What a joyful interview... The "no costumes" and "no team customization" energizes me more than any cup of coffee

New story elements not playable huh? Oh well. Even if Kairi taking on Apprentice Xehanort is cutscene only that will satisfy me

So the CollectaCard Crystarium has returned, huh...
Thank God there aren't any Trophies for these

I sadly feel like this won't sell well after this interview.

Sixty United States Greenbacks for one of the most obvious asset rehashes, everyone. KH Sycophants will say "meh, i'm used to getting rawed like this xD".

Literally the two most BASIC features are absent: making your own team and accessing new costumes. Why is SE so lazy?

To be fair, most rhythm games don't even have things like playable characters.

It appears to me that compared to Theatrhythm, MoM is downplaying the RPG elements and focusing in more on the rhythm gameplay.

I was going to tell you off for your post but honestly I agree. Costumes and an editable party would have added in some flavor, especially for the online component.

Our only hope is final mix version/DLC i guess

Of everything I believe from the interviews this past week is that there won’t be DLC. I think SE wants this to be a one and done deal so they can focus on something that will generate more revenue for them.

Yeah sadly it makes sense if they don't do DLC for this game, it won't be a big selling game especially when it's getting released at the same month of next gen consoles and big games like spider-man.

IDK, I'm not fully off the "no DLC train." It's the one thing that when a dev says, I never believe.

We heard about the no team customisations the other day, but not being able to get KH2 Sora sucks.

Though I hope that people don't feel like they're being forced or obligated to buy this game if there's so much of it that pisses them off or annoys them. If you don't want a rhythm game, what's been said isn't what you were expecting, or you think you'd just rather be youtubing cutscenes then I hope y'all save your money and let SE know that what they're delivering with MoM isn't something you want to support.

Edit: I posted this in another thread but I’ll post it here too since there’s the costume thing.

KH1 Riku looks to only be playable in co-op mode, alongside KH1 Sora. Doesn’t seem like you can choose anyone else for that mode.

“There will be four main parties of three characters. You won’t be able to change the members of those parties but you’ll select them as a whole”, he notes. “And then in addition to those characters there will be Disney guest characters depending on the world that you’re currently in, and so they’ll be able to replace one of the sub-members of that party (but not the leader themselves who will always stay in that party).” And as for multiplayer, Suzui-san excitedly explains, “It actually has both modes! So there’s the ‘versus’ mode which is a 1v1 online mode [against another player] or against the computer enemy, or on the Switch version through local communication. And there’s also the co-op mode in which one person will play as Sora and one person will play as Riku and then you’ll work together playing the same song to try and get a high score.”

[URL unfurl="true"]https://press-start.com.au/features/2020/09/08/talking-kingdom-hearts-melody-of-memory-with-indieszero-and-tetsuya-nomura/[/URL]

I dunno what there is to get so upset about. I just see video games as that video game, not a giant checklist of "features". Obviously this isn't the most exciting game ever but that's... just what it is, I dunno if it ever could be.

The more I hear about this game, the more disappointed I become. Which is a bad sign.
I'm not going to hate the game for its concept or design. I'm sure it'll be fun to play, and I'm not going to bash it for being a rhythm game necessarily. But they're really starting to test me with how meager an experience they're making this sound while still charging a full triple A game price for it. So far, I've heard:
1) No customizable parties/alternative skins
2) No gameplay for the actual story segments
3) Rehashed PS2-style assets, which means this game won't even have the superficial benefit of boasting great graphics and visuals
4) No playable Kairi (in her first own freaking game!)
5) No chance for DLC
6) 10 hours MAX to get through the narrative
7) Won't even drive the story forward that much
So far, it's seeming like a bulk of the game's enjoyability is supposed to come from its multiplayer and other ancillary side-stuff, which, as an introvert and someone for whom multiplayer means absolutely nothing in terms of enjoyability, is unfortunate. But I could forgive every single one of these problems and just enjoy it for what it is, IF IT WEREN'T FOR THAT RIDICULOUS PRICE TAG! And I'm sorry, but the price being because they have to shove the cost of the music rights onto the customer is NOT a good enough reason to charge that much. This is the same price as KH3, a game that had upwards of 60 hours of story content not including ReMIND, and they're charging the same price for this game when it'll only go for 10 hours using old-generation assets.
And btw, before anybody tells me, "Well, if you don't like it, just don't buy the game," THAT'S THE PROBLEM. My issue isn't that I have to play the game, it's that I WANT a Kingdom Hearts game to PLAY—I don't want to just watch the story segments on YouTube. But this price makes it really hard to justify an expense like that, especially for a game that has so much less to offer than its predecessor of the exact same cost.
I know some people are gonna call me a whiner or whatever, and that's fine. I just wish that SE would have done a different kind of game if they couldn't find a way to deal with the music costs without shoving them off onto the consumer. And don't get me wrong, I like the idea of celebrating the music of the series. But if that has to take up the bulk of the cost of the game itself (especially when I could just listen to the music on the soundtracks I already freaking own), then it just isn't worth it to me. Between this, Union X, and Dark Road, I'm really praying the next installment in the franchise has the team getting serious again about their priorities, because so far we've got three games now where the majority of people are preferring to watch the story clips on YouTube rather than pay money for ripoff games. I don't care if it's smart from a business pov—it's ridiculous, and it needs to stop.

