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News ► Dual wielding returns with Kingdom Hearts III's Oathkeeper and Oblivion new formchange



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It's funny how wild people go for the concept of dual-wielding. It's pretty cool, but is it REALLY that much cooler, conceptually, than a spear, hammer, or claws? I don't mean to come off as a cynic but to me, dual wielding was never that huge of a deal unless it was Roxas doing it, or Master Form.

Roxas's brief battle against Axel with the two keyblades was memorable and controlled fairly well, which is nice compared to Roxas's rather lame combat in the tutorial of KH2. Master Form is cool because it's strong and unique, but doesn't feel overpowered or uninspired.

Valor form, on the other hand? Pretty trash. It's... Kind of flashy, but the inability to guard or use magic makes it worse than base Sora. It's also by far the floatiest form in KH2.

Meanwhile, Final form is undeniably cool and exciting, but it passes no resemblance to conventional dual wielding, and is also a smidge too strong in a lot of situations (Critical notwithstanding, as sometimes it's laggy enough to get you killed pretty quick).

The image of Sora wielding Oathkeeper and Oblivion is very cool. It's an iconic setup and it feels like it was inevitable, but I can't help but worry. I hope they're not trying to make this new Double Form a playable equivalent to how overpowered Roxas was when fighting Saix. We already have Ultimate Form to shred HP bars. I'd rather have something that's snappy, responsive, but ultimately just FUN to use rather than monstrously powerful. Dual Wielding isn't very exciting if it's more of a laser-light show than a sword fighting style.
 

alexis.anagram

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People were complaining about the lack of dual wielding gameplay. So it's damned if they do, damned if they don't I guess.
Execution matters. Just because people wanted dual-wielding doesn't mean they wanted the mechanic placed ahead of the lore. One of the reasons I would have argued for dual-wielding over Keyblade transformations aside from personal preference is that the rules and internal logic behind it is better established. It represents the kind of structure that KH3 lacked, and it suffered as a story for it.

It's like, yes I wanted Kairi to have a stronger showing in the game, but no I'm not going to pretend that ReMind fixes her narrative arc just because it patches in some flashy move sets for her. When the attempt to fix the issues with the approach taken towards his game exacerbate the core issues with the approach taken with this game (as @Twilight Lumiair has put it, style over substance) it's not a real answer to the criticism surrounding it. It shouldn't be hard to ascertain why people remain unimpressed.

And I'll concede from the outset that this is all speculative for now. As is any positive or optimistic reception. We're all on equal footing in making a determination about how this looks to us given the information we have available.

If it's just about dual-wielding gameplay all they would have needed to do was making Roxas playable more. It's his specialty after all.
Giving it to Sora now as well again makes him just look more like an all-powerful plot device who gets every gimmick and ability of all the other characters.
While I agree with the general perspective here, I think on this specific issue there's a case to be made that Sora should be able to dual wield because Roxas's heart is with him for the majority of the game, and that it actually causes dissonance within the narrative that he doesn't. There's at least a rationale to Sora displaying that power which, I agree, could and should have been built into a potential arc for Roxas.

Moreover, I think the real issue with Sora's role in the story isn't so much exemplified through these more or less superficial displays of "strength" as it is a matter of his dynamic with respect to other characters and the narrative at large. Sora has always been mechanically superpowered by the end of each KH game, but the story has always gone out of its way to position his strength as thematically relative to his connections and the people who believe in him, and help him to believe in himself. The influence and support of other characters have always been shown to shape Sora's journey in a way that shares the collective narrative space: Sora is the protagonist, but the viewpoints and motivations of other characters are given equal weight to his own. In KH3, the efforts of ensemble hardly even register; if Sora didn't explicitly want to bring back half of the cast, it wouldn't have mattered to the outcome of the narrative. Even the antagonists get short shrift, ultimately losing the fight because, meh, can't beat Sora (or, meh, wasn't really trying to beat Sora, which is generally the level of indifference witnessing this game's climax induces).

It's the inverse of the problem with Kairi, where they try to substitute a real character arc with poorly reconciled superpowers and then expect us to forget or ignore the issue, which is that, unsurprisingly, she isn't functioning as a character.

