When are we expecting news?

[Darkspawn]

Square Enix has its annual shareholder meeting June 21st and there’s usually a Q&A with the CEO. Kinda hoping someone asks him about KH4 and DQ12.

If you all send me $5, I’ll invest it in SE and ask for us. I definitely won’t just use the money to buy the Elden Ring DLC releasing that day. That’d be crazy!

 

[Chaser]

If you all send me $5

What are you going to do with $15

 

[Theart]

What are you going to do with $15

 

[Launchpad]

I think you've mentioned this trailers-as-entertainment model before, what do you mean by that? Like, people rewatching trailers and using them as a basis for speculation etc.?

When I say this, I'm referring to the many KH3 trailers they made that mostly only existed to poke and prod their existing player base with teases and early reveals, like Anti Aqua, Roxas in the keyblade graveyard, Xion fighting Axel, Vanitas threatening Aqua, everyone dying in the graveyard, Scala Ad Caelum, etc.

These trailers made few attempts to sell the game on the merits of it being fun to play, cool, or well made. Every trailer just showed surprises for existing fans to entertain them while they waited for the game to come out.

 

[Darkspawn]

What are you going to do with $15

I was hoping to get to at least $40 USD. No particular reason.

 

[NoWay]

I wouldn’t mind a 2026 release if they gave us a AA console game like an UX remake and a KH 3.5 or something like that.

But here we are, waiting for KH4 without anything else to tide us over.

 

[xenosaga]

 

[NoWay]

View attachment 16450

I don’t know if this is related to my post, but we shouldn’t count Missing Link. I mean it’s definitely not like a normal console game.
If a mobile gacha game has the same value as a side game like BBS for you, then good for you.

But for me, it definitely is not the same. I don’t care about the story updates ML is going to deliver, I want a REAL game, that I can play on my consoles.

 

[xenosaga]

I don’t know if this is related to my post, but we shouldn’t count Missing Link. I mean it’s definitely not like a normal console game.
If a mobile gacha game has the same value as a side game like BBS, then good for you. But for me, it definitely is not the same.

Yeah I mean I do feel the sentiment but unfortunately it's the reality of the situation... and it's not even just for KH.
I fear the days of smaller games like CoM/BBS/DDD are over unless it's specifically different genre (MoM) or mobile gacha game.

 

[Launchpad]

I fear the days of smaller games like CoM/BBS/DDD are over unless it's specifically different genre (MoM) or mobile gacha game.

And personally I'm happy with this! I don't think the side games were very beneficial tbh! Some of the characters are cute and there's good music, but Sora suffered in KH3 by having less skin in the game than the other characters despite being the main guy, and the general standard for KH combat went down the drain for about a decade due to the super quick development time of these side titles.

I just don't think the mainline titles should be 'built up' by supplementary side titles. A satisfying game will introduce characters, tell their story, and give the player a sense of catharsis all in the same title. I think our standards were all warped a little by the decade leading to KH3, where the assumption afterwards became "oh, well, we can't get KH4 yet until they set it up with a game about Roxas, a Terra game, a Mickey training arc, and a Kairi adventure!" when that's actually crazy talk

 

[NoWay]

At this point FF7 Part 3 is going to release earlier than KH4

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

At this point FF7 Part 3 is going to release earlier than KH4

I mean, maybe? And that would be very normal because almost all of the assets they need are already made at this point, so the pipeline for this game should be more streamlined compared to a game like KH4 where everything has to be made from scratch because by nature it requires new assets.

Hamaguchi did say they wanted to recreate the world map with verticality, though, so that may take time but also…money, so I think that idea will likely be walked back for Part 3.

 

[Chaser]

FFVIIR-3 should be on track for 2027 tbh.

 

[Launchpad]

lol I feel really bad that FF7R has had diminishing returns, part 2 was really good and I'm not even a devoted FF7 guy. They must be wondering wtf the point is in keeping up this standard for part 3 when even less people will buy it. If I was them I'd go full linear and wrap it up in the easiest way possible

 

[Darkspawn]

Maybe it’s because it’s so late (early?) where I am, but this is so damn funny to me:

https://www.reddit.com/r/KHML/s/aHVdPdsgZe

“You can’t actually register for Missing Link yet, but you can have a wafer… as a treat.”

