Is Kingdom Hearts poorly written?

[Chie]

"I don't really give a shit about rules if the story has more important concerns."

Lol. Just lol. How can you say this when the game's story goes out of its way to downplay any and all threats at every corner possible?

I have no idea what all those words you typed have to do with what I said at all, but thanks for being angry about video games at me. I love this forum

 

[KeybladeLordSora]

I think the plot being poorly written wouldn't matter as much if it didn't consume SO much of the cutscenes and character interactions, which at this point is just being wasted overexplaining and drawing so much attention to itself, overshadowing other potentially great facets that could come out of experience of watching and playing it.

Think of how much of the cutscene's time in games since DDD (which I love but it really kickstarted this trend in KH) is being spent explaining the lore as it's happening or explaining past lore; the actual amount of minutes, animation of just the characters standing around and listening or talking about it.

If the plot didn't place itself as THE most important aspect of the series, it not being that great wouldn't matter as much; if it was just the skeleton background placeholder to facilitate adventures and character relationships changing or growing or conflicting. The plot and lore are just eating the series whole at this point.

I don't get the point of the games having journals anymore either if everything in them is just going to be explained anyway in painstaking detail in every cutscene now.

Like I said, I believe this is because of all the people yelling about how everything in KH is confusing so many times and the "internet osmosis" making KH's reputation entirely focused around "lol so confusing makes no sense" for about a decade.

 

[ChaosStark]

I think the writing is good in some places, but less so in others.

How ideas are presented can be good- I'm thinking of the Nobodies (for reference, Days was my first KH game, and my only KH game for years). They're presented as these incomplete beings who don't have hearts, going through the motions of having hearts, but that none of their "feelings" are really genuine. That resonated with me- they felt like depression personified. Of course, that had a lot to do with how I personally was doing at the time- I fell into a deep depression not long after Days, so the Nobodies made me feel like I wasn't quite so alone. I knew what it felt like to feel empty, like you're just going through the motions. Part of me also likes the retcon with Nobodies being able to grow hearts of their own, since it means hope for depressed people like me- you might not be able to get your pre-depressed self back, but you can feel whole again. (Incidentally, the opening of Dark Road's third chapter resonated with me for the same reason- Xehanort says that the dark feelings he encountered in the corridor "reminded me that I could still feel" and I just really felt that because... dude, that's depression.)

For me, where the story falls down is character, both in individual development and in interaction. By the time I was able to play another title, I was pretty well on the Organization's side. I sympathized with them, and it was actually really strange for me when I found out they were actually the villains. I played DDD some years after Days, knowing that the series was about this Sora kid and his friends, and figuring I ought to give them a chance. Sora... annoyed me. He had simple motivations- help friends, help people in need, fight bad guys- which can be relatable, but for me is boring. I like nuance in my characters. Therefore, Riku was more interesting- but he still kind of felt kind of flat to me. That, and I couldn't say that I felt the friendship between Sora and Riku- not that I don't believe they couldn't be friends- since I felt more like I was being told, not shown. Then I had the opportunity to play a bit of KH1. I had to put it down because I just wasn't invested. Sora's goal is to find his friends in that game- but we spend so little time on Destiny Islands that I just didn't buy the friendship. Again. KH2? It does show relationships a bit better, I think. Sora shows a pretty strong desperation to help Kairi when he hears she's in trouble, so I can tell he cares about her. He gets very emotional when he's face-to-face with Riku during their reunion, so I can buy that this is an old friend who he hasn't seen in a long time. But there's so little of this sort of genuine emotional interaction anywhere else. BbS was enjoyable for me- the story is fairly cohesive even if I have some issues with it- but Terra, Aqua, and Ventus don't have very much set-up for what's supposed to be a deep friendship. Roxas, Axel, and Xion have a bit of an out since they're all Nobodies and two of them have no point of reference for what friends actually do, but it's still a little flimsy. Characters need to interact with different personalities in a variety of settings to really show who they are. That means their friends as well as strangers, coworkers, villains, or anyone else. We know Sora will challenge and fight bad guys since he does that a lot. We know he'll help a stranger in need, since we see him do that a lot. But what are his inner thoughts like? What do he and his friends talk about when they have down time? (Do they ponder the great questions of life? Do they discuss books they've read? Etc.) What is he like when you strip him of his Keyblade and quest to fight evil? What are any of these characters like without Keyblades and the goal of fighting evil? (I'm actually genuinely interested to hear what people think- I'm not always great with subtleties, so I'm open to other people seeing something I missed.)

