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Square Enix set to launch new titles in the second half of FY2019

Square Enix President and Representative Director Yosuke Matsuda discussed the launch schedule in the Financial Results Briefing Session from the FY2018 fiscal year.
 
You can read an excerpt from his comments below.
 



 
Kingdom Hearts III is slated for a 2018 release. More information should be coming at E3 2018 on June 12-14.
 
When do you think Kingdom Hearts III will release? Let us know in the comments below!
Leamax

Kaoru Wada hints to two new arranged songs for upcoming Kingdom Hearts Orchestra

Kaoru Wada, the composer who worked for both "Hikari - Orchestra" and "Passion - Orchestra" and also for the previous Kingdom Hearts Orchestra concerts arrangements, teased through his Facebook account that two new songs will be revealed during the performance in Los Angeles, which is also going to be the premiere of the entire tour.
 
Following, the Facebook post which Mr. Wada wrote:
 
Actually, the official list set up for the Orchestra consists in seventeen tracks, and it is still unknown if will also feature those two newly teased tracks (which are presumably also going to be part of Kingdom Hearts III).
 
We want to remember that Kingdom Hearts -World Tour- will be starting in June 9th, in Los Angeles. Here you can see all the avaiable dates.
 
Will you be able to attend at any of the tour stages and then listen to those two new and mysterious tracks? Let us know in the comment section below!
Yoshirai

Kingdom Hearts III to be featured in Weekly Famitsu

Kingdom Hearts III will be featured in the latest issue of Weekly Famitsu. The article will contain a recap of the Kingdom Hearts III Premium Event.
 
UPDATE: [May 30, 2018]: Scans for the June 14th issue are now available. You can view them in the galley below.
 
 



 
UPDATE [June 9, 2018]: Translations for the article are now available! You can check them out here!
Leamax

Kingdom Hearts Latter April-May Merchandise Roundup: Cosplay Wallets, Necklaces, and More!

Welcome to KH13’s roundup of all the latest merchandise revealed from the latter half of April up to the present. Check out pictures of the new merchandise below!
 




 
First, Hot Topic introduced a Kingdom Hearts Keyblade key chain. You can purchase this for $7.12 with their current 20% discount!
 




 
The rest of the items are from ThinkGeek starting with their
Kingdom Hearts cosplay wallets! Each are stylized in the form of either Riku or Sora’s costume. Each one costs $19.99.





 
Their other items include a Kingdom Hearts Roxas cosplay necklace ($14.99), a Keyblade Master cuff bracelet, a heartless cuff bracelet, and a Sora cosplay necklace ($9.99).
 





Both Keyblade Master/Heartless cuff bracelets can be bought for $14.99 each!
This concludes our latter half of April through May roundup covering the latest Kingdom Hearts merchandise! What are you most excited about getting? Let us know in the comments below!
NihonScribe

Kingdom Hearts III demo to be available at E3 2018!

In a tweet thanking those who attended the KH3 Premiere, @SquareEnixUSA confirmed that they will be providing fans and attendees of this years Electronic Entertainment Expo with the opportunity to play Kingdom Hearts III at their show booth!
 
E3 2018 will be held in Los Angeles, California from June 12th-14th! Square Enix hosting their own press conference June 11th at 10pm PT which will be streamed in both English and Japanese!
 



maresalis

Kingdom Hearts III Kairi teased as an avatar board available soon for KHUχ Japan!

"I'm tired of waiting, so don't tell me to stay behind! From now on, wherever one of us goes, the other follows, got it?"
 
Previously only teased in Kingdom Hearts Union χ[Cross]'s third anniversary artwork, Square Enix has yet to debut Kairi in her new outfit in any trailer. As fans of the Princess of Heart await her screen time, Twitter user @Roboloid has uncovered her new outfit in a data mine of an upcoming update!
 




 
Both her and Sora's Kingdom Hearts III outfits will soon be available as avatar boards in a future update!
 
