Kingdom Hearts

Kingdom Hearts, electronic game released by Japanese game manufacturer SquareSoft (now Square Enix, Inc.) in 2002 for the Sony Corporation’s PlayStation 2 video-game console. Kingdom Hearts joined two popular fantasy universes: the cartoon world of the Disney Company and the world of SquareSoft’s Final Fantasy video-game franchise. Kingdom Hearts saw great success, enjoying strong sales and critical acclaim that spawned several sequels and spin-offs.

The game features Sora, a human character similar to others from the Final Fantasy series, and Disney legends Donald Duck and Goofy, who together journey through the world of Kingdom Hearts. Maleficent, the evil sorceress from Disney’s animated feature film Sleeping Beauty, bands together with other Disney villains to gain access to everyone’s hearts. The majority of locations that Sora and his animated crew explore in trying to stop Maleficent are taken directly from Disney film lore, such as the city of Agrabah from Aladdin. Many characters from Final Fantasy make cameos as well, including Cid Highwind from Final Fantasy VII and Rikku from Final Fantasy X. Many references are made throughout the game’s story to both worlds, seamlessly blending the two as the player battles droves of the “heartless,” the game’s stock enemy type.

Kingdom Hearts was one of the best-selling PlayStation 2 titles in North America. Praised for its originality and beautiful presentation, the game sat atop many critics’ “best of” lists, and it even prompted the creation of a popular manga-style graphic-novel series. A sequel, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, was released for the Nintendo GameBoy Advance in 2004, and a third installment, Kingdom Hearts 2, was released for the PlayStation 2 in 2005. The prequel Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep (2010) was released exclusively for Sony’s handheld PSP system.