@ Xoj and Kasz216

Can you just accept it's the mixture of the 2 companies? Squaresoft and Disney?
A JRPG with Disney characters and with a touch of FF in there( the spells: Blizaga, Firaga, Thundaga and Curaga)

Nomura: Yeah, regarding that, we talked about concentrating on the gameplay and just making a simple story, and we also thought about Disney's target age range, and though maybe we should avoid a complex story. But at a point when we had the project set out to a certain degree, I got a talk from Mr. Sakaguchi, saying that if we didn't aim for the level that FF does, this project would be a failure. Well, I understood what he was saying. So, for the game's contents...... The gameplay was always the same sort of thing from the start, but we improved the story greatly. At the beginning, we were thinking we'd make the story extremely simple. At that time, when characters like Ansem didn't even exist, we were thinking that you'd kill Maleficent and the game would end there.

3 days after the game’s release 1 million copies of it got shipped out in Japan, after all. Do you think there’s a reason on why the fanbase has widen?
I get the feeling it’s because we made something that has a wide ‘frontage’, something that doesn’t have age or gender as its threshold. I hear things like “My 6-year-old son is playing this” and “People in their 40’s and 50’s also play this” quite often. I guess that means it’s because the game has a ‘wide frontage’.

This one support my statment because they are aiming for both. They are aiming for both JRPG and Disney fan. That's why they improved the story to cater for the JRPG fans. That's it should be on the level of FF or else it would be a failure. They have to keep the balance because that's how I interpret what Nomura is saying.

Then followed up by this one. It's clearly aimed for both Core and casuals. No boundiries becuase if they focus on Disney then what's the point of having FF characters in there and made the gameplay like an A-RPG they could have just made a different gameplay than it's more accessible for disney crowd. As for the FF focus what's the point in putting Disney characters in there. They could have just made another JRPG but that's not the point that's why KH is called a crossover game between Disney and Squaresoft for a reason.

Kasz you said that the gameplay was made for Disney audience in mind. As I recalled that you haven't played KH yet? (Correct me if I am wrong) because if you have played it. It's wasn't made in disney audience in mind but more of JRPG audience in mind IMO.

Yep.

Also i have played it some... Nomura actually says right there the gameplay was decided on when it was decided for Disney fans.

I mean, i know people have an exaggerrated idea on what a game that targets children is like... but lest we forget that most Nes, SNES and probably even PS1 games targeted younger people. 

I was playing strateg games like Romance of the 3 kingdoms in gradeschool.  You undersestiamte children.

I started playing Battletoads, Ghouls and Goblins, Double Dragon, Kid Icarus, Ninja Gaiden, Populous, etc. Back when I was 5/6 years old. Those are some trully hard games. Kids have a great learning capability, especially in the face of great adversities.

How'd this thread go from "What got you interested into KH" to an argument. Sales arguments, no less.

Anyway, I got into KH because I saw the commercial with the gameplay, and unlike what others say with regard to Disney characters, I saw it as reminiscent and nostalgic to my childhood, not "Disney is kids stuff". I also saw the Squaresoft logo at the end and at the time I was just getting into RPGS (my first was FFIX about a year earlier).

I found the story to a SUPERB, and spents YEARS tracking KH2, looking at every screenshot and possible release date. I remember getting angry when I thought the game was releasing in December 2005. It did.....but in Japan. I waited and waited, and I remember this vividly. The Thursday of Spring Break of my junior year in HS, I bought it, and played the Prologue all the way through.

Having beat the game several times already, I could get through it now in like 3-4 hours. But when I first got it, I did nothing but explore, then move the story. Essentially, I was in front of my TV for about 6 hours. And I honestly played KH2 for story purposes only. And I even held myself back afterwards from playing too long of sessions, as to not have the game end to early for myself.

And who could look at Battletoads espiecaly and say that wasn't meant for kids?  Look at the battletoads cartoon for example.

KH is just like a Warner Brothers cartoon.

Targeted towards the cartoon audience, but has enough in it to satisfy most people who want to come along for the ride.

Which is why, by the way.... most kids games fail.  Kids don't want dumbed down games that don't require any skill.  There isn't any fun in it.

@Kas

Well, most of those games if not all were targeted towards kids, thus them having a more cartoony look. Also the mentality of those days was somewhat different from today. Games were mostly seen as toys for kids and not an entertainement medium, so that why almost all of them, even some PC games, had that specific demographics as the target.

True, however why did they make childrens games so hard back then knowing they had to target children?  Because they knew kids could handle it.  Whenever someone says it can't be targeted towards children (only part of the disney fanbase) they ignore the fact that some of the hardest most complex games were meant for children.

Because the thread was a thinly veiled attempt to try and support a sales argument.

It's true, children can handle most of the more complex games, even if by today standarts, games are so dumbed down and so easy that most of them just don't care to try harder games.
I think that giving the difficulty card as a reason not to target to children is not right as well, yet I also don't see how in today's standarts, most children can handle a more complex game.
Not to say that there aren't any children who don't like to play hard and complex games, yet there are not as many as back in those days (we really didn't had any choice though)

I think you'd be surprised.  Afterall "kids" games tend to not sell as well as NES games, despite consoles being far more accepted for all walks of life.

Kids haven't become dumber.  Developers just give kids less credit and don't pay attention to what else they're playing when there parents also pick up a movie tie-in type games.