News ► Nomura: Kingdom Hearts 3 Development Reportedly is "Relatively Advanced"

[Chaser]

French website Gameblog were lucky to interview Tetsuya Nomura who is currently working on both Kingdom Hearts 3 and Final Fantasy VII Remake. Recently Kingdom Hearts 3 had it's development moved to Unreal Engine 4, and with Final Fantasy VII's remake announced, some were worried that development on both titles will be strained.

Gameblog asked Nomura about this, to which he confirmed that both titles are being developed by two separate teams, therefore no interference between the two schedules should occur. He also said that Kingdom Hearts 3 is at a relatively advanced level of development, and development won't take his time away from Final Fantasy VII.

@reishikii has kindly translated parts of the article and provided a summary for us!

Tetsuya Nomura himself says that he wants to take a different approach with the gameplay. The biggest challenge for him is to change the elements of FFVII without denaturing the original game. He thinks some aspects of the game needs to be evolved, like the design of the characters. He then says that he'll be able to work on both KHIII and FFVII as a director and that the two games are developed by two different teams. 

At last, Tetsuya Nomura says since there are two different teams working on KHIII and FFVII Remake, neither of the two games will be delayed. KHIII is relatively advanced while the FFVII Remake is at the early stages of development.

No doubt this just refers to Kingdom Hearts 3 being further along in development than Final Fantasy VII Remake, however with the recent news of Disney working closely to ensure that the Disney worlds in Kingdom Hearts 3 are faithfully recreated, maybe it's almost time for full promotion of the game to start?

Disney working closely with Square Enix to create Kingdom Hearts 3 has been mentioned a few times. Nomura himself mentioned it in the interview with Engadget:

Compared to previous titles that we folded into Kingdom Hearts, we have a lot of creators still alive. The process of gaining approvals then is pretty different. Because the animation studios are actively involved, we want to polish up anything we meet to the standards we demand, before taking it to Disney to approval.

Then there was Nomura revealing he's just talked to Disney about what world to reveal next, and that it might be soon!

Nomura just met with Disney about what world they could announce after Tangled; they might be able to announce the next official world in Kingdom Hearts 3 soon!

And finally we have Greg Coleman, VP, Worldwide Marketing and Franchise Management for Walt Disney Animation Studios and Roy Conli, Producer of Tangled at Walt Disney Animation Studios announcing during the Tangled reveal that;

Coleman: "We're working with the best animated story tellers, and the best game developers in the world to put this out."

Conli: "And I'm incredibly proud because this is my film, the film that I produced, that I love, is going to be the first one in a series, it's called Tangled. We have this amazing partnership between Square Enix and Disney and the fact that Square Enix is really trying to bring it to life with the same integrity that we brought it to life with. It's going to be cool."

 What's your take on the information? Think we'll be seeing Kingdom Hearts 3 next year or does it need some more time in the oven?

 

[Org14Kurix(Riku)]

KHIII is relatively advanced while the FFVII Remake is at the early stages of development.

YES
This is the greatest news ever. This also supports the December/Winter 2016 Calendar/Leaked Trailer Theory.
I think the big question right now is how people would feel with thoughts that what we saw is "advanced" so to speak?

 

[gosoxtim]

this means they are not going to start on ff7 until he thinks kh3 is okay to give tai yasue then right?

 

[Chaser]

YES
This is the greatest news ever.

I wouldn't be so quick to take it at face value, lots of things Nomura says in Japanese often are altered through Japanese -> English translation, and this has been through Japanese -> English -> French -> English. He's probably just comparing it to the development of FFVII. KH3 is more advanced than FFVII is at this stage haha.

I mean, if it's true, then fantastic, I look forward to seeing more of their work and anticipate it coming out soon. If not, well no harm in this, we kind of get a feel of where FFVII is at (and they're at a stage where they actually can show screenshots and whatnot from FFVII which is even more fantastic for VII)

this means they are not going to start on ff7 until he thinks kh3 is okay to give tai yasue then right?

What do you mean? They've already started work on VII, they even have it to a point where they can show it off but decided not to at this stage. We'll see actually stuff from it later this year in Winter. Nomura is able to work both projects. Like he said, there's two different teams and KH3 won't take time from VII.