The series also has a problem with adding lots of things while maybe not setting them up that well. Nobodies kind of came out of nowhere because... we need a new enemy since Ansem SoD is gone. Oh, we need an enemy for BbS... uhm... Unversed! Yes, that'll do. DDD has Sora and Riku taking the Mark of Mastery, so we need a place for them to do that and enemies to fight... Sleeping Worlds and Dream Eaters, go! Roxas, Ventus, and Xion need to come back... let's introduce this Power of Waking idea! I'm not saying that none of these could work- I think they actually fit fairly well in the established KH universe. It's just that they don't come up until the game where they're relevant, and they're either retconned to always have been there or handwaved away without much explanation. This is probably more of a problem with planning the series than anything else- if you're making it up as you go along, it doesn't leave you much room for set-up.

Something that the series gets right is potential. Nearly everything in it has the potential to be something great, to be the start of a wonderful story or an engaging character. See above with the Nobodies- with the information the game gave me, I crafted an interpretation of them that allowed me to relate to and engage with them. It goes even further than that- I'll admit I didn't actually like Days' actual story much. I switched to mission mode because I just didn't care about Roxas. I ended up playing as Xemnas pretty much exclusively. The game didn't tell me much about him- he hardly even appears in it. So all I had to go on was: he's a leader, he's mysterious, he's well-spoken, and he's intelligent. As I played as him, I crafted my own interpretation of him that I actually related to quite a lot- I saw him as isolated, unable to connect to others due to his position as leader. Maybe he doesn't even know how to connect to other people because of the no-heart thing making it hard to form any emotional bond. I saw someone who was struggling internally, who maybe didn't quite know where to go but who had the potential to do good or bad. It was an interpretation informed by my own experience at the time, but it was what I enjoyed about playing the game, and that version of him is something I've held on to, even if later installments to the series contradicted it. If I'd picked anyone else, I might have done the same sort of thing with that character, too. So that's what I think the series really gets right- it gives you enough to craft your own interpretation of it, so what you experience is partly what's actually written, and part of it is how you see it. And I, personally, like that. Is it the best way to tell a story? Not necessarily. It leaves a lot of holes in character and can make itself feel flimsy and hastily put together. But it does let people use their imaginations, which is good. I could see the series possibly finding a better balance- doing better character work and story planning while still maintaing that interpretive aspect. But that's probably easier said than done... and who knows what Nomura's intent is with this whole thing?

 

[kaseykockroach]

I wouldn’t have as much fun with it if it weren’t!

I do, however, sympathize with those endeared by these characters and are continuously disappointed that they consistently only exist as means of exposition dumps.

 

[kirabook]

Don't get me though, I'm not asking for 400 hour long exposition.

What I'm talking about is just... rules. Following the "rules" of how the worlds work. Rules that don't need explaining, it just is what it is. Rules that make logical sense.

Light = good, dark = bad. That's a rule that's probably worth breaking, but they keep juggling between whether it's good or bad.

Nobodies don't have hearts, again, an interesting rule to break, the "heartless" enemies can gain hearts back so they can't be all that bad.

Dark realm is a dangerous hard to get to hard to traverse place... not anymore! All of them can go there to party whenever they feel like now because reasons. This broken rule almost makes Aqua's suffering feel meaningless (it still sucks she was stuck there for a decade though). Sora and Riku were stuck there at the end of KH2 pretty much accepting their fate. Will any of us really fear the dark realm in future games anymore? It's no longer all that scary since they can leave when they want. What was the point in breaking this "rule" other than plot convenience?

The ultra super important ability they needed to save all the lost key wielders, the power of waking. They spent a whole game learning it because they NEED it. Except, they didn't need it to save the key wielders at all except Ven, who was the only one that was legit locked into a sleep he couldn't wake from. That rule is used to hold Sora back from the main plot for nearly the entirety of KH3 and then it's broken on a whim because Sora suddenly says so.

And then you have the DDD thing with the time travel. That's honestly the only truly confusing thing in the entire series for me no matter how many essays I read on it. We get exposition dump after exposition dumb only for it to not really matter and it does kinda seem like some rules were broken there just cause.

