Kingdom Hearts' White Mushrooms Are A Prime Example of How to Design Gimmick Enemies
The Kingdom Hearts series on its face appears to be a standard action-adventure JRPG, where mashing the attack button will generally carry a player through every enemy they go up against. However, veteran players may note that while more standard enemies like Kingdom Hearts 2's Armored Knight Heartless stand out among the others, few are quite as entertaining as creatures like White Mushrooms.
Appearing only in the first game, the White Mushrooms are the first puzzle enemies that players will find in Kingdom Hearts with their gimmicks being a key to unlocking some of the best weapons in the game. A few more similar enemies do appear in the original, and dozens of new puzzle enemies appear in the Final Mix versions of the both Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts 2.
As the initial introduction to this type of enemy, however, the White Mushrooms act as an excellent method for priming players for how these unconventional enemies will work throughout the game. This would later influence some of the best gimmicks that appeared in future games like Kingdom Hearts 3's Flantastic 7, which also becomes necessary for unlocking the ultimate weapon. The lasting legacy of these enemy types comes down to how well White Mushrooms display what players need to do in order to unlock different rewards.
Players are likely to first come across the White Mushrooms in Wonderland, usually just after acquiring their first spell from beating Kingdom Hearts' Guard Armor, with the possibility of having two new spells to use. So, when the White Mushrooms first appear, it might not be immediately clear what the enemies are asking for, but it is clear that they are drastically different than the regular class of Heartless. The fact that these enemies don't attack, for one is an early clue that some trigger happy players might miss at first, but seeing them simply walk around and do their little gestures can be the first hint needed start learning the gimmick.
Once players notice how White Mushrooms move, it shouldn't take too long to figure out that the repeating gestures mean something beyond just making the Heartless look cute. While it could take some figuring to realize that the gestures are assigned specifically to a spell, the indicators are perfectly appropriate for the type of magic the enemy is requesting. The requests for fire and blizzard specifically are obviously clear, even if in the heat of the moment while wading through hoards of Heartless they aren't immediately apparent to someone who's never seen it before.
Another aspect of the White Mushrooms that adds to how well they introduce the concept of these gimmick enemies the lasts throughout the series is the way that the evolve throughout the game. They start off in Wonderland by asking for fire, blizzard, and thunder, and continue to add new spells to their requests with each new world in Kingdom Hearts that players find them in. Tarzan adds cure to their roster, Holloween town adds aero, and Atlantica introduces stop, following Sora's journey of learning new spells with new mechanics that utilize them.
This is a theme for these types of gimmick enemies that extends well beyond just the White Mushrooms and has evolved over the course of each new game that incorporates new mechanics onto the Kingdom Hearts formula. However, while other games have improved on these gimmicks, and others have added some questionable new puzzles that don't quite reach the height of these early enemies, it all began with White Mushrooms. The inclusion of these enemies has greatly improved the end/postgame of the Kingdom Hearts series, and may have been a more subtle way that the games have earned the level of success that they have.
Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory is available now for PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.
Post a Comment