Kingdom Hearts III Was Heartbreaking | KH3 vs. KH1&2

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For the 20th Anniversary of Kingdom Hearts, I'm going to shred its major third installment! ... Wait, that doesn't seem appropriate. Well hey, I talk about why I liked the first two games, so consider it a clash of Light and Dark. This has been a battle long coming, so I hope you'll enjoy it!
0:00 - Intro
2:45 - Setting the Pieces
6:45 - Diving In
13:26 - Olympus
25:00 - Realm of Twilight
34:43 - Toy Box
42:45 - Tangled World
45:17 - Monstropolis
48:35 - Arendelle
53:42 - The Caribbean
1:00:27 - San Fransokyo
1:06:03 - Meanwhile With the Other Idiots
1:12:46 - Destiny of Departure
1:19:40 - Keyblade War III
1:31:20 - Keyblade War III (For Real This Time)
1:40:18 - Scala ad Caelum
1:48:39 - THE END
1:53:44 - Kingdom Fantasy Versus III
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UPDATE: The music in the video's end credits had to be muted due to a copyright claim by Square-Enix's label company. So sorry about that! The words and patron credits themselves are untouched. Thank you for watching. Install Raid for Free ✅ IOS/ANDROID/PC: clcr.me/KePPBj and get a special starter pack 💥 Available only for the next 30 days

[@kailastnam9793]

GET. THAT. BREAD!

[@TreyH.006]

No he didn’t

[@anonymous_idontreplylmaous72]

Kingdom hearts fans stop bitching about about kingdom hearts 3 challenge (IMPOSSIBLE)

[@diegodankquixote-wry3242]

Sorry, but no one will never get me to download RAID: SHADOW LEGENDS, not even God or Shrek. I think most people will agree.

[@chellastation]

It feels like Tetsuya Nomura should have taken notes from Sonic Heroes on how to do a proper finale. At least in SH everyone teamed up to defeat the main villain before Sonic's Team finished the job.

[@tovahwulf]

I also wanna point out something I just thought about from this video. Something hilarious. Belle, from Beauty and The Beast, was able to escape XALDIN with an ELBOW TO THE CHEST. Yet Kairi is... Just... Useless and lets herself be kidnapped.

[@turbotrup96]

Honestly, Belle escaping Xaldin like that was super dumb in the 1st place.

[@tovahwulf]

@@turbotrup96 It's also stupid that Kairi sat there like a lifeless puppet to get killed "twice" when she was supposedly training.

[@turbotrup96]

@@tovahwulf to be fair, all of the keyblade wielders in the good guys' team had brain farts. Mickey and Riku were almost freakin killed twice by a... group of normal Heartlesses? (they were supposedly buffed, but still, Aqua defeated many of them herself in the realm of darkness) Sora decided he can't beat a snowman (while knowing fire magic at that) when he beat Titans at the beginning of the game? Ven just stood there and let himself get knocked out by Terranort? Where are his fighting instincts after fighting Vanitas so many times, for instance? Aqua protected Ven with her own BODY when she literally had Keyblade in her hand? Lea's just... a punching bag?

[@tovahwulf]

@@turbotrup96 Yeahhh... All of that too. The game was just an embarrassing mess. It's sad that Sora and Riku were at their strongest in DDD and KH2.

[@turbotrup96]

@@tovahwulf yeah, especially KH2 - to this day I'm not sure if Nomura actually meant that they can casually cut buildings in half, or they implemented it in just because it looked cool? Then again, similar issue is with the FF7Remake - where Cloud or Tifa clearly have superhuman strength and speed once, and the other time they have trouble lifting, cutting or jumping over some basic stuff.

[@SerinitySack]

Kingdom Hearts 3 definitely had an overwhelming amount of Disney influence compared to the previous games. It feels like it was treated as little more than marketing for Disney rather than the game everyone wanted.

[@runemaster8656]

People gloss over this but I think you're spot on about that. Remember how this was the ONLY kh game to have a "blockbuster" trailer in movie theaters? Even looking back, that trailer just oozes corporate.

[@benpage11]

@@runemaster8656 now it’s the exact opposite issue with the next game focusing solely on square and other properties with some Disney

[@runemaster8656]

@@benpage11 Which, while I am excited for the prospects of, a part of me feels a certain way with how the dark seeker saga ended. The end of the game was as conclusive as it could be and yet it felt so. . . Vapid. I just hope the character interactions improve moving forward.

[@benpage11]

​@@runemaster8656 Personally I loved KH3's conclusion but the story needed some retooling. mostly the lack of a middle section like KH2 had. Its a bit funny as Kh3 story wise works similarly as KH1's story design. Which TBH worked against KH3 overall. The middle section should've been Aqua being saved and other things happening to ramp up the seriousness of the situation. Making Sora more desperate to learn/master the power of waking. Regardless i really liked what we got (outside of frozen haha fuck you disney). TBH i feel like KH4 is going to be the KH2 of the newer games while KH3 will be the KH1 of them. I say that because KH4 is building off of what KH3 did and retooling/reworking Just like what KH2 did to KH1. They even brought back the reaction commands from the second game. I'm excited for it personally as it's insanely promising for the future of the series. (Also that forest area in the trailer is Endor. legit compare it to battlefront 2's map and the movie itself and its the exact same forest. There's also a brief peak of a AT-ST foot as well. so FUCK Darth Vader vs Sora is one hell of a way to get me hyped)

[@runemaster8656]

@@benpage11 I'm definitely hyped for KH4, I'll just temper my expectations and not watch any trailers past the next one lol

[@donebynone30]

“This dramatic Sora scream from the trailer was for a fuckin wall of Goomba’s!” Is the best line I’ve heard in awhile

[@krabman2889]

He should’ve taken a quote from a pig KZbinr that said this back in 2014 “Goomba Fuck You!!”

[@samuelhadjaissa5201]

To be honest I don't think Nomura is tired of Kingdom Hearts, just the darkseeker storyline, the entire problem with KH3 is that its so focused on setting up the next storyline that it kind of skips ove the Important parts of the darkseeker storyline

[@nightwish1453]

I think the bigger problem was that there was too much and setting up the next storyline I think wasn't the issue. I think the issue was the inclusion of Roxas, Namine and Xion which is both too many characters and I don't think it adds much they should of just focused on the arcs of BBS, DDD and to then setup the next story

[@samuelhadjaissa5201]

@@nightwish1453 Roxas, Namine, and Xion get very little scree time so I never felt like they were Included all to much

[@autumn2ashes211]

I disagree tho. Nomura has said that Xehanort is his favorite character. I don’t think he’s tired of KH at all man.

[@TuskyBaby]

@@nightwish1453 It only feels like too much because of how little time they alloted for the actual story to develop and conclude. This should be completely manageable.

[@misterfevillord1588]

I think the game was rushed by a sudden deadline forced by Disney, in addition to have been sidelined to focus in the production of ffviiremake. The story and gameplay has the moments and style we like from the other episodes, but the moments in between are really bad executed and not polished. That lack of polishment must be due to the rushed development.

[@embani]

The best thing about KH3 is its title screen. That's not even snarky hyperbole, it's just that emotionally profound to me.

[@TheRyanSucksAtGames]

I don't think I've agreed with something this hard dude holy shit

[@jeffreyali1456]

Strongly disagree, but it was pretty powerful

[@zeroattentiongaming820]

Hit harder than any other title screen, that's for damn sure.

[@Megaman.ExE7]

Sometimes there are comments that perfectly describe how one feels. This is one of those comments

[@alikcsg]

On God, dude. I broke down at the title screen and listened to Dearly Beloved for a good 10 minutes. It was all downhill from there.

[@Yuschmuhck]

Whenever people use the "argument" that Kingdom Hearts was always stupid and poorly written, as an excuse to deflect hate from the newer games, my mind jumps to the scene at the beginning KH2 where the team is about to leave Twilight Town and is saying goodbye to Roxas' friends. Sora inexplicably begins to cry just as he's about to board the train, making everyone confused and worried. Of course, the player knows why. It's because Roxas' consciousness exists within Sora, and he's the one who's actually crying. Why do I bring this up? Because it's not only one of the most heartfelt moments in the series, but it's also SUBTLE. The game doesn't tell you why Sora is crying, it doesn't show any flashbacks, it simply respects the player enough to let them figure it out on their own.

[@zachanikwano]

Kingdom Hearts has its moments, Sora’s rivalry with Riku, Riku’s development, Namine’s story in CoM, and Roxas being parts of those good writing moments. Also, having KH worlds interwoven with the main game’s narrative. But a lot of KH’s writing is also “light in our hearts” and “darkness within darkness” flowery nonsense. On top of that you get weird, rushed half-recaps of Disney movies. But, I do agree that the games stories started going downhill with every new release (apart from good moments like most anything with Riku).

[@iggyp4390]

That scene still gets me every time lol. Kazushige Nojima at the peak of his writing powers. And the reason it works so well is because Roxas’ scenario was *playable*. We experienced his life through our own eyes, and empathized with him. If his story had just been a handful of cutscenes, it would not have been nearly as effective. Letting us see the world through Roxas’ eyes in the early game sets the foundation for the whole story. KH2 may have its clunky plot moments, but the narrative itself is carefully constructed. Even the twist about “The Guy Who’s NOT Ansem” manages to serve a greater story purpose. The payoff is when Ansem the Wise and his apprentice finally reunite, and Ansem outright states what the game has been trying to say all along: “we may profess to know the secrets of the heart, but its essence is beyond our reach.” KH2 is all about the gray areas in life, the gaps in our perceptions about the world and people. The Nobodies themselves are a metaphor for that. The pieces of KH2’s story are all connected and that’s a credit to Nomura and Nojima. You could tell they were passionate about their ideas and excited to share them with us.

[@aeroga2383]

KH2's prologue is a masterpiece

[@Whodjathink]

when Saix says "If I only had a heart" at the end of fighting him in 2, it made me feel like these Org members who were acting like complete dicks the entire time were just trying their best to become whole again. There's a lot of emotional moments in KH as a story but 3 manages to miss the mark for me every time. Even at all the renunions, I felt more annoyed than joyed.

[@fls128]

@@iggyp4390 The last line pretty much sums up the difference between the stories of 2 and 3. In KH3 it feels like the story was a rushed sloppy way of simply wrapping up the Xehanort saga so that Nomura can start another chapter in the KH story. There were no heartfelt ideas or subtle character moments. Everything felt like cheap fanservice or just flat out poor distasteful writing. The ending of everyone forgiving Xehanort and offering the whole "you don't have to fight anymore" empathy to this guy was such a slap in the face. He literally just murdered Kairi, a child, in front of everyone just to bait Sora into a fight and they act like he isn't a complete piece of shit. Giving some last minute "oh I was doing it for a greater cause I swear" motivation for the main villain of a 15 year long story was just embarrassing. Not to mention the cutscenes of this game make it feel like The Room.

[@TheAzulmagia]

The thing that bothers me about Kingdom Hearts III is how so many character interactions that could've happened didn't. Namine doesn't interact with Roxas or Xion. Ansem the Wise has no interactions with any of those three onscreen. Axel has no interactions with Larxene and Marluxia. Riku barely interacts with Terra and Aqua (with neither acknowledging that he can use darkness without it being a bad thing). I could go on! And a lot of this could've been alleviated by just allowing other characters to do things in the plot instead of Sora being the only one to accomplish things.

