News ► GameSpot: Nomura on expectations, Final Fantasy, what Kingdom Hearts means to him

[Ranma]

Honest question... Why do you lot care so much about Final Fantasy characters in a Kingdom Hearts game? Seriously, I need to know... Am I missing something? These characters are not vital in the story and most people new to the game would not know who they are, why is their inclusion important? I'm not saying this to be quarrelsome, I just don't get it... At all. I need someone to explain it to me.

I never watched any of the Disney movies featured in Kingdom Hearts besides The Nightmare before Christmas and Pirates. As more of a gamer than a Disney fan growing up I didn't care at all about the worlds but really got into the Final Fantasy series because of their inclusion. I'd rather they take all the Disney out before they take all the Final Fantasy out. The best thing about these games are that they are the best of both worlds. There's Square reps, Disney reps and the OCs - who I'd say are right in the middle.

 

[luuizhenriquem]

It would be a kii if we end up seeing Notics with his FF Versus XIII design lol

 

[Luminary]

Hey staff, here’s another interview with The Telegraph: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gaming/...-tetsuya-nomura-working-disney-catering-fans/

It seems Nomura won’t be holding back on the story to cater to new fans and Oswald the Lucky Rabbit seems to be in a situation like Star Wars and Marvel.

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

Hey staff, here’s another interview with The Telegraph: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gaming/...-tetsuya-nomura-working-disney-catering-fans/

It seems Nomura won’t be holding back on the story to cater to new fans and Oswald the Lucky Rabbit seems to be in a situation like Star Wars and Marvel.

Thanks, I’ll get an article up ASAP

*stares at all of these interviews and weeps*

 

[Zettaflare]

I could understand not wanting Star Wars or Marvel but why Oswald? There was a lot of potential to involve him in the KH series.

Though I can't read the full interview so hopefully he provides some context in the KH insider article

 

[Alpha Baymax]

But...the Radiant Garden gang...Zack's storyline...

Lol, Zack was only decided because it was either him or Laguna. One was going to be in Dissidia 012 and the other for Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep. And Zack was just confined to Olympus as the Final Fantasy cameo of that world.

The Radiant Garden gang became irrelevant after 2. The best we got was Goofy referencing Leon in Re:Coded HD. Final Fantasy may still be Square's flagship franchise but it just doesn't have the quality factor it once used to have. The franchise's transition to HD did the games dirty.

I could understand not wanting Star Wars or Marvel but why Oswald? There was a lot of potential to involve him in the KH series.

Though I can't read the full interview so hopefully he provides some context in the KH insider article

I can't read the full interview either, but I'm guessing it's because Oswald is a legacy character and Disney themselves have yet to decide on how to use him again. The last major media featuring him was Epic Mickey 2 and that was a commercial flop.

 

[Megavoltage]

Sad how Oswald faded away after Epic Mickey 1 & 2 weren't big enough successes.

 

[Zettaflare]

Lol, Zack was only decided because it was either him or Laguna. One was going to be in Dissidia 012 and the other for Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep. And Zack was just confined to Olympus as the Final Fantasy cameo of that world.

The Radiant Garden gang became irrelevant after 2. The best we got was Goofy referencing Leon in Re:Coded HD. Final Fantasy may still be Square's flagship franchise but it just doesn't have the quality factor it once used to have. The franchise's transition to HD did the games dirty.



I can't read the full interview either, but I'm guessing it's because Oswald is a legacy character and Disney themselves have yet to decide on how to use him again. The last major media featuring him was Epic Mickey 2 and that was a commercial flop.

Which is a shame if that's true. KH3 could have pushed him back into the spotlight.

 

[Alpha Baymax]

Which is a shame if that's true. KH3 could have pushed him back into the spotlight.

