do you know if they have a north american one yet

The phrase on the side is making me hopeful and nostalgic.

"Now is the time for Kingdom Hearts."

No, there is no confirmation of a North American version of this game at the moment. This is fairly normal considering we don't usually get info on a localization until after the game has released in Japan.

The HD collection is hopefully the start of something better for the KH series. With 1.5 coming, the inevitable 2.5 and eventual KH3... I think we're on the right track.

I really hope the camera is controlled with the second stick with this remake. I never had any problems with the first game's camera, but with KH2 I just felt like I had more control over the game.

It is. That was one of the things they confirmed. Camera remapped to right analog stick.

Do we know what they plan to price it at?

It's about $83 USD converted from JPY.

And before anyone jumps to conclusions, remember that this is merely a direct conversion based off of the current exchange rates.

I was mainly asking out of curiosity of whether or not this game will be the usual price of a new game or if it will be reduced slightly in price because it's a remake.

Considering the amount of work going into this I wouldn't be surprised if it was full price.

PS3 HD collections are usually $10-20 less than a brand new game.

The background on that poster looks new.

Anyway am I the only one who totally fangasmed at the PS3 logo on the poster? Such a combination I've been waiting for a long time! *drools*

I read the description 3 times before realising we aren't getting a remastered version of the soundtrack :P

KINGDOM HEARTS original soundtrack, now remastered like the games

So the poster is "remastered"? That makes no sense.

The artwork is remastered. But I don't see a difference, probably a contrast/vibrance/saturation thing.

It makes more sense when you read the previous "

featuring the familiar artwork originally used on the" :3

You sir, win the prize!

You cannot remaster artwork though. It's a bit like previewing music. Can't do it. But that's another discussion.

Now you're just being nitpicky. There's only so many times you can actually say "recycled/reused/old artwork". Sue me for mixing up my vocabulary for some variety! D:

All right, but I need to know your name and address among other things so we can get this into court ASAP jkjkjk

I don't want to ask, but with this image being used more and more, I think it is safer and safer to assume this has an extremely high chance of being the coverart, and I'm okay with it, it is one of the nicer pieces of artwork from KH1.

OBJECTION



But in all seriousness, yeah, looks like this is the cover art for 1.5 unfortunately. It's nice that they brought it back since the first soundtrack. I just got my hopes up for new art xD

Honestly I am really starting to think that there will be no NA release. Cause think about it you guys. With every Kingdom Hearts that came out not too long after there was always a release date for an NA version. The game is about to come out in a little over 2 months and we still have no word on a NA release date? Think of all the preparation that is needed. Yeah all the voice overs are pretty much a copy and paste but what about 358 new cut scenes and voice overs? They should have started doing voice overs already in NA if this was the case and seeing some of the old posts that are being posted that the actors that do the voice overs have no idea about this game, I think it's safe to say NA is not getting this game. We haven't even gotten a Website yet.

It's not because they're not talking about it, that they're not working on it. Trust me, the odds are with us this time. Just be a bit more patient :3

Sorry, it was never my intention to be rude :P

I really want to see the boxart. It's a little weird that it gets promoted.. It's like a dream finally comes true. :P

This. And its actually underused. Outside khi not many players have seen it so they'll think it's new.

What if (read: what if) the PS3 themes that're unlockable in the game are actually all new art from Nomura? 8D

#wishfulthinking

We don't usually get an announcement until after the Japanese version releases.

Have you read the secret message in KH3D? It pretty much confirms that the collection is being released outside Japan.

I was thinking the same thing.. What sdr08 says is true but it feels like final mix and RE:CoM(never came to EU) to me. And even if they release it in US I don't think Eu will get it. Yes, there is import but it's different when it's official.. So I'm about to pre order from Japan but I don't do it because the entire game will be in japanese.

Please don't get my hopes up lol >_< At this point, I'm preparing for just already overused artwork as the themes -__-



Yeah, I feel like people don't even need to use any other explanations as to "if" the game might be localized, that message in and of itself confirms a US release and IF on the chance SE says they don't plan on bringing it over, that message will be the first thing that goes all over the internet.



