Kingdom Hearts: 359/2 Days is one of the oddest games in the Kingdom Hearts series. After the release of Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance], Tetsuya Nomura expressed a desire to put Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days on the Nintendo 3DS. But rather than being a re: make or a Final Mix, he created this.
Kingdom Hearts: 359/2 Days starts out like the original game, following Roxas's time with the Organization, but soon changes radically, presenting crazy new storylines and brand new gameplay unlike anything before. The game uses the battle system of Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep for the most part, but sometimes changes into a crazy completely different from the norm of Kingdom Hearts.
Compare Kingdom Hearts Coded 2
This game provides examples of:
- Accidental Pervert: After Roxas switches bodies with Namine, Xemnas walks in on him undressing.
- Acting for Two: Roxas and Ven.
- Adaptation Expansion: Instead of Xion not being able to use her keyblade, it gets stolen, causing Roxas and Axel to run all around Twilight Town looking for it.
- All Just a Dream: One of the missions, where Roxas finds out that Saix is his dad, Axel gets his hair stuck in the toaster and Xion runs away to join the Power Rangers, is revealed to have been a nightmare that Kairi is having.
- And Now for Someone Completely Different: There's a segment where you play as Namine and have to fight the Unversed after Roxas first goes to Olympus Coliseum.
- Also, you control Namine at another point, or rather her body which is being inhabited by Roxas.
- Anime Hair: Parodied when Xion realizes that the crazier the hairstyle the higher the power and sets out to get a ridiculous hairstyle herself.
- Ascended Extra: The lady at the ice cream store is now a major character who assigns Roxas bonus missions and has a keyblade.
- Mickey only appeared in one cutscene in the original version of the game. In this, he appears quite a lot, and even joins Roxas's party at one point.
- Ascended Meme: Xigbar calls Terra-Xehanort by his Fan Nickname "Terranort" when recapping the events of Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep.
- Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: A giant hairstyle attacks the Castle That Never Was at one point.
- Badass Normal: The Pizza Delivery Guy, who takes on Chernabog and Saix, even though he doesn't have any powers of his own.
- BFG: Roxas uses one to fight the Hydra.
- Big Bad: Vexen II, Vexen's so called "Perfect Replica".
- Big Damn Heroes: When Roxas, Alice and Namine are about to be shot by the Queen of Hearts, Luxord shows up in a tank to save them.
- Butt-Monkey: Saix, Roxas and Namine get abused to no end. To a lesser extent, Hayner.
- Car Fu: Diz is an expert at this.
- Chekhov's Gun: After coming back from an Agrabah mission, Roxas finds Xemnas's car keys, but Xemnas goes missing before Roxas can return them. Much later, when Roxas and Demyx have to get back to the castle before it explodes, Roxas uses the car.
- Chekhov's Gunman: On Roxas's first mission, a mysterious cloaked figure steals a crystal Axel was holding and disappears. Later on, the figure is revealed to be Future Roxas, who needed the crystal to save Kairi from infection by Xehanort.
- Disc-One Final Boss: Roxas confronts Riku, and it looks like everything is about to end, but then Ven saves Roxas, kicking off the second half of the game.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Hercules throws a nuke at Saix for drinking the last of the Herculade.
- Does Not Understand Sarcasm: When Saix sarcastically says that Demyx would fail a mission to eat ice cream with Roxas, Axel and Xion, Demyx decides to prove him wrong.
- Drunk on Milk: Axel, although justified since there was a heartless who could make anything alcoholic. Even Roxas.
- Dual Boss: When Roxas fights Xigbar in the games, he also has to fight Xigbar's pet Godzilla.
- Enemy Mine: Roxas, Aladdin and Riku team up to fight a giant heartless that's rampaging around Agrabah.
- Final Boss: Pirate Axel
- "Freaky Friday" Flip: The Mindboggler heartless running around Twilight Town causes this several times.
- One time Demyx and Saix got switched, causing Demyx to give people missions like "Steal a doughnut from Xemnas to satisfy my hunger" and "Get the Organization recognized as a country so we can have a cool flag."
- At one point, Roxas switches with Namine and doesn't notice it until a week after he got his body back, when Axel told him about it.
- On April Fool's Day, Xemnas unleashes the Mindboggler in the Castle That Never Was because he wants to out-prank Saix, who always does crazy things like tricking Xemnas into thinking his hairstyle was a heartless.
- Guilt by Association: Aladdin thinks that Roxas is causing all the heartless attacks and tries to kill him.
- Idiot Ball: When Roxas switches bodies with Namine, he doesn't notice until a week after he gets his body back. Xion as well, for thinking Roxas-as-Namine was the Organization's new girl and inviting "her" for a slumber party.
- Instant Awesome: Just Add Mecha!: Xemnas's car can turn into a giant robot.
- Jerkass: Diz throws Namine off of a cliff to see how high it is at one point.
- Latex Perfection: At one point, Roxas awakens to find Xemnas looming over him, but it was only Xion in a Xemnas mask.
- Lazy Bum: Demyx slacks off and watches TV in the middle of a fight against Riku.
- Lightning Can Do Anything: Parodied when Xion, Roxas, and Xemnas are convinced that a tree turned into a bunny after being struck by lightning and go out to investigate.
- Love Triangle: Roxas with Xion and Namine.
- Luke, I Am Your Father: Xemnas reveals this to Winnie The Pooh.
- Me's a Crowd: There are tons of Xemnas clones lying around in Castle Oblivion.
- Memetic Badass: In-universe, everyone is convinced that Luxord's goatee is secretly the most powerful member of the Organization.
- Mind Screwdriver: This version explains the events of the infamous Destiny Islands scene with the line, "Winners Don't Use Drugs".
- Multiple Endings: Lazy Days all have at least five.
- Ninja Pirate Robot Zombie: The Final Boss: Pirate Axel.
- Offscreen Moment of Awesome: Xaldin and a Pizza Delivery Guy manage to take out Chernabog while Roxas was unconscious in a garbage can.
- Offscreen Teleportation: Done hilariously. Xion knocks Riku out of a plane by mistake, and then Riku walks out of the bathroom talling Xion not to push him out of a plane again.
- One-Winged Angel: Namine turning into a giant crab monster.
- Once Done, Never Forgotten: Everyone keeps calling Saix gay because he said a guy cosplaying as Aqua was cute.
- Only Sane Man: Saix and Namine. Except when Saix pulls ridiculous pranks on April Fools Day.
- Pet the Dog: Saix has one when he helps Roxas out on a mission, offers him genuine advice about how to improve, and then gives him the next day off as a reward.
- Shout-Out:
- One of the minigames is called "Sitar Hero".
- One to Ansem Retort when Zexion runs for Governor of Pennsylvania.
- Suspiciously Specific Denial: When Roxas goes to ask Xemnas about Sora, this dialogue takes place.
Roxas: Hey Xemnas, there's been something I've been meaning to ask you?
Xemnas: I'm not lying about you not having hearts so I can turn you all into Xehanort, if that's what you want to ask.
Roxas: Who the heck is Xehanort? - Time Master: Ventus. The second half of the game is composed of his traveling into the past with Roxas.
- Unexpected Gameplay Change: Aside from the random crazy ones that happen on some missions, Lazy Days. They play sort of like Visual Novels, with Roxas running around worlds talking to different characters, getting many different possible scenes based on his dialogue options, what areas he goes to and which characters he talks to.
- Villain Song: Xemnas at one point breaks into song and screams about his evil plans for the Organization, while they stand right next to him.
- The War Sequence: This tops the Battle of 1000 Heartless with the Battle of 1,000,000 Xemnas Clones.
