything I ever dreamed of (ever dreamed of x2) You must be kidding me, did you really think I could say ‘no’?

I want you for a lifetime, so if you’re gonna think twice baby I don’t wanna know, baby, I don’t wanna know Everything is just fine, but if you’re gonna think twice baby I don’t wanna know, baby, I don’t wanna know”

Sora is fucking done with these people not being forthright with their emotions and being deceptive liars and fucking with himself and his friends and all the people who are now in a boarding house in his metaphysical heart. He’s ready to go and take the final step and plunge of having the other person ‘for a lifetime’ -- but if they’re going to hesitate at all, he doesn’t even want to touch it. Things are going fine: but he’s ready to take the plunge, and if the other person isn’t as absolutely dedicated to it as he is… it’s just not worth it and he’d rather not know.

Do it or don’t. But don’t leave him hanging.

#kingdom hearts #kh3 #kh #don't think twice #simple and clean #sanctuary kh #beatext #long post #one day i'll be quiet but right now i'm TRYING to make my blog have like....... my interstes on it... #music #i guess

[derekscorner]

Kingdom Hearts “Shipping” Analysis

Okay, so I got into some interesting talks with someone from KHPlanet.com and with my friend @blackosprey over shippers in the series. We delved into interesting territory and it got my mind thinking-

I’ve been around since KH1 launched in 2002, I’ve see nearly two decades of this now but I’ve never put it into analytical view like I did theories...until now.

You see, I’m not much of a shipper myself. I’ve never really had a good view of such sub groups. Especially after the way the fans of Bleach & Naruto had behaved recently. I would never say it’s wrong, but I do feel it’s given too much importance. People base their entire feelings on a series out of two characters, regardless of whether it’s even a genre of story that focuses on romance or not, and then throw tantrums when it doesn’t work out.

This baffles me. 8 months ago Bleach fans even went as far to burn their merchandise. It was very ignorant for several reasons, 1 they done have your money, 2 the story is over and throwing a tantrum like a toddler won’t fix it and 3 it’s the authors story. You can say “OOC” all you want, but the creator made these people, what is “in character” for them will always be their say not yours.

So rather than “OOC” it’s more like they aren’t acting as you wanted these characters too, not them actually being “out of character”. Granted KH isn’t those fandoms, at least not yet, not sure if it ever will be given how many fans it’s lost due to it’s console spread. The remixes aren’t sparking back much life to forums so I can’t tell.

Anyway, you’re likely wondering where I’m going with this. If you’re a reader of mine previously, you know I’m building a point. That point being, “shipping is strong”. While KH isn’t other fandoms it does have a constant shipping war, or debates rather, that have lasted and changed for 15yrs now.

The KH shipping fandom in particular has two larger camps. You have those that say there is no undertones and it’s all purely friendship and you have those who have some ship they ride with undying, if not scary, fervor.

It’s these two sides that I’ve always somewhat never understood. I’m an analytical man, to me both sides are behaving in extremes rather than logic. You see, each game in the series has had a little of everything.

“What!? You’re just a hater!”

No, no, be calm child. I have a lot of issues with KH but shipping isn’t one of them. What I mean is each game is inconsistent. The people on the “platonic side” are right in that the series main focus is friendship. It always has been, this needs to be accepted.

On the flipside, the “shipper side” is also right. Undertones do exist. We see this all the time. For this post I will focus on the “oldest ship”, SoKai. (hear that @anheiressofasoldier I’m talking SoKai, enjoy~)

It’s by far the oldest ship in the series thanks to Kingdom Hearts 1. It began there. And no, I don’t say this because Sora stabbed himself and became a heartless for Kairi. I say this for the subtle reasons. Scenes such as Sora & Kairi’s moment in the cave, or how Kairi’s heart chose Sora to hide in specifically, or the cave drawing of the paopu fruit, or how Riku openly teases Sora on screen.

Riku also uses this plot point again in the foot race. Saying the “winner gets to share a paopu with Kairi”. If you win, yes you can win that race, Riku scoffs it off as Sora being too serious.

“Well tha-”

Ah ah ah! Sssshhh I’m not done. Let me continue. These things are there, they are in-game, they exist, no amount of headcanon will change this. However no amount of headcanon will make these more than this, undertones.

You see, the ship that started all of this isn’t really that much of a ship. Undertones for something more are hinted but here’s the thing- They’re all on Sora’s end. This is something that exists in several games, Chain of Memories and Days also emphasize this.

It’s always Sora’s feelings of Kairi that we are told about. It’s never her own. This is due to the bad writing at times since Kairi herself is woefully underused. Her “clones” have literally had more relevance going beyond KH1.

“But what about Sora x Riku!?”

