News ► Famitsu interviews Nomura on Kingdom Hearts 4 and Missing-Link

[Chie]

I honestly thought we were going to be revisiting worlds in KH3 with how some thematic stuff seemed lingering after each one. I should have known better though.

Olympus does have this with the statues though, even though it's a tiny thing.

 

[Chaser]

I've not trusted fan feedback ever since it lead to the wrongful removal of endless flowmotion. My favourite way to travel.... gone :'(

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

I've not trusted fan feedback ever since it lead to the wrongful removal of endless flowmotion. My favourite way to travel.... gone :'(

Yeah, I legit loved Flownotion. All it needed was refinement. I blame everybody who complained it was cheap.

 

[the red monster]

The truth is a lot of people usually love the first game they played the most (I'm no exception), probably because the first experience is the one you come into with the least preconceptions and it forms your basis for judging the games you play next. For many, the first was KH2. And for the newest, youngest fans right now, it was KH3. For the older players like me, it was KH1. I feel like each of them practically constitutes a different generation of KH fans, and I'm willing to bet you can track most fans' likes / dislikes about the series pretty well based off of which game they started with.

Mostly true, but for me, KH1 was my first, and i think it's my least favorite outside of REcom/REcoded/days.

 

[Face My Fears]

The truth is a lot of people usually love the first game they played the most (I'm no exception), probably because the first experience is the one you come into with the least preconceptions and it forms your basis for judging the games you play next. For many, the first was KH2. And for the newest, youngest fans right now, it was KH3. For the older players like me, it was KH1. I feel like each of them practically constitutes a different generation of KH fans, and I'm willing to bet you can track most fans' likes / dislikes about the series pretty well based off of which game they started with.

The first game I played was CoM... and I find playing ReCOM a chore lol, but love playing CoM.

I think KH1 was the best because it was the best package with what it offered - the storyline, pacing, DISNEY, Final Fantasy, gameplay all just worked so well together. Yes, there were some flaws, but they were easily ignored because everything else was so good. KH2 was better at some things, but then failed miserably with others. I think the main issue with KH2 was that - it was the beginning of the Nomura-trend of having tons of characters to explain and loose threads (coming off of CoM).

Which is why I think it's actually a good thing to go straight into KH4. Instead of having even more loose threads that a side game could create, we're heading straight into the sequel of "what happened to Sora?" It will be an interesting take on the series because we've never seen that before. As much as I love CoM, I can imagine KH2 being so much better if it didn't have so much baggage from CoM to deal with. Let alone forcing Nomura to use the Organization as actual villains, instead of going off of what was done in CoM to establish them as "bad guys".

 

[Alpha Baymax]

KH2 went from too easy with too many reaction commands to best game ever

To be fair, the original Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix was a Japanese exclusive enhancement so I don't think it's simply nostalgic bias.

 

[Elysium]

Yeah, I legit loved Flownotion. All it needed was refinement. I blame everybody who complained it was cheap.

I'm confused. I know the movement in 3 isn't exactly what it was in 3D, but I thought what 3 has is still considered flowmotion? I mean, you can move up and down walls, just less having to bounce off the wall to do it? And especially midway through Arendelle, with the boost in your movement abilities, you can really go crazy.

 

[Squood!]

So uh...it seems Nomura always takes the fans wishes into account based on this interview.

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

I'm confused. I know the movement in 3 isn't exactly what it was in 3D, but I thought what 3 has is still considered flowmotion? I mean, you can move up and down walls, just less having to bounce off the wall to do it? And especially midway through Arendelle, with the boost in your movement abilities, you can really go crazy.

It’s similar, but it is severely reduced in its capabilities and range of movement. Arendelle might be the only world with the proper application, but I didn’t find it nearly as fun or engaging as it was in KH3D.

To be fair, the original Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix was a Japanese exclusive enhancement so I don't think it's simply nostalgic bias.

that was my point. That it was only after FM released in the west that the game received the acclaim. And people quickly forgot their hate of it in the post-2.5 era.

 

[Chaser]

that was my point. That it was only after FM released in the west that the game received the acclaim. And people quickly forgot their hate of it in the post-2.5 era.

Adding on to this, it is all well and good because 2FM is fantastic! It was when suddenly 2 itself was always top tier that this issue arose.

 

[Squood!]

Adding on to this, it is all well and good because 2FM is fantastic! It was when suddenly 2 itself was always top tier that this issue arose.

Like, OG 2 was pretty damn split in terms of opinion but the big points were "button mash, press triangle to win, drives were bad[i think that was a thing], too easy yadda yadda yadda."

Then 2.5 rolls around and suddenly everyone's minds were rewired into thinking 2FM was basically the original this whole time, an action game almost on the level of DMC, and the Tokyo Team were gods amongst men while Osaka was dragged through the dirt cuz they couldn't do exactly what Tokyo did on a fuckin handheld title running on the same engine as Crisis Core.

 

[LostArtist]

I'm confused. I know the movement in 3 isn't exactly what it was in 3D, but I thought what 3 has is still considered flowmotion? I mean, you can move up and down walls, just less having to bounce off the wall to do it? And especially midway through Arendelle, with the boost in your movement abilities, you can really go crazy.