More than likely, the people complaining about the narrative continuity of this one-off mechanic were big fans of the Data-Organization battles in KH2, which made absolutely no narrative sense whatsoever. I mean, nobody asks why the Organization's members were all recreated as data exclusively for the purposes of fighting people who happened to wander deep enough through the Cavern of Remembrance to find some computers. People just accepted it. Why? Because some things in Kingdom Hearts are just meant to be fun gameplay, they aren't necessarily meant to cohere to the dense thicket that is the series lore.
The difference between these examples is twofold in that:
1) Nomura himself has explicitly tied the internal logic of dual wielding to a set of narrative principles which he can choose to contradict if he wishes, but not without causing narrative dissonance which people are only right to point out and,
2) The lore surrounding the Keyblade, how it works, who can wield it, and under what circumstances is actually essential to understanding the larger story, whereas understanding why and how the Organization Data Battles are possible is not. That's not to say that there are no valid critiques to be issued regarding the Data Battles in this vein, but it doesn't necessarily take precedence whereas understanding the manner in which the Keyblade functions is consequential to making sense of many of the scenarios that form the core of the narrative, beginning with the first game.

In general, I think people who play KH are pretty familiar with the norms of gaming as a mode of storytelling, and are willing to be generous in accommodating gameplay decisions which are then reconciled (or not) with canon. Dual wielding could have been just another ability of the Keyblade which Sora unlocks with the Faeries' help. Nomura chose to complicate the matter. Turning the trust we should be able to have in Nomura's decisions as a writer into another reason to blame the audience (for bothering to care?) only serves to underscore how arbitrary the lines of defense for this game have become.

And anyway, contrary to what Twilight Lumiair said, Sora dual wielding does NOT contradict said lore. It was never established that a person had to have two hearts actually inside them in order to be able to dual wield Keyblades. Roxas dual wielded without Xion being inside him (she had returned to Sora at this point and was NOT inside Roxas' heart). The connection was enough to be able to wield her Keyblade in tandem with his own. Just so, Sora's connections are enough for him to be able to dual wield.
I don't disagree with this reasoning on principle, but it opens up the series to further scrutiny on the issue. Namely, if the strength of a connection between hearts is enough to enable Sora to dual wield, why isn't the same true for other characters? Are their connections weaker than his, and if so, how is that quantifiable (I don't mean scientifically, but how would we as the audience be enabled to recognize that)? Moreover, how useful is it to the story in general to make this argument for one game mechanic: to retroactively degrade the link between other characters' hearts in order to advance the notion that Sora is just special enough to warrant this additional skill set? That would seem to call back to the concern that @Sephiroth0812 rose: that Sora has been effectively elevated above the rest of the cast in such a way that his presence increasingly renders their relevance precarious, as well as contradicting Nomura's own stated theory of the character as a normal boy with no special powers.

Again, this answer isn't unbelievable, but it might have sat better before KH3 poisoned the well. Actually, that pretty well sums up my feelings on the DLC in general.
 

GreyouTT

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Execution matters. Just because people wanted dual-wielding doesn't mean they wanted the mechanic placed ahead of the lore. One of the reasons I would have argued for dual-wielding over Keyblade transformations aside from personal preference is that the rules and internal logic behind it is better established. It represents the kind of structure that KH3 lacked, and it suffered as a story for it.

It's like, yes I wanted Kairi to have a stronger showing in the game, but no I'm not going to pretend that ReMind fixes her narrative arc just because it patches in some flashy move sets for her. When the attempt to fix the issues with the approach taken towards his game exacerbate the core issues with the approach taken with this game (as @Twilight Lumiair has put it, style over substance) it's not a real answer to the criticism surrounding it. It shouldn't be hard to ascertain why people remain unimpressed.

And I'll concede from the outset that this is all speculative for now. As is any positive or optimistic reception. We're all on equal footing in making a determination about how this looks to us given the information we have available.

Honestly speaking I don't think the casual audience side of the complainers (which is most likely the majority) cared if it went against lore. They just wanted drives and dual wielding back because they were fun.

Also since it uses both Oblivion and Oathkeeper, I'm thinking it might just be a unlock reward for getting both keyblades, and not even tied to story or lore in the first place. Like how Resident Evil gives you infinite ammo weapons to use in NG+. As you said, we don't know. But looking at how the two keys are unlocked, I think that's definitely where they're heading with it.
 

SweetYetSalty

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We're all assuming Nomura wants to forget about lore, but what if Sora ends up housing another heart?!
That "ReMinds" me (I'm gonna miss using that joke) we're finally gonna get the answers on the third heart in Sora. Assuming it's still Xion. There are folks that say it's MoM, Ava, Skuld, Ephemer, Yozora, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, or Nomura himself.