It's no surprise that Kairi too will be sporting plaid, a reoccurring look in the new designs for our favorite characters. What do you think? Which character design are you most excited for? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!
maresalis

Listen to the extended preview of Utada Hikaru's "Chikai"!

As we near the release of Utada Hikaru's seventh album, Hatsukoi, her website has uploaded an extended look at the highly anticipated Japanese track "Chikai".
 
The song has received a 43 second sound clip that can be previewed here on her website. "Chikai" or "Oath" will be the fourth song on her new album and is noted on her site as being the theme from Kingdom Hearts III!
 
Hatsukoi will be released on June 27th, 2018 and is currently available for pre-order through CDJapan!
 
Are you as excited as we are for the new theme? Let us know in the comments below!
maresalis

NEW EPSIODE: Everglow's KINGDOM HEARTS TIMELINE - Birth By Sleep

UPDATE: Episodes 24 and 25 of Everglow's series
have been released!  
KINGDOM HEARTS TIMELINE is an episodic look at the events of the Kingdom Hearts series, compiled chronologically. Featuring important scenes and gameplay from all games, Everglow works hard towards having a "perfect road to the final chapter of the Xehanort Saga".
 
You can view the latest episodes of KINGDOM HEARTS TIMELINE Birth by Sleep below:

 













 
Keeping up with KINGDOM HEARTS TIMELINE? Let us know what you think in the comments below!
maresalis

New Kingdom Hearts II assets discovered by 13th Vessel; includes Chain of Memories and a Deleted World

New assets and files from Kingdom Hearts II have been discovered by 13th Vessel. Some of the assets found include unused textures, maps, and items. Many of the assets have been discovered by others over the years, but something that wasn't revealed was that the Keyblade Graveyard could have been in the regular version of Kingdom Hearts II.
 
A transcript of the post can be viewed below.
 
You can check out the video below!



 
For more videos like this one, check out his Youtube channel. We also have a few articles about the assets in Kingdom Hearts 0.2 Birth By Sleep -A Fragmentary Passage- that 13th Vessel had a hand in. You can check them out right here and here.
 
What do you think of his video? Let us know in the comments below!
 
 


Ligero_miguel

Raxaimus' impressions of the Kingdom Hearts III Premiere Event demo

As an attendee of the Kingdom Hearts III Premiere Event, I got the chance to play the highly-anticipated Kingdom Hearts III alongside other Kingdom Hearts content creators, as well as the opportunity to provide direct feedback to the game’s developers. Before I begin, I’d like to thank Square Enix and the other members of KH13.com’s staff yet again, for allowing me the privilege to attend this event. It was a lot of fun to see some familiar faces, meet a bunch of new friends, and finally get my hands on Kingdom Hearts III. I hope that similar community-focused events will continue to take place in the future!
 
The two segments of Kingdom Hearts III that we were given the opportunity to play were the Rock Titan boss fight in Olympus, and around 30% of the much more exploration-focused Toy Box. In the short Olympus segment, Sora had access to Second Form, Wonder Balloon, and Big Magic Mountain, and players used these to defeat the Rock Titan. In the Toy Box demo, players explored Andy’s room, Andy’s front yard, and the massive Galaxy Toys toy store, experimenting with the rest of Sora’s abilities.
 
Within the demo, there were a great deal of positives interspersed with some very noticeable negatives. To provide a more structured critique, I’d like to give my impressions of this demo in the following format; I will be starting with pros, followed by cons, and then a few concerns that I have for Kingdom Hearts III that are unrelated to the demo itself. Keep in mind that Square Enix informed the event's attendees that they would be watching for our feedback in the week following the event. If it seems as though I am bringing up my concerns in a way that would directly address Square Enix and the Kingdom Hearts development team, please be aware that presenting this feedback for the team is one of my primary goals. I hope you enjoy my critique!
 