[@lovesgibson]

Yup. I think the fans imagined them as being one happy group, but in the game we got they’re presented as if they’re all invisible to each other. No conversations, no resolutions or revelations, no deep character bonding moments. That’s what added to the ending of the game feeling rushed and unfulfilling. Spend 30 hours in Disney worlds, then… RACE TO THE FINISH.

[@cloudshines812]

That’s just a big issue too. They had way too many characters to juggle. Some of the characters also just didn’t need to return either and the biggest examples are defiantly Roxas and Xion. The BBS trio at least were somewhat important, but Roxas already had his closure in KH2 and Xion had hers in 358/2. They did not need to warrant a return for lazy fan service

[@TheAzulmagia]

@@cloudshines812 I wouldn't have minded the idea of Roxas getting a return at the end of the game, per se. While I am fine with the send-offs that KH2 gave everyone, the Nobodies being their own people with their own experiences was an idea that had been brewing for a while now that would've been odd to not resolve. But I'm not entirely sure that Roxas needed to be at the Keyblade Graveyard. I feel like something as simple as Lea and Xion being there to see Ansem the Wise and Vexen creating a new body for Roxas to give him a second chance at life, mirroring how DiZ took away his freedom in KH2, would've been a sufficient enough closure for the characters.

[@svendkorsgaard9599]

I disagree. They had enough time and space in the game to juggle all the characters. If every world had an interaction with the main characters, everything would be sorted out. But noooo, disney absolutely needed to make 80% of the game completely irrelevant and useless!!!

[@DLxxx]

@@cloudshines812 Oh, screw that! Roxas and co returning wasn't the problem. The _real_ issue was that the game did little to nothing with them to justify their return in the first place. There was no satisfying journey or development of those plotlines that made their returns in the end feel satisfying and earned. And when they finally DID return to us, they received no further development despite the myriad of character conflicts that were still left unresolved (like Roxas and Riku/Ansem the Wise, for example, could've been an excellent dynamic to tackle and address their growth and negative history). The idea that they shouldn't have returned in the first place because it's purely fan service is simply not true. Roxas' return was set up as early as KH2 final mix, and this was made EXPLICIT by Blank Points at the of BBS (and the ending of Recoded). Nomura had over a decade to plan for that story and how it would be handled, but he was too preoccupied with his own personal hang ups, and no longer held a passion for these characters and their story.

[@fortello7219]

Not to mention how they shafted Aqua HARD. I guess they realized she was too competent and mature, so they just... gave her the idiot ball AND took away her iconic shield. That reaction time for Ven was something... special

[@DLxxx]

Dude, KH3 disrespected and mangled Aqua's character SO badly that it single handedly makes me rage when people have the gall to show a clip of her in this game and act like it's some great example of character writing. It's not. The whole subplot with "Anti-Aqua" actively ruins the arc set up for her by BBS and 0.2. And for what? So Sora could come in (WITHOUT THE POWER OF WAKING), beat the crap out of her, and drag her back to the Realm of Light? Where's HER agency in any of this crap? Why does she never bring up Ansem the Wise again? Why did she ever lose her keyblade in the first place? Why did Seeker of Darkness SHOW UP in the in the first place? HOW did he even know they were there and where to find them? What about Aqua's keyblade and armor in Radiant Garden? We know Zexion knew it was in the Chamber of Repose, so did he just neglect to mention it? The writers can't even wrap their heads around basic cause and effect, or the idea of set ups and pay offs. In fact, they used their BS ploteline with Anti-Aqua as an EXCUSE to have Aqua fail at everything she was set up to achieve. Ventus, for some inconceivable reason, was the one to rescue HER????

[@tacticstories7159]

@@DLxxx Seriously. Every time someone wants to convince me why Kingdom hearts make sense for them, I just end the conversation. This series doesn't only have plot holes. It IS plot holes. That's what it's made of. I was able to excuse that, because it was at least exciting and dramatic. Now that's even made boring. The only way to enjoy it now, is to NOT care about anything fitting together, or making excuses for the story yourself.

[@SolitaryLark]

She has ptsd I think that it only makes sense honestly.

[@lesliesantos8595]

​@@DLxxxdude serious i forgot her armor was left behind in that chamber omg 😮😅😢

[@qrowing]

Really ticks me off, honestly. She goes "you've seen me too weak, too often," has one of the best blocks in the franchise at a full 360 degree shield.. And she chooses to body block Vanitas' attack. At least in the Manga, its drawn in such a way that it looks as if Aqua just barely managed to get there in time to block it. Its drawn so that she doesn't have much of a choice _but_ to block it with her body.

[@nerdinahoodie7972]

Honestly it baffles me how they relegated Riku and Mickey to dark world just for Sora to be the one to pop in and solo Aqua with little difficulty. Like, wouldn't it have been far more meaningful if Riku who felt as if he owed Aqua for saving him in kh1 saved her now? The boy who drowned in misery once before now saving the fallen master from the darkness. If they absolutely needed Sora to be involved then have Sora and Riku work together to save her.

[@knox7945]

Yeah, it makes Riku look weak and incompetent. Especially in DDD he seems to be stronger and became a master which doesn't seem to matter in the end when Sora comes in and saves the day. It kinda ruins the purpose of Riku's growth.

[@thatoneblackdude3333]

Right? Seriously there was nothing stopping them from having it be sora , riku and Mickey save aqua like Damn bro kh3 was just the sora show in the worst way in my opinion why build up the guardians of light and bring back all these characters if your just gonna waste them and have sora do everything.

[@nopeace3689]

Why are you so surprised those cat couldn't even handle their xehanort's heartless in Kingdom Hearts 1 by himself or I had to battle the whole organization from Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 on his own let's be real Donald and Goofy are not really helpful. These cats couldn't even handle ventus on their own The Mickey got training from an actual master and riku Darkness amp. What did Sora have half of himself, which he had to fight to actually exist.

[@chimeratcg07]

Sora is the main character so 🤷🏻‍♂️

[@thatoneblackdude3333]

@@chimeratcg07 that doesn't mean he should do everything if your just gonna give him all the spot light what's the point of the other characters

[@joshuataylor6595]

The fact that Kairi and Xion were both stronger in their representations as KH Union X medals than their KH3 versions is just heartbreaking.

[@LilacMonarch]

I swear every time they released a new kairi medal it completely shattered the game's meta it was so stupid lmao

[@JP-1990]

Disney worlds only "stopped mattering" once they did away with the Disney villains working together like in KH1. And once they did away with that, it also made the whole "world order" thing feel less important, too.

[@WildDancer101]

Yes, the Disney worlds of KH1 semi-followed the original plots of the movies. While in KH2 most of the Disney worlds followed the plotline mostly to the letter, which makes it jarring when taken seriously.

[@MelonTartVA]

Honestly, I’d still argue that the Sköll fight in Arendelle is amazing

[@Cheese4202]

the destiny of departure section was 100% spot on start to finish. They spent no time developing sora and kairi's relationship, then use her "death" as a hollow emotional note, then to only FORGIVE the guy who just did it. love the video man, well written

[@TheSCPStudio]

My dude, the entire series is about Sora and Kairi’s relationship at the very base level, since Kh 1. If you need a narrative to explicitly show you what should already have been understood by you, then that’s on you. Also, forgiveness is a huge factor in this series as well… Riku was forgiven after the events of the first game. Axel literally kidnapped Kairi and is now working with her. Forgiveness also isn’t an oddity in story telling. Dragonball had Vegeta (and many others), Naruto had Orochimaru and Sasuke (and many others). Can you just accept that it’s not your type of story/story telling and stop clinging to the hope that a narrative that’s been around for 20 years will actively shape with you as a person?

[@Cheese4202]

@@TheSCPStudio the narrative direction in KH3 is nowhere close to level KH1 & 2 were at, and I’m not asking it to remind me that they exist, i want to feel the progression of their relationship through the gameplay. Total waste of an opportunity to not have Kairi in your party for at least one Disney world. 2. I don’t have a problem with forgiving characters who used to be enemies that have redeeming qualities, but literally the guy who caused the events of the first two games to happen? It’s just lazy writing. Can you accept that just because you can connect the dots in whatever nonsensical way that makes sense to you that I don’t have to agree with that?

[@vindifference]

If I recall correctly, the only one who had any semblance of forgiving Xehanort was Eraqus, and that's only because they had the whole Sasuke/Naruto, Sora/Riku bromance in their childhood. None of the other heroes weighed in on Xehanort at all, and at best, I think their sentiments are that they just don't care about him. There's no overwhelming hate or rage, they just don't want to put up with his shit anymore. I'll clown on KH3 for a lot of things, but I don't support people putting words in a game's mouth. If players think that the game wants them to forgive Xehanort then that's on them. But based on his character's lines in BBS, his motivations at the end of KH3 weren't news to me. They were consistent with what I thought was always the case, and didn't make any difference.

[@Cheese4202]

@@vindifference that’s the biggest reach around I’ve heard to justify this. Just because the reasoning is consistent doesn’t make it not anti climactic and still uninteresting

[@pikachufrankie]

@@TheSCPStudioRiku was groomed by Ansem and Maleficent in KH1, man was a victim.

[@NovaOrNeo]

The moment i accidentally activated a disney ride in the middle of the dark aqua fight, i hated the game.

[@connorworsham6378]

The argument that Sora is too OP for Disney villains falls apart when you think back to KH Clayton and KH 2 Scar, and KH 2 Barbossa. You can have a "weak" Disney villain with Heartless power-ups. Clayton fought on the back of a Heartless, KH 2 Scar literally received a Heartless Buff, Barbossa fought with a heartless. Why can't Marluxia just give Mother Gothel the power of the heartless? Heck, a boss fight with a Hans/Sköll team-up would have made it x10 better. All it takes is giving the Disney characters heartless/nobody "buffs," and they're a challenge for Sora. It just doesn't make any sense.

[@youngwolf024]

Kh3 has the worst bosses in the series for the simple fact most have nothing to do with the conclusions of the world's. They are just......there. I hate it.

[@fls128]

@@youngwolf024 Fighting a random big heartless instead of Zurg, Sköll instead of Hans, a random heartless instead of Gothel, a random heartless instead of Randall, making Dark Baymax into a dumb aerial fight, and giving Dark Aqua 5 health bars when every dumb big heartless boss has like 15 are just some of the nonsensical things regarding the bosses in this game.

[@beatbone96]

@@youngwolf024 and the designs are poor too, no epicness at all. The boss music didn‘t alarm me and make me panic like usual

[@recess7]

I think it's more of a disney problems. I've once read that disney don't want their characters to be the main villain in the game.

[@yazcona13]

@@fls128 grothel was the heartless

[@RolyatSille]

I really feel like the game should've been broken down to a Kairi section, a Sora section, and a Riku section. Forget the power of waking, have Sora looking for Ventus and the castle since everyone knows we need Ventus and we don't have either of the people who knows where it is. Have him follow the history of the Organization and their known locations in the Light world to find hints and clues. The Organization would have reason to interfere with him as they don't want him meddling with things before they're ready. Have Riku following in the footsteps of Aqua, let it be a little reward for those who played 2.8. Let there be an actual experience there. He can visit ruined worlds, solve things with Mickey, make use of his pre-established talents and understanding of the Darkness. And then let Kairi and Axel actually do training. Give THEM the Disney worlds. The original trio grew to be Keyblade masters through their experience traversing worlds. Sora and Riku too. Hell, even the mobile game characters become masters through protecting and clashing against the darkness in Disney worlds. You have the template right there to mold them into who they need to be. They can clash against Organization members through that and maybe that's how some of them get converted over. Kairi and Axel talk the other two into joining with them. You could even keep the Kaira death scene and it'd be SO much more impactful because you've had this chance to actually grow with her. Her and Axel are still out of their element, but herso more than Axel. Yet she needed to be there and that is exploited by Ansem in the end.