This is to only name a few, things I've already brought up. Nomura and team can set the setting and the rules... but they just break them way too often. Breaking it sometimes is good, can lead to awesome stuff happening for sure. But after a certain point, if you're just adding stuff in to break it. it's kinda pointless.

We don't need a textbook of rules in detail, we just need a small checklist of things that don't change so that people have something to stand on always.

Some things I forgive, like there being more than one key wielder since the very first game revealed there were at least 2 and apparently calling Sora THE keyblade master was some kind of translation mistake. In that case, it's not a big deal. (except when suddenly everyone has one that didn't need one to fight....)

 

[2 quid is good]

Frankly speaking, break the rules of your universe as often and as reckless as you ike for all I care, but at least let me have some compelling character writing to compensate for it, even if it some slice of life filler. I can't find it in me to dislike Dragon Ball super though by rights I really should, when it's full of some really charming character moments. It probably says a lot about me that I enjoy the filler content of most shonen anime (unless they're the clip show or ooc type) than the actual plot, in fact I've realised that the reason why I enjoy KH2 so much is probably because it has the most "filler" to go round in the whole series

 

[kirabook]

That is true, Kingdom Hearts basically has no filler for the original characters, though there's plenty of Disney filler.

 

[Cumguardian69]

but it isn't really filler to find out what stuff the KHOCs do when they aren't keyslinging. not at this point. at this point it's called character building

 

[kirabook]

Filler isn't always bad, though anime gives it a very bad reputation.
Sometimes we want to see character go on a date to a cafe or babysit their friends who somehow turned into a baby.

 

[OrionGold]