I don't get why people keep saying this. What is wrong with the PS2 graphics. I've always loved them and even if you like KH3's visuals better for some reason, I don't think anyone played like 90% of the series thinking "gee it's too bad I have to settle for these graphics instead of [imaginary kh3 aesthetic that doesn't exist yet]"

The bulk of any rhythm game comes from the chase for higher difficulties and better performance.
You don't have to stop playing when you finish the ~10-hour story mode. (Which probably doesn't count completing all the challenges shown in the World Trip mode.)
I got about 10 hours out of the Invector DLC that dropped last week, and that was just 10 songs (which cost $12 by the way).
So with a tracklist of 140+ songs, I expect to spend quite a lot of time with this game even without any multiplayer.

Of course this genre is pretty niche and the rhythm game grind isn't going to appeal to everyone.
But that's what this kind of game is.

40 staff, y’all! They only had maybe like 40 people working on this game outside of the cutscene staff. It’s okay that it isn’t some massive game. The_Echo is right in that the bulk of the content is in the harder difficulties, not the sheer level of content. Also 140+ songs is well beyond the average for any rhythm game.

Most rhythm games Have 20~ all the way up to maybe ~80. 140+ is unheard of.

I mean, I get what you're saying, I'm just used to games in this series being nice and heavy on story. I'm not entirely sure how much of the 140 tracks factor into the narrative segment of the game, but I imagine that if the devs expect the story to only take about 10 hours to complete, then I assume a good chunk of those tracks will be extraneous to the main story. And since the story and all the stuff you can do en route to 100% said story is the only thing I really care about when it comes to video games, I don't imagine all this extra stuff and harder difficulty modes is going to be of any value to me. Again, this is just my personal taste in games, I realize other people are going to find a lot more to entertain themselves with this game, but I still think the price is exorbitant considering that caveat.

You know it doesn't mean that Kairi won't get her playable game after that. This one serves just as a playfield for the serie as well as the start of the new arc.

I have nothing against PS2-style aesthetics in and of themselves, it just seems like one more thing that they had to cut cost on because of how much the music rights drove their price tag up.


I'm certainly hoping for it. If our girl hadn't been getting sidelined for the last 17 years, I'd have more optimism about them following through on an actual Kairi-centric game where we get to play as her. The fact that they finally got around to making a game with Kairi at the center and you (most likely) can't even play as her is a little irksome, and I have doubts that we'll see another Kairi-centered game very soon—A Verum Rex game (if one is in the works), KH4, and whatever they're planning on doing with the BBS trio seem like they'll be higher priorities for the development team after this.

Indieszero has 40 people on staff with prior experience developing on Unity so they built this game with what they were able to use.

That just makes me even more sad at the likely possibility that this game will end up flopping.

Well, I wouldn't say unheard of (Project Diva Future Tone, DJMAX Respect, even Theatrhythm FF Curtain Call come to mind), but certainly uncommon.

Yeah, same. Also I think it was a huge mistake to make this story-relevant. It created the wrong idea in people’s minds about this project on all sides.



That’s really what I meant. Not impossible, just not a frequent thing.

I don't know. For me the fact that everygame is relevant is what makes the serie unique. It's absurd, but they always find a way to put storytelling in the most absurd situations.

Does how much money the developers spent on the game take precedence over the actual content? Personally when I look at graphics I care more about my own opinion on them than... I dunno, them reaching some arbitrary level of Money which is determined by the publisher/producer anyway. (Nevermind the fact that remaking every world from the whole series in KH3 style for a rhythm game was never gonna happen anyway, but that's besides my point.)

As someone who misses mid-budget development especially in Kingdom Hearts, the use of PS2 graphics is awesome IMO. I'd go as far as to say that KH3's style looks worse in comparison especially for dialogue cutscenes.

Like...I know it's a negative post, but this news isn't good news.

•If there is a freeplay option (and there is, we know songs can be selected individually outside of the story mode), there isn't a good reason to not have a freely editable party. The work is already done animation wise, the game is literally on rails, so why in the world can't I have a Sora/Riku/Aqua party (just for example)? It'd be like forcing Mario to use the Mario branded cart in a Mario Kart game. It's needlessly restrictive.