Yes, what about it? To be honest I think my friend Osprey described this phenomenon best. I quote;

Though come to think, it reminds me of a post I saw a while back. It was talking about the weird phenomenon when it comes to writing romances vs relationships. A lot of writers don't really know how to deal with romance, treating it as something super-special and not really giving it a lot of character and presence.

Whereas with friendships, they run the whole gamut of human loyalty and affection because it's just more familiar territory. And as a result, the so-called friendships get more emotional power behind them than the romances do.

... That's basically what happened with Sora and Riku, I think. Rather than trying to make Riku a super-special person to Sora or w/e, he was just portrayed as a valued and loyal best friend. Which feels stronger and more organic than what Nomura was going with in regards to Kairi. 

That is a very compelling point, perhaps very true tbh. Anyone knows friendships are easier to write. You can make two character out of thin air, throw them in a setting and say they're friends. So long as you portray them actually behaving like friends, it's believable. That's the difference between them. Romance has to be built, friendship doesn't.

You could make the case of platonic friendship being the closest of course, although it depends entirely on the people. Romantic lovers can be the closest due to their close nature, but platonic can be just as close for it's pure nature.

If you wanted to treat KH like it's written well then you could view it from Riku's view. Just imagine half the shit Riku pulled, yet Sora still cared. For someone who was through the emotional ringer, that would be quite compelling for Riku's loyalty. You could even make it a case on Sora's personality. If it came to the heart stab scene he truly would do that for anyone, shippers need to accept that fact. However, it's also true the feelings of Sora are told to us to everyone BUT himself. For examples;

• Sora couldn't wake up because his memories of Kairi became Xion, that means he values Kairi so much that she's the specific reason his heart won't wake. Not because he's missing memories of Riku or others, but Kairi. (this scene here, click me)

• In CoM, Namine specifically points out she can't replace Kairi. Trying to do so only amplifies his feelings for her and Namine points out to him that even with his memories gone, his value of her is so strong it overrode her magic. This not only gave him a glimpse of Kairi but changed her charm back to normal. (around 2mins in this scene here, click me)

• In KH2, before SoKu set sail, Donald & Goofy tease Sora about Kairi in Port Royal and he even daydreams of her in Halloween Town. (this scene, click me)

“You’re just trying to prove SoKai, what’s your point?”

My point is this implies an interesting facet about Sora. Ignoring the ignorance the games have given him lately, it shows that normally Sora is open with everyone, he values everyone, even Roxas who he's never properly met.

In contrast, it also foreshadows that he's not as open with Kairi because the feeling isn't friendship. It's more special to him than the rest and he isn't as open because, like any man, he doesn't fucking know how to be.

Women are mysterious creatures, we men don't know how to approach them. Some claim too, some try too, but more often than not we fly blind.

It’s in defining Sora and Kairi’s ties that we see how the others work. Yes Sora stabbed himself for Kairi, but Sora would literally do this for anyone. He is just that nice and he values his friends lives.

Yes Sora cried for Riku, but you have to remember that Sora thought Riku was dead or bad off. We as the players seen Riku but Sora wasn’t ever sure of Riku’s fate.

Riku in turn pulled some bad shit in KH1. His guilt has carried over up to KHDDD. Despite these mistakes, Sora never held it against Riku and even cried knowing he was okay. To Riku, who’s been through an emotional ringer, this would be quite compelling. In Riku’s eyes, Sora deserves the best of loyalty. Which we see in KHDDD. Riku values Sora to the point that KHDDD was almost as SoRiku as KH1 was SoKai.

Then this bleeds into Sora and Kairi’s “clones”. Roxas, Namine and Xion all have their own minds but they also aren’t natural beings. They sprang from Sora & Kairi and aspects of them bleed into the nobodies.

• Xion was the “Kairi Sora remembered” and to that extent Roxas kinda treated her as “his kairi”. Xion herself displayed Sora’s trait of self sacrifice and loyalty.

• Namine was “Kairi’s Shadow” and due to Kairi’s bond with Sora had actual powers over Sora’s memory. Namine in a sense, is the embodiment of Kairi’s hold over Sora.

• Roxas also had unique bonds to Xion and Namine, these weren’t so much bonds of romantic nature but them feeling the effects of Sora’s bonds to Kairi.

In Summary

The point I’m making is that when I analyze the story and the arguments of various ships in the series, I don’t see it. Instead, what I see is mishandled relationships. Yes KH2 and KHDDD had borderline SoraxRiku material, however other games emphasize Kairi’s importance to Sora.

The series constantly goes back and forth and this lack of consistency tells me that there are no romantic points in this story. If I had to place any value, it’d be that Sora himself has a crush on Kairi.

Her importance to him is highlighted regularly and his behavior around her isn’t as open as he is with Riku, Donald and Goofy. If you watch, Sora treats Donald and Goofy the same way he does Riku. The difference is Donald and Goofy are just as big a dork as Sora is, so when Sora hugs them or acts silly so do they.

