Interview with Tetsuya Nomura, producer of “Kingdom Hearts 4” reveals more information regarding the series

Gameinformer has posted an interview with “Kingdom Hearts 4” Producer Tetsuya Nomura, the main points are as of follow:

• “Heart” is still the core element and theme of the “Kingdom Hearts” storyline.

• Kingdom Hearts had most of its endings to be written as “resolving an incident” and “revealing a new mystery”, it was made so that the players can get better understand the key points for the next storyline. This isn’t something unique, as most game developers will take it into consideration.

• He loves the suspense created by the plot writing, one is the ending of the first Kingdom Hearts, because most players were not expecting the storyline to continue.The other one was the ending of Kingdom Hearts 3, when Luxu takes off his helmet. The fans’ strong reaction to these plots was something Mr. Tetsuya Nomura would love to see.
  
• It was unexpected that the characters from 358/2 Days and Birth By Sleep will get such popularity. They thought that the players would want to know more about Sora and Riku’s storyline. But in Kingdom Hearts 4, the storyline starts with Sora’s disappearance, we might be getting some space to elaborate on the storyline of other characters.
  
  
  

  

  

  

  
  

   

• When Sora was officially announced as the last DLC fighter in “Super Smash Bros Ultimate”, the reactions on the internet was mostly “I couldn’t believe Disney actually agreed on that!”, but in fact, Mr. Nomura was the one that was actually being hesitant, as he thinks that there will be a clash in the world setting. Whereas Disney was actually saying stuff like “Go get it! Its a rare opportunity!”, and has gotten a great result in the end.

• The existence of antagonists has added quite some depth and density to the game’s plot. The developer team loves using the slow and gradual approach to build up their characters. For example, the “Heart” themed KH1 last boss Ansem, the “Body” themed KH2 last boss Xemnas, they both originated from the same character, and finally lead to the existence of Xehanort. Thus for the Lost Master arc in KH4, the developer team will still be creating new antagonists, reintroducing characters that has already appeared in KH2.8, and will also introduce new characters, not much information can be disclosed as of now.
  
  
• Although most of the spinoff titles feature main characters that aren’t Sora, but he is the only main character in the mainline series, and bears great importance to the series itself.

• KH4 will still feature Disney worlds, worry not fans, you will know that it is still the Kingdom Hearts that you used to know once you’ve tried it. But with the enhanced graphics and rendering, the quality and standards are also on the rise. The developer team wishes to present more content graphically, thus they might limit the amount of worlds featured in the game. The developer team is currently still discussing on the matter itself.

• The concept of KH4 was already been thought of since the development phase of KH3, regarding which characters to feature, worlds, and systems. They are always considering what systems to be changed and improvised. For example, the Reaction Command system in KH2 wasn’t greatly accepted by the fanbase, but when they removed it in KH3, a large portion of fans felt dissatisfied on the change, thus they are planning to reimplement the said system in KH4.

• Players will spend quite an amount of time in the Quadratum, as it is the base for players to visit other worlds and return to. Fans can expect more tidbits from Sora’s daily life.
  
  
• Many fans believe that Kingdom Hearts is actually the crossover series between Final Fantasy and Disney, but that wasn’t the fundamental concept of KH, and it wasn’t what the game wanted to present. The first KH game had very few original characters, thus they need the assistance from FF characters to let players know them better. But it has come to a state now where the original character roster is large enough and it became somewhat hard to slot in FF characters in the plot anymore. The developer team understands that the fans are dissatisfied that the FF characters wasn’t as emphasised in KH3, and they wish to seek for a decent balance of both sides in KH4, as of how they are going to execute it is yet to be known.

• They are trying their best to start the closed beta of Kingdom Hearts Missing Link within 2022, as many fans might not be interested in mobile games, but the developer team is trying make it into a game where everyone can enjoy and play it well, and it has many connections to Kingdom Hearts 4.
  

Link to the original interview can be found here :
https://www.gameinformer.com/exclusive-interview/2022/06/14/nomura-reveals-more-on-kingdom-hearts-iv-and-the-series-future-with