The PS3 is region-free so for those in Europe, they could get either the Jap or US ones and play it, whichever one they understand better.

Of course it will be released in Europe and North America sooner or later. Disney wouldn't miss the opportunity to make more money.

I wasn't talking about the region locked thing but the language. I have beaten KH many times but it still feels weird to hear only japanese. Also I'm a trophy hunter so I can't understand the trophies either. But my main problem is that I can't understand Japanese. They even changed the english voices. :(

Guys, Square Enix Europe is really dedicated to their fans and tries its best to give people the things they want and more. I can assure you if it is coming out in the United States, it will be out in Europe and Australia.

Except for Spain or Italy. They might get shafted again

Don't remind me. It was surely a dickish move by Square, but several parts of the spanish/italian fandom proceeded to be as nasty in turn for an elongated time. <__<

At first it was totally SE's fault but it is expensive to localize games in general and putting the game in Spanish and Italian was probably a bad decision considering how little people buy the games in those areas. They probably would have been selling the games without recouping localization costs.

It was the fans' faults for making things worse by threatening and attacking SE and people who had nothing to do with the decision and saying "we won't buy the game." It only solidified Nintendo's decision to not publish the games at all.

You don't threaten a company by saying you won't buy a game. That's the fastest way to not getting the game. There were better ways for fans to approach the situation rather than outrage.



Yeah, but at least when they said they weren't going to translate the games and Nintendo was going to publish the English version, they were still getting the game. They sealed their fates with their rude outcry.

Exactly.
I remember at first being very supportive of the fellow EU fans, but after witnessing what several of them pulled off for several days not only on the EU, but also the NA sites/blogs of Square that quickly diminished.

Speaking of localisation, I remember that the original German version of KH 1 on PS2 actually had German voices (Days retained English voice acting and Re: CoM we never got), so I wonder if they would just take the German soundbank and pull it over the new KH 1 FM HD version for PS3 or take Japanese/English voices with German subtitles instead.

Well, Square was an idiot at the time.. Let's hope they don't become an idiot this time. *looks at them in the eyes*

I wouldn't say they were an idiot. If they weren't going to make money off of localizing it in those languages, they had to make the decision of releasing the game in English rather than releasing nothing at all. Also pinning the blame on SE doesn't help because sometimes SE has to rely on Nintendo Iberica and Nintendo Italia to release their Nintendo games in those countries.

Even now it is expensive for companies like Nintendo Iberica and Nintendo Italia to release games in the native language of the area because of just how small the market is.

this could be the same argument for Sony USA not publishing the Final Mixes.

That is a tad bit different since SE publishes their own games in North America, but yeah the same idea can be applied.

Would you want the German voices back? I honestly don't, but I wouldn't mind if the discs had both English and German on them so that we'd be able to choose. And don't you think the chances of it being multilingual in the way BBS was, where it took the language for the text in the game from the language setting of the PSP, is the more likely way it will go?

I hold a little hope that it would have comed to Wii (U) - as i've seen some articles about it. But I haven't been updated lately so I have no idea. Sadly my hope is kinda fading since I haven't seen much about it..

What articles were those? This has only ever been advertised as a PS3 collection.

In all the promotional material, posters, magazines, interviews, trailers, it's all just been PS3 exclusive. I'm not sure where the illusion for a Wii U release could have come from.

I personally could care less about the German voices. I'm used to the English ones (although I never heard the oh-so-worshipped Billy Zane because KH 1 was always in German here), but last time I checked in the German fandom there are several fans who are picky about the voices.
The main issue with including the German voicebank would be the additional scenes in the Final Mix. In KH 1 there aren't that many, but KH 2 would be another issue, as that one also had German voice acting in its first incarnation.

Choosing the voices was always something I am fond of. I remember having that feature in the first four .hack-games, changing between English and Japanese voices. The blu-ray of FF VII: Advent Children Complete has also a choice between German and Japanese voices.
I would actually enjoy playing KH someday with the Japanese voices, either with English or German subtitles.

You're mixing up voices and subtitles here. The language setting of the PSP (or the 3DS for Dream Drop Distance) dictates the language of the subtitles. Voices on the handheld titles are always only in English in Europe, much like with Final Fantasy too.
KH 1 and KH 2 were the only exceptions which originally had German voice acting.

