Sora’s Drive Forms and Formchanges, Ranked

Summary

  • Drive Form & Formchanges enhance Sora’s abilities, each with unique strengths and drawbacks.
  • Anti Form is an uncontrollable dark transformation that limits Sora’s options and acts as a penalty during battles.
  • Guardian Form prioritizes defense, offering passive abilities to protect allies and counter enemies effectively.

The Kingdom Hearts series has shown Sora’s growth throughout his adventures. The growing endangerment of multiple worlds forced the young keyblade wielder to unlock abilities to purify the darkness. This need would guide him through adventures to acquire the power to maintain his Drive for some form of peace.

Drive Form and Formchanges increase Sora’s stats and skills, similar to a super saiyan in Dragon Ball Z, but with less yelling. They have their own strengths, like Drive Form’s variety of equipped keyblade abilities and Formchange’s variety of weapon forms. Some cons do hold these forms back, like Drive Form’s dependence on Drive Gauge, and how Formchange types are locked to certain keyblades. But all these transformations are powerful, even the less popular ones.

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11

Anti Form

Consumed Darkness



Kingdom Hearts 2

Systems

PC-1 PlayStation-1

Released

March 28, 2006

Developer(s)

Square Enix

  • Drive Cost: Every Drive
  • Design: Darkness

Anti Form is the only special drive transformation beyond Sora’s control. It’s never selectable, since its activation is based on an invisible meter. Using other Drive Forms will influence when the Anti-Form unleashes, raising the meter’s percentage each time Sora selects a Drive Form.

Once the form activates, Sora disregards his friends, abilities, items, and keyblade for darkness. He fights opponents with his limbs, using all his might to scratch and kick like a Shadow Heartless. This special form locks Sora out of his magical items and ability to heal, until his Drive Gauge depletes to zero. There’s no way to turn off the form unless the player is outside of battle. It’s more of a punishment than a benefit.

10

Guardian Form

Protector Of Allies



Kingdom Hearts 3

Released

January 25, 2019

OpenCritic Rating

Mighty

  • Keyblades: Hero’s Origin, Classic Tone, Hunny Spout
  • Design: Yellow

Guardian Form enhances Sora’s defense, giving him more opportunities to take damage before returning the favor to his foes. It provides more passive abilities, like Second Chance and Withstand Combos. It even enhances Sora’s guard to protect all around him rather than being restricted to his front.

Guardian is the best Form to keep Sora and his allies safe while turning his disadvantage into his advantage. It can be used in any combat, but relies on patience and knowledge of when to defend and strike back. Hero’s Origin can take a lot of damage with its strong shielding properties before returning the damage to the enemies.

9

Wisdom Form

Magical Breeze

  • Appears In: Kingdom Hearts 2
  • Drive Cost: 3
  • Design: Blue

Wisdom form requires the power of Sora’s magical partner to increase Sora’s magic casting and speed. It is the weaker Drive Form in terms of strength, but its magic power is overwhelming. It’s one of the earlier Drive Forms that keeps the user’s momentum while attacking.

Wisdom Form is good at zoning opponents with strong ranged attacks, but it isn’t limitless. Draining too much magic can leave the user vulnerable, since his greatest tool is on cooldown. Leveling up Wisdom Form rewards Sora with magical buffs in his base form, letting him gain more magic faster with MP Rage and MP Haste. He even gains Quick Run, which gives invincible frames during the animation to escape hostile attacks.

8

Rage Form

Eternal Hatred

  • Appears In: Kingdom Hearts 3
  • Keyblades: Any
  • Design: Darkness

Rage Form is the only formchange accessible during Sora’s critical condition. When Sora takes 70% damage, there’s a chance for it to appear randomly. It is the only transformation to heal Sora while giving him defensive options with Dark Barrier and Teleport Dash. Like Anti Form, it raises Sora’s speed and combos at the cost of other options like items, summons, links, and keyblade changes. It forces him to depend on physical attacks while limiting his magical and bond abilities, yet gives one extra benefit.

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Sora can use riskcharge to deal more damage at the cost of 50% of health. It stacks up to three times before its final move annihilates groups of enemies around the tainted user. It does leave the user low on health. Using the form’s ultimate move will deactivate Sora’s rage.

7

Element Form

Magical Expert

  • Appears In: Kingdom Hearts 3
  • Keyblades: Shooting Star, Ever After
  • Design: Blue

Element Form strengthens Sora’s magical prowess, letting him zone opponents from afar with aerial drifting. It’s more effective than Wisdom Form, since Sora’s attacks are stronger with a wider radius. He can even continue his combos without hitting an enemy, increasing his zoning potential.

