What Is It Gonna Take to Get Me Excited About Kingdom Hearts Again

Way back in the early 2000s, I was working at Electronics Boutique. Not EB Games, not GameStop, we’re talking old school Electronics Boutique. I’m talking wearing khakis and polo shirts every shift, asking customers if they wanted to buy Game Doctors to repair their discs, and eating so much crap from the food court that I can’t even look at a Sbarro without getting a little nostalgic.

Anyway, I was fortunate enough to be working at EB during the PS1/PS2 era, easily one of my favorites in gaming history. It had the right balance of major AAA releases, hidden gems (no one talks about Psi Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy and that is really disappointing), and some truly batshit ideas that fell somewhere in between.

I also, like many older millennials, was raised on DIsney animated movies. Those clam shell cases protected some of the most important films of my childhood. The Lion King, The Great Mouse Detective, Rescuers Down Under; all of them were watched so often I’m surprised they still worked after so many repeat viewings.

So when Kingdom Hearts was first announced, I thought I was having a fever dream. Combining two of my favorite licenses, into an action RPG that wasn’t meant for toddlers felt like the universe was doing me a solid. And thankfully, when the game came out, it was absolutely beautiful.

The story balanced the joy of watching a Disney film with the intensity of a Final Fantasy game with a level of care that even now makes me smile. I also loved seeing the characters I grew up with, being portrayed in new ways. Donald wasn’t an aggressive Naval officer, he was an aggressive sorcerer. Goofy wasn’t going to teach you how to drive or fish, he was the captain of the guard. They still had the same personality traits we’ve come to know and love, but it also felt new as we saw them in new outfits, casting spells, and ramming into monsters. And Sora was such a fun new hero. He was courageous, focused, and resilient, but also insecure, stubborn, and fragile. He was a kid trying to find his friends while making new ones. Combine all that with surprisingly challenging combat, captivating music, and an art style that took the familiar and turned it on it’s head, and you had lightning in a bottle.

Looking back on it now, I still have a lot of love for the original game, but I now recognize it’s flaws. While I loved running around the various Disney worlds (pun not intentional), the lack of a mini map made traversal a huge pain in the ass. Especially in some of the worlds that lacked distinguishing features like Monstro or Atlantica. Some of the objectives weren’t super clear either so levels often felt like you just had to screw around until you accidently triggered a cutscene. Also, Goofy and Donald’s AI wasn’t the best. It was still functional, but holy hell did they burn through whatever inventory you gave them. Granted you can tweak this in the settings but their default actions were questionable at best. These are minor gropes though as my nostalgia and affection for the game surpass any of the flaws. It’s hard to be completely objective when I think about the first game.

Then the sequels started to come out and with it came a lot of new requirements. You had to own each of the consoles which was challenging for a lot of folks. I know a lot of my friends were “PlayStation” or “Nintendo” kids growing up so to get the full experience, you would have to buy a lot of extra stuff if you didn’t already have them. Plus the story got really complicated. I mean, two plus hour long YouTube videos explaining who/what Organization XIII is, the difference between a Heartless and a Nobody, the different characters with frustratingly similar names, and that’s before analyzing somehow mandatory lore found within a goddamn cell phone games.

You also had to be patient too because it would be well over ten years between mainline installments, thanks to Kingdom Hearts 3 going into development hell for multiple console generations. I still really enjoyed the final installment of the Dark Seeker saga (which is something I had to look up because I thought it was called the Xehanort Saga until about 30 seconds ago) but I ultimately walked away kinda forgetting what I played. As of this writing, I still have not played the Re Mind DLC from 3 because I just couldn’t muster up the energy to care.

We got confirmation that Kingdom Hearts 4 is in production way back in April of 2022, and after nearly 2 years of waiting for some sort of update, I got to thinking, about what I would like to see in order to get that same feeling I did when the original launched. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still picking the game up, but I don’t have the same level of excitement as I did back in 2002.

So let’s get into it.

