AGRABAH - CITY OF MYSTERY...

...Of Enchantment...: Here we delve into the secrets of Aladdin's world. Agrabah is straight out of the movie, and the layout is certainly reminiscent of the chase through the bazaar. There's more than just one jump ahead though, and certainly a great deal of new things to explore, and most of all, new themed enemies to fight. As you'll see, the story gains a new element of interest as you learn about the princesses, and check out how Jafar and Maleficent, two of Disney's leading magical villains, are actually pretty badass - at least in attitude. (Maleficent is better though, as we all know.)

PLAZA - WHO'S THERE?

New Enemies: Before we go into what enemies there are, just remember three things that will make your fights a lot easier: Cure, Aero, and Dodge Roll. These three should be at your disposal by now, so be sure to set the spells on your customized shortcuts, as well as equip Dodge Roll ability. That said, let's move on.

Bandit: Amongst the first enemies you encounter are the Bandits. They are turban wearing Heartless who bear scimitars. They have four basic attacks. First, they have a series of forward sword slashes that are pretty easy to avoid. Second, they do a spin attack that will be the bane of your fights against them. Similar to the Air Soldier attacks, they'll try and attack you from out of your camera range, either from behind or to the side. The third attack is another fairly easy to avoid twirl-and-slash that looks like it's dancing. It's still a little tough to get in hits when it's doing this, but they're sort of slow when they do this attack. The last attack they have is simply throwing their swords at you. You can hit the swords back for Tech Points. One other thing to remember is when you are doing your combos, that they often have the ability to block the last swing (just like those Air Soldiers!) and counterattack. Use the same tactics of smacking them around a little, backing off a second, and then delivering the final touches. When they come in groups, that's when you should worry about getting surrounded. Just as if they are Air Soldiers or Power Wilds, try to isolate and corner one or two and take them out. The main thing that will be a pain about these guys are their spin attacks, and the fact that they appear with the other most annoying enemy of this world.

Fat Bandit: Which are these guys, the Fat Bandits. Similar to the Large Body, these Heartless are vulnerable to physical attacks only from behind. They spew out fire, either in the form of a volley of fireballs, or in a large gout of flame. If you haven't guessed it yet, they are most vulnerable to the anti-element of fire: ice. Use Blizzard if you're a magic-using type of player, but be careful since your MP at this point isn't very high, and using too many spells will deplete the MP you might need for Cure. Don't forget that if you get too close, they'll swing their arms at you. These guys usually appear only one at a time, but they appear with Bandits. The combination of these two Heartless are pretty dangerous, so keep moving, and make use of the Aero spell to lower the damage of their attacks.

Pot Spider: These Heartless are just giant spiders in pots. Their legs bust out of the pots they hide in when you get close, so you'll automatically know which pieces of pottery are just that, and which aren't. These guys have two attacks: one is a short range strike with their legs, and the other is a headlong charge. When these guys appear, just whack at them and get them out of the picture as soon as possible so you can concentrate on the more dangerous Heartless.


Princess Jasmine: Once you've fought off the enemies that you first encounter, you'll be looking for Jasmine, our official first helpless princess of the game (Alice isn't technically a princess, but in this game she is one). First, if you're facing away from the Desert entrance, you'll see on your left is a door that leads to the Storage Room. Within that room is the Save Point. Do some saving here, so you don't have to watch that whole sequence with Jafar again if you die in the next battles. Head out of the Storage Room back into the Plaza. From the Plaza, take the next exit up ahead towards Main Street (you want to head into town, not out towards the Desert). From the Main Street area, you can fight the Pot Spiders and enemies for munny. When you're ready to find Jasmine, head left towards the Alley. Jasmine's hiding in one of the stalls. You'll meet her, and she'll tell you how Jafar booted her father out of power and is looking for the Keyhole. Cue Jafar's villain-like "appear from nowhere" entrance. He'll send his Heartless after you, which you get to fight off. Ever so valiantly, Jasmine runs from the battle. That's alright - she's not the character you use in Agrabah. Once you've finished disposing of the Heartless, you want to go find the guy Jasmine was swooning on about: Aladdin. But first you want to get out of this area and get back to the Main Street.