Execution matters. Just because people wanted dual-wielding doesn't mean they wanted the mechanic placed ahead of the lore. One of the reasons I would have argued for dual-wielding over Keyblade transformations aside from personal preference is that the rules and internal logic behind it is better established. It represents the kind of structure that KH3 lacked, and it suffered as a story for it.

It's like, yes I wanted Kairi to have a stronger showing in the game, but no I'm not going to pretend that ReMind fixes her narrative arc just because it patches in some flashy move sets for her. When the attempt to fix the issues with the approach taken towards his game exacerbate the core issues with the approach taken with this game (as @Twilight Lumiair has put it, style over substance) it's not a real answer to the criticism surrounding it. It shouldn't be hard to ascertain why people remain unimpressed.

And I'll concede from the outset that this is all speculative for now. As is any positive or optimistic reception. We're all on equal footing in making a determination about how this looks to us given the information we have available.


While I agree with the general perspective here, I think on this specific issue there's a case to be made that Sora should be able to dual wield because Roxas's heart is with him for the majority of the game, and that it actually causes dissonance within the narrative that he doesn't. There's at least a rationale to Sora displaying that power which, I agree, could and should have been built into a potential arc for Roxas.

Moreover, I think the real issue with Sora's role in the story isn't so much exemplified through these more or less superficial displays of "strength" as it is a matter of his dynamic with respect to other characters and the narrative at large. Sora has always been mechanically superpowered by the end of each KH game, but the story has always gone out of its way to position his strength as thematically relative to his connections and the people who believe in him, and help him to believe in himself. The influence and support of other characters have always been shown to shape Sora's journey in a way that shares the collective narrative space: Sora is the protagonist, but the viewpoints and motivations of other characters are given equal weight to his own. In KH3, the efforts of ensemble hardly even register; if Sora didn't explicitly want to bring back half of the cast, it wouldn't have mattered to the outcome of the narrative. Even the antagonists get short shrift, ultimately losing the fight because, meh, can't beat Sora (or, meh, wasn't really trying to beat Sora, which is generally the level of indifference witnessing this game's climax induces).

It's the inverse of the problem with Kairi, where they try to substitute a real character arc with poorly reconciled superpowers and then expect us to forget or ignore the issue, which is that, unsurprisingly, she isn't functioning as a character.


The difference between these examples is twofold in that:
1) Nomura himself has explicitly tied the internal logic of dual wielding to a set of narrative principles which he can choose to contradict if he wishes, but not without causing narrative dissonance which people are only right to point out and,
2) The lore surrounding the Keyblade, how it works, who can wield it, and under what circumstances is actually essential to understanding the larger story, whereas understanding why and how the Organization Data Battles are possible is not. That's not to say that there are no valid critiques to be issued regarding the Data Battles in this vein, but it doesn't necessarily take precedence whereas understanding the manner in which the Keyblade functions is consequential to making sense of many of the scenarios that form the core of the narrative, beginning with the first game.

In general, I think people who play KH are pretty familiar with the norms of gaming as a mode of storytelling, and are willing to be generous in accommodating gameplay decisions which are then reconciled (or not) with canon. Dual wielding could have been just another ability of the Keyblade which Sora unlocks with the Faeries' help. Nomura chose to complicate the matter. Turning the trust we should be able to have in Nomura's decisions as a writer into another reason to blame the audience (for bothering to care?) only serves to underscore how arbitrary the lines of defense for this game have become.


I don't disagree with this reasoning on principle, but it opens up the series to further scrutiny on the issue. Namely, if the strength of a connection between hearts is enough to enable Sora to dual wield, why isn't the same true for other characters? Are their connections weaker than his, and if so, how is that quantifiable (I don't mean scientifically, but how would we as the audience be enabled to recognize that)? Moreover, how useful is it to the story in general to make this argument for one game mechanic: to retroactively degrade the link between other characters' hearts in order to advance the notion that Sora is just special enough to warrant this additional skill set? That would seem to call back to the concern that @Sephiroth0812 rose: that Sora has been effectively elevated above the rest of the cast in such a way that his presence increasingly renders their relevance precarious, as well as contradicting Nomura's own stated theory of the character as a normal boy with no special powers.

Again, this answer isn't unbelievable, but it might have sat better before KH3 poisoned the well. Actually, that pretty well sums up my feelings on the DLC in general.
There is a logical reason as to why Sora didn't dual wield in KH3. He didn't have his Drive Form powered KH2 clothes anymore. His new fancy KH3 clothes didn't come equipped with that ability. The Good Fairies couldn't be bothered to having his old cloths retain his old powers because they think to the future and not the past, and dual wielding is so 2005. It's all about Keyblades turning into honey shooting pistols!

