Merilly

I do trust Famitsu's credibility but the wording of that quote is extremely strange in my opinion, coming from the director of the series. "We couldn't feel"? They're the ones who created the story. Why would that be a feeling and not a fact? That quote somehow sounds like it was said by an outsider, not a developer. After all, yellow eyes do not prove being a vessel at all... Otherwise all Heartless would be vessels, which they're not. Either this is worded really unfortunately or that wasn't all he said. To be honest, I'm still skeptical she is a vessel until the game comes out. It's not the first time something played out differently in the end because of a mistranslation or the interviewers misunderstanding something. As I said, I'm not undermining the possibility but that quote is somehow really unconvincing in the way it was written. Famitsu is usually a very credible magazine but it just sounds very odd for Nomura in comparison to the other interviews he, or anyone else, has given. Still, thanks for linking the video. I appreciate it despite my skepticism. Edit: That passage was from the same interview with the translation from khinsider. It doesn't sound like a confirmation at all but really, really vague.

Nothing against HMK and the rest, but those were just theories. They can't know for sure since they know about as much about the game as we do. (Perhaps a tiny bit more due to the demos but that info wasn't extremely important.) And it was never confirmed that she was a vessel by an official source. Even when the Guardian grabbed her, she did not change yet. So there is no confirmation she has become a vessel. For all we know, she could just as well be on the verge of becoming some sort of Darkling due to her color scheme. I'm not saying it's impossible, it just wasn't confirmed. I looked through the interviews and Nomura never explicitly said she was a vessel but rather dodged the subject. People were extremely fast to jump on the vessel theory because of the yellow eyes and white/silver hair but that might not be a trait exclusive to Xehanort but possibly a hint toward an influence of darkness as well. Or something completely different.

In 3 hours if nothing changes.

At this point I would be glad if they would just provide both languages. The game is done. There's no reason to hide voice actors or their work anymore and they announced it on both the Japanese and the international KH Twitter accounts. Commercials are one thing, especially with the voice-over, but there's no good reason to do it for trailers anymore in my opinion. Of course it needs a bit more effort to rip footage from each version, but there should be enough time for that.

Where did he confirm that she is under the influence of Xehanort? As far as I'm aware, he's been vague as to what has happened to her exactly. She could have been corrupted by darkness too and not be a vessel.

It's not like everything from today is bad. It's just that Disney only cares about its own products. Yes, KH and its original characters belong to Disney but I can't help but think they care less about the original characters than their own because they weren't involved in their design or story. The interviews suggested that Disney isn't quite as open anymore with KH as opposed to the beginning and their involvement probably doesn't imply only improvements. Otherwise I couldn't explain why most Disney characters looked fine and the original characters still required so much more work and could even use some here and there now. My problem is that people are all too eager to jump on the idea. But that's it. They like their own idea of how it should look like. I do too. But the reality will likely be far from it if Disney handles it. And I'm 90% sure it won't be in the pleasantly surprised way but rather the 'how could they mutilate KH?' way. Because it probably won't have the style of either the manga or classic Disney movies or even Avatar The Last Airbender. Its story won't be canon unless they work with Nomura and the storyboards looked flat. Like Disney giving licenses to to compabies who make those cheap figures. I've taken a look at the comments and most are down for it, but a lot also say they want an anime rather than a western cartoon. They want people like those who did Castlevania to do it because it seems like the studio cares for quality and tries to honor the source. They don't want Disney or Kearsley in particular. I doubt Disney denied the pitch solely for popularity reasons. It could be that they're well aware that if they don't do it 'right', they will garner a lot of hate, which isn't good if you want to sell more in the future. Yes, it could attract newcomers to the series, but might also give them a completely wrong picture of the franchise and what to expect. Disney can create series' which are great. But only when the people working on them know what they're doing. There are plenty good or at least decent series which came out in the past years. You can argue about style and story but not all were aimed at small children. But Kearsley doesn't seem to know Kingdom Hearts all that well. There's just a different connection to a series if you've been part of the development process from the ground up rather than just being tasked of making a copy of existing material. Especially if you're not passionate about the franchise. For example, I'd be more inclined to trust someone who has at least played all the games. Not like Kearsley who claimed he would only do that if the series has a future. That tells me he couldn't care less about KH and didn't enjoy the first game all that much. And I wouldn't be angry if he doesn't like it. He hasn't been part of the development, didn't design anything or worked on anything which is part of KH. If he couldn't connct with it, then that's fine. But I also think that he might not be the best choice to lead such a project then because it's bound to fail if there's a fundamental dislike. Be it games, movies, etc.; they are all art and in order to get feeling across, people need to be passionate or at least invested in their work. Admittedly, I'm not from the US so I don't know about the Disney Channel problems but from what you say I can tell it's not exactly what people might want...

