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News ► KH 20th anniversary event Q&A masterpost



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Rob

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My goodness. Did they not review the questions before choosing to answer them? Rhetorical because obviously not. Asking questions like how did Ansem and Namine meet when that was answered back in the KH2 Ultimania. That couldn't have been a Japanese question (I'd be disappointed if it was; the only exception is if the person just started the series) because the Ultimania's are only released in Japan.

Straight from the Scenarios mysteries of the KH2 Ultimania in 2006, which you can find all the interviews on KHI:

---Did Namine meet DiZ after Sora's story in KH:COM?
Nomura: Yes, they contacted each other between Sora and Riku's stories. Namine coorperated with DiZ not just because she's against the Organization but also because she wanted to protect Sora. She promised to restore Sora's memories so she needed to stay beside him. As stated in Ansem's Other Report #10, DiZ thought it's dangerous to leave Sora in Castle Oblivion, and in order to protect Sora, Namine needed DiZ.

A more useful question, which I submitted, is "when will KH have Japanese audio in the overseas version?" KH is the only Square game that doesn't have JP audio in the overseas release. Even Dragon Quest has it. It's embarrassing. Yes, it's a question that's been asked before and answered, but we need to keep the demand going. Yes, I could just watch a Japanese walkthrough on YouTube (which I already do), but considering they keep catering to casuals who don't follow the story by making recap videos/journals time and time again (DDD/3/the recap videos on YouTube before 3) when you can watch a walkthrough of the series before each new game, this would at least be fair.
 

Henryp

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Nomura: Roxas and Xion's return in Kingdom Hearts 3. I was struggling with the issue until the very last minute, and even considered a scenario where they wouldn't be revived at all. However, everyone's feelings were so strong that I felt I had no choice to bring them back.

While I do believe he struggled with the scenario to the very end, he was the one who put the seed of their return way earlier than KH3, at the very least for Roxas. Even if Blank Points may have not indicated that, in DDD Sora literally tells Roxas that he deserves to be his own person, and that game was released 7 years before KH3. It would have made no sense not to bring him back after those BbS and DDD scenes. Another proof that DDD was most probably made of undeveloped ideas he had for KH3 that he didn't matured enough.
 

SweetYetSalty

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The Namine/DiZ question is pretty random. Out of all the questions you could ask about Namine that's the one that gets attention? Not how she got her name, how she was found by the Organization, the limits of her powers, or even why she wears a tablecloth as clothing.

I wish I had submitted some questions. I would have asked why didn't Marluxia start remembering his past the first time Sora defeated him in CoM as opposed to KH3? Is it because he didn't have Mecha Strelitzia with him? Yeah I'm calling that thing Mecha Strelitzia.
 

Rob

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I was so absorbed in my post that I forgot to mention this:

Axel: "Go on, you just keep running. But I'll always be there to bring you back!"
  • Shimizu got goosebumps during recording of the aforementioned line and was very moved. The way Fujiwara tackled it was amazing.
  • Fujiwara once had to do 70 takes for a line of dialogue, but did it without a sour look on his face. He's very grateful to him.
  • Nomura: "When I talk about Axel, I feel sad."

No wonder Lea/Axel looked kind of sad-ish while keeping up a smile in the anniversary artwork. I wondered how Nomura felt due to FujiKei's passing, especially since he personally chose FujiKei for the red hair roles of his characters.
 

MoonRabbit

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While I do believe he struggled with the scenario to the very end, he was the one who put the seed of their return way earlier than KH3, at the very least for Roxas. Even if Blank Points may have not indicated that, in DDD Sora literally tells Roxas that he deserves to be his own person, and that game was released 7 years before KH3. It would have made no sense not to bring him back after those BbS and DDD scenes. Another proof that DDD was most probably made of undeveloped ideas he had for KH3 that he didn't matured enough.
Before KH3, I never thought Roxas would come back, and here is how I interpreted that scene. In KH3D, Sora didn't know that he had Ventus's heart inside of him. All he knew was that Roxas felt different than him somehow. He didn't know why, he just sensed that Roxas had his own feelings that were distinct from his own. So, he told Roxas that he was his own person.

