Spoilers ► Is the story of Kingdom Hearts really that confusing?

[Face My Fears]

See?

You're blessed with the skill to cross-examine the situation, if we go back even to the first game. The King is the one that leaves a letter for Donald and Goofy to find the keyblade (user). Which eventually leads them to the End of The World where they find the king who found the Dark Realm's keyblade.

Us (the audience in 2002) are seeing this as something sacred. That there are only two keyblades. Right. Right...? Wrong.

The ceremony ends up being pointless because as you said, Lea was given one without explanation. The keybladers belonging to the factions from Chi/Unchained-X, same situation it's no longer a novelty, quite literally everyone has one. So any validity expressed in previous games which would "gatekeep" a weapon like the keyblade virtually get tossed out and is made irrelevant (lmao).

So the concensus then becomes, if they can just retcon information on a dime, following events closely and speculation on what is possible gets thrown into disarray and you're playing knock out, drag out with the writing team trying to make sense of all the information that is canon in one game, but gets retconned in a later game...so, does that invalidate what you played/learned prior? Seems like it.

In a way, I agree with you, but I also don't.

As Kingdom Hearts is an ever-growing franchise with no end in sight, I don't think there needs to be finality in some choices, let alone information given in one game - as they realistically can't. Like in the first Star Wars movie, they couldn't explain midi-chlorian, Order 66, why there are no other force users seen besides Obi-Wan and Darth Vader, what is in a lightsaber/how to make one etc. A lot of that information wasn't important to THAT story. The same applies to KH1. Union X, the keyblade war, Mark of Mastery etc. isn't relevant to KH1's story.

Does the treatment of keyblades post-KH1 affect KH1's story? Not so much. The story boils down to AT THAT TIME Sora was the only one capable of stopping Ansem. That is the condition that we played KH1 back in 2002 and the condition the games have left it a decade later. If it were revealed that a whole horde of keyblade wielders were around while Ansem was doing his thing, then it would mess up KH1 because I would keep thinking "why didn't they intervene?"

Now when I think about the Terra ceremony for Riku and Kairi being "touched" by Aqua and thus gaining the keyblade power... I think that was just Nomura's cheap way of connecting Terra/Riku and Aqua/Kairi for future games - which he ended up using. Those were more "oh look, they have some history, I knew it!" moments rather than actually considering the prestige of the keyblade in the world. I say that because we never know how Terra, Aqua or Ven get their keyblades (let alone if they had a ceremony). And quite frankly, no one cares because it doesn't matter to the story of this game. As ineffectively as Nomura did it, what was more important to the story (and to Nomura) are the connections between characters and Nomura executed that for Terra/Riku and Aqua/Kairi.

I'm not as opposed to all of the KHUX stuff (besides how hard it is to actually consume the story). I find that it actually adds depth to the lore of the series, where an entire civilization of keyblade wielders (and norm) was obliterated. It kind of adds hope to the current games because you actually see a long-dead race slowly rebuild with the light of children (like Kairi's grandma said).

As much as I don't like SO many keyblade wielders being around, the only one that genuinely bothers me and I think was a bad choice was Axel. I don't think he needed a keyblade to be a guardian of light. I think it would have been way more interesting for his character if he redeemed himself and Kairi detected that he had a special kind of light in him and realized he could be a guardian of light.

 

[vaderskywalker]

the only one that genuinely bothers me and I think was a bad choice was Axel. I don't think he needed a keyblade to be a guardian of light.

Agreed.

 

[Just Dari]

FMF, the only thing i can honestly say to separate two of your replies, is the comment you made with regards to playing the games as their own separate stories. On their own, objectively speaking I do agree with you on the terms they are easy enough to understand as stand alones. That is the only perspective to which that 1000% makes perfect sense, call that "the vacuum" i mentioned before.

To your point of continuity and the "at the time" yes, adding newer elements and precursor to the series is also ok. Where I got lost personally, was when they introduced time-travel into the main line of games and to be fair to my own belingerence of avoiding the mobile games, if we're doing a timeline (lol) wasn't it mentioned in the mobile game before it was actually brought into DDD? Even the mobile game's explanation of it was...at least to me, rocky at best. I was more accepting of the concept of time being non-existent in the Realm of Darkness, than the concept of time-travel as well as multiple versions of the same dude existing simultaneously, really "norting" in general...and then reincarnating twice later, once in terms of MX, and the other as Terranort. Say what you want, but that is without question a lot to retain, strictly speaking of continuity. Jesus christ.

Unless there's some lore I missed that was explained in game (and i'm sure I did, full admission here) I always refer to back cover focusing only on the foretellers vs (you) the MC in the mobile games and how theres no mention of your exploits, the other wielders going to sleep or becoming dream eaters, etc outside of the actual game.

I've had these conversations with friends that casually have mentioned the series and expressed interest in it, and even as someone that's played the games for years and occasionally joined these discussions, I don't really know what the hell to tell them that'd be a brief without under-selling it.

