Narrator: They're two of the biggest names in their fields. When you think of role-playing games, you think of Square. And when you think of animated films, you think of Disney. So when we heard that they were teaming up to create a new game that would combine their strengths, we couldn't wait to find out more.

Dan Winters (Vice President of Production - Disney Interactive): This started out through an elevator ride. So Square Soft's is in the same building as our office in Tokyo.

Tetsuya Nomura (Director and Character Designer - Square):  I heard some people saying that Square was the initiator. That story has been circulating around. But that's not quite what happened. Disney initiated it. The offer came to our producer first. When Sakaguchi-san and the Disney producer were talking  about vague production ideas for this project, I happened to run into them, and heard about it, so I told them I might have some good ideas.

Winters: So we started talking about ideas about a Mickey RPG or other types of things, and ideas started flowing around. So when we finally got to an idea that we all agreed with, we said "Hey, this is great! Let's go!" And then Square put their, as usual, incredible resources into the title, and it came out magic I think.

Narrator: The two powerhouses created a totally unique game: one that combined the world of Disney with the sensibility of a Final Fantasy game.

Tomohiro Kayano (Character Model Director - Square): Disney movies each have their own unique world, such as Aladdin, The Little Mermaid, Tarzan, and so on. The world of Kingdom Hearts combines those Disney worlds together into one world, as well as some new worlds.

Jun Akiyama (Event Director - Square): If I were to express it in one word, it is about heart. The main character, Sora, travels around to Disney worlds  and discovers its true meaning.

Winters: Kingdom Hearts is about a character named Sora, who lives on a little island and is always aspiring to go out and be an adventurer and see the world and do all kinds of wonderful things. And he does this with two friends of his: Riku and Kairi, and they sit around and they talk about how great it would be to adventure out.

Nomura: So they plan an adventure to see the world using a small raft. Each character has their own thoughts and goals about the adventure. But the day of embarkation, a storm hits the island; not a natural storm, but a mystical one.

Winters: And that's when he comes involved with Donald and Goofy, who are in the Disney universe, both the magician and the Court guard, and they're off to find their King Mickey, who has disappeared and no one knows where he is.

Narrator: Along the way, Sora ventures through 10 different worlds and meets over 100 Disney characters. He also encounters the Heartless, a new enemy created by Square.

Yuichi Kanemori (Battle Director - Square): The Heartless are shadows that were originally born from the dark side of the heart. They do not have hearts and attack those that do.

Tatsuya Kando (Animation Director - Square): They are darkness, if I express them in one word. Like the name tells you, they do not have hearts. They are enemies that appear everywhere. I wanted to create motion that has never been seen in any other game. They move like bugs or animals; definitely not like humans.

Winters: And they have a world that is being sucked dry of resources. So they get smart and they try to suck the resources and magic and the happiness and the goodness out of Disney worlds. So Sora and our adventurers Donald and Goofy go off in order to defeat the Heartless, bring equilibrium back to the universe, and happiness and magic will forever live on.

Narrator: The differences between the Disney style animation and the Japanese style that Square is famous for presented the game's designers with a major challenge.

Nomura: Prior to actually getting into the production process, I told Disney that I would not intentionally alter any of the new Square character designs just for them to fit into the world of Disney. I did not think it was necessary. Besides, there are already the similarities among the Disney character designs, for example Donald and Tarzan don't blend together well. So I did not force myself to adjust my designing style as long as the color and the feel of the characters matched and wasn't awkward when seen on screen.

Akira Fujii (Technical Director - Square): However, the three main characters, Sora, Donald and Goofy, travel through all of these worlds so we tried to maintain some consistency so they would blend well together while sustaining their visual independence. I was unsure about the Nightmare Before Christmas world and the Winnie the Pooh world in the beginning stages of production. They are both so distinct that I thought of changing the styles of the three main characters as well.

Narrator: With that issue sorted out, the designers then turned their imagination to the Disney characters. Were they allowed to do something that's practically unheard of? Embellish their appearance for the game?

Kayano: We received a set of guidelines beforehand but they asked us not to do add anything that did not originally appear in the Disney cartoons. Tarzan carries a spear in the original movie, so that was no problem. Donald was allowed to carry a stick and Goofy has a shield, but they did not permit us to let them carry swords or anything like that.

Akiyama: We suggested a change of costume. Our director Nomura-san drew image illustrations of Donald and Goofy in The Little Mermaid world, and discussed the designs with Disney who approved them. Other costumes were drawn based on rough sketches by Disney. Nightmare Before Christmas world is not an ordinary Disney world, so the key was how well we can blend in the characters, such as Donald and Goofy, into this particular world.

Narrator: Working on the Disney characters was a challenge for the Square team, but it was one they enjoyed.

Kando: We animators consider Disney an adventure of film animation. Disney is the original animation company and is always in everyone's mind. I'm proud of myself, accomplishing the job and also being part of a Disney project.

Winters: Obviously, we have a lot of knowledge that's kind of part of the deal of being the Walt Disney Company about the characters and the worlds that we try to share with them. So we had little chalk talks. We connected them with some of the animators from the Walt Disney Company who featured animations and told them a little about what the motivation was for the characters.

Kando: Disney offered a class for a day. We learned the basics for how a Disney film is made. After that, I watched tons of videos since each movie has a different feel. I was watching nothing but Disney videos for six months. I studied the characteristics of each character, and then delivered them into the game.

Winters: And I think that's really displayed beautifully in how well they animated the characters in 3D. They move just like they're 2D animated in a lot of ways. And so those chalk talks really paid off.

Narrator: After spending a considerable amount of time with the Kingdom Hearts team, we couldn't help but wonder what Walt would think of Square and Disney's latest creation.

Winters: I would only hope that Walt and everyone else that were involved in the Walt Disney Company for all those years and created such wonderful legacies would be proud and really excited about how innovatively this product will go out there and how creatively it pushes the limits.