Well, let's put it this way: the KH series would NEVER have survived if not for being a video game franchise.
Now, here's what I mean by that: The series is terribly written in many places, and fantastically written in others. But it's very hit-or-miss. Luckily, whenever the story falters, the gameplay and the general aesthetic of the series can usually carry the slack because of how fun and enjoyable they are. I like to think the "bad" moments of writing are actually quite self-aware, the series making fun of how ridiculous its own concept is. But every now and then, the writing does decide to treat things seriously, and it's those moments when it shines. Unfortunately, from what I can tell, these moments feel much rare and more far between than they used to.
Take the case of the first four titles for example: KH1, CoM, and KH2, and Days. These were the games when the series' writing was at its best imo. Nomura had a certain magic touch back then that he seems to have lost nowadays, and that mostly refers to the way he not only wrote the story, but the characters.
KH1, for example, was really great at writing Sora and Riku's characters. Especially Riku. The sense of superiority, eventually corrupted by betrayal and abandonment, was one of the best villain arcs in the series in my opinion, mainly because he was so relatable, and it perfectly fit into the first game's theme of growing up and expanding your horizons, which is not always a wonderful or pleasant thing to go through. Even the little time we got between Sora and Kairi felt more real than all their interactions have since then.
Chain of Memories was another great example of how Nomura used to write characters. I'd go as far as to say that Sora probably had the best character arc in that game, which almost makes it a shame that he forgot all of it. The way the story played with false memories, with self-doubt and obsession, was really well handled, and seeing Sora actually get driven to the point of hatred is something we haven't seen since in this series (would have liked to see that after Xehanort bodied Kairi, for instance).
I've written about how people give KH2's story way too much of a pass for how cluttered and unfocused it is, and how unnecessary most of the Disney worlds are versus KH3 where I feel they implemented the worlds into the plot much better. However, the opening prologue section of KH2 with Roxas to me is still the crowning glory of the series from a writing standpoint. That whole section is a story in itself, and it's a wonderfully told mystery about a boy who suddenly finds his entire world being turned upside down and losing all control over his own life. That shit is extremely relatable. And it was one of the few points in the series that weren't hampered down by all the light-heart-dark nonsense, or the increasingly convoluted plot.
Days, of course, is also great. The relationship between the Sea Salt Trio is one of the best explored relationships in the series, and Roxas' personal growth and learning about the world was perpetually enticing.
In all those games, there are plentiful moments when the writing just gets downright ridiculous, as well it deserves to. This series has always been ridiculous since its conception. And it's healthy for the series to poke fun at it. But the characters were what gave the games a real sense of emotional weight despite how bad the actual dialogue or storylines would get at times.
To me, Birth by Sleep was where the writing started taking a turn in the wrong direction. Now, I know a lot of people love BBS, but hear me out:
To me, the relationship between Terra, Aqua, and Ventus never really reached the same level as the relationship between the Destiny or Sea Salt trios. Their whole dynamic was just not that relatable. Terra was a strangely written character who we're told is supposed to have a lust for power, but they never really show it in any significant way. On top of that, having a lust for power is a very anime motivation for a character to have, and it doesn't have the relatability or emotional charge of, say, turning against your best friend because you feel he's outgrown you and getting better than you (they actually COULD have had that dynamic between Terra and Aqua, in fact they seemed to set it up, but they never actually do anything with that). Aqua is another heavily anime-ed character, who's simultaneously supposed to be the "girl" of the group, but also the "mom" of the group, if that makes sense. Ventus, meanwhile, is just a bright-eyed and naive kid. Despite the constant lessons they each keep learning in the Disney worlds, I never get the sense of them actually developing as characters. From the beginning to the end of the game, they all mostly just turn out more or less the same. Not to mention, I actually think Xehanort and Vanitas from a writing perspective are actually poorly handled as the main antagonists in this game, with neither of them getting very interesting insights into their character, their experiences, or their motivations. They aren't like Riku, who most people who've ever felt abandoned or tossed aside by their friends could sympathize with, nor are they like Xemnas, who was a really tragic character who was willing to commit atrocities just to become human (at least, that's as far as we knew up to that point). The Xehanort Reports belie a deeper character full of scholarly obsession and unfulfilled ambition, but we never actually SEE that side of him in-game. In fact, the Xehanort with the evil grin and the wiggly fingers feels like a different Xehanort to the one who's writing those reports. The Xehanort we see at the end of KH3 actually feels more like the Xehanort in those reports tbh, and that's part of the reason I enjoyed that scene.
Coded doesn't have much to speak of either in terms of story or character, and DDD, well, that whole game narratively was a mess. Even if the plot weren't a massive dumpster fire, I honestly don't think Sora or Riku really evolved that much over the course of the story. They ACT like they did, but really, there was very little actual development. The same with KH3.
And with each of these games, I've noticed the same pattern—just like the earlier games, each of the worlds the characters visit is used to teach them some sort of lesson. But ever since BBS, those lessons have felt more like substitutions for actual emotional struggle and development rather than supplements to it. In KH1, CoM, KH2, and Days, each quest and each world you visit felt like it added to the characters' sense of themselves and their relationships with one another. Sora and Riku's relationship continuously devolves from Traverse Town, to Monstro, to Neverland, and Sora's relationship with Donald and Goofy goes through its own series of evolutions, as well as Sora's sense of his place in the larger world. In CoM, each world, even though Sora forgets it after he leaves, feels like it leaves a lasting imprint on his identity and on his psyche. KH2 constantly plays around with Sora's sense of himself and how Roxas is secretly affecting him from within him. And each mission in Days plays into the developing relationship between the Sea Salt Trio. In each of these games, the worlds act more as bricks to the main story that constantly build on top of one another. There's a sense of progression in them, and therefore cohesion. But in BBS and DDD, each world feels like isolated from the main story. They don't play into it. And so even though they claim to learn these lessons at the end of their visits to each world, we never actually see how those lessons change them throughout the story. They feel like disconnected moral lectures that get immediately forgotten. Because in the later games, the characters revolve around the plot, and not the other way around as it should be.
So, when you DO get to those later games, the "bad" writing stands out a LOT more, because there isn't as much of those emotionally resonant wow moments to lend any gravity to it. Now, even when the story tries to be serious, it still ends up feeling silly, because all the characters know what to talk about anymore is the PLOT. Darkness, heart, light, memories, data, Keyblade. It's a different Ansem who says "So, you have come this far, and still you understand nothing?" from the one who says, "Darkness within darkness awaits you!" Yes, they talked about darkness and hearts and light all the time in the first games, but then they were tempered by deeper messages and characters, whereas in later games that's pretty much all they talk about ever. There's nothing underneath it all anymore. That's why I liked Xehanort's death in KH3—it was the first time I ever saw the HUMAN BEING underneath the hammy evil one-dimensional Palpatine mask. That scene was the first time I saw a man who had spent his entire life since his youth obsessively in search of a single ambition, who was willing to commit his soul and his humanity, who was willing to sacrifice everything good in his life to fulfill that ambition, only to see it all ripped away at the very end. That one scene of Xehanort to me was better than the entirety of his character throughout all the rest of the games, and you can fight me on that. I don't even care if it was inconsistent, it was better. It made me SEE the person that I think Nomura always wanted us to see, but he never managed to actually write him well enough.
It's moments like that scene that give me some small hope that Nomura can reclaim his magic touch, and it's partly that reason why I'm actually glad he's taking the next 2 years off from the series. Hopefully, he can come back fresh and having regained that special emotional resonance that so thoroughly permeated the earlier games in the series, because it's those moments that made those games truly magical. The plot is fun to speculate over as it continues to develop, and yeah, the Master of Masters is an interesting villain, but speculation is no substitute for feeling. If this series is to return to the magic it once had, the plot needs to be refocused around the development of the characters again—the characters have to think about more than just the quest and the battles. They have to think about each other. They have to have real heartfelt moments with each other. And they need to go through relatable, emotional struggles to make them grow, rather than just leaving their growth to sequences of pithy moral lessons and superficial conflicts.
Wow, I wrote a lot. Sorry.