<3

 

Pros


 
First, I’d like to praise the sheer amount of options that are available in Kingdom Hearts III's combat. Between regular combos, Keyblade transformations, Links, Attraction Flows, Flowmotion, and Situation Commands that utilize party members, players are able to construct a very detailed play style that is ideal for their own tastes. In addition, many of these options are currently well-balanced, so a significant portion of the game’s combat system is equally valuable, rather than just a handful of abilities that shine above all others. The Fire/Thunder/Barrier Surge and Balloon/Balloonra/Balloonga commands in Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep and Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance, respectively, both come to mind as examples of absurdly powerful abilities that outranked everything else, and for the most part, it seems that Square Enix has elected to avoid this flaw when designing the intricacies of the combat.
 
Keyblade transformations are a staple of Kingdom Hearts III’s combat, changing Sora’s attack patterns and allowing for unique play styles to shine. For instance, the magic-heavy Mirage Staff (my personal favorite of the three we got) features movement similar to Kingdom Hearts II’s Wisdom Form, and also allows Sora to attack from farther away. In addition, its Air Slide leaves copies of Sora that will shoot at enemies when prompted. Hyper Hammer, by contrast, is used to deal damage in a wide area of effect, and tends to stun enemies that get caught in its wide swings. These transformations also include additional tiers, bringing new attacks and finishers into the mix. They also change the player's magic spells, to keep them consistent with the design philosophy behind each transformation. All of this is great, and gets even better with my next point.
 
Alongside Keyblade transformations, Keyblade switching is a new (and hopefully permanent) addition to the Kingdom Hearts series. Within the Toy Box portion of the demo, we were able to switch between the Infinity Badge, Ever After, and Smile Gear Keyblades in the middle of combat (in the middle of a combo, even!). These Keyblades all come with their own transformations, and if the player activates a transformation and then switches their Keyblade, the transformed Keyblade is “stored” for later use, allowing players to go straight from a standard combo to a transformation with the press of a button. In line with this feeling of fluidity, I’m happy to report that combos can be modified with a mix of melee and magic attacks, which is a welcome inclusion from Kingdom Hearts II’s combat system. In addition, Sora now has an aerial guard maneuver, giving players the capability to remain defensive in most situations.
 
While some players may worry that the Focus gauge may not be utilized enough, I was pleasantly surprised to find that traditional Shotlocks and Flowchain both provide good uses of the Focus gauge, and don’t sacrifice game balance for the sake of flashy, overly stylish attacks. These attacks are all fast and responsive, and most importantly, the damage they deal is quite reasonable.
 
Compared to previous installments, Sora’s movement options have been expanded and changed for the better. Flowmotion returns from Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance, but has been heavily re-balanced. The infamous Flowmotion attacks have become drastically less powerful (Shock Dive no longer produces a large shockwave, for instance), and players can only jump off of walls about two or three times, meaning that it is now impossible to scale giant objects with Flowmotion alone. However, this does not mean that scaling walls is impossible. Certain walls, indicated by an upward-traveling wave effect, can be used to wall-run. This movement is three-directional, allowing Sora to travel upwards or to the left or right. If Sora falls off of a wall, or needs to get onto the wall from midair, simply pressing against the wall while falling will allow players to continue their ascent. Due to the aforementioned factors, platforming has never been more fun to partake in, since Sora’s varied movement options present players with both a great deal of freedom, as well as a significant feeling of responsiveness.
 
Moving on to the game’s visual presentation, I have to say that I am very impressed by the level of detail on display. The addition of idle animations for the party members and physics-based interactions have given Kingdom Hearts III those extra touches that elevate its already legendary visuals to new heights. For a few examples, individual blades of grass react to the movement of characters, a crumpled paper ball can be juggled, and Sora’s hair blows faintly in the wind. The game’s worlds feel very alive, containing plenty of interactive elements and secrets. Even though there weren’t many NPCs like there will be in the Kingdom of Corona world, there are plenty of little touches and details that make exploring Toy Box a real treat. I’m fairly certain that none of the attendees were able to explore and find everything that the demo had to offer on their own, and with only 30% of Toy Box available to us with this demo, it seems like the exploration aspect of the game will only get much bigger and much better as we explore the final game.
 