[@cameronboushehri9423]

That’s EXACTLY what ruined the whole game for me! She seriously deserved WAY better. They just iced her like she was nothing. They failed her. One of the things I hate is anti-feminism. This whole “damsel in distress” routine is starting to feel old, dated, politically incorrect and anti-feminist. I want equality between the hero and heroine, gender equality between men and women. Is that really too much to ask? Her death was a total slap in the face to women’s rights. I blame Tetsuya Nomura. What was he even thinking? He doesn’t even care about what he’s doing anymore. He’s lost his way. This one game ruined the whole KH series, and also my childhood. You know how it feels to have your childhood ruined?

[@redstreak9430]

I think the whole “KH3’s prologue was weaker than 1 and 2’s” could have either been solved by either having 0.2 being the prologue as originally intended or going the BBS route and have you playing as Axel and Kairi training in Merlin’s Hyperbolic Time Chamber or wherever they were. Considering all we got out of it was one scene of them reminiscing about how far they’ve both come, it would have been nice to expand on that and have them (along with the player) getting used to being a Keyblade wielder skilled enough to participate in the final battle.

[@nyhtfall1969]

Ikr

[@minimalchill]

Let’s not ignore that if Time doesn’t matter where they train, then their training being done suddenly when the rest of the team needed them makes absolutely zero sense. In theory, they could walk into that timeless world, and walk right back out. 10x stronger than Sora, and right at the start of the game. Bc time doesn’t matter there so…yeeeaaah. Lol Oops.

[@nyhtfall1969]

@@minimalchill they should of cut that line completely cause the fact they have this as an option but don't do any of it makes every character look like a fuckin moron

[@lpfan4491]

@@minimalchill What I like is that some people say "Why not bring Sora there so he can grind to level 100 in an instant?". I like it because it's literally true. If they are going to rely on the guy anyhow, why not stack the odds against Xehanort instead of going with the unspoken "We've got to have a fair fight"-bs that almost got them killed.

[@DkKombo]

@@lpfan4491 fair fight? 13 op peeps and a whole army vs 7 others. Imagine mickey bringing his army, sora all the frroends he made from different worlds, the hollow bastion gang, etc etc.

[@deepad8089]

Another baffling thing about Kairi being a liability in KH3 is that during her Paopu moment with Sora, she told him that the Keyblade Graveyard will be their toughest battle yet so you’d think SHE would the most prepared out of the group when Terranort attacked but she just stood there like a fucking zombie instead, not even summoning her Keyblade or atleast putting her guard up, what a load of BS. It’s just as bad as when she got captured by Xemnas and “killed” by M. Xehanort.

[@Erinxh]

I have a friend who likes to use 'Sora' as username for most online multiplayer games we play together. Me and some other friends always tend to tease him with stuff like "Why can't you save Kairuhhh?", "Don't you need to go save Kairi?", "Man, you suck! You can't even save Kairi." This all stems from how Kairi was treated as damsel in distress in all 3 main games. In KH1, she gets kidnapped. In KH2, she gets kidnapped. In KH3, she gets kidnapped. Al though in 3 it's technically more 'captured' than kidnapped, but you get the point. It became so frustrating to see how Kairi was being handled over the course of the games. She doesn't get any real development as she was just being used as a device to get a (contrived) emotional reaction from Sora in order to move the plot. And was pretty much the case in all 3 main games. In not one of them was she truly being handled different in the bigger picture. The only real difference is 'HOW' she was captured in each game. It truly annoyed me when she again got captured in KH3, just how useless she turned out to be.... again. At one point you start thinking to yourself "Kairi can't you just stay home in the kitchen, so that we don't need to worry about you getting kidnapped?" That's absolutely the writer's fault, if those kinds of feelings and thoughts are being brought up in the player. They tried to redeem her in ReMind by letting her join Sora for the final fight against Xehanort, but at that point I didn't really buy it cause it felt takt on. Nomura or whoever was responsible, they really did her character dirty. Sorry for the 6 month late response. After reading your comment my Kairi-anger boiled up and I just had to vent my frustration with the character. 😁

[@cameronboushehri9423]

That’s EXACTLY what ruined the whole game for me! She seriously deserved WAY better. They just iced her like she was nothing. They failed her. One of the things I hate is anti-feminism. This whole “damsel in distress” routine is starting to feel old, dated, politically incorrect and anti-feminist. I want equality between the hero and heroine, gender equality between men and women. Is that really too much to ask? Her death was a total slap in the face to women’s rights. I blame Tetsuya Nomura. What was he even thinking? He doesn’t even care about what he’s doing anymore. He’s lost his way. This one game ruined the whole KH series, and also my childhood. You know how it feels to have your childhood ruined?

[@Deoxys_Used_Mimic]

You know what’s off-putting about the “this is an insane amount to get memorized” cutscene? Look at Kairi’s face while Axel is talking. Once the camera jump-cuts to show everyone in the room, look at everyone just… standing there and staring at him while he’s having an Episode. My. F*CKING. God. No one reacts to *anything.*

[@runemaster8656]

Jesus. I just noticed how expressionless she is. Man, this scene could've unironically been the best in the game. These character interactions deserve just as much attention as the main plot. What good is saving all these people when they'll stick to their trio bubble Indefinitely?

[@megasoniczxx]

Something about the way that scene is done just feels really forced honestly. Like the part where he's going on about how Ven looks like Roxas felt like they couldn't think of a better situation to bring that up in so they hamfisted it there. My problem with it is that it comes off like some kind of fanfiction where the writer really wanted someone to acknowledge something but instead of having it naturally come up in conversation, they just have someone point it all out in a non-intelligent way.

[@runemaster8656]

@@megasoniczxx I'm excited for what kh4 brings to the table, but it feels like we glossed over years of buildup for something so half-assed. You hit the nail on the head with how "fanfiction-y" that scene felt. It sucks then that the only way to have meaningful, human-feeling character interaction is through fan works.

[@justice8718]

​@@megasoniczxx Axel could easily just reacted shocked and confused. Just saying "You look a lot like Roxas..." "Huh?!" "You guys don't have to worry about it. He's no longer with us."

[@Nyzer_]

The game is just like that. It's at its worst in the "Terranort beats everyone up" scene.

[@lucidberrypro]

Lol I love how Sora still becomes Hokage after failing the Chunin Exams. Dang, that ending had me choking back tears... That's hard to think about.

[@coolz123123]

You know what I think it is? Kh1 and 2 were made without thinking “what will the players like” but was made through pure creativity and staying true to the series and story …. On the other hand. Kh3 was when square Enix was getting more involved with peoples opinions and thoughts and tried to bring the Disney worlds in relation to what’s popular etc etc and I think that’s where it went a bit wrong

[@s3studios597]

In short, it's far more corporate.

[@mrbubbles6468]

I’m convinced the only reason they got 2 games was they agreed to it first before 1 came out. It explains why 1 and 2 close off the story perfectly with only a tease of possibly continuing.

[@maxentirunos]

@@mrbubbles6468 Chain of memories got out between the two. So maybe he convinced Square for a trilogy in the first place.

[@raze2012_]

​@@mrbubbles6468yeah 1 wasnt guaranteed a sequel which is why it ended ambiguously. I'm guessing KH2 had similar terms, but by the end of thst it was clear Square established another pillar. All the trouble with 3 started with the PS3 and all the difficulties the entire industry would struggle with along the way. To explain that could (and I'm sure, has) be it's own 2 hour video.

[@ak47dragunov]

My biggest issue is the whole idea that you can just "nobodify" yourself, be defeated, be reborn, and then just do it all over again. It makes all your fights seem completely pointless. All the struggles in KH:CoM and KH2 were rendered utterly meaningless

[@thelightangel7559]

I agree. If Nomura wanted those characters to come back, he should've just made the nobodies fake their deaths. Look at Xemnas for example, he faked his death twice in the final battle. It would've made more sense if the other members came back because they faked their deaths instead of coming back from killing the heartless and nobody.

[@minimalchill]

Absolute facts. I’ve noticed this trend in lots of entertainment that I’ve taken in from Japan. They’ll introduce a cast. Kill some off. Only to revive them to “appease” those character’s fans. But like…if there is no stakes in this world…no actual death…then what’s the point of any of it?

[@thelightangel7559]

@@minimalchill at that point, they shouldn't kill the characters off in the first place

[@lucapeyrefitte6899]

So there’s an article that says he only brought back the fan favorites because of the fans

[@drawhou9356]

Not to mention that it completly breaks the in-universe rules, a nobody gets created when a heartless is born, but a nobody can create a heart on their own and become "whole" again, but if a nobody and their heartless get destroyed the original person can be reborn, but also the original person can be reborn even without their nobody destroyed, and also you can create nobody artificially and they can become whole too. The longer it goes the more you realize that everything was made on the spot without stopping to consider how it works as a whole

[@Acecard-jl2py]

"Nomura didn't want to make KH3" That is...shockingly plausible due to the context of Versus 13.

[@nyhtfall1969]

This feels like a kingdom hearts game that didn't want to be a kingdom hearts game

[@manuelbonelli3690]

@@nyhtfall1969 oh man....4 won't be a kingdom hearts game at all. It really seems we are getting away from the kingdom hearts series. I don't like that. Hope I am wrong

[@DLxxx]

@@manuelbonelli3690 Sadly, you're correct. What little we've seen of "KH4" looks nigh unrecognizable to the series. It's literally just becoming a vehicle for his canned ideas with Versus 13.

[@iantaakalla8180]

Everything Final Fantasy XIII touches, it ruins.

[@rowanatkinson3594]

I don't buy that Kingdom Hearts has inherently terrible writing: the writing in the first game is actually really good at setting a really powerful mood. Not to mention how many people found themselves surprised at how heavily they got invested in the ending of 358/2 days and Xion. I know the music does a lot of work in this series, but it's not doing *all* the work here.

[@rowanatkinson3594]

Kingdom Hearts, for all its retcons and over-explanations, is a series that has very simple, powerful emotional logic that runs through that, and that's not something to create by accident.

[@Robbinoks]

Agreed the first one is a simple game that is fun and uplifting and that's all. It was a fluke, and has been wringed dry by nemura. It's so frustrating.

[@frogglen6350]

Idk fam. Donald and Goofy randomly siding with Riku after *all that adventuring with Sora* because Riku had a keyblade was very stupid

[@Robbinoks]

@@frogglen6350 that was a real fake friends moment, but it did fit with their characters goal of finding king mickey. Donald was also a lil douche bag initially. They then came back and that's what cemented their friendship. Was a classic disney trope where the friend group is tested and ultimately made stronger than before. If anyone still loves the kh story more power to them tbh

[@ShadowbannedAccount]

No. Kingdom Hearts has always had bad writing. It was even visible in KH1, from how Kairi could just turn Sora back from a Heartless. Even the fucking Wiki used "somehow".

[@SoaringSoul27]

Near the end you mentioned how you didn't follow Vs 13. I remember being so excited seeing the 1st trailer of Vs 13 and thinking "wow a Final Fantasy with the combat of Kingdom Hearts (2). This will be amazing!" After years of silence and slowly dying hype, it was rebranded to 15 and ended up a gutted version of what was originally promised. With KH3 it almost feels like Nomura did just that as retaliation for losing Vs 13. He took what was so beloved about the series so far, flanderized it, and tried to fill what remained with a second attempt of the game he was denied to make how he wanted. Seeing 2 games I was hoping to play for years become this hodgepodge of a mess just kinda makes the wait feel unrewarded and makes me lose faith in the series regaining its identity in the future.

