Summary
It might be hard for some fans to imagine but the firstKingdom Heartsgame was released over twenty years ago. While there have only been three main installments in the series, the franchise has released over nine games in that time across multiple platforms and re-released many of them several times. Unfortunately, because the series has one continuous story, the plot of theKingdom Heartsfranchise can be a little difficult to follow.
The core concept of the franchise isn’t too difficult to sum up. The main characters go to variousDisney worlds in theKingdom Heartsuniverse, and reenact the plots of various films while battling an organization that commands creatures known as the Heartless. Those organizations are, generally speaking, trying to open the door to a realm known as Kingdom Hearts to obtain the power within to further their own ambitions. The problem is that the franchise goes about this in a way that is very difficult to follow and requires players to have a working knowledge of the plots and characters from its numerous spinoff titles. This is something that the series' next saga needs to avoid.
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How Kingdom Hearts 3 Highlights The Series’ Worst Habit
Kingdom Hearts 3was well reviewed by criticsbut the first few minutes of the game perfectly exemplifies the franchise’s problem of continuity baggage. The game is not a direct sequel toKingdom Hearts 2as some might have expected but a followup to the various handheld games that came out in between the main second and third installments. to understand what is going on in the first ten minutes of Sora’s new adventure, players would need to know what went down in a lot of these spinoff titles.
Right at the start of the game, characters begin to reference events that happened in previous handheld console installments. Characters that were introduced in PlayStation Portable and Nintendo DS games suddenly have a major impact on the franchise’s plot. Sora and other heroes casually begin to mention the villains and their status quo and expect players to already be familiar with it.
It makes the story feel dense, long, and next-to-impossible for a casual player to understand. Inadvertently, it makes the whole series seem inaccessible for all but the most dedicated fans. This is the habit that future installments will need to kick.
How Kingdom Hearts 4 Could Benefit From Ditching the Franchise’s Worst Habit
Thefirst trailer forKingdom Hearts 4was released last year and there currently isn’t a lot of info on it. The third game was the conclusion of the Dark Seeker/Xehanort Saga which may mean that the upcoming game could be some kind of soft reboot. It’s probably safe to assume that the game will introduce new threats and supporting characters while some old allies come in to help Sora.
IfKingdom Hearts 4does opt to bring in charactersfrom previous games, players should not have needed to play the last half dozen installments in order to key in on Sora’s relationship with them. LikeGod of War(2018), it could offer players a place to jump into the franchise without having to understand the franchise’s decades-old continuity. Obviously, the games shouldn’t throw out everything from previous installments, but the story should be something that a player with otherwise little knowledge of the franchise’s past can keep up with and understand.
Currently, it appears as ifKingdom Hearts 4is already making the marketing mistakes ofKH3, but there is no telling what the future holds for it. The trailer showed the return of the Heartless as well as Goofy’s and Donald’s involvement. Hopefully whatever story the developer opts to tell will be a bit more accessible to new fans and ditch the series' worst habits.