Sometime before the beginning of KH3, Sora should have found out the truth about Ventus's heart. The fact that there was a separate heart inside of him would have explained why Roxas never truly felt like he was a part of Sora. He had his own heart all along. And so, in KH3, Sora's goal would be waking Ventus's heart up. Since Roxas's heart was Ventus's heart, there would have been no need for a separate "save Roxas" plotline. Roxas was simply an alter ego of Ventus.

Sora: “I was thinking about Roxas. He’s trapped here in my heart. But…he needs a body to be himself again.”

I couldn't help but notice while playing KH3 that the whole plot would have made a LOT more sense if Roxas and Ventus were treated as interchangeable. It just felt like it was intended to be that way, originally. Ventus was trapped in Sora's heart, and they didn't have any way of finding his body in Castle Oblivion without Aqua's help.

Riku: “No. Sora was dragged into the abyss during his exam. And I went in after him. So, I think if we find someone that was really close to Aqua, and they make the dive, they could reach her down there.”

If Ventus was revived, he could make the dive to rescue Aqua. So, they thought they could get him a Replica body. Sora would still have gone to Twilight Town and met up with Hayner, etc. The plot wouldn't have needed to change all that much, which always led me to believe that bringing Roxas back separately from Ventus was a very last minute decision.

Frankly, I think the story would have been far better if Roxas and Ventus had remained the same. Things would have been less convoluted, for sure. And Ventus, now with Roxas's memories, could have had a more meaningful reunion with Lea at Yen Sid's tower before the final battle. Although many fans loved the RAX reunion in KH3, I thought it was badly written. IMO, Roxas never truly understood Axel. He never understood why Axel lied to him, or how much pain Axel was in during 358/2 Days. Lea and Roxas/Ventus had a lot of things to discuss through before they were ready for a happy ending.
 

alexis.anagram

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I think if Nomura had a really clear authorial intent as to what he was going to do with the "hurting" characters he would have delineated it from the start of that storyline and set up specific outcomes which in retrospect could be recognized as the most appropriate resolutions to their respective arcs. Instead he relegated it to a vaguely defined footnote in the very chapter that was positioned to contend with this narrative problem, hence why the most obvious reading of events is the one that most readily presents itself: if Sora is seen directly preaching to another character, "you deserve to be your own person," that authorial intent speaks for itself.

There's no doubt Nomura phoned in whole portions of the KH3 finale but it would have been pulling the rug out from under the audience to do anything less than restore each of the missing characters to some form of existence, that was implicit to the entire construction of the Days'/BBS/Coded saga. It's like if 10 years from now Nomura says he was considering a version of the KH continuity where Sora never escapes Versusland to reunite with the larger ensemble, yeah it's feasible to say that the story could go in a different direction but there's no discernible reason to expect another outcome.
 

Oracle Spockanort

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Barring the fact that some of the questions were, unfortunately, just plain pointless to ask, my issue is actually towards the staff who actually went through these questions and chose them. I pretty sure there was hundreds upon hundreds of questions that were submitted for the event. Were these the ones they thought were good? Really?

(I swear that Ansem question was already answered way back when in the interview or Ultimania)
I think they wanted to go with some easy questions that were lighthearted vs the more heavy-hitting lore stuff. In the end it failed because Nomura was just like “…you’ll find out one day”
 

SweetYetSalty

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IMO, Roxas never truly understood Axel. He never understood why Axel lied to him, or how much pain Axel was in during 358/2 Days. Lea and Roxas/Ventus had a lot of things to discuss through before they were ready for a happy ending.
Axel was conflicted in 358/2 Days, but "pain" is not what I would describe him as. But whatever pain he might have felt he brought it on himself. Axel wanted to have his friends but never put them above his own survival and let Organization XIII politic their lives until they left or died. Axel failed as friend and frankly his fate of being alone and losing it all was well deserved. He didn't know how to be a true friend at the time. You are right, Roxas didn't understand Axel, but then nobody really did.

