The creator of the Kingdom Hearts franchise has expressed interest in introducing content from the Star Wars and Marvel universe.
Speaking with Finaland at the Japan Expo in Paris last week, Tetsuya Nomura said that while he’s keen on incorporating both series into the Kingdom Hearts universe, he observed that there’s a lot of logistical issues preventing such a transition.
“Of course it would be great if we could add those licenses as well,” said Nomura-san. “But there are lots of rules and restrictions by Disney so we can’t actually put in everything people want. So it’s a quite difficult decision but we’re gonna prepare some surprises for you so, just wait for the information.”
It’s not just Nomura-san who is interested in Star Wars either; fellow Final Fantasy overlord Yoshinori Kitase is also a big fan of the brand.
“We’ve been talking about Star Wars itself since it became Disney’s content recently. When I heard the news I was like wow, wow’. Obviously it’s gonna be great if we could add it,” he commented.
Elsewhere, Nomura-san revealed that Kingdom Hearts III is going to be the final entry in the main numbered titles, and as such the developer wants to make the most of the character of Sora.
“We want to make the most of Sora, playable Sora of course. But again, Kingdom Hearts 3 is going to be the last chapter of the Kingdom Hearts main numbering title series, so lots of fans actually want to play as their favorite characters in Kingdom Hearts 3 so we will consider that, we will listen to what fans wants but hopefully we could give you some surprises in the future announcements,” he said.
Finally, despite being heavily involved in the production of Final Fantasy XV, the Kingdom Hearts creator assured fans that he’s still very much in the thick of it in regards to KH3.
“I always have been heavily involved in this project compared to the other games i’m actually producing or directing,” explained Nomura-san.
“The team creating Kingdom Hearts 3 is in the studios in Osaka, and Osaka and Tokyo are a little bit far away from each other but we meet enough with meetings quite often, and we’re doing telephone conferences too. So we communicate all the time as I am quite heavily involved on this project.”
Kingdom Hearts III was announced at E3 during Sony’s press conference, and will be released for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. A release date has yet to be revealed.
In the meantime, you still have Kingdom Hearts 1.5 HD ReMIX to look forward to, which is due out on PS3 in September.