© They don't need to even give us new costumes (I'd pay extra for KH2 Sora but we know it isn't gonna happen). Just do palette swaps. DDD and KH1 Sora use the same character model for example. KH1 and DDD Riku. Anti Aqua is just a palette swap of base Aqua. Terranort is literally Terra with gold eyes and silver hair. etc. It's RIGHT THERE, but SE says no because...reasons?

indieszero is just working with what they got, dude.

To SE: Give indieszero more. Give them more assets, more time, more of what they need. Look - If y'all want to celebrate the music of the series, then sell the OST. Preferably alongside the games instead of months to year after release. If y'all want to make a video game that celebrates the music of the series, then make a video game. Go all the way. You're not making this as a simple primer of what's happened from KH0 til KHReMIND -- we got that from Memory Archives and so on. This is a game for the fans (maybe SPECIFICALLY for the fans of the music?), but a video game nonetheless. Stripping basic features like free party and unlockable costumes, while also throwing the release of the game right next to the release of next gen consoles, is not good sense of your existing fans nor of making money for new players.

It's just not a good look. I'm not pinning any blame on the developers. This is just another example of SE mismanagement driving people away.

Yeah this is pretty much Limit Cut for $60 in terms of story progression which to be frank, is what we’re all chomping at the bit for. You’ll get a few intro cutscenes, then the hours you spend on completing the game, and a few cutscenes at the end that Nomura and co have openly said are not going to move forward much.

I’m gonna guess that the most that happens is Kairi is told by Ansem the Wise and co that they don’t know anything. Kairi analyzes her memories and Sora’s memories. Kairi and Riku follow their hearts to the Final World and get some clues from the Nameless Star about Sora and Yozora’s confrontation, and Kairi sees a hallucination/vision of MOM who probably takes off his hood to show he’s Sora, but it’s just a trick. Kairi gets a cutscene with Yen Sid and Mickey in which they agree they don’t really know anything and Yen Sid explains the Realm of Death or something?

Am I still getting it? Absolutely, it looks fun, and I do appreciate that Nomura is already telling us to check our expectations in terms of story progression. If there’s one wham moment I want from this, I want the Nameless Star to confirm which of the Secret Episode endings was canon. A part of me is really hoping that the bad ending was canon.

It does when a significant amount of the developer's expense gets pushed onto the consumer. Again, as far as enjoying the series music, like cumguardian said, we have soundtracks for those. Having those be a big chunk of the price is a bit of a ripoff when we already have extraneous products that supply more of the same material. And the devs having to spend so much for song rights takes away from budget that could have been used to make more of an actual game. And if it's more of an issue with the devs just being too few in number to handle a true triple A title, I get that, but then it shouldn't be getting billed as one.

My problem is this game doesn't really seem to understand where it fits commercially. On the one hand, it's a simple rhythm game with budget assets being made by a handful of developers, but on the other hand, it's story-relevant and charges the price of a full AAA game. They can't have it both ways. And I think the result of this is that this game is probably going to tank, because few people outside our fanzone are going to be willing to pay that much for a product that a) reuses assets b) has only 10 hours of main game content, c) lacks customizability, and d) isn't even a fully fledged JRPG game.

Again, the game would be fine if not for that price tag. If there was no way to make a game like this with all these tracks without paying so much for the music rights, then the idea was conceptually flawed from the beginning—it either should have been a cheaper game on a simpler console with NO story relevancy to compensate for the soundtrack costs, OR there should be MUCH more story relevance to justify the expenditures and the consumer cost. It feels half-assed, and particularly unwise considering we're living in a time right now when most people are losing their sources of income, and frivolous expenditures like video games are beyond most people's capacities right now even for games that deserve their price tags.

For this game, I foresee only an incredibly niche pool of people who will be willing to shell out their wallets for it: KH loyalists who don't MIND a rhythm game, and people who love rhythm games so much that they'd happily splurge for this instead of MUCH cheaper alternatives in the market. But most people who even have the luxury of affording video games to begin with—an increasingly dwindling percentage of the population—are likely to save that $60 for something much more like a full-fledged game. All in all, this just seems like a very poorly conceived title from a business perspective. I'm sure the game will be fine for what it is, I just think $30 would have been a much more reasonable price, or they could justify $60 if they had $60 worth of story content and not just a measly 10 hours. One or the other, but assuming people will put up with both is asking too much, even for the most ardent KH fans OR the most hardcore rhythm game fans.

Time and money isn’t going to change the fact that Disney asked if SE could make a music-based game, SE went to a trusted musical game dev company, and that’s what SE is delivering.

