How to play: Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days on PC

This guide aims to explain how you can manage to play Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days on your PC using Melon Mix,
Melon Mix allows you to play Days with a single screen and a controller on PC.

Introduction

For fans of the Kingdom Hearts series who have never played Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, Melon Mix is a great alternative to just watching the cutscenes in the collection, as this game was never ported to newer hardware like other Kingdom Hearts titles.

Using MelonMix with melonDS allows us to experience the full game, including gameplay and story, instead of just watching the cutscenes.

I will go through and explain how I set it up and what I configured, so maybe I can help some people reading this guide set it up themselves.

Shout out to the people who made MelonMix and provided such an easy way to install it and well documented instructions on how to use it.

What is MelonDS?

melonDS is a emulator for the Nintendo DS that is designed to faithfully recreate the experience of playing DS games on modern hardware. It offers features such as save states, enhanced graphics and network play, and supports a wide range of DS games.
melonDS Homepage[melonds.kuribo64.net]

What is Kingdom Hearts Melon Mix?

Melon Mix is an version of MelonDS, which makes Days into a PC game with better controls, graphics, and a single screen.
Melon Mix Repository[github.com]

Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded on PC?

Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded is still WIP, you would have to use an emulator like melonDS or in Steam with Retroarch and DesmuME.
Retroarch Homepage[www.retroarch.com]
DesmuME Homepage[desmume.org]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1118310/RetroArch/

Prerequisites

Before you begin, make sure you have the following:

For playing Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days

• Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days ROM file

For playing Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded

• Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded ROM file

Setting Up Kingdom Hearts Melon Mix (Windows)

1. Go to the Kingdom Hearts Melon Mix release page[github.com]

2. Download the appropriate build for your system (MelonMix-windows-x86_64.zip for Windows)


3. Extract the contents of the ZIP file that you downloaded to an empty folder

4. Create a folder called "roms" inside the folder where you have extracted the ZIP file

5. Rename the ROM file of "Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days" to "days.nds"

5. Drag and drop the "days.nds" file into the "roms" folder.

It should now look something like this:
(.sav and .ini will be created after first start)

MelonMix-windows-x86_64/
├── roms/
│   ├── days.nds
│   ├── days.sav             (Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days Save file)
│   └── recoded.nds          (for Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded)
│   └── recoded.sav          (Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded Save file)
├── melonDS.ini.exe          (Configured settings in the emulator)
├── MelonMix.exe
├── MelonMix_KHDays.bat
├── MelonMix_KHReCoded.bat   (for Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded)
└── rtc.bin

6. To start the game, run "MelonMix_KHDays.bat".

This will open a command window that starts the emulator and opens the ROM file.

Make the command window close itself

If you want the command window to close by itself after starting the emulator.
Just replace the contents of "MelonMix_KHDays.bat" with this:

start "" "MelonMix.exe" "roms/days.nds"
exit

And for "MelonMix_KHReCoded.bat"

start "" "MelonMix.exe" "roms/recoded.nds"
exit

Configuring MelonDS

Once the game is running, all you need to do is adjust the emulator settings to your liking.

Control Settings

The control settings are located in the top left corner under
Config > Input and hotkeys

There are recommended settings from Melon Mix in the readme file[github.com]
Which are basically perfect.

Escrito originalmente por KHMelonMix/README.md:

Recommended Controller Binds
• (DS Keypad tab) Map the DS D-Pad to your controller's left analog stick
• (DS Keypad tab) Map the Select/Start buttons to the equivalent keys in your controller
• (DS Keypad tab) Map the A/B/X/Y buttons to the equivalent keys in your controller
• (DS Keypad tab) Map the L button to the L/L1/LB button in your controller
• (Touch Screen tab) Map the DS Touch Screen to your controller's right analog stick
• (Add-ons tab) Map the command menu to your controller's D-Pad
• (Add-ons tab) Map R1 and R2 rather than the R button from the DS keypad tab
• (Add-ons tab) Map the HUD Toggle to an available button of your preference
• (General hotkeys) Map Toggle fullscreen to an available button of your preference

DS Keys

These settings allow you to map the controls to the Nintendo DS.