I think the bigger problem with adding Oswald is that Disney never created a modern Oswald look, he's always been retro. And I really don't think that Disney would have been generous to have a modern Oswald debut in Kingdom Hearts out of all media. There's just so many complications with narrative and legality that I can see the issues with trying to add him. What's he supposed to do? how big is his relevance? etc.

 

[Meow Wow]

Oswald could easily be incorporated into KH in my opinion. He could either be picked up by the villains or be rouge and you stumble across him on the journey. That or Wasteland being a world I would love for that to happen. I can dream.

It can be debated whether they want to keep the character Epic Mickey established by having Oswald bitter towards Mickey for some odd reason.

 

[Luminary]

I could understand not wanting Star Wars or Marvel but why Oswald? There was a lot of potential to involve him in the KH series.

Though I can't read the full interview so hopefully he provides some context in the KH insider article

Nomura inquired about Oswald and Disney told him it would be difficult to do with no other reasons given. It does seem weird given his appearance in Epic Mickey. But there could still be restrictions on what they can do with the character after getting him back from Universal.

Lol, Zack was only decided because it was either him or Laguna. One was going to be in Dissidia 012 and the other for Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep. And Zack was just confined to Olympus as the Final Fantasy cameo of that world.

The Radiant Garden gang became irrelevant after 2. The best we got was Goofy referencing Leon in Re:Coded HD. Final Fantasy may still be Square's flagship franchise but it just doesn't have the quality factor it once used to have. The franchise's transition to HD did the games dirty.



I can't read the full interview either, but I'm guessing it's because Oswald is a legacy character and Disney themselves have yet to decide on how to use him again. The last major media featuring him was Epic Mickey 2 and that was a commercial flop.

Cid was also a character in Re:Coded. The Radiant Garden gang haven’t been a main feature since KH2 because Sora and friends haven’t gone to a Radiant Garden since that game. In BBS, they weren’t shown due to hardware limitations and a desire to focus on the past lives of the Apprentices. KH3 will not have those hardware limitations and it is the perfect time for Sora to reunite with his old friends who helped him start his journey to defeating Xehanort.

As above, Zack was the only FF character because of hardware limitations and they wanted him to stand out in that game. He and Cloud both have cliffhangers in their stories that should be resolved. With the scale the worlds of KH3 have, there isn’t much of a reason to not feature at least the established characters in some capacity. Ienzo, Aeleus, Even, and Dilan aren’t going to populate Radiant Garden by themselves.

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

Can y'all talk about that stuff here

https://forums.khinsider.com/kingdo...-disney-getting-oswald-into-kh3-new-post.html

 

[TruestSyn]

I would love to see Oswald Rabbit show up as a Darkness.

Xehanort: "Look now, Mickey. We got our own keyblade wielding rodent to do our dirty work."

Oswald: "Yeah, sucks to be you mouse. Next time you should pick your friends wisely!"

 

[Michael Mario]

Okay, back onto the Final Fantasy note since that's still relevant to this thread... I do think that the current plot threads with the Radiant Garden crew need to be wrapped up in KH3 or its DLC. Rinoa was teased in KHII's credits as making an appearance in the future; we still need closure on the Cloud and Sephiroth conflict and what exactly Tifa is; and of course there's Zack who, while was present in Olympus Coliseum, was not from that world.

The weird thing with Sephiroth in Kingdom Hearts is that he was both his own person and now the representation of Cloud's inner darkness. One can assume that he survived losing his physical body by linking himself to Cloud somehow, but then we have Tifa. Seeing as Aerith is very much not dead, though... Yeah. One last hurrah for that plot point until the next trilogy.

Anyway, I'm not expecting that many "new" Final Fantasy characters to show up in Kingdom Hearts III outside of the pool Nomura's drawn from that includes characters he originally designed; although I'm not 100% sure if even Lightning and crew will show up. However, Dissidia has gotten him out of that comfort zone he had for cameos in the past, so my hope is that we'll see a much wider variety of them after the Xehanort Saga: my own best girl Terra Branford of FFVI being among them.