Yeah. I understand the desire for an animated series, I just don't think Kearsley can deliver and medt the expectations long-time fans have. If they made such a series, I would prefer it if a group of people would be chosen who could keep a certain style and who have contact to scenario writers of the franchise. It doesn't need to be a 1:1 adaptation from the games, both the manga and the novels aren't either, but it would be good if they're familiar with the source material and have some passion to do this. Money matters. I'm not expecting anyone to do it out of the goodness of their heart or because they love the series. But I see Disney's increased involvement critical, especially if they should decide on an animated series on their own. The manga and the novels are a good example of valuing the source material while still providing new perspectives. They're bot the greatest works of all time but enjoyable in their own right. KH is my favorite franchise and while I didnnot like everything about the novels and the manga, there were a lot of things I also would have liked to see in the games, especially in terms of characterization since they gave more insight on motivation, habits and quirks. It was both funny and adding more to their personality without changing everything, even though they also sometimes contradict what was said in the games and aren't canon. What we saw from the storyboards carried little value for me. What they wanted to do with it sounded generic and not like they really looked at the material. I'm not expecting anyone to become a fan of the series but if I had to work on a project I would look at the franchise as a whole to get a feel for it and not only the first game just because my plot never ventures further. I just have little sympathy for Kearsley ever since he gave that interview regarding the KH series he had planned and everything he did after only served to support that notion that he is the wrong person for an animated series.

Agreed... I wish everyone did that and wouldn't make their beliefs sound like confirmed facts (i.e. continuously stating there are exactly two Disney worlds left as if that was confirmed). A few fans are prone to only read what they want to see, regardless of confirmation or not. The problem is when they throw a tantrum because of it. Just like with the Starlight Keyblade. Not only did people not read, no, they had to be mean about it. Even though it makes zero sense to be able to download it beforehand. What would they even do with it now? How would it help them? Instead of panicking, it's wise to read it again and then contact them if something isn't clear. They shouldn't need to make a tweet about it just because people are overzealous.

I also hope that, of course. Maybe not for Brave in particular because even though it would be a fitting movie, its main colors are already represented enough in this game for my personal taste, but I would definitely be down for another world. It doesn't even need to be a new one. The only thing I wouldn't like would be another world with a non-human transformation for Sora. I think Monstropolis is enough in that regard and Toy Box also has a significant transformation, despite retaining human features. I didn't want to go against your comment on its own and tell you to qba don all hopes, but rather say that it's not confirmed before people get too hyped again just to be disappointed. It's not because you are, but it felt like quite a few people took that text box as a confirmation. Believing in the possibility is absolutely fine and I can see the reasons why people would. I just saw a lot of people hyping this up more than necessary and even claiming they'd consider the game terrible if that would be it in terms of worlds. I personally would enjoy it if Radiant Garden was confirmed playable. It would be such a waste to not have around for more than a few cutscenes, considering how important the world was in a lot of other titles, especially 1 and 2, but also BBS.

