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Far from the danger of another news drought, the exact opposite is taking place! Thanks to Sqexgal, we just learned that yet another interview with Series Director Tetsuya Nomura will be in this week's Dengeki Playstation! Continuing on from last week, this interview includes the following pieces of information:
- The decision to make HD remasters of KINGDOM HEARTS FINAL MIX and KINGDOM HEARTS Re:Chain of Memories was decided upon prior to that of FINAL FANTASY X HD
- The HD achievements on KINGDOM HEARTS 1.5 HD ReMIX was accomplished thanks to two programmers on the Osaka team (KINGDOM HEARTS Birth by Sleep, KINGDOM HEARTS 3D [Dream Drop Distance]). The team itself remains relatively unchanged, and 1.5 is in its final stages of development.
- The HD scenes from KINGDOM HEARTS 358/2 Days in total come to about two-three hours worth.
- The camera has been changed to be similar to that of KINGDOM HEARTS II.
- There will not be a new secret movie.
Nomura also makes a remark on THE WORLD ENDS WITH YOU, saying that it's a personal favorite title of his, and he expresses that he'd like to expand the series, but for now he wishes that everyone would please enjoy Solo Remix.
We'll have more information for you shortly when the interview in full surfaces later this week. Until then!
Edit: Thanks to Hokanko and Goldpanner, we have some more translations!
Interview with Tetsuya Nomura, Director of Kingdom Hearts -HD 1.5 ReMIX-
Sections from an interview with series director Mr Tetsuya Nomura.
- Plans for HD remaster were around before the FFX one. They consulted with the Osaka Team over whether they could do something to make best use of the PS3's performance.
- Actual development was kickstarted because one, the KH series had been spread over several consoles and two, in the series 10th year it had become difficult for new gamers to join in.
- HD remastering was very difficult, but two programmers from the Osaka Team spent close to a year on this and that and it came to fruition
- What he said he was researching in a previous interview was HD remastering for KH. The clips that have been released are thanks to the Osaka Team
- The programmers that handled the HD remastering were merged in from a team that hadn't been involved in the KH series up until now
- There are KH staff in the Tokyo Team too but there have been drastic changes, you could say that the basically unchanging lineup of the Osaka Team forms the true present staff for the series. The series is able to continue because of them
- Development for HD is basically in the final stages. He thought about perhaps remaking 358/2 Days as a game, but it would have taken over a year so he decided to give priority to the new title and instead have Days, necessary for inclusion, as a video volume
- You can select Days straight away after starting the game
- Some of Sora and the other's models have been replaced with the latest ones
- There is trophy support. He himself hasn't had much to do with the trophy feature, so he is still researching now as to what sort of content to include. Discussion over whether or not you'd need them for clearing worlds and first obtaining Keyblades etc is still underway
- The game controls have been adjusted a little to make them easier to use than they had been. Special commands display for the △ button, and camera controls have been made closer to the base ones in KHII. There aren't really any big additions. He'd like you to think of HD remastering and trophy support as all the additional components.
- There's no new secret movie
- He hasn't thought about making a bundle edition
- It would be unnatural to make 1.5 but not 2.5
- Work is entering the final stages and development is doing well, so it's planned for 2013 but he wants to deliver as soon as possible
- Browser will be a typical browser game. Controls will be simple and using cards, content not strong on action (?). Co-operating with several people is also a feature
- Fundamentally it's for one person
- Development is not by the Osaka Team, it's somewhere else
- It will be a spin-off title, completely removed from the story of the main series. Because of the nature of a browser game, they couldn't put in any grand set up for the story
- There are new characters, but he won't say whether they will be involved in the main series
- The Xehanort Chronicle is formally called the 'Seeker of Darkness Chronicle*'. He definitely wants to prepare us before the conclusion of this.
There is also a comment from composer Ms Yoko Shimomura.
*Translation note: In past interviews and summaries this has been written in katakana, but here it is written in English letters exactly as 'Dark Seeker'. I'm not sure whether this is Nomura's own choice or hokanko's choice. Also, I'm not sure whether to take that with a grain of salt anyway, seeing as early magazines did first publish the 'Unversed' in BBS spelled in English letters as 'Unbirths' which turned out to have been either changed or a mistake. Seeker of Darkness is already a key term in the series so I'm going with that in my translations until localised information is released! The word I translated as 'chronicle' is still in Japanese, though, and it may be localised as something different such as 'saga' or 'series'. I think the word chronicle is the best translation though so I will be using that until a localised term is released.
Source: Gematsu, Game Nyarth, Hokanko and Goldpanner