I can’t claim there’s a ship or couple in the series because there isn’t any. There is no actual romance, just undertones. And even then, while I think Sora holds Kairi in special regard I don’t know what Kairi thinks.

We hardly see Kairi in this series and we don’t get a real solid glimpse of her view. Couples are mutual, if I only see things on Sora’s end then I can’t say there is one.

Even then, all the importance of Kairi to Sora isn’t even told to us BY Sora himself. It’s told to us by others, such as Riku in Days or Namine in Chain of Memories.

Everything truly is connected back to Sora, for better or worse. The nobodies behave the way they do because of Sora, some like Xion even have their “real” faces determined by his feelings for other people. (in this case, Kairi)

I think people see what they want to see more than what is actually present. Whether you ignore undertones as a “platonic shipper” or whether you ignore things outside traditional ships because they’re your OTP. I’m also highly doubtful you’ll see any confirmation on such things, at least not till a final game, if ever, happens.

P.S Yes I didn’t bring up Kairi’s moments in KH2. She did show favoritism towards Sora but at the same time she seemed a bit too obsessed in that regard to me. It’s hard for me to take Kairi’s KH2 personality seriously since the Kairi we’re introduced to in KH1, albeit brief, showed a more natural and equal concern for both her friends.

Then again Kh2′s script was...questionable in several areas so meh. Personally I’d need to see Kairi truly developed more as a character to see SoKai as anything more than her simply being Sora’s crush.

Welp, internet keeps dying. Better post while I can. Farewell dear reader~

#kingdom hearts #long post

[hi-elixir]

This is...such a daunting question?? I’m gonna go ahead & assume you’re talking about specific scenes, & if so I think I’ve covered many of them in another post, so I’ll do my best here to find my favorite Underrated Soriku moments if that’s ok?

Welcome to My Soriku Agenda, this ended up being like 80 pics so most are under a cut: 

KH - After Ansem SoD casts Riku’s heart to the RoD, Riku refuses to fade away/die until he sees Sora & Kairi one last time. Mickey’s voice reaches out to him & is able to help guide Riku with some advice: 

He looks within his heart & senses/feels Sora running toward him, & it’s able to give him the fervor & resolution to keep going. Later in the CoM journal bio for Riku it straight up says that Riku was saved by Sora’s light, & i think this is probably when that event occurred.

Then, at the end of the game, Sora is falling into the dark &, in parallel to the above scene, is given renewed faith/happiness/belief in order to continue flying(as per the rules of flying in Neverland),& the fervor to keep fighting. 

re:CoM: When Sora tried to fight who he believed was Riku into recalling his good memories of Sora  :

& the overwhelming amount of times Repliku believed Sora didn’t care about him. They’re not blatant soriku scenes, but still good for delving into Riku’s true feelings regarding Sora, since Repliku’s memories are still based in Riku’s real ones:

& at the end of Reverse/Rebirth, Riku watching Sora sleep in his memory pod.

358/2 Days: Riku in Days worked with the sole intent of reawakening Sora, so even with Sora out of commission, anything from this game involving Riku is pretty much soriku territory, even all his interactions with Xion (especially according to the novel).

One rly underrated scene is the one after Axel & Roxas are in Castle Oblivion & Roxas gets that major memory migraine, he hears Riku speaking & then abruptly awakens whilst yelling Riku’s name. 

I love that Sora’s connection to Riku is still strong enough to affect his own nobody. Always gets me feeling Some Type of Way.

KHII: There are So many, but a standout scene is the two of them on the dark margin shoreline, completely at peace with each other & content to spend the Literal Rest of Their Days alone together. This was also directly after they’d confessed that they each wanted to be like the other, that Sora had Riku & Riku had Sora, something neither one of them could imitate. 

There’s just, a whole lot there, man.

& this scene was so important that they made it a part of the cgi ending, they could have easily had this be a Sora/K scene but nope.

Also, the framing of this one is rly amazing, with Sora reaching out wondering if the guy in the black coat he just sparred with was Riku, with the upper part of Sora’s face obscured from our view.

re:Coded: Pretty much Anything with data sora & data riku is Good Soriku Content, but some of my overlooked favs:

Data Riku saying “...incredible” after Data Sora talks about the magnificence of worlds & the whole universe being inside them.

 Just, the way the word “...incredible” is delivered rly makes me want to see what Riku’s expression was when he said it. I feel he was very moved and sounded in awe of Sora’s grand speech here, which is why there was a bit of a pause before he said the word. 

The rest of the scene is top notch data soriku as well, 

He’s so.. stunned & touched by Sora’s words. Then they go back to their soft teasing & Riku’s beautiful laughter is a goddamned gift

Sora looking at Riku, then looking away & Riku looking at Sora.