That said, it would be definitely weird if you have Re: CoM and the Days-Cutscenes all with English voices and only KH 1 in German.
Dubbing everything in German would be way too much work though and unneccessarily push the release date away.

This game has never been marketed as a Wii U game. This is a PS3 exclusive.

I was unaware that the German fans had issues with the voices. What exactly don't they like about the voices?

I wouldn't say mixing up, I was trying to state how that system could change the written language of the game based on what language your console was. I'm fully aware that the voices are only in English in the Kingdom Hearts handheld titles. But I probably wasn't to clear about what I wanted to say.
Assassin's Creed does this with the languages, just it doesn't only change the text of things in the game and subtitles but also the voices. I think most games do this if they have multiple languages on the disc.

Yeah it would be weird for KH1 to be German while the rest is English. I agree that it would be too much work and honestly if they'd delay it, some people would just go and buy the US version online, I know I would seeing I don't really have any interest in a German dub.

It's frankly the opposite. There was quite some complaining around that games like Birth by Sleep did not get German voices. It seems that to many German fans, the English voices aren't good enough.
I am seldom in the German fandom though so I cannot actually confirm if that's the majority of German fans or just a very vocal minority at work.

That the written language of the game changes as per setting of the console was already clear then. If they do that with the voices too however it would take the decision away from people which voices they like. For that, I found the way .hack handles this better.
If they decide to use more space to include multiple voicebanks in a work it should also be possible for the player to decide which voices he/she wants to listen to.

I'm on the same boat, I don't need a German dub, but since the original KH had a German dub I would wonder if the sales of the 1.5 HD ReMix would be affected by that somehow.

... honestly that's my complaint about most German dubbed things, but different strokes for different folks I guess. Though I can understand it a little with this series, mainly because of the Disney characters. If someone grew up with the German voices they'd probably prefer those because it's the ones they remember. For me this is a none issue seeing I grew up with the Disney movies in English.
I've never been to a German KH site so I'm kind of clueless about their opinions about the games.

Well you don't really lose the option. I played Assassin's Creed in English and today to see if what I was saying was true i switched the language to German and the voices were in German. So in other words you still can choose, it's just a little more troublesome to change the language.

Do you mean if in the new 1.5 Remix there wasn't any German Dub. It's hard to say, if the German fans are really so unhappy with the English voices, then they probably would be quite angry, if a hd re-release of an old game, which had a dub, didn't include a German dub. Then again it would have two "new" things in it as well... I'd say there could be an outcry online, but most loyal fans would still buy it. I just hope nothing like what happened with the Spanish and Italian releases would happen.

I think I know where that comes from, lol. When I spent some time in the Netherlands I realized that there are rarely (if even) dubs even at TV and they only sub everything and leave it in the original language. A friend of mine told me it's the same in Sweden and Norway where he stayed for some time.
So maybe Germany is just spoiled in this area, rofl.
I could care less since my English is more than good enough to nearly understand everything.
It is generally an issue of preference, so I wouldn't try to judge that, I just though about the issue in regards to EU localisation. The USA, Canada, Australia and UK really have it easier since it's (mainly) the same language.
I'm also no member of any German site and I rarely ever read something there, although I did came to know about some of these issues by accident when looking for something else, lol.
I remember there was also some backlash regarding the localisation of Dissidia Duodecim, where they only translated the dialogue script but any menus, items, attack names and else remained in English even in the subs.

That's what I meant. You have to fiddle around with your console settings, in .hack you could just go to the menu and change the voices from English to Japanese and vice versa, that's much more player-friendly.

It's really hard to say since I also don't have a complete overview of the picture in the fandom. I guess several would probably still get it and then lament online about how they miss the dub. <__<
I doubt that there would be anything like the Spanish/Italian issue with DDD though as long as German text is available. The main issue with DDD was that after having already shown one or two trailers with spanish/italian subtitles Square decided to drop even the localised subtitles, meaning the entire game completely in English except for France (arguably the biggest KH-market in EU) and Germany (second biggest together with UK) who would still get their localised subs.