Disclaimer: I'll be honest, I really can't keep up with half of whats being said, and i've mostly operated off of memory and what i've recently read from other users recently across other threads i've actually taken the time to read and reply to. With that, you're more than welcome to carry on with this discussion without me. I'm bowing out here.

 

[Chie]

Kingdom Hearts X hadn't even started until after DDD was released, and time travel wouldn't be relevant to it at all until UX years later. I'm not sure how you came to the conclusion that you had missed something by not playing a game that didn't actually exist at the time. It wouldn't have been possible for X to cross your mind yet.

 

[Guernsey]

I guess you are right about that. Now that it has been released, how does it tie to the rest of the series?

 

[Deleted member 246005]

@AegisXIII
KH2 had the first retcon with the Ansem/Xehanort switcheroo.

It has a dense plot but it's confusion comes from pacing issues. It just dumps the answers in the beginning and end. So spreading it out better would've been ideal. It's also why people started to dislike the Disney worlds. The first world visits felt too disconnected from the larger plot. And it got worse in the following games.

I don't disagree with @Face My Fears but KH doesn't pull it off. Both Days and DDD hurt the previous games.

KH's problem seems to be it wants to tie everything together after the fact but chooses the poorest way to do it.

It ends up feeling like a weaker version of the FF7 spinoffs. The Xehanort saga ends up feeling more reductive than expansive.

 

[Guernsey]

@AegisXIII
KH2 had the first retcon with the Ansem/Xehanort switcheroo.

It has a dense plot but it's confusion comes from pacing issues. It just dumps the answers in the beginning and end. So spreading it out better would've been ideal. It's also why people started to dislike the Disney worlds. The first world visits felt too disconnected from the larger plot. And it got worse in the following games.

I don't disagree with @Face My Fears but KH doesn't pull it off. Both Days and DDD hurt the previous games.

KH's problem seems to be it wants to tie everything together after the fact but chooses the poorest way to do it.

It ends up feeling like a weaker version of the FF7 spinoffs. The Xehanort saga ends up feeling more reductive than expansive.

That actually makes sense and it may not be just a Kingdom Hearts thing either. Sometimes I wonder if it might be better if some of those games were non canon spinoffs with no relation to the main games.

 

[Just Dari]

Ok so real quick, did Maleficent also time-travel? Where/When/Why? Go.

'Preciate yall fam.

 

[Chie]

Yes, she inadvertently time traveled when her heart was released by the keyblade of hearts. However, she was caught in a digital version of Enchanted Dominion which was set up ahead of time to trap her, and Darkness sent her back to KH2's time.

 

[KHRULER]

Yes, she inadvertently time traveled when her heart was released by the keyblade of hearts. However, she was caught in a digital version of Enchanted Dominion which was set up ahead of time to trap her, and Darkness sent her back to KH2's time.

My question is does she remember what she experienced? It's implied that she's at least somehwat familiar with the past's events (Book of Prophecies, etc.). It also wouldn't cause any paradoxes for her to remember since the past is in the past, unlike if she were able to remember the future if she did time travel.

 

[Deleted member 246005]

That actually makes sense and it may not be just a Kingdom Hearts thing either. Sometimes I wonder if it might be better if some of those games were non canon spinoffs with no relation to the main games.

DMC5 has the same problems as KH2. It was an odd sense of deja vu.

It depends on what they are. Crossovers being non-canon makes sense. But people usually want stories to connect and matter. So it's not really a bad thing that KH tried to connect everything. Its just most of the connections failed to enhance what came before.

It's an execution issue more than the idea itself being flawed.

 

[Chie]

My question is does she remember what she experienced? It's implied that she's at least somehwat familiar with the past's events (Book of Prophecies, etc.). It also wouldn't cause any paradoxes for her to remember since the past is in the past, unlike if she were able to remember the future if she did time travel.

I think she remembers.

There might be some reasons for her not to remember, but...

 

[Guernsey]

How did Merlin make that door to begin with? Merlin is powerful but he may not be able to violate the rules of time travel.

 

[Antifa Lockhart]

How did Merlin make that door to begin with? Merlin is powerful but he may not be able to violate the rules of time travel.

Merlin in his source material is a time-traveler. Disney canon trumps all.

 

[Chie]

Merlin is powerful but he may not be able to violate the rules of time travel.

He explicitly is able to, this is said in dialogue.

 

[Deleted member 246005]

How did Merlin make that door to begin with? Merlin is powerful but he may not be able to violate the rules of time travel.

I figured there is more than one way to time travel.

In hindsight I would've preferred DDD as a time travel game than cramming it in as a last minute plot twist.

KH suffers from poor storytelling and the confusing elements hurt the series more than helping it. They feel like superficial elements that age poorly.

I'm not sure you could fix it outside of a remake like FF7R or an adaptation.

 

[Chie]

In hindsight I would've preferred DDD as a time travel game than cramming it in as a last minute plot twist.

It is, Sora and Riku time travel to Destiny Islands to enter the sleeping worlds, which themselves are replaying their own memories from the past.