[@alenezi989a3]

Exactly it really felt like was trying his best to Kill Kingdom Hearts and turn it to V13, the way so many of the conclusions that I was waiting for felt so ehm "heartless" and how the game seriously felt like a checklist, it's like he was trying to just wrap everything up as fast as possible give everyone a happy ending even Xehanort and just send Sora to a different reality so he can start making v13 as he wanted.

[@Webshooters1]

@@alenezi989a3 Nomura's Revenge is a thing that's been going around but I don't peg Nomura as the type of person to be so spiteful that he would deliberately sabotage his pet series just to make the game he wanted. However I do feel that now with Quadratum he can implement the ideas for Versus XIII that he was unable to do. A second chance inside a game that is guaranteed to be given priority by the company and the resources to do it and perhaps it is for the best. KH3 was always meant to wrap up the loose plot theads of the Dark Seeker Saga while setting up the next arc and it did so in a great way with some stumbles on the way like Arendale. The combat system feel like a coming together of elements form across the series. The UI of KH, the formchanges acting as drive forms from KH2, the shotlocks from BBS, and flowmotion from 3D.

[@adverseresolve8142]

@@Webshooters1 I find the game's attempt to tie all these loose threads together was extremely sloppy and unsatisfying. And what kills it even more is that it felt like the Heart of the series was just gone. Go figure it's because of some stupid petty spite from a man who had never written any of the games prior in his own series.. So sad Square Enix let him Divide the fanbase with an unloved project.

[@ken7007]

@@alenezi989a3 this

[@rwilliamisen]

Saying a creator, an artist, would deliberately sabotage their own work as a form of revenge for actions taken against their work in the past wouldn’t be unheard of. Many artists in history would mess with their work to mess with their patrons demands. That being said, the emotional attachment Nomura has for both Vs. XIII and KH is incredibly deep and he’d not spoil the later but def made it his goal to set up a joining of the two. The issue was that they took creative control away from him in XV and as an artist that is the most terrible thing you can do, ask them to be a cog in a machine.

[@DallyLama93]

I legit feel bad for people that liked the characters from the side KH games only for them to end up as background characters or bench warmers in KH3. They serve next to purpose to the plot other than making people go "oh hey it's that guy, from that game"

[@DLxxx]

Dude... As one of those people, you have NO idea how badly KH3 screwed up fans of the characters. In my case, it was SO painful that I could no longer justify continuing to follow the series (despite spending a near _decade_ being invested in it), and the year following it's release saw my attachment being slowly, agonizingly choked out. It took essays upon essays of ranting in the KH forums before I was ready to move on, and I attribute that to how KH3's unclear ending failed at providing enough closure for me to be content in letting these characters go. If Nomura was so tired of the KH narrative and just wanted to get to his scrapped Versus 13 ideas, the least he could've done was make the ending to this saga feel like a *true ending* for the characters, instead of stringing the investment of it's fanbase along by leaving Sora's fate ambiguous, giving us paper thin interactions, and stuffing in so much sequel bait.

[@DLxxx]

@@dylancatlin1329 Fine. He can do whatever at this point, because my investment in the series died with KH3's narrative.

[@kasam0308]

As one of the people who did play the side games, every KH game are main series.

[@Kira1Lawliet]

One of the biggest changes I would have made to the story would have been towards the beginning and ending. A lot of people say they should have had 0.2 as the real intro level, but I actually think it would have been much more fitting to play through the prologue as a Young Xehanort in Scala ad Caelum. Dark Road should have been the opening of KH3. It should have shown us who Xehanort was, given us all the in-depth characterization we needed for him at the ending of his saga, and it would have bookended the game much more fittingly. The other mainline KH games have a very emotionally resonant habit of "ending where it all began" in different ways-in KH1, you return to a twisted version of Destiny Islands at End of the World, and in KH2, you go back to Twilight Town in order to enter The World That Never Was. I think that would have made for a similar move here, and it would have provided us with the added context we needed to better swallow Xehanort's "sudden character reversal" towards the end. Second, I would have made the ending visit to Scala much more prolonged, with Sora Donald and Goofy traveling through Scala, occasionally battling the Replica Xehanorts, and after each fight seeing a flashback recreation of moments from Xehanort's childhood, thereby giving Sora a much-needed window into Xehanort's character and mindset to make the final speech against him feel more earned. There's a bunch of other things I would have changed too, but that's the main thing that keeps me up at night wishing they had done that.

[@nyhtfall1969]

i would've killed for that

[@reecebantom689]

Dude. You are a genius, and I wish u wrote the story or plot for kh3. It would have been a much more enjoyable and rewarding game after all these years. I honestly not sure how I feel about kh4. But im not as big as I was on the series initially kh3 did alot of damage alot that I feel can never be correct

[@Kira1Lawliet]

@@reecebantom689 I appreciate that. It took me many months to come to a decision about how I felt about 3. I've never oscillated so much between loving and hating a piece of media before. In the end, I decided that I couldn't deny how much I enjoyed the game and how satisfied I felt, but I also couldn't deny that I was really disappointed with a number of decisions they ended up making, but that disappointment is tempered by knowing how fucked over they were by the engine change and by Disney. It's also tempered by knowing that this isn't the end. They have a chance to redeem themselves with the next arc, and I do have faith in them. ReMIND proved that they can take feedback and be constructive with it.

[@recess7]

that would be epic, nice idea

[@pinkiepie379]

Omg this is actual genius… to bad so much was put into the mobile games 😭😭😭

[@7milesdavis]

“They (the attractions) make you look stupid instead of badass.” I think Sora’s character design ensures he will never look badass. He looks like a circus clown on a good day, stumbling around on his giant clown shoes.

[@PaulSmith-nb6md]

The final battle with Xemnas I played over and over again. That laser deflecting scene was ASTOUNDING!!!

[@TheKingRiku]

It was my most hype gaming moment in highschool. You felt it. Even though looking back it wasn't a difficult thing it definitely felt like a climatic moment in the battle. This dude just pulled out all the stops to kill the gang!

[@pigtaku4276]

Riku in 3 sounds like that family member who used to be a addict/alcoholic and got clean but makes that their whole personality now, like yeah I'm happy for ya, ya got clean but now ur annoying

[@brotbrotsen1100]

Riku, you were cooler when you still sniffed darkness.

[@tcbobb.8782]

I never understood why combat felt "off" til you compared the falling at the end of 2's combos and wow i didnt realize how deep this games combat was and the cool thing was how I never noticed it til it was messed up...meaning they really had something good with 2's combat system

[@benpage11]

@sonic 1995 facts. Same with 3

[@pn2294]

KH1 combat was best

[@kerozine819]

Floaty combat

[@benpage11]

@@kerozine819 and?

[@kerozine819]

@@benpage11 yes

[@TheSmallestJo]

Kairi to me is so insufferable in this game. It starts with them not being able to get Hayden back for the role (I think was more of Hayden’s choice which is fine), and they tried to make her part of the hero team and failed miserably. I just wish they gave her more- a better relationship building with Sora meanwhile becoming a stronger hero. Sucks that she stays a distressed damsal

[@ignightroad]

I'd recommend Nomura's stance on the Destiny Trio as a whole--he stated that KH has always been about Sora and Riku and that KH was meant to show 'how friendships can drift apart over time'. I'll admit I've never been the biggest fan of Kairi but seeing how they tried to promote her and show off how strong she was just for her to bench herself endlessly is very telling. She lost her Princes powers by choice, effectively making her just a normal girl and I really think it shows. THOUGH to be fair, I also love that aspect too? Just a normal girl knowing she can't catch up to Sora and Riku but desperately trying cuz she knows if she doesn't try, they'll leave her behind, whether or not it's intentional on their part. However, putting in scenes in Remind where she fights Xemnas for .5 seconds just to lose was hilarious to me, I'm sorry. Good chuckle. Almost as good as her fighting Xehanort and turning into Sora cuz she can't do shit without him. Seems less bullying and more 'normal girl in a world of super powers'.

[@alexandernickaboine4798]

Actually, no it wasn't Hayden's choice. Square just didn't reach out to her to reprise Kairi and she was actually dissapointed about that Josie

[@TheSmallestJo]

@@alexandernickaboine4798 that’s really awful and unfortunate because to me she *is* Kairi. I just understood that she was on hiatus to focus on her kids, but it looks like she was still working when KH3 was in production. That’s whack 😪

[@edwardrichard8093]

You know what would been really cool. If they went with the BBS route and each had their own story since they were the OGs. I would have loved to see Kairi go from damsel in distress to aqua level of awesome.

[@vindifference]

Nowadays I always laugh whenever I read or hear Kairi's name. It's such a sad joke. I could hardly forgive Kishimoto for how the Naruto trio was handled, so to see a repeat of that in KH is just so inexcusably laughable, that I can never ever call Nomura a decent writer of characters anymore. He just gets lucky sometimes.

[@TBP]

Public opinion on the stories of Kingdom Hearts kind of reminds me of my feelings on the story modes in Mortal Kombat. These are beloved characters, they're some people's favorite fictional characters out there. So I don't see any valid excuse for poor storytelling. You should treat these characters with respect, because otherwise it's an insult to them, and therefore an insult to the very people who love these characters. If it was "never good" then that should be inspiration for the devs to make it good, not an excuse for them to accept mediocrity.

[@Peasham]

I'd at least be fine with horrible storytelling if the characters interacted with each other. At all. But they couldn't even do that. Friends that have loved each other for years don't even acknowledge each others' existence, it's embarrassing.

[@adverseresolve8142]

Tbh that's not a very good excuse for poor story telling. Cause it's not that hard to actually treat your story with respect, even if you are a shite writer.

[@alexandreturcotte6411]

[Tekken Fans have enter the chat]

[@adverseresolve8142]

@@alexandreturcotte6411 lol

[@OhKayEl]

That sounds way more like Sonic than Kingdom Hearts tbh.

[@TheKingRiku]

KH3 was like waiting in the line for ice cream for forever just to find out they only had strawberry.