PLAZA - UNLOCKING THE GATES

Color Matching: Figuring out Agrabah requires unlocking the numerous gates around the city. There is a certain path to take for all of these keyholes, so you might get frustrated once in awhile if you get lost. The way to figure out which keyhole is unlocking which door is to check what is the color and pattern is on the gate and keyhole frames. Anyway, once the enemies that Jafar sent after you are finished off, locate the crates on your side near the entrance of the area you're in. Jump up on those crates onto the ledge above. You'll fight some Pot Spiders, and there'll be a treasure chest along with a green keyhole. Once those Pot Spiders are shattered, go unlock this keyhole. This will open a gate that has the same color pattern outline over its doorway. After you unlock this keyhole, look to your right and you'll see some wooden window shutters. Jump on both to the opposite ledge, but don't stand on the shutters too long or they'll break and you'll drop back to the floor. Once you're on the other side, defeat the Heartless that appear, and go through the green gate back to Main Street.

ALADDIN'S HOUSE - CARPET'S CONUNDRUM

Don't Get Your Tassels Tangled: From the Main Street, jump down to the bottom level. Don't worry about the other gates yet; first we want to get Aladdin. Across from the Alley entrance, turn back and on the right hand side will be a small doorway with a pole. This leads up to Aladdin's House. Go up the pole, and you'll be the abode of the street rat.

Free Willy! Er, Carpet!: Once you're in Aladdin's House, you'll notice that Carpet is stuck underneath a heavy piece of furniture. Push the furniture off to set Carpet free, and it'll fly off towards the Desert. Before you take off after the flying rug, look to the left side of the exit opposite from the poles. You'll see another piece of furniture bureau/drawer on the left, next to a green vase. Push the furniture aside to reveal a purple keyhole. Release that keyhole, and that will unlock a purple gate back in the Plaza.

Also Makes Julienned Fries: If you are running low on items, then here you have a chance to restock. Exit Aladdin's House, and then go back up the poles to find the shopkeeper. You'll probably recognize him from the beginning of Disney's Aladdin movie (those game developers did their research!) He'll sell you what your inventory needs by way of things to replenish HP and MP, but generally it's not anything you couldn't buy by going to Traverse Town.

DESERT - GETTING ALADDIN

Our friend, Al: Once you've unlocked the purple gate in the Plaza, head back out into the sandy desert. Go towards the Desert entrance, and after exiting you will find Carpet there, ready to take you out to rescue Aladdin. There will be a Save Point for you, which you can use before going with Carpet to get Aladdin. Once you're in the Desert, you'll be attacked by Heartless - particularly, Bandits. Since the area is fairly large, you can use the whole floor to fight these guys with. If you get into trouble, run off and Cure yourself. Once the Heartless are all disposed of, you'll go into another story scene. Pulling Aladdin out of the quicksand, you'll meet him and Genie.

PALACE GATES - THE MAZE OF KEYHOLES

Rat Race: Getting back to Agrabah, you'll end up back in the Plaza. The first thing is you'll be assaulted by are more Heartless. When you are through fighting the Heartless in the Plaza, head to the right where you'll see 2 crates stacked on top of each other. Jump up onto the ledge from the crate, and head to the left onto the pink awning. From there, jump straight to the green awning. Be careful not to fall down when you fight the Pot Spiders that pop out. When you get through, go through the Alley entrance.

Alley: There are Heartless occupying this area where you unlocked the green keyhole earlier. Once you've finished fighting them, jump across the two window shutters like before. If you fall off, jump back onto the ledge using the 2 crates stacked on the side. When you jump over the two window shutters to the other side, jump up the crates onto the ledge and proceed into the Main Street entrance.

Main Street: If you try to go to the Palace Gates now, you won't see a thing except Heartless. The goal when you get to Main Street is to get to Aladdin's House. In there, you'll get a brief story sequence about the Keyhole of Agrabah. Genie seems to know where it is - sort of. But, you still have to find Jafar to get Jasmine back. From Aladdin's House, jump through the middle exit to Main Street (there are two poles also leading to Main Street, which you can also take). You'll find yourself back outside on the floor of Main Street. Head to your left, turn the corner until you see the yellow pot with the wooden slab on top of it. Jump up the ledges until you get to the ledge with the pole leading up to Aladdin's House. Drop onto the purple awning, and then jump onto the yellow awning. You'll see a red gate that is locked right now. Pass it by, jumping from the yellow awning onto the blue awning. Run over the blue awnings to the white, then to the red awning beside it. When you get there, on your left you will see another door. Jump down onto that ledge, and head towards the Bazaar.

