When do you realistically see this thing being released?

[Chie]

Care to explain why I'm wrong, please?

Okay.

"and the Nintendo switch is a handheld" - I did not explain myself at first because to explain this is to explain the concept "the map is not the territory". Ok, you can hold a Switch in your hand if you really want to, but every single game made for it has to be playable on docked mode on a TV, so every game for it has to have console specs. Its touch screen is basically unusable because it's a phonetype, so that aspect of DS, Vita, etc. is gone. Multiconsole games with Switch versions are exactly the same as PS4 or PC versions but sometimes slightly lower specs, unlike DS or PSP games which were completely designed for only that system and its specs.

The part of the market that handhelds represented, where tiny budget games like Days, re:Coded, BBS, etc. could be made that were still full length video games, no longer exists and has been replaced with gacha games on phones that story writers like Nomura have barely any control over other than the cutscenes.

So yes, handhelds are dead. The fact that a switch can literally be played "handheld" doesn't suddenly change that.

"and we had games between 3D and 0.2/BC, they were the remasters" - Nomura and anyone else on the creative team had no bearing on this, that's literally just giving the game to a porting team and saying "ok put this in HD". That is not "a new game". It's definitely not anything Nomura + his writers made, or even spent time making it instead of doing anything else, because they aren't porters. And even if we put it as generously as possible, it's still something we've already played.

I didn't think it was worth explaining this in detail because I thought it might derail the thread to spend many paragraphs explaining that.

 

[vaderskywalker]

Okay.

"and the Nintendo switch is a handheld" - I did not explain myself at first because to explain this is to explain the concept "the map is not the territory". Ok, you can hold a Switch in your hand if you really want to, but every single game made for it has to be playable on docked mode on a TV, so every game for it has to have console specs. Its touch screen is basically unusable because it's a phonetype, so that aspect of DS, Vita, etc. is gone. Multiconsole games with Switch versions are exactly the same as PS4 or PC versions but sometimes slightly lower specs, unlike DS or PSP games which were completely designed for only that system and its specs.

The part of the market that handhelds represented, where tiny budget games like Days, re:Coded, BBS, etc. could be made that were still full length video games, no longer exists and has been replaced with gacha games on phones that story writers like Nomura have barely any control over other than the cutscenes.

So yes, handhelds are dead. The fact that a switch can literally be played "handheld" doesn't suddenly change that.

"and we had games between 3D and 0.2/BC, they were the remasters" - Nomura and anyone else on the creative team had no bearing on this, that's literally just giving the game to a porting team and saying "ok put this in HD". That is not "a new game". It's definitely not anything Nomura + his writers made, or even spent time making it instead of doing anything else, because they aren't porters. And even if we put it as generously as possible, it's still something we've already played.

I didn't think it was worth explaining this in detail because I thought it might derail the thread to spend many paragraphs explaining that.

I play my switch all the time in handheld mode and rarely play in docked mode, as for the remasters, I still count them because we got new stuff with them, that never came to the USA before.

 

[Chie]

Okay but we're talking about the development cycles of these games, as created by the developers, in Japan. So getting some bosses that are new to you specifically doesn't really have anything to do with that.

Also I am not sure how you playing your switch in handheld mode affects the death of the handheld game industry.

 

[vaderskywalker]

Okay but we're talking about the development cycles of these games, as created by the developers, in Japan. So getting some bosses that are new to you specifically doesn't really have anything to do with that.

Also I am not sure how you playing your switch in handheld mode affects the death of the handheld game industry.

Because handhelds aren't dead, if they were the switch would just be another home console that you couldn't take on the go, then we wouldn't have any handheld consoles, and phones don't count, as for the remasters, it wasn't just new bosses it was new cutscenes and new keyblades, also you haven't said why I was wrong about Nomura wanting all the games on one system.