They’re still making the big budgeted action games y’all want, but those take time to make. It sounds like some of y’all would rather a games drought for a couple of years, like we had from 2007-2009. While we knew we had games to look forward to, we didn’t have anything to actually enjoy for the 3 years between KH2 and Days. At least this time we have MoM to pass the time while the next Osaka game and the mysterious project gets developed.

I know this idea gets shit on but seriously... if you’re not happy with the game and you’re not happy with the price then you do have the option to not buy it. Wait for a discount or just watch the cutscenes online.

Yes, every single person in here would love options. I would have loved to mix and match characters and I’d have loved to be able to use KH2 Sora but while I’m disappointed I can also accept the reality that, with less than 2 months until launch (which includes going gold in about a month), they’re not going to really add in that kind of stuff while they’re in the final stages of development.

[USER=249008]@AR829038[/USER] are you going to format that for human eyes or...?

It's really not that simple.

Look, none of us like these decisions, but this is the result of the circumstances and we can't change that. We wouldn't be getting this game at all if Disney didn't randomly remember a proposal had been made for a KH rhythm game 5 years ago and was actually willing to greenlight it this time.

Game development comes with numerous terms and conditions, especially when you're dealing with one of the biggest media companies in the world. There isn't like a fund anyone can freely dip into when something that tickles their fancy. You're going to have to deal with a lot of moving parts and different people who each want to have their own say, and ultimately all of this will impact the end product. Nobody woke up one day and said "Hey, let's make a low budget rhythm game with extremely limited options, clearly the money is going to rain down from the heavens."

You say you're not pinning the blame on the devs but we've literally watched you do it for weeks. You've been desperately looking for a single party to blame for any misgivings you have with the game, but I don't think you're going to find that.

It's one thing to be disappointed; it's another thing to constantly make false accusations and scream that you've been wronged and robbed.

Be reasonable. If you can't, make your peace with it and move on. There's a fine line between constructive criticism and bitching for the sake of bitching, and frankly, we're all tired of the latter.

IIRC, the next big budget game is already being developed as we speak.

By the way, this team is not a new team, right? I remember Nomura mentioning two new teams working on new titles. Is it one of these? Or do we have two secret teams working on secret projects as well?

Yeah! It is :)

Q12: Can you tell us about plans for what’s next for the Kingdom Hearts series if any? Tetsuya Nomura: “We’ll need some more time as far as the mainline Kingdom Hearts goes, but we have an unexpected surprise coming from the Kingdom Hearts Unchained χ team tomorrow. We already have two new teams in motion, separate from Kingdom Hearts III and Kingdom Hearts Unchained χ. One title from one of them will come sooner than expected. ReMIND’s title screen is a foundation for it.”

Two teams separate from 3 (Osaka) and UXDR (bitgroove). The title Nomura was hinting at here was MoM, developed by Indieszero (not a team started up for game development, just a new team working on the series) so there’s still an unknown team working on something.

Oh nice. So there is one title worked by the main team and one title worked by one last mysterious team.
I am a bit sad, because I wanted the melody of memory team to be a proper KH team so that they could make more games after MoM.

Why am I getting SWSH controversy flashbacks? Like you guys can't deny some of these decisions feel weird? I mean this is the perfect game for DLC! Like this fanbase bought keyblade add-ons for KH3? Its easy money with little effort. Also we know this game is going to sell for like 5 bucks in the future so why not maximize profits while you can?

I think everyone understands this was a mid budget game, which is why there's quite a decent amount of people miffed at the clearly non mid-budget price, whether you find that to be valid or not.

There's nothing really in this interview that I didn't already expect but the lack of KH2 Sora *does* hurt, it feels like a vendetta at this point.

As for the argument over graphics, while there's plenty of places where I think the previous style looked better than the new one, having that AAA price tag just puts expectations in people's minds, rightly or wrongly, because everyone has a bias and what they personally deem as a baseline to pay for such and such things, and one of those things is "Huh well why are the graphics not as "good" as KH3s?".
Anyway, that's just what I think about it, I don't think the complaints regarding this are super puzzling, which is the feeling I seem to get from your posts regarding this topic, I think they're pretty understandable at the baseline

It's sunk cost + stockholm for a franchise that has done dirty at every turn. The status quo is set and any attempt to vocalize dissent is seen as hate and misinformation. Same as for PKMN SwSh. The writing was on the wall, Masuda came out and said not to expect certain things when examples of those certain things already existed in the franchise, then the pro-SwSh folks had a collective confused Pikachu face when SwSh came out to be lackluster at best. The same is going to happen with KH MoM, only the ride or die KH fans won't admit that MoM was unfairly priced - they'll eat it up and keep defending decisions because the music (that was recorded and paid for ages ago) is so good.

It is unfairly priced.

Unfairly proced but not unexpected.

Anyways I'm not shocked at any of this. This is the same company that made advent children cloud a separate character instead of a costume(granted they were using 2d sprites).

