"We're in the final push -- making text fixes and so forth," the Square Enix director and character designer said in an interview with Famitsu magazine this week. "It's a pretty complex story this time, so we have to make sure everything's in order with it. We're fine-tuning it so even people who don't know the series can more-or-less understand what's going on. I'm pretty sure all the work will be done by the time this interview's published."
On that note, should newbies to the KH series worry about being unable to follow the story behind Birth By Sleep, which comes out January 9 in Japan? "That's something people asked a lot with 358/2 Days as well," Nomura responded, "but the way I do it is to have each individual game fully enjoyable when you play from the perspective of the hero. I know some gamers are concerned that since they don't have all the information, there may be parts of the story that they can't follow all that closely. We can't cover every single base in each individual game, of course, but it's not that newcomers can't enjoy the extended story arc, either.
"Rea and others [from previous KH games] show up here," Nomura continued, "but it's the first time Ventus ever meets them too, so to a new player, it'd be the same as him -- he'd know that those characters are some kind of special presence, but not much else. If the player is interested in exploring their roles in the tale more closely, they can then move on to other games in the series. So there's fun to be had both if you know the series and if you don't know it at all. Besides, Kingdom Hearts' story is all about reading between the lines and filling in the blanks for yourself -- You won't understand everything even if you're fully versed in the series."
Like in previous Kingdom Hearts games, Birth By Sleep has a special "secret movie" that's played after the ending only if you satisfy certain conditions. "If you get a chance to see this movie in addition to the ending, I think your entire impression of the story will change," Nomura said. "I'm not going to spoil it, but the secret movie in this game doesn't just set up a sequel -- it puts all the pieces of the story together."
So how do you access it, then? "As always, you have to fulfill a few conditions," noted Nomura. "You choose a difficulty level at the start of the game, and it gets easier to access the movie if you start with the hardest difficulty. On the simplest level you can't see it, period."
It wouldn't be a Nomura interview without some hints on Square Enix's other ongoing RPG projects, and he didn't let readers down this time, either. "FF Agito XIII is proceeding well toward its next milestone," he said, "but the current plan will likely put The 3rd Birthday ahead of it. Both of them will be more fully revealed beginning next year, so look out for those."
In addition, Nomura also hinted at "an unannounced project which is moving along faster than originally expected." He wouldn't reveal any further information about it, but apparently "development's going smoothly and we started voice-recording work recently" on the title.
Finally, "there's one more unannounced title, though that one isn't a completely brand-new game," Nomura closed. "Look out for that one, too."
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