Since the new Toy Story trailer this weekend, Director Tetsuya Nomura has revealed that Kingdom Hearts III will have a second playable character, the Gummi Ship will return, and the development delays were beyond his control. In an interview posted by IGN, Nomura talked about how the upcoming title allows for more than two characters to fight alongside Sora:
[The Dimension Link feature from Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep], that has been done away with. It was actually a compromise in a previous iteration because we were not able to display multiple characters on that platform in that game. We’re able to depict multiple characters. Up to five people can join, even more, multiple characters can join your party.
In the latest trailer, Sora is seen fighting with Donald, Goofy, Buzz Lightyear, and Woody, and Nomura told Game Informer that the Toy Story story in Kingdom Hearts III is original, takes place after Toy Story 2, and sees the group searching for a missing Andy:
[Pixar] preferred for us to not follow the film directly. They said, ‘Please create something original to Kingdom Hearts,’ so we did not draw any inspiration from the films. It is completely original and exclusive to Kingdom Hearts, so you can almost say it’s a sequel of some sort.
As part of GameSpot’s interview, Nomura mentioned that all of the worlds in Kingdom Hearts III will probably be revealed prior to launch:
I don’t think we’ll be keeping any worlds secret until the game is released. I think we will be introducing them leading up to launch. Nowadays games can add content on after the fact through DLC content, so there’s no need to hide any worlds.
Naturally, Nomura was asked if Kingdom Hearts III will be getting DLC, and he said it’s something he can neither confirm nor deny:
Nothing is set in stone, and I’m afraid we can’t go into details, but I have told the team: Just be prepared to be able to accommodate for something like that. We can’t suddenly develop a system where we’re accommodating for downloadable content. So it’s not confirming or denying either way, but just so that the development team will be prepared, I have informed them of making the preparations.
Kingdom Hearts III launches in 2018 for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
[Source: IGN, GameSpot, Game Informer via Gematsu]