 

[Chie]

This is why I didn't want to bother typing it all out... This is exactly how I suspected this conversation would go

 

[vaderskywalker]

This is why I didn't want to bother typing it all out... This is exactly how I suspected this conversation would go

Can you at least explain why I was wrong about Nomura wanting all the games on one system, please?

 

[Elysium]

I also count the Remasters as games since it brought Final Mix content to the U.S. and also gave us the movies + 0.2. Well, that and the transfer of BbS and particularly 3D to main consoles had the feel of more than just ports. We know, too, that KH1 had to be re-built from the ground up.

Anyway, I'm grateful handhelds are dead (more or less). It's much easier to simply ignore the mobile games than the handheld games. With Remasters having become a thing for the series, I feel sure anything important will be translated into a "movie" much like the Foreteller stuff was somewhere down the line in a 3.5 ReMIX (along with KH3's DLC ReMind content included <3 And perhaps a few new additions to MoM maybe?) on PS5. I always supposed something like that would happen after KHIV, but it would be fitting to release a 3.5 ReMIX the year before KHIV since it would feed the fanbase during the wait, bring in a few more newcomers, and build hype towards IV, too. We'll see how things go though.

 

[BufferAqua]

Late 2024-2025.

I can understand being skeptical, but KH3 shouldn't be considered the standard of when to expect a KH game to release.

 

[SweetYetSalty]

If the wait for KH3 has taught me anything, it's that it's impossible to know when these games will be released. I remember being a naive kid and when they announced KH3 was in development I thought that meant it would be released in like two years time. I love laughing at my younger self. The earliest I'll say is 2025. I'd be shocked if it was released in 2024, that just seems way too soon for a big Square title right after KH3 in 2019.

 

[Chie]

See, I don't think you were naiive whatsoever in that situation, which is why I'm always bringing up dev time stuff. KH2 was announced in 2003 and released in 2005, and I'd argue it's bigger/denser in content than KH3 was. KH1 was announced in 2001 and released in 2002. Hell, I know it's a remake with reused assets, but re:coded was released four months after it was announced!

I know I must sound like a broken record always reiterating these facts, but... you definitely weren't naiive to think two years was reasonable. Five years (half a decade!) seeming "way too soon" is not how games normally were nor should be. It's a warped state of affairs by a warped and corroded industry.

 

[SweetYetSalty]

See, I don't think you were naiive whatsoever in that situation, which is why I'm always bringing up dev time stuff. KH2 was announced in 2003 and released in 2005, and I'd argue it's bigger/denser in content than KH3 was. KH1 was announced in 2001 and released in 2002. Hell, I know it's a remake with reused assets, but re:coded was released four months after it was announced!

I know I must sound like a broken record always reiterating these facts, but... you definitely weren't naiive to think two years was reasonable. Five years (half a decade!) seeming "way too soon" is not how games normally were nor should be. It's a warped state of affairs by a warped and corroded industry.

Wow! When you put it like that! I still think 2025 is the earliest, but this was certainly insightful. Since I got into the series after KH1 and KH2 released I didn't know when they were announced and released.

 

[Dandelion]

It's worth noting that when KH3 was announced it had *just* started development. In fact, the footage we saw wasn't in-engine. It was all done by visual works and was a CGI film made to look like gameplay.

What we saw for the KH4 trailer was actual gameplay running on Unreal. There's no reason to think that this game won't go gold in a couple of years.

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

KH3 underwent some unique circumstances being the first HD title of the franchise.

1) it was the first HD title of the franchise, which meant all assets had to be built from scratch rather than reused.

2) Swapping engines early on in development set it back by a year. The developers were anticipating using Luminous, but found out they wouldn’t be due to the engine’s many issues and the prioritization of using FFXV as the game to document the engine.

3) Assets that had been worked on by outside 3rd party asset farms were not up to the quality that SE and Disney required them to be, which required SE to recreate all of those assets over again.

