Famitsu's HD 1.5 ReMIX article now completely translated, with a wealth of 358/2 Days information

3 of the series titles have been remastered in HD as Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix (Referred to as KH1.5 for future reference). One of the titles compiled called Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, which was released for the Nintendo DS, now has its original story compiled into video clips lasting 2 hours and 50 minutes. Now, parts of the scenes derived from the original version will now be shown! In addition, the developer’s staff comments and mini interviews will also be reported.

Changes derived from to KH358/2 Days original version

 Scenes from original version now transformed into high resolution
 Event scenes previously without voices are now fully voiced as HD cutscenes
 It's now possible to view the special scenes (Days) from the chapter menu
 From the beginning of “Roxas’s Diary”, clips depicting the ‘Secret Reports’ will be unlocked and viewable
 Details relating to any characters that appear will be detailed and can be viewed and explained in the newly added “Character Dictionary”
 Upon completion of viewing all the content, a custom theme for the PlayStation 3 will be unlocked
 Trophy system support (Trophy acquisition is related to how much you have viewed)

(Left image): "If you see the words ‘Winner’ on sticks of any finished ice cream bars"

▲ “Organization XIII” is the organization in which the protagonist Roxas belongs to, everyday he is tasked with missions, and there he fosters a friendship between Axel, the person tasked with training him – and Xion, the girl who has newly joined the ranks of the Organization.

(Left image): "The Key"
(Right image): "And then, the great Kingdom Hearts will assemble is all im sayin’"

▲ Organization XIII works in accordance with the intention of its leader, Xemnas – his intentions are littered with ulterior motives. Those intentions before long begin to shake the peaceful days shared between Roxas and his friends.

(Left image): "Sora’s memories have come to a complete stop"
(Right image): "Please don’t hold back"

About: The developers comments and mini interview!

Includes an interview with comments from the cutscene director for Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, Mr Oka Masaru, and the person behind the sound effects, sound design and the electric guitar Mr Hirose Yuki.

The interview for cutscene director Mr Oka Masaru

-- When the HD version was decided upon, what kind of duties were you in charge of?

Oka Masaru: When compiling ‘Days’ into a theatre, just developing the main story into clips was clear, we had 100 new scenes created from the selection of scenarios. The existing cutscenes became a production environment and brought about a big change for the newly created cutscenes. Apart from developing the chains of clips, there was no sense of unease in tuning the graphics as much as possible.

-- Which part do you think users will particularly want to see?

Oka Masaru: This time around, with the fresh cutscenes with added sound (voices), and the abundance of facial expressions, we felt that it was a challenge to use the textures to convey delicate emotions. When given the same scene, with the lines ‘….’, I wonder to myself what kind of emotions and what sort of fresh surprises we are able to get from this. When connecting several scenes, each chapter serves to have its own way of telling its part of the story along with the background music (BGM) which compliment the scenes. Before, there were scenes with a different scene BGM, except this time the way it is presented in the theatre is much more enjoyable and appreciable. But still, in scenes which were depicted with 2 screens, we had to get rid of one of the screens in order to edit them into a 1-screen scene. How it turns out, I hope you can confirm it yourself with the finished product. The theatre spans 2 hours and 50 minutes. When watching all the scenes together starting from the beginning, I think they would be best appreciated by the viewer being settled comfortably.

-- In addition, could you please provide us with any incidents which left a profound impression on you.

Oka Masaru: The HD transformation that we’ve been apart of, as well as producing cutscenes for past projects KH, Re:Chain of Memories, and finally Days; as I look back at those clips, I reminisce at the feeling I got at the time of production and I get a surge of nostalgia. Its something like – ‘This was Kingdom Hearts 10 years ago!’ But that was ages ago, and I’d never thought that we’d be involved with so much KH later down the track. After these 10 years and as we face the future, I feel I want to continue making things for everyone’s dearly beloved Kingdom Hearts series.

Comment from sound designer Yuki Hirose

As the first of the series for the PlayStation 3, the real time portions of KH and KH:ReCoM run on 5.1ch surround sound. This is true too for Days, which adds a huge collection of story scenes, all of which are fully compiled with voices ~ I hope your hearts will flutter for adorable little Xion!! On the side of music, it's being supervised by Ms Yoko Shimomura. The songs used here when compared to the original will have different musical instrument replacements, along with rearrangements of the songs. The sound itself has been reborn, certainly please do anticipate it. Lastly… to all the good kids out there, please don’t go eating ice cream in such high/tall places (laughs).