New Nomura Interview from Famitsu

Kingdom Hearts 1.5 HD ReMIX

Following up with his interview with Famitsu from last week, series director Tetsuya Nomura revealed some more information about Kingdom Hearts 1.5 HD ReMIX.

Nomura mainly noted that the development of the title was decided before Final Fantasy X HD and it took two programmers from the Osaka Team about a year to program it in HD. Kingdom Hearts 1.5 HD Remix is also in it’s final stages of development.

Nomura also stated that Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days cutscenes will total about 2 to 3 hours. As for the gameplay, the camera’s has been adjusted to Kingdom Hearts II’s camera. Nomura also says that there won’t be a secret movie.

Thanks to goldpanner, we have more information on the interview:

– Kingdom Hearts -HD 1.5 ReMIX- development was planned even before Final Fantasy X HD was announced on September 13, 2011, prior to Tokyo Game Show 2011. This means that Kingdom Hearts -HD 1.5 ReMIX- development has been planned for over a year. Square Enix’s Osaka team was consulted over whether they could do something to make best use of the PS3’s performance.

– Actual development was kickstarted because the Kingdom Hearts series had been spread over several consoles, and secondly, by the series’ 10th anniversary, it had become difficult for new gamers to join in.

– HD remastering was very difficult, but two great programmers from Square Enix’s Osaka team spent close to a year on this, allowing it to come to fruition. Square Enix’s Osaka team are the team responsible for Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories, Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep and Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance].

– The Kingdom Hearts -HD 1.5 ReMIX- trailer from Tokyo Game Show 2012 was released 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 Kingdom Hearts series up until now.

– There are Kingdom Hearts staff in the Square Enix’s 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.

– The remade HD cutscenes from Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days total in at about two to three hours of footage, according to Nomura.

– Nomura thought about perhaps remaking 358/2 Days as a game, but it would have taken over a years so he decided to give priority to the new title and instead have 358/2 Days, necessary for inclusion, as a video volume.

– You don’t have to play through the games in order to unlock 358/2 Days‘ video volume. You can select to watch 358/2 Days straight after starting the game.

– Some of Sora and the other’s models have been replaced with the latest ones.

– The camera function for Kingdom Hearts has been modified to be more similar to Kingdom Hearts II‘s system.

– Kingdom Hearts for PC Browsers will be a typical browser game. Controls will be simple and using cards, with the content not strongly action-oriented. Co-operating with several people is also a feature, however, the game is fundamentally for one person.

– Development is not done by Square Enix’s Osaka team, it is done somewhere else.

– It will be a spin-off title, completely removed from the story of the main series. Due to the nature of a browser game, they couldn’t put in any grand set up for the story.

– There are new characters, but Nomura won’t say whether or not they will be involved in the main series.

As always, we’ll keep posting more information as it’s released, so stay tuned!

Source: Gematsu via Game Nyarth, hokanko-alt & SQEXGAL , Goldpanner, KH13, KHInsider (Translations)