I mean I don't really think any video game is unfairly priced because prices of games have always been arbitrary and not some kind of measurement of objective "value". I think 60 is a pretty annoying price to pay for any video game period, but there will certainly be some people who love this game so much that they have no problem paying that much. If they enjoy the game that much, they aren't "wrong" per se, even if I might spend money much less freely than them. Price (in the context of creative works) only has relevance to how much you want something and then how much you enjoy it afterwards, which are completely opinion-based.

Of course if you can stand to wait a little bit, all Kingdom Hearts games recently end up having very cheap used copies within a year. So there's no reason to pay full price if you don't want to, especially if you don't actually think the game will be good anyway.

Is it weird that a lower effort rhythm game costs the same as KH3, or a collection of all previous KH games in one? Totally. But ultimately, I'm after hours of enjoyment, and if that can be commensurate to the asking price, I'm fine with it. If the rhythm gameplay is high quality and provides a rewarding challenge on the highest difficulties, I won't be sore about the price.

40 dollars would have rocked.

yes, 40 dollars sounds more appropriate. Then again, it is the kind of game targetting the fans, thus lower sells. And the fans might complain, but will buy it anyway. The goal is the highest price without loosing your public. :LOL:

$70 dollarydoos would be fantastic instead of $90 dollarydoos but we can't all be winners in this capitalistic hell!

Think of it like an annual subscription to your KH playtime and divide it by the amount of hours you play per year. Mine is something like 60$/300 which is 20cents per hour. I know hobbies that are worst than that. So if you are not happy with the price, it means you have to play more. ?

MoM will certainly get a lot of playtime out of me. KH3 somehow was my longest played game on PS4 last year (thanks to the 2019 year in review that had it at like 160 hours or something).

I know what kind of game MoM is and I'm happy to pay the $90 but at the same time it is unfairly priced in other regions (a new game here is $100 dollarydoos so we are actually getting a tiny discount whereas in America it's the same price any other new game) and $70 still would have been cool. But if I didn't like what MoM was bringing to the table or it was more than $100 for whatever reason, I wouldn't buy it.

Actually, when something sells more, you can drop the price and still maximize your margin. That's how consoles are so much less expensive than gaming computers. For games, it is the same. AAA games can cost the same than AA games because even though they have a higher production value, they are reaching a far broader audience. If AA and AAA games cost the same, it is not necessary the AA games that is a scam but rather the AAA game that is cheaper thanks to the huge appeal.

Y'know, I'm disappointed that we can't change our teams (huh??) or that we won't get costume changes (I get it in terms of the context within the story they're telling, but... Huh??), but I'm still looking forward to the game. The decisions they're making here are... Questionable, but it's not enough to make me say "I'm not buying". It's a shame too because a KH Rhythm game with Disney music would print money if they execute it correctly, so here's hoping that the devs change their minds once they see people asking for more stuff.

Then again, FF7R's release date was April 10th, had zero Day 1 patches (despite it probably needing them for some assets) and Square hasn't touched the game since. It's possible that they'll drop a QoL update out of nowhere at some point, but who knows.

Honestly if you're buying MoM only for the new story content... If you choose to not buy it, I can understand. But if you're a lover of music in general like I am and think that it's pretty great that Yoko Shimomura's getting the shine she deserves here (think about that for a second), as well as a fan of rhythm games... Give it a try. It's been said in here already, but the bulk of the content in MoM won't be the story, but the difficulty levels, the World clearing and the song acquisitions. November 13th is close to the end of 2020, and the 20th anniversary is in 2022. Not to mention with the rumors of FFXVI being announced on Wednesday... I think we should be set for a while. Give it half a year, E3/June 2021, and I'm sure that we'll be getting news about a brand new traditional Kingdom Hearts game.


Plus I mean yo, who doesn't want to play a rhythm game during the holiday season?? Imagine cooped up in your room after coming back home from the cold, maybe there's snow on the ground depending on where you are, back from the mall where they've most likely already started the Christmas jingles... And you're unwinding with Melody of Memory. Idunno, that's a pretty cozy vibe to me. It's clear that MoM isn't a game with a AAA-budget, but it's at least something to tide us over until that next game does come out.

Well, this might depend on the format of the games. For example, Love Live and BanG Dream's rhythm games have 160 songs (or at least BanG Dream's game does). However, those may be different because they're mobile phone games AND because the entire premise of those two franchises are focused on music.

If we're talking about a franchise that gets rhythm games as spin-offs, or something like Project Diva where you have to buy some of the songs though, then yeah, they're not that much. Melody of Memory is lucky to have that many songs because it's spanning a whole saga of almost 20 years. But I think the strictly musical-based series tend to have more, only because that's the whole point. But I agree overall that it's not a common thing to have that many songs.