God, add another line space between your paragraphs. I can't even read it.

 

[Swing]

I would rather say KH is complicated written. It is too complex for its own good. In art school, I learned that simpler stories are sometimes, not always, but sometimes the better ones. And KH, at least in the beginning, was a very simple story. A boy must find his best friends, and one of them is his love interest. But the writers really tried way too hard to make KH complex to the point where the viewer has no idea which character and which story arc to focus on.

 

[DraceEmpressa]

I will never understand people’s love for Kanemaki’s literal fanfiction writing.

If people aren't interested in reading fanfics, ao3 and FFN wouldn't be born . And while i'm not gonna use it for an example of good writing, we know that Fifty Shades of Grey sells even to its own.... crowd. I've seen a specified section in my local bookstores dedicated to self insert fanfictions with kpop boybands. So we can agree that fanfics... have their own appeal. So much that people are willing to monetize it.

I would rather say KH is complicated written. It is too complex for its own good. In art school, I learned that the simpler stories are sometimes, not always, but sometimes the better ones. And KH, at least in the beginning, was a very simple story. A boy must find his best friends, and one of them is his love interest. But the writers really tried way too hard to make KH complex to the point where the viewer has no idea which character and which story arc to focus on.

My friend was an art student, and she have this mindset that writing is also a form of art. However, as it is a form of art, of course it has it own example of abstract art, which somehow has its own abundance in Japan. Still, we can agree that abstract art isn't for everyone, which for that reason, you shouldn't make abstract art in commercialized project, for thus you are betraying the sponsor's trust to make cashback for the company, and the audience's expectation that the work will entertain and relaxes them instead of giving them more headaches. Like Evillious Chronicles,it was published on Youtube not as paid content, and the paid contents (like album or novels or artbook)that gives more convolution are bought by ppl who are into that Japanese Convolution. It's not so with KH which is exactly the problem, and the problem with FF as well, that people come for the power of friendship , some FF and Disney mix, and the convolution make them leave instead. We know Nomura shouldn't be left to write commercialized projects be it KH or FF, even if we can agree to keep him at least as art director.

 

[Xickin]

In my opinion: Not at first, but then it did devolve into a lot of anime nonsense. I'd say from 2001-2010 were its prime days, but after that, concepts that barely made any sense started coming in and then just bleh...

 

[Guernsey]

I consider Kingdom hearts to be decently written but as other people have pointed out it does have some problems. The series is bloated with fluff but for the most part, it just felt like it didn't need to be.

 

[Sephiroth0812]

but it isn't really filler to find out what stuff the KHOCs do when they aren't keyslinging. not at this point. at this point it's called character building

More focus on the characters, their thoughts and relationships is imho exactly what the series would need. That would indeed not be "filler" but character building.
And character building is badly needed for a lot of the supposed major cast.
Break up the stupid trio mechanic, stop forcing the characters apart all the time via plot demands and let them act and interact as duos, groups and more in different constellations., both in battle as Keybladers and in some more mundane, perhaps even partly private settings.
If it would clutter up the "main story" too much there's still the possibility of optional side quests/side arcs which can explore different characters and their dynamics with each other.

It is in this area where the KH series arguably wastes the most of its potential, but that may be because this kind of storytelling simply isn't Nomura's turf.
For him, the most important things are flashy battles and to have things "surprising", the latter in fact so much that he keeps introducing new stuff and concepts he wants to play around with while leaving no regards for the actual internal coherency of his own fictional universe.