I had no idea that other European countries only got subs on TV as well, no wonder I hear that Dutch, Swedish and Norwegians really good in either English or German.
If Germany is spoiled than so is Switzerland, seeing we get you dubs.
From what I can see your English is probably better than mine and it's my fist language.

Yeah it's really not the best choice and wouldn't be execrable in other mediums of entertainment. I'd agree that having an option in the menu would be great, but I can't see Square stating to do that now.

Yeah fans tend to complain a lot online, but still get it anyways. Though it can go overboard every now and then. That's the internet for you, not much you can do.
Well it was a kind of an unfair situation but I'm pretty sure their reaction wasn't justified.
Well the thing with French and German is, it's also spoken in other European countries, so translating them into those languages also allow them to reach a wider market.

I'm still wondering why SE doesn't include both Japanese and English voice-overs in the HD Remix. In Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix it is possible to switch between them in Theater Mode.
I also think from a technical standpoint it's not complicated to include at least a text language switching system like it was done for BBS, because the structures of BBS, KHII and Re:CoM are very much alike (the original KH is kind of different, but not to the point of making it impossible).

I'm not entirely sure, but I presume that countries subbing stuff is actually more widespread than dubbing, at least on video games and TV (cinema movies not so much).
Funny that Switzerland gets German dubs since last time I checked it has three main languages: German, Italian and French. Lol, how does this work with the other parts of the country, do they get then the German dub with French/Italian subs? ^__^
Gee, thanks, although my written English is surely still miles ahead of my spoken one, lol.

In the end it would be only a sort of gimmick anyways, as long as I have subs I can understand I could care less about the language the voices are in. I am also so used to watching Japanese voices with English dubs that even that wouldn't be the slightest hindrance.

True that, these groups tend to be also most often the loudest ones and give the wrong impression of the majority having this opinion but in reality aren't.
That's why I said I could understand our fellow Italian and Spanish fans being upset and there also were those around who were able to discuss the issue in a civilized manner. The overall situation got pretty nasty after a few days though and those civilized fans were simply pushed aside somewhat.
Well, that's a reasonable point, also since French and German are two of the main languages in the EU, although at least Spanish people can counter with the argument that Spanish is also widely spoken. Not in Europe, sure, but nearly all of Middle America and South America (except Brazil) is mainly Spanish spoken.



They don't? I thought they would keep both voicebanks, the old English one and the newly recorded Japanese?
Then what about the translating of the texts themselves? If it's that easy I wonder why they cancelled the italian and spanish texts for DDD. Surely not to invite the shitstorm that then broke loose because there were already subbed trailers in those languages.

We have 4 official languages. I was basically just taking about where I live when it came to the dubs. As much as I know we the German part get most of are programs from Germany as well as their dubs. While the French part get it's programming form Franc and Tessin gets it from Italy. I think the Swiss Romansh speaking people get their stuff in German.
I'm sure you're better at speaking English than you think you are.



Yeah it's amazing how you can get used to things. I'm so used to watching Anime in Japanese and reading the English subs that it seems normal, sadly I don't really learn any Japanese by doing this.



Sadly, in the end it just hurts their goal if they act that way. It really sucks for the ones being civil, because they lose their voice. With the internet being what it is, people feel like they can band together for anything and be as rude as they want to be.
Well it's true that Spanish is wide spread, but apparently the Latin American Spanish is different enough from the European Spanish that they make their own dubs. I think they have their own dubs for the Disney movies, but I'm not sure. Though I would have to guess they still should be able understand it. Another thing is a lot of the Spanish speaking areas aren't very wealthy so they wouldn't make as much of a profit as the French and German speaking areas, though ideally this shouldn't matter but for a company it tends to.

Ah yes, point taken. I was just fetching from my general memory what I knew about our southern neighbours. ;)
Who knows, lol, fact is that I write more stuff in English than I actually speak, although I do have noticed that english words sometimes slip out of my mouth while actually speaking German, resulting in some hilarious results.

I've done the same, mainly with animes that aren't available around here at all. No worries though, as I managed also to only pick up a few Japanese words and standard phrases. *ggg*.