As my final positive point, I’d like to touch on the game’s music. Kingdom Hearts has consistently provided me with some of my favorite musical tracks ever, and Kingdom Hearts III is certainly no slouch in this department. The new tracks present within Toy Box are very catchy, with Toy Story’s famous song “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” making an appearance as the field theme. The battle theme is equal parts uplifting and frenetic, in classic Disney fashion. However, we also heard several returning tracks that got a welcome overhaul. “The Deep End” is probably the most notable of these, being fully orchestrated and having entirely new segments interwoven into the familiar melody. However, tracks such as “Hand in Hand” are also present, and have received a slight EDM-style flair. Overall, I think Yoko Shimomura has absolutely given the soundtrack of Kingdom Hearts III everything that she can muster, and I’m extremely happy with the results.
 

Cons


 
Moving on to discuss Kingdom Hearts III’s current flaws, I’d be doing this critique a disservice if I did not mention the floaty feeling within the combat. After attacking in the air or performing an Air Slide, Sora has a bit of a delay before starting to fall to the ground. This can most closely be compared to Aqua’s physics in Kingdom Hearts 0.2 Birth by Sleep -A fragmentary passage-, where any action taken in the air carried a delay of a fraction of a second, before the animation resolved and gravity took over. This floaty feeling was not present in Kingdom Hearts II, where Sora’s actions would be subject to gravity while an animation was in its final frames. In addition, a lot of the attacks themselves feel somewhat sluggish and clunky to transition between, making Sora feel a little stiff to control in the middle of a combo, especially when compared to the quick, fluid, and responsive combos from Kingdom Hearts II. A stronger adherence to Kingdom Hearts II's physics and responsiveness would be very well received by the majority of fans.
 
One of the other major complaints that has arisen in response to prior trailers and this demo is the frequency of Situation Commands. I’d like to think that the values were tweaked regarding how often these commands appear, as trailers and demos are meant to market a game, and showing off some of the flashier attacks that Sora can use is an effective way of doing that. These values, therefore, may not be representative of the final product. However, when playing Kingdom Hearts III in a more free-form environment, being overwhelmed by a large amount of Situation Commands will present the feeling that these are meant to be the primary form of combat, above all other methods, which I think is an unfortunately shallow representation of the game (see the Surge/Balloon point I made at the beginning of my discussion on the game’s pros).
 
An ideal philosophy, mechanics-wise, would be for Sora’s innate abilities to have their place in the spotlight, and then to use the secondary abilities and Situation Commands as a complement to Sora’s own power, rather than making them the focus. These abilities should instead feel rewarding to obtain, rather than being handed to players for using one or two spells, for example. By making them the focus and having them be so frequent, Sora's combos, spells, and original abilities are devalued, and players will elect not to use them as a result.
 
In addition, based on what I played, the various Attraction Flows and Limits (Situation Commands utilizing Sora’s party members) seemed to appear quite randomly, rather than having some easily discernible cause for being given. I initially thought that Attraction Flows showed up based solely on the present location, but these commands have apparently appeared for other players when they are in completely different environments. For instance, the Pirate Ship command only appeared in Andy’s front yard for me, but it is also apparently available in various sections of the toy store, according to other players’ footage of the game.
 
Due to the aforementioned points, perhaps allowing us to adjust the frequency of Situation Commands, or even completely disable those we don't like, would be a good gameplay element to include. These attacks are an extension of Sora's abilities and those of his friends, so they should be treated as such, rather than becoming the main weapon in their arsenal. They should also be able to be toggled, and their frequency tweaked, just like similar abilities' options in Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II. Another good course of action, in addition to what I just mentioned, would be to make the seemingly random conditions for activating certain commands more apparent.
 
I previously believed that summons (referred to as Links in the game) were also overhauled, keeping party members around while the summon is occurring. Unfortunately, this is not the case, even though the party's health bars are still present. These health bars should disappear to avoid causing confusion, as several players made this mistake the first time they saw a summon.
 