At this point FF7 Part 3 is going to release earlier than KH4

Remake Part 3 is actually one of the reasons I think they are planning for KH4 to be out by mid-2026. Rebirth was developed in about three years following Intermission and they’ve said they want a similar turnaround for Part 3. That would put it early 2027 around the 30th anniversary.

They probably do not want to release KH4 within 6 months of Rebirth as it would mean a lot of marketing overlap. So Summer 2026 is probably the latest they want it to come out right now similar to how XVI released Summer ‘23 and Rebirth released about 8 months later.

Of course, things may end up taking longer for one or both. But I think this is likely their internal target at least. And DQXII needs to fit in somewhere too.

 

[Oracle Spockanort]

lol I feel really bad that FF7R has had diminishing returns, part 2 was really good and I'm not even a devoted FF7 guy. They must be wondering wtf the point is in keeping up this standard for part 3 when even less people will buy it. If I was them I'd go full linear and wrap it up in the easiest way possible

Rebirth was so much fun but by the end I was definitely smiling in the most exhausted, angry way possible begging the game to stop giving me new things to do because I would do them and spend another 10 hours Not! Progressing! The! Story! I’ve never been so happy yet exhausted while playing a game for an entire month straight.

 

[2 quid is good]

Me on the other hand - I'm just slightly bothered that the title has "changed direction" and I hope this doesn't mean KH4 ends up in a sort of mish mash held by threads of an overarching theme with little substance to back it up - like KH3

 

[Launchpad]

Rebirth was so much fun but by the end I was definitely smiling in the most exhausted, angry way possible begging the game to stop giving me new things to do because I would do them and spend another 10 hours Not! Progressing! The! Story! I’ve never been so happy yet exhausted while playing a game for an entire month straight.

I did a little write up here on how FF7R and KH really don't need to be compared lol. the TL;DR is that KH aims for innate mechanical fun whereas FF7R provides interesting external fun here and there and everywhere that you're meant to go find. Both are time consuming to develop but require completely different skillsets

My gf made fun of me for spending a month+ hanging out with Tifa every night.. even tho Barret was my real boo

 

[NoWay]

I mean, maybe? And that would be very normal because almost all of the assets they need are already made at this point, so the pipeline for this game should be more streamlined compared to a game like KH4 where everything has to be made from scratch because by nature it requires new assets.

But why do they have to make everything from scratch? What about all the UE4 assets? I mean, didn’t the majority of us expect the next entry to release earlier because of the engine switch to UE4?

That’s my biggest issue right now. I mean, I genuinely don’t understand it. I’d have been totally okay with another game using KH3 graphics in UE4 instead of waiting 6 years for the next big technical update

 

[Launchpad]

But why do they have to make everything from scratch? What about all the UE4 assets? I mean, didn’t the majority of us expect the next entry to release earlier because of the engine switch to UE4?

My honest expectation is that the reveal trailer for KH4 is sort of a quasi-fakeout. Sora looks realistic, and the setting looks realistic, and our first look at the forest moon of Endor looks realistic, but I feel like whenever we see the normal, KH side of reality, the assets will just be zhuzhed up versions of what we saw in KH3. We can kind of already see this contrast present in KH3 Remind, where Sora's design was different while fighting Yozora (painted-on clothing wrinkles, more realistic clothing textures, actual nails on his fingers, softer hair shader)

I don't think everything is going to be completely redone. They already had to remake every single character for KH3, I'm guessing they'll find an economic way to moderately improve those models (and their animation pipeline too, hopefully), while letting Unreality/Quadratum/Live action settings like Star Wars stun with higher fidelity detail. Nomura said that the major theme of KH4 and its worlds are differing viewpoints, so I strongly believe that the re-reveal of KH4 will include graphics more akin to KH3.