Yep, exactly, they even managed to turn away several fans from other countries who were originally supportive and understanding with their overreacting.
That's another valid point, and of course Square has to look on the profit side to a certain degree, as this is what a company needs to move on with further projects. A company shouldn't put profit over everything (would be also bad PR), but also not ignore it.
That being said though, English being the world language and (as far as I know) being taught in school in nearly every middle to big-sized country people should not make such a fuss about localisations that way. Many people also complain about Europe nearly always (DDD was an exception) last in terms of release, but fail to realize that localizing stuff in more than just one language (English) costs additional time.

EDIT: Just noticed that was post number 4100 0_o

Woah, Selphy, you managed to go much higher on your posts, lol.. I'll never be able to catch up to you.. :( ha.

Yeah, well I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have know this if I didn't live here, because it's unusual for a country to have 4 official languages.
Well I have the tendency to pronounce certain words that come from English as normal English word while speaking German. I find it worse is if I use a English metaphor in German and no gets what I'm trying to saying or it just come of as weird.

Yeah, you do tend to pick up something while watch, sadly watching subbed Anime can teach you the language, would be awesome though.

Sadly Square does have to look that they can make a profit. I think if it were profitable they'd dub every game in every language, but it's not.
Well yeah English is thought in school, but I think many still struggle with it. A few of my friends can't speak English and have some trouble understanding it. Though I think that could be fixed by teaching English from 3rd Grade on wards instead of French, which no one here really wants to learn anyways...
And yeah their complaining about it taking a few more weeks than the US release, seeing is stupid we're getting a game with what 6 Languages on average? I do understand the Australians complaining about it though, seeing their not part of Europe they shouldn't have to wait for those translations.

Congratulation on the 4100 posts!

Remember that the Final Mixes were released in Japan, where a lot but not all of the people there are taught English as a mandatory subject in school. Thus, many people in Japan understand both English and Japanese as opposed to in the US, where English is the only constant between most people.

Well, lolz, I have an edge of nearly two years, y'know? xD



True that, I think the only country I can remember that had several official languages was Austria-Hungary, the double monarchy which ended after World War I.
This goes both ways around though as most German sayings are also incomprehensible by an English audience.

I think for that Japanese is also a bit too complex to learn just by watching some animes, lol.

They're in a business after all, and you can't go on with business if you don't have financial means to do so. If for example localizing stuff in Italian and Spanish would cost them more than it brings in it would be reasonable to say we make it only in English. The error of Square was to not say that in the very beginning (and actually releasing trailers with those two languages).
It's really somewhat weird as English is practically needed in a vast array of fields nowadays.
When I still went to school English was taught in Germany starting with the 5th grade, although nowadays I think children start to learn it already in 2nd grade, at ages 7 to 8.
It's strange that French actually gets priority over English, as the latter one is certainly the more important language. In Germany, English is always taught as the first foreign language, with either French or Italian coming as the second if students wish so.

Only shows that part of the fandom are hypocrites (see what I did here? *ggg*), if there isn't something to complain about they dig for something they can complain about.
I do not get this deal with Australia anyways. By all logic Australia should be included in the US release, as they a) speak English, just like the US and b) they are geographically way closer to the US than to Europe.

Thanks. ^__^

yeah, that's happened to me enough times too... The languages aren't always as compatible as I'd like.

Sadly. I'm just waiting for someone to invent something so I can just download Japanese into my brain.

Yeah that was Square's biggest mistake, I kinda have the feeling it might not only been because of financial means that they called it off, but that it wouldn't have met their planned deadline, seeing they apparently did start.

It's true that English has become very important in many jobs, heck I couldn't even do my job if I couldn't read English. Wow that's quite young that they learn it now. Here when I was in school we had it in 7th grade and in some schools it was optional, now I've heard it's been moved down to 5th Grade. I agree about French being less important, but I think it's this way because it's another official language of our country, also we used to be a bilingual Canton.

Yeah but that's true to any fandom. (Are you referring to YX calling Sora an hypocrite?)
Well isn't Australia still strongly connected to the UK. If that's no longer the case then like you said it would make more sense for it to be included in the US region of releases.