Riku chasing after Sora, scared for both his friend & their memories,

then after Sora explains why he has to try regardless of being afraid, he leaves & Riku still runs after him a bit, like he can’t help himself, & stands in the shot looking at the area Sora disappeared into.

DDD: Uhh h ok so this is the hardest thing bc the game is pretty much like soriku hours by itself, but here are my personal top favs, nothing is rly underrated bc it’s ddd lol everyone knows What’s Up

Riku reaching to touch Sora’s face with like, this super romantic look to his eyes the closer his hand gets to Sora’s cheek, then pulling away bc hologram..

Sora calling out Riku’s name before he fell into a deep sleep that could have been permanent (meaning Riku’s name could have been the last thing Sora would've said, ever)

Riku watching Sora sleep with That Look on his face

Their hearts being in tune & creating Dearly Beloved as a canon plot point!!?

Riku closing his eyes in utter peace while inside Sora’s heart

Riku’s look of !!!! when Sora says he heard his voice the whole time when he was unconscious. Then the smile at the end.

The “Very Careful” concerned bf alert

& KHUX Just for fun, there’s a parallel between what Chirithy says in khux about true love being necessary to awaken someone from a deep sleep, since Riku has undoubtedly done this for Sora.

Anyway these two came for my life bye

#soriku #kh #kingdom hearts #not for the faint of heart lol #the soriku agenda #riku

[palizinhas]

do the thing for kingdom heartssss

Nice, thank you!!!

Tell you my unpopular (or possibly popular!) opinion(s)

I’ll go with the fairly safe option (not because it’s popular so much as it’s just a well-known unpopular opinion I have because I don’t have too many popular options in KH. Like, the closest is probably “KH2 is my favorite KH game”, but it has a lot of clauses like ‘kh2 has very poor pacing and Port Royal is one of the most boring things I have had to do in a game in my life’):

RiKai is. One of the biggest, formative ships of my life? Which, I mean, I have talked about before. I fell in love with RiKai when I was 8 and it’s like. Okay, they have had 0.5 seconds of interaction since the first game, but while I didn’t fall in love with KH until I played Days, I don’t think there’s a single more formative KH moment for me before Days gave me the infamous “I’LL ALWAYS BE THERE TO BRING YOU BACK” scene than Riku fighting Ansem’s possession to protect Kairi?

I mean, Riku fell into darkness on his own, and then he fell further to try and save her, but at the same time it’s how much he cares about her that sets him off on the path to redemption. I think people often underestimate how much Kairi means to him and I just… adore the possibilities that RiKai would have if the writers let them interact on screen, ya know?

Share a song that makes me think of the series/a certain character

That one is hard because I don’t tend to think of specific songs like that, but On My Own has always been a huge KH song for me?

Ramble on about OTPs/characters that make me giddy and/or rage   

Because I talked RiKai on unpopular opinions, and I don’t think I can extend this to both SoKai and SoRiku (and the ultimate, SoRiKai) without going off too wild a tangent, I’ll just talk characters. Or, one character in particular.

Both Roxas and Naminé share the spot for my favorite KH character, but Roxas means… a lot to me. He’s the protagonist of Days, and has a lot to do with how much Days means to me (maybe not as much as Xion, because Xion always struck a huge chord to me, for reasons I’m not really gonna get into right now, but some of the things that apply to Xion also apply to him, and he’s the protagonist, so he gets to have more spotlight, writing-wise, so he usually edges out as a Fave, even if Xion is right under RN to me).

I mean, Days was a bit before my life went Off The Rails, but even though I liked it from the first time I played, it was looking back on it that KH really started… meaning so much to me. I replayed Days a lot during the Year Known As 2012 (aka when my life went off the rails) and while people always go on and on about Days being a pain to replay, which I can sorta agree with, Roxas’ breakdown as the game goes on, and especially on Agrabah (Day 354? 355? I forget), is always a huge hit for me, and any time that game fought me off (just… fuck leechgrave. And the double fire stick whose name I never remember, the boss from Wonderland in KH1 that for some reason DOUBLES ITSELF on Days, because one was clearly not enough) I always just kept going, because of how much Roxas’ conflict in the endgame means to me.

And playing KH2 last year - I don’t think I’d enjoy KH2 as much as I did without Days first, honestly, and that has a lot to do with the fact that I was so emotionally attached to Roxas, the tutorial that turns people off from that game was basically the best written, and executed part of that game to me (though I… could have done without the Wonders). I can’t wait for Roxas to be his own person in KH3 so I can cry.

#kingdom hearts #rikai #wow I didn't mean to ramble so much #womanaction #long post #holy shit I knew I had rambled a lot but even I didn't realize how much