I wonder how many people will now turn around and start praising Kairi's character now that she's playable? I still like Kairi, but her being playable doesn't fix her writing flaws in the series. Give her a story and arc to go with that playable action.
 

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Honestly speaking I don't think the casual audience side of the complainers (which is most likely the majority) cared if it went against lore. They just wanted drives and dual wielding back because they were fun.
There's certainly a contingency of people who feel this way (there are a lot of people who don't care about KH's story at all and play for the Disney and the action components), and more power to them. If it's all just gameplay to someone, they should enjoy it on their own terms. It doesn't render the criticism on the issue of lore invalid any more than the criticism renders their experience untrue.

Also since it uses both Oblivion and Oathkeeper, I'm thinking it might just be a unlock reward for getting both keyblades, and not even tied to story or lore in the first place. Like how Resident Evil gives you infinite ammo weapons to use in NG+. As you said, we don't know. But looking at how the two keys are unlocked, I think that's definitely where they're heading with it.
That doesn't really play for me, because every game mechanic related to the Keyblade has been explicitly made part of the canon on some level. Transformations have seemingly no rules governing their usage but they are still (much to my chagrin) canon abilities on par with locking/unlocking, purifying hearts and everything else the Keyblade does or can do. Limitless weapon systems bug me on a personal level, but they also tend to lead to lazy storytelling: there's no longer any reason for any other form of weapon to be considered viable in the KH universe, and its thematic purpose has been diluted. Why duel it out with a Darkside in a pitched battle for the worlds if it's possible to simply sit on the Twilight Town Clock Tower and snipe it in the head?

And that's where I think this is really headed. The speculation that dual wielding should be possible via Keyblade transformation (because there's no appreciable difference between two skates and two blades) isn't a new one, and I think it represents an articulation of how bad this series has become at attempting to do things that are meaningful, or weighty. Better to just write everything off on the merits of convenience. It's fun! Except it's actually boring, because it's thoughtless, and overeager to make everything easy on itself.

There is a logical reason as to why Sora didn't dual wield in KH3. He didn't have his Drive Form powered KH2 clothes anymore. His new fancy KH3 clothes didn't come equipped with that ability. The Good Fairies couldn't be bothered to having his old cloths retain his old powers because they think to the future and not the past, and dual wielding is so 2005. It's all about Keyblades turning into honey shooting pistols!
That doesn't explain how he's dual wielding in the DLC!
Spoiler Spoiler Show


I wonder how many people will now turn around and start praising Kairi's character now that she's playable? I still like Kairi, but her being playable doesn't fix her writing flaws in the series. Give her a story and arc to go with that playable action.
I think there are a lot of people who, acting in good faith, really want to enjoy this game and are looking for reasons to validate its inconsistencies and poor methods of conceptualizing and delivering its own ideas, and will lean into any appearance of that occurring, but I also think there's a kind of rote cynicism to this whole ReMind project that betrays those folks most deeply. We'll see how it plays out.
 

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This whole thing gets funnier when you realize a mechanic from a KH gacha game (guilt/sin) gets a lore explanation too.
 

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That doesn't explain how he's dual wielding in the DLC!



I think there are a lot of people who, acting in good faith, really want to enjoy this game and are looking for reasons to validate its inconsistencies and poor methods of conceptualizing and delivering its own ideas, and will lean into any appearance of that occurring, but I also think there's a kind of rote cynicism to this whole ReMind project that betrays those folks most deeply. We'll see how it plays out.
I know it didn't explain how he's dual wielding in the DLC. I was making a joke on why he couldn't before ReMind, the clothing ability and all XD
 

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Inquiring minds want to know!

Somebody consult Riku!
At the very least we know Mickey can wield without a shirt, lol.

Speaking of which can Mickey dual wield? He had a different Keyblade in BBS compared to his one that he got in KH1 and used before it got broke. Did they ever explain what happened to Mickey's first Keyblade? Can he summon both his regular one and the Darkness Keyblade and dual wield them since they both belong to him?
 

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At the very least we know Mickey can wield without a shirt, lol.

