Churro

Amazon.co.jp have added pre-order pages for a pair of Play Arts based on Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance]-- "Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance] Play Arts Sora & Riku TRON:LEGACY ver.". These Play Arts, which feature Sora and Riku in their Tron: Legacy outfits, will be available on March 8, 2013 for a price of ￥6,073 each (approximately US$75.77). All images can be seen below. Update 1 (November 20, 2012): Square Enix have announced some release date changes for their merchandise. The new Tron: Legacy Play Arts for Kingdom Hearts 3D have been delayed until April 26, 2013. Update 2 (April 2, 2013): Both the Square Enix e-STORE and Amazon.co.jp have created pre-order pages for the Tron: Legacy Kingdom Hearts 3D Play Arts. These pre-order pages (Sora: e-STORE | Amazon.co.jp, Riku: e-STORE | Amazon.co.jp) reveal that the figurines have been delayed again, and will now be released on May 17, 2013. Thanks go to ArikaMiz for the find.

The March 28, 2013 issue of Famitsu Weekly has included an article on Kingdom Hearts χ[chi] (pronounced "Kingdom Hearts Key"), the currently Japan-only Kingdom Hearts game for web browsers. The article explains that while playing Kingdom Hearts χ[chi], the player will join one of 5 teams and compete against each other. The teams are based on animals, and are known as "Unikorunisu" (Unicorns), "Reoparudosu" (Leopards), "Anguisu" (???), "Urupeusu" (???) and "Urususu" (???). A full translation will be available soon. bKvEBVAvUq has uploaded a scan of the article, and thanks to him, this can be seen below. Update: Oishii has translated the information in this scan, which you can read below. In this work, when a player begins creating their own avatar, they can choose a “Union” to join. A Union is a group with which you kill enemies with the purpose of collecting “Lux”. Every week, the amount of Lux collected by each Union is calculated. If you enter the highest rank, you can take part in a mission where it is possible to obtain a special reward.

Last week, people were given the opportunity to participate in a closed beta test for Kingdom Hearts χ[chi] (pronounced "Kingdom Hearts Key"), the currently Japan-only Kingdom Hearts game for web browsers. Square Enix opened an official website for the game, and has since added a page describing the gameplay elements of Kingdom Hearts χ[chi], complete with screenshots. Thanks go to tomerc10 from KH13 for this find. goldpanner has translated the information provided on this page, and thanks to her, you can read this translation below. [How to play] Slide 1: Welcome to the world of Kingdom Hearts χ [chi]! Journey through Disney worlds and take the light back from the darkness! Slide 2: Defeat the darkness that has appeared in the worlds, the Heartless! Defeat Heartless to get Lux (Light)! Slide 3: Collect Lux (light) to win Team Battles! The Lux you all collected will be tallied together every night to determine the victorious team! The winning team will be rewarded! Slide 4: Defeat Raid Bosses for Huge Gains! Join in the battle when a Raid Boss appears. [Worlds] Slide 1: Simple mouse controls - Your avatar will move to wherever you click the mouse - Click Heartless and things that catch your eye! (Heartless, components Items, Treasure Chests) - Use AP to make actions (TIP: AP regenerates with time) Slide 2: Dynamic Card Battles! - Click Heartless to start a battle! - Defeat Heartless to obtain Lux and cards etc - Use cards to execute various abilities! Slide 3: Gather components! - Synthesise your Keyblade with components to strengthen it! [Card Synthesis] Slide 1: About Card Synthesis - Synthesise your cards to get strong! - Base card - components Cards - Munny is necessary for synthesis TIPS - Synthesise cards of the same type (blue, green, red) and the level will rise more easily - Synthesise the same card to form a Limit Card and raise the card's max level [Deck Formation] Slide 1: About Deck Formation TIPS - Form the strongest deck easily with 'Auto Form' - Deck - Owned cards - Battle with three cards at a time chosen at random from your deck Slide 2: About Cards There are two types of cards! Attack Cards: - Attack cards are set with one Ability - Attack cards have a fixed Attack Strength and Defence Strength! - Obtain Attack Cards by defeating Heartless and through Card Draw etc Assist Cards: - Assist Cards are important cards that decide HP and the Lux you will obtain - Obtain Assist Cards from treasure chests as you adventure through the worlds [Keyblade Strengthening] Slide 1: About Keyblade Strengthening - Gather components Items to strengthen your Keyblade - Once you have collected the necessary components, you can strengthen your Keyblade! - If you match your cards and Keyblade type during battle, you will get an effect up bonus [Team] Slide 1: A Raid Boss has Appeared! - Work together with everyone to defeat the Raid Boss within the time limit! - Damage the Raid Boss to get Lux to defeat opposing teams - Battle the Raid Boss using BP! - The more BP you use, the more damage you deal

Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 ReMIX released in Japan on March 14, 2013. 4Gamer.net have revealed that between March 14 and March 17, the game sold 128,414 copies. For the week between March 11 to March 17 in Japan, this placed HD 1.5 ReMIX in 2nd place, just behind Sword Art Online: Infinity Moment. 4Gamer.net also posted their reader reviews score for the title-- 90/100! Famitsu's own sales estimates for the March 11 to March 17 week have also appeared online, giving slightly different numbers for HD 1.5 ReMIX. Famitsu places the weeks sales at 131,940 copies, making HD 1.5 ReMIX the top-selling game of the week! Either way, these are very good numbers for a HD collection in Japan. We have collected the first week sales of various PlayStation 3 HD collections in Japan below, for comparison: 304,073 - Monster Hunter Portable 3rd HD Ver. 128,414 - Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 ReMIX 89,112 - The ICO & Shadow of the Colossus Collection 59,060 - Metal Gear Solid HD Edition 44,221 - Devil May Cry HD Collection 43,265 - Zone of the Enders HD Collection 39,900 - Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker HD Edition 13,064 - God of War Collection 7,280 - Silent Hill HD Collection 6,404 - Ratchet & Clank Collection 5,542 - God of War: Origins Collection As you can see, Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 ReMIX is off to a great start in Japan. In fact, as far as we can tell, this is the second-fastest selling HD remaster in Japan of all time. Congratulations to the Kingdom Hearts series! Update: Sales information for the second week of HD 1.5 ReMIX's release (from March 18 to March 24, 2013) have been released. Media Create has the amount at 29,401 copies, for a total of 157,815 copies so far; while Famitsu has the amount at 31,481 copies, for a total of 163,421 copies so far.

Famitsu.com have posted an article in celebration of the release of Kingdom Hearts -HD 1.5 ReMIX- in Japan. The article coincides with the appearance of the title in the March 14 issue of Famitsu Weekly, and includes many screenshots, images and information from the article. Check out all images below, in our gallery! The article also includes recent interviews with Tetsuya Nomura, the director of the series, and Tai Yasue, the co-director of the game. Look forward to our translations of this! Update: goldpanner has done us a huge favour and translated both the Tetsuya Nomura and Tai Yasue interviews included in the article! These interviews reveal a wealth of information about HD 1.5 ReMIX, so please check them out. STAFF INTERVIEWS Interview with Director Tetsuya Nomura ---Please tell us about any points that gave you trouble or things you were fixated on achieving when it came to KH 1.5. Tetsuya Nomura (hereon Nomura): For some titles, most of the data from back in the day was no longer available. I had the programmers search through the program manually, and from there they told me various places where raising quality would be impossible. I was fixated on remaking KH 358/2 Days as a video volume and putting the three titles leading to KH2 into one. ---Which particular scene would you recommend from the HD compilation? Nomura: For those who have already played these games, I am sure that it's not the prettiness of the graphics but rather the memories involved that will be powerful... Seeing as story-wise all scenes have been covered before, I think it will depend on everyone's individual impressions. When KH Re:COM released on the PS2 the image quality wasn't very good due to capacity issues, so perhaps seeing the high resolution product will be fresher than you realise. ---Please tell us about your concept for the box art, and any points you want to draw our attention to. Nomura: I drew a similar design for the soundtrack of the first game, but seeing as it had little opportunity for exposure, I decided to channel the title itself and remake and remaster it. Also, I felt that having three titles meant I should have three separate images. ---A final message for gamers? Nomura: As KH has become such a long series, I would be happy if newcomers, those who have only played some of the titles, and those who only played the numbered titles take this opportunity to try playing. I want to draw as many people as possible in time for the anticipated final battle. Interview with Co. Director Tai Yasue ---How did you go about organising work on the HD remake? Had any of the staff worked on the original games? Tai Yasue (hereon Yasue): As several projects related to the KH series, which I am working on as co. director, are currently running simultaneously, scheduling and organisation has been rather complicated. Five programmers in Osaka and a large number of planners and designers in Osaka and Tokyo were involved with KH 1.5. Not many staff had worked on the original version of KH Final Mix, but among them there were people like Oka (Masaru Oka, cutscene director of the KH 1.5 version of KH 358/2 Days), who have participated wholeheartedly, stubbornly, enduringly and lengthily in the KH series (laughs). ---Were there any points that gave you trouble or things you were fixated on achieving with this title? Yasue: The controls and abilities were my sticking point. I referred to things that had worked well in other KH titles to revise many areas of KH Final Mix. However, as this was an already completed game, revising things had side effects... For example, there were some bosses that could not be defeated no matter how hard you tried if you played with the new EXPZero equipped. I ended up adjusting things to clear up all kinds of issues right up to the end of the debug period, suffering chilly stares from those around me the whole time. That was a point that gave me trouble (dry laugh). ---Was there something that left you with a deep impression during development? Yasue: The two programmers that were pivotal to development, who were normally akin to characters from a duo comedy skit, left a deep impression on me when halfway through development we received a bug report from the testers that made them flip out, transforming them into characters with a Berserk status (laughs). Just like how in Final Fantasy the Berserk status ailment boosts attack strength, these two had a boost in C++ strength, and they got to correcting bugs with terrifying expressions on their faces. Since they were also giving off an aura comparable in intensity to that of a berserked FF character, I tried not to go near them out of fear. If I could have given them sound effects it would have been 'vvvvrrrr! RRRRAAAAAAARRRRGH!!' (laughs). ---Which particular scene would you recommend from the HD compilation? Yasue: I recommend the scene in KH Final Mix, where Peter Pan tells Sora, 'Fly, Sora! I believe you can!' and Sora becomes able to fly, and goes to fight Captain Hook. Not only is the picture prettier, but flying about defeating Heartless is quite comfortable now that you can move the camera freely with the left stick. I remember that even in the original version I was moved by the nice link between the story developments and the battle, but I was moved all over again seeing it reborn in HD! ---A final word for our readers? Yasue: While developing KH 1.5, I keenly felt how no matter how much hardware changes or techniques evolve, masterful worldbuilding, gameplay, plot and visuals do not lose their shine no matter how many years pass. The three titles included in KH 1.5 were all masterpieces in different ways. They are even more radiant now that they have been reborn onto the Playstation 3, so by all means play them and see!