Hiku said:
umegames said:
I understand what you're saying in terms of surprises and mystiers, which i'm all for, to a limited extent. IMO, KH has TOO much mystery for my preference of story telling. Could be my own quirk, but i like things chronologically in order. I actually watched the star wars from 1 - 7 (against everyones judgement) and believe i enjoyed it more than i would have had i started with episode 4, because EP4 i had seen the journey of Anakin so i understood exactly who vader was and why, as well as the chaos that was going on among the empire and the galaxy.
back to KH, it actually annoyed the mess out of me in KH2 dealing with R_____S, and further more going from there to BBS seeing V____S. I'm not against having a game and then going backwards for a prequel, but to release 4 games and then go backwards...ugh, irks me. but i love the series non the less, i just would have prefered it in order 
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Well at least the person who asked the question doesn't need to wait years for most of those mysteries to be revealed, like those of us who started at the beginning did, and can just play them all back to back, with the exception of KH 3.
And yeah, I can see how you'd get something positive out of knowing Anikin's story before seeing Vader. I guess the question is what the trade off becomes. If you gain one thing, at the cost of losing two other things in the process for example. That's one reason I tend to go with the order in which the story is presented most of the time, because there are intentions from the writer that may be lost otherwise.
But I also like that way of telling a story, so I don't inherently have a problem with it. I like it when stories become a bit convoluted, and exploring the past after certain themes are already established can be a very interesting way of doing that. A lot of stories do this, in some way or form. Whether it's just a short scene/flashback of an event from the past, revealing some truth in the present, or something more.
I will say that Kingdom Hearts story has become even more convoluted than I would have liked, in the sense that it's hard to piece together all the chain of events that lead up to KH3. But I don't think BBS's placement in the order is particularly related to that, (Dream Drop Distance is a big culprit though, and it taking place in the future didn't help the matter either because it introduced the confusing concept time travel) because many of the revelations in BBS were revelations to mysteries we never knew existed before playing BBS. For example, we didn't know that there was a special reason for why Roxas looked the way he did until BBS was made. Although it's unusual that a Nobody looks so different from their host, Namine also looked different from Kairi, so it wasn't implied that Roxas looked that way because Sora has the heart of someone else (Ventus) inside of him.
Another thing is the encounter between Terra and young Riku, which could explain some things about Riku's connecion with the darkness, and why Ansem (Xemnas' heartless) was drawn to him.
Of course there are also revelations to some mysteries from previous games here, such as learning more about the story of Xemnas and Ansem The Wise, which started being introduced in KH2. But that would have been revealed in the next game anyway, if it hadn't in BBS.
The difference is that if it would have been reveal in a game that lies ahead of KH2 chronologically, it would have been through a limited cutscene of a flashback. Which can make it harder to understamd. But instead we got a much more proper and fleshed out explanation thanks to BBS taking place around that time, and a whole story being built around it. That's a good thing, imo.
I think what really started convoluting the story was the introduction of Xehanort, and to a degree Terra, Aqua and Ventus. But at what time you experience their story doesn't help sorting out the spider web that is the plot, because their stories get integrated into various different points of the story regardless. Especially Xehanort, who can time travel.
BBS taking place in the past helps integrate the stories of these characters in a much more fleshed out way than if it was all summed up in a few flashbacks in KH3 or KH DDD. I'm not sure what exactly it was you had a problem with though? You mentioned Roxas and Ventus, but as I mentioned above, there was no mystery implied to Roxas appearance until BBS came out. Of course if you saw a promotional image of Ventus a year or so before the game came out, the wait to find out what it means would be long.
But one thing that's important to think about when recommending in which order a story should be consumed is if they may miss out on things intended by the writer by going at it in a different order. Besides the things I mentioned before, there's also that when we first see Aqua and co, the concept of a keyblade is presumed to be understood by the player already. As is the concept of a Heartless, etc.
That's why it's also important to make it clear to them in what order the games were released, unless it's obvious from the way the games are titled. Because they may have a preferance already, but might still want some suggestions. For example if a game has little to no relation to the other games in the series.
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, I'm this way about alot of things I read and watch, KH is still one of my top 3 franchises in gaming. 