As a Canadian, I feel this to the core... lol. If this was $60 CAD, I'd be over the moon. But it is what it is. I only hope that people don't put the pricing woes on Nomura, because there's departments in Square that decide that sort of thing and I don't think he'd have a hand in that.

This game is going to do fine, It's on the Nintendo Switch. And if this title is successful on the Nintendo Switch then it will incentivise Square Enix to port the HD Remixes to Nintendo Switch.

Apart from the price, I think they could have avoided some of the negative reaction from fans if they had been quicker with these interviews explaining what is and isn't in the game, or at least made the launch trailer clearer so people weren't speculating about greater story content, non rhythm-based gameplay, customisable teams etc. for several weeks before being disappointed by fate.

Agreed, and that's the downside of a news drip. On one hand, it gives people a "seemingly" steady flow of information, but on the other hand, it takes a while for people to get the information that might be a deal breaker. Cause if all of the story content isn't playable, then I can't blame people if they just decided to watch the cutscenes after that interview. Melody of Memory was already a bit of a tough sell for some.

But you know, between this, UX and DR's monthly updates, it's not so bad. We're not in the dark for years anymore in terms of story content, and while the execution could be better, I like that every update is a big deal in the community. It is what it is. It's like what I said when ReMind came out -- Given the content, it sounds like it justifies the price tag, but it's ultimately up to the buyer themselves to decide if the experience justifies the price. And I was saying that before COVID-19 hit, so that's even more true now with how sparse money can be for many.

You are mentioning something that has been bothering me since ReMind. They do not really explain what you are buying!
That's not good. We should know what it is, how to access it and its impact on the story. ReMind had this issue that when it got released, we didn't know how it would be accessed, nor what are the conditions to unlock the various episodes. I am pretty sure a lot of people bought remind for the story and felt screwed because the meat of this dlc was the superbosses.

If people are only buying something for a certain thing they should be waiting until it comes out and talking to people about it anyway though. You should only buy something on launch if you know you're gonna wanna play it no matter what it ends up being.

Yeah but try explaining that to people during a hype cycle and you'll get downvoted a lot

Cooler heads usually prevail. Although with MoM, there's no real hype because not only has the marketing been pretty lowkey compared to a typical KH game (even if Nomura says this is a KH game, MoM is obviously vastly different in all areas with a seemingly smaller team and budget), the interviews have come out early enough to let people know what's to be expected here. So at least this time people are more reasonable.

If Verum Rex were to get announced tomorrow though, yeah, there wouldn't be a lot of calm discussions due to the hype for a while. I say this on the cusp of a possible FFXVI announcement in the coming days, and while we don't know what to expect, FFXV set the tone on that (both in good ways and not-so-good ways). XV had a lot of hype to it, and I enjoyed it personally, but we know how it ended up.

It's like TLOU2 -- a game gets hyped to oblivion (for good reason), it gets bombed with negative controversy which shaped a LOT of opinions months before release, and the game at release disappoints some because they were spoiled on aspects and the game wasn't what they expected. Did I love it? Absolutely, but too much hype for a product, and it'll work against itself no matter what it does. That's why my expectations are tempered for Cyberpunk 2077.



True, although it's a tricky thing too because you never really know if people's tastes align with yours. For example, just the other day, I heard that people thought the Doctor Strange movie was mid. I, on the other hand, thought it was one of the best Marvel movies to come out, other than Black Panther, Captain America: Civil War, Spider-Man: Far From Home and Infinity War/Endgame (have yet to see Ragnarok at the time of this post). Twitter apparently thinks the Aladdin Live Action movie is trash, but to me it looks promising and I might finally watch it tomorrow. And let's not forget the whole TLOU2 fiasco. Even KH3 had to deal with it, 2019 was rough for KH fans lol.

I think if a game has won you over with everything it's shown, it's fine to take the risk. But being on the fence, it really does depend and like I mentioned above, cooler heads generally seem to prevail. I didn't play Death Stranding until Boxing Day in Canada and beat it on January 2nd. Granted, I wasn't intentionally holding out in that instance, but I enjoyed it even after people moved on from it (and people move on from things quick lol). Even after people were calling it "pretentious" and "boring", I could honestly put it as a GOTY contender if I'm not being biased. It really does depend.

Well I do mean talk to people about the specific content of what's in the work (i.e. how much of ReMind is ultra-challenge bosses), not just a basic idea like "good" and "bad" which I actually would say are pretty much useless, given how much my opinion on everything differs from the concensus.

Honestly, I don't think it's unfairly priced at all, It's just poorly marketed. The content alone justifies the price tag.