But on the subject of Roxas and Ventus, I'm glad they didn't make them the same person. Even if Roxas didn't come back to life in KH3, the games made it clear they were different individuals. Roxas's life was his own. To come out and say that Roxas and Ventus were the same person would have made the prior games misleading and just a bad "gotcha" moment. I don't doubt that that might have been the earlier intention to make Ven and Roxas the same guy when they first made Ventus, but with each game they kept both separate people when addressing one or the other. Why would Nomura hide this when he didn't with the Xehanorts?
 

Face My Fears

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So ignoring story stuff for second funnily enough despite them being visually clones.. I actually think in terms of gameplay at least there's a lot more unique potential for Xion and Roxas than Ven and Kairi. Ven is just Fast Boi who happens to hold his keyblade in a reverse grip and Kairi is.. Im not really sure how to describe the fighting style she got in RE:Mind it was fun though. But like with Roxas you have the constant duel wield gimmick built in. Xion was shown in 3 to still be able to copy powers via her well copying Saix's so she could act as something of a blue mage type, where you'd get only a base keyblade or two but instead of getting more keyblades and transformations and forms you'd get more weapons and powers from her friends and foes. Though obviously from a development standpoint that one is a LOT more work to do and.. is a bit more Devil May Cry or Bayonetta than Kingdom Hearts in concept. But yeah in terms of spin offs or if KH 4 does something where maybe each world on the KH side of the wall between Quadratum and whatever worlds surround it and the classic Disney + Original worlds has a different keyblade wielder as your playable character I would be much more interested in PLAYING a Roxas or Xion World (plus I think if they do Coco Xion is pretty much the absolute perfect character to interact with the themes of that movie)

Storywise Ven is obviously going to be forefront going forward though due to all the UX stuff coming in. Kairi is Kairi and I can't truly believe she'll be a proper main character treated as an equal in her trio until it actually you know happens, it's just burnt too many times there.
If they do Coco, it's definitely being handed to Sora given his current situation. I can just imagine Donald and Goofy being on the living side of the bridge and Sora being on the dead side. Xion (or Namine) is the prime candidate for an Inside Out world.

Roxas and Xion are definitely way more fun and have more creative styles of play... but are they really going to let them be playable again? Xion can be written off as not playable for sure since she didn't get anything in KH3. Roxas is a big MAYBE if he does show up again. It would be pretty horrible if Lea is the playable one while Roxas is around.

I also said to write off Roxas because Ven is definitely getting more screentime. If Roxas isn't going to get his own storyline, then he might as well not hang around.
 

Face My Fears

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I think they wanted to go with some easy questions that were lighthearted vs the more heavy-hitting lore stuff. In the end it failed because Nomura was just like “…you’ll find out one day”
WHEN WILL HE ANSWER WHERE KAIRI'S KEYBLADE CAME FROM!? IT'S BEEN ALMOST 2 DECADES.
 

Sign

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I lied, made another round of updates. Here are the revisions/clarifications.

On KH4:
  • Takes place after MoM, which is 1 year after Sora's disappearance in KH3.
  • Was torn between proceeding with Verum Rex or KH4 for the next title, but decided to prioritize KH4 because it'd be difficult to develop two big console games at the same time, and there were many fans who were worried about Sora. (Famitsu is the one who uses the word "prioritize" if you need to look it up, didn't see any other reports with that particular terminology)

On Missing-Link:

  • Key words: The Multi-Layered City of Scala ad Caelum (not multiple Scalas)
  • There's a base from where you can go out into the world map and explore to collect "pieces," which can be set onto your Keyblade to enhance abilities. These "pieces" take the form of figurines, like what you see in the trailer when the player uses an ability.
  • Start quests from the base and complete them to advance the story.
  • Quests and world map are the two main components of the game.
  • Nomura recalls dreaming of traveling to places that he'd like to visit but wasn't able to.
  • Thinks it wouldn't be very KH-like if you aren't able to go wherever you wanted and are instead limited by how far you can walk.
And all the VA stuff if that's something you're interested in.
 