For Nomura, the KH series seems to be more like a sandbox to play around in, including testing new stuff or changing things around according to current interests rather than actually wanting to tell a coherent story from A to Z with truly fleshed out characters.
Riku and Xehanort seem to be more exceptions rather than the rule.

 

[Akezura]

Kingdom Hearts is absolutely poorly written and it seems difficult to deny that.

The dialogue was incomprehensible around when the series was just KH1-CoM-KH2, but at least after those games you've felt like you've had a complete experience.

Now days, Nomura deliberately uses carrot-on-a-stick storytelling, always creating more questions than answers. The last straw for me was the black box. I remember the first trailer for KH3 was Maleficent asking Hades if the black box was in his world, so it seemed obvious to me that this is what KH3 was going to be about, and they would absolutely answer that question.

KH3 ended up more being Nomura saying "yah yah I'm bored of Xehenort, let me set up the master of masters storyline more". We waited a damn decade for what was billed as a conclusion, and ended up being essentially a prologue.

The DARKNESS DARKNESS LIGHT DARKNESS KEYBLADE dialogue was lulzworthy for years, for sure, but I wouldn't call that bad writing. Bad writing is putting the most important event in the lore (keyblade war) in a japanese only browser game, then remaking that game (but not really) as a gatcha game that drips out critical story elements such as Ven's origin on a monthly basis (but to non-japanese players months late). Lets not forget releasing a borderline shovelware rhythm game (there was really no way to make KH3 stages?) that include less than 30 minutes of actual story content that nevertheless you HAVE to play to understand the next game.

And I don't that will be the only one.

 

[Cumguardian69]

^except that MoM is actually filler and the actual VR KH game will no doubt cover the "events" that happen during it in its glossary/primer just like DDD

 

[*TwilightNight*]

And character building is badly needed for a lot of the supposed major cast.
Break up the stupid trio mechanic, stop forcing the characters apart all the time via plot demands and let them act and interact as duos, groups and more in different constellations., both in battle as Keybladers and in some more mundane, perhaps even partly private settings.

You get a heart reaction for this alone.

The impact of whatever happy ending that supposed beach scene was rang utterly hollow because we have no idea how these characters got there from where they left off last time we saw them. We can just assume. The only reunions we saw were for the blasted trios. As a Roxas fan, he got robbed. His connections don't rely on and don't consist of only RAX, period. Would have loved to see HPO react to seeing him for the first time and welcome him.

For Nomura, the KH series seems to be more like a sandbox to play around in, including testing new stuff or changing things around according to current interests rather than actually wanting to tell a coherent story from A to Z with truly fleshed out characters.

Exactly.

The guy doesn't give a damn for cohesive storytelling and well written narratives that aren't caked in bs to fit whatever idea he decided to retcon or add in. He just does whatever he fancies because he...can.

 

[Vulpes XIII]

Personally for me I don’t care that Kingdom Hearts is poorly written. The plot is a train wreck , it’s filled with plot holes that get retconned way too much, the dialogue can be very cheesy at times, but honestly in my opinion in an odd way it part of the series charm. I personally enjoy just how crazy the plot can get at time, yeah the retcons can be annoying but as someone who enjoys making theories it keeps me guessing and rethinking theories when new information is released and honestly the over the top ridiculous dialogue is good for a laugh and kinda fun to make jokes about sometimes. However at the same time Nomura never fails to make the story interesting, He’s written characters that a lot of people are emotionally invested in and became attached to over the many years the series existed, one of the biggest examples I can think of is Roxas he’s one of the most popular characters in the series and we’re made to care about his story including his friendship with Axel and Xion and honestly the demand for his character to return in KH3 is proof enough of this. Even if you don’t care about Roxas or the Seasalt trio, you can still take the logic and apply it to another trio, even the characters with barely any backstory for example some of the Organization XIII members still had enough fans that there was enough demand for them to make an appearance for the conclusion of KH3, even though the ending left us with more questions than answers.

So despite how poorly the story is written and how many characters lack proper character development.Nomura must be doing something right with the story if he managed to keep such a dedicated fan base going for so long and many who are still planning to return for the next saga.

Although I’ll admit when you just want answers to basic questions in this series Nomura way of telling a story can get a bit annoying at times with the constant cliffhangers.

 

[2 quid is good]

I'm convinced at this point it's part love for the character designs/previous characterisation and part Stockholm syndrome that keep people invested