As Zeldablade7 says, the browser translation may not be accurate so you're probably right to keep expectations low. It's not like they have to include every Pixar movie right off the bat and not every movie is necessarily suitable for the franchise. Of course I'm also hoping for another world, it's just that people are hyping this up a lot without really knowing if it's an accurate translation. Japanese isn't always as clear about the wording and while they have gotten better, those translation softwares do not replace translators. I think there were many issues because of inaccurate translations before, so it's best not to jump to conclusions. Best example would be the newest update for KHUx where people don't know whose sister Strelitzia is. It's a bit ambiguous at times, even for proficient speakers. I think the translation provided by Matt Hunt seems a bit more likely, considering that this text box seems to be more of a general description of the game rather than an announcement. It just has a feeling of a synopsis, though I can't know for sure either and the browser translation could still be correct for all we know. What I'm actually a bit surprised about is that there'll be no demo available. It felt like KH3 appeared everywhere and at every bigger (gaming) event in so many different countries. The fact that it won't appear in Japan again is a little strange, especially if we think about the scope of the event, that KH3 will have a presence and that it's the origin country of the franchise. I'm not speculating there has to be a special meaning to it, I just think it's odd.

I expressed my disdain toward Kearsley in the past and will do so again. He doesn't seem to care for the franchise at all apart from its popularity, considering he didn't express any desire to get into the games unless he gets to work on an animated series for it. I'm not saying that his motivations have to be like this, the interviews he's given suggest it though. If it gets approved, count me out unless people are involved who actually know the series and won't turn it into either a ridiculous show for infants or make it laughable. Yes, it is harsh and I'm not saying every interpretation done by others needs to be bad, after all not every Disney show is terrible and some are really great, but I'd rather they leave Kingdom Hearts be and refrain from turning it into a cash cow just because they suddenly realized it has a considerably solid fanbase. I'm not a fan of him, his style or the works he's been associated with. KH is far from perfect and there's much they could tell but it doesn't need to be an animated series. It usually doesn't work out that well to adapt games.

Me neither, that's why I said I'm not too concerned about this being datamined. Because if that really was so easy, it would be done more often and then it wouldn't be offered for preload anymore, especially not this early. The possibility is always there though. It's really slim but there's just no way to prevent it 100% from happening. I personally don't believe anyone would put in that kind of effort it would take for a game that comes out in less than two months. Admittedly, I know very little about datamining but considering how long it took for them to find assets in 0.2, I doubt it's a process that can be done in one night or even days. In the end I believe gaming companies and those associated with them are trying hard enough to keep their paid content from leaking. It cannot be prevented in all cases, but people would need a lot of determination and know-how to try that and then even have the motivation of spreading it.

To be honest, I'm not too concerned about someone hacking the preloaded game. If that was such a common issue, I doubt they would offer it this early. I'd be more worried about insiders leaking something. Though I did not expect it to become available this early. I have nothing against it since it's just a preload but it still is very far away. To be fair, I don't buy digital copies so I won't know exactly, but is just seems rather early. It's better to be careful of leaks, fake or not. What was once seen can't be erased after all since we can't filter it beforehand and conveniently decide whether it's real or not and then allow it in. Even if Xbox preloaded content is considered safe, something unexpected can always happen and we have to be careful regardless ever since the game went gold. The game being available for preload only serves as a reminder of that.