 

[Lnds500]

I am really surprised. They seem to be moving fast but I still wouldn't expect the game to launch in 2016, it kinda seems crazy!

I hope they take time to polish it though. Small details here and there will make a huge difference. Nor do I want them to cut content to improve shipping time.

 

[Org14Kurix(Riku)]

I wouldn't be so quick to take it at face value, lots of things Nomura says in Japanese often are altered through Japanese -> English translation, and this has been through Japanese -> English -> French -> English. He's probably just comparing it to the development of FFVII. KH3 is more advanced than FFVII is at this stage haha.

I mean, if it's true, then fantastic, I look forward to seeing more of their work and anticipate it coming out soon. If not, well no harm in this, we kind of get a feel of where FFVII is at (and they're at a stage where they actually can show screenshots and whatnot from FFVII which is even more fantastic for VII)


What do you mean? They've already started work on VII, they even have it to a point where they can show it off but decided not to at this stage. We'll see actually stuff from it later this year in Winter. Nomura is able to work both projects. Like he said, there's two different teams and KH3 won't take time from VII.

Fair enough. I got a little carried away. I, just like most of us here, just want an excellent game even if it means being a little patient. I still wish KHx was released during E3 or we got a release date. I think that was my only disappointment during E3.

I am really surprised. They seem to be moving fast but I still wouldn't expect the game to launch in 2016, it kinda seems crazy!

I hope they take time to polish it though. Small details here and there will make a huge difference. Nor do I want them to cut content to improve shipping time.

Content we'd later have to purchase as DLC -_-

 

[Chaser]

Nor do I want them to cut content to improve shipping time.

'Final Fantasy VII': The challenge of remaking a classic

So you could flip the genders of say, Yuffie?

TN: Nothing that drastic! But there will be changes. More than me, [Producer Yoshinori] Kitase and [scenario writer Kazushige] Nojima are more concerned about what gets changed. I'm not too worried about that. I'm often happy to cut out parts. Before meetings, the pair of them often discuss what's happening. It's very likely that not everyone is going to like everything.

 

[gosoxtim]

What do you mean? They've already started work on VII, they even have it to a point where they can show it off but decided not to at this stage. We'll see actually stuff from it later this year in Winter. Nomura is able to work both projects. Like he said, there's two different teams and KH3 won't take time from VII.

i know there two different teams but he cant be at two places at once unless the ff7 team in the same bulinding og the kingdom heart team

 

[Org14Kurix(Riku)]

'Final Fantasy VII': The challenge of remaking a classic

So you could flip the genders of say, Yuffie?

TN: Nothing that drastic! But there will be changes. More than me, [Producer Yoshinori] Kitase and [scenario writer Kazushige] Nojima are more concerned about what gets changed. I'm not too worried about that. I'm often happy to cut out parts. Before meetings, the pair of them often discuss what's happening. It's very likely that not everyone is going to like everything.

Happy he says, makes me wonder what could have been...

 

[Chaser]

i know there two different teams but he cant be at two places at once unless the ff7 team in the same bulinding og the kingdom heart team

Nomura can spend half a day on FFVII, half a day on KH3. Or one week he can spend 3 days at the FFVII office and 2 days in the KH3 office.
Or he uses the internet to communicate his messages and what not. It all comes down to his schedule and from his words can is balancing both without any interruption fairly well.

 

[gosoxtim]

Nomura can spend half a day on FFVII, half a day on KH3. Or one week he can spend 3 days at the FFVII office and 2 days in the KH3 office.
Or he uses the internet to communicate his messages and what not. It all comes down to his schedule and from his words can is balancing both without any interruption fairly well.

true that can work but i don't think the internet commuication wont work i think it beeter if he actually there to so how things are going but that just me

 

[Axel92]

There is even a Nomura Blog Post!

 

[notnow123487]

With the implication in another interview that they have all their worlds picked already and now it's just a potential cutting down the number of worlds as they're developed, I think the game is a little further along than we thought. Maybe a late 2016 release will be possible. This is definitely the most hopeful I've been that were not looking at 2017 since the 2013 announcement.