It unlocks unique abilities to strengthen his magic casting efficiencies, like Leaf Bracer, MP Hastega, Magic Galvanizer, and Magic Combo Thrift. Ever After is one of the best keyblades, making Sora feel like an overpowered wizard.

6

Strike Form

Omega Striker

  • Appears In: Kingdom Hearts 3
  • Keyblades: Favorite Deputy, Happy Gear, Wheel of Fate
  • Design: Red

Strike Form relies on physical attacks, increasing Sora’s offensive abilities to deal tons of damage to groups of enemies. Its significance is its high strength power and greater AOE attacks, since it gives Sora the fewest abilities of all Formchanges.

One great benefit to this form is Omega Finale, which lets Sora end combos earlier to knock back opponents and stop his aggression. This is extremely useful against foes with superarmor that would prepare their counterattacks during Sora’s offense.

5

Second Limit

Old Reliable

  • KH2 Drive Cost: 4
  • KH3 Keyblades: Kingdom Key, Starlight, Phantom Green, Midnight Blue, Dawn Till Dusk
  • Design: (Limit) KH colors, (Second) KH 2 colors

The Second and Limit forms make Sora reminisce on his past adventures, unlocking his old techniques. His fighting style shifts, making him more grounded with his nostalgic moves like Sonic Blade, Zantetsuken, Explosion, Air Raid, and more. He can even dodge roll, giving him an extra defense option.

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What’s great about both forms is their easy accessibility and rewards. Limit Form is the only Drive Form that doesn’t require a partner cost. Both forms grant abilities like Lucky Strike and Draw to earn more treasures from enemies, rewarding Sora with more items to collect, especially the rare ones.

4

Blitz Form

Speed Of Sound

  • Appears In: Kingdom Hearts 3
  • Keyblades: Crystal Snow, Grand Chef, Nano Gear
  • Design: Green

Blitz Form makes Sora’s attacks more portable. Glide, Superslide, and HP Walker are unique abilities that enhance Sora’s agility and movement options. He can easily carry opponents around with combos to split enemy groups or move away from stronger attacks while dishing out his own damage.

It does well against bosses or stronger foes, since its AOE attacks don’t hit as hard as other formchanges. Crystal Snow and Grand Chef work very well in picking up each enemy and separating them from groups. Nano Gear utilizes momentum by shapeshifting its form quickly, combining attacks from other weapons to trap more foes in combos.

3

Valor Form

Key In Strength

  • Appears In: Kingdom Hearts 2
  • Drive Cost: 3
  • Design: Red

Valor form introduced Sora to dual keyblade mastery. It raises Sora’s attack power and combos at the cost of his physically strong partner. It also gives Sora access to Omega Finale, while increasing Sora’s ground speed and jump height to diminish escape routes for any prey.

This accessible Drive Form provides great buffs for its small cost. Leveling up Sora’s Valor form will also strengthen his base form, including his jump height and combo count. Since Sora can equip any dual keyblades together, he can utilize two keyblade abilities during combat.

2

Double Master

Sign Of Mastery

  • KH2 Drive Cost: 4
  • KH3 Keyblades: Oathkeeper, Oblivion
  • Designs: (Master) Yellow & Black, (Double) White & Darkness

Master Drive and Double Form showcase Sora’s growth over his keyblade mastery. Both utilize previous forms for grander physical and magical strengths in battle. Armies of Heartless stand no chance of stopping the dual keyblades that swing around every angle.

Both forms are fantastic options for any scenario, including the later moments of the games. They even have great defensive options with Double Form’s Barrier and Master form’s Aerial Dodge.

1

Final Ultimate

Absolute Instinctive Mastery

  • KH2 Drive Cost: 5
  • KH3 Keyblades: Ultima Weapon
  • Design: Light

Final Drive and Ultimate Form combine the stats and abilities of every previous form to reach Sora’s peak power. He doesn’t even have to touch his weapons to annihilate anything in his path. It is required for Sora to obtain the ultima weapon for his Ultimate form, which has demanding requirements, unlike Final form. The best Drive form is random at first, but stays unlocked for Sora to activate any time, unlike Anti Form.

Both provide the most combo routes and coverage, though Ultimate form drastically increases its radius with waves of swords. He can even teleport to his targets, restricting any form of escape for his foes. It is a better upgrade of Sora’s true potential than Final Form.

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