The larger issue at hand is the fact that this entry feels like padding for the sake of padding just like Re: Coded did. Birth by Sleep and Dream Drop Distance had the benefit of having new Disney worlds and characters whilst Days was riding the success of Kingdom Hearts II and making the most out of Roxas and Organization XIII. To add insult to injury, the use of the outdated PlayStation 2 HD character and environment assets cheapens the presentation of the game by default because they feel dated.

I'm sure this is going to be an enjoyable game, but there's absolutely no denying that this is a stopgap title to fill the quota of releasing a Kingdom Hearts title every year.

Bigger number =/= better, nor does newer. No graphics are "outdated".

Another thought, just like... As someone who likes a (fair and fun) challenge, something that'll make me sweat a little, this game will actually provide me with that, guaranteed, where other games (DDD and BBS spring to mind) in the series have launched with seriously de-emphasized action gameplay and rAaAnDoMnEsS. It's weirdly comforting knowing there's a KH game coming that requires absolute timing and input precision. Something that I can sit with, memorize, and get better at without being punished for the simple action of trying.

For once I don't have to dread the slow realization that I'm playing an unbalanced mess.

(but lemme emphasize that I feel these concerns don't apply as much anymore after the speculative but unconfirmed return of Takahashi to the KH team)

I don't know, I knew exactly what this game was from the very 1st trailer and every time I've seen the game I've been delighted. A playable segment ala 0.2 was just wishfull thinking and nothing they ever showed pointed to that being something happening in this game. This is a rhythm game.

Not being able to costumize the party sounds like a wasted opportunity, but that was never a necessity, it's just the way this game works, you play with specific teams and maybe each of them have specific abilites and such.

The pricing, it's not unfair at all in my opinion. I have bought rythm games for the same price ever since the PS3, look at Guitar Hero, Rock Band or the persona rythm games for example. Just because in your mind a rythm game doesn't deserve a 60 dollar price tag does not mean it doesn't. And this game as 140 songs. That's a lot.

But hey, no one has to buy this at launch, nomura has said the story isn't majorly important, so people feeling the FOMO on the story don't have to worry to much here, that's not a bad thing.

I think the problem here is people wanting this game to be something it isn't since the beginning.

Melody of Memory is built with Unity

That explains a lot.

Let’s see, nothing new, nothing new, more nothing new, questionable price but not as obscene as weekly UXDR VIP, still nothing new…Ehhh…

So a rhythm game with extra Kairi scenes…



Or you know, the name of the file that says “True” on it.

I’d buy this if it weren’t for the fact that I’m bad at rhythm games. Drakengard 3’s “final boss battle” comes to mind…

Old graphics are still really great. They are more suited for motion pictures movie. Unreal engine wouldn't work as good in my opinion. Hercules world in kh3 seemed a bit off.
Motion picture: old engine
CGI movies, new engine.

This is the followup to Kingdom Hearts III, and to be presented with a sequel that uses HD PlayStation 2 assets does make it outdated.

People were fine with the HD Remixes because they were remasters, this is an entirely new game.



Hercules is an outlier because there was no CG references from Disney to go by so they had to interpret the transition from hand drawn 2D to Kingdom Shader 3D the best they could.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed by many of these things. However I'm still excited to play the game...take a guess why. $60 for this does feel too pricey for my taste. $40 sounds more reasonable, but if the game is fun, enjoyable, and has lots of replay value to it then I probably won't mind the extra 20. This will be my first true Rhythm game, so that alone has me hyped at how hilariously bad I'll be lol.

I think it was Chaser who said it, and I agree. I would much rather this then long droughts between games again. I just wish we got all this info sooner before all the wild crazy fantasies of character customizing and switching became a big focus. I'm guilty of hyping those aspects too, sorry.

I have a feeling this game will be the ReCoded of phase 2, in that the gameplay will be better then the story. I still think something important will happen to get us talking about the story. But this game is certainly one more for gameplay and I'm more looking forward to that then story content.

Kairi is almost certainly not playable here, but phase 2 just started. She'll get another chance. Just got to be patient for a little while longer. Good things come to those who wait.

The Theatrhythm games are rather forgiving and eventually the motions click, so I imagine this one would be the same. It would be nice if they had a demo so people could try it out and get a feel of if.

Also we say fuck you to Yoko Taro making the final boss the hardest rhythm game on the planet 8D I never want to hear another chime again.

I already had decided not to buy this game, so I'm not really disappointed with any of this.
Nomura said there won't be a secret ending, but I guess the short scenario they added with KH3 assets will make up for it.

I doubt they will bother with new CGI scenes for the Opening too. It will be reused cutscenes most likely.

Which has always been the case with games the scale of CoM, Days, or Re:coded.

Yeah I know and just another proof to not expect much from this.

