kingdom hearts is probably the most controversial JRPG franchise of all time. it's very common to see non-fans say they can't take it seriously and it's influence ruined franchises they prefer, and it is equally common to see fans say it changed their life and brings them to tears to think about. i think i come somewhere in the middle; kingdom hearts 1 is a pretty moving and cute story for it's target demographic, but it has a lot of clear growing pains that i feel could have been better addressed. the story is probably what i'd single out as the biggest strong point of kh1, it's a very pleasant little story preaching self-belief and perseverance with a lot of fun character moments. the disney stuff, for me, doesn't exactly help but doesn't really hurt. donald and goofy are enjoyable party members that don't really feel too far off from your standard comic relief party members in final fantasy games such as rikku or cait sith. i'm not sure if i'd say the friendship of the party feels especially believable by the end, but it works for the type of story kh1is trying to get across. the original characters are all also pretty fun; i'm not much of a fan of sora, since he feels very stock shonen protagonist, but riku and kairi are both fairly interesting characters. the (unintentional?) gay subtext with sora and riku is definitely the most interesting part of the character interactions in this game, it really oozes out of almost everything riku says and makes things between him and sora a bit more complicated than it initially seems. i felt that the big weakness of kh1's story came down largely to it's focus on the disney elements. many of the worlds are very stripped down versions of movie plots, which aren't really satisfying on their own and aren't really great fanservice, imo. several of my favorite disney movies actually are in kh1, but the only one i felt really happy with the representation for was nightmare before christmas. the good part of this is that the worlds are pretty short and breezy, with very little story, so if you aren't much of a disney fan they aren't tedious or anything. the bad part of this is that the overarching plot still does involve a lot of disney elements up until the last quarter or so, so if you want more meat you're going to be waiting for a while.
where i'm more mixed on kh1 is the gameplay. i played on proud mode, because i wanted to fully engage with the combat and uh... that was a mistake! not because i had too much trouble with the combat, but because kh1 has pretty minimal depth to it's combat, and the boss design can get downright atrocious. the pot centipede, giant ursula, genie jafar, chernabog, basically all of the final bosses, dragon maleficent.. there's so many fights in this game that i wouldn't call hard necessarily but would really call cheesy or boring. for most of the larger bosses the recommended strategy from experienced players is to just mash on them with aero/ra/ga and spam heals when you can with leaf bracer. i only really struggled with a handful of fights, but i would have a lot of trouble naming fights that i struggled on where the difference maker ended up being my skill rather than missing a specific spell or not using a specific summon that trivialized it. things reach a head after the first visit to hollow bastion, because beyond that point kh1 really loves throwing bosses with inflated health bars at you, and in the worst cases, those bosses have a vulnerability window of maybe 2-3 attacks if you're playing fair with them. if that sounds obnoxious and boring, that's because it is, so the recommended strategy for most of these bosses is to make sure to get aeroga and curaga and just wail on them. the room of waves of heartless being spawned on you is also just atrocious, pure chaos with very little counterplay beyond tanking. smart, aggressive play simply does not feel well-incentivized in kh1. i'd say the real peak of the game feeling challenging in a fun way would be the mid-game before you get leaf bracer, and the last fight on the first visit to hollow bastion. that fight kicked my ass a good 4 or 5 times, but it was engaging, fast, lethal, and made me want to get better. i can only hope that future kh games follow that precedent.

asides:
the ff characters in this game, imo, often didn't really act like themselves. squall, i mean leon, especially felt mischaracterized. not a big deal because the story isn't focused on them or anything but as a big fan of 8 i found it a little sad.
music is incredible, i'd mention the heartless theme, kairi's theme, the main theme, and obviously simple and clean as highlights. yoko shimomura is a great fit here, since she's experienced in music for kid's games from the mario rpg series but also has the range for more serious and heartfelt tracks.
the animation is surprisingly very high quality and emotive for a ps2 game, it seems like they really wanted to lean into disney animation principles. genie donald and goofy are all highlights in that regard

It’s no secret that I love Kingdom Hearts and especially Kingdom Hearts II as it was the very first video game franchise I’ve ever became a fan of, however, there is one secret I do have: I never played the Final Mix version until now.

Crazy, I know! Played the vanilla game so many times day in and day out growing up, remembering being so jealous knowing that Japan had an exclusive (at the time) version of the game where you get to challenge all of the Organization XIII and more, and even witness the numerous re-releases of Final Mix in the West, but for some reason, I only just now recently gotten around to experiencing the game, and man I really wish I started sooner.

The same overall package is still here. The grand stories, the memorable characters, the iconic music, the worlds, and the incredible fast-paced combat, but now there’s more and it’s completely fine tuned to perfection. The changes under the hood makes the combat feel even more snappy and satisfying, the new additional boss fights feel like a dance that can overwhelm either yourself or your opponent, the inclusion of Cavern of Remembrance adds even more depth to the gameplay with its movement and enemies, and overall the entire experience is just amped up to a 10. I know the whole “power of friendship” troupe can be so overdone in a lot of media, but I think KH2 does it best while it can be as cheesy as the first game, it fully embraces it without shame and wears it proudly on it sleeves, which works so well because Kingdom Hearts overall is essentially a shonen anime with Disney and Final Fantasy characters. Even with how absurd it can get for some people, there’s so much heart in the writing to where you can’t help but to at least find it extremely endearing.

I feel like I could REALLY go on about this, but I think I wanna save a much deeper depth into KH2 for a review in the future. I think right now it’s hard to fully capture the words and things I wanna say, because this game and series left such a strong impression on me and the impact it has had on me is something that very few games or even pieces of media have ever accomplished, it really altered how I view the medium and understanding of video games and what they could be. Growing up with KH2 has left me wowed and in awe of what an amazing game looks like, and with Final Mix, it gives me another example of what a masterpiece can look like.