First, select the controller you want to use by selecting it from the list at the bottom where it says "Joystick".

To map the controls, click on the button you want to configure and then press the corresponding button on your actual controller. I recommend using the left stick for the D-pad and mapping the other buttons as close to the original DS layout as possible for the best experience.

Config > Input and hotkeys > DS keypad

---

Hotkeys & HUD Toggle

Hotkeys can be used to bind emulator-specific functions to a button on your controller. In this case, the HUD Toggle function allows you to switch between HUD elements on the bottom screen.

I recommend binding this function to the right stick button (R3) for easy access.

Config > Input and hotkeys > General hotkeys

---

Touchscreen and Camera Controls

The touch screen is used to control the game's camera. These mappings emulate a swipe in the specified direction.

I recommend mapping the touchscreen controls to the right stick for the best experience.

Config > Input and hotkeys > Touch screen

---

Command Menu Controlls

This is where you set the controls for the Command Menu.
In KH Days, the Command Menu is normally controlled by holding down the X button and using the D-pad. This means that you would have to hold down the X button and then use the joystick to navigate the Command Menu.

Here you can set the command menu navigation for separate buttons, preferably the D-pad on your controller.

What happens when you use these buttons is that the program will automatically hold the X button for you so you can scroll through the command menu.

Config > Input and hotkeys > Command Menu

---

Video Settings

In this section you can adjust the rendering settings of the emulator. If you're not familiar with these options, it's best to leave them as they are.

For optimal performance, I recommend using the settings shown in the screenshot below. You can adjust the internal resolution to your personal preference. A higher resolution provides better visual quality but requires more processing power.

Config > Video Settings

---

Audio Settings

It's best to leave them as they are and just change the volume.

Config > Audio Settings

Screenshots

Gameplay

The World that never was

Twilight Town

---

Cutscenes

Prerendered cutscenes

Ingame cutscenes

The World that never was


Twilight Town

---

Menus

Main Menu

Pause Menu

Ability Menu

Tutorial Menu

Result Menu

[Keira Lunar]

Dedicated fans sure do the impossible sometimes hearing that Recoded is also in the works makes me wonder if they will revive that 100 floor dungeon that needed a connection with other players ?

[MGZeroes]

I like the unique style of the gameplay, but it is basically a recap of the events of KH1 and Chain of Memories.
The only really important cutscenes are the ones with Maleficent and Pete and the last ones.
A very important (and cool) secret cutscene related to dream drop distance has been added that is only in the remastered version.
But you would not really miss anything if you did not play/watch recoded.

Emulating you would have to use a regular DS emulator but i dont know how well they run the game.

For now, I would recommend watching the cutscenes, as the main story is preserved in the remaster.

I would prefer Melon Mix if it supports Recoded one day.

[BEYOND THE TIME]

Alright, sounds good.

And do you think it's worth it emulating and playing Re:Coded too? How important is that game to the story? Do the cutscenes in this release do it enough justice?

[MGZeroes]

All the fight scenes look kind of stupid considering the fight itself is skipped because you're just watching the cutscenes. They build up some cool conflicts, which then end abruptly because of that.
They made an extra cutscene for one of the final fights in the remastered version though.

And as far as I know.
In the remastered version, some of the game's text conversations were made into cutscenes, but some important story parts (also text conversations) were completely removed/not made into cutscenes: Saix's boss fight and Roxas finally freeing himself from Saix's torment .

Imo play the game first it would be a better experience.

[BEYOND THE TIME]

Should I watch the remastered cutscenes first then play the game? Or the other way around? What's the best way to experience this in your opinion?

[Barack Obama]

N

[Cebolinho つ◕_◕ つ]

<3

[Giorno]

Square really needs to port this