I think fans were overexaggerating when they said the main story would be 100+ hours. Nomura said the story would be around 40 hours I believe and over 80 for 100%. Cutscenes can potentially be condensed quite a bit in size and 80+ hours for full completion probably also includes all of the mini games. A lot of them seem to be rather simple and likely won't take much space. To be honest, I don't know where people still take the notion from that the main story will take 100 hours. First of all, that isn't a good idea because the replay value decreases if the main games takes too long in my opinion. Of course they could fit that much content into KH3 with how many characters there are and give more insight on loads of things, but I don't think that was ever a real possibility. I don't see many games which have such a long main story. (And it doesn't count to the time to get distracted by side quests either.) Another thing is that they have to be compared to other games. We can't compare them to the recent vast open world games since despite being larger, KH is still mainly story-driven and doesn't focus too much on exploration and all those extras which make people sink hundreds of hours into the games. Apart from the mini games and the occasional treasure chest, there likely won't be a plethora of things to do but fight enemies since it's still mostly a hack'n'slay type of game. There's no hunting, no survival, no completely seamless open world, so I think roughly 36GB still translates well to 40 hours of main story. There are lots of games which have similar or even smaller file sizes despite being rather large in terms of content. Persona 5, Monster Hunter World, the new Dragon Quest, etc. all have smaller file sizes if I recall correctly. I can't say I don't have any doubts either after all this talk about having difficulties to fit the game onto the disc because it was so large. I do fear story-related content was cut to adjust to that and so they can make more money from DLC. But the first insecurity I had was quickly debunked by seeing how many other games have this kind of file size without losing in quality. It's not the best idea to compare it to open world games and those which already had considerably large patches though as I've seen some do. It might be smaller than some people imagine but as you said, it will likely still be bigger than any other KH game before. More than file size or what could be added (which, to be honest, will always be a lot in terms of KH since there are always more side stories and character relationships/character development to explore), it's important that it will still be a complete experience, although it might not be as long-lasting as some people hope it will be and won't be able to address absolutely everything we want to see. In that regard, KH3 will only be able to lose. But better that than letting it drag on and on with needless extensions or way too many cutscenes in a small amount of time. (Like in KH2 where you sometimes couldn't take 5 steps without being assaulted by a cutscene. Don't get me wrong, I love story and everything, but some were just too much without giving the player some time to actually play the game.)

That only happened in JP so far. Global is currently just before the Maleficent battle in Enchanted Dominion. We still have quite a few quests to even get there.

The possibility for that to happen is slim. We're several months behind JP in terms of story and unless they decide to catch up after all (which they didn't plan to apparently, though SE has been vague), we will only be up to date in about 5-6 months. Don't expect to see her before KH3 comes out. And these updates are usually not for the whole month of December. They announce the recurring stuff like Coliseum rewards, Monthly Gem Challenge, etc. on the 1st because they run the entire month but they are not an outlook of what will happen. Story updates are only announced a day before actual release and we usually get around one each month. There's an update like this about every week for the weekly stuff.

Yeah, the similarity is definitely there.

Diamond Select is at it again with his face... Is it really so hard to get it right? I also think the price is a little steep for the quality. For a bust this size, they need to be extra careful with details and shading. This doesn't look worth paying that much money for. It doesn't look utterly terrible but for a list price of roughly 200$+shipping for a 25cm bust (a part of which actually consisting of a plain stand), I personally expect more attention to detail. The material also looks fairly cheap and too glossy, though that might just be the lighting. And for a bust of this dimension, it would make sense to have his necklace be an actual one and not sculpted onto the figure and then painted. I think it lacks plasticity, depth, shading and diversity in the use of paints. The paintjob looks inconsistent and the lines around his eyes a little rough, although it's a lot easier to be detailed with busts and also necessary. The hair also could use more brown hues to actually make it look like hair. It's easy for me to pass up on this... I can overlook some static faces and inconsistencies in smaller figures because you need to get up close to see the face, but a bust would mean that the flaws would be glaring at me the entire time. Faces are very important for figures, even more so for busts, and Sora constantly suffers from very mediocre to outright terrible quality. I actually saw a doodle with the comment that it's simply impossible to capture that much sunshine in a figure, which admittedly made me chuckle, but for 200$ this is non-negotiable in this case.

I put it under a spoiler tag, even if it may be a little too late, though I still have no idea what the "leaks" actually entailed. xD' I apologize if that supported spoilers and will take responsibility for it in case anyone feels offended by my post.

Finally! I was somewhat peeved by the fact that most characters are depicted with their Keyblades quite often and Kairi only ever got the most generic of stances, despite having a weapon, and was never featured alongside them. It's really great to finally have some renders with her in action.

