At last year's E3, I got a chance to check out Kingdom Hearts' first North American outing on handhelds, 358/2 Days (or, as Google's automatic calculator called it when I just searched to make sure I had the name right, 179 Days). I recall being impressed at how they managed to ape the solid experience the game delivered on PS2 on a portable platform, albeit at the cost of a bit of visual power and general gameplay depth.

To describe Birth By Sleep using these terms would be awfully irresponsible. If 358/2 Days was Square-Enix's attempt to emulate the franchise's previous offerings on a handheld, then Sleep represents the fruits of the studio's developmental labor. It's not just an attempt to squish the core franchise down to a smaller format -- it's a fully realized extension of said franchise.