Bazaar: As long as you have Donald and Goofy, you can get the Blue Trinity on the floor of the area. There are a lot of Heartless so be careful when you are fighting them off. Once you've defeated the Heartless, get back up onto the ledge where you came from by jumping onto the 2 crates on the side and up onto the ledge. From there, jump onto the two window shutters to the other side. Be careful of the Heartless that will show up when you are jumping onto the various ledges; they'll try to knock you off. Jump onto the 2 crates on the other side of the Bazaar, the onto the ledge on your right. The ledge is a small ledge, so don't go running around or you'll fall off again. To your right will be a long ledge against the wall, where you'll see a treasure chest on the right and the red keyhole on the left. Jump onto that ledge, and get the treasure chest for a Fira Ring. Equip it, or give it to Donald or Goofy if you think the stats are not beneficial for Sora (if you have the Inferno Band from beating Cerberus, then keep the Inferno Band and give the Fira Ring to one of your other minions). Then, go to the left to release the red keyhole that opens the red gate out in Main Street. Once you've unlocked the red gate, jump back to the ledge below and head back to Main Street.

To the Palace: When you reach Main Street, get back onto the yellow awning by going the same path up the ledges from the wood-covered yellow pot. Before you head to confront Jafar, you might want to save at Aladdin's House and make sure your supplies are all in order. If you're good to go, then go through the red gate that you unlocked before, which leads to the Palace Gates. At the Palace Gates, you'll be looking down on Jafar and Jasmine from a high ledge. Stop Jafar (and tell him to let Jasmine go!) by jumping down from the ledge, which engages the story sequence ahead. He'll send his boss Heartless after you: the Pot Centipede.

Boss Battle - Pot Centipede: HP: 600, EXP: 250. The Pot Centipede isn't that hard, so long as you have Aero and Cure as some ready magic shortcuts, and Dodge Roll at your disposal. The first thing you want to do is cast Aero as the Pot Centipede starts to assemble. Then, start whacking away at the Pot Centipede's tail if you can, or head. The head is more dangerous. Try to destroy the Pot Spiders around you while keeping up with the Pot Centipede itself. It will move between the Palace Gates and the Main Street rooms. When the Pot Centipede is fully assembled, it will be at its most powerful. Aim at the body when it's assembled and destroy some of the Pot Spiders to break it apart again. Go for the tail instead of the head, since the tail is less defended. When you've broken up all the pots except for the pot that's holding Jasmine, the centipede will be a little harder to hit. Watch out for the electrified antennae it has, and don't forget to re-cast Aero when it runs out to lessen the damage you take. This boss isn't particularly hard, but you could also get overwhelmed by the many Pot Spiders that come down from above and attack you. Once you beat the Pot Centipede, you get an equippable Item called the Ray of Light.

CAVE OF WONDERS - DISTURBING SLUMBER

Prepare For A Rude Awakening: Before you head off to the Cave of Wonders, you can choose to get the Protera Chain that's in the Palace Gates area after you defeat the Pot Centipede. Return to the Palace Gates through the red gate you went through before, and jump from the pink awning onto the wooden awning ahead, and then onto the yellow awning ahead of you. On your right, there will be a chest with a Protera Chain that you can equip, or give to your minions. It's up to you to whether you want this item or not, but every little thing can contribute to your stats. From the Palace Gates, head back to the Plaza through Main Street, where you can recharge and save in the Storage Room. There will be Heartless along the way, if you want to battle them to level up before heading to the next step of Agrabah - the Cave of Wonders. Also, you have the option of going back to Aladdin's House, where you will find the shopkeeper from before. You can buy some supplies from him and get restocked, but his inventory is pretty limited compared to Traverse Town.

Boss Battle - Cave of Wonders Guardian: HP: 380, EXP: 400. When you get to the Desert, you'll see a small dune ahead. Going up to it, the guardian of the Cave of Wonders, the tiger head, roars out of the sand. It's possessed by the Heartless, and you'll have to punch it a few times in the eyes to get it to snap out of it. Now, it's not as easy as it looks. The first thing is to Cast Aero! This spell will save your butt during this fight, because there's going to be a lot of attacks coming from all sorts of sides as you try to work your way up to the head of the guardian. It has two main attacks: the first are the beams of dark energy that will shoot out of its eyes. These beams will follow you around like homing missiles, but you can Dodge Roll out of the way at the last moment to avoid getting hit. The second attack is an undodgeable sand breath attack that you will get caught in if you're not behind the guardian, or on its head. You have a couple of opportunities to get onto the guardian's head. You could do as we do, and run behind the guardian's head to try and run up the back. Or, you could wait for the guardian to drop its muzzle down into the sand and jump onto the nose there. Lock onto one of the eyes, and continue to strike the eyes until you whack the Heartless out of the guardian. This would be an easy fight, except of a trump card. There are Bandits that pop out of the sand and attack you. They're really dangerous if you're not paying attention to your health meters. Be careful of them, and whack away at them if you need some HP and MP, but you're best off keeping some Potions in you and your minions' inventories. On Expert Mode, this boss can be quite frustrating simply because the Bandits come in droves and their attacks do quite a bit of damage, along with the eye beams from the guardian. So, don't underestimate this boss; if you are dying too fast, even with Aero and Cure on your side, then you probably want to go back into Agrabah to level up.

