Arcee "For us hardcore console owners and fans, the lack of a Kingdom Hearts sequel on consoles is getting to be pretty tiresome. I use a plural to describe the disgruntled Kingdom Hearts fans out there because I know I am not alone in this."
Trying to break into Kingdom Hearts is a nightmare.
My advice; play the games in release order. Alot of people say story chronological order but that can be really confusing. Trust me.
I think a problem that SE is going to run into (or already has run into) with this series is that a lot of the people still following it were kids / teens when they played the first one, and are now much older. I know I'm finding it increasingly hard to tolerate the childishness of some of the stuff in these games, and I'm sure there are plenty of original players who have since just stopped following the series for this reason. I can't count the number of times I was playing KH3 and just feeling like, "What the f*** am I doing?"
SE can keep the series PG-13, and try to get a new audience of kids, but how do they intend to get kids into a series with a story that has been expanding since 2002, and over the course of like a dozen games? Especially when there are already loads of newer franchises out there that have already pretty much cornered the kids / teens market.
Honestly, I think they should either end the series once and for all, or take it in a more mature direction, and ditch the Disney stuff (I know, unpopular opinion, probably). It is a series that hasn't really grown with its audience, I feel. Alternatively, they could try to steer it in a more all-ages Studio Ghibli direction, sort of like Final Fantasy.
I felt this way with KH3 as well, ended up dropping it around half way through. I won't even bother with KH4.
Same here. Kingdom Hearts 3’s dialog was way to childish for me and I only played just to finish the story and wrap up the near 15 year wait.
I doubt I would be buying any other games unless they go in a more mature (all-ages) direction as OP said.
you gotta remember Disney has to sign off on everything they do with KH. Disney is super protective of their IP,
Either way I don't disagree with you on a lot of this stuff becoming more and more of an issue. But it's okay that fans grow out of things like this. But if they do decide to keep it more for the young audience then they will have to solve the problem that the article mentions.
Yeah, I just don't know what they could do to get all the kids invested in it at this stage. The only thing I can think of is a total reboot, but that would be an enormous project, and they clearly have no intention of doing it. I mean, the series has just embarked upon another "saga", which, if it's anything like the last "saga", will take another 2 decades to complete, will consist of 6+ games, and will convolute the overall narrative even further (if that's even possible). It seems to me that, if this is SE's plan, and if they want people to still care about the series in 5-6 years time, then their only real option is to try to appeal more to a non-adolescent audience. Otherwise, the kids won't care because they won't have a clue what's going on, and the adults won't care because the series is too childish.
Having said all that, the Yozora stuff, and the footage we've seen from KH4, does seem to MAYBE indicate that the series is going in the direction I'm talking about, but it's too early to say for sure. KH4 might look completely different the next time we see it, knowing SE.
Kingdom hearts 3 is horrible ..that's why you felt that way. It's the worst in the series by far.
My issue is with the decline of the writing which has been an issue for Square-Enix games across the board. KH3 should have gone out with a bang and felt very satisfying, but instead it was like a wet tissue and left feeling like I missed a lot of content. Having said that, KH3 was probably the last KH game I'll purchase.
Im playing 3 as my first one and I got that same feeling. Enjoying the variety and combat but im not into the story...too confusing.
Indeed. If you wanna give it a try, just go with 1-3. The other games are unfortunately needed to know but you can just youtube all the cutscenes by order of release of each game.
One of the biggest TV and movie tropes in the last decade has been the multiverse, the idea of exploring multiple dimensions to uncover alternate versions of existing ideas. From both a business and creative perspective, it makes sense why established franchises are shaking things up in this way.
However, there aren't many video games latching on to this trend, as rendering multiple worlds in real-time is a difficult feat and the medium is relatively young in comparison to its contemporaries, making crossover opportunities more difficult. Still, there are a few great titles that manage enough to overcome these challenges, and here are some of the best examples.
While I love someone mentioning Planescape, not really multiverse. Planes and dimensions, yes. But, they are typically their own locations and are very rarely tied to another 'verse' let alone another plane. The only things that are directly tied are the ethereal and material planes. Otherwise, they are dimensions created of their own design and goals by the creator/owner and not comprised of 'their own version of another dimension'.
