Kingdom Hearts III is the third main installment in the Kingdom Hearts series developed and published by Square Enix. It was initially released January 2019 for the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One. An expansion, Kingdom Hearts III Re Mind was released in January 2020. The story takes place after the events of Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance. It features an older Sora as the main protagonist, who sets forth on a new adventure to search for seven guardians of light in an attempt to stop Xehanort from bringing about a second Keyblade War. Sora is joined by Donald Duck, Goofy, Mickey Mouse, Riku, Kairi, and others. Along the way, Sora travels to many worlds from Disney and Pixar intellectual properties, and cross paths with the real Organization XIII. Kingdom Hearts III features hack and slash combat reminiscent of Kingdom Hearts II, with elements from later handheld entries, allowing the player to control Sora in a party with Donald, Goofy, and up to two other Disney characters from the various worlds he visits. A major addition compared is the Formchange mechanic, which allows his currently equipped Keyblade to grant him special abilities and change shape. Sora can equip up to three Keyblades at a time, and cycle between them to use his abilities. Another addition is the Attractions mechanic, which occasionally allows Sora to summon and pilot a vehicle inspired by Disney theme park attractions. At certain points throughout the game, the player will be able to control other characters.
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This review contains spoilers
The last quarter of the game was chock full of every theory about “who will come back” out there, and I honestly enjoyed the way things connected but… it was all sped up in the last quarter of the game giving none of the characters time to simmer.
Everyone’s there, but it didn’t feel like anything at all.
I've heard it mentioned elsewhere that Disney is the albatross this series’ neck, and at this point I think I’m inclined to agree. Despite it being the major selling point of the series at its start, I just kinda don’t care about the Disney stuff any more. Sure, the stories in this game were fun, but the game spent 75% of it’s time spinning its wheels on Disney stuff with effectively no KH stuff, and then scattershot it at all out at the end without giving things time to stew.
They needed 20, 30 hours to cover everything that needed covering, and they tried to pack it all into 8 or so. Overall, It just frustrates me because I was hoping that this one, out of all the others, would focus tremendously on Kingdom Hearts, using the Disney worlds as backgrounds. As it stands, I swear KH2 had more Kingdom Hearts story in its prologue than KH3 did :P
Still though, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have some fun here The combat system felt like a step forward at times, but also a few steps back (from KH2) at other times - mainly around the attraction attacks which just come up too often and have very little player interaction.
Will I be back for the inevitable next game? Yeah.
