Square Enix's The Bouncer on PS2 was a major inspiration for Kingdom Hearts

Imagine that SquareSoft tried to make a Yakuza game five years before Sega — a beat ‘em up with role-playing elements and tons of splashy cinematics. Imagine that project was helmed by some of the industry’s most impressive creative talent. Now imagine that the resulting game was far less than the sum of its parts. That game is The Bouncer, developed by DreamFactory and published by Square Electronic Arts in North America in March 2001, shortly after the launch of the PlayStation 2.



source https://www.polygon.com/bouncer-ps2-kingdom-hearts-sora/

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