It’s been a minute since I played these games. But flowmotion in 3 isn’t endless. Yes you can traverse horizontally pretty freely in 3 granted that the wall is glowing, but wall running up a San fransokyo building is boring af lol.

I agree flowmotion in 3d was fun as hell, a favorite memory of mine was going up the notre dame cathedral using flowmotion for the first time, that felt cool as hell ha.

A couple years ago when I was going around finding out ways to go out of bounds in kh3, I started using the endless aero trick coupled with glide to endlessly travel within the bounds of the game in any xyz direction, it’s a pretty sick and endless, you just have to replenish magic, that was my flowmotion replacement lol.

edit this is the aero trick I’m talking about, No Glowing Walls required, you can literally go anywhere within bounds

 

[Elysium]

Well, this is eye-opening. I always considered KH3 to have flowmotion. I enjoy 3 and 3D pretty similarly because I thought their gameplay style was pretty similar once you take away the Command Deck and Dream Eaters. I'm curious if Nomura refers to 3's gameplay as flowmotion or something else? I don't really miss bouncing up the walls; probably the only thing is bouncing on top of enemies or being able to interact with the environment / enemies by throwing things around.

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

Well, this is eye-opening. I always considered KH3 to have flowmotion. I enjoy 3 and 3D pretty similarly because I thought their gameplay style was pretty similar once you take away the Command Deck and Dream Eaters. I'm curious if Nomura refers to 3's gameplay as flowmotion or something else? I don't really miss bouncing up the walls; probably the only thing is bouncing on top of enemies or being able to interact with the environment / enemies by throwing things around.

No, it isn’t called Flowmotion. It is called “Athletic Flow”.

 

[Squood!]

No, it isn’t called Flowmotion. It is called “Athletic Flow”.

The game calls it flowmotion tho

 

[NoWay]

In German it translates to “Free Flow”

I don’t know if this adds up anything but do whatever you want with that information

 

[LostArtist]

I'm curious if Nomura refers to 3's gameplay as flowmotion or something else?

There is “flowmotion” in kh3, it’s the bouncing then supersliding or superjumping to gain horizontal or vertical distance. In kh3d the “superslide”distance is pretty long and speed pretty fast and both the superjump and superslide can be chained with the wall bouncing infinitely. Meaning whizzing around through alleyways with superslides and going up buildings through superslide/superjump. In kh3, aside from flowmotion feeling weird and you having to equip multiple superslides for distance/speed, the biggest thing is that there’s a limit to the wall bouncing activation of flowmotion, so you can’t superslide infinitely for horizontal distance and you can’t superslide/super jump infinitely to go up vertically, this form of freedom of movement is replaced with something else in kh3:

I mean, you can move up and down walls, just less having to bounce off the wall to do it?

This wall moving is not flowmotion, it’s the new kh3 “freerunning” mechanic to run up or sideways on glowing walls.

There’s also airstepping to teleport further forward or further up instantly if you see squares.

You can cover vast distances fast and instantly using both freerunning and airstepping in kh3. You cannot do the same with kh3’s version of flowmotion. Kh3’s answer to freedom of movement is the combination of nerfed flowmotion (even when “maxed out”), freerunning and airstepping. Which doesn’t feel as free?

I’ll admit airstepping was fun to play around with for enemies and travel, but I missed kh3d’s version of flowmotion to travel around the map.

 

[bobgoesw00t]

Even when giving an interview, Nomura-san continues to be the biggest troll in the universe and I wouldn't have it any other way!!! As for the announcement of KHIV itself, I'm glad they let us know it's coming, but I feel the timing of it was off. If E3 hadn't been canceled this year, that would have been the PERFECT place to reveal the game but OH WELL!!!!!!! I was like, "yay...KHIV is coming...eventually..." mostly because I've been playing so much Elden Ring and Guild Wars 2 End of Dragons so my mind was too preoccupied with other things xD

 

[bobgoesw00t]

Like, all the guy asked was if Neku and pals would show up lol

This is Tetsuya Nomura we're talking about here, if he can troll everyone and their mother while answering a question, HE'S GONNA DO JUST THAT!!!!! xP

 

[Launchpad]

As far as Reaction Commands go, I'm all for the enemy-specific RCs that are exploitable and have good utility, like Bat-Fly, Dual Stance, Cyclone, Reversal, etc. Anything that actually factors into the actions Sora can perform is a godsend. These aren't QTEs, they're context specific moves that are as responsive and practical as any other attack.

It's the cutscene-y ones that I'm not really that excited to see return. I mean, don't get me wrong, on the first playthrough they're spectacular and flashy and it's exciting to see all the stuff Sora can do, but on repeat playthroughs? If I'm skipping cutscenes to get into the action quicker, I'm not going to be too happy to sit through long mid-combat animations. I'm not infuriated, nor do I think reaction commands are an affront to the series design philosophy in the same way that the command deck was, but I just don't really care much to see long animations in the middle of a boss fight.

I'm wagering that Neo-Darkside in KHIV will be way flashier than any other boss, with tons of RCs to show how cool Sora is. Think Twilight Thorn in KH2 or Rock Titan in KH3.