As I mentioned before, there's a good chance that quite a few fan theories will come true simply because there are so many and even if some part of supposed leaks became true, it would not mean those were real. After a game has gone gold, leaks would need to be at least 99% accurate for me to acknowledge that the one posting them actually had a credible source. Otherwise all those theory posts which will have some truth in them could also claim they were leaking stuff. If I wrote a post with my theories, there's a good chance some of those would be correct, too and I could go around boldly proclaiming "I knew it because I had access to the game!" but in the end, all the wrong information has to be taken into account as well to determine if it's truly a leak to be believed.

I kinda expected a little more when I read Ultra Detail, though these could still be prototypes. They look nice enough, though the faces and hair could use more attention to detail and the clothes could use a better paintjob with a better use of shadows. They don't seem too tall, so I definitely wouldn't pay more than 40-45$ per figure. I'm still hoping some of the better quality companies will get a license eventually... Not that all figures are bad but I feel like the average or worse quality ones are drastically outweighing good quality ones. But I'm glad that these are static figures and not action figures, but the outlines still don't look too clean in the pictures.

Yeah, I will probably resort to those drastic measures as well. I can't stay off of Youtube but I can at least blacklist some words. I'm not too worried about my Twitter since I don't follow many people and those I do follow wouldn't spoil anything. And I have to click a link for pictures on my old phone, so the risk is fairly low if I don't search for KH. The things I'm most worried about are YouTube and Tumblr because of all the recommended stuff. Sometimes people don't name and tag their stuff appropriately so there's no guarantee nothing will slip through the cracks. Saw that with 0.2 already and it might be infinitely worse for KH3. So I'll just avoid Tumblr altogether. I'm not too worried about this website since the moderators usually keep a good eye on potential spoilers. Of course it's not impossible for something to surface in-between, but it's better monitored than an open and gigantic website. 4chan and Reddit as well as Facebook aren't my thing and I placed a no spoiler policy on my KHUx party due to the wishes of my party members. I guess that means we're as well prepared as one can be without completely going dark. I unfortunately can't afford that so I just hope it'll be enough. It's usually not such a big deal for me when it comes to other games but it will be the last time for quite a while until we get to experience another KH for the first time again and I don't want my friend and I to know all the twists and turns before we start our adventure. I'm fairly certain we can expect the first leaks to pop up at least a week before release. Though it's probably wiser to do it like yourself and watch out several weeks in advance. Even though the most recent one was 99% fake from what I heard, there's no telling when the next one will come after seeing the reaction from the fans and whether it'll be real this time. I know some laugh about that but it happens fairly often that things get leaked so I can't blame fans for being cautious.

I'll probably be gone for about a week once the game launches so even if I would live nearby, no one would probably be able to drag me out of the cave that my apartment will turn into. I think it's a nice little idea though and not the worst marketing technique for the store.

Thank you for throwing yourself into battle for us. Really though, I did not expect them to be true but with leaks being a reality we've got to deal with, it wouldn't be a surprise if something would be posted way before the 25th. The Monstropolis leaks at least had a more credible source with the public server actually being there (though we couldn't be sure it belonged to SE), and images of the quality that were shown would be hard to recreate. But I guess I'm exceptionally cautious for anything story-related. If we think about it, a lot of fans will probably have guessed certain things right since it's not the first KH game and there are theories galore, but claiming it's a leak has me cautious to read it because it's hard to determine whether it's true or not without reading it but you can't erase it once you did. I would also be careful at least 1-2 weeks before the release date. Many people know of ways to get the games earlier through contacts or some stores just not caring, and if the games are meant to be on the shelfs on time, they would probably come in earlier rather than at the last second to manage that reliably. 2.8 was out a week earlier in most western countries because stores didn't care about the release date and there are always those who receive earlier copies and then go online with their Let's Plays, Playthroughs, etc. That's how it was with 2.8 and I doubt they can stop it occuring for KH3... For example, I know the owner of a really small store and even his orders usually come in 3-4 days before release and he sold me copies because we're acquaintances. If someone is in the industry or connected to it, they will get it earlier than the 25th/29th and not all of them are opposed to spoilers.