[@Hyskaris]

I found KH3 was so hard focused on trying to tie up loose ends, that they didn't even think about how it would be accepted by the wider audience. So much time was dedicated to finishing off characters that were resurrected (Ansem and Xemnas), or characters had their crying scene with their friends (Roxas & friends, Aqua, etc.) to show that they were happy to be together again. But none of those moments feel earned because the game does so little to bring said characters to the front lines beyond saying "Hey, remember the past games?! Remember what happened in those! Look how hard they fought to get here!" When it's been over 10 years since Aqua's last major role (I'm not counting 0.2 because that was always intended to be the intro to KH3 anyways), I start to not recognise the past games as reliable growth. So many times throughout KH3, there's flashbacks to previous games. All with the intention of saying "Player, you know this stuff, and have known it for years now. So the main characters are gonna know it, too. Happy?" Without actually putting in a good deal of effort to let the characters figure out these situations organically, and instead ham-fisting the solutions in our faces. How do we find Aqua? Well Mickey just-so-happened to see her in the Realm of Darkness like 2 years ago. So we know she's there. Why didn't we do anything? idk lol How do we find Ventus? Well we get Vanitas to casually drop to Sora that Ven's heart is inside him. Vanitas could probably sense it... so he'll just tell Sora to his face. Easy. How do we SAVE Ventus? Well Aqua knows where his body is, so now that we've found her, let's mosey on over. Oh, right, we said the Power of Waking would be needed to rouse Ventus' sleeping heart... uh... Ventus will just tell Sora he had it the whole time (even though Ventus is supposed to be dormant and asleep and unresponsive besides minor moments, but sure, let's just have Ven start talking). It doesn't feel earned. You can argue that every character in this series has gone through enough hell and strife to earn it. But in a vacuum? This game does not let the characters earn their victories. Yes, you had to fight Aqua to save her. Yes, you had to fight Vanitas to save Ventus. But what the fuck else is new in this series? When we had to save Kairi in KH1, Sora had to stab himself in the chest and become a Heartless. When Riku needed to kidnap Roxas, he had to give into the darkness and forever alter his appearance. When Xemnas needed to be stopped, Riku and Sora were stranded in the Realm of Darkness. I could keep going, on and on, listing reasons why there shouldn't be victory without consequence, because over and over, the games have TOLD us that's just the way of it. Power of friendship be damned, there have been a million OTHER things that work towards these characters earning their victory. And up until now, the games did a pretty okay job at setting those victories up in earned ways. Did most of the things I list get resolved anyways? Yes, but because the characters who endured these trials... well, they ENDURED them. They did not just find the solution 10 seconds later, they had to struggle and deal with the issues and the consequences that were found after. KH3? Everyone's issues get swept under the rug, at least until the next game might say otherwise. Not to mention, none of the Keyblade wielders actually fighting together (until the DLC) was fucking exhausting. Working so hard to get everyone together to take down Xehanort, just to have segmented boss fights (one of which is a joke bc of Roxas' AI) where each trio gets their little "yay! we're friends again!" moment and NOTHING else. It's wasted potential. You spent so many games and so many hours learning these characters and feeling for them, loving them even. Only for Sora to shove them aside because "it's way too dangerous, I need to do it alone." Which is all the more reason that everyone should go with him! Especially if Roxas' AI is so fucking busted, it does not sell to me that, after Roxas' fight with Saix, the game expects you to believe that it'd be better if he, or anyone, stayed behind. It's a mess of trying to write everything off at the last minute. It's enjoyable in a vacuum, but if you've been following these games since their inception like I have, this doesn't sit right. I loved KH3 at launch. My second playthrough, I noticed the issues. And my third, I just tried to enjoy it while not gritting my teeth at every odd choice they made.

[@thatsingingkidd]

There’s always been a level of cheesy, kiddie Disney dialogue in the Kingdom Hearts series but the level of cringe in KH3 dialogue was unbearable for me. Really made me feel like I was too old or outgrew the series. Thanks for this video, you took the thoughts straight from my head.

[@SkimoStories]

almost as if like 13 years past or something since kh2

[@Jet_Ink]

@@SkimoStories If you're pointing out the 13 years in terms of age, some people got into KH when 3 came out - like me - and I also felt that it was unbearable in KH3. And I had played that first.

[@SkimoStories]

@@Jet_Ink yeah I think KH3 has the worst dialogue in the series too, but I definitely would have thought it was amazing as a kid just like the rest of the games.

[@robbiesilverwolf]

you sure you arent to old and out grew the series

[@SkimoStories]

@@robbiesilverwolf I think most of us can admit that the series is corny as hell from an adult perspective. It's still one of my favourite series. The dialogue, cutscenes in Kh3 were genuinely really poor compared to some of the other games. Not sure why, they're just really awkward a lot of the time.

[@AntiRiku]

never thought a single entry could make me stop caring abt a franchise i once obsessed over

[@javaruscarstarphen4062]

Fallout 76?🧐

[@thegreatnoob9991]

@@javaruscarstarphen4062 You have to take into consideration that the OC might not have been into the Fallout series.

[@slentara1]

Exactly

[@mikehurt3290]

I felt the same way I couldn't even finish KH3 I got so bored, I'm replaying KH2 right now and feel 100% the oppsite and it reviving my love of the series

[@Loner098]

Like Pokemon Sword and Shield, The Last of Us: Part 2, Paper Mario: Sticker Star, and Sonic 06?

[@realtalk4994]

I'm still trying to pretend that KH3 doesn't exist. I don't think I'll ever stop feeling that way.

[@AntiRiku]

same, its such a shame

[@lolsnez7542]

Loser

[@danielfuertes1678]

Damn, I thought I was alone. Let us have a moment of silence my fellow brethren in sadness....

[@jakobos93]

One thing about Kairi that I appreciate more now than when I first played KH 1: Her „red flags“ are actually very intriguing. She knew, since the beginning, that Riku was bad news. Or to be precise that he had reached a point that would lead to trouble. A mix of puberty, jealousy, superiority complex and a crush on Kairi (or maybe envy for what Kairi saw in Sora). In a way, that makes her wayyyy more mature than her age. She wasn‘t naive or stupid, you could even call her sinister or ruthless in a sense. Her clear desire to be with Sora shows that she always saw and appreciated his qualities better than any other character.

[@movealongnowDT]

Agreed with how KH 3 did so many characters dirty. What a waste.

[@robbowski]

My headcanon is Kingdom Hearts ended after KH2, everything after that is just some weird fanfic

[@TheForever206]

Judging by the scale of Olympus, im confident most of the budget went to the Olympus world and the rest was given to all the other worlds 😂

[@bubblemage]

yeah lol i was so damn surprised with olympus, a lot of shit happening, the world felt huge, it had a few secret places like the furnace(? place. and after that every single world felt small and empty. the caribbean world doesn't count, water is water

[@onyx_vii7808]

Crazy thing is that Olympus felt empty too,

[@starmangalaxy2001]

It's no suprise that the vertical slices that they developed for the early trailers were the most polished parts of the game.

[@keridavis2623]

I feel the kairi struggle too. She has SO much potential and they keep screwing up.

[@thatoneblackdude3333]

She's in a never ending spiral of build up with no payoff

[@cameronboushehri9423]

That’s EXACTLY what ruined the whole game for me! She seriously deserved WAY better. They just iced her like she was nothing. They failed her. One of the things I hate is anti-feminism. This whole “damsel in distress” routine is starting to feel old, dated, politically incorrect and anti-feminist. I want equality between the hero and heroine, gender equality between men and women. Is that really too much to ask? Her death was a total slap in the face to women’s rights. I blame Tetsuya Nomura. What was he even thinking? He doesn’t even care about what he’s doing anymore. He’s lost his way. This one game ruined the whole KH series, and also my childhood. You know how it feels to have your childhood ruined?

[@kaylinkiester3633]

I really hated the attractions, the fact I couldn't block them from happening until remind was criminal. Every time I accidentally hit an attraction it took me out of the game.

[@UltraThunderSurge]

All I can say is that I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought the characters were not acting like themselves in this installment. I couldn't stand how Sora was written because he acted so much more mature and heroic in KH2.

[@Peasham]

He acted more mature and heroic in KH1 lol

[@TheBlueLink3]

He acted about how he did in KH2. Sora was very well written in KH3.

[@alenezi989a3]

Exactly I mean yes Sora was not always the smartest person but thry kinda made him the butt of all jokes in kh3, in kh he was alway sad and brooding because he was looking for his friends, in kh2 he felt alot more mature he has experience and have been to places, but in 3 it felt like he regressed or something suddenly he is cartoonishly excited by everything and way dumper.

[@TheBlueLink3]

@@alenezi989a3 Sora in three is constantly feeling down on himself. Yeah, he still acts goofy, but the mask slips every now and then. He's almost exactly like how he was in KH1 and 2. Yeah, Donald rags on him a bit too much, but Sora rarely acts like it truly bothers him in front of Donald, nor does he tell him to just stop. I get that that aspect bothers some people a lot, but it was never done enough to bother me.

[@TheBlueLink3]

@Ewan Callister Nomura has always been heavily involved with the stories though.

[@MegaMario9001]

Near as I can tell, Kingdom Hearts III was a game developed with four goals in mind: 1. Advertise Disney's intellectual properties. 2. Advertise Kingdom Hearts Union X, a mobile game built around microtransactions and lootbox mechanics. 3. Hurry up and get the Xehanort saga over with and start hyping up the next saga: Nomura turning Kingdom Hearts into his original vision for Final Fantasy Versus XIII because he's still salty over being taken off that project. 4. Make money off of the well-established Kingdom Hearts name brand.

[@Thundah]

Right on the money! Nomura needs to go imo.

[@CellarDoorx06]

Money. It's ALL money. You guys can keep current gaming. Just because a game and system has better graphics doesn't make it any better because of that singular reason. It's just sad.

[@SlowSpeedChase13]

Yay capitalism

[@SlowSpeedChase13]

@@Thundah I disagree; Disney capitalism is the issue. I’d avoid KH3 too if I were Nomura; the pressure must have been awful.

[@ForrestFox626]

@@SlowSpeedChase13 Then he should gotten it over with sooner

[@thatsastick13]

The weird thing about the Pirates world is that they chose to adapt Pirates 3 instead of 2. The third one is literally known for being the most confusing, badly-paced movie in the franchise. Now that I think about it, this is all the more fitting for Kingdom Hearts 3.

[@nightwish1453]

well the 2nd one ends in a bad note Jack "dies" the others retreat to Tia Dalma and end up teaming up with Barbossa at end. 3rd movie's story is better to adapt here I think

[@NineHundredDollarydoos]

To be fair, a decent chunk of that movie is dedicated specifically to getting the key for the chest off of Davy Jones, and the iconic three way fight with the wheel was fought over the key. That would all be totally unnecessary if Sora were there with his keyblade.

[@TheHalloweenSpirit]

Nomura already confirmed they choice that movie because is his favorite Pirates Of The Caribbean movie

[@heartless2147]

@@TheHalloweenSpirit Which says a lot about his taste, add in him saying Xehanort is his favorite character and the writing of KH3 suddenly becomes clear.

[@jexusdomel5194]

@@NineHundredDollarydoos actually, the keychain for that world's keyblade is that very key, so I think you're correct in your assumptions

[@Svefngengill]

One thing regarding criticism of the "KH2 was actually just as bad" sort, it really brings into question, did those people even like KH to begin with? Like, it's one thing to argue that you like KH3, but when the argument is "KH2 was bad all along you just don't want to admit that", then how are you going to argue that KH3 is worth anything? It's such a weird copium stance to take.

[@johnnyboy7777]

Honestly, I feel like there was a missed opportunity to kill several birds with one stone that I haven't heard many other people bring up. I forget which exact interview, but at one point Nomura said that he originally wanted to include more backstory about Xehanort and Scala Ad Caelum, but eventually decided there wasn't room for it in KH3, and instead got to work on KH Dark Road. This, paired with the poor handling of Scala and introductory world to KH3, made me wonder about this potential solution: An introduction to KH3 that takes place in Scala Ad Caelum, in which the player controls either young Xehanort or young Eraqus and learns the basics of the game. Not only would it solve so many issues with 3, but it would also just be a sick intro to the game, period. It would allow for a fully realized Scala world right off the bat, it would allow for greater backstory and lore development, it would provide a humble beginnings original world to kick the game off, it would be a huge step up from the Darkside boss fight as a tutorial segment, and honestly I don't see a downside. Idk, maybe other fans would hate that idea. But personally, I think it would do the game a great deal of good, even if it wouldn't fix every problem with it.