CAVE OF WONDERS - MONKEY BUSINESS

Chambers Underground: Before going through the top levels of the Cave of Wonders, you'll notice that there's quite a drop into a seemingly bottomless pit. Actually, down below are the underground chambers of the Cave of Wonders. From the Entrance, you can drop down into the levels below. Rather than waste your time going through Heartless to find you have to go down to the underground chambers anyway, just go straight down there. Swim into the Dark Chamber, which is the room with the Save Point. Get up onto the Save Point, and switch Aladdin if your party if you don't have him already in there. You'll need him in the next steps to come.

Silent Chamber: Once you have Aladdin in your party, swim up the waterfall next to you to head into the Silent Chamber. Once you enter the Silent Chamber, on your right you'll see a monkey statue holding a jewel in the part of the chamber adjacent. Swim that way, to enter a part of the Silent Chamber. Once in there, climb up onto the stairs and Touch the jewel on the monkey statue. This will open a gate above. From there, head back into the Dark Chamber by way of the Relic Chamber exit.

Relic Chamber: The chest in the Relic Chamber holds a Thundara Ring, which can be equipped. Go onto the stairs on your right, and face the monkey statue and Call Abu. This will move the stairs beside the statue down into the water. Get onto the stairs that just came down and through the passage back towards the Dark Chamber.

Dark Chamber: You'll find yourself in the Dark Chamber again, but in a side pocket. There's a statue here as well, which you Call Abu to touch the gem, and it will lower the wall that opens the Dark Chamber up. On the wall is a chest that gives you a Protega Chain to equip to your defenses. From there, go back towards the Save Point. On the narrow ledge, the treasure chest contains a Torn Page, which is one of the pages that you will need to return to Merlin back in Traverse Town (remember that Old Book?) At the Save Point, switch Aladdin out for Donald, and head back towards the Silent Chamber.

Pillar of Fire: From the Silent Chamber, you want to get onto the stairs. There, you'll see a Blue Trinity (hence why you have Donald in your party again). Then, jump down into the water ahead of you and swim towards the dark passage into the Hidden Room. When you're in the room, you'll see a giant pillar on the side. Swim up to the stairs, and turn the camera so you are seeing the pillar. When you examine it, you'll get a message that it probably goes all the way to the top. Cast Fire at the pillar, which makes part of it blow up and lowers a section of a room up above it. You'll get a cutscene with Jafar and Genie next. Now you're pretty much done here in the lower sections for now - you can get chests when you come back after you have some extra abilities that will let you get to them.

CAVE OF WONDERS - REVEALED TREASURES

The Treasure Room: The order of the upper halls in the Cave of Wonders go like this: Entrance, Hall, Bottomless Hall, Treasure Room. There is a clear entrance and exit to each of these rooms. Each room has its sets of Heartless that will sometimes knock you off into the underground chambers. If you get knocked off, just go up the stairs that will take you to various spots in the Hall. You want to make your way into the Treasure Room. The treasure chests you can come back to get but there are a couple that you want to get in the Treasure Room. Once you're in the Treasure Room, there will be a Save Point. You can take this opportunity to activate the Red Trinity located in the room, and after that switch Aladdin into your party. Use Abu to activate the monkey statues in here. Activating each statue results in the wooden mask opening its mouth and blowing Sora up onto the piles of treasure. Activate the right side monkey statue to get Puppies, and activating the left monkey statue gets you the other chests in the room. Get the green chest atop the fireplace to get a Defense Up. Use that Defense Up on Sora, and then make sure you are prepared to fight Jafar. That means fix up your inventory, shortcuts, and Save your game. When you're ready, head on into the Lamp Chamber.