Speaking of which can Mickey dual wield? He had a different Keyblade in BBS compared to his one that he got in KH1 and used before it got broke. Did they ever explain what happened to Mickey's first Keyblade? Can he summon both his regular one and the Darkness Keyblade and dual wield them since they both belong to him?
Based on the design his new Star Cluster keyblade I think he fused Star seeker and Kingdom Key D together
 

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At the very least we know Mickey can wield without a shirt, lol.
I still think Nomura should have also had his pants disappear in that scene and reveal that his classic trousers are actually boxer briefs. For the sake of consistency.

Speaking of which can Mickey dual wield? He had a different Keyblade in BBS compared to his one that he got in KH1 and used before it got broke. Did they ever explain what happened to Mickey's first Keyblade? Can he summon both his regular one and the Darkness Keyblade and dual wield them since they both belong to him?
I think it can be inferred that RoD Keyblades are different from RoL Keyblades in that they're born (I guess on rare occasions?) as counterparts to their respective Keys on the other side. Probably has something to do with balancing light and dark in the universe, but at any rate it seems as if they're essentially up for grabs by anyone who dares (or is desperate enough) to try. It seems likely that Mickey can wield both, but in keeping with the rule of hearts, not at the same time--but then it's still not clear to me wtf happened with his Keyblade after the Anti-Aqua shenanigans, so yeah. KH3 "breaks" Keyblades in more ways than one.
 

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Speaking of which can Mickey dual wield? He had a different Keyblade in BBS compared to his one that he got in KH1 and used before it got broke. Did they ever explain what happened to Mickey's first Keyblade? Can he summon both his regular one and the Darkness Keyblade and dual wield them since they both belong to him?
As I said in an earlier reply, Mickey never lost Starseeker. We see this is 0.2. He had both KK-d and Starseeker across the series, and periodically switched between the two (he used Starseeker for the entirety of Re: Coded, for example). But despite having two, he was never shown wielding both at once. Indicating he can't. It's the same with Aqua at the end of BBS when she had both her own Keyblade and Master's Defender (during the final episode specifically). Holding two Keyblades isn't the same as dual weilding them.

Once Kingdom Key D was damaged beyond use, he went to Yen Sid, who seemingly repaired it (or just flat out gave him a new one; it's unclear which), and based on his new Keyblades design, the implication is that he may have combined the two together.
Aaaaand I was ninja'd by alexis, nice XD
 

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That doesn't really play for me, because every game mechanic related to the Keyblade has been explicitly made part of the canon on some level.

I mean, just because the mechanics themselves are canon, doesn't mean bonus unlocks are. Plus if it does require unlocking through the proofs, then it's definitely not a canon thing because you'd have to beat the game on Critical just to unlock it. The Proof of Times Past is even only added to your inventory after you make a clear save.
 

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As I said in an earlier reply, Mickey never lost Starseeker. We see this is 0.2. He had both KK-d and Starseeker across the series, and periodically switched between the two (he used Starseeker for the entirety of Re: Coded, for example). But despite having two, he was never shown wielding both at once. Indicating he can't. It's the same with Aqua at the end of BBS when she had both her own Keyblade and Master's Defender (during the final episode specifically). Holding two Keyblades isn't the same as dual weilding them.

Once Kingdom Key D was damaged beyond use, he went to Yen Sid, who seemingly repaired it (or just flat out gave him a new one; it's unclear which), and based on his new Keyblades design, the implication is that he may have combined the two together.
Wow! Shows how much I pay attention to half these Keyblades. I didn't even realize Mickey was using Starseeker for ReCoded. But interesting he can't use them both at once despite having two.
 

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Aaaaand I was ninja'd by alexis, nice XD
You were more confident in your explanation so it's worth more.

To be honest I don't mind the idea of Mickey combining his Keyblades (no more than Riku supposedly using Soul Eater as a medium to forge one), but then it's placed so awkwardly within the material as a solution to a problem that didn't need to exist. At least with the Way to Dawn there was an implied journey that took place, and it was indicative of Riku coming into his own as a protagonist. I can accept that as a symbolic gesture. What doesn't ring true is introducing a symbolic obstacle through one scenario, and then resolving it immediately not through character action that provides insight into the metaphorical foundations of the narrative, but by making the relationships between the characters and the metaphors cheaper. Keyblades are supposed to be toys in the real world, not the fantasy one.

I mean, just because the mechanics themselves are canon, doesn't mean bonus unlocks are. Plus if it does require unlocking through the proofs, then it's definitely not a canon thing because you'd have to beat the game on Critical just to unlock it. The Proof of Times Past is even only added to your inventory after you make a clear save.
That's a fair point.
I'm still calling BS on Roxas though.
 
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