While we've patiently waited for the inevitable Kingdom Hearts III, Square Enix has kept our appetites at bay with a steady stream of prequels, spin-offs and sort-of sequels. From 2009's 358/2 Days, to last year's Birth by Sleep, followers of the Final Fantasy/Disney mash-up have had ample opportunities to revisit its bizarre, but successful collision of emo-spouting pretty-boys and anthropomorphic theme park stars. Kingdom Hearts Re:coded, a DS remake of an episodic Japanese mobile phone entry, mostly succeeds in continuing to distract us while we wait for that full-on sequel to finally arrive.

Given its phone-to-DS porting, I wasn't exactly dying to wield a Keyblade again in Re:coded. However, despite some camera-crippled platforming and other minor annoyances, it managed to suck me back into the series' imaginative world. Sure, it revisits many of the locales from the 2002 original -- damn, has it been that long? -- but it also incorporates enough new tricks to put a fresh spin on the at-first familiar-feeling settings. Additionally, it reunites us with series star Sora, the spiky-haired hero who's sadly been absent from the last two titles.