I think if this game didn't have story stuff in it people would be way less harsher on it. I know nomura has said it, and it technically IS a KH game, but I think we need to stop looking at this game with the lens of a KH game and more of a rythm game.

What's on offer here is incredibly rich for a rythm game.

I just hope there is a sizeable chunk of KH3 songs.

No. Styles used in the past do not become outdated or replaced with styles used in the present. They are just different, that's all. The point of visuals in games is not to continuously advance in polygon count, but to be utilized according to the need of the work.

Though even beyond that I don't know how anyone can expect them to remake every single world in the series in kh3's style just for a rhythm game.

I was personally Team "Use PS2-era Assets for KH3", just because I wanted to keep that uniformity and sentiment within the saga. I'm not complaining we got the new, shiny stuff, but the climax, the storytelling and the characterization will always prevail over any aesthetic value.

Needless to say, it's like coming home seeing these graphics.

I understand the push-pull frustration of course. I feel like KH is having another identity crisis:
- Welcome to Phase 2! :D Of the neverending Xehanort Saga! :D
- It's Kairi's time to shine! :D You still can't play Kairi! :D

Coming from a franchise where interviews and concerts reveal canon material, it should be no surprise that a game with the "Kingdom Hearts" banner does the same. Every game thus far has. [S]Be quiet, V-Cast.[/S]

I know there are a lot of people here justifying the price tag on their behalf (for myriad reasons that have yet to be confirmed), but Square and Disney are monolithic brands, and they don't need anyone's justification for their prices. People will just buy their products.. just because it's the latest Square / Disney thing. You can walk into retail, find an old Disney film that's been re-released and repackaged countless times and it will still carry the price tag of a new release. It's fine, it's whatever. But we're definitely talking about corporations here, and some of y'all should be paid for the good, quasi-altruistic PR you're coming up with.

That being said, the price doesn't surprise me in the least, and I'm buying this game.. eventually. I fucking love KH music, I do. And this offers a new level of interactivity with these amazing soundtracks. However, I am also fortunate enough to be dealing with a backlog. I haven't even played Re:Mind yet. So, by the time that cache has cleared, this game will likely, conveniently, have gone on some sort of sale, and I will capitalize on that. Honestly, if Square would have given us some sort of Collector's Edition, like a sucker, I would have paid day one for a game I would.. eventually get around to. But the choice has been made for me.

Y'know the Kairi thing reminds me of the whole playable Vergil situation in a reverse kind of way.

The new story bits are obviously focused on Kairi and her backstory, but she isn't playable.

Vergil has been playable twice, not counting the reboot since that's basically a different character altogether, but he hasn't had a story focused on him.

People want Vergil playable with a story, people want Kairi story but with her playable.

Personally I'm a bit disappointed that you can't change up the party members and that there's no alternative costumes, but those aren't going to ruin the game for me.

It became pretty clear that despite the price point this is a lower budget game where they are making the most out of the resources they have available. Honestly I was starting to get the picture that a lot of easy crowd pleasers wouldn't be in the game, but it seems fine for what it is, a smaller entry like we haven't really had in awhile.

This'll be my first rhythm game. Not even sure, if I'll like the game play, but everything I've seen makes me excited to try it out and figure out if I'll like it or not.

I have slightly mixed feelings regarding this.
It is a little disappointing that there aren't more characters and there aren't custom teams, because that was present in the Theatrhythm games.

However, with this and them saying that leveling only really increases attack power and HP, and that abilities are pretty much set in stone from the beginning, it appears to me that MoM will be honing in on the rhythm game aspect much more than Theatrhythm did, which had a lot more RPG to it (which ultimately felt a bit half-baked anyway).

Along with them specifying a separate one-button mode, I'm hoping that MoM will be a more fully-realized rhythm game, with more complex and difficult charts than Theatrhythm's limited input options could offer.

I'm completely ready to forgive any lacking cosmetic options or RPG elements if it means a richer and more challenging rhythm game.

Despite what I've said earlier, I am probably going to get this game. It just looks charming in general, but I do have to agree with some of the points that've come up in this thread: No party customization? No costume changes? That sucks, man. I would've at least liked to play as KH2 Sora or Riku. I feel like those iterations of them don't get enough credit for their designs.

Especially Riku. He's just a sexy guy.

KH2 Riku is the sexiest iteration. KH3 Riku is pretty cool, but MAN did KH2 Riku's hair go well with that outfit (damn you 3DS!).

idk I love his hair long and short.

That interview was a proud David Gallagher moment.

People say it's unfairly priced but I've seen rhythm games with waaaay less content go for $60.

P5 and P3's rhythm games seem to two that fall into this category, apparently. And if memory serves, they were sold at full retail AND separately.

i love kingdom hearts and been there since the begining. idc if its badly priced. it looks fun and i wanna play it