NP: “When I played through Final Fantasy XVI, I occasionally found what I believed to be evident Kingdom Hearts gameplay inspirations that I’d rather not detail here due to spoilers. Still, with it having been previously confirmed that Kingdom Hearts staff was working on this title, the notion wasn’t all that surprising.
However, I didn’t realize how truly instrumental Kingdom Hearts team members were in developing Final Fantasy XVI. After digging through the title’s credits, I found crucial Kingdom Hearts development staff who played significant roles in ensuring the combat design excelled.”
My cousin and younger sister were both fans of KH once upon a time. Not anymore though, they've lost interest. They never really cared to play all the handheld spin-offs and are now totally confused by the story. They just can't bother anymore, on top of KH3 taking TOO DAMN LONG to get here. I'm not giving up yet though. I need to see how it all ends.
People despise Square for FF related missteps, but for me it's for how they've treated KH.
"Kingdom Hearts III it will pick up directly where Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance will leave off. Basically, much like with Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories and Kingdom Hearts II, you would have had to play the previous console games and the portable games to get the full understanding of the story for Kingdom Hearts III."
Well... It's a series. Is that not the point of a series? To continue on with the story...?
--LONG POST AHEAD-- *Spoilers too*
I really can't stand this series anymore honestly.
The original Kingdom Hearts to me is an RPG classic, if anything because it took the odd concept of Disney plus Square Soft and made it work incredibly well. The characters were enjoyable, combat was functional, creating gummy ships was addicting and the simple plot was refreshing compared to other games that become almost over saturated with plot. I couldn't wait for Kingdom Hearts 2 after the cliffhanger of the first ending. I really wanted to find Riku again, see Kairi and defeat the Heartless for good.
Then came Chain of Memories. I already had a GBA, so the need for another platform didn't bother me, though I did have a couple of friends who missed out because of it. Garbage card system aside I was pretty indifferent to the game. The Organization was an interesting concept (before learning they were Nobodies) that I didn't mind, the memories being affected/implanted/removed by Namine was cool (imho), and later playing as Riku and learning of his struggle with darkness was neat. I hated the whole 'Puppet Riku' though and the ending although necessary, came off to me as lame. Oh well though, this is a side story right? Just give me KH2!
When the second game came around I was pumped up; I had been waiting four years for the game. I dove right into the game, though my friends who had not played COM struggled with understanding some of the plot points. Data and Tech stuff aside at the beginning, which I found odd, I was refreshed by the return to the familiar game play style and enjoyed the new command system with Triangle. I didn't even mind playing as this strange new Roxas character.
Then Nobodies happened.
Nobodies are the shells of powerful beings that lost their heart...okay, makes sense, I didn't mind a new enemy besides the Heartless, just let me find Riku and Kairi and defeat the Heartless to save the world. Then the Organization shows up and Yen Sid tells me they were actually powerful Nobodies...that somehow aren't white blobs like the rest, okay...at this point I'm wondering what direction the series is going. Then they showed me the forms like Valor and I was pumped, the plot went to the back of my head. So more plot happens, Ansem was just Xeanhort's Heartless which at that point I didn't even care because so much other crap is going on, Organization is made up of old lab members of Ansem the Wise, Goofy "dies" for like half a second, awesome huge Heartless fight, Organization has Kairi, Axel dies, Pete and Maleficent show up out of nowhere, meet Riku (the high point for the last several hours of game play for me), fight Organization members, wonder why the hell Kairi is using a keyblade, end game boss is neat, roll credits.
At this point I'm torn between how much I enjoyed playing the game and how little was resolved from the first game. I have Kairi and Riku back, but pretty much nothing was done about the Heartless and the once simple and enjoyable plot has now had a clusterfuck of other crap thrown on it. It's not even good, deep plot, it's large amounts of shallow, non fleshed out garbage. Whatever, just give me KH3 and some closure.
KH3 is taking too long. The end. Too many spin-offs and it's getting frustrating.
So sad that this game is probably not even yet in development and it has been over 6 years since 2