On a related note, though, I'd like to talk about how invincibility frames are handled. During the finishers of several different commands, including the aforementioned summons, Sora is locked into a particular animation, unable to avoid any damage. Players don't have any invincibility during these sections, which can often lead to Sora suffering an unfortunate death through no fault of the player.
 
This next point may seem minor, but has been a serious concern amongst those who’ve played the demo. The colored wave effect that travels up the entirety of a wall-run compatible surface has often been noted as being “too distracting” and “a case of visual overload”. Since the wave effect travels along any surface that can be climbed, it has capacity to appear far too often, potentially overwhelming the appearance of an area, and distracting players who are exploring or fighting. A more subtle effect would be a much better way to effectively communicate the intended function to the player, without sacrificing the aesthetic of the area or dividing the player’s attention.
 
As the final negative critique I have, I'd like to bring up the topic of input lag. All of the demo setups at the event had a large amount of delay between pressing a button and receiving a response from the game, making actions feel even more sluggish than they already appear and feel. This could be a result of the specific TV models we were playing on, but it’s a point that has been very commonly complained about by attendees, so it is worth taking into serious consideration. If there is any sort of input delay inherent within Kingdom Hearts III, it should ideally be fixed while optimizing other aspects of performance such as the game’s framerate.
 

Miscellaneous Concerns


 
Finally, there are a few concerns that I would like to bring up that are unrelated to the material that I played in the demo. Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance started the trend of having to play the game once to unlock the much-beloved Critical Mode, and this trend continued with the release of Kingdom Hearts 0.2 Birth by Sleep -A fragmentary passage-. A large portion of the fanbase, myself included, believe that Critical Mode should be made available from the start of Kingdom Hearts III, rather than being unlocked by beating the game once. Speaking personally, I usually play Kingdom Hearts games on the highest difficulty available, because I love a good challenge. Having to play through a game once to unlock a higher difficulty is usually an unwanted chore that challenge-oriented players just slog through to get what they wanted in the first place. There is no reason for Kingdom Hearts III to feel like a chore, especially when it is meant to be fun for anyone who plays. As a result, Critical Mode should be an immediately available option for players looking to challenge themselves, rather than a reward to be unlocked later.
 
Similar to the previous point, Critical Mode should also be properly balanced and rewarding. In Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep -A fragmentary passage-, Critical Mode not only increased enemies’ damage output, as one would expect, but also took away crucial abilities and halved the player’s MP. This made Critical Mode feel like an unfair and punishing experience, rather than a fair challenge that is fun to proceed through. Instead of making Critical Mode absurdly hard for the sake of being absurdly hard, this difficulty should be developed with the philosophy of offering the player a legitimate and fun challenge.
 


<3

 
I hope you've enjoyed what I have to say! Whether you are a developer at Square Enix who is working on Kingdom Hearts III, or just an average fan who wants the best for a series we love, I hope you value my impressions and feedback, as well as the impressions and feedback of everyone else who got to play the game!
 
What do you think of my impressions of the Kingdom Hearts III Premiere Event demo? Do you have any concerns of your own that you hope Square Enix will address? Let us know in the comments below!
Raxaimus

RUMOR: More Kingdom Hearts III Funko Pop Announcement

Another wave of Kingdom Hearts III Funko POP figures has been rumored to release by popcurated. This wave is reported to include Kingdom Hearts III Mickey, Riku, Soldier Heartless, and Vanitas.
 



 
This rumor comes a week after the first wave was rumored. There isn't a release date announced yet or confirmation by Funko.
 
What do you think of this set? Will there be more Kingdom Hearts III Funko figures? Let us know in the comments below!
Leamax

Kingdom Hearts III Premium Invitation Fact Sheet gives details on what to expect

Square Enix released a press release detailing some key points from the Kingdom Hearts III Premium Event. Included on the key points are Keyblade transformations, interacting with the environments (dive deep underwater, scaling massive cliffs, free-falling), using Attractions in combat, and Classic Kingdom minigames.
 
You can view the transcript below.
 
 
What do you think of this fact sheet? Let us know in the comments below and check out our coverage from the Premiere Event here!
Leamax

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