[@protatype7487]

My brother and I predicted a Dive Into the Heart opening with Eraqus and were sad it didn’t happen. We really thought that would have been something special.

[@rhysking3597]

That sounds dope af honestly

[@Mactao100]

For that to work 100% you need to hide very well that you are playing with Xehanort so you can make a connection with this new guy and have the shock to discover that he is the Big Bad guy... But please Keep Xehanort evil

[@odatai1425]

Fucking- Wow, that would’ve been incredible.

[@mage2105]

Honestly that's perfect. It would also be a great callback to the Roxas section in 2, and it would make the final fight much more interesting.

[@TheSmallestJo]

Idk if I’ve commented before but I’m so disappointed on what they did to Sora. I know KH2 isn’t a perfect game, but it’s my favorite out of the series. When you mentioned the 1k heartless fight, we see Sora just determined, full of emotion and thinking about what will happen next which 100% resonated with me when I got to that part of the game. In KH3, he’s absolutely dumbed down for no reason. Sora has always been kind of silly and light hearted, but I don’t remember him being the butt of the joke coz he’s stupid. Not even in KH1. He had more heart then (ironically) imo than in this game.

[@izukuOfa]

That’s also my problem with KH3 Sora. He was so dumb for no reason. Hope he gets back to himself in KH4

[@hustheposum]

People say people who were disappointed with the game have too high expectations. Well if all you expected was a decent kingdom hearts story with a beginning middle and end, balanced and engaging combat, and a satisfying conclusion to the DS saga, your expectations still would not have been met.

[@mahamib]

That is rather subjective, wouldn't you say?

[@hustheposum]

@@mahamib never claimed it wasn’t. All opinions are subjective. It doesn’t need to be pointed out every time someone says something.

[@terraventusaqua123]

31:40 I’ve heard at least a dozen KH3 reviews, even CinemaSins style videos, and you are the FIRST person I’ve listened to to acknowledge Riku’s haircut. I genuinely thought I was the only one who noticed that.

[@truesoprano2152]

Thank you for pointing out how Saix's ending made no sense. I feel like this is rarely brought up in criticisms of KH3. Saix was always the biggest douche, and even as Isa he was a bit of a bully to Lea, so to have him all of a sudden have been a good guy all along makes absolutely no sense, and seeing him on the clock tower with the people he bullied so much really felt wrong.

[@TheAzulmagia]

I suppose the idea is supposed to be that becoming Isa again before reverting back to Saix changed him or something, but he really does become an entirely different character in KH3 right out of nowhere.

[@keridavis2623]

Also the essence of Baymax wasn’t that chip, it was the healing chip Hiro’s brother Tadashi made. It wasn’t even his actual “heart.” It drove me nuts.

[@viatlas4835]

Sora is now officially the Goku of kingdom hearts. Always steals the win and acts like a dense, overly excited 4 year old when in reality he has seen more of the universe than even imaginable and experienced hardships that test him and his friendships. Somehow he went from being some super powered kid with a big heart and bright personality to now being quite literally the lamest character in the series. What a shame corporate greed and lack of vision ruined such a great franchise.

[@adrianderose953]

Big facts

[@maxentirunos]

Two things : 1) It's DBSuper Goku that is like that, not DBZ or even DBGT one. Super flanderized to the extreme each character. 2) the same happen here. Every character is flanderized to one or two character traits and done with it. It's more apparent with Sora, but also Axel limited to being comic relief and using catchphrases, but also Kairy as a princess in danger with less sentences in this game than either KH1 or 2

[@TheAzulmagia]

@@maxentirunos I don't know if I'd say Goku always steals the win, since he's just as liable to get his ass beaten as anyone else. That said, Goku is typically built up as the guy who does the best against any particular adversary. Even when Gohan kills Cell, for example, it's only after Goku has to coach him every step of the way, even after he dies. Goku's fight with Cell is a big, pulse-pounding affair where both sides are (seemingly) putting in their all, while Gohan vs. Cell is a joyless affair that's just one side curb-stomping the other side, with that side depending on how motivated Gohan feels at the moment.

[@SonGoku100YearsLater]

@@maxentirunos Speaking fax

[@SonGoku100YearsLater]

@@TheAzulmagia You’re not wrong my friend

[@salty_lake]

You are the goat for tearing down all the arguments KH3 glazers use

[@CoffeePotGames]

i loved KH3, but was still disappointed bc it just wasn't better than KH2 when it absolutely should have been. Shiiittttt now we have KH4 coming out!!! Can't wait!!!

[@katchereye]

Remember how important it was to flip through the menus in KH1, KH2, and DDD? Like it was absolutely crucial to getting far in the game and building your own original playstyle. I somehow beat all of KH3 and I had no idea that you could even upgrade your Keyblade…

[@brotbrotsen1100]

To me the strangest thing was the abilities. In KH 2 i gave ever AP+ to sora to be able to equip all or atleast most of the abilities i wanted. In KH, i looked at a certain point, of the game at my abilities after not caring much about them from like lvl 40 to 50. Suddenly i saw that they went from 90 aviable points to like 130 aviable points, i was shocked when i realized that i can pretty much just equip all of them now without the use of Ability + items at all.

[@Locaneo]

I loved KH3, it was the best 30-40 hour teaser trailer for a mobile game sequel ever. It even had Disney characters and people that looked like Kingdom Hearts characters in it! It also had some great references to Star Wars, episodes 7-9, treats our beloved characters nearly the same way. 13 Darknesses outta 10 (Just remember Disney actually owns the characters and they get final say on basically everything. That's why we got such wonderful Disney levels padding the plot like it's a graveyard.)

[@Lightning-ig2do]

I appreciate what Barry said in his Good Enough Summary of Kingdom Hearts. "It's easier to take it all in as an avant-garde interactive art piece, rather than a traditional narrative." (And the KH3 Sleeping Realm theory is pretty cool)

[@andrewlavigne44]

To me, the biggest change would be Nojima's involvement: he directly did scenario writing in KH 1 and 2, but was only a supervisor on 3. The character writing in those first two and in FF7 Remake, whatever you think of the big twist at the end, is very strong (his speciality I would say). That, and admittedly the amount that has to be in KH3 is massive...which just makes it more baffling why Nomura didn't work in more things into the Disney Worlds instead of having them be mostly of 0 importance. And yeah the Disney characters coming to help you for the Keyblade War seems like such a no brainer, especially once Yen Sid *does* show up (but no one else.)

[@TheZintastic]

To me this was the final entry on the whole series. In my headcanon the story ended with KH2. The organization was no more and the gang was back together. I didn't need to know what the letter from the king actually read, it was just a promise of a new adventures the S/R/K would have in the future, with or without us. It closed the circle and all was well, a satisfactory ending. ...Then the "side games" happened. As said, in my headcanon story ended with two (especially with the ending of 3....) but nevertheless I stayed along the whole ride, along all the years and all the new games (except BBS since I didn't have PsP, played it later on a collection though & didn't play the mobile ones since I expected 'em to be a "fan service" products at best) that it took and gradually it became clear that the end wasn't here just yet, we're building up for one more title, ONE more grand one, KH3, BABY! It took years, but (as said) I stayed on since at that point I just had to see how the "expanded story" would truly end now that we didn't let it end with the 2. ...And then the finale came out FINALLY and all those years of waiting, all that time I considered myself a fan (although not the most die-hard one, sure) all the interest I had, all the anticipation... and KH3 basically gave me big middle finger, smiled and said; "see ya in KH4! HAHA!" ...That was the point I decided I was done with KH titles after the 3. Despite KH being a big thing in my life for nearly two decades it showed absolutely ZERO respect towards the time I invested into series and basically spat on my face by having the gall of building the next entry... "Yeah, we know you didn't like this, any of this, but let's face it; WE OWN YOU BY NOW! You're gonna buy the next one anyway!!" ...But no, I'm not. I simply don't care anymore. For ~10 years it took to build the KH3 I don't think that asking for a nice ending - an ending that closes the book nicely and in satisfactory way - was too much to ask. KH2 did it before the story expanded, so why wouldn't KH3 do it? Because ***** YOU and buy it, that's why. If the game didn't give a flying **** about its ending after the ~10... *****... Years of buildup to it... then why should I care about the next entry?! Then there was the DLC that also ... sort of ... is just a buyable teaser stuff for the next entry.... And at that point I lost all the respect I had left, thus where my story with the franchise ends. ...Overall I'm glad I played 'em, heck I can return to most of 'em from my shelve and enjoy a play whenever I want to and have a good time. KH2 is still my favorite, I can still play the 358/2 and play (solo) "multiplayer" with the oganization members and have fun on DS, I liked BBS fine and DDD is fun to jump around in... I can even have fun in KH3 since it's pretty as heck... But after getting no respect at all this is definitely where I draw the line with the series.

[@UniqueHandles]

Ok

[@lovesgibson]

Tetsuya Nomura’s gift is creating an atmosphere, setting and feeling that what you’re experiencing is part of some grandiose plan and amazing story, and that once you experience the full story then your mind will be blown. Tetsuya Nomura’s shortcoming is that he is unable to fulfill the finished story. He constantly adds more and more elements to the story which prolongs it even more, and we basically end up with never ending sequels and never getting the satisfactory conclusion we were hoping for. Not sure if he is doing this unintentionally because he’s incompetent in whatever capacities, or if this is intentional so that he can make square and himself more money by having never ending franchises. On one hand I couldn’t really blame them for doing this. They probably wanted something like how Nintendo has mario and Zelda. Characters that they can make new games for for eternity that their fans will continue to keep buying. I guess the difference is that mario never has a grandiose story line. And zelda games have a mostly concluded story at the end of each game. KH1 was so epic when I first played it as a kid. “You are the one who will open the door”. That always seemed so ominous and exiting. Even today, I don’t even know what that meant. We’re they talking about the door in the beginning sequence? We’re they talking about the door he opened on destiny islands? Is “the door” still yet to be opened? I think what draws you in with Kingdom Hearts is all of the mystery. What is the light, what is the darkness, where did these powers come from, etc. There’s still so much unknown in the KH world, and instead of getting answers, we’ve only got more mystery and questions that have been passed on to KH4. Who is the Master of Masters, why is Sora special/the chosen one, why is yozora being made to seem like he is Noctis, what do the characters from the mobile game have to do with anything, what does any of this have to do with the GENESIS of the Kingdom Hearts universe? I feel like we could get to Kingdom Hearts 6, and still not have much answers to any of these questions, probably just more questions. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad if it didn’t take an anticipated 4-6 years between each game… so basically maybe we’ll have a conclusion to Sora and friend’s lives in the by 2032. Wow! Can’t wait! Maybe we’ll get a conclusion to this all once Tetsuya is ready to retire, and once im as old as he is now. People complained about final fantasy 15, but at least it had a concluded story. Noctis died, the curse was broken, and their world lived happily. You know if they kept nomura working on it, he would’ve made it with some cliffhanger ending that implies a sequel game.

[@metastase895]

That's what you deserve for giving them money! HAHAHAHA!

[@javaruscarstarphen4062]

😐

[@vargsieber]

Exactly, but it isn't only Kingdom Hearts, it's square enix as a whole, FF XV isn't better with all the dlcs that should have been in the game instead or the FF VII remake with all the unnecessary crap they added. I'm at a point now where I just don't buy big square enix games anymore because that way I can't get disappointed, the smaller scale stuff like Octopath Travelers or I am Setsuna and so on is still great, but I can't bring myself to buy another AAA Game they make.