Offer a Primer
To this day I still don’t exactly know what the hell is going on in this franchise. I have a loose understanding of what the titular Kingdom Hearts actually is, along with the broad strokes of what happened, but a lot of it is “someone in a robe said something weird that upset someone else in a robe. Also Tarzan.” As difficult as it may be, some sort of concise official explanation of what has happened would be amazing. The only thing I gathered from the KH4 announcement video is that Sora is back which means a lot of lore is coming too. Give us the highlights of the fun stuff like what Sora did in the Tron world, but focus a lot on the Keyblade stuff, what is going on with Aqua, and why is Mickey always bouncing around this universe.

That’s a sentence I never thought I would write.

Continue to be Complex, but also Manageable.
Tying into the first point, I’m not opposed to having a multi-game story arc with constantly evolving characters and stakes. In fact, I’d continue to welcome it, but a much more focused narrative would be appreciated. While the handheld games have been for the most part pretty great, I can’t help but feel like they had two purposes. The first was to of course add to the increasingly complex lore, but also to buy time between parts 2 and 3. I hoping Square learned their lesson with part 3 but this is definitely a “fingers crossed” thing.

Bring Back the Final Fantasy Characters
This is one of the biggest issues many players had with Kingdom Hearts 3. One of the big draws this franchise had was its ability to blend in characters like Cloud, Cid, and Aerith seamlessly into the Disney universe. It felt like due to the development hell stuff, that KH3 ran out of time to incorporate Cloud and company back in. I would love to see characters from Final Fantasy 12-16 brought into the next saga. Imagine learning black magic from Y’shtola, fighting whatever the new equivalent of Heartless is gonna be alongside Clive, and riding in a Gummi Ship with Vaan.

Have the Disney Worlds Plotlines have More Involvement in the Overall Narrative
Usually when you enter a new Disney stage, the events within feel very self-contained. You’re stopping Clayton from wiping out all of the gorillas, finding the evidence to save Alice in a trial, or watching Elsa sing “Let it Go” in it’s entirety. While there usually is some reason to be there, you usually don’t find out what it is until the end of the level and there isn’t much of a reason to go back aside from completionist goals like rescuing the dalmatians or finding the hidden Mickeys.

At this point, Sora and crew have travelled to so many worlds and met so many characters that it would be great if they had larger roles to play aside from “save us.” For example, how amazing would it be that instead of just locking a magical door or trying to save a princess, we’re actively recruiting. I know the current lore is that the different worlds shouldn’t know about one another to preserve some sort of order, but this is a new saga. Rules can change or be broken. Why can’t Hercules come along because the big bad is draining a resource from Olympus. Have Woody join so he can find his purpose now that Andy grew up (especially if the theme of the new saga is related to that.) Have Winnie the Pooh be our new chef. Why not have Elsa join because Organization XIII has set up a base in her kingdom.

These worlds can be more than just single set pieces is what I’m getting at essentially.

Start to Transition to a New Hero
Granted there have been other playable heroes in the Kingdom Hearts universe but Sora is without a doubt the “main character.” As we enter this new saga, I would love to see Sora meet a new character and begin to pass the Keyblade over. As far as I can remember, Kingdom Hearts 4 will involve rescuing Kairi. If Square wants to play it safe, I would love to see her take on the mantle as the new primary protagonist. Preferably we would get a new original character to go along with the new saga but to see Sora take on more of a mentor role would be interesting.

Expand Beyond the Games
Kingdom Hearts has been begging to be more than just a game series. I know they’ve been turned into mangas but this series has the potential to be an amazing TV series on Disney +. Seasons could serve as a recap of the previous games or even focus on the KH version of DIsney characters to give them a bit more depth. I always felt like Disney and Square really missed out on incorporating the new characters and even the KH iterations of classics in to the parks. I’m sure part of it is a licensing issue but that could be worked out.

I just want to walk around Traverse Town in real life. Is that too much to ask?

So that’s what I got. Let me know what you think in the comments or on my Twitch channel.

Disclaimer: Thoughts and opinions expressed are my own and do not reflect those of my employer: Activision Blizzard.