Boss Battle - Jafar: HP: 500, EXP: 600. Jafar here isn't tough, but he does have help. Genie helps Jafar here, but Genie will warn you before he hits you so you can Dodge Roll away from Genie's attack, and if you get hit by genie you will get HP, MP and munny balls in return. Avoid the stone ring center of the room, since that is where Jafar's magical attacks will center. Jafar floats around along the edge and avoid him until he floats near a ledge where you can jump up and attack him. Be careful of Jafar's snake staff attack, which shoots a laser beam that hurts you if you get hit by it. Dodge Roll out of the way to avoid it. Your minions may not be of much help at all, since they end up getting hit by Jafar's magic attacks in the middle of the room most of the time. You could probably keep them alive longer by pressing the triangle button on your controller to call them to your side, or focus them on Jafar instead of Genie. Keep moving throughout the entire fight. Don't bother with using magic spells when Jafar is out of your reach - rather, save your magic for healing yourself and if you want to spare, your party members. There are a couple of ledges that Jafar will float close to that you can jump up on and whack at him with. Otherwise, this battle is simply a matter of patience and lots of Dodge Rolling. Truth be told, Jafar is one of the easiest bosses in this game. Really. Winning this battle gives you Blizzara.

Save!: After the fight, go back to the Treasure Room and use the Save Point to save your game. Restock items if you need to, and when you're done, head back to the Lamp Chamber. You'll see that Jafar is gone, and Jasmine is unconscious next to the world keyhole. Go towards her, to trigger the next sequence where you get to fight... yep, you if you know the movie, you'll guess it: Genie Jafar. (When will he ever learn?)

Boss Battle - Genie Jafar: Jafar turns into a genie and your job is to get the lamp from Iago, Jafar's own little minion. Iago will fly around the chamber carrying the lamp and you have to chase him. The difficulty here lies in the shifting ledges of the room to various heights so sometimes Iago will be out of reach if you don't get there in time. Add to that, Jafar throws giant fireballs at you. You can Dodge Roll them, but likely that Donald and Goofy will get the brunt of the attack. You can also drop behind the ledges to avoid the fireball. Be Sure To Cast AERO, or you'll be hearing the HP alarm bells. When the HP on Jafar gets low, sometimes Iago will drop the lamp. If you can, go to the lamp and smack it as many times as you can while Iago is down. You can hit Jafar a little bit with Blizzara, but your main target should be the lamp because the damage to Genie Jafar is insignificant compared to the damage you can do if you hit the lamp. You can't fall in the lava so don't worry about that (unlike Mario.) Genie Jafar has basically 3 attacks. He can: 1) hit you, 2) shoot a column of fire at you, or 3) throw a big fireball at you. Aside from that, Genie Jafar is probably even less difficult than fighting Jafar the first time, though you'll have to jump around a lot. For winning this battle, you will gain an upgrade from Fire to Fira, as well as Ansem's Report 1.

Magic Carpet Ride: Once you defeat Genie Jafar, the Cave of Wonders will start to crumble. You get to do a fun (albeit short) carpet ride out of this popsicle stand. Use the circle button to flip over obstacles and barrel roll around pillars of flame. Aside from that though, sometimes this section is just too short. Carpet's awesome - not enough airtime there.

AGRABAH - REGROUP AND RETREAT

Regroup: You all regroup in Aladdin's House, where you'll receive three important things: Genie as a summon, the Three Wishes keyblade, and the Green Trinity ability. Once you have these three, you can go back through Agrabah and get the chests you missed. You'll probably notice that there aren't any Heartless to bother you, and instead there are a couple of actual inhabitants that appear now that the shadows are gone from the city. Before you leave this world, head to the Storage Room in the Plaza to activate the Green Trinity located inside next to the Save Point. That trinity will give you a Power Up, which you can use on Sora to increase your Strength stat. Once you've done what you need to do, it's time to get out of here. Head back to your gummi ship via the Save Point, and go on to the next worlds.

Traverse Town Retreat: When you finish Agrabah, you'll find a Torn Page amongst the items that you've acquired. You have the choice to go back to Traverse Town, to return this page to Merlin's old book. You don't have to do this now, though if you feel like following Goofy's words then go back to the Magician's Study in Traverse Town (3rd District) and open up the old book to engage in Winnie the Pooh's world, the Hundred Acre Wood. If you choose not to go back to Traverse Town, then proceed on your way.

End: Agrabah.