[@tatsuyasuou3368]

I started with 3 (it was on Xbox game pass and I was bored) and I still share a lot of criticisms with people who’ve been fans since kh1. Using “you’re expectations are too high” is a shield against criticism. I went in expecting a good game and got a mediocre one instead

[@KingsCompanyy]

2 was the peak of this series. Still leaves a sour taste in my mouth after waiting 13 years for the sequel to be nothing I expected it to be

[@jacobreveles7222]

For such a long awaited climatic finale, KH3 felt like one giant lazy, rehashed, careless middle-finger to the care and passion that came from the first two games. A slap in the face to its audience that were waiting YEARS for another entry. Actually, no, this is more like a punch to the stomach to be given such a poorly executed, poorly designed, poorly written sequel to it's fans. Tetsuya Nomura basically pulled a Shenmue 3 where he botched his beloved series into a lazy, irredeemable mess.

[@silversungaming9451]

I couldn't agree more. This game was so unfulfilling I wish they'd just pull it from store shelves and remake it.

[@Vidiocity92]

"Kingdom Hearts III is a game that feels like it did not want to be made." Wow. That really sums up the whole reality of it. The experience is still fun and stupid, but could've meant so much more.

[@SuperMarioSwagger]

What i hate the modt about the final boss music is that they decided to use Rage awakened for no reason. Rage awakened is Terra's rage. Not just the "cool xehanort boss theme everyone like". It could have been good if the boss had multiple phase where you'd fight with Terra and other guardian of light kinda like a reversed version of the graveyard labyrinth.

[@raymontyoungblood4453]

"Kingdom Hearts III was a game that didn't want to be made" To double quote you, "You took the words right out of my mouth"

[@Yulises]

I’ve still never played the KH games, but I do intend to play them one day. The OST alone makes me want to give the games a try. *Dearly Beloved* makes me feel emotional and I don’t even understand any of the context behind it.

[@ekubo954]

You cant go wrong going with either KH1 or 2. Both games, while very different, are great introductions to the series

[@Zephhi]

KH1 and 2 are peak and if you don't want a sour taste, I'd play all of em except for DDD and KH3. If you can't help yourself, play em all I guess.

[@maiprincesse]

imagine being a normal heartless minding your business and some douchebag attacks you with giant teacups

[@mei-chan1337]

There were a *lot* of things in III that bothered me, but the lack of a "hub" town, like Traverse Town in I and Radiant Garden in II bothered me a lot for some reason? Hard to put into words apparently, but those towns just kind of always gave you a familiar place to go back to in between other worlds to give you a breather, and this game just didn't have that

[@saintitchief]

Hit the nail on the head. I felt the same about Uncle's video as you did, but you said everything I ever wanted to say here. Only thing you missed was emphasizing how much of a slap in the face it us to us long term fans to have to get the finale a series we invested so much time into as a fucking commercial for the game he "really wants to make". I get it, it sucks that SE did him dirty, but that's not OUR faults. He should have pushed through for us if anything but he didn't care. That's why FF isn't in the game, not due to "time" but because he was salty, and his own ego was more important than us. I'll never touch another KH game or any of his work ever again.

[@IceSick88]

Yeah...I own the special edition of KH3....pre-order and all that....I won't be picking up KH4

[@laststep56]

Don't know if you'll read this, but I have to say when you said you have watched many videos that you didn't feel spoke how you felt about this game I was right there with you. I have to say you almost perfectly put together my complaints on this game. Interested in seeing your feelings on the remake.

[@chardrive]

Same. I think the communities copium for this game has been off the charts. The worst part is people try to pretend you’re weird for criticizing it’s very obvious flaws. With those things he brought up “KH has always been bad”.. no actually

[@black369ace7]

I don't suppose you could explain as to what the "remake" thing is? I have no clue what it means lol

[@laststep56]

@@black369ace7 final fantasy 7 remake if im not mistaken.

[@Alex_Barbosa]

@@laststep56 oh that. Ugh

[@MistaMushoo]

50:15 If you've seen AskYourUncle's "Kingdom Hearts 3 Was a Waste of Effort" he makes a joke during the Frozen world where Sora is looking at his watch when Anna breaks into musical verse. That's basically how I feel for 90% of KH3, lol.

[@FalseH3]

I’m genuinely curious about the behind the scenes creation of this game, more than any game I’ve ever played. Knowing how corporate and controlling Disney can be with their IPs I wonder how much decision making they had. Having the team inject “rides” into the game is one thing but at the sacrifice of gameplay is another. Level design, combat, etc are all so uninspired. If feels like they didn’t even try or that they had no budget to develop anything because it all went to Skrillex for the theme song. I also am extremely curious about Nomura’s mindset while writing. While playing this game I would have sworn up and down that someone different wrote it and took over for him. It feels like this was handed off to a team that just read cliff notes about the characters. The emotional character developments are just gone. The main character we’ve been playing as through the main installments of the game come off like he hasn’t learned a thing, like every hardship he faced never happened. You can’t keep resetting the MAIN protagonist in a series in every iteration! I could almost forgive tedious boring gameplay if it still gave us some substance and good character archs. Everything about this game feels like a wrong decision. How can you play through the first two and then play this and come to the conclusion that it was made by the same people? I would love to see a truthful behind the scenes of the creative process on its development because this was a such a sad entry into something we waited a lot of our youth for. Kh2 ending will always be my final concussion to the series. And thank you for your time and effort on the video.

[@SoulfulZane]

KHIII: 7.8/100 too many xehanorts

[@e69alpha]

Oops All Xehanorts

[@minimalchill]

@@e69alpha 🤣

[@chimeratcg07]

That's a fair grade lol

[@pedroluccas1850]

@@chimeratcg07 actually he's mean 1.3/10

[@lunarshadow5584]

The better way to have the "final clash" go about, even with keeping the lose, would have been Aqua blocking terranort, showing they are both on the same level as they were in BBS, then the other thirteen make their appearance as we find one of the darkness's being equivalent to one of the lights, in theory. It would have been more like bad matchups were all twisted in favor of the darknesses that had been waiting for this. And with all the warriors weakened, Yen Sid instead shows up to try and stop the death of the hero's but the 13 darknesses are too much for an old, retired master. Cue the swarm of shadows to absorb the heroes. Then it changes. The Keyblade graveyard is vast but is exactly where the lingering will resides, he just needed to know the spot. And that one change would help keep everyone from being overwhelmed by a bad matchup till xehanort tries to salvage the situation by summoning darkness, before Yen Sid arrives to counter the storm of shadows. That's when Xehanort creates the labyrinth, some of the wielders of light being inside to increase urgency, making Sora go in alone to back up his allies.

[@decadentgamer3108]

Your rant at the end of the video was the perfect summary for this game. Now I will admit that I haven't played the game mainly because my love for KH waned and is borderline on life support after 2010 when I got so tired of all the side games coming out. As someone who played KH1 and KH2 in their respective year frame they came out (moreso KH2, I played KH1 a year after it came out), I was one of the people who was waiting for KH3 post 2007 and as the years went on and we continued to not get KH3 but instead more of these other games that I honestly didn't care about, my interest was waning by the year till when KH3 finally was announced, I couldn't in confidence say that I was hyped. And even to this day, I just don't have the motivation to play KH3. However I followed along with what the game's narrative was and the bits I was reading about felt so confusing or made no sense. Watching this video, you have filled in the blanks of some of the things I was confused about but it only made me all the more annoyed with how bad the story written. It's true that the KH games weren't masterpieces but like you rightfully pointed out, KH1 had a simple and engaging story that made you care about the characters and KH2, silliness and all managed to do the same even if some parts were admittedly dumb.Hearing this summary of the story for this game, I'm shocked with ow this is supposed to be the conclusion to the trilogy. 15 years waiting and that is what we get? Kairi is shafted for a third time in a mainline game and none of the friends that Sora met along the way (ignoring Donald an Goofy) don't even accompany you to the final world when they all have stakes and emotions tied to Xehanort's decisions and plan? That is some grade A BS there. Which is why I think your theory on how Nomura simply stopped caring about KH long ago and just rushed the story so he could finally be done with it seems so plausible. It's understandable if he's burned out of KH, the series has been around for about 15 years now and if he really wasn't allowed to work on other new projects of his creation, I can see why he might have some resentment to KH and it's all the more reason why KH3 should've been released during the PS3 era while the likeness was still there. And the fact that this is the closing of the "First chapter" and that there's plans to make a new chapter, I speak for myself in saying "Oh hell no", I don't think I have the patience or drive anymore to follow more KH plot that is bound to be plagued with awful writing. It sounds harsh but after seeing where the game left off at, it's just hard to get invested into a new trilogy. Anyway awesome retrospective as always, it was an enjoyable and entertaining watch~

[@Mono_303]

Seeing what Nomura did with Kh3 I’m no longer following the series because he truly disrespected the whole KH community with the work he put out for 3. He knew he had to eventually make 3 to conclude the shi show of a story he created, and now he’s using KH4 to make the game he got robbed off being VS13. In my head canon KH ended in 2.

[@Banzano96]

Like many others, I got emotional seeing the title screen reading “Kingdom Hearts 3” while the music played. It finally came. I could finally experience the great saga close in a fashion that only my imagination carried me since I finished kh2 back in ‘06. And now we, dedicated fans, had it. Oh, how we were so naïve about what we were about to experience was nothing more than a disappointment

[@riplix20]

Bro your name has kingdom hearts in it. I don’t understand why everyone is so “ this game is the worst thing ever REEE “

[@ambientNexus]

@@riplix20 It's a game that people waited forever for, yet ended up being less than mediocre. Reasonably high expectations + bad delivery = terrible reception.

[@GuiltlessGear]

That "postive nostalgia" uno reverse card at 5:53 hit me like a ton of bricks. I like this guy

[@Quickword15]

I don’t think finishing a boss with a drive form for it to carry into the cutscene was stupid at all. I really liked how the game paid attention to the form you were using for it to display in the cutscene afterwards. It was extremely disappointing for me to find it was a feature absent in KH3. I shared a ton of similar feelings and agree with just about everything said in this video. KH2 is definitely where it concluded for me because that is where the peak of the series was.

[@mariomaster4568]

More than a decade…and this is our conclusion. What a fucking waste of time this has all been. I feel so bad for those who were genuinely hyped for this “product” only to discover it to be a marketing ploy with THE dumbest conclusion to may I remind you, all the story was leading up to? This is the BIGGEST middle finger to the fans I’ve ever seen Disney done before.

[@zacbenson9533]

for 24:20 onwards for the Olympus section, there's a good reason Phil doesn't speak. The VA for one of the languages had passed away and they felt it to be respectful at the time not to replace him, that said that meant that they couldn't add voice acting on the other languages.

[@hello6089]

8:17 I honestly very much despise this troop of “ oh these guys play chess, they must be very smart ....” I hated that scene every time, especially when they just made up new “hidden” rules to the game on the fly just so light could win. Made me very angry that my hand is being held to believe that Xehenort is smart, especially when his plans are mostly backed by his mystic prowess rather than cunning. No duh he can pull “elaborate” plans off when he has the power of a demigod. It’s the equivalent to showing “Zeus” playing a game of chess to show he’s really smart but all through out the series he’s saving his plans with mystical B.S....... if he has powers okay show him training or demonstrating his powers like in the KH2 secret ending, if he’s cunning show him getting what he wants without anyone else being none the wiser. Granted he does both in BBS but after that he’s mostly just saving his failed plans with his stupid broken powers, when those powers alone would of been more than enough to win.....