 

[Nazo]

This actually makes me even more nervous that the odd graphical look of the characters is going to stay the same. If this game ships out with everyone looking like a Disney Infinity character, I'll be upset. I don't get why the environments look so good, yet the characters seem so cartoony looking. Even the Heartless looked a bit strange in the E3 trailer.

Again, though, they have plenty of time. I'm sure it's pre-alpha so there's more to add and touch up. But we've now seen 3 trailers and the cartoony animated art style doesn't seem to be changing. Seriously hope the final product doesn't look like that. Just look at Eraqus and Xehanort's faces when they look into the camera. They look straight out of a high-budget Barbie animated film (that's not meant to be a jab, just comparing art styles).

 

[Chaser]

This actually makes me even more nervous that the odd graphical look of the characters is going to stay the same. If this game ships out with everyone looking like a Disney Infinity character, I'll be upset. I don't get why the environments look so good, yet the characters seem so cartoony looking. Even the Heartless looked a bit strange in the E3 trailer.

I just took that to mean the shaders or something haven't been applied to the characters yet.

Also worth noting, both the English and Japanese trailers were in perfect sync with their respective languages.

 

[Sephiroth0812]

As usual I see that people in their hype/overexcitedness are overextending the meaning of what Nomura's statements say. (and as Chaser pointed out, these have gone through several rounds of translation).

What is said here is that KH 3 is relatively advanced compared to the FF VII remake as they're both mentioned in the same single line which is logical since the FF VII remake just recently started.
It is not a real indicator as to where the overall development of KH 3 itself is standing.

 

[bazimon]

The fact that Conli is working on the KH3 project could mean that his other works that we haven't seen could have a high possibility if appearing (Big Hero 6 and what I'm mostly hoping for, Treasure Island). The fact that he even mentioned that Tangled "is going to be the first one in a series" emphasizes this idea a lot!!!!

 

[Nazo]

I just took that to mean the shaders or something haven't been applied to the characters yet.

I hope so. I get that the trailers we get are going to evolve over time, since it's not like the old days where the PS2 technology is set and they're just changing mechanics and locations. The graphics will be much more in-depth and such. I just hope the character models don't look like straight-to-DVD animated film characters in the final game.

The fact that Conli is working on the KH3 project could mean that his other works that we haven't seen could have a high possibility if appearing (Big Hero 6 and what I'm mostly hoping for, Treasure Island). The fact that he even mentioned that Tangled "is going to be the first one in a series" emphasizes this idea a lot!!!!

I noticed this as well. If we're only going off films he produced, then Big Hero 6 and Treasure Planet are definitely the ones, because the others are Hunchback (which was already in DDD) and Feast, which is a short.

If it's any film that's he's worked on, then Frozen and Wreck-It Ralph are also added to that pool of possibilities. And I am game for all of those possibilities.

 

[ultima-demi]

Assuming it's possible for kh3 to release in 2016,would 1 year and half be enough to iron out some of the issues shown in the trailer.

I'm not sure how much time is needed to polish animations and graphics,though going by FFXV it's possible to make great progress in a short about of time so idk..

 

[BEASTENDER]

My real question is...who on earth wanted to make Yuffie a guy???

As for graphics, that D23 trailer just looks superior to me in almost every way; almost. And Nomura said in an interview that they were going to drastically improve upon what was shown. The effects looks great, but the character models.... (at least in parts). But they may look like that to match the style of Tangled, which is what the Kingdom Shader was created for; to match the original style of the film, so they don't look out of place like they did in places like Port Royal. So they may look totally different in other worlds. If that's all that happened, I'm totally fine with the graphics in the trailer as I won't be spending much time in the Tangled world anyway (unless there are some really good heartless). Either way, I don't take his comments to mean they're on the verge of finishing KH3, so I don't believe what we saw is close to what the final build will look like (Similar, but with the drastic improvements he promised). Nomura also said he was working on many projects inside and outside of the company. With FFVII now being revealed to be one of them, I still hope one of those projects is TWEWY2. That last screen in the remix foreshadowed a sequel.