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WHEN WILL HE ANSWER WHERE KAIRI'S KEYBLADE CAME FROM!? IT'S BEEN ALMOST 2 DECADES.
At this point I'm sure this question only exists cuz Riku was holding it for three seconds.

Like,

Dark thing holding character down/still

flash of light

keyblade.

Same thing happened to Sora in KH1 only there was no one next to him just holding it there.
 

Chaser

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I used to want to know what Nomura thinks of, his plans and ideas. Now I want to know what he thinks of us. How does he sees us in relation to this series and how we perceive it versus him.
I honestly think he thinks we are too serious aha. He’s very jokey and self-referential and pokes fun at that, but then the fans try and find hidden meaning in everything.

I also think he’s over us and the complaining. The man had the dialogue in this trailer be like “if you didn’t like kh3, go play other games. There’s a lot out there. If you come back to us though don’t expect it to be like 1 / 2”
 

okhi12

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Quoting you again because we've gotten some more impressions with added context :)



There are some other stuff too, like a sales update for KH3 (6.7 million as of September 2021). I'm still making edits so y'all just peruse at your leisure.
Thanks a lot! That makes sense.
 

SuperNova

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You know I'm not surprised that Nomura was burnt out from KH3 and is over parts of the fanbase. I may not like some of his decisions but I respect the work he tries to put into the KH series and I don't mind the new direction since KH3 wasn't that bad.
 

MoonRabbit

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Axel was conflicted in 358/2 Days, but "pain" is not what I would describe him as. But whatever pain he might have felt he brought it on himself. Axel wanted to have his friends but never put them above his own survival and let Organization XIII politic their lives until they left or died. Axel failed as friend and frankly his fate of being alone and losing it all was well deserved. He didn't know how to be a true friend at the time. You are right, Roxas didn't understand Axel, but then nobody really did.
I think the fandom, by and large, did not understand Axel nor his relationships very well. Axel was in a lot of pain over how much Saix had changed. You can see it very clearly in his diary entries. One of the main themes in KH is that Nobodies are "chained" by their memories. Axel and Roxas had a discussion about what they couldn't bear to lose. For Roxas, it was his present. But for Axel, it was his memories of his past. Saix was no longer the same person, but Axel couldn't bear to lose the memory of who he used to be, and that was the motivator for all of his actions. That is why Axel needed a proper backstory probably more than any other character, aside from Xehanort. Because without that, his characterization made no sense. And then we wind up with KH3 Lea who had all of his complexity stripped away.

I don't doubt that that might have been the earlier intention to make Ven and Roxas the same guy when they first made Ventus, but with each game they kept both separate people when addressing one or the other. Why would Nomura hide this when he didn't with the Xehanorts?

I am not exactly sure why Nomura decided to hide it. I guess he wanted it to be a surprise twist or something. He did put various hints and foreshadowing in, such as Xemnas telling Roxas, "Sleep has taken you yet again."

"Roxas is the utmost secret for Kingdom Hearts III. He's the top secret actually for Kingdom Hearts III so I really can't say anything about him."

In June 2018, he said Roxas was the "utmost secret" of KH3. Well, Roxas was not the big secret that Nomura made him out to be. In fact, Roxas really didn't have a significant impact on the plot.

“Regarding Roxas and Xion reappearing Kingdom Hearts 3, I was hesitant up until the very end about bringing them back, and even had a story route where they would not return."

The most likely explanation is that, even as late as that interview, Nomura was on the route of not bringing Roxas back. IMO, the big secret was that Roxas's had Ventus's heart.
 

MATGSY

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Q: When does Kairi finally get a game?
A: When she pries it out of my cold dead hands.

Q: Will Days and/or Coded ever be playable again?
A: What the fuck is Coded? I don't remember that.

Q: How fucking hard can it be to port some God damn PS2 games to Switch?
A: We had a budget set aside for that but I ended blowing it all on coke & hookers in Riku cosplay. After I woke up in a back alley dumpster the following morning with both kidneys missing, I realize we would have go to Plan Beta.

Q: Wait, cosplaying as Rikku or as Riku?
A: Yes.
 
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