Tai Yasue discusses Kingdom Hearts with Kotaku

Meilin Lee · Jun 11, 2014

As E3 continues, Kotaku was able to catch up with Kingdom Hearts co-director, Tai Yasue, who provided some words on Kingdom Hearts 2.5 HD ReMix and Kingdom Hearts 3, which can be read below:

Last week, when Square Enix published their E3 trailer for Kingdom Hearts 2.5, they added a little teaser for Kingdom Hearts III. We knew that already.

What we didn't know is that according to Kingdom Hearts III co-director Tai Yasue, who spoke to me this morning in an E3 interview, this is actually the first thing you'll see when you open up the game.

"That's the starting scene for Kingdom Hearts III, actually," Yasue told me. "Nomura has a real clear picture of the starting sequence. He wrote that up actually, the drawings, and we voice-recorded that. That's gonna be a real integral part of the story of Kingdom Hearts III. It's gonna be the starting point of Kingdom Hearts III."

Yasue is here in Los Angeles to talk about the upcoming Kingdom Hearts 2.5, a remake of KH2 for PS3 that also includes Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep and some other features. He's co-directing that one, too. It's out in December.

And though I was warned before the interview that Yasue couldn't talk much about the third Kingdom Hearts, which was announced for PS4 and Xbox One at E3 2013, I couldn't help myself. I had to ask for something, anything.

"Is there anything you can hint at or tease to fans who might be desperate for any information on Kingdom Hearts III?" I asked.

"As a developer I'm really excited, the technology is totally different, and creatively it's moving at leaps and bounds," Yasue said.

He pointed to the gameplay that they showed off at D23 in Japan a few months ago, where Sora and crew rode around a giant boss on a rollercoaster-like train. We'll see a lot of big setpieces like that, he said.

"We'll have, I think, a lot of that," Yasue told me. "You could I guess imagine a theme park sort of ride-based action. I think that might be an important part of the game, and so I think people can really look forward to that. It will be moving in leaps and bounds, I think. It's very exciting."

I told Yasue, who is bi-lingual and speaks both Japanese and English, that the first thing everyone thought when Disney bought Lucasfilm was that now Kingdom Hearts could have Star Wars. He laughed and said he couldn't comment.

But now that Kingdom Hearts 2.5 is almost done, Yasue and crew are focusing all their energy on Kingdom Hearts III, which still has no release date, or even a release year.

"Kingdom Hearts 2.5 is gorgeous, I think," Yasue said. "But Kingdom Hearts III is pure magic."
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via Kotaku

Baptista · Jun 11, 2014

That's the starting scene? So ... no CGI Intro ? No Sora talking about dream ? :(

. : tale_wind · Jun 11, 2014

Baptista said: ↑

That's the starting scene? So ... no CGI Intro ? No Sora talking about dream ? :(
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I'd assume it means the starting scene not counting the CGI intro.The CGI intro has always come before anything else, and the intro really isn't a scene anyway.

Oh, but this is intriguing. Kinda makes me think of the scene from the beginning of DDD with Xehanort and Braig in Ansem's lab. Lore is always good...

~Clave Ensis~ · Jun 16, 2014

Baptista said: ↑

That's the starting scene? So ... no CGI Intro ? No Sora talking about dream ? :(
Click to expand...

On the contrary, I think it's quite a clear way to open the game. We don't see anything - it's mysterious and builds tension. But I do hope that after this scene they have some CGI to visually engage gamers. That would top it off.

Misty · Jun 18, 2014

~Clave Ensis~ said: ↑

On the contrary, I think it's quite a clear way to open the game. We don't see anything - it's mysterious and builds tension. But I do hope that after this scene they have some CGI to visually engage gamers. That would top it off.
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The interview with Famitsu that was just posted said they were working from a storyboard Nomura did up, so I imagine it'll be quite a bit more detailed than that in KH3 heh.

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Tai Yasue discusses Kingdom Hearts with Kotaku

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