Monday, May 14, 2012

I think I like Kingdom Hearts spoilers?

The Kingdom Hearts obsession starts again!
Let the American-side promotion machine begin!  ^O^!!! 
Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance (Kingdom Hearts 3D) will release in America, on 07/31/2012, for Nintendo 3DS.
http://youtu.be/jhCvWzYmKzY

I already watched all the cutscenes already, from the Japanese version (with subtitles), but nothing's been spoiled for me.  I've always been pretty immuned to spoilers, since I have more fun experiencing a story, rather than simply finding out how it ends.  That's pretty much why it's so fun to re-watch something over and over again.  I never get tired of it, not completely. 

In fact, seeing it dubbed, is like making the scenes fresh and new again.  I love switching back and forth between languages on my DVDs, whether it be anime or Mulan.  Switching languages is also great on bilingual videogames, like The Bouncer or .Hack//.  Even translated songs too, like Hikaru Utada's English versions of her songs, or Trish Ledeaux's anime opening/ending themes translations, that preserved the rhythmns and enabled singing the songs in English.  Any extra layers of experiencing a fandom, always adds to the enjoyment.  Afterall, that's why anime fans get interested in learning Japanese culture, or why we started eating more pizza as children, when we became Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles fans.  It's why we draw fan-art and research world history, after becoming Hetalia fans.  Experiencing multiple language versions of the same thing, is another refreshing layer to fandom.

Specifically to Kingdom Hearts, maybe I should always watch all the earlier-released, Japanese cutscenes beforehand, to make playing the game in English much more enjoyable.  In these 10 years of Kingdom Hearts, I've begun to notice a trend in how I experience the game and its story.  Usually, I jump right into the next game, impatient to have all the questions from the previous game answered.  "Is Riku okay?",  "Will they ever have their friendship mended?", "What battles have they resolved between games?", etc.  But most of my questions revolve around the orginal Kingdom Hearts characters and their story, not the Disney half of the story.  Which is too bad for me, because the first half of each Kingdom Hearts game is more about the Disney side, than the Square side.  And I've often found myself too impatient to have the core story conflicts resolved, to the point where I can't enjoy the Disney, exposition half of the game/story.  It all just feels like stalling, before what I really want to see, and I just can't fully enjoy it.  And yet, after I have those questions answered, conflicts resolved, and friends reunited, what I really want to do is spend more time with that reunited party, wandering around, stalling, having fun in the Disney side of the worlds.  But after the core story's conflicts from the previous game's cliffhangers have been settled, it's immediately time to finish the current game's storyline.  ;_;  No time to enjoy wandering around Disney worlds, after the last quarter of the game.  Therefore, after having already seen all of KH3D's story (in Japanese with English subtitles), I can now enjoy just wandering around the Disney worlds, without those unanswered, cliffhanger, core story questions, hanging over my head.  Completely spoiling the whole story ahead of time, and eliminating my impatience with the first half of the game, could be the best thing to enhance my enjoyment of the gameplay, when the English version arrives.  ^-^  Maybe I'll try this from now on (at least when it comes to Kingdom Hearts). 

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