Kingdom Hearts 1.5 HD Remix is as pretty (and dated) as you expect

This is Halloween

Sometimes, all an old game needs is a new coat of paint to feel as though it was just made. Other times not so much. After getting some hands-on time with the ludicrously named Kingdom Hearts 1.5 HD Remix, we found that while we were pulled in by the world and the impressive visuals, the controls still pushed us away.

Our journey brought us to Halloween Town, and we immediately started running around the world, taking in the HD sights and humming along as This is Halloween played softly in the background. The environments looked great in HD, and the characters looked even better--we were stunned at how crisp the bandages on Donalds mummy costume were, and when we ran into Jack Skellington we marveled at how HD the Pumpkin King looked. When we fumbled with the controls and summoned Simba, we thought he looked good, too.

But when we say fumbled, we mean fumbled. The controls have been modified to fall more in line with Kingdom Hearts IIs, with the right analog stick controlling the camera and the menu being revamped to be more useful, but the gameplay was still hard to get a hang of. We figure itll be easy enough to re-learn nuance of Kingdom Hearts when the game releases this September, but our brief hands-on reminded us of how dated the gameplay was. Hopefully by the time Square-Enix gets around to making a sequel, itll go back to the drawing board.

Check out the following slides for additional images and more information.

Summons look wonderful, bringing classic Disney characters to life.

Mickey Mouse has never looked more bad-ass.

Tinkerbell is a healer, flying around and replenishing health.

HD cutscenes from handheld Kingdom Hearts games are included as well.