Go my pretties, kill, kill!

Michael: Well, we got a chance to play the multi-player mode of Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days and to our surprise, Square Enix has implemented a deathmatch mode. Of course, they didn't mean to actually implement this mode, so it was interesting when the four or us selected our characters and began slaughtering each other in what was supposed to be a cooperative mode. Finally we got around to actually playing together on the same team, but we didn't get to see much except two areas where we battled some heartless. After that we decided to try again, but this time we just went into full deathmatch combat. After all of us died enough times the demo ended, and sadly, we had no idea who had done the most damage, so no one had bragging rights. It was entertaining for all of us, but not really in the way the designers had intended, so it's hard to say if I'll really enjoy the full version or not. Time will tell.

Adriaan: The limited demo capabilities didn't really let us experience any real gameplay. Only attack and jump commands and a limit break attack were available. However, the multiplayer demo did include four player multiplayer with friendly fire, and so our co-op experience quickly devolved into a free-for-all. It controls smoothly and looks terrific, but the important thing to remember is that I killed Sam three times.

Hack-n-slash fun.

Sam: At Square Enix we had the chance to try out the multiplayer mode in Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days and instead of doing what the demo asked of us, we decided to have a blood match in which I was killed as both Axel and Demyx. Mac, Adriaan and Manny all completely ganged up on me and since friendly-fire was something that couldn’t be turned off, we decided that a free-for-all was far more entertaining than going through two rooms as a unit. Needless to say, I’m still bitter that Adriaan only decided to attack ME. I will get my revenge!

Emanuel: During E3 I played I was able to play a fair bit of the single player story mode, but I was left wondering how the multiplayer turned out. I finally got my answer today along with my fellow RPGamer staff members. We did two runs through a multiplayer map with the four characters of our choice. I picked a card wielding character the first round and a hero with a scythe the second time around. Like in the single player, locking on to enemies, centering the camera, and unleashing combos was pretty easy. The level was pretty short but one thing that stood out in particular was the friendly fire. I found it incredibly difficult not to hit my allies as we all rushed to kill the same enemy. Honestly, without much knowledge of how deep the coop missions actually are I’m left feeling that the real draw here is the single player story. On the other hand if you want to give your friends a hard time on the DS, look no further.