4) The development team had never worked with Unreal Engine 4 before and had to be trained, which took time out of the development cycle

So yeah it took them 6 years to release from 2013 to 2019. But the game was only truly in development from 2014-2018, so a 4 year development cycle is a fairly good one considering all of the issues the development team was dealing with.

KH4 in comparison should not be as insane of a cycle like KH3 was.

They have a strong understanding of UE so working with UE5 will be easy.

UE5 has a ton of cool automation and scaling tools that has streamlined a ton of work processes.

Also SE probably isn’t going to hire asset farms without good vetting or prior experience with them so they don’t have to worry about that.

That doesn’t mean there can’t be issues, but I think KH4 will have a smooth development cycle. They had likely been working on it since 2018/19, and accounting for the pandemic setting them back by a year or so, 2024/2025 is a fairly appropriate window for release given they haven’t run into any extremely awful issues beyond that.

Quoting myself for the new page because KH3 was a unique game and still only had a 4 year development cycle overall. KH4 having playable, polished sections already means it is farther along than KH3 was at this stage.

 

[Zackarix]

I think it's important to remember that the development environment we're in currently in is different from the handheld era, which was different from the PS2 era.

In addition to the KH team being put on Versus, probably another reason for the handheld era was to delay the transition into HD. Developing in HD is a lot more work and any setbacks are more difficult to recover from. And SE's growing pains in the PS3 era are infamous. Even if they had started working on KH3 immediately after development for KH2 was complete it likely would have been a longer development cycle.

I just hope that SE's bad habit of announcing games when they've just started development is truly over.

 

[vaderskywalker]

I think it's important to remember that the development environment we're in currently in is different from the handheld era, which was different from the PS2 era.

In addition to the KH team being put on Versus, probably another reason for the handheld era was to delay the transition into HD. Developing in HD is a lot more work and any setbacks are more difficult to recover from. And SE's growing pains in the PS3 era are infamous. Even if they had started working on KH3 immediately after development for KH2 was complete it likely would have been a longer development cycle.

I just hope that SE's bad habit of announcing games when they've just started development is truly over.

One can only hope.

 

[Disney Adventurer]

Late 2023 (pipe's dream) but realistically speaking, 2024 or 2025 at the latest. Depends on how much
time UE5's programming shaves off of Kingdom Hearts IV's development cycle.

 

[Face My Fears]

Would the DISNEY/PIXAR world choices also help?

I remember hearing during KH3's production that using worlds like FROZEN and TANGLED allowed them to access assets that were in the DISNEY database, unlike when they would have to do things from scratch for the animated films. Supposing that all the worlds (unfortunately) in KH4 are recent CGI films - with the exception of Star Wars - wouldn't that also help speed up production time by making things easier?

 

[Dandelion]

Having resources helps, but it's not like they dragged and dropped the fully-formed models into the games from the movies. The skeletons still needed rigged, still needed new textures. Their work helped, but in the end most of what Square built for the game was still pretty custom.

 

[SweetYetSalty]

Rather then release time I'm more worried if I'll have a PS5 in time for it or not. I think that's the biggest hurdle for me concerning KH4 rather then it's release. Are PS5's still hard to get?

 

[Launchpad]

Rather then release time I'm more worried if I'll have a PS5 in time for it or not. I think that's the biggest hurdle for me concerning KH4 rather then it's release. Are PS5's still hard to get?

Recently I've seen pictures of honest-to-god PS5s in stores, but YMMV locally. @Wario64 on Twitter is on the ball with tweeting out when the consoles become available to order through Sony's store, Walmart, and others. That's how I got both of mine in 2020, and it was harder then.

I'm sure Square wants to wait until the PS5 is more common before releasing the game. This is another topic, a little bit, but it's interesting that platforms weren't announced with the first trailer. IIRC we knew KH3 was coming to PS4 and Xbox One as soon as it was announced, but for some reason platforms are still TBA for KH4. Could it be that there's a PS4 version? Or timed console exclusivity on the PS5? Or maybe even PC will get it on launch?

Hard to say.