[@KirbySonicTeam]

Great video my dude! When you said you hadn’t seen people talk about kh3 in a way that took the words out of your mouth, that’s exactly what you’ve accomplished for me. Many points felt like ideas ripped straight out of my head and so there was a great amount of catharsis here. As usual your personal passion wether positive or negative stands out. Well done in every way. Can’t wait for the next video.

[@jamesbarr4996]

I've definitely come to notice that, even though the discussion is centered around Kairi for being a big...exasperation of the problem, the KH series has a serious issue with writing women as anything other than a damsel in distress. Kairi is a pretty clear example of this at all times, but it ends up happening to Aqua, Namine, Xion--hell, the princesses of light are basically a damsel in distress McGuffin. The only women that don't constantly and horribly show this issue tend to be the ones not made for the game since they already have character arcs and stories created for them or just aren't around enough to get tossed into the mix.

[@Hazielangelo]

In fact, especifically in BBS, Aqua is a good character. You can feel the strugle of her trying to keep the pices of everything that she love togheter and How she fight hard to keep her friends safe, to the point of sacrifice her self to save Terra's body. The problem is that BBS is the only game where you can really see especific traces of this characters with some detail of their reasons and personalities. But i agree, besides her, and i would say besides BBS, the wringting becomes absolutly atroucious, especially with the woman's.

[@Hazielangelo]

@Estrogen Fury i really belive that she is, because, despise the litle problems in the game, you can really find interesting personality traces and really understend better the character based in her actions in BBS. And this is something that you can see by all the 3 campains. You Will find a lot of litle interations that hint traces and emotions of the characters and dialogues that, independent How you feel about the Voice acting, are really trying to say something Else. Look, i really feel that, with rare exceptions, the wringting in the series in the other titles is a lot more childish than should be. The writers really don't looks to understend that their audience is a lot more adult now. But still, about Aqua, i belive she is over the rest of the feminine cast exactly because we had her campain really focused in show some detail about her, and this is a thing that Just she had between the female characters in the series.

[@chairkun9139]

You are so woke

[@Axle3000]

@Estrogen Fury I mean she was undefeated the entire game.

[@loli-knightxardej2252]

I don't inherently mind Kairi essentially being a damsel in distress (it's not like that doesn't exist in real life or anything). My problem with Kairi is specifically that she was clearly meant to have an arc where she goes from being a damsel to an actual warrior... but her time to shine never comes. Honestly, if KH3 had just cut all the Disney stuff to focus on the KH-original characters (which the series was pretty much exclusively about after the first game anyways) then we probably wouldn't have had any of the narrative issues that we got. Maybe we'll get lucky when KH4 releases in 30 years it'll mostly be about non-Disney stuff and have a properly balanced story since it seems like Nomura never gave a crap about the Disney content anyways.

[@TuskyBaby]

47:20 I have as many problems with this game as anyone else here, but this scene got me HOLLERING with laughter. Sora's delivery and timing was simply perfect to me.

[@rhnirsilva652]

god I miss kingdom hearts, sadly they never made another one after 2

[@Moonswirly]

Not enough people bring up the below-par music and I'm glad you did, especially with Dark Domination (the Xehanort battle theme) and ESPECIALLY bringing up that awful, whiny, outdated violin sample. Ishimoto's tracks in this game straight up just are not mixed well, are kind of boring and almost generic sounding, and feel so out of place compared to Shimomura and Sekito's.

[@nyhtfall1969]

kh3's soundtrack was so forgettable to me especially the violin work the only standouts to me were the data org fights in remind and yozora with some scaela thrown in

[@iggyp4390]

I’m very glad you wrote this. The final boss theme is infuriating even to this day. I could understand if Yoko was busy and they hired Ishimoto to make a quick placeholder track. But to not even hire her to compose a brand new final boss theme for the new Armored Xehanort fight in ReMind was just a slap in the face to KH music fans who’d supported the concerts and OSTs. The last hope for a *true* Xehanort final boss theme is Dark Road, but after they reused The Final Boss Theme Which Must Not Be Named in both ReMind and MoM I’m certainly not holding out hope lol. SQ knew music fans were looking forward to the music for Master Xehanort. The “KH World Tour” concert even ends with a medley of the series’ final boss themes. What hurts most is listening to Yoko’s KH3 works like “Dawn of Hope,” “Stranded Beyond,” and especially “True Darkness.” She’s at the top of her game and it’s sad knowing her final boss theme truly would have exceeded all our expectations.

[@arcuslux516]

KH3 or "the I really wanted to make my FF vsXIII but sony said no, so now this is just a setup for the sequel" the game

[@steven3814]

I think my biggest issue with it is that it's finally kingdom hearts 3 and it takes forever to answer anything. Like all we want is story. I started when I was 12 with kingdom hearts 1. The reason to travel through the worlds is the weakest yet. And then the story was without dlc very disappointing. Idk I was just glad it was over but excited for the newest installments.

[@InMaTeofDeath]

Imo the interesting thing is for me the series's greatest strength is rapidly becoming it's greatest weakness, the Disney worlds. I think they could be done in an interesting way but at this point the non-disney KH lore related stuff has become far more interesting than most Disney worlds and I bet most people would enjoy seeing more of it.

[@steven3814]

@@InMaTeofDeath very true. They aren't doing a good job of properly Intergrating into the narrative. I mostly blame Disney for this. But also they are gonna run out of Disney worlds at some point.

[@Didi-kf5hh]

The story with the dlc is ass too

[@nyhtfall1969]

@@Didi-kf5hh the dlc is ironically emblematic of the issues kh as a whole it feels like never ending questions that lead to more questions where its no longer interesting its just a piss take and no i don't want to play a stupid mobile game for answers

[@Zephhi]

@@steven3814 I honestly don't think they're going to run out of Disney worlds because they still have so many movies that they have not adapted and it takes fucking forever for them to release KH games.

[@richardsejour7731]

1:45:00 Thank you for being one of the few who criticize the soundtrack. It lacks form or inspiration, but sounds like genetic orchestra themes.

[@Alex_Barbosa]

GOD IM SO GLAD SOMEONE FINALLY SAID IT!!. Kingdom Hearts 3 just didn't want to exist. They legit just wanted to get past it as quickly as possible so they could work on whatever Yozora is. That's it. They just wanted us all to shut up about Kingdom Hearts 3. The entire game wants to end so it can get to the setup for a different game. It's insulting. And I don't know how anyone can have any sort of excitement for upcoming projects in the series, when they've shown that they are more than willing to throw out a decades worth of story telling and buildup in order to move on to what they ACTUALLY care about.

[@KTChamberlain]

Kingdom Hearts III Portrayed by Spongebob Squarepants: "Are you feeling it now, Mr. Krabs? Are you feeling it now, Mr. Krabs? Are you feeling it now, Mr. Krabs?"

[@BobCentral]

This video actually had me laughing out loud because you managed to properly convey so many of the issues I had with KH3 in a really funny way. The pause between voice lines and the anime grunts happen to urk me the most.

[@xmixraven8633]

Out of all KH3 videos this one definitely said what was itching my mind the whole time. The entire final section completely articulated what I've been thinking ever since I came across Yozora after putting down the game in sheer dissappointment. I'm not here for Final Fantasy versus 13, I was here for the emotions between Sora and his friends and the climactic battles against great foes like Xemnas. 3 had my face getting more and more sour each world, and now KH4 has been teased, I'm not even excited. Sora's in Tokyo, why should I even be excited? It just seems like the series is a shell of its former self, and I'm just sad that I won't be able to see the conclusion to KH2's plot threads I spent ages imagining in my head as a kid. 358 and BBS got the most nothing payoff and now all the focus is on a Noctis ripoff, I'm just bewildered. If you're excited, more power to you and I hope you enjoy where the series is going to, but all I wanted was another story with the heart of the first two.

[@ekubo954]

I'm excited for KH4, but mostly because its (likely) going in a completely new direction for the series, HOPEFULLY similarly to botw for the Zelda series. However, I am rather peeved that a lot of the build-up from previous games just kinda shatter with KH3 and will likely never be brought up again in future games unless they're related to KH Chi

[@alchemike6346]

thing is as much as nomura wants to see some of the ideas he had for Versus XIII,it does not automatically mean the entire game is going to be Versus XIII he shows it on the trailer because that's where the story is at the moment but nothing tells us that kh4 won't have a prologue like kh2's to lead us to something yes different but still KH. Like isn't this kinda the same thing as the kh1 secret ending that was an entire shift in mood to kh1? Or kh2 secret ending that led us to something completely different? I completely get that you are not invested in the moment,but the series always had really strong mood swinging to return to it's status quo mood that defined the series. Like Donald and goofy at the end made pretty clear that there are no intention from kh to get disconnected from Disney.

[@fls128]

I'm actually far more excited for KH4 than any other KH since 2. By the time they made KH3 it was abundantly clear Nomura didn't give a shit about the plot involving Xehanort and the game was just an uninispired mess. KH4 has something close to clean slate and at least isn't bogged down by the mess created by the other games. It feels like KH3 existed just because it needed to, and this is the game that Nomura actually wants to make. I however totally understand people who have given up on Nomura, if I didn't have such strong feelings towards 1, CoM and 2 I probably wouldn't get hyped for KH4 in any sense, sadly I'm a slave to Square Enix.

[@RealCGH]

I disagree a crap ton with this. It's clear nomura was likely ready to move on from the darkness Saga(which is fair it was 17 years long) and wanted to work on the mobile game Saga. Sora going to quandratam and the implementation of all the mobile game characters is quite interesting since the mobile game stories are arguably better. There's alot that can happen in this saga. Plus Disney will still be in tact, got a tease of the star wars world and everything and the tone looks darker

[@superlombax1561]

1:11:27 Not to mention Xehanort brought back Larxene and Marluxia after they betrayed the original Organization, and luckily for Xehanort, they didn't feel like betraying him this time.

[@starkillermarex]

KH3 was a sad use of a beloved IP to just try to sell more Disney crap. The Disney worlds in KH were just glorified ads for those Disney movies. Aside from Olympus, the KH story wasn't the focus and it shows. Disney wanted KH to sell Disney merch and movies for them, not tell the story of KH.

[@DistantKingdom]

attractions are almost as bad an addition as Arendelle. so many horrible decisions made for KH3 through and through. KH4 seems to be a proper step in the right direction! also nomura did kairy so dirty it makes me think he has some kind of hate boner for her. shes so terribly written i just dont understand

[@SkimoStories]

I agree, attractions ruined my first playthrough. Then I realized there is an ability to funnel attractions into your form gauge, so you only ever have to do two attractions in the entire game. (the scripted ones)

[@nineinchthread]

i heard kairi wasn't supposed to be originally in kingdoms hearts at all so that could be one of the reasons personally i dont mind her as a character

[@plasticsurgery1155]

@@nineinchthread that isn’t a valid excuse, they ultimately decided to put her in and make her an important character in KH1 and constantly tease her romantic connection to Sora. But that’s all it was just teasing the audience.

[@nineinchthread]

@@plasticsurgery1155 was trying to explain that could be an option

[@trick2jee]

I remember being so hyped I got the game the day it came out and I stopped playing halfway through Tangled because I was so tired of the attractions. I picked it back up a few months later with no expectations and I was still disappointed. The dialogue, the characters to the combat was all just so bland to me. Sora going from “We can take him on our own” to “I’m useless on my own” speaks volumes to how careless the writers were.